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]

14. Episode 14: Persistence of Memory

A/N: Welcome back! Thank you all for your comments, feedback, and support. Still don't own anything you recognize; this is just for fun.

This chapter is inspired by TNG 5x15 Power Play. We get some backstory for Ethan and Julia; our engineers are next. We get more background on the accident that killed Alira's father, with more to come later as we discover exactly what happened. Our 20th century culture fest continues, but we can blame Hoshi for it this time. All I'm saying is that we were robbed by not seeing more canon Vulcan and Denobulan reactions to movie night.

There's some slight Lower Decks references in here, because I couldn't help myself! Particularly the senior vs junior staff reactions to a crisis.

With the Solnarans, I wanted to give humanity a counterpart where the roles they played in their early collaboration with the Vulcans were reversed. It may help to go back and read the beginning of E9: The Arena, where Erika gave the initial briefing. And in case you're wondering, yes, Simon (who shares the same secret as Malira, though Malcolm doesn't know it), the Corsettis, Lord Senath, the attack on Kandar, and Captain Hernandez's visit are all related. Somehow. We'll get to that soon...

By the way, I wanted to let you all know that I'm close to finishing writing this season and I'm already planning a season six. We're going all the way through the war!

Next time, we get our first epic, sprawling space and land battle of the season. Shran returns too. Get hyped!

Season Five

Episode Fourteen: Persistence of Memory

The frozen tundra of Calder IV was rugged, asperous, utterly inhospitable.

The away team beamed down in the wake of a snowstorm; great swaths of the mountainside were covered in fresh drifts of white powder, skirting the rocks in concentric rings down to the ground, which was entirely unseen from their height. The air was thin up there, so each wore an oxygen mask underneath their cold weather gear; however, the wind was howling so fiercely it threatened to steal their breath away anyway.

They'd swept into the system only hours before and all but crashed into the docking berths at the research station at Calder II, responding to an emergency correspondence from the scientists that they'd noticed a pod-like craft dart across their sensors, simply a blip of statistical noise across subspace. That is, if they hadn't known any better.

There they met a very dour-looking Vulcan, apparently a Ministry of Security operative in league with Captain V'Nara, who informed them that the cloak signature matched that of the neural telepresence unit that attacked the Saral.

It had been enough for them to burst into action.

The power readings from the vessel were faint at best, and kept moving around with all the interference in the atmosphere. Twice they'd followed a red herring and nearly gotten lost while traversing the wintry landscape, until their lead lost his navigation privileges, which we duly passed onto the ranking officer. Together they passed a frozen stream cutting through a pass dotted with coniferous trees, a shockingly blue lake inlaid in a nearly silent valley, and more than a couple of squirrel-like creatures with meter-long tails and a single, cycloptic eye.

They at last reached the summit of what seemed to be the tallest mountain in the range; someone called out to their companions, barely audible around their mask, that they were within a hundred meters of the craft. The three of them split up and clambered unsteadily over the rocks, pausing after every step to ensure purchase between the spikes on their boots and the ground.

One continued straight forward while their companions went left and right, almost immediately descending into a crag-like fold in the mountainside. Shade overtook them, and they squinted, grateful for a momentary reprieve from the blinding sunlight glinting off the snow.

A few more steps and they laid eyes on the broken and breached hull, completely shattered but still smoldering, simultaneously what they most desired and most feared. A hand came up, wrestling with a scarf tied around the lower half of the face. A wisp of blonde hair came into view, followed by two striking blue eyes.

Taking a deep breath, Alira pulled her oxygen mask to one side and shouted, "Commander! It's over here!"

Her breath instantly froze in midair and fell to the ground in a flurry of ice crystals.

Ethan Novakovich reached the crash sight first, stumbling over his last few steps and nearly slipping down the side of the peak. Alira caught him by the elbow and wrenched him backwards, almost causing them to collapse in a heap into the snow. He huffed and nodded his thanks, which was barely visible around his balaclava and goggles. Slowly approaching the pod, he reached into his pocket and fumbled for his tricorder, struggling to press the buttons with his heavily gloved hand.

"Be careful, Lieutenant," Julia shouted from a distance. "Remember what happened the last time our people got this close to a telepresence unit."

"I don't think this one's in any condition to steal me away," he replied, sinking down to his haunches. The cold was intense, and he was shivering, trembling, chilled to the bone. He wondered if the rest of the away team could hear his teeth chatter.

Alira reached for her phase pistol anyway, standing over him like a shadow. The unit was no longer than five meters with olive-colored hull plating, interspersed with round, hatched windows that she suspected were illuminated from within when main power was online. There were a few Romulan characters here and there, arranged in rows and columns. It was longer on one end, shaped a bit like a folded-over tadpole, with subspace transceivers protruding from one side. She'd read Trip and Malcolm's report from the Babel Crisis a thousand times over, and recognized it from visual sensors. It was a spitting image, but a fraction of the size.

It was exactly what they were looking for.

"Main computer's fried," Ethan reported, and her heart sank. He was shaking his head, not wanting to believe it, and kept scanning. Once fine motor control became too difficult, he slipped off his glove and flexed his hand experimentally, already feeling the cold settle into his joints. "Navigational control is intact. We'll know where they've been, where they were going, and where-"

Absentmindedly, he reached for a portion of the hull and touched it, only to feel a sudden jolt of electricity shoot up his arm. He inhaled sharply and keened over to one side, feeling Alira's hand rest protectively on his back.

She felt it too, a flash of current that was gone in a split second. Behind her, Julia saw her officers' reaction and took a step back, noticing how they recovered almost immediately.

"Are you-"

"I'm fine. Just a bit of static." Ethan frowned and stood with some difficulty. He gestured towards the oblong section of the craft. "We ought to tear out the computer core and take it with us. It's the only thing of value, and probably the only thing we can carry ourselves back to the rendezvous point."

Surely there was more than that. Commander Hammond reached for his tricorder and he obliged, passing it towards her.

The moment she made contact with it, a spark arced between their hands, almost imperceptible. She barely felt it at all.

In the excitement that followed of tearing the unit apart, she would soon forget all about it.

---

Enterprise Captain's Log, February 26th, 2156: We have arrived in the Solnaran system and are only a few hours from making second contact. It is evident that the local ruling body will have only two choices to prepare for the impending Romulan invasion: evacuate their people, or remain and fight with whatever defenses they have.

---

"I'm telling you, this morning I got up, went to the bathroom, opened the shower door, and-"

"Right there on the floor? Fangs and scales and everything?"

"Draxxan cloud vipers, four of them. Apparently they'd been molting and needed a warm environment. Not only did he scare the hell out of me, but he kept the water running overnight and used up our entire ration for the day." Lieutenant Cutler threw her hands up in frustration, then brought them down on the table. "If I'd known living with a doctor would be this terrifying, I never would have-"

"Sure you wouldn't," Malcolm interrupted, a knowing smile on his lips. Liz and Phlox had been inseparable since the first year of their mission, and were one of the few constants in their perpetually shifting crew complement. "In the grand scheme of things, is it really that difficult?"

She shook her head and turned towards the window, where the great sphere of Solnara III awaited them. It was enormous, imposing, though lush and edenlike, a vast majority of the land untouched and unpopulated. For some time before their briefing, they'd stood at the view port and admired it together, wondering what misadventures awaited them on the surface. They were both apprehensive, yet fleetingly hopeful, and continued their idle discussion as they waited for the Captain and the Commodore to make an appearance.

"I suppose not," she acquiesced, "Except when it comes to getting some rest."

"And how exactly does that work?"

She turned on her heels and propped her hands on her hips, regarding him with amusement. "Are you asking me how I share quarters with someone who doesn't sleep?"

He hesitated, then began to nod slowly. The question seemed overly familiar, and somewhat intrusive, but he was curious. He needed to know.

Perhaps for the future.

"Earplugs help. Sometimes I cue up white noise on my headset." She returned to the table and began to fiddle with her PADD, bringing up a geological survey of the surface that had occupied her team for the entire day prior. She paused and made a dismissive gesture with her hand. "Other nights I just kick him out."

Malcolm couldn't help but laugh at that. "And he doesn't take offense?"

"Why would he?"

He didn't have the opportunity to respond, for the next moment their COs were rushing into the wardroom, taking their seats at the head of the table. More often than not, they kept everyone waiting, though they were rarely late. This was an exception, and from their demeanor he could surmise they'd just gotten off a subspace conference with San Francisco.

The fact that they'd asked to meet without the rest of the senior staff, not even with Ensign Singh or one of her assistants, was incredibly telling.

"Go ahead, Lieutenant," T'Pol prompted, turning to face the view screen. They were presently looking at a cluster of photographs, taken during Captain Hernandez's first contact mission nearly two years ago. One of them particularly stirred Malcolm's memory: the away team standing with a cluster of Solnarans in the atrium of what he suspected to be a grand ballroom.

They were humanoid, though shorter than the average Terran, between four and five feet tall. They wore ruffled shirts and waistcoats and breeches tucked into tall boots. Some wore cloaks and medallions, but they were all smiling to an almost absurd degree, the joy with which they regarded their visitors almost palpable. He realized what had endeared them to him during that initial briefing in the first place.

They reminded him of hobbits.

He made a mental note to keep this observation to himself.

"As we know, the Solnarans are only recently warp capable. They achieved warp one by themselves, and with Columbia's help, they've been able to improve structural integrity and field containment. They hope to be able to pilot a mission to Sol in order to participate in Coalition talks by this time next year."

"A lofty goal," Malcolm mumbled, knowing from the report written by his counterpart that they had no weapons or defense systems to speak of.

Liz nodded and admitted, "We also know that they're only two hundred years out of a world war fought with dilithium weapons. Primitive, but devastating. It seems that their population was decimated several times over."

"How many are left, Lieutenant?"

"About one hundred thousand, from two different cultural groups. At the conclusion of the war, their militaries were disbanded and a provisional government was formed. These two factions are represented by two Lords at the helm of a council. We've got Lord Moberly-" She paused, gesturing towards the screen, where a distinguished gentleman with a face full of battle scars looked down at them. "-Representing the northern continent. They initiated the war when the southern continent infringed upon their territory."

"That's where the proposed dilithium mining site is," Archer noted, studying the schematic of the planet that appeared in that next moment.

"Yes, sir. As such, we're going to have to play by their rules. We'll be hosted in the southern capital city by Lord Senath." He was a much younger man, with a twinkle in his eye and a prodigious smile. "I can almost guarantee he's going to be more receptive to our proposals. He's the one that convinced the planetary council to enter into business with the Corsettis."

"Speaking of which-"

"They're expecting us, ma'am. When I left the bridge, Ensign Singh had just managed to contact them. The sooner the better, apparently." The transmission she overheard had been brief, curtailed, and deliberately vague. It was enough to set her ill at ease.

Archer nodded in agreement. "As soon as we can get down there, we can start bringing their equipment down. They'll need all the help they can get if they want to stay and defend."

"Assuming that's the conclusion they reach," T'Pol said firmly, knowing full well the Solnarans stood no chance of holding their ground. They only had one vessel in orbit, an unarmed patrol, and it would take every United Earth ship in the sector to even make a dent in the Romulan arsenal. For the past few days, she'd been anticipating death and destruction, blood and utter devastation, and she was already convinced it was all too imminent.

"It's the only plausible one," he replied, his tone affecting a note of frustration. Try as he might, even though he was privy to a majority of her thoughts, Jonathan couldn't understand why his bondmate seemed to think that evacuation was a viable option, or that leaving the previously untapped dilithium supply rife for the taking was an acceptable strategic move. Though he treasured and respected her input, he was the absolute authority on the operations of the fleet, and he wasn't budging on this.

He soon realized his science and tactical officers were looking at one another across the table, unsure how to proceed. It was rare that their COs fought, truly argued, so the state of peace in the wardroom was all the more tenuous.

He didn't have the chance to break the silence, to assuage their concerns, for a second later the hatch opened, producing Ensign Pascal.

Simon took one step towards them and paused, noting the tension in the room, then treated them to his trademark disarming smile. Malcolm turned in his chair to look at him, noticing that he'd slung a duffel bag over his shoulder, and his belt was loaded down with his phase pistol, tricorder, and communicator. That could only mean one thing, and he dearly hoped he wasn't right.

"Can we help you, Ensign?"

He didn't mean for it to sound so rude, at least outwardly, but he could see that he was undeterred. "Ready to go when you are, sir. Shuttlepod One is prepped and idling."

Though he didn't move his upper body, he met Cutler's gaze from across the table, and could see that her expression was nothing short of incredulous. Surely the Captain wasn't thinking about bringing him along, after he'd all but begged her not to tell him about the hybrid plot under the hunch that he couldn't be trusted. He'd had a rocky start with the senior staff, particularly Liz, who still hadn't forgiven him for telling her she was ready for a promotion to wife following Feezal's untimely death at Kandar. Though a majority of the crew loved him, respected him, cherished his company, Malcolm was almost sure he had something to hide.

Before he could even ask, the Captain explained, "Lord Senath has asked for assistance in training their pilots ahead of their mission to Sol." And they will need all the help they can get if we are to evacuate, she added silently, much to Archer's chagrin.

"Ma'am, I don't think-"

"My decision is final, Mr. Reed," she affirmed and stood, causing a ripple of reactions around the room. "Be prepared for departure on the hour."

---

That evening, the crew of the Maelstrom assembled in the mess hall for movie night.

Figuring the crew could benefit from watching an uplifting story for a change, Hoshi completely vetoed Trip's selection, deciding on The Sound of Music. Word traveled fast; those who had seen it declared it couldn't be missed, though some warned of its length, so many off-duty personnel had shown up in their pajamas, carrying blankets and snacks.

Yuris and Alira were there to continue their tradition, which they hadn't missed since their first week aboard. They usually sat in the back so they could talk, a bowl of popcorn placed on the chair between them as they curiously studied that week's marvel of human culture. The two of them continued to bond over being the only non-humans aboard, much like Captain T'Pol and her half-father had during the early days of Enterprise's first mission.

The doctor and the tactical officer weren't a perfect match of wits; in fact, they probably couldn't have been more different, in temperament and life experience. Privately, she found him sullen and irritable, and he found her exhaustingly positive, but they were friends nonetheless, a relationship forged partly out of necessity and a little bit of affinity.

"I don't know about you, but I'm looking forward to this. It's not everyday you get to see such a realistic depiction of early twentieth century Earth," Alira said, nestling her water bottle underneath her chair and making a mental note not to inadvertently kick it over. Ensign Lisbon had topped her off with a dry riesling clandestinely from the third row; she passed it forward and received it full only a minute later, catching his eye and giving him a thumbs up.

Yuris crossed his arms, and the ghost of a frown darted across his lips. "The 1930s were an interlude between two of the most violent periods in human history."

"I know that. I used to teach all three Terran world wars when I was tenured." Before she'd left behind her friends, her old life, and nearly everything else to pursue a career in the Infantry, that is. She used to encourage her students to make analogies to the deeply shameful Antaran Wars of the past, discuss the undercurrents of imperialism and intolerance therein, and then show them holo-images of their own prisoners of war, emaciated and thoroughly demoralized, and ask them if they thought any one species was superior enough to subjugate another like that. It was a difficult lecture every semester, but ultimately effective. "Doctor, even the Vulcans can agree that if we don't learn from our history, we're doomed to repeat it."

He acquiesced, nodding minutely, then turned his focus to the screen, where the opening credits were just begging to roll.

They soon were treated to a magnificent view of the Austrian Alps through the lens of a rather primitive camera, zooming over the mountains that looked much more hospitable than anything they'd encountered that day, interspersed with hills and dales and lovely grassy meadows. There was a river dotted with boats and entire villages along the shoreline, all saturated in rich technicolor.

The view shifted to a waving prairie over their protagonist, where Yuris very helpfully pointed out that he could hear the aircraft approaching overhead as the music kicked in. She shook her head and nudged him, encouraging him to pay attention.

Soon several more beautiful landscapes danced across the screen, melting into churches in the countryside and finally a grand old cathedral, steeped in history and veneration. A female choir was singing, and it reminded Alira of the time they'd gone to evensong at Westminster Abbey during leave.

It was Christmas Eve, and they were hours away from their own form of misadventure. As the sun began to set and outside the sky threatened snow, they had settled into a pew near the back and off to one side. Neither of them were religious, but they were separated far enough from the locals and the tourists to where he could lean in and point out the various aspects of the structure, the Gothic spires and columns, the intricately arched ceiling, the stained glass, the stalls set into the floor holding the remains of important Britons of antiquity, and far into the distance, the inner chambers of the choir, where they could hear people singing but could not see them.

Most of it had fallen onto deaf ears; she was fixated, utterly enthralled by the chorus, the Latin verse, the entire splendor of it all. The music seemed to ricochet around the rafters and filter into the heavens, and she was almost completely overcome by reverence, fighting an emotional response that didn't go unnoticed. Malcolm had asked if she was okay, if she wanted to leave, and she'd only responded by squeezing his hand and tucking her head into the crook of his neck, training her eyes skyward.

The movie continued with Yuris pointed out continuity or historical errors, filming mistakes, and poor dubbing along with the music. All the while he was munching on popcorn like a fiend, something that he did unconsciously, though voraciously, so much so that the beta shift steward had threatened to cut him off. He'd been completely bewildered by this remark, not believing that he'd allowed himself to consume such a large quantity of an unhealthy human snack, but continued his habit nonetheless.

As the protagonist explained to the Mother Abbess that one of the other nuns always made her kiss the floor after they had a disagreement, and that she'd taken to kissing the floor when she saw her coming just to save time, he said, "Perhaps this will help Captain Tucker and Commander Kelby resolve their continuing arguments."

She couldn't help but laugh, shifting in her seat to gain a view of the man in question. While Kelby never seemed to show up for these kinds of crew bonding events, Trip was sitting with Hoshi in the front row. As she watched, their comm officer leaned over and whispered something into his ear, which he was taken aback by, regarding her with consternation. Clearly, they'd had the same idea.

Later on, as their hero traipsed through the streets of Salzburg, singing about adventure and her new assignment and a frankly ludicrous amount of confidence, the person who'd been sitting in the row in front of her turned in profile to address them.

Like her, Ethan had spent all afternoon studying the telepresence unit, to little or mixed success. They were both boned tired but trying to hide it, and suffering under a persistent chill that had been following them since they returned from Calder IV. Alira was wearing two different sweatshirts over her civvies, but she was loath to admit it wasn't helping very much. She hadn't realized they were sitting so close together because he'd wrapped a blanket around his head, looking rather like a child hiding from a thunderstorm.

"Pay attention, Novakovich. This is exactly how the Captain expects us to show up to duty shifts from now on."

He scoffed. "That's pretty much exactly how you came aboard, Taxa."

She tilted her head to one side and frowned, though she wasn't able to maintain it for more than a couple of seconds. "That's funny, I remember something about simulated combat," she teased, reaching for a handful of popcorn and winking rather ostentatiously. "And tactics."

He laughed, shifting in his seat so he was facing them in profile and his feet jutted out into the aisle. She could see that he was wearing what appeared to be several pairs of socks underneath some comically large slippers. Before he replied, he took a moment and rubbed his legs together, shivering and settling further into his blanket. "Is it just me, or-"

"No. It's almost worse up here than it was on the surface."

This time, Yuris shushed them, holding one finger up and blowing strongly in a way that made Alira wonder where exactly he picked that up from. Rolling her eyes, she reached for her thermos and passed it to Ethan, who only had to take a whiff of its contents to understand her gesture. He took a rather long drink, much longer than would have been appropriate, and gave it back, causing her to swat him upside the head.

Minutes later, she and the doctor were experiencing Sixteen Going on Seventeen for the first time, finding they were experiencing mutual feelings of shock and dismay. Yuris leaned over until his lips were right next to her ear, and then asked, "Is this young woman aware that she's allowed to aspire to more?"

"She's in such a rush. I didn't even take a lover until I was almost forty," Alira replied with a grimace, then reached forward to get Ethan's attention again. When he looked back at her, she hissed, "Is this what passed for romance in the twentieth century?"

"Yes," he answered automatically, then frowned and made a noncommittal gesture with one hand. "No. It was a different time."

As if that explained anything. The two of them exchanged nearly identical skeptical looks and settled back into their seats, mentally preparing themselves for whatever other cultural oddities they were sure awaited them in the next two hours.

The rest of movie night seemed to fly by, filled with tree climbing (one of Alira's childhood pastimes, though the only trees back home were contained on nature preserves), puppet shows (the likes of which Yuris claimed were used to teach children about the life of Surak back on Vulcan-she made a mental note to investigate that further), and glittering party with well dressed attendees scattered across a golden ballroom. At some point, Ethan got up and vacated the mess hall as if in a trance, though she scarcely noticed it-she'd spotted the emotional undercurrent in the room rising like high tide.

The Mother Abbess was belting out some song about living the life one was born to live, to the rapt attention of their protagonist and nearly everyone in the room. Leaning forward slightly, she noticed Petty Officer Rostov sitting on the opposite end of their row, eyes wide, with his drink paused halfway to his mouth. His date was in a similar way, though she was sitting forward with her elbows on her knees, her hands covering her face. It was as if they were all temporarily frozen in time, and for nearly three minutes, a majority of the audience was close to tears.

She suddenly understood why Hoshi had chosen this particular film, for this particular crew, at this particular point in their mission.

The spell was quickly broken by a change in scenery, and everyone seemed to relax, gathering their composure or else hiding their emotion behind a flurry of hushed conversation. Even Yuris was shifting around in his seat and clearing his throat, devouring their popcorn at double the speed now. She chastised him, telling him that she'd already refilled their bowl three times, but that didn't deter him any, and he forged on with his feast.

Minutes later, the navy captain and the governess were embracing in the pavilion under an arbor of flowers, and she was singing about her wicked and miserable past and love that surmounted all. This time Yuris nudged her, having taken notice of the way she clutched her chest with one hand, breathing heavily, her eyes brimming with tears.

"I'm fine," she insisted, though the wavering of her voice betrayed the opposite. She reached into the bowl beside her and found it empty; thanking her lucky stars for the momentary diversion, she grabbed it and hurried to the back of the room, only to find the counter completely empty. It was clear the beta shift steward had already cleaned up and left for the evening.

It didn't matter. She swept into the galley and threw the bowl into the sink, leaning into it with both hands and exhaling slowly. After a few moments of relative silence, she allowed her gaze to drift up, centimeter by centimeter, until she was faced with her reflection in the mirror. It wasn't the same woman who had volunteered for this mission, nor the only who had so willingly become a part of a very human crew. In fact, it wasn't any woman she recognized, or cared to.

In her eyes she saw shame and solitude, desperation and a profound, overwhelming sadness. She didn't want to mislead or lie to anyone, least of all him, but it was time to face the situation for what it was.

In terms of her service with the Section, she was in too deep.

On the other side of the bulkhead, the family was singing at the festival, mere moments from being spirited away by agents of the Third Reich. She listened through their first song, wiping her tears on her sleeve, until the father began a reprise of an earlier ballad, trying and failing to make his way through the chorus with the depths of his own emotion.

When she'd first heard the song, she'd been taken with it, mostly because it reminded her of a flower which grew in the wild on back home, spurting up between the cracks in the sidewalk and sewer grates despite impossible odds. The Infantry tended to make analogies to it, telling new recruits that by the time they were done with them they'd be able to thrive even in the most inhospitable of conditions and the harshest of conflicts.

For the most part, they had been right.

Gradually, his wife joined in, followed by the children and the rest of the audience, until the music was so loud that she could hear it as if the speaker was stationed directly behind her. The volume boost was almost unnatural. Tilting her head to one side, she listened to the words, tapping her finger along to what should have been the tempo on the countertop.

Small and white, clean and bright, you look happy to meet me…

Something within her compelled her to move forward, with slow, careful steps, until she reached the swinging door which led into the mess hall. In the near complete darkness of the galley, she reached out and laid her hand on the hatch, watching out of the corner of her eye as her shadow was reluctant to follow. She paused, listening to the music slow down and distend, until it was repeating over and over again, almost entirely incomprehensible.

Blossom of snow, may you bloom and grow...bloom and grow...bloom and grow…

It was all wrong. The playback was skipping, and the crew was soon to notice and demand that someone fix it immediately, especially in such a climactic moment of the film. Suddenly desperate to remedy the problem, Alira burst into the mess hall, only to find the rows and columns of chairs before her completely empty.

It was as if a tactical alert had been called without her knowledge, and everyone had dropped everything to run to their stations. Blankets were slung across seatbacks, cups and snack bowls thrown haphazardly across the floor. On the screen, the projector kept repeating the same two seconds over and over, and the image of the family standing there began to warp, growing smaller and then larger, then shrinking to a pinprick size and disappearing altogether.

There was a moment of tense, overpowering silence, and then the exterior hatch slid open.

By that time, her heart was racing and was positively terrified at what she might find, but look she did, turning on her heels to face the nearly blinding light streaming in from the corridor.

Instantly, she came face to face with her youngest sister Dracil, dressed in her school uniform.

She did a double take, though she scarcely registered it, taking a step forward and extending her hand. As if on cue, a distinctly Denobulan grin spread across her features, and she started to enter the room, only to remember herself and stay exactly where she was. Alira stepped to one side and then the other, noticing how the light glimmered off the silvery buttons of her jacket, that she cast a shadow, that she seemed to be three-dimensional and very much real.

She hadn't visited Teerza Prime in nearly three years, and they couldn't have possibly been farther away from home.

It was impossible.

Alira slowly closed the distance between them, watching for a telling change in her reaction, but finding none. She kept telling herself that it was normal to hallucinate, that it was a normal way for her species to relieve stress, that it was usually an indication that another hibernation cycle was approaching. But she was still well over six months from her next one, and though she had been quite stressed lately, something wasn't adding up.

As soon as she was close enough to see the reflection of the corridor lights in her sister's eyes, she spoke up, asserting, "You're going to be late."

"Late for what?" Her own voice sounded stretched, distorted, as though she was speaking underwater.

"The wedding," she said matter-of-factly, then turned and dashed down the hall.

Without a second thought, Alira gave chase. The moment she stepped over the threshold, she was no longer on the Maelstrom, but back in their family compound in the capital, on the eighty-seventh floor overlooking the Supreme Council gardens. The walls all around her were a rich, textured red that set off the various portraits and pieces of iconography hung at odd intervals. They passed a window, catching a glimpse of a hovercar zipping past, and a dozen doorways, all shut tight. In her head, she began to list off the members of her family she knew lived there, her fifth paternal grandfather, her aunt's lovers, her young cousins.

Dracil began to run faster, at one point turning and skipping backwards, laughing, ignoring her questions about what was going on and where they were going. Soon they passed a more familiar section of the corridor, where Phlox and his first wife had lived for a time, then her old room, and then…

Her sister paused and stepped up to the wall, phasing through it and disappearing in an instant.

Alira stopped dead in her tracks, watching, listening to the clamor of the city all around them. Sure, she'd often hallucinated, a lingering sound or two, a fleeting image, but this was different.

It was like she was there.

She moved to the spot she vanished, sweeping her hand along the wall until her knuckles brushed against an access panel next to a door, an incredibly familiar room, one which she found occasion to visit time and time again.

Though she was shaking tremendously, she pressed forward, and the hatch opened to a barrage of memories.

There was the double bed, where she'd found herself repeatedly as a small child, fleeing from a nightmare or thunderstorm, only to be lulled back to sleep with loving words and a soft song. There was the chair laden with blankets where she'd been read story after story, only her favorites, until she practically had them memorized. There was the closet door slightly ajar, where she'd played dress up with her siblings, swathing themselves in relics from another time, another life. And sitting among all of it was her mother, a much younger woman, sitting in front of her vanity, weaving white flowers into her hair.

Small and white, clean and bright.

It was the day of her mother's second wedding, the day she was marrying Phlox, and she'd collected those same flowers from along the sidewalk on her walk home the day before. It was ceremonial, a tradition, and it was also one of the last family events she'd be present for, as she was about to move cross-continent with some friends to attend university.

As she took one more step forward, Feezal turned and smiled, beckoning her closer. She complied, only for the weight of her own grief to come collapsing down on her once again. Alira fell to her knees and pressed her face into her mother's lap as she began to weep.

"What's gotten into you, little one?" She sounded concerned, but she was stroking her hair and her back in small circles, attempting to coax an answer out of her.

Gasping, she looked up into her face, one not very much unlike her own, and found that she couldn't hold her curiosity for more than a moment. "Why did you do it, mother? Why did you go?"

She looked confused, then realization hit, and she shook her head. "I did it to protect you. I hope you will understand one day." With one hand, she seized her chin, tilting it up towards the mirror. "Sooner rather than later."

Alira was plainly taken aback by what she saw; rather than a shell of a broken woman, she saw herself as she appeared at twenty years old, tall, lanky, and awkward, with none of the strength and confidence her Infantry career would afford her later in life.

"Mother, what's happening to me?" She whispered, immediately realizing how foolish it was to seek answers from a figment of her imagination. The individual who she saw before her, the same one who had encouraged and molded and cherished her for so long, was no more and would never be again.

"Stop that. You're going to be just fine," Feezal replied firmly, pulling her up to her feet, moving over so she could take a seat next to her. It was a tight fit to say the least, and Alira was having trouble maintaining her composure, especially when she smelled her perfume, felt her warmth, sensed her affection. "Would it kill you to brush your hair every once in a while?"

She didn't wait for her to respond, seizing her comb from the table and starting to run it through from root to tip with impossible tenderness, a gesture which brought her back to another time and place. "And on such an important day. I hope you're ready."

She remembered.

As the oldest child of the bride, she was tasked with reciting the Rite of Devotion to their assembled guests, a rambling tome which was one of the most revered entries in their literary canon. It was a beautiful ode to love, love between spouses, love between family, love between friends, and it was expected that she would move the audience to tears. She'd practiced for weeks and weeks to mostly mixed results, and because she so desperately didn't want to disappoint her mother or her new half-father, had settled on writing a few lines up and down her arm, something she could clearly see now through the fabric of her sleeve.

"I wasn't ready." She asserted, making eye contact with the apparition through the mirror. She knew that she knew, and was avoiding the matter at hand. "Whatever you were hiding, you could have told me."

"And what would you have told me if I'd asked you about one of your Special Ops missions back in the day?"

"That's different."

"It most certainly is not." She was pulling harder, more aggressively, causing her head to list to one side. "You were doing what you believed was right. So was I."

"To what end, mother?"

"To buy all of you some time. Forget the war. This is about the survival of our people."

I hope you can find it before they find you. Those words, nearly her last, had replayed over and over in her mind for weeks following the attack on Kandar, as she desperately tried to decipher them, to make some sort of sense as to what she meant. But clues were scant, and the database remained mostly encrypted, so there was no way of knowing, perhaps until it was too late.

"What if I don't find it in time?"

She paused, suddenly intense, seizing her by the shoulders and shifting in her seat to face her head on. "You will. And if you don't..." she insisted, then tapping her forehead about one temple. "It's all up here."

Alira didn't have a moment to question that, for in the next moment the door opened again. A familiar voice entered her mind and set her senses alight, causing her pulse to quicken and nearly sweeping her away in an undertow of emotion.

"My beautiful ladies." Her father was standing there, arms outstretched, exactly how she remembered him, tall, fair-haired, regal, and impossibly strong. He was still a lieutenant, but carried himself like the Supreme Commander he would eventually become, and his smile could positively charm anyone and everything. She was seized by the urge to run to him and wrap her arms around him and tell him how much she missed him and how she'd spent almost two decades trying to right the wrongs that had been done to him, but forced herself to stay in place. "We're just about ready for you."

"How's Phlox?"

"More nervous than you are," he answered, pulling on the sleeves of his Infantry dress uniform. "We are fortunate that he promised to show the twins around his menagerie tomorrow. That's the only thing keeping them in their seats at the moment."

She knew he was referring to her little brothers, the only boys out of the nine of them, who must have only been four or five years old at the time. They were certainly a nuisance growing up, and she privately thought they had continued to be as adults.

Her mother was laughing, glancing out her window, hearing the wind whistle around the pane. At their height above the ground, it sounded like a hovertrain coming through. "I suppose I'll have to yell to be heard on the terrace."

"All the way to that dreadful grandmother of his sitting on the back row."

"No one's ever said that Feezal Taxa was one to back down from a challenge."

"They wouldn't dare," he assured her, bending down to nuzzle her cheek. It had been a rare display of affection between them, and it was seared in her memory, so much so that she couldn't look away from the two paragons of her disheartening past. Taxa caught her eye and furrowed his brow, immeasurably concerned. "What's wrong, Li-Li? Are you going to make it through this?"

"She doesn't believe that she will." Mixed in with her surprise at being called her childhood nickname, which she hadn't heard since well before the accident, she suddenly realized that they were no longer talking about the wedding.

"Really?" He reached for her, helping her up to her feet. "Funny. I thought I raised you better than that."

She was squeezing her father's hand for dear life, hoping to convey her desperation, her hopelessness, her sorrow, her remorse. "You did, I promise you. I'm trying to...I want to…"

"You need to stop running, little one," he insisted, and suddenly she felt something warm rush over her hands. Looking down, she discovered blood running between her fingers, and tried to pull away, though he held fast. "Whatever you're running from-"

As if on a cue, his words began to slur and seep until they were incomprehensible, and his face shifted and contorted until it was entirely disfigured, a mass of scars and wounds and rumpled skin.

It was exactly as she'd seen them, how they'd all seen him, years ago lying in state on the floor of some anonymous building following the attack on his patrol vessel.

Quickly, he turned her around, holding her arms with bruising strength as she faced the window, her mother's smiling face the object of her focus for the next few moments. She was utterly oblivious to her husband's horrendous disfigurement, but if she wasn't, she was doing a magnificent job of pretending not to notice. "You need to stop running and face it head on," she said, reaching for her, barely reacting as she leaned away. "Like I did."

Over her shoulder, a spot of red appeared on the horizon, growing larger and larger until the sky was filled with flames. One building disappeared into the inferno, then another, until she knew they were next. She was thrashing, screaming, doing anything she could to escape, but it was no use.

The window blew out, and it was getting hotter, so hot that she thought she could feel the flesh melting off her bones.

There was a sudden flash of white light, and then she surrendered herself to oblivion.

---

Fading back into reality, Alira realized she was standing at the back of the mess hall, holding onto their popcorn bowl for dear life. On the screen, the final credits were rolling, and she had no idea just how long she'd been there, effectively losing her mind in a room full of people.

Yuris had a general idea.

"Ensign," he whispered, tugging on her sleeve, his eyes brimming with his own brand of Vulcan-like concern. "Ensign, are you with me?"

They locked eyes, and she started to shake her head, but then nodded.

It was common to hallucinate. Extremely common, painfully common.

She'd been reliving those same memories over and over for weeks as it was.

And she missed the both of them, immensely, more than words could possibly say.

And she had been stressed.

She prayed it would all add up.

"I'm going to go lay down," she whispered and rushed off before he could drag her into sickbay, willingly or otherwise.

---

The headache started as innocuously as possible, with a faint twinge at the base of her skull an hour after they returned to the Maelstrom. It seemed to migrate as the afternoon passed, moving to behind one ear and then to her forehead, before progressing into a full-on migraine. Immediately after her shift, she sought the assistance of Dr. Yuris, accepting his hypospray but not his offer to scan her. She'd then met Trip and Kelby for dinner in the Captain's mess, where Tucker was trying and failing to convince them to join him and Hoshi in the mess hall for the movie.

"Are you sure, Jules?" He'd asked her multiple times, but she refused, saying that she wasn't feeling well and really ought to just turn in for the night. He seemed sympathetic, and didn't bother to ask if she'd gotten checked out, which she was incredibly thankful for. She rarely had migraines, or even bad headaches, but when they hit they could sure knock her off her feet for hours at a time. The last one she'd had was years ago back on the Columbia, following an away mission she'd tried her best to forget.

Kelby managed to slip out first, mumbling something about being needed in engineering, leaving the two of them alone. Julia offered her friend a weak smile, hoping he could see that she was in pain, that she was in desperate need of a restorative night's sleep. He made one final attempt, laying a hand on her shoulder, saying, "You won't want to miss this."

Something ignited in the reaches of her memory, something she could not suppress.

She returned to her quarters in a daze, the stretch of hallway between the mess hall and the senior officers' block passing by in a blur. As she changed into her pajamas, she nearly fell into the wall, and she noticed her hands were trembling as she reached to turn on the sink. Breathing deeply, she sunk down to her haunches, resting her hands on the countertop.

The pain was overpowering, stabbing, stinging, and she screwed her eyes shut, but composure eluded her. It could have been minutes or hours, but she finally rose to her feet, gripping the wall and coming around the corner into the bedroom.

The second she crossed the threshold, she was no longer in her quarters, but rushing onto the bridge of the Columbia during a red alert. She'd been dead asleep in the middle of alpha shift, preparing to take the conn that evening, when she'd been shaken from bed. As she came around to the Captain's chair, she was still struggling to secure her pips onto her collar. Her arms and legs were shaking, her entire body was shaking, down to the very core of her being.

Captain Hernandez, Commander Mbatha, and the rest of the away team were in imminent, mortal danger, and as the next highest ranking officer aboard, she had been called upon to remedy the situation. It had been the first time she'd taken the big chair during a crisis.

That was another matter entirely-stepping up to the viewscreen, which was blank for the moment, she caught a glimpse of herself and realized this memory came from a time when she'd still been presenting to her friends and colleagues as a man.

Lieutenant Commander Jordan Hammond, reporting for duty. Her own voice rang out from the very depths of her recollection, of a time when she'd been outwardly confident, but slightly unsure of herself and of her place in the world.

Running her hands over her uniform, her eyes darted about the room, to her crewmates, who were already awaiting her command with bated breath. Though she'd lived through this before and knew exactly what the outcome would be, she still had to swallow the lump in her throat before asking, "What's going on?"

"Shuttlepod Two is on a decaying orbit. They've lost thrusters and attitude control." One of their science crewmen was moving about their station, furiously punching buttons and calling up various displays, and all she wanted to do was push her to the side and take over. "I can't get a transporter lock through the interference."

"Let me see," she demanded, and their helmsman complied. Julia could see that they were orbiting an familiar M Class, one whose name she'd willfully forgotten. Far below, she knew that the pod was careening helplessly towards a certain disaster, having lost the helm the second they entered the atmosphere. "Hail them."

The roar of the strained engines was deafening as Captain Hernandez fought to maintain control of the craft. Like the Commodore, she'd been a pilot in her past life, but she was no match for their failing systems as they careened towards the surface. Commander Mbatha was peering through the viewfinder, looking for a break in the dense tree cover below them, or else a place where they wouldn't be smashed to smithereens on the rocks.

"Columbia to Shuttlepod Two, can you read me?"

"Affirmative. We're about to make a rough landing." Erika sounded calm, even though they were moments away from certain disaster. "We're dropping hull plating. You'll have another shot at beaming us out here in a second."

"I wouldn't recommend it, ma'am. You need that plating to have any chance at surviving the impact." It was their tactical officer, and he wasn't having any of it.

"Your objection is noted, Lieutenant. Stand by, Columbia."

"Acknowledged." She turned to the crewman at the science station, who had seemingly frozen in place, plainly taken aback by what she saw. Julia stepped up to her, leaning over her station, and she could see the complete and utter shock in her eyes.

"I'm reading several thermal fractures in the rear driver coil assembly. It's likely that's what's causing the impulse drive to overheat."

She shook her head, adamant, and could feel the scrutiny of their entire bridge on her. She knew, as well as everyone else, that the engineering team had been swamped the day before, so she'd been tasked with conducting the pre-flight checks. There was no way she would have missed something like that.

Or perhaps she did.

As the days passed, an investigation would find that atmospheric interference caused the overload, but in the moment, she couldn't shake the feeling that her negligence might be sending an entire away team to their deaths.

"Hull plating is down." Their tactical officer's voice caught her attention, and she seized the top of the science station, to keep from trembling more than anything.

"Can you get a lock?" Her voice was so quiet that it could be scarcely heard even across the room.

"I can. It'll have to be one at a time."

Their eyes met, and she realized that this was one of those moral conundrums they prepared you for in ethics class at STC. Do you save the young scientist with the promising future, or the seasoned senior officer, or someone in between? In what order? And, most importantly…

Who do you leave behind?

Her training all but left her mind in that moment. Taking a deep breath, she ordered Captain Hernandez to be beamed aboard, followed by their first officer.

She knew the both of them would have told her to transport anyone else first, but that didn't matter in the moment.

They were having trouble maintaining her pattern coherence; rematerialization took so long that by the time Commander Mbatha appeared on the pad, there was little time to transport anyone else. This time she did push the crewman to the side, desperately trying to lock onto anyone, until the moment the pod crashed into the surface and shattered into a hundred pieces, bursting into an uncontrollable fireball a second later.

She wouldn't ever know it, but the science crewmen she'd personally assigned to the mission had been clinging to the wall, clinging to the seats, clinging to the hull plating, holding on for dear life right up until their lights had been extinguished completely.

Back on the bridge, she felt like she was going to faint. It felt like her brain had completely detached from the rest of her body, and she could almost feel the heat of the inferno, hear their screams of desperation, sense their terror. The room was utterly silent, and she was crushed under the weight of realization and loss.

Carefully, she made her way to the Captain's chair, staring it down as if it were her nemesis to be vanquished. In the coming days and weeks and months, she would relive it over and over again. No matter how much reassurance she received from her superiors and peers, that she'd acted admirably for her first time in a crunch, that she'd done the right thing but saving who she could, she would never forget the moment that had shaped her as a commanding officer.

And she would never forget the briefing they'd received the day before, where the Captain had asked if she was sure she didn't want to come along on their initial scouting mission. When she refused, saying that she wanted some new commissions in their brigade to gain some experience, Erika had laid a hand on her shoulder and told her...she'd told her…

You won't want to miss this.

She sat down heavily at the conn, and found herself back on the Maelstrom at the end of her bed.

Julia sat there motionless for some time, entirely too afraid to move. Finally she glanced at the chronometer on her desk, realizing nearly an hour had passed since she returned to her quarters. Her head was still pounding, harder now, and she could almost feel her heartbeat in her skull.

This was unlike any headache she'd ever experienced, and she knew immediately that something was dreadfully wrong.

Rising to her feet, she retreated to the door and stepped out into the hall.

---

Ever since they returned from Calder IV, Ethan had been feeling a little out of sorts.

Suddenly, it felt incredibly necessary for him to look over his shoulder wherever he went. He was on edge, jumpy, with a flutter of nerves dancing away in his gut.

He attributed it to the critical nature of their work, and forged on, showing up to movie night in his warmest civvies with a blanket wrapped around him. He greeted a few people, quietly, with very little of his usual enthusiasm, and took his seat without much fanfare. At some point he zoned out, utterly engrossed by the movie, and the blanket migrated to over his head.

The audio and the hushed conversation of his peers sounded distant, muffled, like he was listening underwater. His vision blurred, then shifted, and he ducked his face into his hands, rubbing his eyes.

Ethan didn't realize that Alira and Yuris were seated behind him until she tapped him on the shoulder, and he engaged her in conversation, only half registering what was being said. His hands and feet were so cold he could barely feel them, and he was trembling to the very core of his being. He almost felt that he was having an out-of-body experience, but he was sure he was going to be fine.

He was sure he was fine until the moment he heard...that.

Exiting the abbey, their protagonist had stepped under an archway, turned in profile, and said: "When the Lord closes a door, somewhere he opens a window."

The memory hit him like a speeding hovertrain, and he found that he could not suppress it.

There was more idle conversation, but Novakovich was lost in his thoughts, consumed with sorrow, wistfulness, and regret, perhaps the most powerful motivator of all.

A magnificent party was happening on screen, and he was trying his best to pay attention, though it was shattered as soon as he heard his name said aloud.

He glanced back at Alira, but her eyes were trained directly ahead. He looked left, then right, but heard no one. Taking a deep breath, he settled back into his blanket.

Ethan. There it was again, louder this time, punctuated by what sounded like a kick to a bulkhead. He froze in place, listening, and was rewarded by a repeat performance.

He knew that voice, and knew that sound.

He'd tried to forget it for years.

It took a couple of minutes, but he finally mustered the courage to rise from his seat and investigate, taking his leave of the mess hall altogether and sweeping into the hallway. It was mostly empty that time of night, and the crewmen he did pass looked at him curiously, but didn't bother to interrupt him. He was walking strongly, with a purpose, his head down as he listened to his own name, repeating over and over, following him through the corridors wherever he went.

By the time he reached his quarters on C Deck, Section 7, he was almost positive he was losing his mind. Just short of the hatch, he heard a kick from behind the bulkhead next door. His name was quieter now, softer, beseeching him to give in to this fantasy.

He refused, even though he remembered who had once lived there, that they used to lay in their bunks in their own quarters and talk through the paper-thin walls, for hours and hours, day after day until it was impossible to do so.

For years it had been the three of them, Liz and Ethan and her, best of friends, working together and eating together and navigating every hairpin turn of their mission together. He remembered the first day he met her, the day Enterprise shipped out. Their residence block was lively, convivial, and he'd made an effort to introduce himself to everyone, especially his next door neighbor, who he heard was an EPS control specialist recently transferred from the Saratoga. She was warm and sarcastic and knowledgeable and everything he looked for in a friend, and soon she was welcoming him into her quarters.

They were sparsely decorated, save for a few family photos and a framed piece of embroidery declaring that phrase, that when the Lord closes a door, somewhere he opens a window. He made some stupid joke about it, asking if she was one of those Live, Laugh, Love kinds of people, but she explained that her grandmother had sent it for Christmas, and she always tried to remember it whenever things got a little hairy in engineering.

Over the years they had gotten closer, painfully close, a bond forged by challenge and strife.

That had made her death all the more difficult.

Forcing that thought from his mind, he burst into his quarters and collapsed face down on his bunk, soon lapsing into a fitful sleep.

He dreamed of weapons fire and exploding consoles and fire and brimstone. He was running and running, but not fast enough, and he was overcome by an unfortunate fate time and time again. He thrashed and cried out, but there was no escape, and when he came to, he was surrounded by darkness, with a tactical alert blaring overhead and the deck plating threatening to fly apart underneath him.

Immediately, Ethan knew where and when he was. It was unmistakable.

Stumbling to his feet, he clung desperately to whatever he could hold onto, fighting his way to the door. He could see now that he was in uniform, still an inexperienced officer, still a non-com, still terrified at this recent development. All he could remember in that moment was an overwhelming urge to get to his emergency station and help out in engineering.

He burst into the corridor in a cloud of fire and smoke; several beams had fallen across his path, but he was stumbling over them, hoping and praying the turbolifts were still operational. A second later, the hatch next door opened, issuing Crewman Jane Taylor, looking harried but mostly awake. They fell into step together, moving as quickly as possible through the fractured hallway.

"Where's Liz?" He had to shout to be heard over the rumbling around them, the bursting circuits, the shouting and screaming.

"Already in the heat of it trying to keep the port nacelle from going out." A moment after being shaken from her bunk, she'd reached for the comm, confirming with Rostov exactly where she was needed. They had no way of knowing they were mere minutes from shipwide communications going out.

A panel exploded in the wall, and Ethan had to jump back to avoid being set alight by the fan of sparks. What came out of his mouth next was nothing short of ridiculous. "Think we're under attack?"

"I don't know, maybe." Even in their dire situation, in the heat of the Battle of Azati Prime, she still had her sense of humor. They were moving faster now, brushing past crewmen on the way to their stations, or else helping one another to sickbay. They passed a familiar science crewman, hunched over, leaning into the wall and struggling to walk. He wasn't sure if he'd seen right in the dim glow of the emergency lights, but he could have sworn he was missing an eye and the vast majority of one side of his face.

The sight catalyzed them, and they were almost running now, having to turn and shift on a dime to avoid people and debris in their path. They were almost out of their section when Ethan heard the deafening groan of metal shifting against metal, then a sickening pop. A fraction of a second later, the section depressurized, and he felt himself being pulled backward, a sudden rush of cold, and the undeniable urge to exhale the contents of his lungs.

Two strong hands pressed against his back, pushing him forward and over the barricade the second the emergency bulkhead came crashing down.

He fell to the deck plating, gasping for air, running his hands over and over his chest as if to assure himself that yes, he had had a close scrape, but he was certainly alive. About a dozen crewmen had been trapped on his side of the bulkhead, and who knew how many were still trapped inside, with little to no hope for survival.

Including his friend.

Irrationally, helplessly, he rose to his haunches and banged on the wall with his fists, trying to scream, but no words came out. He could feel the frigid stillness of space against his skin through the scant protection of the wall, and all he could visualize was Jane floating around on the other side, hands outstretched, her face frozen in a mask of mortal terror.

He couldn't forget it. He wouldn't, not for the rest of the battle, not for their entire time during the Expanse. Together Ethan and Liz would help one another recover from their loss, but it would take months, years.

But no matter how much he tried to distract himself, fill his time with new people and places and experiences, he would never forget the sacrifice she made.

He would never forget her.

Ethan stopped in his tracks in the middle of the corridor, recognizing he was on D Deck but not being entirely sure how he got there. There was a pit in his stomach and he felt faint, as if he needed to cry and vomit at the same time. At some point he'd discarded his blanket, and now felt colder than ever, colder than a winter storm, colder than the space all around them. He turned this way and that, listening to the ambient noise of the ship, before coming to a troubling realization.

The voice had stopped.

---

Alira all but crashed into her quarters minutes after telling Yuris she was going to lie down; she was suddenly seized with the urge to do anything but that.

She wanted to go to the gym and run until her composure was restored and she was no longer thinking about death and destruction and mortal peril, but knew in the state she was in she was more likely to collapse. Her heart continued to race as she stood just over the threshold looking over the empty, sterile room.

Alone. Miserable and alone. As usual, as always.

Not wanting to waste any time throwing herself a pity party, she forged ahead with her nightly routine. She knew something was wrong, but willfully ignored it, focusing on breathing deeply and the measured rise and fall of her chest. Alira was sure that it was her own guilt making her feel this way. She would feel better in time. She always did.

She would need to endure it until she could find a way out.

A few minutes later she crawled into bed, her skin stinging from a blazingly hot shower, and trained her gaze at the ceiling. The ambient noise of the ship flooded the background, the footsteps in the corridor, the plasma conduits running through the ceiling, the thrum of the impulse engine somewhere below her. She focused on it until she'd nearly dozed off, then reached for her PADD, checking that day's correspondence.

Her evenings usually ended with replying to a letter from her lover; it was their daily tradition, and they had scarcely missed a day since the Maelstrom commissioned, to such a degree that the last time she'd been too busy to write, Ensign Singh had reached out to her in the morning under the suspicion that something was wrong with subspace communications. Today had been an exception; as far as she knew, he and Liz were down on Solnara III, rubbing elbows with dilithium specialists and trying to convince the inhabitants that the Romulan threat against them was extremely real and very imminent.

It didn't matter. She was constantly flooded with correspondence from family, and it wouldn't hurt to entertain them once in a while.

"Computer, address message to Miss Yolanna Kladon, Denobulan Coalition, Teerza Prime Colony, Waxtaron Province. Start recording." She paused, waiting for the tell-tale beep. When it arrived, she rolled onto her side, tossing her PADD onto the bedside table. "My dear sister, I hope this letter finds you well. I'm sorry it took me so long to respond. I'm sure you can imagine we're very busy around here."

Alira smiled weakly, knowing that a majority of her letters to family started this way. It was true. There were so many of them, it was hard enough to keep them straight. "I wish more than anything that I could have been at your Rite of Passage ceremony last week. I'm so happy you decided to have it anyway. It's what…" She trailed off, setting her jaw. "It's what mother would have wanted."

She wrapped her arms around her stomach and hugged herself tightly. "Sounds like your afterparty with your friends was a lot of fun. I'm surprised you didn't go crazier. During mine, we nearly set the family compound on fire. That's the one and only time mother and I ever got in a screaming match."

That night had gone down in infamy in her old social circle, and she keenly remembered suffering the consequences of being young, dumb, and reckless. Not much had changed since then, except that she could hold her liquor better.

"I will say-" She reached for the PADD, but pulled her hand back just short of it. "Go out there and find yourself. Enjoy your engineering courses at the Science Academy. Stay away from men for the time being. I know that may sound hypocritical coming from your big sister, but believe me, they're a lot more trouble than they're worth."

Alira knew her little sister would be receiving the same talk from their mother if circumstances had been any better, but she was all the more willing to step into that role herself. It was sound advice; sure enough, there were plenty of lovers from her past she'd prefer to expunge from her memory.

She settled back into her side, staring off wistfully into the space on the wall above her desk. "Speaking of which, while I do think it's quite sweet that the lot of you are betting on when me and my human friend will get married, you really ought to move that timeline out a little." She made air quotes around the middle of the sentence, a gesture she had picked up from her crewmates. "Unfortunately, we're resigned to doing things the human way. I'm sure that-computer, pause."

It was in that moment she felt something which made her blood run ice cold: the distinct sensation of the other side of the bunk depressing, as if someone was joining her, one knee and then the other, laying down until they were spooned up against her. Carefully, agonizingly slowly, a hand began to wrap around her waist, plainly relishing every second of contact. When at last it finished its journey, seizing the arm which she'd held captive underneath her, she realized who it was.

She remembered that hand, the same one that had so often caressed her cheek, those arms, which had held her and comforted her and shielded her from harm. There was that familiar warmth that she could never get enough of, and the fact that no one over the course of her lifetime had made her feel so much like herself. No one ever could.

Until she'd arrived on the Enterprise.

"Why are you here?" She whispered, knowing full well this was another hallucination, that none of this was real. Even still, she rolled over onto her back and looked up at that face, his face, that always had enthralled her. This time, though, she felt nothing but fear.

"Do I need a reason to visit my betrothed?" He was stroking her hair back from her face, as he often did, his smile uninterrupted.

She pulled away slightly, sitting up in her bunk. He wasn't here, there was no way, but he felt so real, so loving, so sincere. "Nieron, I don't know how to tell you this, but you've been dead for fifteen years."

He shook his head adamantly. "I'm here, though, aren't I?"

"You are, but you're not real. You died in the accident. The same one that-"

"They never found my body though, did they?"

"You're right about that, but we found your…" She trailed off as emotion warped her voice, and she swallowed the lump rising to her throat. "Your genetic material scattered across half a light year. We think you sacrificed yourself to save my father."

"What lot of good that did," he mumbled, and his sense of humor was exactly the same as she remembered, dry, yet incredibly dark. "But you want me to be real."

He was moving closer, meaning to embrace her again, but she broke free, climbing over him and farther into the room. "You're wrong," she asserted, moving to her chest of drawers and staring into the mirror above it, her heart sinking just as his reflection joined her.

Nieron reached forward, seizing the holoimage in front of her and switching it on. It was one of her favorite pictures of her and Malcolm, standing at the top of the Eiffel Tower, bundled up against the cold. He was smiling at the camera, but she wasn't taking her eyes off him for a second, pressing her lips against his cheek.

"He reminds you a lot of me, doesn't he?"

She snatched it from his hands and stashed it in her pocket, and when she spoke, her words were full of poorly concealed irritation. "He's nothing like you."

"Does he know about me?"

"He knows I was betrothed at some point, but that it didn't work out," she admitted, inhaling deeply. That had been the understatement of the millennium. "It was a long time ago, and I'm still trying to make the people responsible pay."

"You know I wouldn't want that. Neither would your father."

She turned to him, incredulous and hurt and slightly overwhelmed. The memories were flooding back to her now, entirely unbidden and unwanted.

They'd been new officers when they met, and she'd been visiting General Taxa's ship between assignments. The moment she'd walked onto the bridge and seen him at the navigation console, she knew she had to have him. It had all been a whirlwind, beautiful and passionate and ultimately tragic. She hadn't even attended his Rite of Absolution ceremony. It was too soon after her father's own, too painful. After the fact, she'd made a conscious effort to erase every trace of him from her mind, destroying photographs and communiques and personal logs.

And now he'd returned to haunt her.

"You don't mean that. I know how close the two of you were. He would have gone after these Andorians in a heartbeat."

"Alira, please." He seized her shoulders and took a step closer, and she really wished he hadn't. "You and I both know that what they did to us is nothing compared to what this Section will do to you."

She didn't want to admit it, but knew he was right. Nieron was leaning closer and closer until their forehead practically touched, and she couldn't begin to hide the way it made her feel. "Take a look at yourself. The guilt is eating you alive. If you want to keep him-"

Suddenly, she broke free and rushed towards the door, but paused over the threshold for a fraction of a second to look back at him. She knew it would be the last time, and the memory of him had already faded so greatly over the years that she needed one last glance at the man she once loved.

He was pleading now, beseeching her. "They won't stop until they've taken everything from you. You need to-"

"I will," she promised, blinking back tears. She looked down for a fraction of a second, then back up, and he was gone.

Gone as he had been. Gone forever.

She slipped into the hallway, leaving the door to her quarters wide open, keeping her eyes trained towards the ground. Thoughts racing, entirely occupied with plots and plans and ideas, she scarcely noticed when an hour had passed, and then two, until she found herself at a junction of two corridors, Commander Hammond and Lieutenant Novakovich to either side of her.

Like her, they wore pajamas and looked tremendously harried, as though they'd been up all night. Without the exchange of words, they knew exactly what had transpired.

"Let me guess," Julia said with a faint smile. "Running from the dead?"

---

The away team from the Enterprise beamed down into a seemingly endless prairie, with waist-high grasses and plentiful wildflowers all around.

It took a second for Archer to register exactly where they were, but the moment he did, he threw his arms wide and inhaled deeply. "Smell that, Mr. Reed? That's fresh air. Doesn't get much better than that."

"Certainly not, sir," he agreed, turning this way and that. The meadow continued in all directions for as far as the eye could see, stirred almost continuously by a gentle breeze. The sky was cloudless and tremendously blue, and the landscape was illuminated by twin suns, one slightly larger than the other, situated directly above them.

Liz Cutler was seemingly enraptured by their surroundings, plucking a particularly beautiful red flower out of the ground and lifting it to her nose.

"Be careful, Lieutenant. We wouldn't want you to pull a Novakovich," Pascal advised with a smile.

She laughed, though it was somewhat forced. "You really have studied our mission reports, haven't you?"

"The proposed site of the mining settlement is this way," the Captain asserted, and led the way without preamble towards the south, followed closely by the Commodore.

Malcolm and Liz shared a pointed look, then pursued them, moving the grasses ahead of them to the side with both hands, feeling the soft earth shift underneath their boots.

It took nearly half an hour, but they finally reached the horizon, finding themselves standing on a tall cliff overlooking a boundless ocean. The sound of the crashing waves reached them first, and then the scent of saltwater. The breeze was stronger here, whipping their hair and the hems of their dress uniforms, and they all stood there motionless for a few moments, spellbound.

Lieutenant Cutler was scanning, her demeanor singular and focused, attempting to find a way down from the precipice. Certainly the Corsettis hadn't meant for them to scale down the rock face; in the very least, she surely hoped they didn't. Finally she located an aberration in the shoreline and broke free from the group; they followed her closely until they found a place where the ground curved down, hugging the side of the cliff and promising safe passage to the beach far below.

They shuffled forward, standing closely together with their hands pressed against the wall. Malcolm realized the scenery quite reminded him of the Cliffs of Moher, where he'd been time and time again as a child, running and playing along the shore. It was a spitting image, except for one key difference.

The sand was jet black, and as they reached the ground, he kicked a little bit with his boot, watching as it caught in the sunlight and turned a vivid red. In fact, the entire underlayer of the sand was crimson, and the five of them seemed to leave bloody footprints as they walked parallel with the tides.

It was a fitting metaphor for their mission: lovely and familiar at first, then threatening and transparently violent all at once. Though he found the idea of its unknown depths terrifying, he paused and took a step towards the ocean, drinking in the promise of infinity.

Suddenly he heard a shutter click, and turned around just in time to see Simon lower his camera. He was looking back on him with familiarity, and Liz was hovering at his elbow, smiling for once.

"Penny for your thoughts, sir," Pascal said.

"Nothing much. How do I look?"

Liz took the camera from his hands, squinting at the tiny digital screen. "Like you're about to drop the hottest album of 2156."

Soon the three of them were laughing, a welcome reprieve from the discomfort between them that had endured for weeks. They had to jog a little to catch up with their COs, but Simon managed to ask, "What do you imagine it's about?"

"Failed relationships. Drinks with the lads. Being the family disappointment," she paused, gauging his expression, then pressed on: "His feelings."

"You see, that's where you're mistaken, Miss Cutler. I don't have any of those."

She scoffed, stowing his camera in her jacket pocket. "Right, that's what I hear."

He didn't even have time to form an appropriate witty response; they were presently rounding a curve of the shoreline and the great, yawning maw of a cave was open before them, flat with the face of rock wall, dark as night from a few meters in to the end of the tunnel, wherever that may be.

The Commodore took one step into the blackness and almost disappeared entirely, shouting: "Hello! Anyone there?"

His voice echoed and ricocheted off the walls over and over, repeating to an almost comical degree. There was a pause, then the Captain began to follow him, only to be stopped by Malcolm intercepting them.

"Ma'am," he said, almost admonishing, though really meaning to protect them from whatever lay inside. "Are we sure this is the right place?"

"Quite sure," she affirmed, and he shook his head ruefully, switching on his flashlight and proceeding into the darkness. The beam caught several piles of rubble, assorted equipment and even an automatic mining cart, set on a makeshift track leading into a narrow tunnel built into the wall. Momentarily distracted, he all but stumbled into a metal barrel filled with light pink crystals, mottled with threads of yellow and white.

He instantly recognized it as dilithium, one of the most valuable commodities in the known universe, and briefly wondered what such a large quantity could be doing sitting out in the open like this.

A shuffling sound caught his attention, and a narrow beam of light appeared in the distance, seemingly deep within the cliffs. His free hand hovered over his phase pistol and he called out: "Is anyone there? We're looking for Dario and Martina Corsetti."

A second set of footsteps joined the first, but there was no response. He tried again. "This is Lieutenant Commander Reed from the Enterprise. We've just arrived. You've been-"

"We've been expecting you, yes!" An unfamiliar voice regaled him; whoever it was had a strong Italian accent. He waited until the two of them got closer, then one of them aimed the beam of their flashlight up towards their faces, and he was greeted by the sight of two middle aged scientists with warm, inviting smiles.

Dario didn't even hesitate; he gripped Malcolm's hand and shook it vigorously, then his wife repeated the gesture, until he was thoroughly welcomed to their own little slice of paradise.

"An honor to make your acquaintance," he assured them. "If you wouldn't mind, the Captain and the Commodore are waiting outside to meet you."

"Oh! Oh, of course." In the darkness, he heard them shuffling around, then when they appeared back in the light, they were sporting twin pairs of sunglasses, presumably to protect themselves from the sun's rays.

"Do the two of you-"

"Yes, about a kilometer back. Once we get the equipment you brought for us set up, we will invite some of the locals to live with us," Dario explained.

"We've got it all set up, or at least, what we can accomplish with just the two of us. We've had plenty of time to just sit around and wait, you see." Martina pushed past him and began to move towards the beach with a surprising amount of speed.

"Yes, about that. Please allow me to apologize sincerely for our-"

"No need to apologize, Mr. Reed!"

"Of course, absolutely no need! You are an answer to our prayers!" She sounded excited, positively giddy, and it occurred to Malcolm just how much she reminded him of his mother. Dario, on the other hand, was much too pleasant to ever be compared to his father.

Once they stepped into the light, he realized they were dressed like inhabitants of their host world, and their hands were rough and calloused, indicating two people used to a life of hard work. They exchanged enthusiastic greetings with the rest of the away team, seeming a bit awkward and stilted around Ensign Pascal, but friendly nonetheless.

"How are you enjoying your new posting?" The Commodore asked, his interest genuine.

"It's certainly different," Dario admitted. "Though, we couldn't have stayed with the warp seven project, what with the Maelstrom commissioning with our new engine."

"We would have been stuck in an endless cycle of process improvements. Tedious work. Let the young people do that. Now, this-"

"Is completely new to us. Starting up and optimizing a mine on an unfamiliar world on the fringes of our civilization is the ideal adventure. Probably our last before we retire." Dario paused, lowering his sunglasses by a fraction of a centimeter, squinting out over the surf. "Would you all care for a tour?"

I can only hope that we are this ambitious when we are in the same stage of our careers. T'Pol's fleeting thought reached him through their bond, and he realized this meant she was planning on staying with him for the long term. This, of course, went with the territory, but warmed his heart nonetheless.

He could see that Lieutenant Cutler was practically bouncing on her toes at the opportunity to explore a dilithium mine, but time was almost certainly of the essence.

"I'm afraid we've got to get to the capital to speak with the Lords. It's extremely urgent. It's-"

"About the Romulans? Rest assured, Commodore, we'll be ready when they come." Martina winked conspiratorially, then lifted the edge of her tunic to reveal a phase pistol strapped to her belt.

Malcolm wanted to tell her that she would be needing a lot more than that, but he held his tongue.

"We do have a hovercar that should accommodate all of us. It's about an hour into the city center. Martina, amore, do you remember where we put the keys?"

She clapped her hands together, somewhat sheepish. "I'm afraid I'm not quite sure. They may still be at our base of operations."

"I'll come with you," Pascal volunteered, a little too fervently.

"That's quite kind of you, Ensign, but I believe I should-"

"Perhaps you should stay with the Captain and the Commodore," he interrupted, for once showing his cards. "Being the tactical officer and all."

"I'll go too." Liz cut a glance towards Malcolm, and he nodded, slightly relieved. To their specialists, she said: "I've always wanted to see the inside of a dilithium mine."

Martina wrapped a companionable arm around her shoulder, guiding her into the mouth of the cave. "Where are you from, exactly?"

"The American Midwest."

"Then you know precisely what one looks like," she promised her, and the four of them vanished into the darkness.

---

Yuris was mere minutes from closing up sickbay for the evening when the three members of the away team came crashing through his door.

He'd spent all day preparing for the onslaught of casualties that were sure to await them on Solnara III, making emergency packs, synthesizing analgesics, and programming autosutures, all at the explicit request of Captain T'Pol. Whether the local government decided to evacuate or not, it was definitely going to be a bloody and violent encounter, and he could only hope the Romulans didn't choose to employ hybrids for the attack, or even worse, use Vulcan ships.

That would certainly be difficult to explain to the dozens of patrol ships equipped with long-range sensors in the area.

These thoughts kept running through his mind over and over again, until he was sure he was going to need a doubly long meditation session that evening. He was looking forward to it, even, but the moment his guests arrived, he knew he would have to place that on hold.

They were frantic, emotionally overwrought, desperate to get their words out. The three of them talked over one another for several minutes until Julia shushed them, explaining, "Doctor, the three of us have been experiencing hallucinations since we returned from Calder IV. Really vivid ones."

"I was back on Azati Prime, escaping a collapsing bulkhead. It was terrifying," Ethan said emphatically, and he believed them. Alira seemed uncharacteristically quiet, her arms crossed across her chest, brows furrowed with concern. She was certainly there, but she wasn't present.

He retrieved his medical tricorder and passed it over their first officer, then Novakovich, then Taxa, plainly taken aback by what he found. "I'm reading extreme hormone imbalances in the cerebellum, prefrontal cortex, and the amygdala." The latter was associated with memories of fear or mortal terror, so their reactions to their ordeal weren't entirely surprising. "Ensign, you've got near critical levels of norepinephrine in your hippocampus. You will need an injection immediately."

Norepinephrine. Fight or flight.

It was the same neurotransmitter seen out of balance in the Captain, and the dozens of Vulcans incapacitated on the Saral.

It couldn't have been a coincidence.

He moved off to prepare the hypospray. All the while Hammond and Novakovich were explaining to him their plight, how real their visions were, and how frightening it had all been, while Taxa moved around in the background, hugging herself tightly, hunched over at the waist.

"Did the three of you make contact with any wildlife? Any unusual pieces of machinery?"

"No, I-" Ethan paused, then realization hit him like a lightning bolt. "Actually, I felt a little shock of electricity when I touched the telepresence unit. I know Alira felt it too."

"So did I, come to think of it. Doctor, do you-"

"Ensign?" Yuris called out, coming out from around the corner where he stored his vials. He could barely make her form, crumpled over in a corner near the door, facing away from all of them. Her hands were constantly on the move, running over her arms and shoulders and head, as though she was trying to prevent herself from crawling out of her own skin. Together they began to approach her, carefully, and soon discerned that she was whispering something over and over to herself, in what they suspected was Denobulan but was likely mixed with something else.

Julia and Ethan stopped, repeatedly saying her name, trying and failing to get her attention, while Yuris crept forward, hypospray in hand. He was about a meter from her when he took notice of a spot on her neck where her hair had fallen to one side. It would be his target, where he would deliver the medication that he hoped would stop whatever cataclysmic reaction that had been sent in motion, where they could-

She turned on him suddenly, rising to her feet and shrieking in fear. It was there for a second, before rapidly being replaced with desperation, neutrality, anger, and then resolve. She smiled, that same broad smile characteristic to her species, and tilted her head up to look at them.

It was all the more unsettling now that her eyes were black as night.

A second later, she was out the door, running faster than anyone had ever seen her move.

---

Captain Tucker was completely asleep by the time the security alert was issued. At first he was disoriented, because the fleet-wide standard used the Enterprise's designation, the blaring klaxon coupled with Malcolm's voice informing any and all security and MACO staff to report to their stations. It was one step below a yellow alert, but still warranted concern, and before he could hesitate he was tumbling out of bed and shimmying into his uniform.

Hoshi sat up and reached for the comm the second it went off, and together they listened as Dr. Yuris explained, with an extraordinary amount of calm, that their tactical officer was under the influence of some alien virus and was presently going berserk on anyone and everyone she could find in the corridors.

She wasn't particularly coherent, either, so Hoshi decided to come along, knowing full well that they likely couldn't rely on the UT in a situation like this. Together they hurried through B Deck, then through C, every so often pausing and listening for shouting or weapons fire. They found a half dozen MACOs outside the turbolift on D Deck, getting briefed and steeling themselves for a confrontation.

"Weapons set to stun, folks," he said, accepting an offer of a weapon from one of them. Down the corridor, he could hear someone yelling, screaming bloody murder, begging for mercy.

A moment later, his first officer came running around the corner and collided directly with him, nearly finding herself on the receiving end of seven different phase rifle blasts. Julia didn't notice, seizing his arms and bearing down with unbelievable pressure. She was frantic, terrified, and when she spoke, he could tell she was dangerously close to losing control. "They've got both of them, Trip. First it was Alira, then it was Ethan, and I don't know how long I have, they're in my head, they're trying to gain control, they're trying to push me out!"

"Who, Jules?" He seized both sides of her face, if only to stop her from trembling than anything else. Her eyes were darting around wildly, and she seemed to shrink inwardly from him. She was at a loss for words, and couldn't for the life of her get her thoughts out. Gesturing to herself then down the hall, she let out a desperate, strangulated cry that caused the hairs on the back of his neck to stand on end.

The MACOs were moving, rushing past them, weapons held aloft. Hoshi moved toward her, arms outstretched, and Julia fell into them gratefully, weeping and wailing for all of her might.

It pained him to leave them behind, but he did, rounding the corner to a long stretch of hallway running the length of the saucer section. The floor was littered with the crumpled and unconscious bodies of MACOs, security personnel, and other crewmen, and his tactical officer was standing amidst all of them, a phase pistol in each hand, as if she was daring them to come at her.

As usual, Alira was all strength, all intensity, and all decisiveness. In situations like this, Trip wasn't too proud to admit that she scared him. Once during senior staff combat training, he'd asked her if she ever missed, and she'd told him that she never missed when it counted.

When he pressed her further as to when it counted, she informed him that it almost always did.

"Stand down, Ensign!" He shouted, watching as she began to stride towards them, undeterred, smiling all the way.

As she came closer, he realized her eyes were black, the pupils melting into the iris, an unsettling deviation from normal. One of the young corporals rushed at her, meaning to wrestle her down to the ground, only to be incapacitated and thrown over her shoulder in a fraction of a second. She hardly hesitated, and a second later the corridor was flooded with a rush of weapons fire. He thought he heard Hoshi scream or cry out, but he couldn't run to her no matter how much he wanted to. He was pinned down next to Sergeant Kemper and Corporal Chang, who soon fell, having been hit with what he dearly hoped was the stun setting.

Now the only person left conscious in the corridor, Trip opted for a different approach, one that he knew would almost certainly mean his death. He crouched down to the ground, laying his weapon down, then extended his arms out to her. The look in her eyes was murderous, positively bloodthirsty.

"Alira, please. Tell me what's going on. This isn't you," he pleaded, watching as she visibly waged war on whatever threatened to overwhelm her, shaking, whimpering, rolling from side to side. The phase pistols fell from her hands, and that was enough of a cue for him.

Trip rushed at her, knocking her off her feet and slamming her into the deck plating. She didn't struggle, though she did meet his gaze. For a second, she was entirely there. "Captain, help me," she whispered, her face contorting in despair and panic. "Get him out, please!"

"Who? Who's attacking you?" He demanded, feeling her extremities tense up. She began to thrash about violently, threatening to overwhelm him, and he seized her wrists with bruising strength, holding them together above her head.

Hoshi was there suddenly, looking a little worse for wear, explaining something about Julia's demeanor changing on a dime, how she'd thrown her to the ground and ran into the turbolift and she had no idea where she was now. She joined him in restraining their friend, listening as she began to babble, slipping in between Denobulan and English and something else that he couldn't trace.

"She's saying they're trying to kill me, they're trying to kill us all, we have to get back."

"Get back where?"

She shook her head. There was no way, no conceivable way she would know enough to carry on a conversation like this, but all the same…

"She's speaking Betazoid. At least partially."

Realization hit, and he was plainly horrified, leaning down to look into her black, soulless eyes. "Who are you?" He demanded. "What have you done with my tactical officer?"

She swallowed hard, opening and closing her mouth, struggling to get the words out. When she spoke, it was her voice, but not her inflection or her tone, as if someone else was using her as a mouthpiece. "Your tactical officer is now my vessel. You need to listen to me. I can't fight, but she can, and I don't know you, but she does. You must bring us back to Betazed."

"How do I know you can be trusted?"

"I suppose you don't. Let me afford you some options. My colleagues are presently en route to take over your bridge using the sum of knowledge only their hosts possess. Either return us home, or give us a shuttle and let us be on our way."

"I don't negotiate with terrorists," he hissed. "I want my people back, and I want them now."

"I don't care what you want. The three of us must inform the others before it's too late."

"Too late for what?"

"For the rest of them." Her voice was suddenly softer, quieter, and he leaned further into her. "There's hundreds like me, but if your alliance falls, Betazed is next."

"How can you be so sure?"

"I can guarantee it." She was smiling again, and he felt like telling them to knock it off, to leave their host before he forced them out. Though he didn't have the time, for in the next second she thrashed against them with the sum of strength they didn't know she possessed, throwing them off of her and stumbling to her feet.

Before either of them could even start to pursue her, she was gone, en route to the turbolift.

---

The ride into the city in the Corsettis' hovercar turned out to be an adventure in itself; it was rickety, dilapidated, and almost rusted through, with sagging seats and no windows to speak of. The roar of the engine was deafening, and it truly seemed that it would fly apart at any moment. Dario had to shout to explain that the design was Solnaran in nature, dating back from before their interplanetary war, and they all nodded gravely, hoping that a sudden mishap wouldn't send them flying, scattering each of them to the wind.

Martina had quite the lead foot, accelerating as they zoomed out over the open prairie, dipping so low that Malcolm thought he could have reached out and brushed the grasses with his hand. He was squeezed in the back with Lieutenant Cutler in a seat that was probably meant for one, and they were less than a half meter from the back of Ensign Pascal's head, but that didn't stop her from telling him exactly what she'd seen in the depths of the mine.

"I saw them talking," she said so quietly he wasn't sure if she'd just been mouthing it, then tilted her head towards their helmsman, and then towards Dario.

His eyebrows lifted in surprise, and he settled farther into his seat, tucking his elbow into the window and placing his chin in his hand. The two men in question were engaged in spirited conversation; what about, he couldn't be quite sure, but he surmised that the scientist was explaining the landscape around them, the distant mountains, the broad river they were soon to cross, the prairies melting into rolling hills.

"What about?"

"Not sure. They were in the shadows, and Martina was distracting me." There was a pause, then he felt her hand on his arm, drawing his attention. When she was sure she had it, she asked, "What do you think it means?"

"I wish I knew," he replied, and meant it.

Soon they were flying past a small farming community, rectangular plots of land carved out of the plains and covered with flourishing crops. As they approached, laborers paused their work, set their tools aside, and waved at them with both hands, whooping excitedly. The Corsettis reciprocated the gesture, banking the hovercar to the left as they came around the outskirts.

They were surrounded by fenced enclosures on both sides, filled with dozens of cow-like creatures, slate blue in color with spots and long tails that dragged the ground. Malcolm hadn't the faintest idea what such an animal could be used for; he was sure Dario was explaining it with the way he kept talking with his hands, but he couldn't hear him.

They were now zooming over a cobblestone street leading into an outcropping of hills far into the distance; at first he was sure it was just a natural geological formation, until they grew closer and one of the hills seemed much taller than the other; he realized it was a grand building, painted in brilliant primary and secondary colors, built into the side of the dirt mound, with many secondary structures around it.

A circle of rocks formed a natural barricade, scarcely large enough for a hovercar to pass through. There were a surplus of them, parked just inside of the city walls, outside of buildings, lining the streets and sidewalks. As they drew closer, he could see that they were in similar state to their own, rusted and falling apart; in fact, everything in the city seemed to be cobbled together from old or recycled parts, affording the capital a bit of a haphazard appearance, but also making it feel lived-in and welcoming.

As they slowed to a stop in front of the large building at the city center, Liz stepped out immediately, her eyes dancing across the homes and businesses built into the side of the hills, the warped and reused glass in their windows, the tall grasses and flowers rising up indiscriminately of the hustle and bustle around them. She was captivated, utterly transfixed, and the spell was only broken when a child ran up to her and tugged on the hem of her skirt.

She surreptitiously reached her to UT and held it at her waist, smiling down at the little girl in front of her. She was adorable, with a mop of dark curls, enormous eyes, and a friendly smile. It took a moment for the UT to latch onto her dialect, but once it did, they understood her intent.

"Are you from that big ship? Where's the lady?"

"We're from a different ship. It's called the Enterprise," Liz explained, plainly amused.

She didn't look convinced, glancing between her and Malcolm, then at their COs following the Corsettis up the steps towards the exterior of the building. When she spoke again, she was genuinely curious, though somewhat apprehensive. "Are you going to make us leave home?"

So everyone already knew. Come to think of it, he'd seen plenty of pictures, and now realized the capital was vaguely reminiscent of United Earth in the decades following World War III. Malcolm immediately knew that asking the Solnarans to abandon the new paradise they'd managed to cobble together from the broken remains of the past wasn't going to go over well.

"I don't know," Liz confessed. "But we're here to help you. We'll do whatever it takes."

She stood there for a second, appearing to ponder this, then ran away, heeding the call of an unseen minder somewhere around them. The two of them exchanged a meaningful look, then retreated to the large, circular door at the face of the hill where the rest of the away team was waiting.

The Commodore had already knocked a half dozen times, using the brass ring that was so large that he could hear the reverberations of it ricocheting around the halls within. He glanced at the Corsettis, who seemed confused and more than a little apologetic. They were about to give up altogether and return to the hovercar when the door began to open, agonizingly slow at first, squeaking and grinding on its track as it swung towards the interior of the room.

There was a pause, and then two men stepped out, so jovial and approachable that their slight was immediately forgotten.

Lord Moberly was the more imposing one, with a heavy beard and full, bushy eyebrows that afforded him a naturally dour expression. He wore a heavy cloak in spite of the warm, springlike weather, and carried an ornately wrought dagger strapped to his waistband.

All the same, he offered them a handshake, explaining that Captain Hernandez had shown them how humans greeted one another, and that with the Corsettis taking up residence on the far reaches of the southern continent, they had learned enough to where they could easily assimilate into their culture with a moment's notice.

Jonathan laughed, saying he was sure they could, then introduced the away team, starting with their Captain and ending with their science officer.

Lord Senath was the one to greet Liz; he was young and handsome and immensely confident, and the top of his head scarcely reached her shoulder. He shook her hand and beamed at her, and his friendly demeanor made her ask exactly how Solnarans usually greeted one another.

He glanced at her commanding officer and then his colleague, who shrugged. Then, before she could react, he seized both sides of her face with his hands and stood on his toes to kiss her forehead. It was brisk, businesslike, entirely unsentimental, though the second he released her, Malcolm could see she was blushing.

"Exactly like that," he confirmed, then gestured for their group to join them inside. "We'd like to give you a little tour of our High Assembly before the reception this evening."

"Reception?" The Captain repeated somewhat incredulously, glancing at Archer. They were doing that thing again, seeming to have a conversation without words, though their hosts didn't seem to notice.

"Yes, of course. We extended the same honor to Columbia," Moberly said impassively, though firmly, as if to imply he would be offended if their invitation was refused.

This time, the Commodore spoke. "That's very kind of you. Unfortunately, we have a lot of business to discuss-"

"Business!" Senath crowed, throwing up his hands in frustration. "All of this Romulan business. Can we not have one more evening of happiness before we start talking about doom and gloom?"

Malcolm thought they were being a little nonchalant about the impending destruction of their world and the slaughter of their people, but he said nothing, following a very reluctant command team into the corridors.

It seemed like hours passed as they traversed the halls and chambers of the High Assembly, viewing various historical artifacts and cultural curiosities of the Solnaran people. They were each generously lit with a mixture of lanterns and electric lights, bathing the stone floor and ornately painted walls in a warm glow. They were truly inside of the hill, and the ceilings were pretty low; every so often the tallest of them would have to stoop to come around a corner.

Ensign Pascal hung around the back of the group, chattering excitedly with the Corsettis, asking them question after question about the plans for their mining operation. Malcolm wanted to believe he was genuinely curious, but couldn't be sure, and kept an ear trained towards them as the Lords led them deeper into the labyrinth.

Moberly went on to explain that just over two hundred years ago, the two major cultural factions of Solnara were locked in a war of attrition, with heavy losses on both sides. Only when they'd wiped out most of their own population had they seen the error of their ways and strived to forge a new society under the watchful eye of a joint government. Apparently, science and arts and reason had flourished and developed rapidly, so much so that one of their top researchers had discovered warp technology only a decade before. They were newly stable, and immensely eager, to join the interstellar community and leverage the natural resources so plentiful to their world.

United Earth had been an ideal partner.

At least on paper, Malcolm added silently, if they weren't going to at least attempt to follow their advice.

Soon they were coming into the far end of the building, and the hush of musicians warming up reached them. They could hear people talking and moving about, and at once they crossed over into a grand ballroom with a vaulted ceiling that was made entirely of glass, many colors melted down and combined into a single sheet that stretched out before them until it reached the ground. It made up the entire back curve of the hill the High Assembly was built into, and beyond it, they could see an expansive garden dotted with walking paths and lanterns.

Inside, there were benches and chairs and long tables piled high with an extensive feast the likes of which none of them had seen before. Individuals who they supposed to be dignitaries from far-flung cities and provinces were there, already helping themselves to food and drink, their laughter and conversation melding together and setting the tone for the festivities.

He glanced towards his COs, who scarcely had time to give orders before the Lords were pulling them away, saying they had many people to introduce them to. They resisted at first, but then gave in, and Archer was mouthing over his shoulder to them, his time frame clear: Half an hour.

The musicians struck up a lively tune that reminded Malcolm of at least a half dozen different Irish reels, and that was all but forgotten.

Some time later, Malcolm and Liz found themselves seated against the wall, trying and failing not to look obvious as they observed Simon speaking furtively with the Corsettis across the room.

"He's up to something," Liz said, and he agreed. He had an inkling of what it might be, though he didn't dare vocalize it.

He needed to do some research.

All around them, people were carousing, toasting the day, celebrating the new opportunities that were sure to come to them and their people, though the two of them weren't feeling particularly festive. The Captain and the Commodore were standing towards the far end of the room, undoubtedly trying to convince Lord Moberly to pay attention to what they had to say, to heed their warnings about the imminent threat to the system, all to no avail. He felt like joining them, though he knew his persuasion skills were certainly lacking and he likely wouldn't be much help.

In the next moment, the band struck up another lively tune, and the assembled guests reacted with mutual surprise, laughing and shouting, beginning to pair off and draw one another into a circle in the center of the room. It was a pretty simple dance, all hand claps and stomping feet and holding one another at arm's length before pulling away and spinning in the opposite direction around the circle, faster and faster until many of them were just a blur.

All the while a couple of Solnarans were trying to coax the rest of the away team onto the floor with little success; the two of them were too absorbed in watching the revelers to notice when a woman approached them, seizing Malcolm's hands and attempting to pull him to his feet.

She was pretty, red-headed, wearing a flowing dress tied back with a bow, and her smile was certainly encouraging, but he shook his head, indicating that he wouldn't, he couldn't possibly.

She seemed to be struggling to find the right word, but finally found it, pointing between the two of them: "Dance?"

"No, I'm sorry. I wouldn't be very good." He had no way of knowing if she understood, but she shrugged and moved away, finding another partner with ease.

Liz elbowed him. "You should have gone for it."

"Why? It could have spelled disaster for us."

"You think you'd be so bad at dancing that you'd cause an interstellar incident?" She sounded skeptical.

Well, when she put it that way…

"Yes. Absolutely."

She shook her head and turned her attention back to the center of the room, only to find Lord Senath standing before her, hand outstretched.

"Wouldn't you, Miss Cutler?"

"Oh, I…" She trailed off, glancing at Malcolm, who was sporting a teasing grin and was surely only seconds from reminding her what she'd said moments ago.

Go for it, her mind said, and she rose to her feet, allowing herself to be lead into the circle. It took a second, but stepped up to her, wrapping an arm around her waist and guiding her through the steps with ease.

Soon they were twirling and reeling around the room and she was smiling and laughing, truly laughing, and it was the first time Malcolm had seen her happy in quite some time. Surely since before the incident at Kandar.

Since they realized their world was due any day now to fall apart around them.

Malcolm knew someone was approaching, but didn't realize it was Simon until he took a seat in the chair Liz had recently vacated, looking at him somewhat expectantly.

"You know, say what you want about the Solnarans-"

"They know how to have a good time," Pascal finished the thought for them, tapping his foot on the floor.

There was a somewhat awkward pause, then Malcolm decided to do something he had previously resolved to never do. Twisting around to face him, he interjected: "You know, Ensign, I must admit that I don't know much about you."

His expression was instantly dour, severe, resolute. "And I don't know anything about you, Mr. Reed." A bit of malice raced through his eyes, fleetingly. "Except what I hear from other people."

And there was an unspoken agreement to keep it that way.

The undercurrent of those words certainly weren't lost on him.

The song ended, none too quickly, and the assembled crowd was clapping, cheering on the dancers. Liz turned and mimed wiping sweat off her brow, inhaling deeply and taking a single step towards them.

Suddenly, Senath seized her by the wrist and drew her back in, kissing her on both cheeks this time, holding her face in his hands, his joy evident. It lasted no more than a couple of seconds, but then they parted, going their separate ways. Liz was now free to face this music.

In a manner of speaking.

"Your secret is safe for me," Malcolm reassured her, passing a goblet into her hand.

Liz took a long drink, then sighed and sank into the chair opposite Simon. Even from that angle, he could see she was smiling. She looked at the both of them, a twinkle in her eye, her cheeks red with excitement. "You can tell him all you want."

From across the room, they caught a glimpse of the Captain and the Commodore disappearing into a side chamber, and rose as one, each coming to the same realization.

It was time.

---

Ensign Mohindra Bhaduri was terrified, plain and simple.

When he received his assignment to the Maelstrom, he'd been beside himself with excitement. His friends from STC who had been relegated to far flung outposts and colonies had been jealous, and his parents were proud of him for what seemed like the first time in a long time. He knew that the newly promoted Captain Tucker had a reputation for getting into trouble; nonetheless, he'd jumped right into life aboard a starship. He made friends. He explored his surroundings. He threw himself into his work. By all accounts, he'd done everything right.

That hadn't mattered. It was only two months into his commission, and he'd already been through enough traumatizing missions to fill an entire career. This gamma shift, which was usually perfectly uneventful, was no exception.

Their current conn officer, Lieutenant Mayweather, was seated at his station preparing for their impending invasion. As soon as the security alert had gone off, the weapons, shields, engines, and other critical systems were locked down immediately. Emergency bulkheads sealed off the bridge from the rest of the ship and each deck apart from one another; of course, that didn't make a difference when one of the members of senior staff who had lost their grasp on reality had every manual override memorized.

Jimmy Nguyen, their tactical officer's second, had quickly excused himself to the armory. It was the only place on the ship where these codes could be changed, something that he made a mental note to remedy once all this craziness was over. Mayweather seemed perfectly nonplussed, locating the compartment in the deck plating where they kept weapons prepared for emergency boarding situations and passing him and the overnight communications officer phase pistols.

Ensign Medina, the only newly commissioned member of the junior staff whose enthusiasm levels could have possibly rivaled his own, seemed to accept his fate readily. He nodded as Travis told him he was free to defend the bridge using all necessary force, including shooting and incapacitating their senior officers, then turned back to his work, idly pressing buttons at his station. It seemed like no one truly realized the gravity of the situation.

He never should have switched shifts with Ensign Farrokh.

From somewhere below them, they heard screaming and weapons fire, followed by the thundering of feet on the deck plating. Involuntarily, he flinched, reaching for the weapon he'd been given and drawing it into his lap. As if on cue, Lieutenant Mayweather turned to look at him.

"Got your station locked down, Mo?"

"Yes sir, with my personal codes."

"And the comm?"

"Open channel with the Captain and the armory. We're ready."

"Dropping out of warp," he said, and as one they felt the gentle nudge pushing them forward as they decelerated into open space. When that was done, he rose to his feet and approached the back of the room, listening carefully as the emergency bulkheads disengaged and the lift started to rise through the floor.

There was a pause where the only discernible sound was him clicking the safety off of his phase pistol, then the doors opened, issuing three very angry looking crewmen onto the bridge.

The officer formerly known as Commander Hammond was the first into the room. She was moving quickly, purposefully, without a hint of the typical amusement she usually possessed. Her focus was singular, and she breezed past Mayweather to the helm, where her fingers began to dance across the screen.

A second later, she brought her hands down on the console, growling in frustration. She gestured to her companions, and they split off, going to stand by the science and comm stations. Ensign Taxa turned to him in profile, momentarily glancing at him before turning her attention to her commanding officer. He noticed that her eyes were completely black, impenetrable, and he immediately knew that the MACOs she'd taken down on their way to the bridge couldn't possibly have been exaggerating.

"What's wrong? Command codes not working?" Travis called out, and Mo knew he was testing fate. Taxa wasn't armed, but she kept clenching and unclenching her fists at her sides, seemingly ready to beat the hell out of him at any moment.

"I'm not playing games," she hissed. "Set a course for Betazed, and we won't kill this crew."

He seemed confused, though about a hundred different emotions were racing across his features in that moment. "Who are you?"

She rushed at him, seizing him by the collar and dragging him towards the helm, before pushing him down so hard he almost fell to his knees. "Ersa Nephele, Daughter of the Fifth House. These are Oran and Boreas, also of my line."

Julia reached for his phase pistol, and he pulled away with the veiled threat of physical action, though not wanting to retaliate unless absolutely necessary. Clenching down on his shoulder and bearing down until her lips were right next to his ear, she hissed: "Set a course. I'm not playing games."

Travis slowly reached for his console, his fingers hovering over the keys. In that moment Medina spoke up, attracting their attention. "Is that your master plan? Do you really think you can take down everyone on this crew and take control? We outnumber you fifty to one."

"If we were to leave now, it would take us nearly two months to get there. What would you even do in the meantime?" Bhaduri added, and Taxa turned her head to him, her smile wide but her eyes flashing, as though she was daring him to finish his thought. And so he did, even though he knew he shouldn't. "I guarantee you couldn't hold us off for even a full day."

In a flash, she reached forward and grabbed the phase pistol in his lap. There was a brief struggle for the upper hand, but she quickly overpowered him, pulling back and striking him with the butt of his own weapon so hard that his head snapped back and he cried out in pain.

He knew he was bleeding, and very shortly, knew he'd lost teeth as he spat them out into his hand. Taxa didn't hesitate, grabbing him by the hair and forcing him to look at her. "If I want to hear a single word come out of your mouth, I'll let you know."

When she released him, he pitched forward, inhaling sharply, desperately trying to maintain his composure. A few meters away, the alien inhabiting Lieutenant Novakovich's body came to a rather unfortunate conclusion.

"He's right. They ought to just give us a shuttlepod."

"And let us keep it," Julia concluded.

"Let us keep it," Taxa echoed, and he looked up just in time to see a shadow of doubt pass between them. He realized that they were acting in desperation, in anguish, without complete comprehension of the impacts or irrationality of their actions. They were floundering, grasping for straws, and even though they were surrounded by alien body snatchers, he was immediately a lot less terrified.

He knew Travis was picking up on it too, for the next thing he said was: "Our sister ship encountered a Betazoid patrol a couple of weeks ago. We could send you there."

Assuming they could even find the Delphina, that is.

"No!" Julia cried vehemently, grabbing the back of his uniform and pulling him to his feet. "We've got to go home."

In her eyes, he could see her own consciousness warring with the entity that had called herself Ersa, clashing, fighting for dominance. They were both in an extreme amount of pain, and he could read it in her body, in her tight shoulders, in the way that she was trembling with every fiber of her being.

"We need insurance," Ethan insisted, crossing the room in two strides, repeatedly striking his palm with his phase pistol. His occupant seemed calm and collected, with a perfectly dispassionate demeanor which complemented his black eyes.

"Insurance," Taxa repeated as she abandoned the science station, leveling her weapon towards his face. She was angry, violent, and increasingly confused. "You, get moving."

Despite the dire circumstances, Travis felt a sudden surge of relief.

It was the first time he'd seen them make a bad move.

Medina and Bhaduri tried to make eye contact with him as they made their way to the turbolift, but the only gesture of reassurance he afforded them was a dismissive hand gesture the second before the doors closed.

There was a pause, and then Medina asked, "So which of us has the conn?"

---

The second the audio cut out, Trip stepped away from the comm panel and back into the corridor outside the shuttlebay. He turned in profile, caught a glimpse of Hoshi, and admitted, "You were right."

Mercifully, she didn't take a single second to gloat. "There's something not right here. They're not being rational. None of this makes sense."

"If they're really trying to take over the ship, they're doing a piss poor job of it."

"That's because it's not their goal," Yuris mumbled, not looking up from his tricorder. The three of them had just passed underneath a layer of internal sensors, affording him the opportunity to see how their hormone levels had changed over time. When she realized they were looking at him, he continued: "Heart and respiration rates are high. Norepinephrine and cortisol levels are nearing life-threatening."

They didn't seem to be understanding him, so he turned in full to face them and spell it out as clearly as he possibly could. He'd seen these readings over and over again. They all had. "They're dying, Captain."

"Who's dying?"

"The Betazoids, and if we do not act decisively, they will take their hosts with them."

Trip nodded gravely, appearing deep in thought, then looked back at the two of them, ready to propose solutions. "The minute they step into the shuttlebay, we can flood the room with anesthizine gas. It'll knock out Travis too, but the effects will be temporary."

"I wouldn't recommend that for the rest of our senior officers. They may go into cardiac arrest."

"Do you think Travis could take down all three of them?"

"He's good, but no one's that good. We'll be better off taking them by surprise."

"With what? Two phase pistols and a tricorder?"' Hoshi was incredulous, wondering if he'd really also been there to see their tactical officer take down a half dozen MACOs by herself.

At that moment, the doors of the turbolift slid open down the hall. Together they retreated around the corner, pressing themselves against the wall and listening to the sound of rapidly approaching footsteps.

"I hope Ensign Nguyen remembered to disable the launch bay doors," Yuris whispered, only for Hoshi to lift a finger to her lips and shush him.

"He wouldn't be a very good tactical officer if he didn't," Trip replied, scarcely loud enough for them to hear. Seconds later, they heard the hatch slide open, and then closed.

They waited, listening to the ambient noise of the ship, before receiving the go-ahead from the doctor. Trip led the way, only to be stopped by a hand on his elbow. He stopped in his tracks, looking back at Hoshi, who was studying the access panel intently.

"Lieutenant?"

"You may know your engines, but I know the comm." She pressed several buttons, and the feedback started on the overhead speakers inside, a persistent, shrill sound that was deafening even through the bulkhead. He nodded, and she increased the volume, so loud that the wall between them started to shake. Seconds later, she cut the sound, though he couldn't really be sure that she did over the ringing in his ears.

It was only then that Trip burst over the threshold, finding the four of them hunched over in pain. He and Travis made eye contact from across the room, and he made a mad grab for the phase pistol that their science officer had dropped, presumably switching it to stun and firing two rounds into Julia and Ethan.

Alira seemed to snap back immediately, but she didn't rush at him. Her expression fell from rage to despair, and she crawled on her hands and knees towards her fallen colleagues, shaking them, speaking to them quietly in what they assumed to be Betazoid. Travis made a move to incapacitate her but froze in place when Trip shook his head.

"It's time to stand down," he began carefully, approaching her slowly with his weapon held aloft. "We'd like to help you. Our doctor can find some way to preserve your consciousness until we can make contact with the Delphina, but we need our people first."

"You don't understand," she said, and they could hear that she was very close to tears. As she rose and turned towards him, he could see that this was indeed the case. "This is our last chance to get home before…"

"Before what?"

"Before what happened to the pilots from our world and Tellar Prime happens to us. Please, I need to see home, just one more time."

"Wait, do you know what's happening to you?"

She nodded carefully, as if it were a foolish question. "Enough to know that I need to warn my people before they can get to the others."

"Who's they?" By the time he finished his question, they were perhaps two meters apart, and Travis was slowly rising to his feet.

"The Romulans." She was unarmed, though she looked like she was ready to fight. "They're building something. I felt it before we were joined for this mission. Our intelligence agents needs to-"

"What are they building?" Fear was building up in his gut, unmistakeable.

"Aren't you listening to me?"

He held up his free hand in an attempt to placate her, then passed her, coming between her and the pod. If they rushed at her together, they just might be able to take her by surprise. "I just want all the information before we let you go."

"You're wasting my time!" She shouted, and closed the distance between them in seconds.

Trip attempted to block her movements with his body, only to feel her wrap an arm around his shoulder and the other between his knees, lifting him off his feet in a second and throwing him roughly to the grating on the floor.

It hurt like hell, and he immediately saw stars. As he inhaled once, then twice, trying to catch his breath, he became aware of Alira and Travis struggling for dominance. Soon she was able to catch him by the wrist and twist it around his back, shoving him into the wall head first.

Trip soon realized he had no other options. He fumbled for his phase pistol and shot her in the back as she ran away.

---

They left the ballroom and stepped into a receiving chamber, wide as it was long, with a curved ceiling so tall that their footsteps echoed across the stone floor. A handmade wooden table anchored the room, covered by all means of books and paper and writing utensils, pages open to battle accounts and profiles of long-dead Solnarans, scientists and warriors and politicians from long before the war. Lanterns mounted to the wall lead the way to the end of the room, where their COs were presently engaged in spirited conversation with the Lords, their faces illuminated by the flames of a roaring fireplace.

The Commodore was talking with his hands, desperately trying to relay the severity of the threat, reminding them about the minefield and the Babel Crisis and the attack of Kandar, to limited success.

"We've read your mission reports, Mr. Archer, and while we agree the threat is imminent, we see no reason for such a strong reaction." Lord Senath leaned against the wall somewhat casually, training his eyes towards the hearth.

"Even if we were to evacuate, it would take days. Weeks, even. And there's no guarantee we could reach the more remote colonies this time of year."

T'Pol cut a glance towards Archer, then stepped forward, pinning Lord Moberly under her gaze. "Our communications systems are far more advanced. There are also more than two dozen patrol ships en route to assist."

"You're asking us to leave our world, the only home we've ever known," Senath reminded them, his tone passionate. "We may not have a standing military anymore, but we can easily call for a civilian militia."

"You won't be able to defend yourselves," Malcolm insisted, causing the group to turn their attention to him. "You may have one ship in orbit, but it's not armed. They've got cannons, disruptors, and torpedoes. One shot and they can reduce this entire city to rubble, all without setting a single foot on your soil."

"And if they hit that dilithium mine straight on, it'll level everything within hundreds of kilometers, probably thousands." Liz was the next to speak up, lending her expertise to what they'd all suspected, but not dared to acknowledge.

"She's right," T'Pol said, taking another step closer. "Have you thought to ask the Corsettis what they think? Are they as willing to die needlessly as you are?"

Before they could reply, she glanced back at the Commodore, flinching as if she'd been stung. He was glaring at her, saying something without uttering a single word.

"They're ready to fight," Simon confirmed, then at their curious looks, reminded them: "That's what they told us back on the beach."

The silence from the Captain and the Commodore was supremely non-reassuring.

"It's a good thing we have you to protect us." Senath's voice was cold, mocking. "The mighty United Earth, so willing to start a settlement on our territory, but so reluctant to send more soldiers to defend it. It's likely you're the reason they're here."

Malcolm wasn't sure if he meant that the Romulans tended to follow them through the quadrant like a shadow, or that they meant to conquer Solnara III for its natural surplus of dilithium, which had only become apparent to them through Starfleet's influence. He supposed both were plausible.

Archer was frustrated, that much was clear. He propped his hands on his hips and glanced down, seemingly deep in thought, then went for what he thought would be a compassionate approach. "I understand your anger. My people only discovered warp a hundred years ago, right after we'd come out of our own world war. Right off the bat, we had the Vulcans looking over our shoulder. For years, I thought they were just there to hold us back, to keep us out of the skies, but then I realized…" He trailed off, rubbing his temples, and when he spoke, it was with renewed resolve. "They were protecting us from what we weren't prepared for. Now, I won't pretend to know all the answers…"

"It is very clear that you don't," Senath interrupted, only for Moberly to place a cautioning hand on his shoulder.

He was entirely undeterred. "As I said, we don't know it all, but the reason we're telling you this is that no matter whose solution you choose, if you don't cooperate, if you don't listen to us and do what we say, I can tell you from experience that people are going to die."

"And their deaths will be unnecessary," T'Pol added softly, and they descended into silence.

For nearly a minute, the tension in the room was palpable, the only discernible sounds being the crackling of the fireplace and the dull roar of the reception outside. Finally, Senath made a move, shaking his head, and shoved past them towards the door.

There was a pause, then Lieutenant Cutler reacted, rushing after him with Ensign Pascal in tow. Malcolm was about to join them when he caught T'Pol's severe expression, and was easily convinced to stay right where he was.

The moment the door closed behind them, leaving the triumvirate and Lord Moberly alone in the receiving room, he turned to them, fear and recognition of the inevitable in his eyes.

"Tell me what we need to do to get our people out of here."

---

Liz burst into the ballroom only to discover that a considerable amount of time had passed since they took their leave of the party; the sun had set above them, and dozens of lanterns had been lit, laid on tables and chairs and held up by hooks on the wall. Long shadows were cast over the room, making everything and everyone appear warm, blurred, and distorted. She knew they were all staring at the two Starfleet officers pursuing one of the two senior most officials in their government, though she didn't dignify them with a passing glance, catching up with Lord Senath just as he exited the High Assembly into the garden.

She didn't mean to grab his arm, though she did, causing him to stop dead in his tracks. When he looked back at her, she saw nothing but anguish in his eyes.

"Sir, I hope that you…" Liz trailed off, inhaling deeply, squinting into the darkness. She realized that they were surrounded by flowers, in all shapes and colors and sizes, arranged in patches and encircled by walking paths. Some were night-blooming, and others swayed in the breeze, while all were encircled by the Solnaran equivalent of lightning bugs, as large as a fist and emitting a muted blue glow. The sight was spellbinding, utterly mesmerizing, and she wished she had more than a second to admire it. "I hope you can take their advice."

"And what good would that do for us? We can't run in our own ship at warp one; they'll catch up to us in a second. We can't stay and defend, as your tactical officer so kindly pointed out, and we can't evacuate. I don't care how optimistic your Captain is."

She could feel Ensign Pascal sidling up to her, but she ignored it. "This is about what's best for your people. I can't imagine how difficult of a decision this must be-"

"Don't you dare-" He pulled away, suddenly enraged, but quickly clamped the lid down on his anger. Senath shook his head, dropping his face into his hands momentarily. When he spoke again, it was barely above a whisper. "Don't you dare lecture me about what's best for my people. You know nothing about us, nothing about what we've been through. You don't understand."

They often received refreshers on how to behave around alien delegates, how to avoid confrontation and disagreement. Hell, there was an entire class at STC about it, but they hadn't gone so far in depth as to how to interact with a world leader whose entire civilization was being threatened due to a risky business decision. She decided to go for it anyway. "You're right. Though if you tell me, I just might."

He looked up at them, first doubtful and then understanding, before turning and leading them further into the garden without another word.

It could have been a couple minutes, it could have been an hour, but at last they reached the end of the path before what appeared to be a giant greenhouse, the walls tinted and nearly opaque. The door was ajar, and Senath led the way, followed by Simon. Liz lingered outside the building for one long moment, gazing out into the open prairie, saying a silent prayer to the powers that be for guidance.

The darkness inside the structure was complete, momentarily overwhelming, until she heard the distinct sound of someone turning a crank over and over in the distance. Slowly, the roof covering begin to buckle and shift, revealing glass paneling with a seemingly infinite number of crystals secured to them by unseen strings. They were at varying lengths, some right next to the roof and others only a couple meters above their heads, but all seemed to catch the light seeping in from the moon and the stars, creating a dazzling display of sparkle and radiance all around them.

Liz wanted to ask where they were, what this could possibly signify, but Senath beat her to it. He stepped into the center of the room and trained his gaze skyward, and she could see the glimmer of reverence in his eyes. "This is a monument to all those that died during the Solnaran planetary wars just over two hundred years ago. Care to guess how many there are?"

She got the sense his question was rhetorical, and she was right.

"Close to ten million. It took decades for us to mine these crystals and arrange this display, though the struggle was fitting. This reminds us of the beauty of life, of its fragility. It reminds us of a state we can never return to."

Simon shifted, as though he meant to say something, but she caught his eye, shaking her head.

"It wasn't just combat that killed our people, but famine and disease and our own hubris. Lord Moberly's people and mine, we were fighting over pride, over so-called claims to land that belonged to us all. Our planet was hurting. We were hurting." He turned, looking up at them, his expression beseeching, as though he was begging them to understand. "We had to change, and we did. It was a deeply shameful chapter in our history, though we pressed onward. We made social advancements and scientific discoveries. We discovered that we weren't alone in the universe."

It wasn't lost on the two of them how similar the histories of Earth and Solnara III were, starting with the near total annihilation of their species and bleeding into hope and progress in a new day.

"We found you, and though Moberly objected, I convinced him it was a good idea to join forces with your scientists to learn how to collect and refine dilithium. We'd used it before in its raw form, but this way we could join the interstellar trade community, we could make allies, we could see beyond our own stars." He inhaled deeply, and a swift breeze rushed through the greenhouse, ushering forth a ringing sound akin to a thousand windchimes. "It was a calculated risk, but a misguided one. I now believe we never should have gone forward with it."

"You don't mean that," Simon offered, and Liz wondered exactly why he was encouraging him in this way.

"You're right. We're committed to it now, whatever happens. I hope you can see, Miss Cutler, why every time your commanding officers suggest we evacuate, I wind up right back here." They locked eyes, and the intensity in his gaze shook her to her core. "We worked so hard to be able to say that we'll never return to such a warlike state. Now, it seems we'll have little choice. I'd rather die than let the Romulans take even a fraction of this from me."

She nodded, silently and gravely, and looked away.

The shine coming off of those crystals was suddenly unbearable.

---

Alira came to in a vacant white space, surrounded by nothing and no one.

She was in a tremendous amount of pain. Her head was pounding, a certain spot on her back throbbed, and everything was sore. Experimentally, she sat up, running her hands over her chest and arms. As before their ordeal, she was in her pajamas, except for now, she was also covered in scratches and bruises and human blood.

What's more, she was once again herself.

It took some time to stand up, but she finally did, stumbling off into the distance. The white space continued indefinitely, and she called out, waiting for a reply, but received none. Was she dreaming? Was this another stage of the possession?

Was she dead?

Irrationally, she began to panic and broke out into a run, faster and faster until she was certain if there had been a ground, her feet wouldn't have been touching it. A small dot appeared on the horizon, growing closer and closer until she recognized it as a person laying on their back, struggling to breathe and stay awake.

She sunk to her haunches as she reached their side, realizing it was a teenage boy, not much older than her youngest sisters, with dark hair and dark eyes. He reached out to take her hand and she obliged, barely registering the free flow of thoughts and emotions between them. Squeezing his hand, she studied his expression and his demeanor, and immediately knew who it was.

He opened his mouth and said just two words: "Get help."

Immediately, she obeyed, standing and breaking out into an all-out sprint. She ran and ran and ran until her legs threatened to collapse, then just as she was considering taking a rest, the ground fell out from underneath her.

She supposed it really wasn't the ground, just whiteness and then a rush of blackness, then she was falling, screaming, thrashing. She didn't have time to think, let alone feel anything as she crashed into the void.

Gasping and shrieking, she sat straight up on her biobed, and would have fallen to the floor if Trip hadn't been there to catch her, seizing her shoulders and pressing her back down.

"You're alright, Ensign, you're okay!" Involuntarily, she grabbed his arms followed by his hands, squeezing with all her might, trying desperately to slow her breathing.

"Captain, what-"

The curtain swished open, producing Dr. Yuris. He looked as worried and preoccupied as he could possibly allow himself to be. Taking one look at her, he whipped out his tricorder and passed it over her head, studying the results with interest.

It took more than a few seconds, a worrying amount of time really, before he delivered his verdict. "Your hormone levels have returned to normal. There is no further cause for concern."

"And the others?"

"The very same. You are the last to wake up." He activated the viewscreen on the computer console to one side of her bed, and got straight to business. "It appears that these Betazoids were remotely piloting the neural telepresence units as we've seen before, however, to circumvent the issues they had with the Aenar, they infected each of them with a neurogenic virus. It was genetically engineered to start replicating itself the moment the unit activated. Really, it is a remarkable piece of technology."

Trip grimaced. "Doctor, does this mean by the time we found the unit with their consciousness still tied to it, they were too far gone to save?"

"It is likely the Romulans intended to kill them before any Betazoid patrol or probe could track them. These units run off of their own fear, their terror at being captured and likely tortured, and the subspace transceivers amplify it. In this case, multiple individuals were linked together. If anything, this ordeal was useful to us in that we now know non-telepathic species can be affected, especially at close range."

"How close?"

"It could require physical contact." He shrugged, the barest of movements of his shoulders. "Our officers received an incredibly concentrated dose of psionic energy. What they felt was…"

He trailed off, not sure how to explain that they'd been under the influence of the final, desperate thoughts of three dying Betazoids over a matter of light years. He'd tried to salvage their consciousness, to separate and transfer the external brain waves, but by the time the away team had been brought to sickbay, it had been too late, and he'd needed to save the patients he could.

"We were feeding off of their anguish," Alira explained, bearing down on his hands once again. "He was so hurt and angry and confused, sir. For a time, I could feel Julia and Ethan's thoughts. I know they were as well."

"We were able to confirm using brain waves from the three of you that the unit we found on Calder IV is the same one that attacked the Saral." Yuris paused, layering the intrusive signals over one another in a triplex, then comparing them to the readings from the Enterprise. "With your permission, sir, I would like to notify the Commodore."

He nodded, and the doctor moved off, leaving them alone behind the curtain.

It was only then Alira released him, and he took a step back, returning to a professional distance. "Captain, I need you to tell me. Did I…" She frowned. "Did I kill anyone?"

"Almost," he replied, then at her worried look, pressed on: "You knocked a bunch of MACOs unconscious, and you pistol whipped Ensign Bhaduri."

She sighed, pressing a hand into her forehead. "Oh, poor Mo. Remind me to apologize to him."

"He's fine. Smile's gonna look a little different from now on, though."

Something was teasing her memory, until realization hit her, and she smiled sheepishly. "Do you promise not to give me a reprimand for body slamming a superior officer into the deck plating?"

"As long as you swear not to tell Malcolm I shot you."

"You know what? I think I just might." She began to laugh but stopped herself short, clutching her lower back where the stun blast had made contact. "Did you get a chance to talk to Julia and Ethan?"

"Sure did. Novakovich was telling me how sorry he was that another away mission of his went wrong."

"And what did you say?"

"I told him that technically it was the second since we left space dock. Yadalla Prime definitely counts."

"You're damn right it does," she mumbled, struggling to sit up in bed. "Does this mean we can't continue studying the telepresence unit?"

Trip wanted to tell her that they would get rid of it, disable it, destroy it by any means necessary, but that would mean losing the only link they presently had to this particular arm of the hybrid plot. It was information they'd worked so hard to acquire, and information the Betazoids desperately wanted. He wondered if they knew about the neurogenic virus, and its potential to bring their entire civilization to its knees.

It would certainly explain their behavior.

"We'll keep it behind a level four containment field. Scan it all you want, just don't touch it."

"That sounds manageable. Give me an hour or two and I'll be back at it."

"Take the rest of the day off, Ensign. That's an order." He turned and started to take his leave of her, then suddenly returned to her bedside. "I do have another assignment for you."

While she'd looked slightly disappointed before, she now looked hopeful, accepting the PADD he offered her.

"Do you remember telling me that the Romulans were building something?" As a matter of fact, she didn't. That much was clear by her bewildered expression. He tapped on the screen, illuminating it. "I want you to find out as much as you can."

"Sir, I-"

"Listen, Taxa. I know you still have contacts in Infantry Special Ops. Don't even try to deny it. I'm sure one of them knows something."

"And you're giving me permission to-"

"I know where your loyalties lie." They locked eyes and he smiled, somewhat faintly. "I expect updates at every turn. Do you understand?"

"I think so, sir."

"Good. Don't disappoint me, Ensign." He nodded curtly, and left without another word, leaving her alone with her thoughts and the crushing burden of memory, of her mother's words, of her final warning.

I hope you can find it before they find you.

---

It seemed like hours had passed by the time Lord Senath returned. He was followed closely by Lieutenant Cutler and Ensign Pascal, who looked both emotionally affected and deeply reassured.

Malcolm looked towards them curiously, seeking meaning and understanding in the countenance of his friend, but finding nothing. He wanted to pull her aside, to figure out what had transpired and gather clues, but could tell that their previous conversation was very far from over.

Suddenly, his communicator beeped, and he went to answer it, knowing full well a call from the Enterprise this late at night could mean nothing but trouble.

Meanwhile, the two Lords were preparing to square off. They nodded toward one another and moved off together to talk, quietly this time, huddled in the far corner of the room next to the fireplace.

"Lieutenant?"

"He's adamant, sir. I don't think his opinion's going to change," Liz replied, though that was yet to be seen.

The Captain and the Commodore seemed to converse wordlessly again, and the room fell mostly silent, save for the quiet rush of conversation on the two opposite ends of the chamber.

Malcolm soon returned to them, his expression fraught. His words didn't betray it, but there was fear in his eyes. "The patrol ship Mariner has reported that the Romulan forces are on the move, sir. If they continue at their present course and speed, they'll be here in forty-eight hours."

Liz felt like she'd been punched in the gut. She grabbed the top of the chair nearest her and pressed down tightly.

"Did they have any specific information other than that, sir?" Pascal asked, perfectly calm.

He shook his head. "They were lost with all hands just a few moments after that transmission came through. Other ships have been able to pick them up on long range sensors."

"And our sister ships?" The Captain had clasped her hands in front of her, rubbing her thumb across her knuckles, awaiting his reply with bated breath.

"The Cochrane is twelve hours away, the Phoenix twenty. None of the Vulcan ships we've been promised can make that time frame. The Maelstrom can make it here right in the nick of time if they red-line the engines all the way here." He paused, shaking his head. "They managed to track down that telepresence unit. You're not going to believe this."

"I am sure that I will," T'Pol said, "But what of the long-range sensor reports?"

"From the Victory, ma'am. They say…" He trailed off, glancing down at his boots, then looked into her eyes, anticipating the impact of his words. "They say they look like Vulcan ships, but they're sure it's a computer malfunction."

There was a pause, then she exhaled, cursing under her breath.

The away team was plainly shocked by this, but the Commodore didn't give them any time to think about it. Approaching the Lords standing at the far end of the room, he clapped his hands, then spread his arms out wide.

When he was sure he had their attention, he demanded, "So what's it going to be?"

End of Episode Fourteen

---

Next time on Enterprise...

Episode Fifteen: Battle of Solnara

All hell breaks loose, and United Earth's hand is forced. Shran tags along for the ride.