Captain's log, stardate 85197.2.

Today ends my very first mission as captain of the ShiNarva.

First, a bit of background. The Khitomer Accords are dead. Following the end of the Dominion War, a hardliner faction began to take over the Klingon High Council. Chancellor Martok was slain, and Worf, who fought at Martok's side, was slain as well. Martok's body was disposed of, while Worf's was returned to Earth for a hero's burial. Following this, the new Chancellor has pursued an anti-Federation platform. War has not broken out… yet. But Earth–Qo'noS relations are on a hair trigger.

We were sent to Vulcan, to pick up Ambassador Sokketh, one of the Federation's most senior diplomats to the Klingon Empire. He desired passage to P'Jem, and requested they be escorted there by a starship lest a Klingon raiding party attempt to assassinate him. So we set course for 40 Eridani, took orbit over the town of ShiCa'at, and waited for the ambassador to arrive. During that time I had to spend quite a bit of time arguing with the abbot at P'Jem over subspace. Since Ambassador Sokketh would not disclose a reason for his trip, she was not inclined to give him landing privileges on the planet. Eventually, she backed down, but only on the condition that I escort the ambassador to ensure that nothing improper happens while inside the sacred monastery.

Sokketh arrived, but was ten minutes behind schedule. That perplexed me. Vulcans are never late. Wasting time would be illogical, punctuality is an important character trait, for a diplomat especially. I thought it improper to as what had held him, so I showed him to his quarters and then brought the ship to warp. P'Jem was the closest star to Vulcan, and it was a mere eight hours away. I was going to spend the time the holodeck, practicing my diplomatic skills.

Eventually I retired to my ready room. The trip was completely uneventful, and I wanted to look at something other than the viewscreen. But T'Vrell quickly called me out to the bridge. Upon dropping out of warp, we found a Klingon raiding party in low orbit, blockading the monastery. When they detected us they opened hailing frequencies.

The Klingon Captain, K'Tak, did not spend any time on pleasantries. He said that an Undine infiltrator has inserted itself into my crew. They demanded that I stand down so they could search the ship for the shape-shifter. Needless to say, I did not agree. Their accusations did not sound plausible. I am good friends with all of my bridge staff; if something was wrong about them, I would notice. And I explained to the Klingon captain that the below-decks crew would travel in small groups when off ship, making infiltration by shape-shifters even more implausible. But K'Tak would not back down.

This was my first time confronting a hostile starship. I did not know what to say. I eventually ordered the forward phasers powered up. I was very much bluffing; fighting a Borg ship is one thing, but fighting a ship full of angry and very competent Klingon soldiers was quite another. But fortunately for me, K'Tak's orders did not include firing on Starfleet vessels. He relented and allowed the ShiNarva to taxi into transporter position.

While I was in the turbolift, I received a ping from the bridge. K'Tak was requesting to speak to me in private. I told the ambassador I would be a moment, then diverted the turbolift to my quarters. K'Tak was much more amiable this time. Klingon ship discipline requires the captain to always be courageous. Cowardice was one of the few reasons a Klingon could refuse orders. The Klingon Empire was on the verge of war. K'Tak would never attack a Federation vessel, but negotiating on his bridge would put him in a bad light with his crew. I asked K'Tak if they knew who the infiltrator was. He did: Ambassador Sokkath himself. I refused to believe this. Sokkath had been a wiry thorn in the Klingon High Council's side for many years now, ever since he was appointed chargé-de-affairs to Qo'noS. Knowing Klingons, this was probably a pretext and they were probably seeking revenge for some trivial slight. I refused to order the landing party to return. At this point K'Tak seemed to give up. I have to respect a Klingon who knows what the effects of a diplomatic row such as this would have been. I thanked him cordially, cut off transmission, and beamed down to the monastery with Sokkath.

I got an earful from the abbot when I arrived about the Klingons in orbit. I was able to explain to her how I was able to convince them to stay in their starships. Nothing seemed to happen until dinner. I was able to contact Starfleet Command using the communications equipment at P'Jem by using my ship as a relay; they instructed me to keep an eye on Sokkath. The Klingons may be right. But the Vulcans were waiting for me to sit down so we could begin dinner, and I did not want to keep them waiting any longer than I had to. We all sat down and I looked at my meal. Cooked leafy green vegetables and a side of potato. Vulcans did not eat meat; that's fine. While at the Academy I ate at as many different species' restaurants as I was able to stomach, so I was not squeamish about the taste or the texture. Annoyingly, a fork and knife were provided and I was expected to use them, even though this kind of plant is considered finger food on Earth. Vulcans do not touch food with their hands, and I did not want to cause another issue with the abbott by doing so.

However, dinner did not begin as the abbott still wasn't here yet. A request was put out on the PA system for her to please report to the dining room. However, the monks decided that while they will wait for her to eat, conversation would begin. I am good at small talk, mind you, but chatting was against the creed of these monks; they wanted to talk about a subject. I asked what that subject was, expecting it to be some incredibly boring point of theoretical logic, and I was told they would be analyzing the history of P'Jem circa Captain Archer's time. Well, I find that fascinating. I started to chat, but then I was interrupted by my combadge. I tapped it and said this was not a good time. Elise was on the line, and she was very, very agitated. Excusing myself from the table as quickly as I could, I walked away so I could have some privacy. Elise told me that Vulcan investigators have identified a John Doe body on their homeworld as Ambassador Sokkath. I looked around furtively. Sokkath was not here. Uh-oh.

I tapped off my badge and returned to the table, now extremely agitated. I shouted "Does anyone know where Sokkath is?" I received a few stares from the Vulcans; strong condemnation, but I didn't care right now. "He's probably with the abbott right now. Great."

P'Jem was a big place, and the ersatz ambassador could be hiding the abbott anywhere. I have never ran into an Undine infiltrator before; they are very rare. As far as I can tell, until they revert to their true forms, Undine have the exact same bioreadings as the species they are impersonating. One of the Vulcans stood and asked me why I have interrupted their dinner like this. When I told them that Sokkath is dead, the one we have here is a shape-shifter, and that he's probably holding the abbott hostage somewhere, the Vulcans decided quite quickly to aid me in my search.

Sounding an alert on the PA would tell the Undine that we've found him. I want to try to put that off as long as possible. There are roughy three to four hundred Vulcans here at any one time, but the monastery is built to accommodate up to a thousand. I hit my badge and told Elise to get a security team to the transporter room pronto. They arrived very quickly; unfortunately, none of them could give me any better information on the Undine than I could.

Now, it was time to try something else. I hit my badge again, and ordered me patched through to K'Tak. After a moment, he answered. I told him that he was right, that the shape-shifter could be anywhere, and that our scanners do not know how to tell an Undine from a real person. He replied that he had a team of Klingons equipped with more potent scanners standing by. Putting him on hold for a moment, I told the lead monk how there was a specialty team available who could help us, but that they were Klingons. There was some disagreement here, as no Klingon would be able to show the proper respect and deference expected inside the monastery. Besides, they might smash something. However, the prevailing opinion was that I would be permitted to do this. I told K'Tak to send his men down, but to have them be on their best behavior. He agreed.

The Klingons arrived a moment later. I noted that none of them carried a bat'leth, although they did have disruptor pistols. The Klingon team leader sent his men to put up equipment at specific locations within the monastery. This would create a scanning field that would unmask our intruder. However, as the field was extended, eventually covering the entire inhabited area of the monastery, we found nothing. Our enemy was therefore somewhere in the vacant wings. There were hundreds and hundreds of empty accommodations, with grooming and dining areas repeating every so often. The place was massive. The Klingon leader announced how it would take a lot of valuable time to put the scanners up throughout the area. I, however, knew better.

I reconfigured my tricorder to scan for Vulcan life signs, and pointed it down the entrances to the vacant areas. I quickly found some, behind room #163 on the lower level of the first wing, about as far from the inhabited areas as you could get. Again, to chase the infiltrator down on foot would take far too long. I called my security team over, snapped out coordinates to the transporter officer on the ShiNarva, and we beamed ourselves right into his room.

The fake Sokkath snarled as security officers beamed in surrounding him. The abbott was tied up in the back of a walk-in closet, and we rescued her quickly. I tried to arrest the infiltrator, but he beamed himself out of the room, saying "You'll never find me" as he dematerialized.

My badge pinged. An Undine bioship has appeared, seeming out of nowhere, and it is attacking the ShiNarva. I shout "Transport now!" to anyone in earshot, then called for beamout.

I rematerialized, with all four of the other away team members on secondary pads. Whew, I thought. If I ever send down a landing party and need to pull them immediately back, then I can use a party of no more than five people. If I had sent down more, the rest would be stranded on the planet. While that wouldn't be a problem now (the crewman could just wait), it might be a problem later when we don't have the choice of someone staying behind. I rushed to the bridge.

Elise was at tactical, and the bioship was on the viewscreen. It was dodging and weaving as it fired at us, since our ship is much larger. Elise was trying to follow the ship as it moved, but it was more maneuverable than our phaser gunners could handle. As such, she had not scored a hit yet, despite firing many times. Our shields were holding, for now.

I thought quickly. I learned several plans to get a starship out of the situation. I chose one in the heat of the moment. I ordered the ship moved so it would show its ventral profile to the bioship. It started strafing runs agains the bottom; our shields were impacted again. Elise yelled that we can't take too much more of this. I snapped out for shield emitter number twenty-three be set to half its current power. Elise picked up on my move immediately, and focused all the weapons on that location. The bioship came in for another strafing run, saw the phony damage it dealt, and flied straight into the trap I set. I don't think they ever saw it.

With the danger gone, I hailed Starfleet Command, told them of the infiltrator and the battle with the Undine ship. The admiral told me well done; given the Undine ship's maneuverability, I was right to blast them to pieces immediately. When I was told this, I gasped and fell down into the chair in my ready room. With the danger over (and the danger of getting in trouble with Starfleet too), my body revolted. It needed rest. Badly. But the Admiral just laughed. He said all captains do that after their first great test. No matter how good a student one is, a cadet's body is not built to just go back to normal after something like this. The Admiral laughed, and ordered me to my bed. According to the computer I had slept for nine and a half hours. I was awake, ready for another test (of the negotiate-with-aliens one or the destroy-aliens one), and was begging for another assignment. I should get up to my ready room now; I do not know how long it would take for Starfleet to give us further orders.

Computer, end recording.