Star Trek: Enterprise: The Romulan War

by Michael A. Martin

  Valdore did not enjoy hearing such things. During his entire tenure in the military, and even during his Senate career before that, he’d had little patience for the vicissitudes of high technology—to say nothing of those who seemed to be apologists for its frequent shortcomings. Fair or not, his suspicions were roused.

  “How much of a delay?” he asked, his eyes narrowed.

  “It is extremely small,” Threl said. “A couple of heartbeats. No more than a small fraction of an ewa.”

  “And the hevam somehow managed to time their departure to the precise moment of our sensor transition?” Valdore said.

  “Apparently,” said Threl. “As you have said yourself many times, Admiral, it does not pay to underestimate the hevam.”

  “Other than, perhaps, their courage,” Valdore said.

  Threl favored his commander with a martial, predatory smile. “Do not be concerned, Admiral. They won’t get far.”

  As if on cue, T’Velekh spoke up. “Sensors reveal multiple warp trails.”

  “Follow those trails,” Valdore said. “Did the hevam flee the system?”

  “No, Admiral. They’ve gone to Cheron.”

  The outpost, thought the admiral, his heart and spine suddenly as cold as space. He imagined the hevam savages picking the flesh from the charred bones of loyal soldiers of the Empire.

  “Redirect the fleet accordingly,” he said.

  Enterprise NX-01

  Robust though the planet’s ionosphere was, Archer knew that it wouldn’t conceal the fleet for very long. Malcolm’s shouted report, therefore, came as no surprise.

  “The Romulan vessels are entering the atmosphere, Commodore.”

  “Don’t keep ’em waiting, Malcolm. Give us some altitude and fire at will. Hoshi, advise the rest of the fleet to do likewise.”

  The next several minutes both crawled and sprinted, forming a blur composed entirely of shouted orders, the rumbling and moans of strained hull plating, and the smell of fear, blood, fire, and ozone.

  Enterprise took a terrific pounding but somehow remained both operational and spaceworthy as the scrum of battle spread through all three dimensions, encompassing both the blue of Cheron’s sky and the blackness of the space that lay beyond its slender layers of atmosphere. One particularly vicious disruptor strike caused T’Pol’s station to erupt into a shower of sparks and smoke, knocking her to the deck. Private Davis, a MACO corpsman, offered his arm to steady her. T’Pol shook it off and moved back to her charred and darkened console and began trying to reactivate it.

  Archer saw that her right temple had received a nasty-looking burn. Green blood was dripping down the side of her soot-smeared face, tracing the outline of a cut she had received from the explosion, presumably from a piece of flying shrapnel from her station.

  “Get down to sickbay, Commander,” Archer said.

  “We’re in combat,” she said. “I don’t have time for medical attention at the moment. And my injuries aren’t that extensive.”

  Under the present circumstances, he found he couldn’t argue with her.

  Instead, Archer immersed himself in the all-consuming task of directing the fight, which spiraled upward into ever-higher orbits above the Romulan outpost world. As the battle spread out and unfolded, he pushed aside his emotional reaction to the wanton destruction. Large, charred hull fragments from Starfleet vessels burned as they tumbled in low, decaying orbits, cracked open like so many eggshells. Vacuum-asphyxiated bodies tumbled along with them. The Starships San Antonio, Iroquois, Argus, and Hermes had been reduced to scrap during the initial exchanges of fire. Perhaps half of the Starfleet force remained functional. Seeing the occasional explosion among the Romulan lines, Archer could only hope that his task force had given as good as it had gotten.

  But at the rate things were going, there could be only one outcome. Though the battle had reduced it considerably, the Romulan force was still too large to overcome. Archer was gradually coming to fatalistic terms with a harsh but increasingly unavoidable reality.

  Humanity had lost the Battle of Cheron.

  “I’m picking up new warp signatures,” Malcolm said.

  “Incoming ships confirmed,” T’Pol said. “At least twenty warp signatures.”

  Archer decided there was no harm in allowing himself a kernel of hope. “Ours?” he asked.

  Malcolm’s tone and expression were as somber as a cenotaph. “I don’t think so, sir.”

  Warbird Dabhae

  “The enemy is at our mercy, Admiral,” Threl reported. “Their fleet is reduced by more than half, and the remainder are so badly damaged as to be effectively neutralized.”

  “And yet they fight on,” Valdore said, astonished as he watched the relentless exchanges of fire on the central tactical viewer. Cheron, now relatively safe from hevam incursion, fell away into the distance. “Though they are beaten, they continue to fight.”

  Through the hevam were nowhere near as physically repulsive as the warrior race known in the decadent circles of “polite” Romulan society as the kll’inghann—Valdore preferred to use the pejorative designation klivam—the two species had to be closely related. Both races lacked the capacity to recognize an existential superior and could not admit to having been defeated by same.

  “A number of ships are dropping out of superluminal mode,” said T’Velekh.

  Valdore’s brow contorted in puzzlement. “If they’re reinforcements, they have arrived well ahead of schedule.”

  T’Velekh blanched, his olive complexion transforming to a fish-belly white before Valdore’s eyes. “Admiral! The incoming vessels aren’t Romulan!”

  Yikh ships, Valdore noted with no small amount of surprise. Alien vessels of unknown origin—at least so far. “Identify them.”

  “They’re opening fire, Admiral,” Threl said.

  “On whom?” Valdore asked.

  “On us!”

  Valdore performed a quick count and realized to his horror that the combined opposition now narrowly outnumbered his own forces. The Dabhae’s hull groaned and shuddered as one of the newcomers’ weapons found its target, and he muttered a heady curse. He needed time to regroup, to reassess the suddenly altered situation.

  “Bring the fleet about,” he barked to Subcommander Threl. “Fire all aft tubes as we turn. I want to put some distance between us, the hevam, and their allies—at least for the moment.”

  Enterprise NX-01

  Archer was delighted at the prospect of the cavalry coming over the hill in the proverbial nick of time. As the battle continued to rage all about Enterprise, the viewer caught it only in slices, and the constant tumbling motion of the new combatants as they evaded and returned salvo after salvo of Romulan disruptor fire made it difficult to examine the particulars of each ship’s configuration.

  Then, astonishingly, the Romulan line began falling back in response to the surprise entrance of so many armed defenders; nearly every remaining warbird opened fire from aft in an obvious bid to discourage pursuit.

  Loath to tempt fate any more than necessary, Archer ordered the fleet to cease firing and hold its present position as the Romulan remnants withdrew. The main viewer showed the newcomers as they ceased firing and took up what Archer hoped were protective positions around the eleven surviving Starfleet ships.

  “The Romulans have come to a relative stop,” Malcolm said, keeping a weather eye on his tactical displays. “Thirty-eight vessels, keeping station at about one point five AU.”

  “Sensors confirm a distance of approximately 225 million kilometers,” T’Pol added.

  “They could come back within weapons range in a matter of seconds,” Malcolm said.

  “I doubt they’ll do that before they’ve taken a good, long look at the new arrivals,” Archer said. “But keep a close eye on them just the same, Malcolm.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  “T’Pol, how many ships have just dropped in on us?” Archer asked.

  “A total of thirty-one,” she said. �
�Their weapons remain active, but none of them is directing any sign of aggression toward us.”

  “Allies,” Malcolm said. “Well, better late than never.”

  “The more the merrier,” Archer said with a nod, wondering if he might summon another appropriate cliché or two. The image of an unfamiliar ship, apparently a beat-up freighter of some kind, was moving slowly across the main viewer.

  Archer frowned as he studied it. “Do we have any idea where these ships came from?”

  “It is an extremely heterogeneous group of vessels,” said T’Pol, staring into her scanner. “All, apparently, have recently received significant weapons upgrades. In addition to a number of configurations that do not appear in the Vulcan ship database, I’m reading several obsolete military vessels of Klingon and Andorian manufacture, both large and small. As well as a number of Klingon and Andorian cargo ships.”

  Klingon, Archer thought as a grin spread slowly across his face. Andorian.

  “Commodore, I’m receiving two simultaneous hails,” Hoshi said.

  “Put them both on the screen, Hoshi,” Archer said. “Conference mode.”

  A moment later, the image of black space dappled by spacecraft and stars vanished, replaced by a pair of humanoids who were separated from one another by a vertical graphical border. A gaunt, gray-haired Klingon male in civilian clothes scowled from the screen’s left side. A hard-eyed, blue-skinned Andorian male in formfitting paramilitary garb—sans any Imperial Guard insignia, Archer noticed—glowered from the right.

  “Advocate Kolos,” Archer said. “And General Shran. This is quite a surprise.”

  Kolos, the Klingon defense attorney to whom Archer owed his life, spoke in a tone deeper and richer than his aged body appeared capable of generating. “Captain Archer,” he said with a snaggletoothed grin. “I did caution you not to expect any official Klingon help. The assemblage of Klingon freebooters, military outcasts, and escaped but penitent criminals that I have gathered may be as far from official as one can possibly get. Regardless, we Klingons are creatures of duty, any lack of imprimatur from the chancellor or the High Council notwithstanding.”

  “Thank you,” Archer said, his voice catching slightly in his throat. “You and your people have taken a hell of a risk on our behalf.”

  The convolutions of Kolos’s brow deepened noticeably. “By venturing out to your Romulan front? Or by defying the High Council’s decision to leave Starfleet to fend for itself?”

  “Both,” Archer said.

  Kolos chuckled as he raised and lowered his broad but bony shoulders in an apparent shrug. “Both risks are preferable to the alternative of embracing the High Council’s dishonor, which would have cost all of us the privilege of entering Sto-Vo-Kor. If you ever reach my advanced age, Captain, you will come to understand the importance of such considerations.”

  His antennae moving in slowly accelerating circles that Archer interpreted as mounting impatience, Shran cut in. “My people are all likewise displeased with Andoria’s decision to abandon Earth to the Romulan cutthroats.”

  Archer nodded, keeping his expression otherwise neutral. “I understand, Shran. Which is why I will direct my gratitude toward you and your people, rather than to your government. Besides, I don’t want to get you into any trouble back home.”

  “For helping you? Or for caravanning with Klingon pirates?”

  Archer smiled. “Take your pick. Or you could just say I don’t want to give Andorian Foreign Minister Thoris an opportunity to deny that you were ever here.”

  A smile split Shran’s cerulean features, revealing his even white teeth. His antennae probed gently forward. “It’s more likely Thoris would attempt to take credit for routing the Romulans.”

  Archer’s smile fell in on itself. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, General. I wouldn’t exactly describe the Romulans as ‘routed.’”

  “Perhaps not yet,” Shran said, his expression suddenly as cold as the grave.

  “There’s another incoming message, Commodore,” Hoshi said, interrupting.

  “Please excuse me,” Archer said to both men on the screen. Almost in unison, Kolos and Shran nodded, and their images abruptly vanished, replaced by the stars, portions of the combined Starfleet-Klingon-Andorian force, and the great black emptiness that enfolded both.

  Moving to the comm station, Archer said, “Who’s contacting us?”

  “It’s a subspace burst with an ID marker I’ve seen only a couple of times before,” Hoshi said, looking puzzled. “It’s already stopped.”

  “Damn,” Archer whispered.

  “But I managed to capture most of it.”

  “Most of it?”

  “The transmission definitely came from the Romulan flagship. Because of that, our latest communications security protocols shunted the message into a special memory buffer designed to screen out incoming Romulan malware. The transmission was in the process of being purged from the buffer when I noticed the name attached to the message header: Lazarus, a name I’ve seen only twice before. I assume it belongs to the author.”

  Lazarus. That name froze time in its tracks. It belonged to a dear friend who, like his namesake, had cheated death. Twice before, Charles Tucker III had used that alias to bring important information to Archer’s attention.

  Trip’s on the Romulan flagship? Archer thought. But why? How?

  He said, “There must be more to this message than the name.”

  Hoshi nodded and began tapping commands into her console with the speed and grace of a concert pianist. “There is. Whoever sent this embedded several strings of code sequences into the message. Not all of it survived our security ‘watchdog’s bite,’ but I unscrambled the remainder using a standard Starfleet decryption key.”

  “Interesting,” T’Pol said. Archer’s exec had approached Hoshi’s station only moments after he had. As she watched the strings of numerals and other characters parade across the primary linguistics display, she added, “The text appears to be a string of computer commands. Raw machine code.”

  “This still could be just another Romulan attempt to take control of our systems remotely,” Hoshi said. “In fact, I’m not sure what else it could be, since there don’t seem to be any instructions embedded inside it.”

  “I’d probably think it’s a trap,” Archer said, “except for the name that’s attached to the message.”

  “‘Lazarus,’” Hoshi repeated, nodding. “I’m assuming that’s the name of some sort of double agent, or deep-cover spy.”

  “I’m afraid I can’t tell you, Hoshi,” Archer said.

  The comm officer held up a hand. “I don’t want to know,” she deadpanned. “It’s never good to stumble onto anything that’s above your security clearance.”

  “Send the message to my ready room, Hoshi,” Archer said, then turned to face the tactical station. “Malcolm, you have the bridge. Coordinate repair efforts aboard Enterprise and throughout the fleet. And alert me if the Romulans so much as sneeze in the meantime.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  Archer strode toward the situation room located just aft of the bridge. “T’Pol, you’re with me. We’re going to figure out what the hell this information is supposed to do. And if it really came from Lazarus.”

  “I am confident that it did,” T’Pol said from a few paces behind.

  Archer heard a thump and turned in time to see T’Pol staggering away from a railing she appeared to have just collided with. He rushed toward her, catching her as she pitched forward, limp and unconscious.

  Damn you Vulcans, he thought, and your delusions of invulnerability.

  “Hoshi, call Phlox. T’Pol needs medical attention, now.”

  Warbird Dabhae

  “Taken together, the hevam and their new allies now outnumber us,” Subcommander Threl said. He gestured toward the image of the cluster of enemy vessels depicted three-dimensionally in the small holo-imager atop Valdore’s desk. “Perhaps we should consider waiting for our reinforcements t
o arrive before renewing the offensive, lest we sustain even more serious losses. Otherwise we may not be able to continue to ensure the safety of all seven of the avaihh lli vastam vessels.”

  Seated behind the bulky desk in his private office, Valdore wasn’t convinced. Nor was he eager any longer to protect the high-warp vessels as though they were so many fragile mogai eggs. Despite the constant efforts of his technologists, including Mr. Cunaehr, none of the vessels had yet reached the speeds of which they were supposedly capable.

  “Waiting for reinforcements would take up more than a dayturn.” Valdore said. “S’Task would not have sanctioned such timidity.”

  “Perhaps, Admiral. But I would be remiss in my duty were I not to point out that we have only thirty-eight spaceworthy ships now, to their forty-two.

  Valdore waved his large right hand dismissively. “Many of the hevam-allied vessels are far smaller and less well-armed than our warbirds. There is no reason to delay—”

  The door buzzer sounded, interrupting Valdore’s argument. He tapped a button on his desk, and the entrance hatch hissed open.

  Subcenturion T’Velekh stepped into the chamber, saluted, and stared straight ahead. “Admiral, we have traced the unauthorized transmission to its source.”

  Valdore nodded, though he did not attempt to conceal his displeasure at the lengthy span of time the task had taken.

  “And?”

  “It originated from Mister Cunaehr’s secure quarters. Unfortunately, the information he transmitted was encrypted, so we have yet to determine the signal’s content. But it was clearly aimed at the hevam fleet. Specifically at En’ter’priz.”

  Valdore was sorely tempted to draw his Honor Blade. Instead, he dismissed the subcenturion. When he was once again alone with Threl, he said, “Those quarters must have been something other than secure.”

  Threl looked stricken. “Mister Cunaehr may have discovered a hitherto unknown method of gaining access to the communications grid, Admiral. He is, after all, quite a clever engineer.”

  Yes, the admiral thought. So clever that he might have been directly responsible for some of the losses we just sustained in battle. He wondered whether his fleet would have suffered a more than fifty percent reduction had Cunaehr not been aboard, plying his evil trade.