Star Trek: Enterprise: The Romulan War: Beneath the Raptor's Wing (Star Trek : Enterprise)

by Michael A. Martin

  Burch paused for a moment before replying, as though adjusting his composure. “We just came a lot closer to a core breach than I ever want to see again, sir.”

  Archer sighed and slumped into his desk chair. “Report.”

  “The magnatomic flux constrictors are shot, along with the intercoolers, and those failures allowed the warp coils to get partially flash-fried by the plasma stream before I got us out of warp. Warp five or even warp four are totally out of the question now—at least until I can get a week or more of dry-dock time to do a thorough rebuild of the entire propulsion system.”

  Damn.

  It was Archer’s turn to pause in order to calm down. He was glad the conversation was audio only. “Do we still have any warp capability, Lieutenant?”

  “Almost half the plasma conduit system will have to be bypassed just to keep any warp capability at all, sir. Give us twelve hours, and we’ll have the warp drive juryrigged back into service. But warp three will be our absolute limit until after we can lay over somewhere for repairs.”

  Archer slowly counted to ten before answering.

  “Thank you, Lieutenant. I know you’ll do everything you can. Archer out.”

  Command was a lonely place to be even when everything aboard ship was five-by-five. But now, sitting alone in the semidarkness of his cabin, Archer felt the distance that separated him from his crew grow exponentially, multiplied by the unimaginable volume of emptiness that still separated Enterprise from home. Ever since the setback the Romulans had dealt to Starfleet at Berengaria VII—effectively scuttling, at least temporarily, a plan to establish a parsecs-spanning network of starbases—space itself seemed to have gotten a whole lot bigger and darker.

  Let’s just hope we don’t run into any more Romulans before we get our sheets back into the wind, he thought.

  And as he opened another channel, it occurred to him that in all the vastness of space that still lay within his lamed vessel’s reach, he had no idea where the nearest friendly port might be found.

  “We are quite fortunate,” T’Pol said.

  Archer knew he hadn’t slept well last night, so he was going out of his way to be cheerful so as not to aggravate what appeared to be a fairly glum state of morale on the bridge. T’Pol’s last sentence, however, strained his efforts to remain pleasant just a little bit past any reasonable person’s endurance capacity.

  “My ship is still crippled, Commander,” he said in measured tones. “Mister Burch says that won’t change for at least another four hours, and once it does the best we can hope for is warp three. Somehow, that all points to a decidedly less than ‘fortunate’ outcome.”

  T’Pol approached from her port science console and came to a stop beside his command chair. “Nevertheless, Captain, we are indeed fortunate, at least according to Vulcan maps of this vicinity of space. The planet known on Vulcan charts as Haurok leh-keh lies only four days from our present position at warp three. We should find everything we need to regain full operational status there.”

  She handed a padd to Archer, and he examined it in silence. It contained a brief list of materials that Burch and his staff would need, the rarest of which were the refined dilithium Enterprise needed for power generation and the verterium cortenide plating necessary for Burch’s proposed rebuilding of everything from the plasma conduits to the warp coils.

  “Verterium cortenide,” Archer said. “And dilithium, all in one place. Huh.”

  T’Pol seemed almost pleased with herself. “As I said, Captain, we are fortunate. Even if the planet cannot supply processed verterium cortenide, we can synthesize the material from raw orestocks of polysilicate verterium and monocrystal cortenum, both of which are present in abundance on Haurok leh-keh.”

  “It sounds almost too good to be true.” Archer rose from his chair and approached the starboard tactical station, where Lieutenant Reed was studying a chart of local space. “Malcolm, do our charts have any information on this planet?”

  The Englishman nodded. “UESPA has charted the system, but never visited or explored it. It’s known as Cygnet on our charts. It’s a bright B-type star with seventeen planets. Based on communications interceptions, the fourteenth planet appears to support a high-order civilization. But that’s essentially all we know about the place, Captain.”

  “So it’s likelier than not that they’ll know we’re coming before we arrive,” Archer said.

  Reed nodded. “I wouldn’t assume we could sneak up on them and simply take whatever we need.”

  “One of the things we need is access to an advanced repair facility, Malcolm,” Archer said, returning to his chair. “We’ll need all the goodwill we can muster if we’re going to expect Cygnet XIV to furnish that. Ensign Leydon, start laying in a course for the planet. Engage at maximum safe speed as soon as Lieutenant Burch says it’s safe to do so.”

  “Aye, sir,” said the helmsman as she started making the necessary calculations on her board.

  Turning his chair toward the comm station, Archer said, “Hoshi, we’re going to need your linguistic expertise.”

  “I’ve already begun a multifrequency search of the subspace bands,” Ensign Sato said, an expression of intense concentration creasing her porcelain features as she listened via her earpiece to voices audible to no one else. “I’m hoping to find some comm traffic originating in the Cygnet system while I’m studying the linguistic data Commander T’Pol just sent me from the Vulcan database.”

  Archer smiled, feeling an infusion of real enthusiasm for the first time in weeks. Enterprise was on a mission of exploration again—a genuine first contact situation, at least for the starship’s human contingent.

  But that enthusiasm was tempered by the harsh knowledge that this mission could easily end in utter disaster for his injured ship should anyone make a serious mistake.

  Monday, December 8, 2155

  For perhaps the first time during the long months that had passed since Captain Archer persuaded her not to transfer from Enterprise, Ensign Hoshi Sato felt that her skills were essential.

  It wasn’t that the Cygneti language had been all that difficult to figure out, at least in terms of its broadest phonetic, grammatical, and syntactical characteristics. The basic work had taken less than a day. It was the cultural assumptions that underpinned that language—what was a language but a species’ cultural operating system, an ultimate expression of its most fixed assumptions regarding both itself and the outside universe?—that had posed the most formidable challenge to her skills. And it was a challenge that easily could have consumed an entire career.

  Four days into her analysis of the few snippets of Cygneti comm traffic Enterprise’s EM and subspace receivers had intercepted so far, most of it apparently low-security, entertainment-oriented material, she still wrestled with the curious lopsidedness of the language’s gender characteristics, not to mention the frustration of the previous morning’s apparently mutually baffling attempt to exchange intelligible hails with personnel at a Cygneti ship-repair facility.

  She continued to hope that she hadn’t missed anything fundamental about the Cygneti language even as Enterprise settled into a high orbit above the aquamarine world, whose surface as displayed on the bridge viewscreen looked surprisingly ice-free despite its extreme distance from its star. According to Commander T’Pol, who was providing real-time sensor analysis, Cygnet XIV’s relatively temperate climate was the result of a combination of internal geothermal heat and the tidal interactions of the planet’s two large moons.

  The only question Sato was truly interested in at the moment, however, was whether or not the captain would succeed in talking with the Cygneti. As a large orbiting hangarlike facility rolled into view across the planet’s terminator, Captain Archer rose from his chair and turned toward her station.

  “Hail them, please, Hoshi. Let’s hope whoever answers this time doesn’t find our troubles quite so amusing.”

  “Aye, Captain,” Sato said, recalling the highlight of th
e previous audio exchange: a gurgling sneeze that had sounded very much like a startled spit-take followed by giggles and guffaws. Setting aside her last nagging doubts about the accuracy of her newly revised translation matrix, she opened the standard hailing frequency, including video, should the Cygneti decide to use it.

  “This is Captain Jonathan Archer of the Starship Enterprise, from Earth,” said the captain. “As we indicated earlier, we are in need of repairs in order to continue our homeward voyage. I wish to discuss trading—”

  The hangarlike facility abruptly vanished from the viewer, replaced by the face of a frowning woman of perhaps early middle age. “You’re the captain?” she said, the universal translator matrix rendering her Cygneti words in incredulity-tinged English. “You must be joking.”

  “Jonathan Archer. Commanding officer of the Starship Enterprise, from Earth.”

  “A man. The captain. Of a great big starship.” Her frown disintegrated under the onslaught of her own peals of laughter. “That is just adorable.”

  Archer was beginning to look irritated. “I assure you, ma’am, this is no laughing matter.”

  The woman on the screen appeared to get hold of herself. “You’re quite right, ‘Captain.’ My apologies.” Another snicker escaped her lips, but she seemed to be trying to maintain an otherwise almost businesslike demeanor. “But before we discuss your repair issues any further, would you mind turning around once or twice? I’d like to get a look at you from behind—”

  Responding to Archer’s chopping hand signal, Hoshi touched a control, causing the woman’s image to disappear. The ship repair facility, gleaming in the blue-white glow of distant Cygnet, took its place.

  “Hoshi, are the wires still crossed on your translation matrix?” he said, annoyed. “She seems to find my request awfully entertaining.”

  Hoshi was at a loss. “As far as I can tell, the matrix is providing accurate two-way translations. Of course, there could always be cultural factors I haven’t dealt with adequately.”

  “Perhaps the fact of the matriarchal nature of Haurok leh-keh’s humanoid civilization has not been adequately addressed,” T’Pol said.

  “The Vulcan files on this civilization mentioned that fact,” Sato said. “I’m sure I accounted for it.” In fact, she was certain that the Cygneti matriarchy, which had evidently endured for many centuries, had much to do with this language’s gender bias.

  “This might be an aberration on the part of the Cygneti,” Malcolm Reed said. “I mean, Vulcan is a matriarchy, too. But they aren’t sexist pigs about it.”

  An inspiration struck Sato then, and she exchanged a look with Archer that told her instantly that he was thinking along the same lines.

  “I think the Cygneti’s cultural expectations are a little bit different from ours,” he said as he approached her comm station, removing three of the pips from his uniform’s right epaulet as he walked.

  “When in Rome...” Sato said as the captain dropped the pips into her hand. She relinquished her seat as she began attaching the small metal rectangles to her own uniform tunic.

  “Captain?” T’Pol said.

  Seated in the comm station’s chair, Archer turned toward his exec. “Any objections to my giving the hardest-working communications officer in Starfleet a temporary field promotion to captain?”

  T’Pol raised an eyebrow, her manner frostier than usual. “None at all, sir.” Lieutenants Reed and O’Neill murmured their assent as well, while trying to suppress their mirth.

  “Good,” Archer said, and reopened the channel. The Cygneti woman reappeared on the screen.

  “This is Captain Hoshi Sato, in command of the Starship Enterprise,” Sato said, putting as much authority as she could muster behind her words.

  The woman on the screen not only seemed to relax immediately, she seemed to take the conversation far more seriously now than she had before. Within a few minutes of gentle haggling, Sato—with some assistance from T’Pol, who seemed uncharacteristically miffed—had engineered a mutually acceptable arrangement whereby Enterprise would gain access to Cygnet XIV’s most advanced ship-repair facilities for upwards of ten local rotations in exchange for some exotic chemicals that could be synthesized in the ship’s warp core.

  And although no one laughed during the proceedings, Sato did come close to losing her composure when T’Pol got even with the captain by coolly ordering him and Lieutenant Reed off the bridge—while in full view of the Cygneti woman—to fetch some Vulcan spice tea for “Captain” Sato, Lieutenant O’Neill, and herself.

  Now I’m really glad he talked me out of putting in for that transfer, Sato thought.

  She did wonder, however, if D.O. might have gone a bit too far in delivering a good-natured swat to Archer’s backside as he turned to enter the turbolift.

  THIRTY-FIVE

  Sunday, December 14, 2155

  Cochrane Institute

  New Samarkand, Alpha Centauri III

  AS A GENERAL RULE, Tobin Dax hated to complain. Complainers tended to draw a lot of unwelcome attention to themselves, and usually ended up directing blame at others inappropriately, rather than taking it to heart as a personal learning experience and an encouragement to do better the next time.

  But when the most urgent hurry-up research project of his scientific career got interrupted—and on the orders of the very people who always seemed so unwilling to compromise on the deadlines they’d already imposed on that selfsame hurry-up research project, no less—Tobin saw no viable alternative to griping out loud to whoever might listen.

  A brisk walk beneath the twin midday orbs of Alpha Centauri A and B took him swiftly across the university’s carefully tended grounds and into the cool shelter of Henry Archer Hall’s main superluminal propulsion research lab complex. A few moments after making it through the sprawling facility’s three layers of biometric security scanners, he caught sight of his two colleagues, both of whom seemed to be quietly reading data from padds in the warp-seven team’s customary work area.

  Tobin started giving vent to his fulminations without preamble. “Exactly how are we supposed to finish creating a warp-seven drive prototype when Captain Stillwell drops some other project that’s on fire right into our laps?”

  S’chn T’gai Skon, the mathematician on temporary loan to Starfleet from the Vulcan Science Academy, looked up from his padd and raised an eyebrow quizzically. “On fire?”

  Dax grimaced. Sometimes he wondered if the universe hadn’t created Vulcans for the sole purpose of deemphasizing his own socialization deficiencies. “I’m talking about this... side project that Starfleet has suddenly gotten so excited about. I mean, I hope Stillwell intends to cut us some slack on our sched—”

  “Dax, don’t you ever start a conversation with small talk?” Doctor Pell Underhill said, tossing his own padd onto a nearby desk with a chuckle. “With conversationalists like you around, Tobin, we almost don’t need Vulcans. No offense meant, Skon.”

  “None taken, Doctor,” the Vulcan mathematician said in apparent agreement with the Centauri-native human’s sentiment.

  Damn. I did it again, didn’t I? Dax thought. Nervous and anxious, he started chewing the cuticle of his right thumb, but stopped himself as soon as he noticed he was once again doing something that others would see as socially awkward. He constantly had to remind himself not to let his interactions with others get carried away on the wings of his obsessions, as hard as that was during times of stress; as his Symbiosis Commission counselor had pointed out on multiple occasions, it was always better to start a conversation with a flashy card trick instead of a detailed analysis of Andrew Wiles’s proof of Pierre de Fermat’s final theorem.

  Sports, he thought. Sports is always a good topic. Aloud he said, “How about that documentary on the London Kings’ last season?”

  Both Skon and Pell stared back at him blankly. And neither of them appeared to be in the mood for a card trick. Tough room.

  “All right, Tobin,” Underhill said f
inally, shaking his gray head with a sigh. “I guess that’s enough small talk for now. Can I assume that you’ve already read the packet Captain Jefferies sent us?”

  “The terminal in my apartment is not secure,” Dax said, shaking his head. “So I haven’t seen any of the technical specs yet. All I know so far is that Stillwell and Jefferies want us to drop everything for the moment. What I don’t know yet is why, or what they’re expecting us to do instead.” With the Romulans having already gotten to within striking distance of Alpha Centauri, perhaps rendering Earth, or even Trill itself, vulnerable to invasion, Dax was hard-pressed to imagine anything more urgent at the moment than the crash warp-seven-drive program to which he had already devoted most of the past year of his life.