Disclaimer: Yes, I have suddenly acquired all rights to Star Trek since posting my last chapter. Or I'm being sarcastic. It's one of the two.
"Yew said the planet was uninhabited!" Tucker said accusingly, glaring across the table of Archer's briefing room at T'Pol.
"That is what sensors indicated," the Vulcan said calmly. "It appears that these life forms were not detected by our scanners. I am running an analysis to determine why."
"Not detected? You don't say," Tucker grumbled, already feeling guilty for his harshness to her. It wasn't her fault, after all, and he wasn't really angry with her. He was worried sick and furious with himself, just looking for someone else to blame it on. He should have been more careful, should have kept Reed closer to the group instead of letting him wander off.
"Cool it, Trip," Archer said warningly, though the engineer had already subsided into sullen silence. "We're going to get him back. T'Pol, have you been able to detect Malcolm's biosign?"
"I have not, Captain," T'Pol admitted reluctantly. "However, it is possible that whatever prevented me from detecting the planet's indigenous inhabitants is also preventing me from locating Lieutenant Reed."
Or he could be dead, Tucker tried not to think.
The door slid open to admit Doctor Phlox. Archer rose to his feet expectantly. "What news, Doctor? How is Crewman Novakovich?"
"I see no cause for concern," Phlox said. He held out a small glass container to Archer. Through its transparent sides, Tucker could see a small, sharply pointed piece of wood. "I discovered this in Crewman Novakovich's neck. It is covered with a powerful plant-based sedative." He paused. "An interesting side effect is that I am currently unable to detect Crewman Novakovich's biosign. I can obtain medical readings with a hand scanner at close range, but my imaging chamber reports that he is deceased when, clearly, he is not."
Tucker felt warm relief wash over him. "So that's why we can't pick up Malcolm's biosign, Doctor?"
"It is quite possible," Phlox said optimistically. He turned to T'Pol. "I believe this may also explain your inability to detect the indigenous life forms on this planet. If the plant that secretes this chemical forms a part of their diet, or if they consume animals that eat this plant, their bodies would contain trace amounts of the substance, making them impossible to detect. They could have built up an immunity to the substance's sedative properties, or it could be simply ineffective when ingested rather than injected."
"How long until this substance wears off?" Archer asked. Tucker could see where the captain was going.
"Difficult to say, Captain," Phlox admitted. "I've synthesised an antidote to counteract its effects, but I am still unable to detect Crewman Novakovich's biosign." Archer nodded and turned to T'Pol.
"T'Pol, I'd like you to start working on the scanners. See if you can configure them to work around this. In the meantime, Trip, I want you to take a security team down to the surface to search for Malcolm. Have the doctor inoculate you with his antidote before you go."
"Yessir," Tucker said grimly. "We'll find him, Cap'n."
Hazy awareness returned slowly, and it was a long time before Reed could distinguish between reality and the chaotic, confused dreams of a drugged sleep. He heard deep voices speaking in a rough, broken language that he vaguely recognised, though he couldn't place it, and felt the low vibrations of a ship's engines around him. When he opened his eyes his vision was blurry and gave him only an indistinct view of a dark room dimly lit with a reddish glow. He tried to sit up, only to realise that his hands and chest had been bound to the surface he was on with thick bands of an inflexible material. He couldn't feel his legs. This was far less disconcerting than it should have been. He was still heavily drugged, and couldn't quite bring himself to struggle against his bonds.
Footsteps approached, and a dark shape he couldn't make out leaned over him. Fingers pried his eye wide open and a bright light pierced burned into Reed's retina, making his eyes water.
"He'll be waking up," one of the deep voices grunted, speaking English. "Drug him again. Knock him out, just don't kill him. Harris wants him alive."
Another voice replied in the alien language. Reed felt the sharp prick of a needle in the side of his neck, and his eyes slid closed again. Just before awareness left him, his drugged mind supplied a name for the unaccountably familiar language: Klingon. He had no time to process the implications of this before blackness surrounded him again and pulled him back into the ethereal world of dreams.
Back on the planet's surface, Tucker saw that the balmy atmosphere of earlier had entirely changed. The storms of the afternoon had given way to a cool, damp early evening, but the calm was deceptive. The search party kept silent and close together as they followed their scanners to the place where Reed had been abducted.
"I've got a biosign," Crewman Alex said in an undertone, indicating his scanner. Carefully, followed by Tucker and four armed MACOs, he started forward into the trees. Under the canopy of vegetation, all was dim and quiet except for the flat plop of water droplets dripping onto wide leaves. Their feet made little sound in the long grass, which was flattened into a drenched mat by the rain. Although the temperature was mild, the humidity was oppressive. Tucker's breathing sounded loud and close in his own ears, and when Alex stopped and spoke in a low voice, it might as well have been a shout.
"Lost it," he said, frustrated. Tucker stepped forward with his own scanner, to no result.
"Dammit," he muttered softly.
"Over here, sir," one of the MACOs said. Tucker turned to find the man examining a patch of ground where the matted grass had been disturbed. "Something was here. There's a trail."
Tucker couldn't see the trail himself, beyond the tousled grass, but the MACO, Corporal Ryan, pointed out a broken stem here, a torn-up tuft of grass there. His scanner and Alex's still picked up nothing, but what else was there to go on? Tucker followed the two men through the dense undergrowth. The rest of the away team followed closely.
Ryan stopped suddenly and knelt, examining something on the ground. "Sir," he said softly, beckoning. Tucker hurried over to see the grass coated with something dark and wet. He bent to touch it, and his hand came away sticky and red.
"It's human," Alex confirmed, sending a shot of anxiety through Tucker. There was a lot of blood here – perhaps not a fatal amount, but far too much for comfort. "Sir, I'm getting something –"
"A biosign?" Tucker asked quickly.
Alex hesitated just too long. "I – I can't tell, sir. It could be. It's close."
"How are those sensors coming?"
"Nothing yet, Captain," T'Pol answered patiently, for the sixth time. Archer gripped the armrests of the Captain's chair, resisting the urge to pressure the Vulcan to work faster. His urgency was of no utility to her. As unconcerned as she seemed, Archer knew that she was working as efficiently and quickly as any of his crew could, and probably more so. He took a steadying breath and wondered at his own anxiety. This was not the first time someone in his crew had gone missing, and although he was always worried, this time felt different. He was having difficulty concentrating. Already he had to resist the childish urge to ask T'Pol again if she had made any progress. Archer worried that his disquiet would rub off on the rest of the bridge crew. With a conscious effort of will, he forced himself to relax.
"Sir, we're being hailed." Sato's voice broke his thoughts, bringing the tension rushing back. "It's Trip. Audio only."
"Patch it through," Archer said sharply.
"Aye, sir."
"Trip?" Archer asked, when Sato's nod told him the channel was open. "Did you find him? Report."
"I – yes, sir." Tucker's tone was oddly flat. Archer's skin crawled unpleasantly. "Captain –" there was the slightest of breaks in his voice, just enough to tell Archer the truth before Tucker spoke the words. "Malcolm's dead."
When Reed woke for the second time, it was more fully. He could still feel the sedative lurking at the edges of his consciousness, dulling his senses, but only faintly. He stared up into the red glow surrounding him and made out a dark ceiling far above.
"Lieutenant Reed, glad to see you've finally re-joined us." Harris's voice spoke from beside him. Reed turned his head to see the man sitting cross-legged in a chair beside him. Slowly, Reed tested the boundaries by shifting his hands, and he was surprised to find he was no longer bound. He sat up shakily and looked around.
"Ah, yes," Harris said. "I'm afraid my Klingon colleagues were somewhat crude, if effective, in their methods. I asked them to remove the restraints. No need for such things." There was a hint of distaste in his voice, as if the thought that Reed might have to be compelled to cooperate was absurd.
"Klingons?" Reed's voice was a bit slurred, but the full impact of this realisation hit him like a sledgehammer. "You're working with the Klingons?"
"Come now," Harris said reprovingly, with a slight frown. "We have ties with everyone. You know how we operate."
"Trust no one, know everyone," Reed said. "Yes, I remember. But the Klingons are enemies of the Coalition."
Harris's face was difficult to make out in the darkness. "All the more important that we have ties to them, then."
There was logic in that, Reed had to admit, though he hated it. What must Harris have done to forge this alliance? The thought almost made him shudder.
"I'm no traitor, Lieutenant, whatever you may think of me," Harris said, as if he'd read Reed's thoughts. "There are much worse threats to the Coalition than the Klingons. You had the peculiar fortune to encounter one of those worse things recently. That is why you are here now."
Reed didn't need to think hard to understand what Harris meant. "The Anachron ship."
"Exactly," Harris said. "You may find this hard to believe, but I didn't want to pull you back in. I intended to let you go after the last time we met. But you've become valuable to me again. You have information, you have experience, and more importantly…" he trailed off, shaking his head. "But we'll talk about that later. For now you know enough about why I brought you back. This Anachron species you were fortunate to discover is one of the greatest dangers the Section has ever encountered. However, Starfleet Command does not agree. We must handle this matter discreetly."
"I don't know that I was fortunate," Reed said darkly.
"On the contrary, Lieutenant, I believe you were extremely lucky," Harris said, and Reed lacked the desire to continue the debate any further.
"Where are we now?" he asked. He looked around the dim room for a clue, but there were no star charts visible on any of the computer monitors.
"That is not important," Harris said. "You are exactly where I need you to be right now."
That was one of the most unhelpful answers Reed had ever gotten. "What about the Enterprise? Tri – Commander Tucker and the away team? You didn't hurt them, I suppose?"
"No reason for concern, Lieutenant. We darted your Crewman Novakovich so it wouldn't look suspicious, but he will recover quite well under your doctor's care. No one else was touched, though I expect they will be saddened by the death of their Tactical Officer." He checked the chronometer on his wrist. "Yes, they should have found your simbiot by now."
Reed felt a flash of pure hatred for the man sitting in front of him, calmly talking about how the people Reed cared about would be grieving and in pain over his apparent loss. Harris frowned, apparently seeing the displeasure in Reed's expression.
"Lieutenant, perhaps you think I'm being callous. I assure you that I don't do this because I enjoy it. I have taken only the measures necessary to accomplish what I must. This Section is one of the greatest forces at work in the known universe, and our purpose is to protect mankind. That includes your ship and her crew. Do you think they won't be affected by what we – by what you – do here? On the contrary, you will be helping to protect them and what they stand for."
"How idealistic," Reed said cynically, but his anger faded against his will.
"That's the attitude I remember," Harris said approvingly. He stood up. "You might as well get some more rest," he suggested. "We'll be at our destination in a few hours, and I daresay you'll need all the rest you can get."
"And where exactly is our destination?" Reed asked as Harris made to leave. The older man smiled faintly at him.
"Where it always is, of course. It is exactly where we are going."
Although Phlox had advised against it, Archer felt a strange compulsion to see the corpse that Tucker's team had retrieved from the surface of the planet. He knew what the doctor's procedural DNA test had shown; but somehow, he had to see with his own eyes. It was the only way he could convince himself that his officer was actually dead.
He felt oddly impassive as Phlox led him to the corner of Sickbay where a thick black plastic bag lay on a biobed, concealed behind curtains. He wasn't sure what to expect. He'd heard the preliminary report of Reed's injuries, but official photos had not been taken yet. In addition, he wasn't sure what to expect from himself. Would even this make him accept Reed's death? Sitting in his office and staring blankly at Phlox's report, he'd found himself half-expecting to be hailed by a disgruntled Reed, asking why the hell he'd been left behind on the planet. The thought of his Tactical Officer's lifeless body lying in Sickbay was simply too surreal to fully accept.
"Captain, I must request that you not view the body," Phlox told him softly, though he was already preparing to unzip the bag. Archer guessed that the Doctor didn't actually expect him to agree, which was just as well since he didn't intend to.
"Doctor, if you would." He nodded toward the zipper. Phlox sighed.
"Please be advised that he suffered severe injuries before death. It is – 'not a pretty sight.'"
"I understand."
Phlox unzipped the bag and pulled the sides apart, then slowly folded back the dark cloth that covered Reed's body. Archer saw immediately that he had been right. It was not a pretty sight.
Reed's throat had been slit – and not with a single, clean cut. It looked as if someone with a blunt knife had tried repeatedly before finally managing to sever deep enough to kill. Worse still was the injuries to his chest. Two cuts, running diagonally perpendicular to form an "x," sliced through skin, muscle, and bone. The sides of the wound had been peeled back, exposing a bloody mass of internal organs. Archer was no doctor, but even he could tell that the organs had not remained undisturbed in the natives' gruesome exploration of the intruder on their world. Whether from curiosity or in some brutal ritual known only to them, the indigenous inhabitants of the planet below had apparently conducted a dissection of sorts.
Blood, mostly dried or coagulated, caked much of the body below the throat. A few trickles of dried blood still clung to the white face where they had run from Reed's nose and mouth. Besides that, the face showed little sign of trauma. There were no bruises; the eyes were almost shut, with just the barest slit of dull grey showing beneath the lids; and though the expression was pained, it showed no agony or fear.
Archer stared silently down at the body until Phlox slid the cloth back over Reed's chest and face and zipped the bag up again. This sound finally dragged him from the mesmerized stupor.
"There were no injuries of note on his lower body," Phlox said quietly. Archer nodded. It was good of the doctor to preserve Reed's dignity, even in death. Archer opened his mouth to thank Phlox for allowing him to view the body, but he couldn't find any words.
"He was drugged, Captain," Phlox said gently. "I am quite sure he was unconscious at the time of death."
Archer nodded slowly. Reed hadn't felt a thing. Did that make it better? Not really, Archer thought. He might not have been in pain, but neither had he been given the chance to fight. That wasn't what he would have wanted.
"Thank you, doctor." It wasn't what he wanted to say. Who would do this, perhaps, or why did this happen? How could this happen? What the hell am I supposed to do? But he was the captain. It was his job to answer those questions for his grieving crew, not ask them. He looked up at Phlox as he spoke, and behind the Denobulan's professional calm he saw that the doctor was as shaken as he. Archer clasped Phlox's shoulder briefly. "Thank you," he repeated, feeling utterly inadequate.
He walked back up to the bridge in a mindless haze, the image of Reed's dead body imprinted firmly into his mind. What had he accomplished by looking at that? It was his duty, he supposed, in some way. Reed was his officer, and even now he had an obligation to him.
An obligation. Archer's heart sank. For the first time, he thought about his next steps. Clearly a conversation with Admiral Gardner was next – overdue, if he was being honest with himself. And after that…Reed's parents had to be notified.
It was not the first time Archer had had to notify next of kin of a death, but that made it no easier, and the fact that he'd had – at least to some extent, though he wasn't sure how far it had been reciprocated, especially in the past months – a personal as well as professional relationship with Reed only served to make the impending conversation more difficult. Not for the first time, Archer wished that Starfleet still practiced the old military tradition of notifying next of kin with an in-person visit from an experienced representative.
The atmosphere on the bridge was worse than Archer had ever seen it. Against his will, his eyes were immediately drawn to the tactical station, where Ensign Tanner sat hunched over the controls. He hadn't lowered the seat from the setting at which Reed had left it, which made it much too high for him. Archer scanned the crest of the crew silently. Mayweather had his back turned. His shoulders were slumped. Sato was fighting tears with marginal success, but her hands remained steady. Tucker was missing entirely. At a guess, he was either in his quarters or buried somewhere in the bowels of the ship's engines, trying to rid himself of the sight that Archer knew neither of them would stop seeing for a long time. Only T'Pol looked remotely normal, although she did not meet his eyes completely when he looked her way. Archer searched for something to say, but the well of available wisdom was dry. He cleared his throat before speaking.
"Travis, plot a course for Earth. Hold off on my word."
"Yes sir," Mayweather croaked. His hands trembled as he went to work on the control panel.
"If any of you need to be excused for personal reasons, you have my permission to call a relief," Archer told them. "It's been a difficult day. I'll be in my ready room if you need something. Please try not to disturb me; I'll be speaking with Admiral Gardner."
There was no answering murmur of assent, but he hadn't really expected one. At the door of the ready room he paused and turned to the tactical station.
"Ensign Tanner." Sentiment had no place in the continued function of the Enterprise. "Please lower your chair, it's much too high."
He suspected even Reed would have left Tanner alone.
Reed slept restlessly, feeling the time slipping by between indistinct, disturbing dreams of things he'd seen, things he'd done – or perhaps not. In the trance-like quality of his still somewhat drugged sleep, there was no way to be sure of the reality of what he saw. He woke, feeling mildly sick, some hours later, when Harris re-entered the room.
"Come," Harris said, seeing him awake. Still in his uniform, which had begun to feel sticky and uncomfortable, Reed slid off the hard bed and followed him, blinking to clear lingering sleepiness and dizziness from standing up too quickly.
As they walked through the ship, which Reed soon realised was a Bird of Prey, he caught glimpses now and again of its Klingon crew, but none spoke either to him or to Harris and for the most part they turned away upon seeing the two humans. This behaviour struck Reed as oddly uncharacteristic of the normally bold, aggressive species, but he knew better than to ask questions he didn't need the answers to.
From the Bird of Prey, they embarked onto a Starfleet shuttle, which surprised Reed. He glanced back at the Klingon ship as they left, but he couldn't see it.
"Is that ship cloaked?" he asked, disturbed.
"Yes," Harris said, and offered no explanation. As far as Reed knew, only the Romulans possessed effective cloaking technology – and the Romulans and Klingons were certainly not on friendly terms. The realisation that Klingons apparently now had cloaked ships was deeply unsettling. Reed slid into the co-pilot's seat beside Harris and stared out of the front viewport. They were approaching a half-built space station, one he'd never been to but recognised instantly both from pictures he'd seen and because of the planet looming behind it.
"Jupiter Station?"
He saw Harris's nod in his peripheral vision. "It's come a long way since you were last in the system," he said. "The lower half is already permanently staffed. Largely medical and scientific, of course, but we have a facility there as well. Experimental work, according to Starfleet pay rosters. We're studying psychological effects of life in deep space. I thought it was a nice little irony."
"How long was I out?" Reed asked, ignoring Harris's pleasure at the Section's deceit. The Enterprise had been far from the solar system; it would have taken them weeks at maximum warp to get back to Jupiter Station. Either Reed had been drugged unconscious for far longer than he thought, or the Klingons had higher warp power than he or anyone in Starfleet suspected. Harris only smiled and replied, "Long enough."
They docked at a small, isolated port in an unremarkable location a third of the way up the constructed bottom half of the enormous station. Once through the airlock, they were met by a young woman with short brown hair, dressed in the white coat-over-jeans of a casual physician's assistant or a lab technician.
"This is Sam," Harris said briefly, and Reed knew that was all he needed to know or was likely to ever know about this woman. "Go with her."
Somehow, Reed had expected Harris to stay with him. There was of course, he saw now, no reason for Harris to do so. Reed nodded acknowledgement and followed Sam as the woman started along the corridor.
"When was the last time you ate?" she asked over her shoulder in a pleasant but professional tone.
"I don't know," Reed said, honestly. "It's been a while. I'm not hungry, though."
"Oh, I wasn't offering you food," she said chirpily. "It's best if you haven't eaten in a while. You may feel nauseous."
"Why?" Reed asked warily, but the technician didn't answer. Reed supposed he would find out soon enough.
"Wait in here," she said at last, guiding him into a bare examination room, empty but for a strange-looking biobed and cabinets from floor to ceiling along one wall. The biobed had leather straps dangling from its sides, clearly restraints for its occupant. "We'll be ready for you soon. Please remove your clothing."
Reed stripped to his underwear, feeling remarkably un-self-conscious in the sterile medical environment. He did not sit on the biobed with its ominous straps, but instead leaned his back against the wall and settled himself to wait. In the absence of anything to occupy him, he felt his heartbeat begin to pick up. What were they going to do with him? Neither Harris's laconic replies nor Sam's "you may feel nauseous," boded particularly well for him. But anxiety, he reminded himself, was a luxury that he had little room for. No matter what Harris intended, it was going to happen regardless of what Reed personally thought about it.
He didn't have long to wait. Sam re-entered after only a few minutes, with a man about Reed's age who barely glanced at his patient. "This is him?"
"Yes." Sam adjusted the controls on the biobed until the back was raised to a seated position, and Reed realised that it was not a biobed at all, but a heavily-built medical chair. "Have a seat, Mr. Reed."
He seated himself obediently, without showing a trace of the reluctance he felt. In a business-like manner, Sam began fastening the straps over his wrists, arms, and legs. Reed felt his heart beating hard and fast with adrenaline.
"Is this really necessary?"
"Yes," Sam said, tightening a strap around his chest until he could feel it constricting his lungs. At least they didn't put a strap around his throat, Reed thought grimly. The man – a physician, Reed assumed, ran a hand scanner over him with the quick professionalism of a doctor with many patients to attend. He drew several vials of blood from Reed's arm, then unlocked the cabinets on the wall and opened them.
Lurking behind the wooden panelling like a carnivorous beast was a machine that Reed had never seen the like of. Wires drooped off of an oval-shaped body of dull grey metal, from which a hydraulic arm protruded. Most of the wires trailed up along this arm and attached to the round protrusion on the end, which was slightly larger than a human head. Reed was mesmerised by the bizarre sight until he realised with sudden alarm that this protrusion was to be placed over his head. He stiffened as the doctor moved the hydraulic arm toward him, but kept quiet. Harris knew what he was doing, didn't he?
It was dark inside the helmet-like contraption, and despite small vents in front of his nose and mouth, Reed felt the moisture of his breath pooling uncomfortably against his face. He couldn't see. He felt someone attaching small, needled ports to various places on his body – chest, arms, hands, and neck.
"We're going to perform a series of scans," Sam said, her voice sounding muffled through the metal around his head. "It may be uncomfortable for you, but you should experience a relative minimum of pain."
A relative minimum of pain? What did that mean?
Lights popped brightly, directly in front of his eyes, making him flinch. The lights flashed again, and kept flashing, varying in pattern, tempo, colour, and intensity. It was dizzying. He closed his eyes against it, but the light glared through his eyelids so that it made no difference. A prickling pain shot through him from each of the ports connected to his body. It felt like he was being electrocuted, although it was not so much painful as incredibly uncomfortable. Reed clenched his hands involuntarily on the armrests as his muscles stiffened against his will. His head spun, and the lack of any visual reference point to orient himself made it worse.
He thought the lights stopped, but perhaps he only lost consciousness, because the next thing he knew the contraption was being removed from his head and most of the needled ports on his body were gone. He had no sense of how much time had passed, but he suspected it had been much longer than it seemed. The doctor was gone. Reed felt unnaturally exhausted, and he flinched uncomfortably at even the light touches of the restraints being removed. He kept his eyes pressed closed against the bright white lights of the exam room, fighting nausea and a migraine headache. The lights dimmed, blessedly.
"Mr. Reed?" the voice of the technician prompted him. Sam, he thought, trying to connect the name to something concrete. "Mr. Reed, can you open your eyes, please?"
He managed it with difficulty, and the world swam around him. Reed gagged from the dizziness and brought up nothing but acid into the basin held in front of him. He winced at the burn in his throat.
"This will pass soon," Sam said, sounding unconcerned, as if she'd seen it many times before. Probably she had.
The disorientation faded slowly and after a while Reed was able to open his eyes more than a pained slit. He was sore all over and his muscles kept twitching involuntarily, sending jolts of pain through his aching limbs. His head throbbed sharply with every beat of his heart. The leather of the seat burned against his bare skin.
"What did you do to me?" he croaked, his throat raw from acid.
"No permanent harm," Sam said. "Let me know when you can stand. I'll take you to somewhere more comfortable."
It was a long time before Reed could stand, and even then he needed the support of the wall. Sam provided him with loose-fitting garments of a thin, light material, and he dressed with painful slowness. Even the soft fabric stung his skin when it brushed against him.
"Hypersensitivity," the technician explained to his slightly-less-than-coherent question. "It's a common reaction."
All that meant to him was that everything bloody hurt. He limped out of the room with her support and after a time found himself being led into another bare room with a toilet and a sink in one corner and a cot on the other side. He collapsed on the cot, too exhausted to care about the shooting pains it sent through him. He heard the door lock after Sam left, and he had the distinct impression that he would never see her again – not that it mattered. He'd experienced this before in the Section. You hardly ever saw people who did things to you a second time. It was always a new face, one you couldn't associate with anything, either good or bad.
Reed curled into the least uncomfortable position he could find and closed his eyes, but his muscles kept spasming, twitching him away from the brink of a twilight sleep, and it was a long time before he fell into a troubled doze.
"I'd like to hunt down every one of those bastards and kill them with my bare hands," Tucker said hoarsely, not directing the words exactly at Archer but rather at a spot on the table of the Captain's mess somewhere between Archer's glass of scotch and his own – both untouched. "I know, it wouldn't do anything," he added miserably, forestalling the Captain, "but it might make me feel better."
"I doubt that," Archer said. He sounded unbearably weary. "You'd regret it."
"Maybe." He would regret it as soon as it was done, but his helpless rage wanted an outlet and found none. "I just wish – he shoulda gone down fightin', Cap'n, not like this." Not drugged and helpless, perhaps struggling feebly as the aliens slit his throat and carved open his chest with their dull knives. It might have taken him a long time to die. Tucker felt sick at the though. He never would have pictured it like this – Malcolm, killed in a meaningless, freakish murder by a barely-sentient species on a planet with no more significance than the next. It was such an un-Malcolm-like way to die that Tucker was sure he would never be able to reconcile his friend's death with the circumstances.
"I know," Archer agreed. His face was lined with pain. He looked older than Tucker had ever seen him. "I think Gardner blames me for carelessness. He's right; we jumped straight into that planet without bothering to take a closer look."
"It's not your fault. The scans –"
"I know," Archer said again. "But that doesn't make me feel better about it." He leaned forward and rested his elbows on the table, burying his face in his hands. "Goddammit. Goddammit, Trip, now I've got to call his parents…"
Tucker closed his eyes and tried not to think about it, but the thought of how his own parents would react crept into the back of his mind anyway. "Can't Gardner –"
"He offered," Archer said, raising his head wearily. "But it's my job. I am – I was his commanding officer."
Tucker nodded, accepting the reason. He knew he would have done the same thing, in Archer's position, and he respected the Captain for it. But still…
"Gardner's going to find a replacement," Archer said. "For now, Ensign Tanner's taking over."
A replacement. It sounded horribly wrong. A replacement for Malcolm.
"You can't replace him," Tucker said thickly, and Archer didn't argue because he understood. Another person might sit at Reed's station on the bridge, might do his job and protect the ship and offer strategic advice, but there could never really be a replacement. Reed quite simply couldn't be replaced. Tucker thought about Reed's snarky banter, his bits of wisdom that always popped up when they were most needed and least expected, and his fierce loyalty and devotion to the Enterprise and her crew. His eyes burned. "Dammit," he muttered, rubbing the palm of his hand roughly across his eyes. "Why didn't he stay closer?"
Why hadn't he, actually? It wasn't like Reed to be so careless, to wander off like he had. Why hadn't he stayed close and on the alert, as Tucker had seen him do on so many other unknown planets?
The door chime rang, and Archer raised his head, sending a glance Tucker's way before calling, "Come in."
Unexpectedly, it was Phlox, and there was a strange expression on the Denobulan's face. He held a PADD, which he set on the table in front of Archer.
"This is a full autopsy report of the body Commander Tucker brought back from the surface," he said, acknowledging Tucker with a nod.
This seemed an oddly callous way to talk about Reed, and by the slight frown on Archer's face he thought the same thing.
"Yew mean Malcolm," Tucker said, a little sharply.
"On the contrary," Phlox said softly, "I do not believe the body you retrieved from the surface belonged to Lieutenant Reed."
Archer rose to his feet with something perilously close to hope in his eyes. "Explain, Doctor."
"This is a comparison of Lieutenant Reed's DNA with that of the body Commander Tucker found," Phlox said. The three of them were in Sickbay, and Phlox had projected the information on the PADD up on a larger monitor. "The two are very similar – practically identical, in fact, except for a small marker I found here." He indicated something that Tucker couldn't distinguish from what the DNA strand was meant to look like.
"My initial DNA test confirmed a match to Lieutenant Reed," Phlox said. "Retinal scans showed the same scar pattern, and the burn scars on his arms were also identical. I didn't find anything unusual during the examination. However, as you know, the body that Commander Tucker retrieved was…severely injured. When I began to clean off the blood in preparation for a stasis chamber, I noticed something odd. Yesterday, Lieutenant Reed suffered a hypospanner cut on his left hand. I prescribed three treatments with the dermal regenerator. As yet, he had only completed two. Although there was no longer an open wound, there was a very distinct mark where the injury was – inflammation, scar tissue, and stiffness. This body has absolutely no sign of such an injury. So I took a second look at the DNA."
Phlox straightened, settling his hands behind his back. "Captain, do you remember the Lyssarian Desert Larva?"
Archer's reaction was immediate and unmistakeable. He stiffened and his eyes widened. "Yes," he said after a moment's pause, his voice rough. "I remember."
The name was vaguely familiar to Tucker too. Some years ago, he'd been seriously injured and in a coma. What had happened had never been fully explained to him, for when he asked Archer had gone quiet, looking haunted; Reed had refused to meet his eyes and muttered something about a disagreement of methodology; and Phlox had flat-out refused to discuss it with him. He had seen the body, though, the body that looked exactly like his, heard the rumours about a clone and about murder. He'd heard mention of the Lyssarian Desert Larva, though he had only a dim idea of what exactly it was.
"It's a clone?" Archer asked in a brittle voice.
"That is what I believe, Captain. This DNA marker is characteristic of the Desert Larva." He paused. "I feel the need to add, Captain, that I cannot be completely certain of this. I do not know the full extent of the sedative chemical on the human body, since I neutralized it in Crewman Novakovich. Perhaps the chemical has some kind of regenerative properties, and it could also explain the discrepancies in DNA. This body could still belong to Lieutenant Reed."
"I understand," Archer acknowledged, but Tucker could hear the hope in his voice. "Doctor, please forward a full report of your findings and all applicable data to Starfleet Medical. I will contact Admiral Gardner. Trip, help T'Pol with calibrating those scanners. If that isn't Malcolm, I mean to find out where the hell he is and who is behind this."
Reed woke to the sound of the door opening. Someone flicked on the light in the bare room, and Reed sat up, squinting at his visitor. He still ached all over, but his clothing no longer burned his skin and the migraine had faded to a dull, bearable throb.
"Feeling better, I hope?" Harris inquired.
"What did they do to me?" Reed asked. Harris waved a hand dismissively.
"A scan, of a sort. We needed to determine the full extent of the temporal anomaly's physical effects on your body."
"And it required that?"
"We got what we needed," Harris said, without answering the question. "We also removed trace amounts of a certain substance from your body – a substance we can use to protect the mind against the effects of a temporal anomaly."
The Zytexian perfume. Of course the Section wanted to get its hands on that. Reed wondered at the choice of words – Harris made it sound as if the chemical had been entirely eliminated from his body. Not that he would mind that, but his inability to fully grasp his former handler's meaning irked him. He was used to being able to see through Harris's smokescreens better than this.
"A vaccine against time travel, perhaps," Harris said. "You are already proving your value, Mr. Reed."
"Is that all you want from me?"
Harris laughed. "I see you're not quite recovered after all. If that was all we wanted, we wouldn't have bothered with the elaborate hoax of your apparent death."
"Of course," Reed said acerbically. "How stupid of me. I suppose you want information, too."
"I did say that when we first spoke, didn't I," Harris mused. "The fact is, Lieutenant, we've already got all the information we need. I'm sorry to disappoint you. I'm sure you would enjoy recounting all the sordid details of your adventures all over again, but we're not going to learn anything from that. We have your reports, and they do have a certain charming ring of truth in them. They are quite in character with you."
Reed willed himself not to react to the subtle taunts in Harris's words. "Then let me go back to the Enterprise." It couldn't, of course, be that easy. As Harris had just said, a simple blood sample would not call for such a ruse.
"Don't make me repeat myself," Harris said disapprovingly. "The Section isn't in the habit of going to unnecessary lengths to retrieve things it doesn't require."
The thing in question being him, Reed thought. But he'd known that all along. Harris didn't just want his medical data; as he'd said in their first conversation, he wanted Reed.
"Then get to the point," Reed said impatiently. "Tell me what you want so I can get it over with as soon as possible."
"So you've agreed to do whatever we want?" Harris teased.
"I don't see that I have much choice."
"You don't." Harris leaned forward, abandoning his own amusement and growing serious. "The Section has a mission for you."
Reed eyed him sceptically. "It's been years since I've been in the field."
"Are you telling me you're incapable?" Harris asked, a flicker of anger in his tone. "You know your contract to the Section, Malcolm. I hardly believe you'd allow yourself to grow soft. Surely I trained you better than that."
"Maybe I have gotten soft," Reed said. "Maybe I'm not fit for this anymore. Maybe I've forgotten what it means to be an agent of the Section."
Harris smiled darkly at him. "I don't think so. See, here's what I think, Malcolm, I think you've tried to forget. You've done everything you could to forget. You've tried to make yourself a new life, but deep inside you haven't forgotten. How could you? I trained you not to."
"Your training wasn't perfect."
"My training was exactly as it should have been," Harris said. "If it failed, it's because you weren't exactly as you should have been."
That was true enough. Reed shook his head in unconvinced denial. Harris patted him on the cheek lightly. The action was too familiar; it felt violating.
"I have work for you. But I don't want Malcolm Reed; that is useless to me. I want Blackbird back."
It was the code name he'd used, many years ago during his time under Harris. He'd been given it by another agent, one long dead now, who had told him he was 'like Poe's raven – grim, ungainly, ominous – "quoth the Raven, Nevermore."' The team he'd been with then had started calling him 'Blackbird' and the name had stuck. It struck at him now with the powerful compulsion of memory. Reed forced himself not to grimace.
"Blackbird is dead."
"You've tried to kill that part of yourself, haven't you?" Harris laughed. "You've tried to be an honourable man. It's a beautiful persona, I grant you. Tell me, who do you do it for? Trip? Jonathan Archer? You like them to think highly of you, yes? Or is it for Hoshi Sato? She's very lovely. I wonder what she'd think of you if she knew what you've done."
"Don't you dare talk about Hoshi," Reed snarled. Sato's name did not belong on the lips of a man such as Harris. But you are a man such as Harris, his mind whispered back at him. As infuriating and painful as the older agents words were, Reed knew they were largely true. Not for the first time, he wished he had never heard of the Section. He wished he truly was the clean, respectable officer that most of the crew of the Enterprise believed him to be. Harris watched him thoughtfully.
"I see," he said at last. "But here's the problem, Malcolm. No matter how hard you try to make yourself into Lieutenant Malcolm Reed of the starship Enterprise, you'll never be him. You can't erase who you are. Blackbird is not dead; if he was, you would not have come. You would have gone to your Captain and reported everything to him. Why didn't you?"
Why hadn't he? Archer couldn't fault him when he hadn't initiated the contact with Harris. He could have recorded the entire conversation and brought it to the Captain.
But it wouldn't have ended there. Archer would never have been satisfied without a thorough explanation, not after a second incident involving Reed's murky past, and Reed would have had to come clean to him. And even though the Captain had an inkling that his tactical officer had been involved in questionable circles, the truth was an entirely different beast.
"You were protecting yourself. Your personal interests." Harris leaned forward. "Tell me, does that sound like something the noble, self-sacrificing Lieutenant Reed would do? I think not. But that is something that my Blackbird would do. Protect himself. You haven't changed. You can lie to yourself and to Archer as much as you want, but every lie you tell keeps Blackbird alive. Go ahead, try to pretend that you're something you're not. After all, you thrive on deception."
Reed gritted his teeth in helpless anger, but there was nothing he could say. After everything he had done to try to turn his life around – and in five minutes, Harris had twisted it into something filthy and corrupted. And the worst part was, the handler was right. Wasn't he? What other explanation was there? All these wasted years of trying to live a life he could be proud of. It hadn't been easy. Sometimes he'd feared that he could never consider his life without the sick twist of disgust and loathing in his gut. Now, that fear was horribly justified. He would never be anything but a fraud with blood on his hands and deception in his mouth. How could he ever have hoped to be anything else?
"Some men are made for the spotlight," Harris said gently. "Your Captain Archer, for one. But you and I are a different kind, Malcolm. We are made to live in the shadows. Ours is a different calling. You cannot change who you are." He rose to his feet. "Come. It's been too long since you've eaten. Join me for a meal. Then, it is time for you to learn your mission."
A/N: Oh, the mind games. Malcolm just can't catch a break, can he?