Disclaimer: Paramount owns everything.
Rating: R - bordering on NC-17
Author's Note: I had thought "Family Secrets" would be a stand alone, but I now have an idea for more chapters. So, this is the first of a few more to come. Note the rating. This is more explicit than Chapter 1, for plot reasons, naturally.
Vulcan legends and myths had told stories of a breakaway sect made up of those who rejected Surak's teaching. During the Time of the Awakening, this lost tribe had left Vulcan and disappeared into the cosmos. Some historians believed that, like all mythology, there was a historical basis for the tales of the lost tribe. Several had even posited the idea of Romulans being members of this group, given the rumors of their resemblance to Vulcans. But all of this had been conjecture based on second and third hand accounts. There were no documented, proven encounters with Romulans in the Vulcan database.
Until now.
T'Pol examined the genome taken from her father's hair. There were a few tiny mutations, such as would be expected from a population isolated for 5,000 years, but otherwise the genome was identical. For all practical purposes, Romulans were Vulcans and Vulcans were Romulans.
"It's astounding," said Phlox, "How science can solve civilization's greatest mysteries."
T'Pol sighed.
"But the good news is," continued the doctor, "You're as Vulcan as you ever were. There's nothing in this genome that anyone could say isn't Vulcan. There's no reason this should affect you in any way or any reason to believe it would have ever affected you."
T'Pol examined the scans. Vulcans earn their emotional control. It doesn't come from their DNA. If anything, Vulcans gets their passionate and violent nature from their genes and their disciplined minds from their culture. Perhaps that means, she thought, that she could still regain some of the emotional control she had lost in the Expanse. Things had improved over the last year and a half, but there was more ground to be gained.
"The man this came from," said T'Pol, "Seemed to think otherwise."
"Well," said Phlox, "It doesn't sound like Romulans are ones to embrace logic."
T'Pol nodded.
"By the way," said Phlox, "I received a joint order from Starfleet Command and Section 31. This conversation, these scans and everything to do with you and Commander Tucker's adventure in Romulan space has been deemed classified."
T'Pol nodded again. She and Trip had already been debriefed. As far as everyone except the captain and Phlox knew, she and Trip had been kidnapped by Klingons in an attempt to get ransom from Starfleet. Romulan and Klingon ships were of similar design, enough to convince most people on that Vulcan transport of the cover story.
"Thank you, doctor," said T'Pol as she exited.
"By the way," said Phlox, "Congratulations on your wedding."
T'pol nodded and took her leave.
*****
T'Pol returned to what was now her and Trip's quarters, a space created by cutting a door into the quarters next to hers. It was still relatively cramped, but it would be home. Not a temporary home, but the real thing. T'Pol had no one on Vulcan left, and Trip had told her after Elizabeth died that he no longer felt at home on Earth.
T'Pol looked up at the picture of baby Elizabeth sitting on Trip's desk. Because she had lived and died, Trip had told her, he had lost his connection to his homeworld.
He had told her so after they had buried the child on Vulcan. In his head he knew that Terra Prime was not representative of the majority, but in his heart, he felt betrayed by his own people. He couldn't walk down the street without wondering if the strangers who stared at him and T'Pol did so in pity or disgust.
Ironic, that a child created to foster hate had been so loved by its accidental parents. Perhaps it was the ultimate repudiation of Terra Prime that Elizabeth's death had evoked an outpouring of sympathy from most humans. Most, but not all. Either way, Trip didn't want to be an object of pity or revulsion.
Since Elizabeth's death, Trip told her that he only felt at home on Enterprise. T'Pol felt the same. It seemed only natural, then, that they would continue to serve on the ship that brought them together and try to rebuild their lives together.
She hadn't thought it was possible. After they buried Elizabeth, she assumed it would be the end of her and Trip's love affair, despite their bond. Humans didn't deal well with grief, and the death of a child often tore human couples apart. Trip had said as much. But Vulcans reacted differently to grief. If anything, losing a child made the mating bond stronger, all the better to share feelings that were so deep and taboo they could never be outwardly expressed. The fact that Trip knew, actually felt, how ripped to shreds she was inside, drew him to her. Never again would they feel the pure joy that had shared before Elizabeth's death, but that innocence had been replaced by something deeper - something that no on else could understand. For both of them, it meant they could not be apart.
However, no announcement had been made about the wedding. Trip and T'Pol had married privately on Vulcan and only told select friends and family, cautioning them to keep the news quiet. Word had spread on Vulcan quickly, and the couple had moved to clamp down any rumors on Earth. If asked, people were to say that they didn't know what the status of the relationship was. After Elizabeth, Trip and T'Pol had no intention of allowing their marriage to become a lightening rod for hate groups or allow themselves to live in a fishbowl. The crew of Enterprise would know, of course, and there would be rumors. But they would be nothing but rumors.
Trip entered their quarters. He was still in uniform, clearly tired from a long day. He sat down on the couch next to T'Pol and was quiet for a long while.
"Phlox says that the Romulan and Vulcan genome are identical," said T'Pol finally.
Trip inhaled sharply. While a relief to T'Pol, the fact that Romulans and Vulcans were essentially the same race was a bombshell that could threaten the fledgling Earth/Vulcan/Andorian/Tellarite alliance. It was going to have to remain classified information - as was his wife's newly discovered parentage.
"Do you think there will be a war?" asked T'Pol. She spoke the question with the same intonation she would have if she had asked about the weather.
"I don't know," said Trip, "But given the nature of things . . .the way humanoids always tend to . . .well, I would not bet against it."
T'Pol slipped her hand into Trip's. She knew he was thinking of Malcolm and his's mission on the drone ship. And their encounter with her father. Even back to the Expanse, where a good man like Degra could be so easily manipulated into mass murder. The very nature of people pointed to a long, frightening conflict in which there would likely be no winners.
Where did you hide the ring?
It's in the lower cabinet, inside an antique human purse that belonged to my second foremother.
T'Pol had told Starfleet command everything about her trip to Romulan space except the gift of the ring. Before their debriefing, she and Trip had shown the captain and he had requested they hold back that piece of information.
"They'll try and deconstruct it - or worse," Jon had said, "And I don't think they'll be able to. All those bureaucrats will do is ruin the one chance you might have of contacting a powerful Romulan. We can't take the chance. We might need to use this one day," he had said and ordered her and Trip to keep silent about the ring.
After all his experiences in The Expanse and on Vulcan and Andoria, the Captain knew that it wasn't worth destroying that ring. It might come in handy.
Nice of the captain to order us. That way its on him, not us.
Yes. Though I plan to never use it.
T'Pol pulled the box out from lower cabinet and carefully removed the handbag that had belonged to T'Mir. It was here that she had hidden the ring.
"That looks very Earth-like," remarked Trip. "Not Vulcan at all."
"It isn't Vulcan. My second foremother obtained it on Earth. I told you and the captain about her visit."
You said that was just a story.
I never said that was just a story. You just assumed it was just a story. I merely chose not to correct you.
Trip noticed mischief in her eyes. Yeah, Vulcans had a subtle sense of humor, but they definitely had one. And pulling one over on humans was hilarious to a Vulcan.
"Well, I'm glad she didn't land in Florida. If she had, no doubt one of my Tucker ancestors would have had to sweep her off her feet - and you might never have been born."
T'Pol would have responded, but she was too busy pondering the strange expression - "swept her off her feet" - it seemed like an unusual way to court a woman - removing her from the ground. Humans did such strange things with metaphor.
She removed the ring from the bag and held it up to the light.
"It's an unusual device," she said, "and it has a very strange energy signature even when it is off."
Trip shook his head.
"The Romulans have been isolated in their own quadrant for five thousand years. They have technology that we can barely understand. I'm sure they developed some of it and stole some of it, too."
Trip felt anger stir inside her, and he knew she was imaging what would happen if she tossed the ring into the warp core. He reached up and gently put his hand atop hers and guided her hand down. He took the ring from her.
"Promise me that you won't destroy this," he said.
She looked at him, and it was clear she didn't want to make that promise.
"If not for yourself, promise for the Captain," said Trip in a low voice, "You know there's been more drone attacks in the last six months. Things are starting to get ugly. . .and this may come in handy. I don't know when or how, but we shouldn't destroy the potential to contact . . .him."
Trip placed the ring back in T'Mir's bag. T'Pol took the bag and returned it to its hiding place. Only three people knew of the ring's existence - besides her father, of course.
"I don't even know his real name," said T'Pol blankly.
Trip reached up and brushed her cheek with with his hand, and he knew there was nothing he could say to console her. She was going to have to come to terms with the identity of her father on her own. All he could do was be there for her, if she needed comfort. He couldn't pretend to understand. That was what was hard about the bond. He knew what she felt, and yet he couldn't really comprehend her feelings. He had always known exactly who he was, even if it was plain, old Charles Tucker III.
"You're the same person you've always been," said Trip, "You've just gotten a piece of new information."
He reached out took her into his arms. She placed her head on his shoulder and sighed. This form of affection was foreign to her, but she had come to enjoy it. She felt Trip's heartbeat, and it comforted her.
"I wonder if my mother knew," she said, "They were married. I thought they were bonded - the way we are."
Trip stroked her hair and kissed her on the top of her head.
"There's no point in dwelling on things you'll never know. . .your mother did love him. She told me so."
T'Pol raised an eyebrow.
"Not in so many words...but in her Vulcan way."
T'Pol sighed. She missed her mother every day, almost as much as she missed Elizabeth. Trip stayed silent for a long while, sharing her grief through the bond.
After he felt her sorrow subside, Trip moved to get up.
"I think I need to get in the shower. . .if I don't, I'll just fall asleep. ."
T'Pol pulled him back down next to her and crawled into his lap. She placed one hand on the back of his neck and reached up to kiss him on the lips. She slipped her tongue in his mouth and placed her other hand on his chest - as if daring him to get up.
"Honey. . .I told you. . . haven't showered. . "
"I like the way you smell," she whispered as her hands found the zipper of his uniform.
He didn't need to be told twice. His hands slipped underneath her shirt and caressed her breasts for a moment before he removed the garment.
Still seated in his lap, she could feel how turned on he was. She kept kissing him on the mouth as she rubbed against him. He moaned in response.
Suddenly, he rose up, taking her with him. He carried into their room and put her down on the bed and quickly removed the rest of her clothes. She reclined against the pillow and watched him. He sat on the edge of the bed and removed his boots and the rest of his uniform.
For a moment, he didn't move. He just stared her, lying there in the shadows and starlight. Beneath the desire he felt emanating from her, he could feel the pain she was suppressing.
Perhaps this will work better than meditation, he thought, as his hand gently moved up her thigh. Over the last few months, he had introduced her to the human practice of using sex as salve for grief. She had helped him so much in those months after Elizabeth died. Sometimes, it had been gentle and soft with her. Often, it had been primal, bordering on the rough. Tonight, he sensed it was to be somewhere in between.
His hands slipped between her legs, where she was wet and quivering. She whispered forbidden words in Vulcan as he stroked her. She had taught him those forbidden words; words that had been long ago banished from polite Vulcan society. Words only spoken between mates.
He stopped caressing her and crawled up next to her. She pulled him down into a searing kiss, and he slipped his tongue inside her mouth. She reached down between his legs and returned his earlier caresses, only harder and faster. But he didn't want this to end too soon, so he grabbed both her hands and pinned them on either side of her head.
"Say it," he whispered in her ear, making her shiver.
He looked into her eyes. After all this time, she still hated saying it aloud. And he loved making her say it. He shifted her hands higher above her head, so he could keep them pinned with one hand. He reached down with the other and started to make small circles on her belly.
"You're not going to get what you want, until you say it," he said.
She drew in a breath. She knew she could break free if she really wanted, but she didn't want to.
"I love you," she whispered.
He looked down at her and smiled. He waited.
"I love you, Trip."
"That's my girl," he whispered, letting her hands go and covering her mouth with his.
She reached down and helped him slip inside her, crying out softly as he did so. He waited just a moment before starting to move inside her - first slowly, then faster and harder. She clutched at him tightly, scratching at his back. He whispered English words into her ear, ones that he had had to teach her.
She began trembling, and he moved faster.
"That's it, baby," he whispered, "I know you're close."
She nodded, eyes closed.
"C'mon, that's it," he continued, pushing harder.
Suddenly, her whole body spasmed. She cried out, muffling the sound against his shoulder. She clutched at him, her mind dizzy and euphoric.
Through the bond, he felt what she did. It triggered his own release, and he fainted in her arms.
Minutes later, his eyes fluttered open. She was staring at him, her face again like glass.
"I'm glad I was able to help you relax," he said.
"So am I," she said.
