They were on the outskirts of the system now, and therefore running at about three-fourths impulse. It would be another day before they reached the inner planets of interest, but until then, the other seven Minshara class planets were being scanned for clues.
But that didn't help them at all. Archer glanced over to Soval across the table. He was calm, collected….typical Vulcan. "Why are you out here?" Archer asked. Soval just looked at him with a look Archer had learned from his father as the "What a stupid human question." look. "I mean….what do you think is in this system that has you so scared as to not only send us backup, but to just give us almost a hundred year's worth of improvements to our technology?"
For the first time that Archer knew of, he saw a Vulcan sigh. "Captain, we believe that what you call vampires are based in this system." Seeing Archer's look he continued. "Unlike what your mythology says, vampires are actually a race of humanoid creatures from this system. But we had thought that they would be only a nuisance, until we found out that your race had the proper blood chemistry to feed them, and to become them."
"So you are doing this for our protection? Doesn't that violate some Vulcan protocol?"
"It does, but we are also looking out for our best interests, as are the Andorians."
"We are here to help our friends. The fact that we may also protect the interests of the Andorian people is irrelevant." Shran stood up from the table. "Captain Archer has earned the respect of my government time and time again for his heroism and wisdom. We need more people like him out here, not more Vulcans."
"What are you implying Shran? That chaos is the way to rule?" Soval almost sounded angry.
"Now you listen here---"
"CHILDREN!" Archer yelled at the top of his lungs. He was tired of this. In a few months, these people were going to be sitting at a more important table, one that would shape how the next three hundred years would play out. He knew this from all of the experiences from traveling to the future with Crewman Daniels. "PLEASE!" Archer looked at the shocked faces of the people in the room. Only Trip had seen him fully angered before, and luckily it hadn't been pointed at him. Trip had laughed at the last person who had been the target of his friend's last anger burst. That poor guy had ended up with a broken arm and a bruised lung…and Archer had been half his size. Now all Trip could feel was sorry for the two people that had managed to catch him at just the wrong time to piss him off.
"Now you two still might have some hatred for each other, but I am going to ask only once that you lay that aside! I am in command of this fleet, so that means that you two are both under my command. So, unless you want me to order you to get along, I would recommend that you two would think twice about doing anything the old way. I have three letters yet to write to families back on Earth, and I don't know what to put in them!
Soval, you say that we are coming up to some kind of vampire homeworld. Shran, how did you hear about what was going on?"
"Let's just say that we have been trying to contact these people for a while, and as the Vulcans have, we have lost a couple of vessels that we have sent out here. And like the Vulcans, we had an invasion of our homeworld by these creatures. We have a chemistry that would support them, not as well as humans would, but as a last resort they could try. Fortunately we had a sufficient level of technology to eventually rid ourselves of these creatures. I brought with me all the information we had on fighting them."
"Why would you be trying to contact them instead of destroying them?" Soval looked at the Andorian with a slightly cocked eyebrow.
"We thought that anyone that was interested in destroying the Vulcans wasn't so bad, and…."
"And you were looking for someone to help you fight a war?" Archer shook his head. That was it, he was going to rip into these two, right here, right now. "You two stay here, everyone else GET OUT!" He pointed to the door as everyone jumped and dashed to it. Not that they were going to miss the fireworks show though. Hoshi and Malcolm leaned against the door to listen in.
A few seconds after they leaned against the door, it opened and an enraged captain barked "YOU TWO OUT, or so help me I will shoot you two out an airlock!"
Stunned. The two looked at each other. "So, want to grab a bite to eat Ensign? Better yet, why don't we go on a date?"
"Sounds great." With that, both dashed down the corridor to the turbolift, both praying that there would be something left of the poor two souls that were staring down the barrel of a very large caliber gun, the Captain.
This time, it was slower. The buildup started in the engineering section of two of the Vulcan ships, and the bridge of the lead Andorian vessel. It wasn't detected until it was too late.
The three vessels all exploded at the same time. The resulting blasts managed to take out three additional vessels, and cripple the rest. Enterprise was the only ship not damaged, since she had been traveling above and ahead of the rest of the fleet.
"Doctor….I'd break out the spare bandages, cause we are going to have some problems."
They had stopped in orbit around the last Minshara class planet before the mysterious three inner planets would be encountered, and the surviving ships weren't in good shape.
Two would be able to fly again. The rest were being cannibalized for parts, their decimated crews transferring to where they could find rooms. Enterprise was taking some of them on, filling already cramped quarters.
"Now we are forced to work together. You'd better get used to it, cause it is the only way we are going to work through this."
Both Soval and Shran were still on board Enterprise. They had taken their verbal lashing, and because of it both knew not to mess with Archer. Both now knew the full strength of a human who was pissed, and unfortunately, both thought,there were several billion more like him.
God help whoever pissed them off.
In the years since Enterprise had first ventured out into space, it had encountered more dangers and had come closer to death more than any one in either species histories. And somehow, Archer had not only kept the crew alive, but had formed them into a family.