Somewhere along the line Chapter 1, third chapter of chapter one.. Did that make sense? I don't think it did.. Well the point is that this is reallt still the first chapter.. I've simply, in an attempt to make it look like I update more than I do, have cut this first chapter into 3 parts.. Yeah.. This should be the longest, and last part.. Unless stated otherwise at the bottom.
Anyway! Onto the story!
Setting down their drinks Trip and T'Pol began to rise from the bench. And Trip suddenly began to feel very out of place. Surrounded by red skinned aliens who appeared to have no interest in him completely enthralled and exuberant pouring and splashing liquid, he was starting to feel a little thirsty. "Do you know when we will be heading home?" Trip asked still looking around him at the faces of people enjoying themselves.
T'Pol took out her scanner and held it up towards the sky. "It would not be wise to travel into the upper atmosphere at this time." T'Pol responded and continued to scan in an attempt to determine when the storm would let up.
Trip sighed lightly, trying not to appear agitated: he was the guest after all; he should be having fun. But fun was not what he had been experiencing the past 3 days since their arrival on the planet. He and T'Pol had been negotiating for a permanent schedule and price for dilithium, as the Tarlikians where experts at mining the valuable commodity, but unfortunately stubborn in pricing. Trip had to continually remind himself that Archer was his superior officer, which meant Trip couldn't sock Archer one for sending him down in Archer's place. All Trip really wanted at the moment was to sit down in his bed and relax hearing his engines hum almost silently in the background.
But that was not the here and now so he decide to focus on more relevant things.
"I believe we will be able to safely return to Enterprise in two or three days."
"Three Days!" Trip said in a very good mimic of a whining child. "What are we gonna do for Three Days?"
"I admit I am surprised, when initially scanning the weather disturbance I had determined it to be over in only a matter of hours." T'Pol agreed
Trip sighed once again, less careful to hide frustration this time. "Well, I suppose we should be heading back to our room than, huh." T'Pol nodded her agreement.
As they began to leave T'Pol noticed the Mayor heading in their direction. Grabbing Trip by the shoulder lightly T'Pol whispered in his ear "we should probably have an excuse for leaving." She herself was no master at improvisation, so she left it to Trip to do his part.
Trip bit his lip and continued to walk as if he was perfectly innocent. After all the only thing he *was* guilty of was being incredibly bored.
Despite attempts to avoid him, the mayor was quickly upon them. "Commander Tucker, Sub-Commander T'Pol, where are you headed to, the festival has only just begun." he said cheerfully, almost drunkenly so.
"Oh, not that we mean to offend, but we realized that we just realized that we would need to send out our cloths to the cleaners by 5 tonight. And by your clock it is almost that. We wouldn't want to go around smelling the place up." Trip said quietly as if he didn't want others to hear his tail of bad smelling. T'Pol simply nodded her agreement with his explanation.
"Well, there is no reason to worry about that, we took the courtesy of going through and sending all your soiled clothing items to the local dry cleaners station, where they should be ready to wear by tonight." The Mayor smiled broadly, obviously proud of his thoughtfulness and caring.
"Oh.." was all Trip could think to say.
The Mayor used the silence to offer the two a glass of the substance and proceeded to call a waiter over from across the way. "It doesn't appear that you have taken the liberty to enjoy our offerings." he said not unkindly.
"No, it's not that we don't like it. But we've got different stuff in our skin ya see.. " as Trip tried to explain to the man the complexities of chemistry, the waiter was still coming towards them.
T'Pol began to look around the town, content to allow Trip to do the talking at the moment. She noticed one young girl holding a still filled glass walking around appearing lost, and although T'Pol was Vulcan, she was still female, and her maternal instincts kicked in as she headed for the child. T'Pol had almost arrived at the girl's side when the child squealed happily and ran toward two people, whom T'Pol presumed where her parents. Realizing she would not be needed T'Pol turned around and headed back to her colleague when she felt something cold and wet soaking into her uniform. Sahe turned in ripe raw, Unvulcan anger to see who her assailant was. But all she was able to catch was small feet running away out of the corner of her eye. She turned to see where those feet where headed only to be met with more of the offending liquid.
As she would find out later, the child who had assaulted her with the solution had run directly into the oncoming server, whom the Mayor had called, causing the man to lose entire control over his tray which careened forward covering T'Pol's drenching her from head to toe with the alien delicacy.
T'Pol turned toward Trip, whom had rushed over to her when he heard clattering trays and breaking glass, and gave him a VERY unhappy look before storming off towards the exit.
Trip did not miss the look and quickly excused himself before following T'Pol out of the town square, hoping to God, that she wasn't as mad as he thought she was.
YAY! I typed this one up fast!! This is the REAL end of chapter one.. Look forward to a very mad T'Pol and a very Confused Trippy-poo, Yayness!
Please review, it lets me know you care!
