Chapter Five

A/N: I really hope you guys will bear with me for the whole tale of this story. I'll aplogize before hand about some things wrong, this is the first romance story I have ever written, so I might need some help in the love department, folks. I have tried to keep Malcolm Reed as close to the real thing as possible, but when coupled with a leading lady like Briana, It's a little tough. I am not British, so I have no clue what some of the words he would use are. I'm american, like Briana, but it's proving to be an intersting thing to research for this.

Briana fought agaisnt the darkness creeping into her vision. But the harder she fought, the easier it was to give in and just sleep. So Briana, fell uncounious beside Malcolm,still clutching his forearms. Briana's hair had inadvertitlly fallen out of her braids and hair pins, so waves of black hair flowed around her and covering Malcolm.

*)_(*

Looking at the females around him, one of the large lobed aliens was finidng it hard to pick just two of the beautiful bodies. But walking into the room with two of the humans on the floor, he knew this one was one of the two, he was taking. She was beautiful in his eyes, a goddess among mortals. Her black hair was loose and flowed around her like a black cloud to highlight the sun. Her skin was flawless, yet looked like she went outside a lot. She wore a black tank-top that ended mid rif, with old, faded cargo pants with a camoflague pattern. Normally for them, their females were always kept unclothed, but this female in front of him, it would be better to cloth her and make it look mysterious to others, that way, she was all his.

The next female that only this one liked the most was a pointy eared, female, wearing a skin tight light blue catsuit. Her ears intriegued him the most, the other females had rounded ears not the pointy tipped ones she sported.

So he dragged the two females that he had chosen to the ship, knowing that the others would come as soon as they stopped downloading the database on a female that the Romulans wanted for a high price. A price so high in fact that every bounty hunter in the two Quadrents couldn't stop talking about it. The empor of Romulas had made it his specail duty to make sure that people knew the price on her head. The female they claimed to be looking for was human with black hair that was long and the softest and brownest eyes ever to be seen on the Planet. He also said she was a warrior to rival the best Klingons, but most thought that was just him joking to make it look like they had gotten their money's worth.

*)_(*

Malcom awoke when Trip put a hypo spray to his neck, looking around himself, Reed couldn't find the person he was to guard with his life.

"Glad you're awake finally, Malcolm. Lookis like those aliens that came last time are back for more of Enterprise's technology. I need your help." Trip told his friend, patting him on the back, after pulling the groggy Englishman to his feet.

"The ones that had Captain Archer telling them about a vault?" He asked, trying to find his sparring partner. "Where's Sheppard?"

" Saw one of the aliens dragging the sub-commander and our guest." Trip told him, tossing one of the last phase-pistols to Malcolm.

"How long ago was this?" Malcolm asked, catching and setting the phase-pistol. After making sure it was operational, he holstered it and started to head for the bridge. It was just the two of them aboard a ship to rescue their captured members.

"Ten, twently minutes. They used a hypospray to wake up Briana, before knocking her out again." Trip hurried to catch up with his friend.

"That doesn't bloody give us much time to catch them before they're out of range." Reed took his place at tatical, while Trip moved an unconscious Travis of the helm.

*)_(*

When Briana awoke, it was in a prison cell aboard an unknown ship. Guessing from how much the deckplating was vibrating, she found the ship was going warp three or four.

Looking towards her room-mate, Briana found that T'pol was just starting to wake up. The walls of the ship were a redish brown, while there was one wall open. Lunging towards it, Sheppard had to much momentum to stop her voloticy, and she ended up getting thrown to the floor from hitting a force-feild dead on.

"Why did you throw yourself towards the force-feild, Major?" T'pol asked, watching the young woman roll and stood up from the floor groaning.

"If you're going to tell me it was illogical, Sub-commander, I already know that." Briana pushed her hair away from her face, once more. "I'd say from the looks of things, that we are in a pickle."

"You are correct on that assumption, Briana Sheppard." T'pol sat cross legged on the ground, watching the younger woman start to figet.

Humans long ago had stopped surprising her, well after Trip had become her mate. But Briana Sheppard was odd even for a human, the commander noticed.

"Someone's coming." Briana tilted her head and listened harder, doing this all by keeping her hair over her ears.

"I noticed their footsteps several seconds before you did, Major." T'pol watched fasinated by Briana. She was illogical, yet logical. Briana had scampered towards the opposite wall, steading herself for a fight, T'pol noticed.

The aliens who entered were not the ones that captured the Enterprise, no these aliens could have been mistaken for Vulcans, except they all had a ridge shaped like a V above their eyebrows.

"Romulans." Briana breathed the word, backing farther away from them as possible. She had heard the stories from her grandfather. He claimed that Romulans were cousins of Vulcans, very distandly, he put emmisapse on distantly. Briana now knew why Vulcans didn't like the bond between their two people.

"I am Travon of the Romulan Star Empire. It would seem that we have saved you from a worse death by the Ferengi." The one wearing the more decoration on his uniform spoke. "Which one of you is Briana Sheppard?"

Briana closed her eyes and breathed deeply, calming herself. It wouldn't do if she was hysterical and gave some important bit of information away, Romulans after all could never be trusted. "Why are you looking for her, Travon?" She asked, coming closer to the Romulan and T'pol.

"She was sent to help us defeat an enemy calling themselves the Wraith. They have taken over much of the empire all ready." Travon, knew that this was the one that he was looking for, when he noticed the widening of her eyes at the mention of the name.

"Wraith, now that's a race that I'm well accainted with...Whatever were the Romulans thinking when they tried to make them slaves?!" Briana muttered to herself, knowing that it was pointless to hide what their captors already knew.

*)_(*

Trip could feel T'pol's worry. Something was wrong and Tucker didn't know how he could safeguard his mate. Looking at Malcolm, he grimly smiled. There was nobody he'd rather have watching his rear, than Malcolm Reed, Security officer of Enterprise.

The warbird that they ended up chasing, when the alien vessel that had captured the two crewmembers was destroyed, had stopped in a planetary system.

Why go to all that trouble of hiding their warp trail when they were heading towards a empty system. Four of the ten planets could hold life but none of them didn't. Their sun on the other hand was in the first stages of colllasping.

A/N:Please leave a review, This is my first romance and I might need some pointers and things of the like, if you know what I mean. Anyway THANK YOU for reading this far in the Gypsy Traveler. I will get back to you in three weeks, maybe less.