Works used in this story that don't belong to me include:

High Flight by Pilot Officer John Gillespie Magee, Jr.

I Vow to Thee My Country by Sir Cecil Spring-Rice.

Amazing Grace by John Newton.

Trip had transported planetside early in the morning just after dawn. He was scheduled to take an early train up to London to meet with one of the Queen's protocol officers and a representative of Starfleet's Public Affairs Office to go over the final plans for Malcolm's funeral. If Starfleet sent that Lieutenant Rivers, Trip mused, then he was gonna find out if Her Majesty's government still locked people in the Tower; better yet, if they still beheaded 'em. It wasn't like Rivers had a brain in there that he'd miss!

He'd made arrangements to be allowed aboard HMS Victory at this early hour. He'd been there once before in much happier circumstances. After he and Malcolm had married, Jon had given them 2 weeks leave. They'd spent the second week in England, and Malcolm had shown him around. Even though Malcolm hadn't wanted to join the Royal Navy, he was proud of its traditions, and this ship, the oldest commissioned warship on Earth, had been their first stop. Trip had found the ship amazing: So small, yet so tall and astonishingly beautiful. He'd asked Malcolm if it had really looked like that going into battle. Malcolm had looked at him like he was some kind of spider from Mars, which had prompted Trip to explain that he had seen the USS Constitution, a ship only slightly younger than Victory and also still a commissioned vessel in the US Navy, in the Charlestown Navy Yard in Boston. That ship had seemed so severe, painted all in black save for the gun ports that were a light color, either yellow or white (Trip couldn't quite remember). Victory, on the other hand, was brightly painted and ornate. Malcolm had smiled. He couldn't resist needling his new husband just a bit. Just what had Trip expected of "Old Ironsides"? Boston, Puritans, "frugal" Yankees - of course the ship would be austere! England, on the other hand, ruled the waves, and HMS Victory reflected that.

Trip walked up the gangplank and turned to salute the quarterdeck. In addition to flying its country's flag, this Victory, unlike Trip's, still flew an admiral's flag. Trip was welcomed aboard by a tall young man with an athletic build, curly auburn hair and bright blue eyes. If he read the rank badges correctly, then the man was a commander.

"Captain Tucker, welcome aboard, sir. Have you visited the ship before? Would you like the grand tour?"

"Oh, God! He sounds just like Mal," Trip thought. He hadn't planned on touring the ship, but he had time and he wanted to keep the man talking. "I was here some years back, so I wouldn't mind having my memory refreshed a bit."

He'd been shown the plaque in the deck that marked where Nelson had been shot by a marksman in the rigging of the French ship Redoutable early in the battle of Trafalgar. He'd been taken down to see the cockpit which served as the ship's sickbay and where Nelson had died. Now, Trip and Malcolm had both spent considerable time in the sickbay on the old Enterprise and hadn't liked it a bit, but Trip could not imagine medical care being provided in this dark, cramped place. Of course the "care" would have been amputation for just about any extremity wound, no anesthesia, no antibiotics and no clue about asepsis. "How could Malcolm's ancestors sign on when they knew this horror awaited them?" Finally, he'd been shown the gun deck. The cannons had been state-of-the-art in 1805 but probably couldn't even dent a starship's hull. Trip remembered Malcolm's fascination with them nonetheless. He smiled to himself. "If he could have, Mal probably would have spirited one away and used it like a hood ornament or somethin' on the Enterprise."

The tour came to an end, and they were back at the gangplank. The young commander suddenly seemed almost shy and diffident, another of Malcolm's traits. With a pang he hadn't expected, Trip realized that if he and Malcolm had had children, then they'd be about the age of this young man. "Son, is there somethin' I can do for ya?" Trip asked quietly.

The young man blushed just as Malcolm had. "Sir, some of the other officers and I would like to take part in Admiral Lord Reed's funeral. Rather a salute from those of us who serve the legends of the past to one who is already a legend in the present and from one Victory to another, if you will."

"That's right kind of ya, son. I think Mal - Admiral Lord Reed - would be honored. I don't reckon those protocol boys will listen to a thing I say, but I'll put in a word for ya, I promise."

"Thank you, sir. That's all one can ask, really." The young man favored Trip with a dazzling smile as he returned his salute.

It wasn't until Trip was on the train speeding toward London that he realized who his guide had been: Commander A. E. A. Wales, also known as H.R.H. Albert Edward Arthur, Prince of Wales, the firstborn child of Her Majesty, Queen Diana, and heir to the English throne. Once he got over his shock, Trip smiled. "Oh, Mal, I wonder how he would have felt it he'd known ya had a schoolboy crush on his momma?" The smile turned wistful. "Don't worry, darlin'. I won't tell 'im."

Trip was bored and more than a little put out. The room at Buckingham Palace was indeed beautiful, but it could only be expected to hold one's interest for just so long. He had been sitting there for hours listening to the "protocol boys" nitpick and haggle over every minute detail of Malcolm's funeral. He was convinced they'd forgotten he was even there. He would have loved to have said "to Hell with it" and left, but he felt honor-bound to represent Malcolm's interest in the proceedings, particularly considering what Starfleet had wanted to do to him in the first place.

His reverie was interrupted by the British protocol officer. This man sounded like Malcolm, too, only like Malcolm when he was in a snit about not getting more power for the phase cannons. "Captain Tucker, do you have any requests you wish to make on behalf of Admiral Lord Reed?"

"Yes, sir, I do; four of 'em actually."

"First, I'd like the poem High Flight recited. If I remember right, it was written by a Yank in the RAF during the Battle of Britain. He was killed in a plane crash, I believe." That should satisfy both the British and Starfleet, which was still dominated by Americans.

Trip had first heard the poem as a teenager. He'd stayed up to watch some creature feature on a small, local video channel. Just before playing the national anthem and going off-line for the night, the channel had played a Starfleet PSA that showed all its latest craft while the poem was being read. Trip figured that was when he first seriously considered joining up. For some reason, a couple of lines of the poem had stayed with him.

"Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of earth

And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;"

That fit for Mal all right. He'd had to go into space to learn that he was a person of talent and worth. He'd found friends, a family of sorts, respect and love, all things the surly Earth had denied him. But, like someone had said long ago, "There ain't no such thing as a free lunch," and space had also ultimately brought his death.

"And, while with silent lifting mind I've trod

The high unsurpassed sanctity of space,

Put out my hand and touched the face of God."

Second, I'd like I Vow to Thee My Country as one of the hymns. The British protocol officer nodded in agreement immediately. Starfleet's representative looked perplexed and accessed his data terminal. Trip couldn't blame him, really. He'd never heard of it either until Malcolm had introduced him to it.

Trip remembered the night. He and Malcolm had been working doubles trying to get the phase cannons upgraded before they were needed. They'd stopped in the mess hall for a combined lunch, dinner and midnight snack. Shran had been first officer then and was working on reports while listening to Gustav Holst's The Planets on his ever-present music player. Knowing Shran, Trip had guessed he was listening to the section entitled Mars, The Bringer of War,but Shran corrected him. It was Jupiter, The Bringer of Jollity. It was then that Malcolm had told him that it was also a hymn written in 1918 at the end of the Great War and one of his favorites. Shran had found it in the ship's database and downloaded it to the player.

"I vow to thee, my country, all earthly things above,

Entire and whole and perfect, the service of my love;

The love that asks no question, the love that stands the test,

That lays upon the alter the dearest and the best;

The love that never falters, the love that pays the price,

The love that makes undaunted the final sacrifice."

That was the quintessential Malcolm Reed: Devoted to duty. Devoted to the persons and places he loved. He would do whatever he could to protect them, regardless of personal cost, whether it was Enterprise, England, Earth or the extraterrestrial worlds of the Federation, and he had died thanking God that he had done his duty. For Trip, he was the dearest and the best and for that reason he had had to bring him home, had to hear his memory honored as his body lay coffined before the high alter of St. Paul's.

But the hymn had had a second verse, very different from the first.

"And there's another country, I've heard of long ago,

Most dear to them that love her, most great to them that know;

We may not count her armies, we may not see her King;

Her fortress is a faithful heart, her pride is suffering;

And soul by soul and silently her shining bounds increase,

And her ways are ways of gentleness, and all her paths are peace."

For all that Malcolm loved weapons and explosives and studied the ways of war, Trip thought that he was the gentlest, kindest, most loving of men. On a peaceable Earth in a peaceable universe, Trip could have imagined Malcolm working as a master pyrotechnician going from place to place and devising grand fireworks displays, to the delight of young and old alike, for public celebrations like New Year's and the Fourth of July. "OK, Mal, on second thought, you bein' English and all, maybe not the Fourth of July."

But what would be Malcolm's place in the Peaceable Kingdom of God? Trip's grandma and momma had made sure he went to church, but he had always had a much clearer vision of Hell than he did of Heaven. True, he could imagine Mal with angel wings - he loved to fly. But a harp and singin' God's praise? "Just talkin' with that lovely accent might be better." Maybe God would put him in charge of the auroras, or meteor showers, or comets or, best of all, supernovas. "No, darlin', I s'pect you ain't gonna get to recreate the 'Big Bang'."

"And your third request, Captain Tucker?" The "Malcolm in a snit voice" brought Trip back to reality.

"Now as I understand it, you gents have already agreed on playin' Amazin' Grace. Do I have that right?"

"Yes, sir, you do. A piper from the Black Watch will be playing it."

"That's good. Now, what I want you to do is to print the third verse - not the first verse that everybody knows, but the third - in the program, bulletin or whatever ya'll call it." This time both protocol men looked perplexed and made to access their data terminals. "Don't bother, gents, I can tell ya'll what it says." With the slightest of grins, he added, "Don't worry, I won't be singin' it."

"Through many dangers, toils and snares,

I have already come.

'Twas grace that brought me safe thus far,

and grace will lead me home."

It shouldn't be thought that in making this request Trip was giving himself a pat on the back for keeping his promise to Malcolm to bring him home. Trip knew that if he'd been left to his own devices it would never have happened. No, it was an acknowledgement that some higher power, be it God or "The Force" or whatever one wished to call it, had given Malcolm talents and abilities that had served to keep him alive through countless difficulties from an abusive childhood, to away missions gone awry to previous great battles in space. This power had also given Malcolm that indefinable "something" that had led so many to trust, respect and follow him and had made him the love of Trip's life. That "something", and Trip was willing to call it "grace", was what had really brought Malcolm home to Earth and the power that had bestowed it had taken his soul to a safe place where it would know no more pain, or so he hoped.

"Finally, there are some officers on HMS Victory who would like to take part in the funeral. I promised I'd put a word in for 'em. Now, I don't normally mess with another command's duty roster, but if some kind of accommodation could be made, I'd be mighty grateful."

"There was no need for you to go to the trouble, Captain Tucker. The officers on Victory, ours that is, will form the honor guard when Admiral Lord Reed's coffin is brought up river to London on the frigate Ark Royal and will march beside the caisson bearing his coffin to Westminster and later to St. Paul's."

"Ya'll are bringin' 'im up river on a boat?" This possibility had never occurred to Trip. He'd assumed Malcolm's body would be brought to London in a hearse or on a train or something on land.

"Yes, we're copying certain aspects of Lord Nelson's funeral. We thought you'd be pleased. Is there a problem, Captain?"

"No, no problem. Just s'prised is all, but I guess I should have realized," is what Trip said. "Hell, yeah, there's a problem! Mal's terrified of water!" was what he thought. Anyone who knew him would have seen through the deception, especially if they'd also known Malcolm well, but neither protocol officer did.

Trip stayed for almost another hour listening to the "protocol boys" go at one another again. The latest argument, whether Last Post or Taps should be played, was the final straw. "Damn it, why don't ya'll just play 'em both? If anybody deserves to rest in peace, it's Malcolm!" With that, Trip stormed out. He was supposed to meet up with Jonathan, T'Pol and Jhamel at the American embassy, but there was something back on Victory he needed to take care of first.

"Captain, we didn't expect you back. You forget something?" Russell was manning the transporter again.

"Nah. Somethin' came up in London, and I gotta take care of it. I'll be back directly. Ya can keep the meter runnin'," Trip said with a slight grin.

On his way down to the cargo bay, Trip was joined by Commander Hardy. "I understand some officers from HMS Victory will be by tomorrow to escort Admiral Reed planetside and then on up to London?" Hardy asked.

"That's right, and one of 'em is the Prince of Wales, so make sure ya'll are on your best behavior and get the ship policed up or the Admiral will come back and haunt ya."

"I'll see that we are then, sir," Hardy said with a bland face, although personally, he thought that having Admiral Reed's ghost aboard the next time the ship went into battle might not be such a bad thing.

Trip went into the cargo bay alone and this time dismissed the honor guard. Nobody else needed to hear what he had to tell Malcolm. He put his hand lightly on the coffin over about where he thought Malcolm's heart would be.

"Mal," he began, "I know ya ain't gonna like this, but ya need to listen 'cause there ain't a damn thing you or I can do 'bout it. Tomorrow mornin' some of the officers from HMS Victory are gonna come up here to get ya and take ya the last little way down to Earth. Their commander is the Prince of Wales, Mal. I met him this mornin' and he seems like a nice boy and a real credit to his momma. He asked for this job special, so I know he's gonna take real good care of ya."

"Now, this is the part ya ain't gonna like. They're gonna put ya on the frigate Ark Royal and bring ya up the Thames to London just like ya was Lord Nelson or somethin'." Trip rushed on as if overriding Malcolm's objection. "I know ya don't like bein' on the water, but I figured ya wouldn't want me blabbin' that to the whole world, now would ya?" He paused for a moment. "No, I didn't think so. I swear to ya, Mal, they won't let anything go wrong. Ya know how embarrassin' it would be to the Royal Family if ya, say, went for a swim?"

"Now, Mal, don't ya go callin' me that! Ya know it ain't true! 'Sides, if momma heard ya say that, it would her hurt feelin's real bad. She always thought ya were a good boy, so polite and all."

"Look, I'm gonna do the one thing that will guarantee you'll be fine. Much as I wanna be with ya, darlin', I ain't gettin' on that boat. Hosh, may she rest in peace, didn't call us the 'Disaster Twins' for nothin', so I'll be waitin' for ya with Jon, T'Pol, Travis and Miss Jhamel at the Whitehall steps. From there on, darlin', I'll be behind ya every step of the way." Trip's voice was pretty choked up by now. "Just do what they tell ya, baby, and I promise it'll be all right."

Trip stood silently for a few minutes, his hand idly caressing the Starfleet flag over Malcolm's coffin. "I'll see ya in the mornin', darlin'," he said softly. He'd almost made it to the door when he turned back one last time. "Mal, you give the Prince any trouble, and I swear I'll change my mind and tell him ya had a real thing for his momma!" Satisfied that he had done all he could, by hook or by crook, to ensure Malcolm a safe voyage, Trip left the cargo bay and Victory and headed back up to London.

Late that evening, Trip prowled about the suite of rooms he'd been given in the American embassy. He hadn't been particularly hungry at dinner, even though he knew great care had been taken to provide his favorite foods, and the meal had seemed to last forever. Jon, T'Pol, Travis, Jhamel, young Lieutenant Shran and General Telev had all been kind and considerate and had tried to provide support, but despite their best efforts, without Malcolm, Trip had felt painfully alone. Now, he couldn't sleep. He'd had the audio player on and then the video machine just to have noise in the room, just to have the illusion of company, but it wasn't working. Malcolm hadn't been gone that long, yet Trip knew that how he felt now was how Malcolm had felt most of his life until he'd joined the Enterprise. "God, Mal, how could ya do it? How could ya stand it?"

His thoughts were interrupted by a soft, almost timid, knock on his door. When he opened it, he was surprised to find Jhamel. She was dressed in a floor-length gown with a high mandarin collar and long, full sleeves. The shiny silk seemed to change color from blue to gray depending on the light. "Like Mal's eyes" was all that Trip could think. He still couldn't get over that she had cut her long, usually elaborately braided white hair such that it was shorter now than T'Pol's.

"Miss Jhamel, I'm sorry. Was I keepin' ya awake?" Trip hit "mute" on the remote he was carrying. Jhamel had been assigned the adjoining suite, and Trip had forgotten about her ultrasensitive Andorian antennae.

"Not at all, Captain. I have something for you, but I did not think you would wish to open it in the presence of others. May I come in, please?" She held out a hand to him.

"Beg pardon, Miss Jhamel. Don't know what's happened to my manners." Trip carefully placed her hand on his arm and led her to a comfortable chair in the sitting room. She functioned at so high a level that it was easy to forget that she was blind.

"You have other things on your mind, I think? No offense is taken for none was given." From the sleeve of her gown she extracted a small blue leather box which she held out to Trip. "It is a custom of my people. I am told it was once a custom of yours as well, although perhaps no longer?" There was something comforting in the soft, gentle cadences of her voice.

When Trip opened the box, he saw a platinum locket on a long, finely wrought chain. He recognized the Reed family crest on one side of the locket and the Tucker family crest on the other. Trip smiled. "Miss Jhamel, I 'spect my branch of the Tucker family don't have the right to this here crest." When he opened the locket, however, he gasped and was left speechless. Andorian jewelry is highly prized as Andorii craftsmen are perhaps the best in the known worlds. By some process Trip couldn't name, the jewelers had recreated in gems and precious metals the wedding photograph he had placed in Malcolm's coffin. Malcolm's eyes changed color with a change in light and seemed always to be on Trip no matter where he held the locket. It was as if they were alive. Trip was mesmerized and silent.

"If you do not approve, Captain, then there is another," Jhamel said quietly. "The portraits are different: Ti'er Malcolm's is from the day he was promoted admiral and yours is from the day you won the Cochrane Prize in Engineering. Thy'lek and I thought it more appropriate for Ti'er Malcolm's space in the Wall of Heroes, but if you would prefer . . ."

Trip finally came out of his daze. "Oh, Miss Jhamel, I don't know what to say! This is beyond 'beautiful'. I've never seen the like. Thank you is hardly adequate. But you had a second made? Why? How could I possibly disapprove of this?"

"You must understand, Captain, that Ti'er Malcolm's space in the Wall of Heroes is, for us, his grave on Andoria. Thy'lek, the children and I did not wish him to feel that he had been buried alone on an alien world so far from his home."

"I doubt he'd feel that way, Miss Jhamel. He was always treated with respect there and enjoyed the warm hospitality of the House of Shran." Jhamel silently inclined her head in thanks.

"It's a shame you cut your hair," Trip went on after a moment. "It was kinda your trademark here on Earth. It'll take forever to grow back."

"It is a sign of respect and mourning. It will grow back, Captain, and sooner than you would expect, although perhaps not quite the same. More silver than white, I should think."

Trip stared at her for a moment. "That a subtle Aenar way of sayin' eventually I'll get used to Mal bein' gone, that life goes on, only just a little different? I won't keep seein' somethin' or hearin' somethin' that reminds me of 'im everywhere I go? I won't keep feelin' like my heart's been ripped out and stomped on but I ain't quite dead yet?" He tried to keep the bitterness from his voice but knew, with her in particular, that he wouldn't be successful.

"Neither will you forget him which is what you fear even more," Jhamel said in a still quiet voice.

"Yeah, well right now I wish I was a Vulcan or an Andorian. That way, when he died, I would have died right along with 'im!" There, how he really felt was out in the open, but actually saying it didn't help the way he'd hoped it would.

"Jeez, Jhamel, I'm sorry. I got no business sayin' somethin' like that to you, you bein' married to the commandin' general of the Guard and Tren goin' into battle with Starfleet and all. Mal always says - said - I let my mouth fire before my brain's acquired a target. I didn't mean nothin' by it." If it were possible, Trip felt even worse.

Jhamel favored Trip with a small, sad smile. "I am afraid I will disappoint you, Captain. Not that I am angry with you, for I am not; rather, that I must tell you that what you believe is a myth, at least on Andoria. I am not qualified to speak for Vulcan, and in any case it is not my place to do so, but that of Madame T'Pol's. I do not say that what you believe never happens, only that it is not common. There would be little left of the Andorii warrior caste, and no Aenar left at all, if it were. It is simply that we noted long ago that some surviving bond mates soon follow their beloved into the West, but no more frequently than on Earth, or so I am told. I am afraid the observation became somewhat romanticized over time. I expect to suffer Thy'lek's death or Tren's or both as you suffer Ti'er Malcolm's should that be the will of the gods."

"I don't rightly know what I was expectin' anymore, Jhamel. When I first took up with Mal, I was scared to death he was gonna get himself killed, and more likely than not, savin' my sorry ass." Trip made a wry face. "If you'll pardon my language?" Again, Jhamel silently inclined her head.

"He was so determined to prove he was worthy of his job. He never got much love or support at home. No matter how hard he tried, it was never good enough for his dad. By the time he was assigned to Enterprise, he'd come to feel he really had to push the envelope to be taken seriously. Then he found that the crew cared for 'im and that I loved 'im. He couldn't believe that just bein' himself was all we wanted or needed in return. It took awhile to get through to him that we wanted him to work at stayin' alive. Somewhere along the line I got to thinkin' he was invincible, or maybe I figured that since we were almost always together when somethin' went wrong that that's how it would be in the end."

"When he was promoted captain, I was already in the Reserves and teachin' engineerin' at Georgia Tech. This thing with the Romulans was just startin' up, and when he chose a ship over assignment to Weapons R&D . . . ," Trip paused for a moment. His eyes seemed to be gazing at something far away. "Well, that's the closest we ever came to divorce. I thought he was tryin' to get himself killed again. It took me awhile to get that he wouldn't be the man I loved if he didn't do what he saw as his duty and that I'd been pretty insultin' to think he'd risk his ship and crew just chasin' glory. 'Course, to be honest, it helped when the Weapons Lab at Argonne went up. If Mal had been there, he would have died just like a couple of his friends. He looked into it and told me it wouldn't have made no difference if he'd been there. Sometimes, what looks real good on paper just don't work worth a damn in the real world." Trip cringed slightly at his use of the curse word. "So, I made sure to message him every day, even if only a short one, and to always tell him I loved him."

"After he made Admiral, and with the war really heatin' up, I got called back to active duty. Mal may have pulled strings to get me in his command, but I doubt it. Starfleet probably just figured it would work out better that way. Ya may have noticed I have a tendency to get vocal when I'm aggravated." Trip managed a wry grin. "I guess I got lazy and went back to thinkin' like I did toward the end on Enterprise. As dumb as it sounds, considerin', I just never expected not to be with him."

"Miss Jhamel, if ya don't mind me askin', how do you deal with - well, ya know?"

"Well, to begin with, I did accept the bonding proposal of an Andorian military man. Thy'lek never pretended to be anything else, although, like Ti'er Malcolm, he is a great deal more. For a few years after Talla was born, Thy'lek did leave the Guard to work for an import/export firm. He owed a duty to his family, he said, but he was so miserable. I could not bear to sense him like that and finally convinced him to seek reinstatement in the Guard. For whatever reason, the gods gave him, and probably Tren as well, a talent for war, as they did Ti'er Malcolm. One is meant to use one's talents, else life has no meaning."

"Or death, either?"

Jhamel sighed, "Or death, either. Otherwise, I cope as you did. They know they are in my thoughts always and that I love them."

"Thy'lek told me what his people think happens after death. What do the Aenar think?"

"The Aenar soul is of three parts. One part, the ba'elan, remains with family and friends."

"Like a ghost?" Trip, the horror movie fan, hadn't expected something like this from the gentle Aenar.

Jhamel smiled. "Yes, but not like in most of your videos. There is no evil intent, only a wish to be remembered."

"You sayin' part of the reason I feel so bad is Mal's fault? He's already hauntin' me so I won't forget him?"

"I would not say that it is his 'fault', but given some of what I know of his life, it would seem reasonable for him to be more sensitive to the issue than others might be. I also suspect that he did not really consider being without you. He must adjust to that just as you must."

"So, you're sayin' he's gotta get used to bein' dead?"

"The ba'elan does, certainly, and perhaps the ka'elan, or second part of his soul as well. This is the part you would probably describe as personality. It dwells in the West, a world of peace, plenty and ease, although I suspect that what that would entail for Ti'er Malcolm is quite different from what my people would find pleasing."

"Not that Andoria ain't beautiful, mind ya, 'cause it is; but yeah, he'd like it a lot warmer with green grass everywhere. 'Course, even if that's what he got, he wouldn't believe it at first. He'd have to check it out." Trip flashed Jhamel a brief smile and then sobered again. "He's gonna miss settin' off explosions, though. And he's still gonna want to patch things up with his dad."

"Perhaps his father will desire it as well. Perhaps they will go sailing together." At Trip's look of disbelief, Jhamel explained, "In the West, there is no fear. Ti'er Malcolm will once again enjoy the water. His father's fears and disappointments in this life, whatever they may have been, will be erased as well. As for explosions, I believe Aenar and Humans alike enjoy fireworks? I know the Andorii do!"

"Sounds nice, Jhamel, but not exactly Thy'lek's version of Heaven."

Jhamel shrugged. "Once the Dark Lord is defeated, then the Hall of Heroes becomes - what would Ti'er Malcolm call it? - the neighborhood pub. For some Andorii, that will lose something in the translation."

"There are those of my people, like the Andorii in general, although I suspect Thy'lek did not tell you this, who believe that Ti'er Malcolm's ka'elan soul would do well to 'check things out.' They believe there are demons who will try to steer the soul off the true path to the West and lead it into a blizzard's whiteout, an avalanche or onto melting or calving ice where it will be lost forever. If they are correct, perhaps it is better that Ti'er Malcolm has gone first alone? He is highly skilled in such matters. When he returns for you, he will know the correct path and will lead you safely. Is that not his deepest nature?"

"Yeah, it is," Trip sighed. "Still, on the off chance there's a demon smarter than him (like maybe his dad), then I'd rather we be lost together."

"But he does not. You changed a great many of his perceptions of love, and perhaps rightfully so, but you could never change this one. As long as it can be done with honor, he will always put your well-being first."

"And the third part of the soul?" Trip asked. He figured it was his last chance to hear something comforting.

"The akh'elan is what I believe most humans would consider the true soul. It is the part given by the gods, and it returns to them to become a star."

"Well then, maybe when this thing with the Romulans is over and we can get back to explorin', Travis will get to name a star for 'im - preferably one that's about to go supernova." The thought brought a genuine smile to Trip's face.

Jhamel rose to leave as the sky in the east began to lighten. "Or Tren will name a binary star for you both," Jhamel gently offered with a smile.

It was gray, cold and damp with fog rising above the Thames as Trip waited for Malcolm's body to arrive at the Whitehall Steps. He could hear the minute gun at the Tower firing at regular intervals like a steady heartbeat. Perhaps it was the weather or the distance or just a trick of acoustics, but the report of the gun sounded muffled as if it, too, were in mourning.

Finally, the black-draped frigate HMS Ark Royal hove into view. As Malcolm's body was transferred to shore, the vessel's off-duty watches, in dress whites with a black arm band, stood to attention. As expected (except perhaps by Trip), everything went off without a hitch under the watchful eyes and clear, ringing commands of Commander Wales. Malcolm's coffin was carefully and securely placed on the caisson that was to be drawn by ratings of the Royal Navy. It was covered by the flag of Starfleet. At its head, a large wreath of red, white and blue flowers; toward the middle, the velvet-lined case holding Malcolm's numerous decorations; and at the end, just placed there by Trip himself, a small wreath of yellow, thornless roses.

"Mornin', darlin'," Trip whispered. "See, I told ya you'd be fine. You're home, Mal, just like I promised, and ya ain't gonna have to go on the water no more, neither. Ya oughta see all the people! They're so proud of ya, but all together, they ain't any prouder of ya than I am. Now, I know ya don't wanna be late, so we'll get this show on the road. I'll be right behind ya every step of the way just like I promised. I love ya, darlin'." Trip saluted the coffin and nodded to Commander Wales. The command was given. The drums of the Central Band of the RAF began the slow, "dead cadence", and the cortege moved out. All Trip could think of at the moment was that he was adding a whole new meaning to the phrase "dead man walking."

Malcolm's funeral was everything Trip had hoped it would be - solemn, moving, beautiful and appropriate. Everything continued to go flawlessly. As much as it pained him, Trip had to admit that maybe the "protocol boys" had known what they were doing after all. Jon had delivered a most gracious eulogy that chronicled Malcolm's career with as much pride as if Malcolm had been his son. And at the end of it all, down in the crypt of St. Paul's beside the grave of Malcolm's hero, Admiral Lord Nelson, the Starfleet flag from atop the coffin had been folded with the utmost precision and handed to Trip by Commander Wales.

"My condolences, sir. I promise you we'll take good care of him. It has been an honor to serve you, sir, both of you."

"Thank ya, son. You've done a fine job. Malcolm and I are right grateful, and I hope your royal momma's suitably proud of ya too."

Trip had brought Malcolm home, so all that was left for him to do was to return to Georgia to the rambling old house he and Mal had shared whenever they'd both been on Earth at the same time. All he had to do was go home. For the first time in his life, the thought filled him with dread.