"The captain wishes to speak to you, Ensign."

Hoshi had barely sat down with her breakfast when T'Pol paused beside her table and passed on the message.

Trip, Travis and Malcolm all looked up in surprise, much as Hoshi did. It was unusual for Captain Archer to speak to any of his staff before their shift started, unless he had invited them to have breakfast with him – and he would not spring such an invitation on them at the last moment.

T'Pol's expression was uncommunicative, but there was nothing in her tone to suggest that this was anything of particular concern. "I am sure he will wait till you have finished eating," she added.

"It's okay, Sub-commander, I'd rather find out what he wants first," said the young woman, and hurried away to the captain's private dining room, her expression faintly anxious.

Before the Vulcan could turn away, Trip drew her attention to a subject that had been under discussion before her arrival. He was in the middle of one of his favorite pastimes – lieutenant-baiting – and was keen to recruit as many supporters as he could. So far he'd succeeded enough to have Malcolm put his fork down and look irritated, and this success was one he wanted to build on.

"Don't you think there was a real look of Lieutenant Reed here about that guy last night?" he asked, in the tone of one who thinks there can hardly be any doubt about it.

Malcolm crossed his arms. This was another hopeful sign. He had already expatiated on the topic of the 'supposed resemblance' between himself and the hated celebrity at some length, and although even Trip knew it could be no more than a coincidence, it was far too good a sore spot not to rub it a little more.

T'Pol considered.

Travis opened his mouth to agree, observed the signs, and wisely shut it again. He had targeting practice scheduled later that morning with the irate lieutenant, and doubtless wanted to complete it without getting his head bitten off.

The Vulcan's gaze drifted to the tactical officer's wrathful visage and studied it. Then she turned to Trip.

"As First Officer, I receive copies of the security reports for all those who come on board the ship. I have reviewed them as I always do. You must be aware that the security protocols would flag up any resemblance to any known person in Starfleet files."

Trip looked crestfallen. Although there was no reason why these files should be routed to him, he knew that they were indeed routinely scanned by automatic recognition programs. Any alert would have been picked up immediately by the ship's conscientious XO.

"Furthermore," pursued T'Pol, "I spoke with Mister Westbury after the concert. It is hardly likely that I would fail to notice any particularly striking resemblance, if such a thing existed."

Malcolm nodded, smirking. "Finally, somebody around here is talking sense!" he remarked to nobody in particular.

At that moment the door to the captain's dining room opened, and Hoshi came out again. In contrast to her slightly worried demeanor when she went in, now she was fairly dancing.

"Just look!" she squealed as she reached the table again. In her hand was a photograph, scrawled across with silver ink.

Travis and Trip almost banged heads in their eagerness to see it. Even Malcolm deigned to let it be seen that his interest was – however reluctantly – piqued.

"Hoshi, he never did autographs!" breathed Travis reverently.

From the English corner of the table came muttered words, of whom the last three were undoubtedly 'ugly poncing git.' It appeared that the lieutenant had gotten a better look at the guy he was accused of resembling, and was even more displeased than ever. Perhaps he didn't like the hat, but certainly the lipstick was a bit much.

And now you came to look, perhaps the resemblance wasn't as striking as you might have thought at first. For sure Malcolm Reed would never have been guilty of sashaying across a stage in skin-tight velvet and lace, and as for that rigid back loosening sufficiently to give the hips such a sensual, provocative sway…

… Well, it just wasn't going to happen, was it?

"Come to think of it, Loo-tenant, maybe you don't look all that much like him after all," Trip conceded blithely.

Malcolm was not nearly naïve enough to mistake this for a compliment. He glared, waiting for the punch line.

It wasn't long in coming.

"…He's good-lookin' as well as talented."

Hoshi and Travis oohed. Even T'Pol looked slightly pained.

The gray eyes narrowed to gun-slits.

Somewhat belatedly, Trip remembered that his target practice was scheduled right after Travis's. And that as Weapons Officer, Malcolm had the right to organize extra practice sessions for any of the crew for whom he deemed it necessary. Two facts which certainly wouldn't have slipped the Brit's mind, and weren't likely to over the next couple of hours.

Vistas of spending every spare hour for the next two years sweating in the effort to hit a moving target with a cunningly misaligned phase pistol rose up before his horrified gaze. Surely Malcolm wouldn't be that vindictive … would he?

In a panic he watched an oblique smile slide slowly onto the Englishman's face: the knowing smirk that said, You don't know the half of it, Mistah Tuckah.

He looked at T'Pol; no help there. Travis was watching him in wide-eyed sympathy as if mentally numbering him already among the dearly-departed. Hoshi, however … Hoshi, quit dribblin' over that damn photo and get me out of this!

As though hearing his anguished mental shriek, the comm officer looked up from the photograph, and now she was gazing fixedly at Malcolm.

It was evident from her first words, however, that Trip's imminent doom was not foremost among her thoughts.

"The captain told me Ian said someone had asked him to do this for me, but he didn't say who."

The tactical officer shrugged. "Don't ask me. I wasn't even on board when they arrived."

It was unnecessary for anyone to point out that he had certainly been on Jupiter Station when the shuttle docked there for security checks – in view of recent protest movements, some of whom Starfleet was taking seriously, no craft from Earth would be allowed to go straight to the ship without being screened.

Hoshi's specialty might be languages, but she certainly knew enough mathematics to add two and two together. Without more ado she leaned over and gave Malcolm a smacking kiss on the cheek.

"Ensign!" He tried, probably not very hard and certainly not very successfully, to look outraged by this very public breach of protocol. It was probably damned hard to look outraged when you had a pretty woman giving you the starry-eyed look like Hoshi was now, with her hand resting on his arm.

Trip noted hopefully that the expression of Machiavellian intent on the armory officer's face had now been replaced by one that – in ordinary circumstances – would have elicited a certain amount of teasing later on. His kindness unearthed, Malcolm was looking … yep, definitely 'bashful'. In the present circumstances, however, Trip was firmly of the opinion that the safest option all round was to fade quietly out of the picture. Who knew? A while longer of exposure to the starry gaze might put Malcolm in such a good mood that he'd even forget about target practice altogether.

Well. Maybe that was a mite unlikely.

But the strangest things happen.

The End

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