—CHAPTER 12—
"Thank God for Chef Tucker," said Hoshi, licking her lips.
Hoshi and Travis were seated at the dining table watching Trip working to complete the meal, while Malcolm handled the logistics, dropping things off for Travis and Hoshi to distribute about the table. Trip had fallen into the role of the ship's chef since the first day, which was only natural given the man's obsession with his next meal and undeniable skills in a kitchen. T'Pol had fallen into the role of sous-chef without any discussion on the matter. She chopped and diced the items required, handed Trip the foods he needed at the proper times and generally saw to it that the process ran smoothly.
"How is it that we have meat on a ship stocked by Vulcans?" asked Hoshi.
"I had Chef put together a half dozen boxes of mixed foods for our mission," said Trip. "He knows the things I like to cook, so he took care of us."
"A vegetarian diet would not have been as terrible as you imagine it to be, Commander," said T'Pol.
"Well, we'll never know T'Pol," said Trip, "unless you toss our food out. If that happens, our lovely SubCommander will find herself on the menu. I could do wonders with your tender flesh."
"You could do wonders with the SubCommander's tender flesh?" said Hoshi, laughing. "Did I hear that right. Because a Freudian would find all kinds of meaning in that statement, Commander."
"Shut up, Hoshi," said Trip, fixing the Ensign with a steely glance.
Malcolm smirked at their exchange, and followed that smirk with another at the thought of explaining T'Pol's fate to Soval.
"What are we eating tonight, Commander?" said Travis as he walked into the Galley.
"You'll see in a minute, Helmsman," said Trip. "Don't bother the chef."
"Yes, sir," said Travis and started chatting with Hoshi.
"That's it for you, T'Pol," said Trip, looking round. "Go sit down and relax."
"As you say, Commander," said T'Pol, and joined the rest in watching Trip defy the fire gods with his cooking style.
Ten minutes later, the food started coming out. Toasted focaccia with caramelized red onion and mushrooms and topped with feta cheese crumbles and sesame seeds and large Greek salads. By the time they'd finished the appetizers and Malcolm had cleared the plates, the next course came out. Steamed jasmine rice, a vegetable stir-fry and grilled swordfish steaks basted with butter and a big basket of tempura battered fried shrimp and oysters for all to share, save of course T'Pol, who had a six seasoned strips of tempura battered tofu, deep fried, and a grilled portabella mushroom cap instead of the seafood.
Trip joined them at that time and noted that T'Pol, who was seated next to him, was nibbling delicately on one of her tofu strips.
"Ugh. I can't see how you eat that cursed bean," said Trip.
"That is an odd thing to hear, from the man who cooked the food," said T'Pol.
"T'Pol, I'll cook a possum for you, if you ask it of me, but that doesn't mean I'll eat it."
"There is no danger of me asking for a possum, Commander Tucker, but I assure you, this fried tofu is quite delicious," said T'Pol, stabbing a strip with her fork and pushing the tofu towards Trip's mouth. "Try it at least once and I will never ask again."
The rest of the crew watched the exchange merely to gauge Trip's reaction to the tofu, but Hoshi found something else of interest. She's spent four months of Vulcan, learning the language, and she knew Vulcans did not typically feed others off their plate, save perhaps for family, and even that was rarely done in public. And they never shared cutlery.
"Eat, eat, eat!" said Travis and Malcolm, pounding fists on table.
Discretely looking at T'Pol out of the corner of her eyes, Hoshi looked at T'Pol, really looked at her. The emotionless Vulcan with a wooden expression, as Hoshi had perceived her initially, didn't seem that way any longer. Sure, her expressions were subtle, but they were there, and at that moment, force feeding her tofu to a reluctant Trip, her face looked sweet, her eyes warm…
Holy shit, thought Hoshi, T'Pol is attracted to Trip!
"Eat, eat, eat!" said Hoshi now, along with the others, to conceal her thoughts, while her mind raced.
How long has this been going on? Is Trip attracted to T'Pol as well? Are they lovers? Impossible! But maybe not impossible in the future. They're always together. Fighting like cats and dogs half the time, true, but they seem to enjoy even the fighting. Oh, my, God, it's probably like foreplay for these two sickos!
As an extrovert, Hoshi was naturally something of a gossip, but she made a resolution never to betray this thing, whatever it was. Only a monster would jinx a couple this cute!
Trip savagely bit off a chunk of tofu, and before he finished it all, T'Pol shoved the rest of it in his mouth, along with her fork, Hoshi noted.
"Well?" she said, as Trip swallowed the last bit.
"Ok, it tasted fine," said Trip, "but I can feel my penis inverting, my breasts growing and my skin getting softer. This stuff is pure poison for a man bursting at the seams with raw testosterone, T'Pol!"
"Do you know such a man, Commander?" said T'Pol, and Hoshi groaned at the ferocity of T'Pol's thrust, while Malcolm and Travis laughed.
"Judging by the hungry look on Lieutenant Reed's face when you described your physical transformation," said Travis, "I think you should sleep with one eye open tonight, Commander."
Everyone but T'Pol laughed at that, though she seemed amused when Malcolm gave Trip a devilish grin as his eyes narrowed. With a satisfied sigh, Trip pushed his plate away.
"Excellent meal, Commander," said Hoshi and Travis and T'Pol nodded their agreement.
"Great meal," said Malcolm as he started bussing the table.
"And you're a natural busboy, Lieutenant," said Travis.
"Hey, Trip feeds me like a king, three meals a day, in exchange for being his whipping boy in the kitchen. I can live with it. And it's your job on our return trip. Remember our agreement, Travis."
"I remember."
"No dessert?" said Hoshi, disappointment audible in her voice.
"On the counter," said Trip. "I woke up at 05:00 to make that baby and then I hid it carefully, to keep you jackals from devouring it, just one taste at a time."
That last barb was aimed at Hoshi, who always denied her sweet tooth, yet could consume a bucket of sweets in the course of a day: I just want a taste, she'd say time after time, while throwing bite after bite down her gullet.
"What is it?" said Hoshi, who had bounced out of her seat and was the first to reach the dessert tray.
"Heaven itself. Torte Dobos. Five layered cake, with chocolate buttercream between each layer, topped with thin sheets of caramel."
Hoshi licked her lips and allowed her gaze to lovingly caress the torte, and said, "What's that I see on the side?"
"Ground hazelnuts and bits of white chocolate," said Trip.
"Really…," said Hoshi, lost in her larcenous thoughts, so much so that she jumped a bit when Travis spoke.
"I know that look!" said Travis.
"What look?" said Hoshi, defensively.
"Like you're about to grab the cake and scurry like a rat with it down a dark hallway, in search of a private place to bury your face in OUR dessert."
Ten minutes later, table cleaned off, a giant piece of torte and a cup of French Roast coffee in front of each crew member, they began the shoptalk.
"So where next, SubCommander?" said Malcolm, after which he shoved a piece of torte in his mouth and made an appreciative noise.
"Sebra, a huge marketplace in the Ramatis system," said T'Pol.
"Any particular reason, SubCommander?" said Travis.
"No particular reason," said T'Pol. "But it is a huge market in which we're likely to be overlooked, and it is a good distance away from our recent encounter with the Happa."
"What did your analysis of the Happa's DNA tell you?" said Malcolm, after taking a sip of his coffee.
T'Pol looked reluctant to speak.
"T'Pol?" said Trip.
"This torte is quite good, Commander."
"T'Pol."
T'Pol sighed, and said, "I do not know what it means, but the Happa's DNA was Vulcan."
"I didn't know Vulcan had criminals," said Travis.
"Every species has criminals," said T'Pol, "though such people are rare on Vulcan.
"You're sure, SubCommander?" said Malcolm, looking at T'Pol. "Your lab looked sparsely equipped."
"It was more than adequate," said T'Pol. "In any case, I forwarded my results to the Vulcan High Command. I'm certain they will confirm my findings and hopefully they can tell us more."
"How so?" said Hoshi. "Did you find something unusual in that Vulcan's DNA?"
"Nothing unusual enough to be called that," said T'Pol. "I saw some minor mutations, but the genetic sample was Vulcan. However, if records exist of such mutations on Vulcan, it might give us a starting place."
Hoshi said, "You think it might lead you to a region of Vulcan, or maybe a family blood line?"
"Any and all of that, if we're lucky," said T'Pol. "If we're not, that Happa was an off-worlder, a colonist, in which case we might not find a match for months. Or we might never find a match."
"What did you pull off the body, Malcolm," said Trip, looking at the Lieutenant.
Malcolm excused himself and returned a minute later with a small cloth sack, which he upended on the table. A dozen or so items were cluttered in a pile.
"We have a data chip," said Malcolm, pulling it out of the pile and handing it to T'Pol. "Encrypted. I'll let you know if I can crack it. Several coins, a ring, a tiny pocket knife too small to be considered a weapon by the Orions and a map of Syndicate space. Unfortunately, it's not marked in any way that I could see, though you may want to take a look at it as well, SubCommander, for markings could hold valuable information. Several keys and a pill box."
People started rummaging through the stuff, looking for anything that might stand out, but T'Pol's attention was drawn by Commander Tucker. The man had frozen suddenly and T'Pol had noticed his tension.
"Commander?" she said, looking first at the man, then at the pile of items in front of them all, for the cause of his discomfort.
"Give me that, Travis," said Trip. "Give me the ring."
The Helmsman handed over the item, and the rest of the crew watched as Trip took a long look at the ring, then folded it in his hand.
T'Pol held out her hand and Trip dropped the ring in the SubCommander's palm with a sigh, his fingers touching hers as he drew his hand back. T'Pol looked at the ring. It was engraved with the stylized form of a bird of prey in a dive, and oddly enough, holding a ball in each claw. The insignia told her nothing. It had told the Commander something, of that she had no doubt.
"You know something, Commander Tucker," said T'Pol. "What is it?"
"I've seen that logo before. I have a copy of it in my cabin aboard the Enterprise, inscribed on a medallion, meant to be worn on a neck chain."
"Where did you get it?" said T'Pol, though her logical deductions had already led her to the answer: it only remained for the Commander to confirm her conclusion.
"Ke'Relle," said Trip. "She gave it to me before she left the Enterprise."
Ke'Relle had been a Vulcan which the Enterprise had rescued from Orion pirates weeks before. She'd stayed aboard the Enterprise for a week or so and in that time had managed to annoy T'Pol mightily, though of course the SubCommander would never admit it.
"So Ke'Relle is mixed up with the Happa," said Travis.
"Maybe," said Malcolm, but I could think of dozens of reasons to argue both for, or against Ke'Relle being associated with the Happa."
"As could I," said T'Pol. "But it will not hurt to forward this information to the proper authorities, have them monitor Ke'Relle."
"Why did she give you that medallion, Trip?" said Malcolm.
"I assumed it was as a gift for rescuing her from the Orions, something by which to remember her. But," said Trip, "she did say if I was ever threatened by someone with that insignia, I should show them my medallion."
"I must go and notify the High Command," said T'Pol. "They need to pick Ke'Relle up and question her."
It was still night watch on the ship, a bit past 05:00, and T'Pol was alone on the Bridge, seated in the Helmman's chair. Vulcans needed less sleep than humans, especially when combined with meditation, so she'd taken every night watch since they began this mission, in the interest of maintaining the crew in peak condition. She was about to begin her meditations when one of the internal cameras showed motion on the main display monitor of the Bridge. T'Pol maximized the window to see Commander Tucker in the Galley, pouring himself a tall glass of his iced coffee and coconut milk blend. He was wearing his pajama bottoms, a t-shirt and Hoshi's Hello Kitty slippers, so if he intended to return to bed, the intake of caffeine was illogical. After perfecting his coffee with a splash of brown sugar syrup, T'Pol saw the man reach for the intercom button.
"Trip to Bridge."
"Yes, Commander."
"I'm coming up. What can I bring you?"
"Some tea would be nice," said T'Pol. "Hot, please."
"What kind?"
"Surprise me, Commander Tucker."
Five minutes later, Trip entered the Bridge, drinks in hand.
"Thank you," said T'Pol, as she accepted the cup from Trip.
A moment later, Trip sat next to her, in the Tactical operations chair, which was located next to Helm chair in this ship, so they were only two or three feet apart.
The ship had been stocked by Vulcans, so she was greeted by the pleasantly bitter aroma of redweed tea, though truly, she'd grown to like some of the human teas just as much as Vulcan.
"That coffee won't help you fall back to sleep, Commander."
"I went to sleep right after dinner, so I slept nine hours or so. I'm actually just starting my day."
"I see," said T'Pol. "The High Command reached out to me. They have no record of a Ke'Relle of Vulcan. She certainly never served in a military unit, as she had claimed."
"Doesn't prove anything," said Trip. "She could have been raised on one of the Vulcan colonies, or perhaps even a non-Vulcan colony. None of us asked her much about her past. We just made assumptions."
"True, Commander. However she seems to have vanished from the face of your Earth, as well."
"Really? Do your people think she's moved on to another planet?"
"Actually, Commander, they think she's still on Earth, using fraudulent identity cards to stay anonymous. They think she has taken a new name, and a new identity."
"No idea of the reason for it all, I take it?"
"No, Commander. Not at the moment. But some of our special operations people serving at the Embassy are looking into it all. They are now quite eager to question her."
Trip was conflicted. If she was associated with these Happa, and if she was moving about on Earth using fraudulent Vulcan identity cards, she was up to something shady, but… He really liked her, and he didn't want her tangled up with the Vulcan security forces. Oh hell.
They sipped their hot beverages for a time, then T'Pol said, "You know, we should test this neural whip, Commander."
"What do you mean, T'Pol?"
"We should determine the limits of control the whip imposes on me," said T'Pol. "If your base unit should be taken from you, I wonder if I should be able to act on our behalf, or if the whip would incapacitate me, or perhaps even cause me to turn against you and the rest of the crew."
"I think we can take it for granted that it would incapacitate you, T'Pol. That's what it's meant to do, after all."
"We can't assume that, Commander. Vulcan mental training is more rigorous than the norm, not to mention my own professional training, which may well negate the abilities of the whip. If not, we need to know what my limits are."
"I'm sure I could alter the whip, T'Pol. Perhaps lower its limits to a tolerable level right off the bat."
"The Orions do not allow gentler settings on their neural whips and they do a great deal of surreptitious monitoring for weakened whips, which makes sense, given the thousands of captives they have to control."
"It's your hide, T'Pol. Let me get the base unit from my quarters."
T'Pol savored her tea patiently until the Commander returned and slipped back into the Tactical chair and sat, his left leg folded under him. She was already in her meditative pose in her chair, legs crossed in a pose she could maintain for hours.
"Tell me when you're ready, T'Pol."
The SubCommander set her tea on the ground, and said, "I'm ready."
Trip's first sensation for T'Pol to sample was the memory of getting badly bitten by dozens of red ants when he was a child. That he remembered it all these years later, was a testament to how nasty it was, but T'Pol seemed unaffected. He imagined it once again, and turned the power settings up.
"T'Pol?"
"Unpleasant, but well within my limits."
The second test was the time his asshole cousin Karl had poked his butt with a cattle prod. T'Pol flinched a bit at that, but nothing more. A dozen more tests, each more unpleasant than the last, some bordering on the sadistic, some past that border.
"Well? How about it?"
"I could still have acted if called upon, Commander."
On they went through trial and error and found that T'Pol possessed a high pain tolerance was still able to act through any pain, save at the two highest power levels. Since most slavers kept the intensity in the low to mid levels generally, T'Pol would be able to attack an unwary enemy, which could be a life or death issue in some cases. Interestingly enough the mental sensations disabled T'Pol most. When Trip remembered an incident in which he'd actually drowned in the waters off the Florida coast, T'Pol tapped out in the low levels of sensation.
"Well, now we know," said Trip. "So long as they don't try to mentally drown you in the Gulf of Mexico you're my ace in the hole."
"Perhaps we should try the other setting, Commander," said T'Pol, head lowered.
It took Trip a second to make sense of it.
"Oh," he said with a smile, "you mean the pleasure settings?"
T'Pol nodded, head still bowed, and said, "We must prepare for all eventualities, as disagreeable as you might find the task."
"It's only logical that we plan for all eventualities, T'Pol, and I don't find the task the least bit disagreeable."
T'Pol raised her head and it was clear from the flush in her face and the tint of color in her ears that she was conflicted about these tests, and possibly excited, thought Trip, though the chance of that was small as he saw it.
"You are correct, Commander, it must be done," said T'Pol, and closed her eyes, in order that they might not betray her. "You may proceed at your discretion."
Now that her eyes were closed, Trip allowed his eyes to gaze without pause at the face of his lovely SubCommander, and his mind to wander back to their stint in the Decon Chamber, not long ago, a time he'd spent much time thinking of since then, and as his mind wandered, the base unit transmitted his neural engrams to T'Pol's neural whip, and she wandered with him.
Trip thought back to when he'd touched her ears, and he could tell she felt the sensation, because she tensed visibly, before she forced herself to relax. Trouble was, that damned feedback channel he'd set up for Morse code communication was feeding her engrams back at him, so it wasn't just that she was feeling his touch, he felt as if he was actually touching her ears now, in real life. He wasn't going to be able to keep as detached from this test as he'd thought.
He imagined himself behind her, and his right hand slipped across her waist to pull T'Pol into his embrace, while his left hand caressed her jaw, then gently turned her head to the left, placing her delicate right ear well within nibbling range, her neck only inches further away from his lips. He even inhaled her scent since they were sitting so close together, which only furthered the sensations.
Trip's duty demanded this sacrifice of him, and so he persevered, for the good of the Fleet. It was an odd sensation though, feeling the SubCommander's body, as he bent his head to begin his task as his right hand began to glide across her body, while another part of Trip watched T'Pol's face closely from his seat at Tactical, as her face flushed further, her eyes fluttered, her nostrils flared and soft whimpers escaped her lips—.
The hiss of the Bridge door opening snapped them both out of the abyss they'd been sliding into.
"So I grabbed Porthos by the tail and—," said Hoshi to Malcolm, as the pair stepped onto the Bridge, and she sensed that something was off.
Malcolm, more sensitive than Hoshi by nature and much more observant due to his training, knew they'd interrupted an intimate encounter of some sort. What type, he could not say, for the SubCommander was separated by a distance of two feet from Trip, but Malcolm knew he was not mistaken. The SubCommander was as close to rattled as he'd ever seen her, while Trip just emanated a cold anger at their presence, eyes narrowed to slits.
"What are you two doing here?" said Trip.
"It's 08:00, Commander," said Malcolm. "We're due for our shift."
Damn it, damn it, damn it, thought Trip, we started with the wrong end of the neural whip.
"Then you'd better get to it," said Trip, before turning to T'Pol. "Get some rest, T'Pol. We'll try our hand at meditation another time."
"Yes, Commander," said T'Pol, cool as a cucumber once again. "I will return to the Bridge in five hours."
"Make it seven, T'Pol. We're all well rested and I interrupted your meditation."
"That is true. Seven it is," said T'Pol.
"Ok," said Hoshi, once Trip and T'Pol had left the Bridge, "what the hell was that?"
Malcolm ignored the question, hoping Hoshi would drop the matter. She did not.
"Look," said Hoshi, "I know I'm not crazy, and if you hadn't seen this thing too, I'd die before telling you of it, but there's something going on, and we need to know what it is!"
"Why?" said Malcolm.
"Lieutenant, we could make a game of it, pretend we're secret agents or something."
"Umm, hmm," said Malcolm, a wry look on his face. "Secret agents. Do you think we could pull it off?"
"I know we could, Malcolm. Look, it would be just between the two of us, I swear."
"I like Commander Tucker," said Malcolm, giving Hoshi a brief glance as he began bringing up some schematics, "and T'Pol is a fine officer. Give me one good reason that I should stick my nose in their business?"
"I can't give you a solid reason, but I'll find some way to make it worth your while," said Hoshi with an impudent smile, and that promise and that smile were open to a lot of interpretations, thought Malcolm.
"Ok," said Malcolm. "I'm in, if you let me do my work in peace, now."
Hoshi gave a mock salute and said, "Good to have you aboard, Lieutenant Reed."