Chapter 5

T'pol sat in the brig desperately trying to calm herself, trying to meditate but failing miserably. She had no idea how strong the emotion of betrayal could be until now. She was still in shock she believed. How could Thy'lek betray her? How could he betray Soval was a better question, the two men had been close friends for years, Soval had taken Thy'lek under his wing when the Andorian had arrived on the Avenger when he was eighteen. The two had become inseparable, their relationship evolving from one of mentor and student to a strong friendship. Why would Thy'lek do this?

'His sister.' whispered a tiny voice. She knew it was right, but now Thy'lek was constructing a tool to break her, how was that ensuring his sisters safety? To this question the voice had no answer. Suddenly there was a very strange sound, a kind of high pitched noise, and it was followed by sounds like men crying in pain and collapsing. The two guards watching her shared a look and went to investigate. T'pol wondered how idiotic someone had to be to walk into an obvious trap. Apparently as stupid as those two were because her very sensitive Vulcan ears heard the sound of two more bodies collapsing. A minute later the door opened and Thy'lek entered a phaser in one hand and a strange ball in the other. He looked behind him and seemed to struggle with a thought, then stepped away from the door and it closed. She stood up and watched as he deactivated the forcefield, and stepped into the brig itself. He stared at her with an expression that she couldn't interpret, but his antennas were drooping severely; an indication of great sadness and pain. She felt anger flare within her and quickly repressed it. He didn't seem to know what to say to her and she told him as much.

"How can I say anything that will help repair the damage?" he asked softly

"You cannot." she answered. He nodded, swallowing hard.

"You have to know I never wanted this to happen. I never wanted Soval to die."

"You could have let our plan succeed."

"You were captive and you carried the information the rebels would need. Without it the rebellion still wouldn't have had much of a chance to succeed even with the Defiant destroyed."

"Regardless this ship needs to be destroyed! As long as it's in existence the balance of power is completely off."

"Agreed." Thy'lek turned around, slipping the phaser into its holster. "Come on." T'pol didn't move; she didn't trust him anymore. Thy'lek turned back to her. "Unless you'd rather wait 'till the self destruct countdown reaches zero?" He held out his hand to her giving her an imploring and pleading look. She hesitated then took it slowly. She felt his emotions through the contact, he felt regret, deep regret and there was a sincerity and worry as well. He squeezed her hand slightly and gently pulled her along. They stepped out into the corridor and T'pol noted the men unconscious on the ground.

"What did you do to them?" she asked, not out of concern but curiosity.

"I used this on them." Thy'lek held up the mechanical ball in his hand.

"What is it?"

"A kind of neural neutraliser, I made it a few years ago. I knew it would come in useful someday."

"Why does it not affect you or me?"

"Well, because Vulcans and Andorians are both telepathic, even if it's only slightly, it makes all the difference. Our brain waves work on a different frequency to humans (which could explain an awful lot) so this little beauty interrupts the brain wave frequency of humans and renders them unconscious. It took a long time to find the exact frequency that was required I can tell you."

"Will they recover?"

"Not for several hours and when they do they'll have the mother of all hangovers… that is, they would if the ship was going to be around in several hours. I hope we don't run into anyone else, this needs to reset itself after each use." She nodded silently. She noticed he had yet to let her hand go. She suspected that he was using the slight telepathic connection established by their touch to keep himself calm, using her logic as a focuser.

"Where are we going?" she asked, although she had an idea.

"The escape pods."

"Captain Archer is probably already aware of my release and the activation of the self destruct."

"You'd think so wouldn't you." he smirked proudly. "He won't even realise something is up until we've released the pod."

"They can still destroy us with the phasers." He paused and faced her, an irritated look on his face.

"T'pol please, give me some credit. I'm an engineer, I know how to shut down a key system without anyone knowing about it." She raised an eyebrow at him and he sighed and they continued, Thy'lek had very good timing, it was mid night shift, so almost no one was around now. They were only a deck above the escape pods and they headed for the turbo lift. They were silent as it descended, when they went past the deck they wanted to land on and continued on. They shared a look, sudden panic engulfing Thy'lek's eyes as he gripped the neural neutraliser then suddenly slipped it into T'pol's hand and pulled her slightly behind him. The door hissed open and Major Reed stood on the other side. His eyes widened and he drew his phaser on them sharply.

"What are you doing?" he demanded angrily.

"I need T'pol for the neuro-synaptic field; the captain will no doubt want it perfect. I need her to make sure it is so."

"I thought that the brig and science room were on the same deck."

"I needed to change the room for the chair because the first one lacked several power conduits I needed."

"And you just decided to take her along without any guard?" the major sneered.

"She's not stupid enough to try anything." T'pol felt him nudge her and understood what he was telling her. The neutraliser was probably ready. Keeping herself half hidden behind Thy'lek she raised her arm and studied the device in her hand, locating the button. She pressed it. Reed went down. She switched it off. She would give it credit; it was a useful little device.

"Resume." Thy'lek commanded the turbolift and it obeyed. He sighed and sagged slightly in relief as the lights flashed by. "If we manage to get off this ship in time to get away from the blast it will be a miracle."

"I thought Andorians didn't believe in miracles."

"If we get out of this in one piece then this Andorian will." he informed her dryly.

"How much time did you give us?"

"Fifteen minutes. It seemed the best time, just enough to get away but not enough for Tucker to figure out how to stop it."

"Then we have approximately seven minutes to get off the ship." she deduced

"Don't remind me!" he groaned loudly. The turbo came to a halt and the door slid open. There didn't appear to be anyone in the corridor, but Thy'lek stiffened and drew his phaser out. His antennas moved back till they were almost lying flat against his head, she knew this meant he was feeling bloodthirsty. She realised he was hoping that Archer would be present so he could kill him. She knew there was no time for this so she grabbed his arm and he looked at her. She said nothing but she knew he understood what she wanted, he had a talent for reading people. He sighed and relaxed himself slightly and lowered the phaser slightly, but he didn't loosen his grip on it. They crept on to the deck and stayed close to the bulkhead, both suddenly feeling jumpy. Thy'lek peered around the corner and she watched as his antenna drooped slightly.

"Come out Shran! We see you!" Archer's voice barked. Thy'lek withdrew his head and he took the neutraliser from T'pol and looked at it. By her calculations it took ninety second for the device to reset. Normally that was no time but every precious second lost meant they had less time to escape the blast of the Defiant… if they even got off the ship at all. They had a minute to wait out before the device was ready. Thy'lek muttered a Klingon curse softly and then he called calmly

"Well I know that neither of us are fools captain, I know I'm not anyway, not so sure about you, but we both know what I'm up to, I'm sure." There was a definite tone of sarcasm in his voice. She knew that he, like her, had had enough of Terrans. He still bore the brown skin of Klingons on his forehead to remind him if he ever doubted it.

"You think you can smuggle T'pol off this ship? You Andorians must be dumber then I thought!"

Fifty seconds…

"Well I think you may want to rethink that thought." Thy'lek was smirking slightly, but his knuckles were changing colour rapidly as he gripped the neural neutraliser tightly. "Because whether you stop us or not this ship will blow up in…" Helooked at T'pol questioningly.

"Less then six minutes." Antennas squirmed uncomfortably at the meagre amount of time.

"Less then six minutes." Thy'lek deadpanned for Archer.

"… I don't believe you!"

"It's true… pink-skin." T'pol raised an eyebrow at the words.

"You couldn't have accessed the self destruct sequence, let alone activate it… you're just an Andorian." Antenna flew back against the head again.

Forty seconds…

"Well are you really going to risk it? If you don't go now then you'll be killed along with the rest of us. Do you really want the name Jonathon Archer to be noted as the man who committed treason against the Empire and tried to usurp the throne and failed before he even tried? It'll still happen whether or not you get off this ship, but if you get off then you'll have a chance to fix that won't you?" Thy'lek glared at the neutraliser in frustration obviously wishing it would hurry up.

Thirty seconds…

"Shut it off!" shouted Archer.

"And why would I do that?" drawled Thy'lek actually daring to peek around the corner a smirk on his lips. He ducked back a second later as someone took a shot at him. T'pol gave him a patronising look. He was being careless now.

"If the ship blows up you'll be killed too."

"At this point I'd rather die then serve you Terrans-"

Twenty seconds…

"-because the life we lead under your rule is no life at all."

"We rule you, we unite you, all of you!" bellowed Archer, "Without us the Andorians would have been dominated by the Vulcans!" Thy'lek's antennas twitched, "It would have been worse if they ruled us. They would have made us suppress our emotions, our cultures would have been torn apart by them!"

"Just like you tore at their culture and mine and every other culture you took over! You're right captain."

Ten seconds…

"You do unite us."

Nine seconds…

"You unite us in our hatred and misery of your rule."

Eight seconds…

T'pol swallowed hard.

Seven seconds…

"But alliances formed by those things-"

Six seconds…

"-will never really last."

Five seconds…

"Which is why…"

Four seconds…

"The Federation is our future."

Three seconds…

"And I don't think-"

Two seconds…

"-that we'll let humans join, somehow."

One second!

Thy'lek activated the neutraliser and the thing screeched for all it was worth. Archer and whoever was with him could be heard screaming and then there was silence. Thy'lek let out a breath he'd been holding then noticed T'pol was looking at him. "What?"

"You have an illogical flair for dramatics." she stated as she stepped past him.

"Oh give me a break!" he muttered softly but not softly enough that she couldn't hear him. He probably knew it too. She felt him paused behind her as they stepped over the captain (Thy'lek had deliberately stepped on his hand) and the others. He was staring at Tucker with a very strange expression. T'pol realised it was a mixture of hatred, anger and uncertainty. His grip on the phaser had tightened.

"If you kill him now you will be no better then them." she stated.

"Will it make a difference since the ship will blow up in five minutes?"

"It makes all the difference." He knew that, she knew he did. He sighed and let her tug him away. They reached the escape pods and Thy'lek made short work of releasing it. Even so they had less then four minutes to get away. It was barely enough. They watched as the Defiant seemed to float for a moment, then it exploded! The resulting wave buffeted the pod around like a bottle in a sea storm. T'pol was flung into a bulkhead and everything went dark.

Final chapter next!

Night's Darkness