Season Five

by EnlightenedSkye

Picking up six months after Terra Prime, the Enterprise attempts to hold the Coalition together while keeping an eye on the growing Romulan threat. Trip takes his own command and the war begins mid-season. [July 2155 to January 2157. 25 episodes. Fully episodic, so each chapter is a stand-alone story. ATP, Troshi, Malcolm/OC, P/C. Rated T throughout. Complete, S6 and S7 complete]

8. Episode 8: Butterflies and Hurricanes

A/N: You know, I always go into a chapter thinking it's going to be a reasonable length, that I'll get through the scenes relatively quickly, but then this happens! Here we introduce what I'm going to lovingly call the alternate Mirror Universe. It originates from a very simple premise: what would have happened if T'Pol had died during the rescue attempt during S1's Shadows of P'Jem? Cue the butterfly effect.

I'm always fascinated when characters are forced to make morally ambiguous decisions, and here we find two very big (and honestly very questionable) ones. We may or may not return to the alternate Mirror Universe at some point, and it may or not be a story from Columbia's perspective as they deal with their...ahem...unexpected help.

This episode draws from TNG 7x11 Parallels, VOY 5x10 Counterpoint (very briefly, in dialogue) and VOY 7x03 Drive (also briefly, in premise). It bugs me how when folks get sent to AUs they're fairly calm about it-that's not so here. There's also some extremely self-aware dialogue about how far out the things science officers say can be. As an engineer, I have to say that most of the time us tech folks only halfway know what we're talking about.

Sidebar: have y'all seen the trailers for Lower Decks yet? It looks amazing. I feel that's the kind of life Rostov, Hutch, and crew are leading while the senior staff are living their own particular brand of DS9-like ensemble cast madness.

Still don't own anything you recognize. The cold open is a little longer this time around, but that's because there's a ton of exposition to get through before we commission the Maelstrom in E10! Get ready for the mother of all ATP episodes next week.

Season Five

Episode Eight: Butterflies and Hurricanes

Captain's log, November 19th, 2155: We are maintaining a geostationary orbit of Coridan III. The Coridanite government is far from stable, and our Coalition negotiations are in jeopardy unless we can find some way to ingratiate ourselves to the Chancellor.

---

"The first step is to be forceful. Demand and take what you want."

"Forceful?"

"Declare your intentions almost immediately," Lieutenant Cutler explained, then stopped in her tracks in the middle of the corridor, almost causing her companion to collide with her. "But not too quickly. Always start by saying how much of an honor it's been serving with him. Butter him up a little."

Lieutenant Novakovich nodded emphatically, typing in a few lines of notes into his PADD. Before he could finish, Liz took off again in her usual purposeful stride, and he had to jog to catch up with her. "Got it. Then what?"

"Well, I started by reminding her of all my accomplishments. For you, I'd mention your doctoral thesis on psychotropic pollen, the upgrades we did to the long range sensors-oh!-and your extensive cross training in engineering. Really emphasize how dedicated you are to the mission, that you're entrepreneurial, a real self-starter, all those buzz words. Think of it like a job interview. It pretty much is." The two of them stepped into the turbolift and Liz hit the button for A Deck, watching the doors close in front of them.

Ethan's typing reached a manic pace. With only a month remaining until Maelstrom commissioned, he had decided to risk his pride and directly request promotion to chief science officer. His friend Liz was notorious for having won her posting by approaching the Captain in the days before Enterprise relaunched, and while he wasn't sure he could ever be as brave as her, he knew that Commander Tucker was sure to be a far less intimidating audience. "What do I do if he starts asking questions? Why do I want this position, what I plan to do with it, things like that?"

The door opened and they stepped into the corridor. "Just tell him the truth, Ethan. You finished your doctorate, but you're still here. A lot of my scientists can't say the same. So why did you stay?"

He had to step to one side to allow Crewman Rosner to pass, pursued closely by a string of engineers. Ethan shrugged, already rolling his eyes at the mawkishness of what he was about to say. "I guess you could say that I love this place."

"Exactly," she said, reaching back to reassuringly pat him on the arm. "Just tell him that. You're going to be fine. If you ask me, I think you've got a good chance. Tucker already asked for my recommendations, and you were at the very top of the list."

He smiled and muttered his thanks, continuing to follow her down the hallway. It was amazing to think how far they'd come in four short years, from inexperienced crewmen with a thirst for adventure, to seasoned officers with the wisdom to avoid the misfortune that often came along with those adventures. If anything, he was going to miss Elizabeth and her companionship, though he was immeasurably excited for the next chapter in his life to begin.

Assuming he could get past this conversation with Commander Tucker.

As the wardroom came into view at the end of the corridor, he seized the opportunity to sneak in one final question: "Any last advice?"

She made an about face, her hand hovering over the door controls. She appeared to think about this for a moment, but then her eyes lit up with amusement: "Remember, Ethan, when all else fails, it never hurts to suck up to the boss!"

Cutler swept into the wardroom, looking from side to side, silently praying that none of their seniormost CO's had heard her last statement. Mercifully, it seemed that most of them had not yet made it up from the shuttlebay.

At least one member of the away team was in attendance; Alira sat at the opposite side of the table with her back to the windows, still in her dress uniform with her arms crossed confrontationally over her chest. Malcolm Reed, seemingly the owner of the worst immune system in Starfleet, paced the length of the room behind her, stopping every couple of meters to cough or sneeze.

"You alright there, sir?"

"Lieutenant," he said, his voice sounding pinched and nasally, "I'm alright. It's just this damned cold. I get it once or twice a year. Knocks me off my feet every single time."

"He's being a child," Ensign Taxa insisted, rummaging around in her pocket and producing a handkerchief, which she held up over her head. Malcolm frowned, but accepted her gift, and blew his nose in a manner that quite sounded like a goose being strangled. "A decade ago my entire senior staff came down with Levodian flu. I guarantee the seven of us put together didn't complain as much as you are right now."

In a manner of speaking, she was right. Over the years, they'd seen Reed engage hostile races in close quarters, take absurd but ultimately fruitful risks, and nearly sacrifice himself to save the ship a number of times, so it always was a little odd to see him undone by something as small as a head cold.

"It's the man flu," Hoshi said with a smile, then at Alira's confused expression, continued: "When human men get sick, they tend to be a lot more dramatic about it than a human woman would with the same symptoms. It's pretty much a constant everywhere in the universe."

She raised her eyebrows, which was followed by the beginnings of a broad Denobulan grin. Like Phlox, when Alira found something funny, her mirth was infectious, and soon Liz was struggling not to laugh as well. "Man flu. I like that!"

"I'm glad to see the two of you are amused at my expense," Malcolm mumbled.

At that moment, Alira sneezed violently into her elbow, taking them all by surprise.

"Seems like that cold of yours is spreading around," Travis observed, only to be dealt two nearly identical reproachful looks.

Liz took a seat next to their chief navigator, whose presence at their morning briefings was a welcome surprise. Travis was technically a part of the senior staff and certainly possessed the most space-faring knowledge out of all of them, but she found that his skills were often under-utilized. "What are you in for, Travis?"

"I'm honestly not sure," he admitted, "About fifteen minutes ago, the Captain called ahead and let me know my presence would be appreciated." His tone conveyed that he was excited as to what this could mean.

"Ah. Well, welcome to the circus," Hoshi said with a dramatic flourish of her hands.

As if on cue, the door opened, admitting the Enterprise's triumvirate. The Captain and the Commodore proceeded immediately to their seats at the head of the table, while Commander Tucker started to pace around the room, rubbing his hands together excitedly.

"How was your visit to-"

"It was amazing," Trip blurted out before Hoshi could even finish her question, cupping either side of his face with his hands. "Their shipyards are state of the art, thousands and thousands of engineers all working at once. They've got an assembly line type situation going on, and they can whip up a ship from nose to tail in less than a month. I've never seen anything like it."

"Yes, it seems that-"

He interrupted the Captain without hesitation, sliding into his seat across from their tactical officers. "Taxa can tell you, their phase cannons have the highest particle yield I've ever seen, even higher than ours, even higher than the Denobulan severance beam. They even let me get into the warp seven simulator. Smoothest ride I've ever had. Not even a vibration."

"You didn't tell me that!"

"I was getting to it," she assured him, before turning her attention to their COs at the far end of the table. "Unfortunately, to get our hands on that technology, the Coridanite government will need to make more than a few concessions. Security was precarious-" She trailed off, holding a finger up to indicate she wasn't done. As they watched, she scrunched up her nose and began to squint, the tension slowly building in her face and shoulders. Finally, she sneezed even more loudly than before, wiping her nose on her sleeve. "-To say in the least."

"Chancellor Kalev assures us that the threat from the anti-government rebel factions has decreased in recent years, though there was still evidence of protest and demonstration around the capital. It is also a concern that they refuse to accept the trade restrictions against the Orion Syndicate," the Captain explained.

"It's more than that. In order to be considered for admission, they've got to agree to trade indiscriminately with every other species in the Coalition. They can't go around only selling their dilithium to the Vulcans anymore." The Commodore reached over and activated the computer screen, pulling up some unfamiliar schematics. It was what the senior officers had grown to recognize as the universal signal for: Buckle up. We've got a lot to cover in this morning's briefing.

"Take a seat, Mr. Reed," the Captain demanded, and he complied, accepting the PADD that was passed to him from across the table.

"The Kandar satellite has been fully operational since the first of the month. We're already receiving some invaluable data. You're looking at hull and weapons configurations for over a dozen classes of Romulan starships."

Alira leaned over precariously in her chair in an attempt to get a better view. "Am I imagining it, or are those-"

"Complete energy signatures from their warp drives and cloaking devices. If you scroll down a little, you'll find an extremely detailed log of all ship movements in the sector of Romulan space closest to the Tarod system. As it stands right now, they can't even charge weapons without us knowing about it," Archer advanced the screen, pulling up a diagram of the data, replete with arrows and directional markers.

"It's incredible," Travis acknowledged. "I'd like to see them try to sneak up on us now."

"Ensign Taxa, there's also a personal appeal noted in one of the postscripts directed towards the Enterprise. Your mother requests that certain personnel posted to this vessel take the time to reply to her communiques," T'Pol said impassively, as if she were delivering the weather report.

She threw up her hands in frustration and more than a little bit of embarrassment. "Does she know that the entire fleet can see this?"

"Knowing your mother, I'd say she probably does," Trip replied with a smile, watching as she buried her face in her hands.

"We should expect reports every two weeks in accordance with the moon's solar cycle," the Captain continued. "It's worth noting that this morning we detected a small amount of chroniton radiation around the far side of Coridan III. We now know particles are produced by the operation of Romulan cloaking devices. This seems indicative that they've been in this system at some point in the last few weeks."

Beside her, Liz nodded. She'd been the first person outside of the triumvirate to lay eyes on this report, early in the morning, shortly after Crewman Marceline had discovered the phenomenon on gamma shift. Needless to say, having been familiar with their mission reports from their time in the Expanse, Marceline had reached out to her immediately, and she'd wound up having a rather urgent conversation at 0200 hours in the Captain's quarters. Their long range sensors were currently at maximum power scanning far and wide in either direction, just in case this meant that the enemy was close at hand.

"We'll stand by for tactical alert," Reed assured them, then turned his chair a full one hundred and eighty degrees away from the table, wracked by another fit of coughs.

"On to better news," Archer queued up a series of headshots they'd been sent from Starfleet headquarters. "Admiral Gardner has instituted a new protocol for all NX class vessels effective the first of the year. We're going to have dedicated first officers outside of department heads to manage operations, mainly staffing and allocation of ship's resources."

Trip balked at this. "What's the matter with the old fashioned way? It's always worked out well for us."

"Absolutely nothing, but if HQ is determined to move forward with these changes, we've got to follow through," he replied with a touch of consternation. He suspected Trip was a little peeved about not being able to select his first officer personally, and he didn't blame him. "This role on the Maelstrom is going to be filled by Lieutenant Commander Julia Hammond of the Columbia. She's Captain Hernandez's science officer right now, and is overdue for a promotion. She comes with the highest recommendation."

He tilted his head to one side, searching the far reaches of his memory for someone he'd met during his brief stint under Erika's command. When he came up empty, he admitted, "Not sure I recognize the name."

"You might remember her as Jordan. She's back on Earth at the moment, but her medical leave will end the week before commissioning." The Captain managed to retrieve a photo from the personnel database, and she was exactly how Trip had remembered: a beautiful Black woman with a full head of box braids, freckles and a dazzling smile.

Trip clapped his hands together suddenly, startling everyone at the table. "I remember now! Captain, she's amazing. Wicked smart, great instincts. Kicked my ass at target practice, too."

"I'm gratified to hear you approve of Admiral Gardner's choice," T'Pol said, nodding towards the Commodore. He pulled up another picture, and everyone was surprised to see a Vulcan, seemingly around the same age as the Captain, with an impossibly stern and unyielding expression. "The High Command has recommended Sub-Commander Tovin, who stepped into my role on Ambassador Soval's staff once I accepted my posting aboard Enterprise."

"Tovin had a professional relationship with the Captain," the Commodore explained carefully, glancing toward Ensign Taxa.

"We used to serve together in the Science Directorate," T'Pol continued, raising one eyebrow by a fraction of a centimeter. Suddenly, Alira understood: a hybrid.

Archer cleared his throat and sat forward. "His commission is still pending his completion of the oath of service next month. He'll be joining us when we rendezvous with Columbia in a couple of weeks on Tellar Prime."

"Mr. Mayweather, have you made your formal recommendation for the Maelstrom's helmsman?"

He grimaced, glancing down at his hands. "I'm sorry, Captain. There's a lot of great candidates coming out of the STC training program. I'm taking the time to read all of their personal statements."

"No rush, Lieutenant. There's a number of officers, senior or otherwise, who haven't made a decision about the transfer yet, either." He looked towards Hoshi, then Travis, the implication evident.

Malcolm blew his nose again, handing the PADD over his shoulder to Alira. She accepted it pinched between her thumb and forefinger, placing it in the middle of the table with more than a little disgust in her expression. "The only one we have to worry about in the armory is Nguyen. He hasn't decided between us yet. The MACOs seem to have split right down the middle."

"Efficient," the Captain noted with the same slight uptick in her tone that usually indicated she approved. "There's one final matter we must discuss. The Coridanites have invited us this weekend to participate in the-" She paused, holding her PADD a few centimeters close to her face. "Coridan Trans-Stellar Exhibitional Rally."

Beside her, Travis visibly perked up. Hoshi asked, "What is that exactly?"

"As I understand it, it's a sub-warp speed shuttlepod race through the Coridan system and surrounding space. Nearly all humanoid species in this sector compete, spending months to modify their crafts to the year's specifications. Being invited is considered a great honor," the Captain said, passing the information on to Travis.

Suddenly his invitation to the morning's briefing made sense. He began to read, scrolling through pages and pages of technical data.

"I hear there's a trophy presented to the winner at the end, Lieutenant." The Commodore leaned forward into his line of vision, a twinkle of amusement in his eye. "Though there's probably bragging rights involved."

"We'll get them," Travis promised them, "We've got three days. I'll have it ready in two."

"You're allowed one copilot. I hope I'm not jumping the gun too much by putting my name in the ring," Commander Tucker cut in hopefully.

"It would be an honor, sir. You can help me with these modifications to the pod's engine."

Trip sat back and knitted his fingers together behind his head. He nodded towards the Commodore. "I'm looking forward to it. Got to have my fun before I get attached to the big chair on the Maelstrom."

"It's not that bad," Archer reminded him.

He smirked, as if to say, yeah right.

"A word of advice, Lieutenant," the Captain cut through their excitement, pinning them down under her gaze. "While this is the first such contest we've entered, remember that Shuttlepod One has never lost a race."

"And it won't, ma'am. You have my word."

---

Two days later, Trip and Travis found themselves in the shuttlebay with their sleeves rolled up, covered in injector fluid, engine exhaust, and heaven knew what else.

As it turned out, the Coridanite's specifications were nothing if not specific. Their participation would involve pushing the impulse engine to the theoretical maximum, as well as increasing the agility of the navigational controls by threefold. When they were finished with the upgrades, Travis promised they'd be able to turn three hundred sixty degrees on a dime, while Trip promised he'd hold him to that.

All the while, the two of them were catching up. Trip realized it had been almost a year since he'd sat down with Travis, what with his usually honored standing invite to take his meals in the Captain's mess. He suddenly remembered all the good times they'd had on away missions, making repairs, taking bridge shifts together. He was looking forward to serving as his second during the race.

At some point in the morning, they heard the door open far above, then someone announcing their presence. Trip peered out the hatch to behold none other than Lieutenant Cutler, who was leaning over the railing to speak to them.

"How's it going down there, boys?"

"If it were going any better, we would have already won. What about you, how's the bridge?"

She laughed. "You missed it. Alira sneezed so hard her entire face expanded like a pufferfish. It took her a full minute to get back to normal."

"I saw Phlox do that once on Earth," Travis said, remembering their bar fight cut short. "Just when I thought I'd seen it all."

"I've seen him do it a couple of times, but this is a first I've seen from her. Apparently it's some leftover evolutionary defensive response."

"How's Malcolm doing?"

"Not much better. He's got the conn tonight, so I feel sorry for Singh and Novakovich having to listen to him complain." She paused, turning her PADD over and over in her hands. "The Captain wants an update on your progress when you have a moment."

"Honestly, Liz, we're just about ready to take it out for a test run. They've finally got the course marked, and I promised Trip I'd show him a few tricks," Travis wiped his hands with a rag and began to ascend the ladder. Three rungs up, he caught her expression, hopeful and expectant. He realized she'd gone to the trouble of walking all the way down here when she could have just hailed them, and suddenly, he understood. "Do you want to come with us?"

She grinned and gave him a thumbs-up. "You bet your ass I do. I've been wanting to get behind the wheel for years. The non-com training at STC didn't include hours on the flight simulator."

Trip had also been hoping to take the helm for a little while, but upon seeing her excitement, he knew he couldn't refuse her. "Give us a couple minutes to clean up and we'll get right at it. You can do the honors of letting the Captain know."

"I'm on it," she said, and hurried out of their line of sight towards the comm.

---

A couple hours later, Trip was thoroughly regretting his decision as they zipped through open space, banking sharply, taking the curves of the race course with break neck speed.

Once they'd traversed the first half of the course and verified that the shuttlepod could complete all the necessary maneuvers, Trip had graciously abandoned the co-pilot's seat and watched as Travis showed her how to speed up and slow down, tilt upwards, and make a gentle turn. Once the training wheels came off, however, it was a total free for all.

Liz, as it turned out, was a natural pilot, with a steady hand and an inherent inclination to take risks. As they reached a straight stretch, she'd laid on the metaphorical gas, accelerating so quickly that Trip felt himself being pushed back in his seat. All the while, Travis and Liz were laughing, and her eyes were lit up with near maniacal glee.

They'd gradually transitioned to more and more complicated maneuvers, and Trip was finding that he was having more and more trouble keeping down his lunch. She breezed through a displacement roll with no problem, turning the shuttlepod one hundred eighty degrees and nearly bringing them upside down. The rolling scissors had been next; at Travis's insistence, they broke free of the marked course and accelerated into open space, turning into a corkscrew motion as they went.

The inertial dampeners could only do so much. Unbeknownst to either of them, Trip leaned forward and placed his head between his knees, in a classic position his flight instructor at STC had once called kiss your ass goodbye. On the Enterprise, he never really felt when Travis pulled these insane evasive maneuvers, but on a shuttlepod, the momentum of every turn was far more concentrated.

Soon, they returned to a mostly straight path, veering back onto the course. Trip's nausea gradually subsided, and he seized the opportunity to snap a picture of the scene before him. Travis was fully relaxed, his feet up on the dashboard, his hands braced behind his head. Liz was hanging on his every word, sitting all the way forward in her seat, her eyes wide as she beheld the great expanse of open space before her.

He forwarded the photo to the senior officers' group chat, along with the caption: She's tearing it up out here, folks…

There was a pause, then Dita replied: Looks like the Maelstrom's found its new navigator.

The doctor was typing for almost a full minute. That's my Elizabeth! He finally declared, along with what was a frankly ludicrous amount of emoticons.

"Mind if we get some music going?" Trip asked, trying to find something to focus on besides the stomach turning itself in knots. It would only take the touch of a button to tap into the overhead speakers. He still had a road trip playlist on his personal PADD from the solo motorcycle ride he'd taken through the south during leave.

"Please," she replied, not taking her gaze off the controls for a second.

And so the last half of the course devolved into the three of them belting out the songs at the top of their lungs, playing air guitar, using whatever they could find as microphones. For a few minutes, they were able to forget about duty, forget about the Romulan threat, forget about the impending commissioning that would separate them from the family they'd built over the past four years.

So busy were they putting on an impromptu concert for no one that they nearly missed the final turn around Coridan II. Suddenly sobering up, Travis directed their pilot to complete a lag roll and turn out at the last possible second, using the planet's gravity as a slingshot to send them speeding them back to the ship.

As Liz entered the turn, Trip hit the comm and let Enterprise know they were on a return course.

"Acknowledged, Shuttlepod One," Ensign Singh replied, "You're clear to approach."

"Easy on the clutch. You're going to want to come out of this turn too fast. Stay with it. Just when you feel the gravity beginning to tug on the hull, reverse direction."

Liz nodded gravely, visibly attempting to relax as the pod began to vibrate, the upper atmosphere of the planet streaking by their view screen. Beside her, Travis was holding his hand mere centimeters above the dash, ready to give her the signal.

"Now!" He cried, slapping his hand down. This time, the sudden shift in momentum really did through Trip back in his seat and into the wall. It felt like his stomach was pressing up through his throat. He was really starting to suspect he was going to hurl when Liz miraculously was able to complete the turn, and the Enterprise came into view far into the distance.

Suddenly the entire cabin began to shake violently and a flash of white light streamed from the aft section to the view screen, flooding their line of sight and temporarily blinding them. A deep, primal fear clenched Trip's gut, and he knew they were in trouble. As soon as it appeared, it vanished, and the entire ordeal was complete within a fraction of a second.

Cutler removed her hands from the controls and looked towards Travis, utterly bewildered. He shook his head and stood, proceeding to the back of the craft.

"It wasn't you," he assured her, "Though it doesn't look like our sensors picked anything up either."

"What could that have been?" Trip asked, hoping he had some bit of boomer wisdom tucked away that would explain the entire situation.

"I have no idea, Commander," Travis admitted as they continued towards the ship, which was in its same location and orientation as it had been seconds ago. Reaching for the comm, he called out: "Mayweather to Enterprise."

"Enterprise here." There was no mistaking Hoshi's voice on the other end of the line.

"Wasn't it Dita just a minute ago?" Cutler whispered, and Trip nodded vigorously. He was sure of it.

Travis was equally as astounded, and had to take his hand off the comm to collect himself for a moment. Finally, he said, "We're about to begin our final approach."

"Acknowledged, Shuttlepod One. Prepare for scout mission debriefing protocol alpha. The Captain will meet you in the shuttlebay."

The transmission was cut swiftly, and Travis returned to the pilot's seat, checking their current location. "We're exactly where we took off from, alright."

"I don't understand. What if we-"

"It's going to be fine," Trip asserted, looking between his subordinates, and dearly prayed he was right. "The Captain is going to have a great explanation for this. She always does."

With a touch more seriousness this time, Travis talked Liz through the docking procedure, and they gently rose through the hull plating into the ship. Once they'd cleared the motion sensors, the bay doors shut underneath them, and the room began to pressurize.

The next three minutes seemed like an eternity; no one said anything, for they each knew, but were refusing to acknowledge, that something was dreadfully wrong. Once the atmospheric readings in the room were back to normal, Trip tentatively opened the hatch, and ascended the ladder with bated breath.

It only took a second for him to confirm his worst fears; standing at the top of the ladder, looking down the railing at them, was none other than Captain Jonathan Archer.

He didn't wait for the three of them to completely exit the pod. Seizing Trip's arm, he asked with incredible intensity, "Did you see any of them out there?"

"Them, sir?"

He lowered his voice and took a step forward. "The Andorians." Cutting a glance to Liz and Travis, he confirmed they were still out of earshot. "Or the Vulcans."

Trip was struggling to keep his expression neutral as the panic rose in his chest. Shaking his head slowly, he said, "No, sir. We're all alone."

"Good," Archer affirmed, gesturing down the walkway. "Come to the wardroom, gentlemen. Lieutenant, would you mind taking this biometric data down to sickbay? We've just received them on long-range communications from Captain Voris aboard the Seleya."

Liz nodded and accepted the PADD, trying to hide the fact that her heart was racing.

"The Seleya, sir?" Trip vividly remembered their encounter with the Vulcan ship back in the Expanse. Their ship trapped by the sub-space distortions and their synaptic pathways degraded by Trellium-D, the crew had slowly lost grip with reality and resorted to murder. They'd nearly killed the away team, and had set his very good friend down a dangerous path. Ultimately, they'd had to overload the power grid to escape, and the ship had been destroyed. So that made him wonder exactly where-or rather, when-they were.

Archer nodded. "They'll be here in a little less than twelve hours, and they're bringing Ambassador Soval. Captain Namara and the Kumari will be here in eighteen hours, and Forrest will be calling in via subspace. This truce is uneasy enough as it is, so we need to strike while the iron's hot."

"A truce, sir?" Travis echoed dumbly, his mind racing a mile a minute.

"Yes," he replied thoughtfully, his fingers paused over the door's controls. "Maybe we'll get lucky this time and the Vulcans won't send their minions after us."

A moment later, he disappeared into the hallway, leaving three very bewildered crewmen in his wake.

---

Stepping into the corridor felt like passing through a time warp. They'd gotten so used to the wider corridors, the brighter overhead lights, the thinner bulkheads, that the sudden reversion back to the prior build of the ship felt incredibly claustrophobic. Liz separated from the group as they reached the first T in the hall, and for a split second she made eye contact with Commander Tucker, nodding slightly. She would collect as much reconnaissance as she could in her short jaunt up to D Deck. She was praying that everything was exactly where they'd left it.

She moved through the corridors with purpose, head down, only glancing up when she passed another crewman to give them what she hoped passed as a polite smile. In reality, her thoughts were racing and she was beginning to panic. This was not something they'd been prepared for at STC, to say in the least.

After saying hello to Lieutenant Commander Hess and one of the stewards from the mess hall, she reached the turbolift and stepped inside, heaving a massive sigh of relief.

A second before the doors closed, a hand came between them, forcing them back open. Crewman Jane Taylor greeted her warmly as she joined her, pressing the button for C Deck.

"What's wrong, Lieutenant? You look like you've just seen a ghost."

It was impossible. Jane had died during the battle of Azati Prime while trying to reach her station. The section she'd been in had depressurized and she'd suffocated in seconds; it had been a full week before the medical team had been able to navigate their way around the debris to get to her. Serving in her limited capacity as a field medic, she'd helped Phlox clean her wounds, dress her in a fresh uniform, and lay her in a casket for long term storage in cargo bay three. It was only after all of the dead had been accounted for-a full quarter of the crew-that she'd broken down sobbing on a biobed still stained with blood and soot, and allowed him to hold her until she'd run out of tears.

"You startled me, that's all," she said dismissively, fighting the wave of emotion that was rising in her throat. After the battle, all she'd wanted to do was speak to her friends one last time, and now she was finally getting the chance. "It's so good to see you, Jane."

She laughed, a sound that Liz hadn't realized she missed until she heard it. "Okay, crazy. We had lunch together like three hours ago."

Closing her eyes, Liz silently cursed herself for laying it on too thick. The doors opened onto D Deck and she stepped out, but not before Jane could ask, "Are we still on to hang out on Saturday night? Provided the Andorians don't blow us to pieces before then."

She knew it was a joke, but it pained her tremendously to hear her say those words. Giving her a small, sad smile, she assured her, "I wouldn't miss it."

On her way to sickbay, she passed a chronometer on the wall and skidded to a halt, squinting up at the numbers.

November 21st, 2155. The current date. So they hadn't traveled backwards or forwards in time, but stayed exactly where they were and jumped, to the left or to the right, to another reality.

One where the Andorians were threatening to blow them up?

One thing was for certain. She had to see the one person who always put things in perspective, who always calmed her down when she worked herself into a tizzy, who always made things right.

She burst into sickbay and saw a familiar silhouette standing behind a curtain. She didn't hesitate, calling out, "Phlox, something's wrong. Like, really wrong."

The shape began to move, and suddenly became much less familiar. A balding man with a mustache and a kind face stepped out into view, and she realized she'd made a mistake.

"Dr. Lucas?" She meant for it to sound like a greeting, but it rather came out like a question. She naturally remembered Phlox's oldest and dearest friend, his partner in the Interspecies Medical Exchange, the godfather of more than one of his children. But what she didn't understand was why he was there right now. "I'm sorry, slip of the tongue."

"I was about to say…" He trailed off, gesturing around sickbay, which she noticed was free of the menagerie she was used to. "Dr. Phlox hasn't served on this vessel for nearly two years."

Two years? What the hell had happened in two years? Involuntarily, Liz reached up and cupped her forehead with one hand, closing her eyes.

"I still get letters from him from time to time. He asks about you sometimes, you know," he said with a twinkle in his eye, then seemingly processed what she'd said when she came in. "Is there something I can help you with?"

"Oh, I…" She trailed off, desperately trying to form a coherent excuse, then remembered the PADD in her other hand. "Some biometric data from the Seleya for Ambassador Soval and his staff. It reminded me that there's some crewmen down on E Deck that are having trouble with facial recognition access to their personal computers. People are upset that they're missing letters from home."

He made a contemplative sound in the back of his throat and accepted the proffered PADD. "Well, I might not be able to do much about that, but you know who you should ask? Lieutenant Tucker."

"I'm sorry, do you mean Commander Tucker?"

Dr. Lucas frowned and began to nod, punctuating his words. "No, I mean Lieutenant Tucker. His wife." At her confused expression, he continued: "Hoshi?"

"Of course! Lieutenant Tucker," she mumbled, her eyebrows climbing into her hairline. In their own reality, she was at least passively aware that her friend had feelings for their chief engineer, but she was struggling to comprehend where they could have found the time to get married. Really, was there anything else this universe could throw at them right now?

"Are you alright, Elizabeth? You look a little flushed. Let me just…" He removed his medical tricorder from his pocket and began to move it towards her. Without thinking, she smacked it away, for fear that he would somehow be able to tell she was an imposter in their universe.

"I'm sorry, Doctor. I'm due in the wardroom." She turned and fled the room, not bothering to look back at him even as he encouraged her to take it easy and get a little extra rest tonight.

Liz rushed towards the lift, her head down, studying the screen of her personal PADD she'd tucked away in her back pocket. She first turned to her direct messages and confirmed what she'd feared: Taxa, Singh, Kov, the Captain she knew...all gone. Quickly, she opened a new channel with Trip and Travis.

Something's wrong. Phlox isn't assigned to Enterprise anymore. Our new brigade is missing from my contacts. I just saw Crewman Taylor in the hallway.

They were both typing frantically, trying to get their messages out at once.

Apparently I haven't corresponded with the Horizon in over three years, Travis said.

Unless I miss my guess, we're at war with the Andorians right now at least, and maybe the Coridanites. It's hard to tell. Jon's not being too specific, Trip informed them.

I'm on my way. Be there in a minute.

Anything else you'd like to tell us, Cutler? Maybe that the sky is falling or we're about to be sucked into a black hole?

I wouldn't be surprised at this point, Travis admitted.

Yeah, you're married. To Hoshi. Congrats.

A few seconds later, she burst into the wardroom, taking in the sight of her partners in crime and Lieutenant Commander Reed sitting around the table. At the far end of the room, Archer stood in front of a massive map of the sector which was littered with troop movements and ship positions. He glanced up at her as she took a seat, saying, "Nice of you to join us, Lieutenant."

She suddenly felt like she was a kid again being called into the principal's office. "I hope I didn't miss anything important," she declared, glancing over to Malcolm. "It's great to see you're getting over your cold, sir."

Across the table, Trip cleared his throat and looked away, while Travis just looked at her with wide eyes, utterly incredulous. Liz instantly decided it was probably best for her to stop talking for the time being.

"My cold?"

"Sir, what were you saying about the Columbia?" Travis said loudly before anyone could put much thought into her statement.

Seemingly undeterred, Archer gestured towards the screen to a familiar section of the Beta Quadrant the three of them knew like the back of their hands. "She, the Phoenix, and the Cochrane are still dogfighting their way through the Expanse. If Captain Hernandez's reports are to be believed, they're hot on the trail. They've made contact with the builder of the first weapon and are currently trying the diplomatic approach. If it works, we might just be recalled to help."

"I've been hearing stories about this section of space, sir. There's sub-space anomalies everywhere. The rules of physics don't seem to apply there. If we're going to be of any help to them, we ought to leave this sector now to make it there in plenty of time," Reed asserted.

"I tend to agree, Malcolm, but Admiral Forrest seems to think we've done enough."

"It's been almost two years," He protested from across the room.

"It doesn't matter," Archer stated plaintively, his tone saturated with regret. "I think we all know by now that there's some mistakes you can't come back from."

"We were just trying to help-"

"We almost found ourselves on the other side of the war. As much as I disagree with them, Starfleet Command has made it clear that our place is here, on the diplomatic front lines. It may not be exciting, it may not be anything to write home about, but it's keeping us alive." He punctuated his remark by bringing his hand down onto the table hard, causing Liz to flinch slightly.

"We can't do much with the Vulcans keeping us in the dark like this."

"Which is why we have to make do with the information that we have. I know Shran's allies are still out there, and with any luck, we can convince them to stop associating with these people before things get out of hand."

"You mean before they come after Earth?"

"Yes, Lieutenant Commander," he ground out, his frustration evident in his voice. Archer paused and rubbed at his eyes, and for a split second, they could all see how weary and demoralized he was. When he spoke again, his voice was much quieter, more measured. "That's exactly what I mean."

"Bridge to the Captain."

Archer reacted as though he'd been stung, crossing the room in three long strides to answer the comm. "Go ahead."

"We're reading a Denobulan ship approaching on long-range sensors. It's the Caileph, sir. They're eight minutes away, and Captain Taxa is hailing."

The group descended into silence. Though she could feel Travis and Trip's eyes on her, Liz didn't dare look up. The tension in the room was weighty, palpable.

Archer bowed his head, looking down at his feet. He seemed to be breathing hard. Suddenly he pitched forward, punching his fist into the wall. "Son of a bitch!"

The assembled senior officers jumped in their seats and looked towards him, immeasurably concerned. Only Reed seemed to be disaffected by his reaction.

He hit the comm once again. "All hands, this is the Captain. Prepare to be boarded by Denobulan inspection teams. Give them your full cooperation. Let's get this over with."

Almost as one, they rose and rushed onto the bridge, relieving their seconds as they made their way to their stations.

Hutchison didn't so much as glance in his direction as he vacated the navigator's seat. He appeared harried, nervous, thoroughly beaten down, which was perfectly at odds with his usual upbeat demeanor. Glancing down at his console, Travis confirmed, "ETA seven minutes, Captain."

A moment too late, Trip realized he should probably be in engineering. Out of habit, he'd approached the conn around the side of the science station to stand by Archer's side, and startled at the sensation of someone grabbing his arm.

His gaze drifted downwards to the delicate, well manicured hand, the wedding band, the Lieutenant's pips, then to the face of none other than Hoshi Tucker, their communications officer, his wife. He smiled, somewhat weakly.

"I'm glad you're safe," she whispered, then turned back to her instruments. "She's hailing again, sir."

"On screen."

Alira sat front and center on the bridge of the Caileph, her hands posed on the armrests, her legs crossed, her expression the very image of imperiousness. She wore the traditional uniform of the Denobulan Infantry, the mottled gray jacket and trousers, with white piping across the shoulders and a white turtleneck that peeked its way out of the sleeves and neckline. A variety of tiny silvery medals traversed either side of her jacket's zipper, and her hair was pulled back severely, tied halfway up at the nape of her neck. Behind her, the crewmen were moving quickly about the bridge, careful not to touch one another, tending to the bronze consoles set on platforms behind her.

"I see the Vulcans sent along their welcome party."

"Captain Archer," she began, and her usual dazzling smile returned, if just for a second. "How long has it been? Two weeks? Maybe three?"

"Not long enough."

She narrowed her eyes, and the same smile was transformed into one of disdain. "You know the drill. Order your officers to stand down. Cooperate, and perhaps we won't have any issues this time."

The transmission was cut, and it was only a matter of seconds before Liz's console began to light up. "We're reading Denobulan biosigns on Decks E, C, and…"

Before she could finish her statement, Alira appeared in a whirlwind of light, flanked by three guards carrying phase rifles. They moved away quickly, standing in the far corners of the room. Briefly, Liz made eye contact with her, praying to find any trace of her half-daughter, the good friend and loyal officer she knew, but found none.

She turned on her heels, surveying the room, then barked, "On your feet!"

They complied, even Archer.

"The Captain's on the bridge," she said with a hint of laughter in her voice, then approached the navigation station. Liz breathed a sigh of relief that she didn't seem too interested in her at the moment.

Travis didn't turn to look at her, but he could feel her hand resting on the small of his back, snaking up and curling around his shoulder. She stepped closer than ever would have been appropriate in any sort of professional situation, bringing his lips to within a couple centimeters of his ear. "Mr. Mayweather, those course reports and projections?"

He glanced over his shoulder and found himself pinned down under her gaze. It was intense, utterly profound. She was looking at him like a lion would its next meal.

Suddenly he was fumbling around his station for a PADD, any PADD, one he prayed contained the information she was expecting. He had no idea what alternate-universe Travis had been up to in the hours before their crossing, but he was hoping he'd been prepared.

Out of blind intuition, he selected one and passed it into her hands. Her eyes lit up as she examined his work, nodding slowly. Finally, she delivered her verdict.

"There's a good man," she said, giving his bicep an appreciative squeeze as she turned and approached the communications station.

Hoshi was ready, holding three PADDs out in front of her, staring Taxa directly in the eye as she did so.

"Why is Miss Sato the only one that's ever prepared?" Alira asked rhetorically, glancing around the room. When she received no response, she returned her attention back to Hoshi, asking, "I trust there are no omissions this time?"

"None, ma'am." Trip studied her expression, her clenched jaw, her flared nostrils. She was angry.

"Excellent. It really is so tiring to catch you in these lies, again and again. And all these bureaucratic hoops I must jump through to report it…" She trailed off and shook her head, glancing towards Trip as she sauntered the tactical station.

This time, she set the PADDs aside and leaned over the console, sizing up her prey. "Mr. Reed."

"Captain Taxa. Always a pleasure," he grumbled in a way that confirmed that it most definitely wasn't.

"Likewise," she confirmed, and they could hear the smile in her voice. "Most of the time."

As unceremoniously as possible, he shoved the PADD into her line of sight, and she accepted it, her eyes dancing over the lines of their weapons manifest.

She scoffed and leaned forward a little more, so close that they could have touched foreheads. Her hand came out and she tapped one corner of the PADD into his chest. "Mr. Reed, I've told you before that you're good at a couple of things. Writing reports, unfortunately for you, is not one of them. Fix it."

She shoved it into his hands and approached the Captain's chair, sizing up Archer as she went. He finally interjected into the proceedings, taking a step towards her. The guards reacted, leveling their weapons, and he soon found himself staring down the barrels of three different rifles.

He took a step back and crossed his arms. "Do you ever get tired of harassing my crew?"

Alira appeared to think about this for a moment, then shook her head to indicate the negative, settling into the Captain's chair. "I quite like this one, Mr. Archer. You must send my engineers the specifications."

"That's Captain Archer to you," he admonished. "I'm wondering what we've done to warrant a second inspection this month."

"With your track record of collaboration with the Andorians, it certainly wouldn't hurt. We will be within striking distance of them over the next few days, and I know you're stupid enough to attempt another act of treason. If it's any comfort to you, your other ships would receive the same level of scrutiny."

"The incident in question was almost two years ago."

"All the same," she replied, her eyes widening, fingernails digging into the armrests. "I don't need to remind you that Administrator V'Las expects complete cooperation in this attempt to make peace with the enemy."

"The Andorians aren't the enemy, and you know it. It's their ally, this new species, these Xindi!"

This time, Trip glanced at Liz, who looked towards Travis, their expressions a mixture of panic and confusion.

"Tell that to the twenty million Denobulans that died at the hands of that weapon!" She shouted, rising from her seat and stepping well into Archer's personal space.

"A Xindi prototype!"

"A Xindi prototype guided by an Andorian ship!" She looked away for a split second, then her voice became lower, more treacherous. "We know they're planning something bigger. Please, for the sake of this alliance, go along with our attempts to make peace. You don't need to like it. You don't need to try and win the Andorians over to our side. They're a lost cause. Don't attempt any heroics, Mr. Archer."

"You and I both know that the time for diplomacy has passed. It's not going to work. We have to work as one," he paused, as if preparing himself for what he was about to say. "And you're one to lecture me about ethics. We all know how you earned this posting."

"I don't care for your insinuation. I'd rather you just come out and say what you mean."

"You're a murderer," Malcolm declared from across the room.

It was the first time Liz had seen a true scowl cross Alira's face, but in a second she had disengaged from the Captain and turned on him, slowly walking towards his station, her words punctuating every step. "I understand how you must feel about your friends, but those Andorian officers had to be put to death for their crimes against the people of Denobula. We had to root out all Xindi conspirators, a gambit which ultimately failed. Their influence was already too wide to be extinguished."

She paused and looked around the room, her smile back for a fraction of a second. "Truthfully, Mr. Reed, I only gave the order. But let's be perfectly clear, given the opportunity, I absolutely would have killed them with my bare hands."

Travis discovered that he'd been clenching the top of his chair with his hands and released his grip, feeling the blood roaring in his ears. He was horrified by what he'd just heard, and was hurriedly trying to connect the dots in his mind. Did this mean the Xindi mission never happened? That the Xindi had convinced the Andorians that humans were the greatest threat to both their worlds? That the prototype never destroyed Florida? That their loyal and steadfast security officer had given the order to kill?

Somewhere in the room, a comm chimed, and Alira answered it, effectively breaking the tension in the room.

"We've completed our inspection, Captain. There's no traces of Andorian biosigns, weapons, or communications on the ship."

She turned on Archer. "You see, that wasn't so hard, was it?"

A snap of her fingers was all it took for her guards to return to her side. Her gaze drifted over the bridge staff, making eye contact with each of them, before delivering her final warning: "Your vessel will be under constant surveillance during these negotiations. Expect immediate retribution if you make a move. You can confirm for yourselves that our phase weapons are presently online and aimed at your critical systems."

The second she was gone, Hoshi pitched forward, propping her elbows on her console and burying her face in her hands. She was breathing hard, shaking like a leaf, and when she spoke, it almost sounded like she was about to cry. "Sir, I was so terrified she was going to find-"

"See to it that she doesn't, Lieutenant. I'm expecting another inspection before we get underway. Add another layer of encryption if you have to."

Before any of them could say anything, Archer disappeared into his ready room, plunging the bridge into silence.

---

The rest of the duty shift passed by in a blur, as least for Liz and Travis. Their alternate universe counterparts had seemingly had their way with their consoles, leaving what they could access an indecipherable mess. Liz spent the next few hours trying to look busy, trying to steel her expression, trying to slow her racing pulse.

Finally she dared to pull out her PADD and venture into the personnel database, making the one inquiry she'd been dreading.

She typed in the four letters and hit enter, then selected the single result. And there it was spelled out in pixels, unavoidable, unchangeable.

T'Pol, Sub-Commander: KIA 12 October 2151.

Something about that date sounded familiar. Accessing her personal logs, and silently thanking the powers that be that her parallel hadn't thought to change her access codes, she discovered why: it was the date of their first attempt at a diplomatic mission with Coridan, when Archer and T'Pol had been captured by an anti-government rebel faction. That had been a notable day for the fact that Hoshi had called her down to the bridge and asked her to modify the sensors so they were able to scan for human and Vulcan biosigns across a larger area; it was one of the first times her expertise had been called upon during a mission, and had a measurable impact on the outcome. She'd been proud of it. She'd told Phlox about it over dinner that evening. She'd written home to her parents about it.

Her personal logs made no mention of how the Captain, her friend, had died, or under what circumstances their away mission had gone so horribly wrong. She prayed she had nothing to do with it.

She sent the link to her partners in crime, watching out of the corner of her eye as Travis shook his head. A moment later, he replied: Already looked. My logs mentioned that Captain Sopek was killed too, but not much more than that.

Trip was next. Mine's a little more detailed, apparently we met up with Shran and managed to break out the hostages. When the Vulcans blasted into the building, part of the roof collapsed. The shootout was a lot more crazy than I remember. Seems like Shran shot Sopek in the firefight, and the Captain died of her injuries.

Travis's fingers were dancing over the screen, his brows furrowed with concern. When he found what he was looking for, he sat back in his chair and heaved a massive sigh. Looks like Shran was killed by Lieutenant Tarah on Paan Mokar. Archer never was able to get him to speak to Ambassador Soval. The Vulcans declared war on the Andorians a couple weeks after that.

I'm looking at an old all points bulletin sent out by the ECS warning freighters to avoid traveling near Andorian space. They've been taking pot shots at our ships, believing we were supplying the Vulcan war effort, for the past few years. According to this, they've also taken out several communications relays and transports.

And the Horizon?

As she watched, Travis's shoulders visibly drooped. Haven't looked yet. Afraid of what I might find.

Trip's next message arrived quickly. I'm getting a transmission. Let's meet in my quarters at 1900 hours. There's a lot of history we need to catch up on.

Better be mine, Liz said, you've got a wife now.

Across the ship and several decks down, Trip realized she was right. His gaze shifted from the PADD back to his computer display, then back to the PADD. He threw it down and made a lap around his office, wringing his hands, deep in thought. Finally, he closed the blinds and returned to his seat, studying the words on the screen with disbelief.

INCOMING VIDEO TRANSMISSION. TUCKER, ELIZABETH. PANAMA CITY, FLORIDA, UNITED EARTH.

His hand hovered over the button for an endless moment, seemingly frozen in time as the memories washed over him. He remembered the last time he'd hugged his sister and how the top of her head had fit right underneath his chin. He remembered hearing about her big move back to their hometown, and teasing her about all the male attention she was sure to get. He remembered writing to her almost weekly at the start of their mission, their correspondence becoming less and less frequent as time went on. He remembered hearing that Florida had been hit, visiting the scorched patch of earth he'd once called home, learning that she'd been declared dead in absentia because there was nothing left to be buried, and breaking down in front of T'Pol months later when the weight of the situation finally came crashing down on him. He remembered his baby sister vividly. And now he was about to see her in the flesh.

He should have expected it with what they'd learned so far. He should have known, because Cutler had seen Crewman Taylor in the turbolift. He should have been able to hold it together when he opened the transmission, but instead, he began to tear up almost instantly.

"Trip? What's wrong?"

She was exactly how he remembered her, the long blonde hair with a fringe of bangs, hazel eyes, and the trademark Tucker crooked smile. She sat in her apartment, the same one she'd sent him a video tour of when she moved in, with the curtains thrown open behind her, flooding the room with the Florida sun. And what's more, she was alive.

"Nothing's wrong, Lizzie. I missed you, that's all."

She frowned. "I guess it's been a couple of weeks. I meant to call earlier, but what with the honeymoon-"

"Honeymoon?"

"Yeah, did you get my pictures from the wedding? I'm sorry you weren't able to make it, but don't worry, mom and dad understand. Aunt Tracey mighta been a little upset, but she'll get over it."

Trip laughed and dabbed at his eyes with his sleeve. "I'm sorry I wasn't there. I'm so happy for you, Lizzie. You looked beautiful in your dress."

As a matter of fact, he hadn't seen the pictures, but he was sure it was true.

"You think so? It might have been a little shotgun, but-" She rose from her chair and cupped her stomach; she looked like she was due any day now. "Albert's wife told me a bump always looks elegant in white."

He could see in his mind's eye, their older brother's better half fussing over her and fixing her hair, probably leading the procession as her maid of honor. He wished he'd been there.

"They're really lucky," he said, referring to her spouse, whoever that might be.

"You should have seen Mason's face. Mom snapped a picture right as I entered the church. It's been a whirlwind, Trip. I can't believe I met him just a year and a half ago."

He'd spent years wondering what might have been if the Xindi hadn't launched their probe on Earth when they did, and now he knew. Under the table, he clutched his stomach, fighting a sudden wave of grief that threatened to overwhelm him.

"You know what they say, Lizzie. When it's meant to be-"

"And it really was," she interrupted with a smile. "Enough about me, though. How are you? I hear y'all are preparing to make a truce. It's all over the news."

Truthfully, he wasn't sure how he was. Or rather, how his alternate universe counterpart was. So he settled for a very noncommittal: "I've been better. I'm losing sleep over this mission for sure."

"And how's Hoshi?"

"The same. You'll probably be getting a letter from her soon. Archer's got her working hard on the UT ahead of these negotiations."

"Tell her I'm looking forward to it." She paused, looking beyond the camera, gesturing to someone behind it. When she glanced back at him, she looked rushed, but incredibly apologetic. "I'm sorry, Trip. I've got to go. Mason's made us reservations at that restaurant down by the waterfront, the one we celebrated dad's fiftieth at-"

"Bucky's?"

"Yessir. Home of the singing waiters, with the giant woodchuck statue out front. I'll take some pictures for you! It's a hoot and a half."

He wanted to beg her not to go, to talk with him a little longer, but knew it was a lost cause. This wasn't his reality, and this wasn't his Elizabeth. But all the same-

"You two have fun." He paused, fighting the emotion which threatened to overwhelm him. "I love you, sis. Always will."

"Love you too, Trip. I'll talk to you soon." She smiled and ended the transmission.

She had no idea how incorrect that statement was. He sighed, which sounded incredibly loud in the formidable silence of his office. A moment later, the tears began to fall, and he let them, burying his face in his hands.

---

At a touch past 1900 hours, Travis swept into Cutler's quarters, finding her and Trip already bent to their research. It had taken a hot minute to find them; before moving in with Phlox, Liz had lived with a roommate in the non-comm block, but in this timeline, it appeared that she'd been commissioned for the past few years. He eventually found her in what had always been T'Pol's quarters, the ones reserved for the chief science officer, just a few doors down from the turbolift.

As he entered, Liz looked up at him, her eyes wide with concern. She offered him the PADD she'd been looking at, urging him, "Travis, look at this."

What he saw there was unmistakable. A news article from the archives, dated November 2152, declared: UNITED EARTH DECLARES WAR ON THE ANDORIAN EMPIRE AND THE CORIDANITE PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT, JOINING THE SIDE OF THE VULCANS. STANCE OF PRESUMED ALLIES UNKNOWN.

"Just a month after Shran was killed, and the Vulcans made their move on Paan Mokar. It was more than just taking pot shots at ECS freighters, Travis. They destroyed over a dozen of them, mostly the ones carrying ore, but some civilian transports. Most of our mining establishments-Utopia Colony, Orpheus, Europa Station, Pluto Depot-they're all gone."

"You might want to sit down," Trip advised, and he complied, suspecting he already knew what they were about to tell him.

Liz rolled her chair over to the side of the bed and took his hand, explaining, "The deciding factor to go to war came with the third or fourth freighter. They weren't just attacked, they were hunted, all the way through an ion storm and an asteroid belt. They sent out a distress call, but no one could get there fast enough. They got cornered between two warships, and the Andorians decided to make an example out of them. No one survived. I'm so sorry, Travis."

She didn't even have to say the name of the vessel. He suddenly understood why he hadn't heard from his family in three years. He looked away, then back down at his hand, which Liz was squeezing hard. He met her gaze, and saw that there were tears in her eyes. He suspected the incident report had been much more graphic than she'd let on, but for now he didn't want to know.

Travis didn't realize he was crying until Liz rose from her seat and wrapped her arms around him. A second later, Trip had crossed the room and grasped his shoulder, before doing away with all pretense and mirroring her gesture.

It seemed like an eternity that they remained there, drawing strength from one another, before Trip dared to speak: "This isn't our reality, Travis. Your family is still alive. We're going to get out of here."

"But will things even be the same when we get back? Do we know?"

Liz shook her head and disengaged from their embrace slowly, continuing to scroll through her notes. "According to this, while the Andorians took the side of the Coridanite rebels, Enterprise mounted one last attack to try and reinstate the government and maintain our access to their dilithium mines. This made us targets. They assumed we were supplying the Vulcans for their war effort, and they were right."

"What about the weapon? Did the Xindi not send their probe?"

"It doesn't look like it." Trip set his PADD aside. "Say that you're the Xindi. You've been told by the Sphere Builders that in the future humans are going to destroy your home world. But then you see they're engaged in a bloody war with a species you've never heard of, a war of attrition, heavy losses on both sides. What do you do?"

"Bide my time," he mumbled, taking deep breaths in an attempt to steady himself.

"Exactly. You don't bother with the probe, because if you send it, you give the humans an entire year's notice to prepare and hunt you down. You start work on the prototype of the big one. In our timeline, that's the one Shran tried to steal to gain leverage against the Vulcans. But this time, you reach out to the Andorians. You've got a common enemy. You ask them which planet in this sector is most similar to Earth, in terms of size, specific gravity, land features, because you want to test your weapon without letting your real target know. What would the Andorians say?"

He thought for a moment before delivering his verdict: "Teerza Prime." The Horizon had run freight there dozens of times during his childhood, and he had fond memories of visiting the capital city, running, playing, enjoying the hospitality of the people there. The people were-

"The largest Denobulan colony outside of their homeworld. Twenty million inhabitants." Liz turned her PADD towards him so he could see the picture attached to the encyclopedic entry, the debris that had once been a habitable planet. "It was destroyed in December 2153. The atmosphere was incinerated instantly, the seas were vaporized, and it ushered in a near-nuclear winter. You'll remember from our conversations in the mess hall who has family that lives there."

Alira. "Her mother's third husband and a younger sister."

"Two sisters. Both under twenty years old. Too young to leave home." Trip came around to sit next to him. "The Denobulans were considered allies of the Vulcans even though they'd been maintaining their neutrality on paper, but they were considered too weak to fight back. The Infantry mobilized immediately, acting on intelligence that Andorian ships had been seen escorting the weapon as far as two light years from their system. They managed to assemble enough firepower that they could have wiped out the entire moon the Andorians call home."

"They would have, if the Andorians hadn't been ready for them when they arrived. If I missed my guess, this was around the time we received a message from the future. It looks like Archer warned them about the Xindi's intentions, contacting Lieutenant Tholos directly. He used to serve under Shran, he figured he would be on our side. He needed to tell them that they had to break off their alliance immediately to avoid the complete destruction of their homeworld," Liz continued.

"And that's where our Captain Taxa earned her stripes. Her men killed just about every single ranking Imperial Guard officer during that battle, anyone who could have had the power to order the attack on Teerza Prime. The humans haven't been trusted since. Enterprise got recalled from the front lines, and while the new NXes have been running around the Expanse trying to track down the Xindi, we've been here. Watching and waiting."

"Why aren't the Vulcans helping us?"

Trip shrugged. "Unless I miss my guess, it's because they see us as expendable. The Vulcans seem like the real superpower on this side of the alliance. The Denobulans aren't even authorized to enter the Expanse even though they were the ones attacked; they've got some of the most advanced warp engines and weapons in the quadrant, but their economy and armed forces have been severely disrupted. Knowing what we know from our timeline, it seems like the Vulcans are trying to make humans and Denobulans dependent on them."

"Administrator V'Las has got to be behind that."

"Probably. In this universe, Jon and T'Pol's entire desert field trip to find the Kir'Shara never happened. He's more powerful than ever. Who knows what he's planning, honestly." Trip acknowledged, fully unaware of the plot to reunify Vulcan and Romulus.

For the past couple of minutes, Liz had been completely silent, studying her PADD with rapturous intention, eyes wide. Travis reached for her, but she leaned away from his touch, swiveling around to face the wall.

Finally, she reacted, slamming her PADD onto the table, crying, "That's it!"

Both men reacted with a start and leaned back. The empty space was soon replaced as Liz gestured wildly, trying desperately to explain what she'd found. "The two of you took introductory quantum mechanics at STC, right?"

Travis shook his head, while Trip admitted sheepishly, "It was an elective. I went for exobiology."

She waved them off dismissively. "Have you ever heard of a quantum fissure?"

Again, they indicated the negative. She rose to her feet and began to pace the room.

"It's a fixed point in space where you can pass into any number of realities. Every choice we make, there's another universe where we made a different choice, and so on for every subsequent choice we make, until we reach an infinite number of quantum universes. Anything that could happen does, whether it's a worst case scenario or not, just in a different reality." She turned to them and pointed to Travis. "It's possible that your modifications to our impulse engines caused space-time to tear slightly, allowing us to pass into this parallel universe. We're emitting a different quantum signature than everything around us right now. It's incredible, I've only read about this in theory, but now that I think about it, it's really obvious."

Yeah, really obvious. Trip really only understood about half of what she said, but he thought he got the gist. "Where did the three of us from this universe go? Why did we wind up in this one and not one closer to our own reality? Why did-"

"I'm a generalist, Commander, not a specialist. You're free to ask Crewman Carvalho about it when we get back," she said, referring to their resident theoretical physicist.

"How do we even get back in the first place?" Travis asked.

"It's far from certain, but I think an inverse warp field would do it, and still be able to seal the fissure behind us. We'd have to fly right back through the way we came."

"Shuttlepod One doesn't have a warp engine," Trip reminded her.

"I know that," Liz admitted, somewhat defeated, leaning against the porthole on the opposite end of the room. "We're going to need some help."

"From who?"

There was a moment of weighty silence, then Trip rummaged around in his pocket, producing a small, copper colored device.

"Is that-"

"A Denobulan communicator. I paid a visit to Malcolm's office right before I came down here, just trying to see what information I could dig up. He stepped out of the room for a minute, and I spotted this in a drawer." He turned it this way and that, studying the blinking red light set in the slender end. "It seems that we're not the only ones keeping a secret."

"Where did he get that? Do you think he's trying to betray the Captain?"

"Where do you think?" Trip asked incredulously.

Travis shook his head. "There's no way. No way. Malcolm's never been one to mix business with pleasure, and I can't imagine him doing that in this universe."

"They say you should always keep your friends close, and your enemies closer," Liz reminded him, "especially when both sides have something to gain from it."

"Why would Taxa even help us anyway? She doesn't trust any of us as far as she can throw us." Travis was sure he didn't need to remind them that the Caileph's entire arsenal was trained at them as they spoke.

"Think about it. What's the one thing that we know from our universe that no one here does, not our own ships, and definitely not the Denobulans?"

"The location of Azati Prime and the Xindi Council planet," Travis said automatically, and immediately his eyes lit up with realization. "We can't do that, sir. It'll change the course of history in this timeline."

"Right now, I don't give a damn about what happens in this timeline. Maybe Jon would have tried to fix things out here for everyone, but all I care about right now is us getting back to our own universe." He paused, seemingly conflicted, his expression constantly shifting between determination and introspection. "Maybe one day there's going to be a list of rules we have to follow for this kind of situation, but right now we have to think on our feet. We're going to need another backup plan, Liz, and Travis, if she agrees, you're going to need to tear out of this shuttlebay like a bat out of hell. My primary concern is the safety of this crew, and it's always going to be."

Maybe he was right, and things were going to spiral towards disaster in this universe no matter what they did, but he wanted to believe there was still a chance to save all of their lives. It was a moral dilemma he'd never encountered before. He looked towards Liz for support.

"Travis, there's millions of timelines out there. Maybe billions. It's possible that this one never was going to have a good outcome," she reasoned, though she also looked unsure. "I'm sure there's thousands of timelines where the Denobulans found the superweapon first, and a few where they worked together with us to get the job done. This one just isn't one of them."

He sighed, training his gaze at the floor. The room was silent for a long time while he mentally dissected the situation, their next move, their alternatives. Then he reached for the communicator, saying, "Give me that."

"Why you?" Liz questioned. "I'm more than willing to-"

"She showed some-" He shook his head, looking for a way to describe what had happened during the inspection. "-interest in me earlier."

"How can we be sure she's going to be open to helping us?"

"There's only one way to know for sure." Gesturing for them to be quiet, he flipped open the communicator and whispered into the unknown: "Mayweather to Taxa."

The response was almost instantaneous. She sounded amused. "Mr. Mayweather! What a welcome surprise!"

He wasn't sure what to say next, and the random hand motions Liz and Trip were making to try and get their points across weren't helping. So he settled for a vague: "I was hoping to see you tonight."

This time, she laughed, though they weren't sure why. "Very well. Prepare for site to site transport."

Travis stood, tossing the communicator through the air to Trip, who caught it with one hand.

"Good luck out there." Liz mumbled, halfway expecting her companion to return with a phaser wound or missing a limb.

"Am I going to need it?"

Trip ignored his question. "Remember, whatever you do, don't let her know we're from-"

He disappeared behind a column of light before he could finish his sentence, leaving Trip and Liz alone in her quarters.

It was some time before either of them spoke again. Liz returned to her desk chair and sat across from him. "Sir, do you think we're going to get out of this?"

"We are if we can help it," he assured her, and was prepared to discuss their backup plans when the comm went off.

"Tucker to Tucker."

He slapped the button immediately. "Tucker here."

There was a pause, then Hoshi asked: "Are you coming to bed at some point?"

Trip reached for his PADD and activated the screen, noticing with surprise that it was very close to midnight. He realized how this must look to his wife. If the computer had found him here, she must know he was in another woman's quarters, way past a respectable hour, and alone with her.

"I'll be there in just a minute." He ended the transmission and began to gather his personal effects. "Message Travis. Let him know if he gets an answer to send it to you. I don't want to risk Hoshi answering the comm by mistake."

"Can do."

Trip hesitated at the door, looking back at her and her empty quarters. "Are you going to be okay tonight?"

Liz suddenly realized that she'd been sharing quarters with the Doctor for almost three years, ever since shortly after their mission to rescue three geologists from Xantoras. She was used to falling asleep cuddled up to her own personal space heater, and waking up in the middle of the night to find him puttering around their quarters or gone altogether, working on some theory in sickbay. She hadn't understood how much she enjoyed their ritual until it was no longer an option.

"I'll be fine," she replied, but knew that probably wasn't the case. "I'll be standing by the comm."

He nodded and stepped into the hallway, leaving her alone in a nearly empty room.

---

Trip arrived to his quarters in record time, but the moment he stepped up to the door, he paused, resting his hand on the frame.

He was coming home to his wife. His wife, that only earlier in the day, he'd considered one of his oldest and closest friends. His wife, who he'd attended movie nights with, gone on away missions with, been to hell and back with. He'd be lying if he said he never thought about Hoshi in that way; she was beautiful, smart, and funny, and in the early days of their mission, he was sure there might have been a chance for them.

Hell, he'd even pretended she was his wife in front of the Ferengis when they'd boarded the ship. And it had rolled off his tongue pretty easily, but he hadn't put much thought into it. In fact, he hadn't put much thought into their relationship since things started getting serious with T'Pol during the beginning of the Xindi mission, when most of his waking hours were consumed with thoughts of retribution and his sister. But recently, and even more so now, he found himself thinking about her more and more.

Subconsciously, as though he was unaware of his actions, he found himself entering his access code and stepping over the threshold, finding his bedroom curiously empty.

"Trip?" He heard her voice coming from the direction of the bathroom, and she suddenly appeared, dressed for bed in one of his old tee shirts and a pair of shorts. The look in her eyes, one of pure affection, made his heart skip a beat.

She bounded over to him and threw her arms around his neck, kissing him soundly. For a moment it felt like the room was spinning and he almost broke it off, before leaning into her and kissing her back, surprised by how natural it all felt. The butterflies in his stomach were there, as if he was finally making his move on a longtime crush, and in a manner of speaking, he was.

Hoshi pulled away and smiled, standing on her tiptoes to kiss him on the bridge of his nose. "I missed you today. What have you been up to?"

The way she said it, amusement mixed with a little suspicion, made him think she was a little irritated with him. He began to unload the contents of his pockets onto his desk, assuring her, "Hoshi, honestly, it's not what it looks like-"

She shook her head and retreated to the mirror, where she retrieved her brush and began to work through the tangles in her hair. "Come on, Trip, you know I trust you completely. You need your rest, though. Dr. Lucas has been getting onto you about your sleep habits for months."

Thank God. He bent over and began to remove his boots. "Engineering's been a zoo the past couple of days. I can't help if they need me. Liz was just giving me her opinion on some warp coil modifications."

A second later she was laughing, setting her brush aside, turning to face him. "You don't need to convince me! I know you were working. Besides, her and Travis are kind of a packaged deal these days, aren't they?"

Liz and Travis were together in this alternate reality? That was something he was going to keep to himself.

"She never stops talking about him," he said, shimmying out of his coveralls. Hoshi approached him, but at the last second turned, extended her arms out to either side, and fell face first onto the bed. "Rough day?"

Hoshi sighed dramatically and rolled onto her side to look at him just as he slipped his undershirt off. Involuntarily, Trip froze, feeling somewhat embarrassed.

"Go on, it's nothing that I haven't seen before," she reminded him as he hurriedly changed into his pajamas, trying his best to ignore the appreciative way she was looking at him. "I really thought Captain Taxa was going to find that transmission we sent to the Imperial Council earlier this week. I buried it under ten terabytes of subspace communications, but their scans get closer and closer to breaking the encryption every single time."

"Hopefully after peace is declared, we won't have reason to go behind their backs anymore," he called out from the bathroom, noticing how her toiletries were mixed up with his in the medicine cabinet, and how their toothbrushes shared the same cup on top of the sink.

"Do you really think so?" Her reply sounded distant, far away. "We just need them to understand that we've all got the same enemy, and that's the Xindi. We need to find out what they're planning before they-"

He emerged from the bathroom to find her already tucked underneath the covers on the right side of the bed, her hand poised over the light switch above her head. "I don't want to think about the Xindi right now," he declared, and he meant it.

The lights went out, descending the room into darkness. Gingerly, he felt his way over to the bed and joined her, feeling her cuddle up to him and lay her head on his chest.

"What do you want to talk about, then?"

He began to stroke her back in small circles, relishing the feeling of her relaxing into him. "Hoshi, how long have we been together?" He was genuinely curious.

"Must have been right after you and the Captain escaped from Canamar. I was so terrified that I was going to lose you. When you came back, I knew I had to make my move. You know I'm not in the business of wasting time."

About two years then. He looked down at her and met her gaze, taking in her smile, her beautiful eyes, the way she was looking at him as if he was the only person in the world. He wondered if she could ever love him this much in his own reality. "You're never going to lose me, Hoshi. I'll always be there for you."

"That's what you said in your vows," she reminded him. "I worry sometimes. This war could continue for years. Nothing's certain for either of us."

"Hey," he whispered insistently, "The Captain's doing his best. We're going to sign this treaty, and it's going to be okay." He knew in his heart, though, that the only way the encounter could end was in disaster.

She looked doubtful, pulling away for a second to look at him. Soon, she was nodding, trying her best to put on a brave face. "Well, we might not know what's going to happen tomorrow, but I love you, Trip."

"I love you too," he replied automatically, shocked by how naturally those words came out of his mouth. "To the moon and back."

"Which one?"

"Any of them. Take your pick."

She laughed softly and leaned forward to embrace him again, this time with intensity. Soon she'd rolled over and straddled him, pressing him into the pillow to deepen the kiss. At first Trip reciprocated, his lips leaving hers and trailing down her neck, finding a sensitive spot along her collarbone. His heart was racing, a problem that was only made worse when her hand made its way underneath his shirt, drifting lower and lower…

This was wrong. Hoshi was his wife, but he wasn't her husband, no matter how much he wanted to be in that moment. Carefully, he seized her hand, whispering, "It's been a long day."

She looked a little disappointed, but moved to one side and lay on her back, staring up at the ceiling. He mumbled his apologies, but she insisted it was alright: "Don't worry about it, honey. Sweet dreams."

Trip waited for her to settle down, then turned to one side facing away from her. Almost immediately, he felt her snuggling up against him, wrapping an arm around his midsection and squeezing slightly.

In the darkness, he whispered: "What are you doing?"

"You love being little spoon," she said plaintively, and damned if she wasn't right.

He fell asleep quickly, wrapped in the arms of the woman he loved.

At least in that timeline.

---

On the other end of the site to site transport, Travis found himself in a great room, massive by the terms by which starship quarters were considered.

The lights were low, but a copious amount of candles were scattered about the room on various tables and shelves. Denobulan cultural iconography, some of which he recognized from sickbay, dotted the walls, interspersed with family photographs. A trail of furniture across the space led into a full sized bed which looked like it hadn't been touched in weeks, and in the middle of the room, lounging on a chaise with a drink in her hand, was Captain Taxa.

She'd removed her jacket at some point in the evening; in the low light, he could see it draped over the back of the couch, along with her personal PADD and communicator. It was hard to believe this was the same woman who he'd had dinner with almost every day for five months, the same one who always took him up on his invitations to play basketball, the same one he'd watched slowly folding herself into the social order of the crew.

She took notice of him and sat up, gesturing for him to join her. "Mr. Mayweather, please, sit down. Would you care for a drink?"

"Not right now, thank you," he replied politely and began to approach her slowly, for a moment understanding why Lieutenant Commander Reed was so captivated by her. She was beautiful, almost frighteningly so, and her electric blue eyes seemed to stare down to the depths of his soul.

The moment he settled into the couch, she moved closer to him, getting much farther into his personal space than he would have been comfortable with. She began to trace the curve of his cheek with a feather light touch, moving down across his chest and shoulders. "I think you should know that you're not the first person from your vessel to be sent here to get information on the Vulcans by any means necessary."

"This isn't about the Vulcans."

"Oh?" She touched his chin with two fingers and turned it, forcing him to look at her. He realized she was breathing deeply, inhaling his scent in a way that seemed incredibly intimate. "What is it about then?"

"We need your help. I'm prepared to do you a favor."

"And I'm prepared to do you a lot of favors, Mr. Mayweather." Her hand strayed to the zipper on his coveralls, her gaze never once leaving his. "Provided that's the direction you want to go."

He seized her hand and squeezed it hard. "I don't think so."

She pulled away roughly, and though the smile never left her lips, she leaned back and nonchalantly draped her arms to either side across the back of the couch, looking as confident as ever. "Go on."

"Several of us on the Enterprise…" He trailed off, trying to formulate a way for him to explain their situation without revealing they were from another reality. "We've discovered a spatial anomaly that will allow us to travel great distances in milliseconds. We've been ordered to deliver intelligence to the Columbia in the Expanse, but we need an inverse warp field to force us through."

"Why not use your own warp engines if it's so important?"

Did the woman ever blink? She continued to stare him down even as she took another sip of her drink, making him feel incredibly nervous.

"Enterprise doesn't go fast enough to activate the anomaly, and our shuttlepods don't have warp engines at all. I understand your ship can reach warp six-point-five."

"Six-point-eight," she corrected him with a wink, "On a good day."

"A speed only second to the Coridanites," he marveled.

"I think you'll find the Caileph is second to none, Mr. Mayweather. What I'm not understanding-" She shifted slightly, rolling up the arms to her white turtleneck, then leaned forward into his personal space once again. "-Is what's in it for me."

"We're prepared to give you two possible locations for a weapon the Xindi are building. It's said to be much more powerful than the last one."

Something indecipherable rushed across her expression, gone in an instant. "Why two? Are we not confident?"

"It's based on the latest intelligence, Captain," he assured her. And not on a wild guess made from what had happened in a previous timeline. "I think it's a shame that the Vulcans aren't allowing the Denobulans into the Expanse after what happened."

"Likewise. Although, I'm afraid I can't help you. I don't know why you ever thought I would."

Travis sighed, closing his eyes momentarily. It was time to go for broke. "Because you don't want peace nearly as much as you let on. You're driven by loss and the need for revenge. You think about it every single day, and with your current assignment of chasing United Earth ships all over the quadrant, you don't think you're ever going to right these wrongs."

Her eyes widened and her nostrils flared. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see her gripping the top of the couch so hard her knuckles were turning white. When she spoke, she was having trouble keeping the emotion out of her voice. "I don't know what you think you know about me, but I can assure you that's not true."

"I know that you're the oldest of nine, the firstborn of either of your parents. You were named after your great-grandmother, one of the first colonizers of Teerza Prime. Your mother is a professor of quantum optics. Her two youngest daughters and her third husband were living on the surface when the Xindi attacked. Do you remember?"

The stricken look on her face told her everything he needed to know. She stood and rushed across the room to the window, and he pursued. "Your father was General Taxa, who was the Supreme Commander of the Denobulan Infantry up until about fifteen years ago. You could have gone by just your first name, but you keep his name added on because you're very proud of that fact. He took you out on patrols all the time, and some of your fondest memories are making model ships with him at the kitchen table. You remember what he called you, don't you?"

She shook her head and screwed her eyes shut, striking the window so hard with her fist he feared it would shatter.

"Li-Li. Little star. Bet no one's called you that in fifteen years." Everything he'd told her was information she'd told them all freely in her early days on board in the other timeline or they'd only just pieced together in Liz's quarters, except for the final bombshell, which he'd picked up from Phlox.

Suddenly she whirled on him, seizing him by the lapels and nearly lifting him off the ground with strength he hadn't known she'd possessed. Her eyes were burning with fury, and when she spoke, it was low, gravely, dangerous. "Who are you?"

He knew better than to reply, feeling at the same time that he'd taken it too far and yet just far enough. "You're not from around here, are you? Why are you here?"

The implication in her tone didn't escape him. "I'm here to give you the chance to make things right. I can't promise you how it's going to end, but you'll get a shot at revenge."

She released him suddenly, looking at him like he had three heads. "What's going to stop me from using your anomaly to get me very far away from this place?"

"If it doesn't show up on our sensors, it won't show up on yours. And because you're not a coward, Captain Taxa." He had no idea if his Alira was capable of such atrocities in their reality, but there was one thing he knew was intrinsically her. "You'll face your doom, or your success head on."

She turned away from him for one endless moment, shoulders hunched over, trying to catch her breath. He could practically see the gears turning in her head, and when she turned back to him, he was surprised to see a hint of her previous confidence in her expression. "When will we receive this information?"

"The second we're in the wake of your inverse broad-spectrum warp field. You'll see a shuttlepod leave during the negotiations tomorrow morning. Follow us and await our signal."

She nodded. "Do not try to deceive me. My weapons are still locked on the Enterprise, and if you leave without fulfilling your end of the deal, I will give the order to fire."

"We're not your enemy, ma'am. I think you've always known that."

---

That next morning, Trip found himself falling into step behind Hoshi as she gave a quick briefing to Archer on the status of the truce negotiations.

"The Andorians are being represented by Captain Namara, she's no friend of ours, but her second might be. I recommend you talk to him first."

"Are they still denying their involvement with the bombardment of Teerza Prime?"

"And their alliance with the Xindi, though we have intelligence that proves otherwise. It's important not to bring that up. Follow Forrest's lead, go for the peace angle at whatever cost. We have to convince them to stand down."

"And the Vulcans?" Archer stepped into the turbolift and the two of them followed close behind.

"The Seleya arrived a few hours ago. Soval would like to speak to Forrest before we begin so we can get out stories straight."

"See what you can do."

"Yes, sir. I believe that the leader of the rebel faction will be joining us representing the Coridanites, so that means we're just missing the-"

"Mayweather to Lieutenant Tucker."

Hoshi reached out and hit the comm. "Tucker here."

"The Alveron just dropped out of warp. General Vesena and Ambassador Lexora are requesting permission to come aboard."

"Stand by, helm." She cut the transmission and glanced towards Archer. "The Denobulans. That's everyone."

"Isn't the General related to Captain Taxa somehow?"

"I think so. Stepmother, or something like that."

Half-mother, he wanted to correct them, but he kept his mouth shut.

"Hopefully she's not as difficult," Archer mumbled, and Hoshi agreed.

The doors opened and deposited them onto A Deck. Turning to his comm officer, he said, "Lieutenant, go down to the transporter pad and start welcoming our guests. Bring a security team with you just in case anyone decides to try anything."

She nodded and moved off quickly, leaving the two men alone in the corridor. Jon met his gaze and glanced towards his ready room, nonverbally asking him to join him.

"Hard to believe this war could end today," Trip mused as Archer poured them both a drink of what he hoped was the hardest liquor in his inventory.

"It probably won't," Archer argued, "Even if we get a truce hammered out, the Xindi are unlikely to stop developing their weapon. They don't care about the Andorians. They just want to have a distraction while they lay waste to the entire damn quadrant."

They clinked their glasses together and drank. Trip brought his down on the table with a satisfying thump. "So we're not giving up trying to reach the Andorians?"

"We can't give up," Archer insisted, turning and approaching the window, just as he'd seen him do a hundred times before. "I know Shran's allies are still out there. He couldn't have been the only one. We've got to join forces if we want to defeat the Xindi."

Trip nodded contemplatively, joining him at the window. Off their bow, he could make out the phase cannon turrets of the Alveron, the rich red hull of the Seleya, the Coridanite transport, and a half dozen Andorian battle cruisers, seemingly blocking their way back to the quantum fissure. He experienced a wave of panic that he could not suppress.

"Do you ever wish she was still here?" The words left his lips before he could stop them.

Archer recoiled from the window, turning away from him. He finally set his glass down and sat in his desk chair, his expression dour. "Every single day," he began, "Not a day goes by when I don't think about how things could have been different."

"It would have been easier to communicate with the Vulcans for sure."

He momentarily dropped his face into his hands, rubbing his forehead, before looking back up at him. "Do you know what her last words were?"

Trip was stunned. He didn't know what to say.

"I was holding her in the rubble of that building, we were both trapped, I could hear the weapons fire all around but couldn't see it. She knew what was going to happen to her. She grabbed my hand and held it, and she whispered, 'Jonathan, stop this war.'"

"Sir, I-"

"And I couldn't even do that!" He cried in frustration, in grief, in despair.

"You did what you thought was right." He was sure that was true, but his decision to warn the Andorians of the Denobulans' impending attack and the Xindi's intentions had effectively removed them from the front lines and greatly decreased their chances of finding the Xindi weapon in time. It was shocking, truly terrifying, how history had been altered with one choice. "And you've got the chance to at least end the attacks on our mining facilities and our freighters, to wrap things up with a nice bow on it. If you want my advice, I'd say don't waste it."

A moment later the comm sounded, letting them know that most of the delegates were assembled. Archer stood, straightening his uniform, steeling his expression. "Are you ready for this, Trip?"

"Ready as I'll ever be," he mumbled, and the two of them entered the hallway.

Halfway to the wardroom, they passed Lieutenants Mayweather and Cutler, doing a poor job of looking natural as they stood outside the bridge. They locked eyes, and Trip excused himself under the pretense of helping them solve a docking issue with the Coridanite shuttle. He nodded at Archer's insistence that he not take too long, and the moment he entered the wardroom, the three of them began to double time it towards the turbolift.

"Everyone got everyone they came here with? Pretty sure we can't leave anything behind," he said once the doors had closed behind them, thinking of the time Malcolm had left his communicator behind on the pre-warp planet.

"Yessir. Everything's exactly where I left it in my quarters. Pretty sure my counterpart won't even know that someone's been there," Liz replied.

"Is Taxa standing by, Travis?"

He held up the Denobulan communicator between his thumb and forefinger. "As soon as an hour ago, she was ready to go."

The doors opened and they stepped onto E Deck, hurrying towards the shuttlebay. "How did you convince her?"

He grimaced. "You don't want to know."

Liz looked back on him as they thundered down the walkway. "That bad, huh?"

"Nothing I wouldn't tell Malcolm," he assured her.

Moments later, they were opening the hatch to Shuttlepod One and beginning the ignition sequence. Liz fired up the long range sensors and quickly arrived at the same conclusion Trip had just moments ago. She implemented a new course correction and passed it off to Travis, who hurriedly input it into the computer.

"How long is it going to take for us to reach the quantum fissure?" Trip asked from the back of the pod, where he was battening down the hatches and conducting the fastest pre-flight check known to man.

"Ten minutes, give or take," Travis called out from the helm. "Assuming the Andorians don't shoot us down first."

The bay doors came open beneath them and the pod shifted, nearly causing Trip to fall into them. "And how long is it going to stay open?"

"That depends," Liz replied somewhat vaguely.

"I'm gonna need you to be more specific than that, Lieutenant."

"We know the general area the fissure is in, but we won't see it until the Caileph's warp field lights it up. There's also no way to hold it open, so it could be a matter of seconds," she explained, clinging onto the console for dear life as Travis accelerated into open space.

"Is there any way we could widen that time frame?"

"Sir, I can't change the laws of physics."

"Sure would be great if you could," he mumbled.

"You know, Travis, this pod could use some seatbelts," Liz said plainly, as if they weren't currently in mortal danger, as if the hull wasn't vibrating so hard that she was starting to fear they were going to fly apart.

He scoffed and leaned into the controls. "I'll get on it the second we get back."

Seconds later, they were being hailed by the Enterprise. Trip's hands hovered over the comm, but he didn't press it, listening to Hoshi say, "Unauthorized shuttle departure, please return to the bay immediately, or we will be forced to-"

There was a rush of muffled conversation on the other end of the line, then she changed her tactics entirely. She sounded distressed. "Trip, what are you doing? You need to come back. You need to-"

He hit the mute button and surged forward towards the viewing window, where they were quickly approaching the Andorian ships. They soon received a hail from the Kumari, but ignored it, rocketing across their bow and through a narrow gap in their formation.

"Mayweather to Taxa."

"Taxa here."

"We're three minutes away. Proceed to the rendezvous point."

"Right behind you." Their proximity sensors lit up, detecting motion from two different directions, and Travis immediately shifted into evasive maneuvers, sending Trip tumbling into the wall.

"One of the Andorian ships has broken off. They're arming weapons." Liz reported, bringing the phase cannons online without prompting.

"They're moving into the Caileph's path. I think they mean to-"

The hull was rocked by the reverberation of weapons fire nearby, followed by an echo of returned fire. Immediately, Travis knew the chances of their truce was shot to hell. "Taxa, what's going on?"

"The Undali means to challenge us. A momentary setback. We've been delayed by about thirty seconds."

"Acknowledged. The second we disappear, you need to jump to warp and get out of here."

"Already ahead of you. There are four more cruisers meeting us two light years outside of the Expanse."

"Sounds like you've already got a plan. Stand by for coordinates. Godspeed, Caileph."

There was a pause, wherein he suspected the UT was trying to find the Denobulan equivalent of that idiom. Finally, she replied: "Ten seconds to inverse warp field ignition. Walk with the light, Mr. Mayweather."

"I'd hold onto something if I were you," he advised, watching out of the corner of his eye as Liz transmitted the location of Azati Prime and the Xindi Council world. They were coming around the curve of Coridan II with their co-conspirators hot on their trail; the second the gravity of the planet began to tug on them, the Caileph's engines stalled and the quantum fissure ignited from a single point in space. The viewscreen was flooded with bright blue light, effectively blinding them. Liz pointed out an ion trail originating from the center and urged Travis to follow it, as the lights in the pod grew brighter and brighter.

"How do we know we'll wind up back in our universe?" Trip had to yell to be heard over the roar of the engine.

"We don't!"

"What?!" Trip and Travis shouted at once, but before they could probe further into that, the pod was filled with dozens of copies of the three of them, walking around the pod, leaning against the chairs, fiddling with instruments on the walls.

A second later, they vanished, and the light retreated, causing them to slide out of the last quarter of the turn into open space. Travis quickly regained control of the pod and brought them to a complete stop, and the three of them sat in silence for one endless moment, trying to catch their breath.

Finally, Trip endeavored to ask the question they were all thinking about: "Where are we?"

"Exactly where we were before. And the quantum signature of the planet-" Liz's fingers danced over her tricorder, and they waited with bated breath. "Matches the one of the pod."

"Oh, thank God," Travis sighed, leaning back in his chair, clutching his chest.

Trip took a different approach, sliding down to the floor and laying on his back, staring up at the ceiling. "So let me get this straight. This whole time, you had no idea if we would return to our own timeline, and let us go ahead with the plan anyway. Did I get that right, Lieutenant?"

"Quantum physics isn't an exact science, sir."

"It's a science, it's right in the word!"

"I had a hunch we'd wind up right where we were last, but didn't know for sure. I'm glad it worked out."

"And all those copies of us we saw walking around the pod?"

"More alternate universe versions of us, probably also trying to get home. I think that if we'd tried to go through at warp speed, we would have been scattered into multiple different realities-"

"Stop!" He cried. "I don't wanna know any more."

The comm sounded and Travis reached for it, hesitating for a second. But then he hit the button, and they were all relieved to hear Ensign Singh on the other end of the line.

"Shuttlepod One, are you alright?"

"Yes, why do you ask?"

Liz couldn't help herself. She started to laugh, covering her mouth with her hands, all of the tension that had been building up in her body over the past day dissipating in an instant.

"You disappeared from our sensors for approximately four seconds." This voice sounded echoey and far away, as if someone was talking to them from across the room, and was punctuated by a rather loud sneeze. "Where did you go?"

"Ensign Taxa, I've never been so glad to hear your voice." Trip called out from his position on the floor.

"Four seconds?" Travis whispered, looking towards Liz. "We were gone for nearly-"

"Heisenberg's uncertainty principle," she interrupted. "We could have reappeared a couple days before or after we passed through the fissure."

"Of course." He rolled his eyes and activated the comm again. "If we told you where we went, you probably wouldn't believe us."

"Try me." It was the Commodore. "You're free to approach, Shuttlepod One."

"Please report directly to the wardroom for a debriefing," the Captain added, and ended the transmission.

"Yes, ma'am," Travis said to no one in particular, and turned the pod to reveal the Enterprise far off in the distance, their amazing, glorious, perfectly normal Enterprise.

"I don't know about you, but I've never been so excited to sit in a meeting in my life." Liz remarked, watching as the hull grew closer and closer. As an afterthought, she glanced back and informed her CO, "You're probably good to get off the floor now, sir."

Trip waved his hand dismissively and sighed, draping an arm across his eyes. For the past day, he'd been running continuously on adrenaline, and he was quite enjoying the comedown. "I'm good, thanks."

---

A few days later, Hoshi found herself lingering outside engineering, deep in thought, trying to talk herself down from the precipice. She'd just finished reading the away team's report; it had come across her desk on its way to be transmitted to Starfleet Command, and she couldn't help herself. She was curious. Even if her friends seemed somewhat traumatized by what had happened and were still reluctant to talk about it, she had to know.

She had been shocked to read about how one away mission gone wrong had destabilized the entire quadrant and led to an interstellar war, how the Xindi were manipulating the Andorians in their continued pursuit to destroy Earth, the atrocities her good friend Alira had been so willing to commit, and the how the High Command seemed to have both the humans and the Denobulans under their thumb. There was no way to understate it. That parallel universe sounded like hell.

Apparently, there had been a great deal of discussion as to whether they'd done the right thing by altering the timeline in order to get back home, but under Liz and the Captain's analysis that there were millions or perhaps billions of timelines out there, the threat of a reprimand hadn't held up well. Hoshi wasn't sure about that; it seemed like a cheap way to avoid the inevitability of consequence, and she didn't like to think about all the people who could be suffering as a result of their actions. But then again, there was no way of knowing how the Caileph's mission would turn out.

As far as they knew.

There had been multiple parts of the report that had thrown her for a loop, not in the least being her marital status. She understood why Trip hadn't wanted to bring it up with her, and she knew that no one outside of the senior officers knew the contents of the report, but that didn't stop her from feeling self-conscious as she made her way down to engineering. It felt like everyone was staring at her, that everyone knew that her thoughts were racing and her heart was pounding.

Before she could stop herself, she burst into the room, avoiding eye contact with everyone, and made a beeline to Trip's office. Through the accordion blinds, she could barely make out him sitting at his desk, studying the display on his computer console. She hit the comm but entered a fraction of a second later, catching him by surprise.

"Hey," she began somewhat awkwardly, shifting from foot to foot. "I thought I might find you here."

"In my office?" He leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms, giving her that crooked smile, the one that always made her heart flutter.

She sighed and gestured to the chair set in front of his desk. "Um...yeah. May I?"

"Please," he said, "Do I have any letters from home?"

"Not today, we're still a couple days from Echo Nine. I do have Lieutenant Mayweather's official transfer confirmation signed off by Admiral Gardner." She placed the PADD on the end of the table and slid it down to him.

"Finally. Did you get a chance to read his transfer request before he sent it off?"

She shook her head.

"Apparently he admires my grace under pressure and is looking forward to serving with me." Trip slid the PADD into a drawer and closed it with a satisfying snap.

"After reading that report, I say that's an understatement."

He pulled an odd sort of pained expression, but it was gone immediately. Trip leaned forward across the desk, trying to appear nonchalant. "You should have been there in that first debriefing when the Captain asked us if we still wanted to participate in that Coridan Trans-Stellar Exhibitional Rally. I've never said no faster in my life."

In spite of her situation, she laughed. "And you should have seen Liz prepping her sensor logs from traveling through the quantum fissure to send back to her alma mater. That woman's probably gonna win a Nobel Prize."

"Well, if anything comes out of our shared traumatic experience, I'm glad it's that," he replied with a hint of sarcasm in his voice. "Speaking of which, have you decided which way you're going to go?"

She studied his expression, the quiet anticipation, the unspoken longing. She thought about how long they'd danced around the subject, chalking up the tension between them to their close friendship. She thought about their alternate universe counterparts, and of the best advice she'd ever received: Go after what you want, because the worst people could ever do is say no.

"Look, Trip, I'm not in the business of wasting time." She watched as he visibly recoiled, and briefly considered aborting the mission entirely. She had no way of knowing that this was what her parallel had said to him of their early relationship as they lay in bed together on the other Enterprise. "I've been dropping plenty of hints, and I just want to make one thing abundantly clear. We've been friends for years, but I think there could be something more there. I don't want to lose an opportunity to find out what that might be. If you feel the same way, and you'll have me as your comm officer, I'd love to come over to the Maelstrom."

He seemed flustered, shifting uncomfortably in his seat and avoiding eye contact with her. All the while, she was silently willing him to say something, anything, until he finally spoke: "I just don't know how we'll explain this to the Captain."

"I already talked to her, just before I came down here. She's happy to have Ensign Singh."

"You-" He shook his head. "I'm sorry, you what?"

"She understands the situation!" She threw up her hands in frustration. "What the hell did you think she was going to say? 'Absolutely not, you stay away from my ex-boyfriend?' Trip, she just wants you to be happy!"

Trip looked stricken, like he was still trying to process this information. Hoshi continued to babble. "You know, I really didn't think too hard about it until we were both infected with that silicon-based virus and trapped in decon together. We talked for hours, and it was amazing. And then you stopped me from opening that airlock and I was half out of it, but I distinctly remember feeling your arms around me and thinking, hey, this isn't so bad, I wish we weren't already on death's door!"

She stood and began to pace the room, gesturing wildly, all the emotions she'd not dared to verbalize for months rushing out in waves. "You made me feel safe, Trip! You always have! You make me feel like everything's okay even when the ship is shaking apart around us. You're one of the smartest people I know, and you tell the best stories. You make me laugh. And if our counterparts proved anything, it's that this could work, we just need to give it a try!"

"Hoshi, I'm sorry, I-"

Tears were beginning to sting her eyes, and she looked down, desperately trying to blink them away. "If you want this, just say the word, I'll stay here for as long as it takes for us to talk things out and figure out what this relationship is going to look like. Otherwise, I'll leave right now, and never mention it again. It's your choice." She paused, taking a deep breath, but heard nothing. The silence was soul crushing. She reached for the door controls and hit the switch, causing it to slide open, exposing her to the normal hustle and bustle of engineering.

"Hoshi," he called out, and there was something in her voice that gave her pause. Glancing over her shoulder, Hoshi could see that Trip was standing behind his desk with a smile on his face, arms outstretched, beckoning her to come to him. What he said next was exactly what she hoped to hear.

"Close the door."

End of Episode Eight

---

Next time on Enterprise...

Episode Nine: The Arena

The Enterprise arrives at Tellar Prime for the last stop of their diplomatic mission. Enterprise's new first officer joins the crew. T'Pol comes face to face with the enemy, and Trip tries to not cause a political incident.