Herald of Light:
Okay. Fourth chapter is up, and I am working hard on getting more done. I will try to post one ever few days until the story is done, but if this doesn't happen it is because I have become busy studying for tests or something like that (I am a college student after all) so don't worry, this story will get told!
"CAPTAIN! WE HAVE ANOTHER ENERGY BUILDUP!"
"Where is it?"
"Aft torpedo tube. If we have an explosion the same as what destroyed the Armory, the nacelles will be damaged, if not destroyed."
"I can't dissipate the energy….the hull isn't polarizing!"
"Captain….I'm…Sor---"
Captain Archer shot up in bed. Porthos, sitting on the edge of the bed was pushed off. This was the first night that he had slept back in his quarters in a while, and of course, he had had a nightmare.
It didn't make sense. He had lived the last twenty years without having them, but the last couple nights, despite sleeping near T'Pol, and then in his own bed they happened. The comm. panel chirped. "Yes?"
"It's Dr. Phlox. T'Pol is asking for you, she says that she can't get to sleep. I have removed her from the chamber; her immune system is back to normal. I would say that she could try going to the mess hall tomorrow under her own power if she wants to."
"Thanks Doc. I'll be there in a couple minutes." Archer turned off the panel, looked down to Porthos, "Looks like you are sleeping alone boy. I'm sorry." Porthos jumped up and started licking Archer on the cheek. "I know boy, but soon we won't be the only ones living in these quarters, you know?"
The crewman checked to make sure his room was empty, then keyed into the communications array, and pointed a signal to the designated coordinates.
"It isn't the designated time, why are you violating your orders?"
"I felt that the current situation needed to be addressed Master. T'Pol has woken up. The Vulcans and Andorians have arrived in force. They are modifying and strengthening Enterprise. Columbia is also coming, with additional reinforcements. I advise that we stop the mission."
"No, the plan will proceed. We cannot wait any longer. Humanity is the only species that would feed us fully. The Vulcans and Andorians are a danger, but we can easily take care of them. Plant devices on their ships as well."
"That might be a little hard for me sir. Archer is out on a headhunt trying to find me. If they get a good scan of me…"
"Don't worry, Enterprise will soon be under our control, and soon after Columbia, then…."
"I have to go! The comm. officer on duty is trying to get a message back to Earth, and I have the dish pointed the wrong direction!" The crewman shut off the comm. display, then erased the log entries for the subspace radio. There could be no evidence of the communication.
"Admiral Forest, how are things there on Earth?"
"They are getting pretty fuzzy Jon. It seems that someone has been abducting global leaders. Starfleet is having a hard time keeping everyone from starting a shooting war. We may need to call back Columbia in order to keep the peace."
"Is there anything we can do to help?"
"No Jon, there isn't. You just need to investigate that star system. Anyone that scares the hell out of both the Vulcans and Andorians won't like us too well either. I'm authorizing you to do anything necessary to protect not only your ship, but to protect the best interests of Earth."
"How far should I take that Admiral?"
"As far as it needs to be taken. Forest out."
"Malcolm, how are your new toys coming along?" Trip asked the exhausted Armory officer as he sat down to a slice of Pecan pie.
"These shields…they are wonderful devices. They are so simple, yet why we haven't found a way to make them I don't know. As far as the Armory itself, it should be finished within the hour. It seems the Vulcans have these little nanobots that are helping with the reconstruction. They are telling me that they are highly experimental, and shouldn't even have been considered to be used, but something sure has them scared enough to get past their thoughts on us. What about the warp drive? How fast can we go now?"
"You won't believe this. The simulations show that we could bump warp 7 now. But I don't get the feeling we will be getting to test that anytime soon. As far as powering things, it seems that we should be able to get all that we need from it. Your shields will be quite the energy hog, but we can handle it."
"Really? I wonder if you could also handle the phase disrupters that we came up with."
"Phase disrupters?"
"We blended our technology with that of the Vulcans and Andorians. It's more powerful than any other ships in either fleet. Our phase cannons are only a tenth as powerful"
"A tenth! I don't know if we can handle that!
"Well, you're going to have to; we just don't have the time to try to rework things any other way."
"Hey honey, how are you feeling?"
"I really wish you would stop being so emotional when I am in a weakened state. Our link fully transfers all of them to me, and I can't handle them right now." T'Pol took Archer's hand into her own. He seemed to calm down when she did that. This time though, something was wrong. There was something different about her mate. "Has something happened?"
"Nothing has happened, nothing that concerns you anyway." With that, Archer grinned and bared his teeth, revealing two fangs in place of his incisors. "Nothing that you will care about anymore."
T'Pol tried to resist as Archer moved to bite her on the neck, but she was still too weak. What was going on? Why had her beloved now act like he was going to suck her dry? What was the mythical creature that there were stories told about on Vulcan? A Ch'Lak?
T'Pol's eyes shot open as a hand touched her arm. It was Phlox. "Captain Archer is on his way. I'll make the other biobed up so you two can be alone, ok?" T'Pol simply nodded. Doctor Phlox had been very kind during this entire ordeal. It was against regulations for those who weren't sick to be in Sickbay when it was closed, but seeing as how close T'Pol and Archer were, Phlox didn't report the violations. She would have to remember that when she was making her list of people to thank on their wedding day.
Their wedding date was set for April 12. That was four and a half months away, but soon after the ceremony was over, she would move in with Archer and they would start the task of moving into a dual quarters, the first in the history of humanity. But then again, their marriage was going to be one of many firsts.
Archer shot in and immediately was at T'Pol's side. "What's wrong dear?"
"I had a…disturbing dream." T'Pol was weakened, but she was still able to keep her cool.
"Is it a side-effect of you not doing your meditations for so long?"
"No, the Vulcan healing state is even deeper than normal meditation, so I should be okay. There have been a few occasions where Vulcans have dreamed despite being at the highest levels of emotional control. Each time though, the dreams were of events that were about to happen."
"There have been instances of that happening on Earth as well. As a matter of fact, there was a very good instance of this when the King of Babylon had a dream about a giant statue made of gold, silver, iron, and clay. Only one man in the entire kingdom could interpret the dream though. What was your dream about dear?"
"I would rather not go into details, but I must ask you a question about your mythology, since I am not fully versed in your culture. Are there any mentions of a creature that drains the blood of a victim so that it may live?"
"There are several mentions of that T'Pol. The chubracabra for instance, then there is Dracula, er, vampires."
"What are vampires?"
"Well, like you said, they would feed on people in order to solve a problem with their blood, they were anemic. Sometimes these people that were fed on were turned themselves. There seemed a master/slave order to things. If I remember right, there were a lot of movies devoted to them. Why do you ask?"
"There are tales of a similar creature on Vulcan, except that it was a small incident. Since our race doesn't have the same blood chemistry as yours, we weren't able to fulfill their need for iron. There was an invasion of these creatures onto a major colony. Only a few know of the incident, but my family passes the stories on, mainly to the children, as bedtime stories."
"Bedtime stories?"
"In order to get them to meditate, they would threaten that these creatures would attack them if they didn't."
"Remind me not to let you tuck in the kids, ok?"