ILuvHawkeye: I am glad you love it. I did put character descriptions in here, just for you. And really... were the millions of e-mails telling me to update truly necessary? It has only been two or so days. :)
T'Son: Thanks!
Data: Thank you. I should hope that I have improved- it would be dreadful to write this much and not! By the way, Rachel is one if you are the one who left the review signed "professor" on her story, whichever one it was. Were you?
This chapter is a bit of a less funny chapter, but do not worry, I will try to keep my "humor" genre, though I am better at writing serious things. I am also sorry if Toreth seems cruel and evil the entire chapter, but she is a Romulan and the Chairman of the Tal Shiar. I do not care if you flame me- please review!
Toreth, Chairman of the Tal Shiar, flopped back on her bed and grinned up at the ceiling. She was having a wonderful day. Vokar had remembered that it was Christmas and had bought her a most lovely pair of earrings. The war was still favoring Romulus by far, and no one was being too annoying or incompetent. But then, this was a higher race than the humans who could never live up to her expectations.
Everyone on her warbird was completely loyal to her. However, there were some secrets no one could know. One of those was her origins. She did not dare say that she was once a human and in the United Federation of Planets. Only Vokar knew that. Only Vokar ever would. Her past life was unimportant, and could never mix with her present life anymore.
This Christmas was spent patrolling the far side of what the silly Federation members called the Romulan Neutral Zone. They were cloaked, of course, and these pitiful starships could not detect her twenty-fourth century cloaked ship with their twenty-third century sensors. All in all, it was rather boring. That was okay though. Boredom suited her. As Chairman of the Empire's intelligence organization, one of the best of the galaxy, she had plenty to do.
A chime ran through her quarters and Toreth quickly stood up and walked out into the main room of her quarters. At her word, the door slid open to reveal Vokar. He was tall, with slightly wavy dark hair cut a bit shorter than the traditional Romulan style, and very dark brown eyes.
"Oh, it's just you, Vokar," Toreth said, relaxing a bit. "Come in."
"What do you mean 'just you'?" Vokar asked, a teasing hint of a smile forming on his face.
"Oh shut up," Toreth said. "I mean you are the only person I can completely relax around... almost completely. I did read the Voyager: Dark Matters trilogy after all." Vokar did not respond, as he was used to enigmatic comments of that nature. "That is not important though. What's happening?"
"Well, some Federation idiot managed to get past our patrols and is headed towards Romulus. I have to admit- he is good."
"Then obviously he is not so much of an idiot, now is he? I suppose I had better get up to the bridge and capture his ship and crew. Who knows how advanced these Starfleet ships are with T'Son over there?" Toreth said and strode out, Vokar at her side.
Upon reaching the bridge, Toreth ordered a report. What ship was that, and did it pose any threat?
"It is the USS Royale, sir. The idiots in the Federation have sent their flagship out here. It is as good as an invitation to attack their heart, Earth," a random officer said. Toreth grew pale.
"It cannot be him," she whispered, too softly for anyone to hear. He had no right to mess with her life now that it was perfect. She would have to show him that. How dare he come here!? It was just like him too. "Thank you, now take us to Red Alert, station our ship directly in front of him, and decloak."
The Romulan patrols had been hard to get by. However, T'Son had not learned nothing from all his years of watching Star Trek. He had managed to get in and was now heading to Romulus and praying that he would get out of this alive. Despite what he had told Qwi, T'Son was very nervous about this venture. No sane person would not be. Of course, he could not let that show, because he was Vulcan and because he had argued so forcibly to do this.
Suddenly, without warning, a Romulan ship decloaked directly in front of him. He closed his eyes in horror. It was similar to a TNG warbird and he had not even come close to detecting it with his sensors. Apparently Toreth had gotten to some place of influence and had been busy. He went to Red Alert, although he was relatively sure he did not stand a chance. All his glorious dreams of the future...
"Sir, they are not attacking," a puzzled voice broke into his thoughts.
"What!?" T'Son asked, but it was true. "Hail them..." The forward viewscreen filled with a warbird bridge. In the center stood a woman. She had the typical pointed ears of her species, but she was by no means normal. Silver eyes flashed in a mix of emotions and her black hair, instead of being cut short like most Romulans, was in a braid that reached to the middle of her thighs.
"T'Son," was all she said, and no wonder. She looked like she was about to faint. He must have looked startling after all these years to her. His hair was black too, but unlike most Vulcans, it would not lie flat no matter what he did, or was twenty-third century gels he used. His eyes still were a hazel, though they no longer changed color like they did when he was human.
"Toreth?" he asked, just as speechless as her. The one thought that penetrated his mind was that he was safe. Toreth had recognized him, and thus remembered their old friendship. The Royale was not going to be cosmic dust after all.
"What in the name of the Empress are you doing here?" Toreth asked.
"I was going to do some scientific research," T'Son said.
"That's what they all say. I suggest you do it on your side of the border. The RIW Kaleh will escort you back." Assuming that was the name of her warbird, T'Son nodded, cut the communication, and went to Green Alert again.
That was when the first disruptor sliced through his hull.
As soon as T'Son's face was off screen, a haughty smirk took up residence on her face.
"Fool," she sighed, which was her thought about the Federation in general. "Aim for weapons, shielding, propulsion, communications, basically make him dead in space. These coordinates might help." She typed in a few numbers and her tactical officer got to work. Toreth almost felt sorry for T'Son as she efficiently disabled his ship. He was not expecting anything, and thus was completely unable to retaliate. She had the survivors beamed to her brig, and left the bridge with Vokar.
"Was that the same T'Son you used to know?" he asked softly.
"Yes," she said, and that was all. As Chairman of the Tal Shiar, she did not have time for regrets or sympathy, but she had never betrayed a best friend before. Despite the fact that she did not even remember T'Son that well, for the last time she had seen him was ten years ago, she remembered their friendship. She thought back to her other best friend of the time, Qwi, and wondered how she was doing too. Was she even still alive?
"Are you going to go talk to him?" Vokar asked.
"I suppose I am obligated to..." she said uncertainly. Though efficient in her profession, social matters, even with her closest friends, had always been a strain.
"If you are not yet ready, I can talk to him first. What are friends for?"
"Thanks Vokar," Toreth said, and headed off to her quarters to get lost in boring, but soothing paperwork.
T'Son smiled bitterly as he sat in the Kaleh's brig. He supposed he should have expected Toreth to act the friend and then turn on him, like any duplicitous Romulan. However, she had always felt very strongly about betrayal. She despised it with all her heart. At least, she used to... He heard footsteps approaching and wondered if they were hers. They were not. A male Romulan came into view.
"You are T'Son of Vulcan?" the man half asked, half stated.
"Yes," T'Son answered, seeing no reason to lie. Obviously Toreth had told her crew who he was, and he thought he recognized this Romulan from the bridge.
"I am Subcommander Vokar, and close friend of the Chairman."
"Wait... Chairman?" T'Son asked, worry starting to creep through his Vulcan stoic ness. He had a bad feeling about Toreth.
"Yes, Chairman Toreth of the Tal Shiar," Vokar said, looking curiously at T'Son. "You did not know?"
"I was hardly in a position to receive news about the political positions of my enemies," T'Son said dryly. "Could I speak to... the Chairman?"
"She does not want to see you right now," Vokar answered flatly, making no effort to soften the blow. T'Son nodded, wondering why. He would have thought that she would either want to gloat or ask his forgiveness.
"And the Royale?" T'Son asked, suddenly fearing for his ship. "My crew?"
"Your crew is in the brig too, and your ship is in our tractor beam. Once we reach Romulus, your ship will be taken apart for study and you and your crew will be at the mercy of the Tal Shiar."
T'Son did not like those odds one bit.
Toreth opened a small, locked box she kept in a secret drawer under her bed and pulled out two ancient pictures. One was of two girls grinning at a mall camera booth, surrounded by a flame-like border. The other was printed off a primitive, ancient computer and was of a boy lying on his stomach on his bed with an interesting expression on his face. Their names were Stephanie, Rachel, and Nathan. Names Toreth had almost forgotten.
She sat down at her computer and pulled up a Starfleet personnel list. It was not difficult for the Tal Shiar to see such lists. She pulled up two names side by side. T'Son, Commodore and Qwi, Captain stared up at her from the screen. T'Son she had just re-met. But Qwi... wow, Qwi looked so different!
Her hair was still dark brown and should-length, but it hung very nicely. Her eyes were a lighter blue than Toreth knew, almost icy, but a warm ice, if such a thing was possible. However, the thing that that startled Toreth most was that she was, according to this, captain of the USS Hawkeye. That meant Qwi was in Starfleet. Qwi had passed Starfleet Academy and advanced through the ranks almost as quickly as T'Son.
The thing that most surprised Toreth was that she looked at these pictures without any emotion whatsoever. T'Son and Qwi were people she did not know. Her only friend was named Vokar, and she needed no one else. Not that the Chairman was allowed to indulge in vanities like friendship in the first place. She found that she almost did not want her old friends back in her life. They were living reminders of her short time in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, a time she did not particularly want to remember. At this point in her life, she could give T'Son over to be interrogated about Federation war maneuvers and not care less.
"I really hate social life," she said out loud to no one in particular.