A/N: Thanks, everyone, for the reviews. Much appreciated.

CHAPTER 19

Hoshi had planned to go to lunch with T'Pol like she usually did, but the Vulcan was glued to the science console, tweaking scanners and analyzing data, and showed no indication of leaving the bridge. Hoshi then decided she would skip lunch, if only to avoid Reed, who had left the bridge to go to the armory. It would be just her luck to go to the mess hall, sit down by herself, and find that Reed had been waiting for her.

She tried to ignore the growing rumbles from her empty stomach, but her bodyguard didn't. She almost jumped when Mayweather spoke directly to her for the first time.

"You better get something to eat, ma'am," he said in a low voice.

While she appreciated that he'd pitched his voice so that it wouldn't be overheard by the others on the bridge, she wished he'd mind his own business. "I'm not hungry," she whispered back.

Her stomach picked that moment to produce the loudest growl yet. Mayweather raised one eyebrow and waited.

"Oh, all right," she said, relenting under the weight of his amused stare.

She shut down her console. Archer had gone into his ready room some time ago, and the bridge crew was busy. She left unnoticed by anyone except for Mayweather, who followed her into the turbolift.

The mess hall was bustling. The noise level was louder than usual as personnel talked excitedly about the coming confrontation with the Andorians. Hoshi tried to block it out as she selected a sandwich and some chips from the food cabinets, but she couldn't help but hear some of the comments coming from nearby tables. They were all looking forward to battle with an eagerness that bordered on bloodlust.

She found a vacant table. No one in the mess hall seemed to be paying any attention to her as she sat down, except for Mayweather. He stood alertly a couple of paces away, his back to the windows. He apparently wasn't allowed to eat while on duty.

She had just taken a bite of her sandwich -- roast beef so dried out it looked like shoe leather -- when the mess hall doors opened to admit Tucker. He turned to survey the room after picking out his lunch from the food cabinets. Hoshi tried to shrink down, hoping to avoid his gaze, but Mayweather, standing straight and tall behind her, stood out like a beacon among the sea of seated diners. Tucker's eyes lit up when he saw her.

He made his way over and sat down at her table as if they were the best of friends. It was one similarity with his counterpart in Hoshi's universe that she had no trouble recognizing. Neither Tucker stood on ceremony.

"Guess T'Pol's too busy on the bridge to take a break for lunch today, huh?" he asked as he dug into his food, the meat loaf and mashed potatoes that seemed to be available at every lunch and dinner.

Hoshi didn't know what to say. Yes, she normally ate lunch with T'Pol, but Tucker usually wasn't around. How did he know? Then she remembered that the engineer had some sort of love-hate relationship going on with T'Pol, and he probably kept tabs on her. Almost a stalker, but not quite.

Hoshi became aware that, although he was eating, Tucker was watching her, waiting for an answer. "Uh, yes," she said. "That's right."

Tucker nodded. "We're pretty busy down in engineering too, so I can't stay long. Plus, I left Kelby in charge, and that man doesn't know his head from a hand spanner." He took a swig from his glass of water. "Not that we aren't ready for anything anytime, but you can't be too careful when you go up against the Andorians. They're tricky. But we'll whip 'em. We always do." His eyes glinted maliciously as he shoveled a forkful of potatoes into his mouth.

Hoshi didn't know if Tucker was boasting or just trying to reassure her, but the undisguised hatred in his tone sickened her. She took another small bite of her sandwich, but it tasted like cardboard. She reached for her glass of juice to wash down the unappetizing morsel.

Tucker reached across the table to touch her hand as she grasped her glass. "You'll be okay. Enterprise has the best captain in the fleet."

He actually was trying to reassure her, Hoshi realized. She mustered a small smile. "I'm sure of it."

He grinned at her. "That's more like it. You can't go wrong with Jonathan Archer." He withdrew his hand and stabbed a piece of meat on his plate with his fork. "That's why I made sure I was on his ship."

Remembering her earlier vow to find out as much as she could about this universe, Hoshi asked, "Did you know the captain before you were assigned to Enterprise?"

"Only by reputation," Tucker said. "I went into engineering mainly because of his father's work on warp engines. Never got to meet him, though. Cochrane killed him before I was old enough to join the Imperial fleet."

"What?" Hoshi's exclamation slipped out before she could stop it. In her universe, Zefram Cochrane and Henry Archer had worked together on the warp five engine. But Henry Archer had died from Clarke's disease, not murder. "Why did Cochrane kill him?"

"I'm not really sure," Tucker said with a shrug. "Probably because Cochrane wanted all the credit for the new engine. But the captain made sure his father was avenged."

Hoshi was afraid she knew what had happened next, but she had to ask. "What did the captain do?"

"He made sure Cochrane had an accident. One of the fatal kind." Tucker chuckled around a mouthful of food. "It was never proven the captain was involved, though that's the scuttlebutt."

Hoshi had known that the people in this universe were cruel, but this surpassed what she'd believed possible. She thought she was going to throw up right there. She stared at her plate, fighting down nausea, as she was struck full force by the fact that she slept each night with only a door, and one she couldn't lock from her side, between her and a murderer.

"Hey! You okay?" Tucker asked.

She swallowed hard, forcing the nausea down. "Yes."

"Good." Tucker pushed his empty plate away and stood. "I need to get back to engineering. Tell T'Pol I missed seein' her." He walked away without a backward glance.

Hoshi pushed away her barely touched plate. In her present state of mind, eating was out of the question. She may as well go back to the bridge.

Hoshi's shift was almost finished when she caught another embedded transmission. Like the first, it was in Andorian and had been tacked onto what appeared to be a routine message. Unlike the first, it offered hope that they wouldn't be too late to prevent a massacre.

She turned to look at the bridge proper, but Captain Archer wasn't in the command chair. He could still be in his ready room, but he might have gone elsewhere while she was at lunch. Maybe she should ask T'Pol, who was still at her post at the science station.

She didn't want a repeat of this morning, however, when she'd been the center of attention. She loaded the translated message onto a data chip and got to her feet, intending to approach T'Pol at her station. She was almost there when a voice behind her made her spin around.

"Going somewhere, luv?"

Reed was standing not a meter away, having come up quietly behind her. He'd been on the bridge when she'd returned from lunch, but he'd been occupied at the tactical station and, to her relief, hadn't paid her the slightest heed. Or so she had thought. Hoshi sensed more than saw Mayweather moving closer. Steadied by the bodyguard's presence, she replied, "I've found something the captain should see." She held up the data chip.

Reed snatched the chip out of her hand. "Now would not be a good time to disturb him."

"You have no right--" she began, only to have him cut her off.

"As chief of security, I have every right to see any intercepted message that may have a bearing on our mission," he said. He glanced toward the ready room door, which Hoshi took as an indication that the captain was in there. "But maybe you should interrupt the captain. I'm sure you'll be in for a surprise."

Hoshi didn't understand. The information she'd found was important, and the captain had specifically asked her to find any coded messages. From the corner of her eye, she could see T'Pol observing them, but the Vulcan was making no move to intervene. Angered that Reed was once again looking at her as if she was a treat for his devouring, she grabbed the chip from his hand. As she turned away, she heard him mutter, "You'll be sorry."

Once again she'd become the focus of everyone on the bridge. There had been no avoiding it, not after her little clash with Reed. But she was in the right, she told herself. Wrapped in self-righteousness, she strode around the upper level of the bridge, past T'Pol, to the ready room door. She reached for the chime, hoping the captain answered immediately and that she didn't have to stand there, waiting, as the entire bridge crew watched.

There was no response to the chime. Hoshi fought the urge to look back at the others. Lifting her chin, she pushed the button and held it down. She didn't think the captain would have fallen asleep in there, but as she continued to hold the button down, she was beginning to wonder if perhaps there was some other exit from the ready room that she didn't know about. It would be entirely in keeping with the way things in this universe operated.

"Lay off the chime and get in here!" she finally heard Archer shout through the closed door.

With an exhalation of relief, Hoshi opened the door, crossed the threshold, and stopped dead in her tracks.

Archer was stepping away from his desk, zipping up his pants. Behind him, sliding off the desk and adjusting her uniform trousers, was a female member of the crew. Almost more shocking than finding the captain in flagrante delicto was the woman who was with him. She was was Elizabeth Cutler, one of Hoshi's friends on board her own Enterprise.

"I'll come back later!" Hoshi stuttered.

"No," Archer said sharply. "We're done here." He turned to the redhead. "On your way, crewman."

"Aye, sir," Cutler said, flushed and out of breath.

As Cutler brushed past Hoshi, Archer went to the window and, putting one hand on the frame, looked out. "This better be important," he said in a monotone.

Hoshi waited until the door closed behind Cutler. She now understood Reed's cryptic comment about being sorry. Well, if Archer wanted to have sexual relations, she'd just as soon it didn't involve her. She delicately cleared her throat as she regained her mental equilibrium. "I've found another embedded transmission."

Archer turned quickly from the window to face her, a look of expectation tempered by concern on his face.

She held up the chip. "It was in with another routine transmission from the same Andorian freighter as the first one."

"What did it say?" he asked.

A small smile crossed her face. "'Holding position until chancellor's ship arrives.'"

Archer looked off into the distance as he considered the message. "They're waiting for the Andorian chancellor. Shran must want to direct the attack himself."

Hoshi's eyes all but bugged out. She'd thought seeing Cutler with the captain had been a surprise, but it was just one big shock after another today. Shran was the Andorian chancellor here?

At her startled expression, Archer asked, "What?"

Hoshi shook her head, a small, almost hysterical laugh escaping her. "There's a Shran in my universe too, but he's not a chancellor. He's an Imperial Guard commander."

Archer's eyes narrowed. "Imperial?"

"Not Terran Empire Imperial," she clarified. "He's a commander in the Andorian Imperial Guard... Oh, never mind."

Archer stared at her a moment. "You're absolutely sure that's what the message said."

"Yes."

Archer paced toward the door, thinking, then turned back to pace a few more steps. "We now know that we can reach Panmikar before the attack force, sinced they've delayed to wait for their chancellor." He turned again, took a few more steps, and stopped. "But that would put us in a defensive position." He frowned, not happy with that option, before retracing his steps. "Or we could change course and intercept the attack force. We don't know how many or what type of ships they have, but we'd engage them away from Panmikar, sparing the colony any damage." He turned to face her, his arms swinging at his sides from the force of his strides. "Or we could cut off the head of the snake, and end this revolt before it gets started."

Archer had made his decision. She could see it in his eyes. He was going to intercept Shran's ship and engage it in battle.