He had Hoshi pressed to her window, her legs wrapped around his hips, her head rimmed with stars.

"Wave hello to the cloaked Romulan warbird for me," she purred. "And then, let's give them something to see."

"You think they are interested in writing home about this sort of thing?" Travis murmured, but just barely, as her touch tremored his voice.

Hoshi chuckled and teased. "If they're as wily as they pretend to be, they will. There will be all sorts of very actionable intelligence to gather before I'm finally through with you."

"Something got you wound up, Starbird?" Travis teased back, drawing chevrons on the silky skin of her cold, bare back.

"Playing ambulance to Denobula, for one thing..."

Travis felt a smile pull at his mouth. "Nothing for you to translate, huh?"

"Nothing for any of us to do," Hoshi answered, her tone grating slightly against their mood. "What's the point? They've a whole planet full of doctors, scientists, social workers. What are we going to do?"

Travis sighed as he felt her muscles knot beneath his fingers, and tried to rub the gathering tension away. "This stuff is important, I guess. Lending an ally our full throated support in a time of crisis..."

Blessedly, after a moment, Hoshi did relax into his ministrations. "Full throated support, huh? I hope my throat is supportive? I don't suppose you'd care to tender an opinion?"

Bracing himself for an argument, Trip made sure not to slow his pace as he strode into the armoury. It had been a long day and if he did not have the embrace of T'Pol to look forward to, he might have blown it off.

Malcolm... didn't look good. Hadn't for a while actually, although the frenetic energy the man gave off had camouflaged it for a while. It was hard for Trip to put his finger on exactly what it was; pallor and thinness, certainly, but not just those things. And it had started when they heard from Shran that the Aenar clones had died.

Despite Trip's best intentions, he had pulled up short, after all. He WAS staring. And it was only a few more seconds before Malcolm lost patience with pretending not to know he was there,

"Commander Tucker, no less," he said, sucking air through his teeth. "You drew the short straw this evening?"

"Malcolm, Alice may be willing to coddle you by playing dinner-lady, but I'm not. If you are hungry, pull your head out of your ass and go to the mess-hall."

Malcolm shrugged. "Why are you here then?"

"Mostly to tell you to pull your head out of your ass. DX317 couplers, Malcolm, really? I thought we'd discussed this?"

"We did," Malcolm replied, finally looking at him, but smiling a little nastily. "You said if I wanted to waste my own damn time on it, I should go ahead."

"Well, I didn't mean it," Trip huffed. "Obviously. It was a figure of speech. And you knew that..."

"So do you want me to take them out or what?"

"...no, but..."

"Then what are we talking about exactly?"

Malcolm's voice had taken on an unpleasant edge and Trip's temper was fraying. Furthermore, he was perfectly aware that all he had to do was lose his temper and he would be free to storm off to the serenity of T'Pol's quarters, to her waiting arms. He took a deep breath, and pondered the debt of friendship, before replying.

"Beats the hell out of me", he said in the most affable tone he could summon. "I could be having a much more pleasant evening with T'Pol."

This did the trick somehow, and the mood shifted ever so slightly. Then a little more.

"Oh?" Malcolm replied at last. "I'd have thought she'd be a little busy preparing. Didn't the captain appoint her Tsar of our response on Denobula?"

"No," Trip replied carefully. From nowhere he remembered a summer camping trip from long ago. A faun and its mother in a clearing. His cautious approach before the inevitable startle and flight. "No, didn't you hear? Her away-mission clearance got pulled, so she had to farm it out to one of her ensigns. Jon's fit to be tied, by the way. I would not want to be Alice right now."

Astonishingly Malcolm chuckled at this. "Now there is a cage match I'd pay to see. T'Pol must be frustrated though, after coming so far, only to have it snatched away again?"

Trip blinked. "Actually, she seemed...aw, I don't know Malcolm. The day I actually understand what's going on in that woman's head..."

"Not knowing is half the fun, isn't it?"

Trip laughed, and it almost hurt. "You have a strange idea of fun, my friend."

And then Malcolm smiled, and that hurt as well. "I suppose I do."

"So you get it?"

With all honesty, Fabrecia's excited squeak thrilled H.B. Morello's heart more than the actual news had. He wasn't used to having a girlfriend. Especially not one so...Fabrecia.

"Well...we'll see," he replied a little sheepishly. "Presumably both Archer and T'Pol are going to be lobbying pretty hard to get that away-mission status reinstated..."

Fabrecia was pouring pear cider into champagne flutes. The shoulders of her loosely tied robe slid down her arms.

"Wouldn't worry about that. Alice can be pretty stubborn when she thinks she's right..."

"Or Phlox could override her..."

"He can't, actually!" Fabrecia said happily handing him one of the flutes.

H.B. blinked in dismay. "You talked to Alice about this already?"

"No. But the sound-proofing between the ready room and the bridge is not that great, and the captain has a loud voice. So you're fine! Congratulations!"

"Well, I don't know about 'congratulations'," H.B. murmured, his mind half on the weight of his responsibility and half on the way that Fabrecia's lips glistened with cider. "It is a disaster zone, after all."

"Well, you're an epidemiologist," she argued back gently, refilling his glass. "If you're put in charge of a situation it's never going to be kittens and rainbows. That doesn't mean you shouldn't be congratulated when congratulations are due."

"Well, I'm not really in charge, per se. Commander T'Pol is. I'm just..."

"The man on the ground?" Fabrecia purred. Irresistibly.

H.B. sighed. "Things always sound so much better when you say them."

Tending and maintaining their complex social relationships was the primary leisure time activity on Denobula, so communications systems often ran near capacity, even in better times than these. So it was little surprise that, even with the skill and charm of Hoshi Sato on his side, it took Phlox a long time to establish contact with his daughter.

When he at last did, he'd been so delighted that he'd run speedily through all of the details. It took him quite a long time to notice that Palayjah did not seem as pleased as expected by his imminent arrival.

"Mettus is here," she explained at last, worry drawing all the colour from her face that pregnancy might have been expected to add.

"Oh. I see."

"He's my brother," she continued defensively. "There are travel bans. But he could make it."

Phlox carefully smoothed his expression. "You have no need to explain yourself to me, Palayjah. I have not the slightest intention of making trouble in your home. Mettus shall not hear a harsh word from either of us."

"You, or... Elizabeth Cutler, is it?" Palayjah clarified, pronouncing the unfamiliar syllables carefully. "You know how Mettus feels about aliens..."

"He need only be civil," Phlox replied firmly. "He has the capacity for that, although I suppose you'd have to ask Mettus himself if he also has the inclination..."

"All...all right," Palayjah sighed. "We will expect you both in a few days."

"Marvellous!"

The park in which Sayden sat would normally have been teeming with children, chattering and negotiating endlessly about who was to slide next, who would push who on the swings. But today, like the streets, it was relatively deserted.

He'd picked a bench well back from the water. Whenever he caught sight of his face, multilated to pass for that of a Denobulan, he found himself overcome with an urge to howl.

He wondered whether his contact felt similarly. He was right on time.

"He's coming," Sayden informed the man, without passing pleasantries. "Phlox. My contact has just informed me he will be at his daughter's house in three days. He's coming on Enterprise." Sayden's jaw set at the name.

"Good," Sayden's contact smiled.

"I should tell you that we've paid our source with a vaccine. For his sister."

"What does one woman matter to me?" his source replied, smiling pleasantly. "So, I suppose you would like Destera Quarter, where this daughter lives, open until Phlox's arrival? And you will suspend dispersal in that area until after Enterprise's arrival?"

Sayden nodded. "But I'll pour it into the water supply after that, if you want."

His contact lifted an eyebrow arch in amusement. "The usual dispersal method will be adequate. But Destera will be infected before the end of the week?"

"It will."

"And you will take your life after your business with Phlox is concluded?"

Sayden stared into the small inky eyes. "As we've agreed."

"Excellent!" his contact replied, pleased. "Then I will not see you again. I want you to know though, Sayden, that your service to the Empire is appreciated, and the Empire thanks you."

Sayden nodded curtly, certain the man would forget him the moment he turned around. Empire, he snarled to himself. The 'Thanks of the Empire'! The Empire could die in flames for all he cared. It was always the lesser of two evils.

And now the greater evil was coming.