by Dave Stern
“Your father knew how to adapt, Lee. We’ll have to do the same. In the meantime…” Duvall put her hands on his shoulders and spun him around. “Let’s get you back in bed. The doctor should be here soon.”
Duvall was right, Archer realized. Where was Trip? More than enough time had passed for him to return with the doctor.
And just then, the door sounded.
“Who is it?”
“Trip, sir.”
“Come on in,” the captain said, freeing the lock.
His chief engineer entered the room.
Doctor Trant of Eclipse, dressed in a green-and-orange Guild uniform, followed a step behind.
Archer took one look at her and frowned.
She took one look at Duvall and the boy, and her eyes widened in surprise.
“You’re Sadir’s wife,” she said.
“You’re with the Guild,” Duvall said. She turned to Archer. “What’s going on here?”
“That’s just what I was wondering.” He turned to Trip. “Commander? I thought I asked you to bring Doctor Phlox.”
Trip stopped in his tracks and groaned softly to himself.
He’d made, he suddenly realized, a terrible mistake.
He should have cleared Trant with the captain. Why he hadn’t thought of that down in sickbay or on the way up here…Stupid. Too caught up in seeing Neesa again, too surprised by Phlox’s announcement regarding Ferik, too anxious not to return empty-handed—
“Sorry, Captain,” Trip said. “Doctor Phlox was busy. I should have double-checked with you about bringing Trant.”
“You should have.”
“Is there a problem with my being here?” Trant asked. “I’ll leave.”
“No, it’s all right, Doctor,” the captain replied, but Trip could see that even though the frown on his face was gone, Archer was still angry. His voice, however, betrayed none of that emotion as he spoke. “Captain Duvall, Doctor Trant has been treating my crew for a variation of the same problem your son is suffering from. I’ve trusted her with their lives.”
“I don’t know that I’m willing to trust her with my son’s.”
“Captain,” Archer pointed out, “may I remind you, the Guild has no interest in seeing Lee harmed. Just the opposite, in fact.”
Duvall frowned, considering. Behind her, the captain saw Lee doing the same.
“I always have exactly the same interest, when it comes to my patients,” Trant said. “Helping them get better.”
“You say you’ve treated this same problem before?” Duvall asked.
“It sounds like the same problem, from what Commander Tucker was telling me,” Trant corrected. “I won’t know, of course, until I examine your son.”
Duvall nodded reluctantly. “All right.” She gestured towards 430. “There’s a bed in there. Probably the best place to do the exam.”
“I agree,” Trant said. “Shall we?”
The three of them left the room.
Archer watched her go a minute, then shook his head.
“You were right, Trip. She’s a different person.”
“Yes, sir.”
“I suppose I’m a different person here too.”
“I suppose. Don’t know that we’ll ever know that for sure.”
“Let’s hope not.” The captain looked directly at him. “We have a problem.”
“Yes, sir.” Trip prepared himself for that tongue-lashing.
But Archer’s next words surprised him.
“It’s about the boy.”
“Sadir’s son.”
“No.”
Trip frowned. “Is there another boy?”
“No.” The captain hesitated a moment. “Only one. But the thing is…he’s not Sadir’s son.”
“Oh.” Trip didn’t understand. Had he missed something? “Well, then, whose…”
Archer looked directly at him, and all at once, Trip knew why the boy had looked so familiar to him before.
“Oh boy,” he managed. “Could be a problem is right.”
“You see a resemblance?” Archer asked.
“Now that you mention it…”
“Will others?”
“Hard to say. Depends on how often they’ve seen you. If they see the two of you together…”
“We can’t let that happen, then,” Archer said. “Denari’s future rests with that boy. No one can even suspect he’s not Sadir’s son.”
“Agreed.”
“I’m going to have to lie low for a while. You’ve had the most experience with the Denari. Anyone needs to talk to Enterprise, for any reason, they talk to you.”
“Yes, sir.” Trip suddenly remembered what Malcolm had told him. “Something I need to talk to you about, Captain. Peranda’s little booby traps.”
“We got all those, didn’t we?”
“We thought so. But we just found out they work off timers. There may be some on board that haven’t armed themselves yet.”
“Wonderful.”
“We’re going back over the ship again, top to bottom. We’ll find all of them.”
“Be easier if Peranda would tell us where they were.”
“He’s still not talking.”
“We’re going to have to do something about that. A little truth serum, perhaps?”
“Just what Doctor Trant and I were thinking. She’s already volunteered to help us administer it.”
“I see.”
Archer studied him a moment, and Trip could see the question in his captain’s eyes: What, exactly, was the nature of his relationship with Trant?
Trip was ready to answer that when the entrance to 430 slid open, and Trant herself appeared in the doorway.
“Some interesting results,” she said, turning to talk over her shoulder to Duvall. “I’ll let you know.”
She turned back to the door then, scanner in hand, and saw Trip. A smile crossed her face.
Later, he would recall every second of what happened next in excruciating detail, as if it had all happened in slow motion.
Neesa smiling. Behind her, in the bed, the boy, sitting up. Duvall turning away from her son, taking a step toward the door as well.
At that instant, Trip, for some reason, looked down.
A pencil-thin beam of blue light stretched across the bottom of the doorway, at ankle height. One of Peranda’s bombs. Trip traced the beam back with his eyes. The bomb was fixed to the back of one of the table legs along the same wall as the door. He wouldn’t have spotted it in a million years.
He took in all that in an instant, and pushed the captain away.
“Stay there!” he yelled to Neesa. “Don’t move!”
He tried to wave her back with both hands.
For a fraction of a second, her expression changed. But whatever she thought then, whether she intended to act on what he was saying or not, it was too late.
Her foot was already moving forward.
The last thing Trip saw was it break the thin blue line of the beam.
Then, for a split second, everything turned a brilliant, bright white.
Twenty-Two
ARCHER BLINKED and opened his eyes.
He was in sickbay, on one of the beds. Trip and Phlox were leaning over him.
His head hurt like the dickens.
“What happened?” he croaked, his voice sounding thick and harsh with disuse.
“An explosion,” Phlox said. “You’re quite all right.”
“Peranda.” Trip’s face was grim. “One of his little going-away presents.”
Archer remembered then: the two of them talking, Trip suddenly pushing him toward the door…
Then nothing.
“How long have I been here?”
“Almost a day.”
“You’re all right?” he asked Trip.
“Except for this.” Trip touched the side of his face and turned his head to the right. He had a black and blue bruise that stretched from his temple all the way down to his jaw. “You and I were blown c
lear across the room, along with that new couch in there. Protected us from the shrapnel.”
“Almost all the shrapnel,” Phlox corrected. “You had quite a nasty head wound, Captain. A bit of a concussion as well.”
“What about the others? Duvall? Lee?”
“Kid’s all right, sir. A few bruises. Nothing serious.”
“Some potential hearing loss,” Phlox added. “And his digestive system is still functioning at less-than-optimum efficiency. But he is basically fine.”
The captain nodded.
He noticed Trip hadn’t said a word about Duvall.
“Commander,” he repeated. “What about Duvall?”
Trip shook his head.
“She didn’t make it, sir. I’m sorry.”
Archer groaned and closed his eyes.
In his mind, he went back to that instant in the brig, when he’d looked at Peranda and known that the man had something else up his sleeve. Another trick. The bomb.
“I saw it,” he said softly. “I saw it in his eyes, and I didn’t do anything. I could’ve saved her.”
“Not all your fault, Captain,” Trip said. “Travis was warning me not to underestimate him. I did it when we first took over the ship, and Westerberg died, and I did it again when—”
Trip’s voice broke.
Archer opened his eyes and saw his chief engineer blinking away tears.
He suddenly remembered there had been someone else in the room, too.
Doctor Trant.
“Trip?”
“Sir.”
“Not Trant too? She’s not…”
Archer’s voice trailed off. Trip hadn’t responded then, but he didn’t need to. Archer saw the answer in his eyes.
“Ship took a beating,” Trip said, and actually managed a laugh. “We’re going to need new guest quarters, too.”
“It’s all right.” He sighed heavily. “For what it’s worth…I’m sorry, Trip. I guess the two of you were pretty close.”
“Yes, sir. We were.”
Phlox stepped forward. “You should be resting, Captain. Your injuries are not severe, but you have lost a considerable amount of blood.”
Archer nodded. He did feel weak. And hungry.
And anxious to know what had been happening while he was unconscious.
“A minute, Doctor. Trip, can you fill me in? What’s been happening?”
“Strategic situation is status quo. Makandros and Lind are anxious to talk to you, and the boy.”
“They know he’s here?”
“They do. A mix-up after the bomb went off. When we gave them the news about Trant, we ended up telling them about the boy as well.”
“Understandable,” the captain said. And no great disaster, considering they were about to tell the general and Lind about Lee anyway.
“Yeah. But Makandros isn’t happy.”
“What a surprise.”
“We do have some good news, though. Launch Bay Two is operational again.”
“Peranda talked?”
“With a little help.” Trip smiled thinly. “Gave us the location of every device on the ship, and the codes to disarm them. Sneaky bastard. He put one in your quarters too, sir.”
“You’re sure he was telling the truth?”
“It would have been physiologically impossible for him to do otherwise,” Phlox said, “considering the amount of serum we put into his system.”
“He hasn’t stopping talking yet. We may be able to get some valuable information about General Elson’s intentions from him,” Trip said. “Provided he doesn’t get too sick.”
“It’s nothing serious,” Phlox added. “Just…uncomfortable.”
“Good.” Archer felt exactly zero sympathy for the man.
“Captain.” Phlox stepped forward again. “Please. You are running on adrenaline right now. Your system needs rest.”
“I’ll rest in a few minutes.” He looked up at the doctor. “Right now, I need to talk to Commander Tucker. Alone.”
Phlox frowned. “I really would prefer—”
“Doctor, give us a moment.”
Phlox nodded reluctantly, and left.
“Have you talked to anyone else about what I told you? About Lee?”
Trip shook his head. “No, sir.”
“Good. Let’s keep it that way. A lot depends on him, poor kid.” Archer frowned. “He knows about his mother?”
“He never lost consciousness. We couldn’t keep it from him.”
“And how’s he handling it?”
“Not too well, frankly. I tried to talk to him a little, but…”
“Maybe I’ll have better luck. He knows me—or thinks he does, anyway, from what Duvall told him. I’ll try in the morning.”
“Yes, sir.”
Archer looked in Trip’s eyes. “You going to be all right?”
“Yes, sir.” Trip nodded. “I’ll be fine. Soon as I stop beating myself up for not forcing that information out of Peranda before.”
“I’ll be doing a little of that too, later, I suspect.”
Trip managed a laugh. “That’ll make three of us. You should have seen Malcolm.”
The captain could only imagine. He smiled to himself—
And then remembered something else he needed to talk about with Trip. The anomaly. Their nonexistent way home. Not just Trip—he wanted to alert all the department heads. A staff meeting.
Then a wave of exhaustion washed over him, and Archer decided that too would have to wait till morning. He said good night to Trip, and lay back on the bed.
He saw Trip and Phlox enter one of the isolation wards. The captain wondered, briefly, who the doctor was treating in there.
And then sleep took him. An uneasy, dream-filled sleep, with scenes from his first year at the Academy, places and times he’d shared with his Duvall, mixed in with fantasies of the life this universe’s Jonny and Monique had shared.
Incongruously, a young Henry Archer kept popping in and out of his dreams.
Archer called that long-overdue staff meeting for the next morning, in his ready room, after Phlox reluctantly dismissed him from sickbay. He kept it small and private: himself, Trip, Reed, and T’Pol.
“Just us?” Malcolm asked, leaning up against the far wall near the small cabin’s sole port.
“That’s right,” Archer confirmed. He and Trip stood side by side, backs to the inner bulkhead, while T’Pol sat in front of his workstation. “What we discuss in here, stays in here. Understood?”
Heads nodded.
The four gave him a status update then, on the extent of the damage suffered by the ship and crew—minimal, the status of repairs—almost complete, and the crew’s overall health—supplemented by a brief com link with Phlox).
And then Archer took a deep breath and told T’Pol and Reed the secret he’d brought them there to hear:
Who Leeman Sadir’s father really was.
The two of them were silent a moment after he finished talking.
“That’s unbelievable,” Reed said. “So there’s a strong resemblance between the two of you?”
“Strong enough,” Trip said.
“Which is why Trip will be our liaison with the Denari. So no one spots that resemblance.”
“Captain,” T’Pol said. “May I speak frankly?”
Archer nodded.
“You are concerned for the boy. That is understandable. You may also feel a degree of responsibility for him—kinship, even. That is understandable as well. However—”
Despite his best efforts to stay calm, the captain felt his cheeks flush.
“I know what you’re going to say, Sub-Commander. And I appreciate your concerns. But I’m well aware that the boy is neither my kin nor my responsibility. I simply want to do what I can to help him—and the Denari—avoid a cataclysmic war.”
“And how far are we willing to go to do that?” T’Pol asked. “If General Elson cannot be convinced to stand down—or his men convinced to defy his orders—wha
t then? Will we use Enterprise’s weapons to force his surrender?”
Before Archer could reply, Trip spoke up.
“I’m not even sure that would be possible. If Elson stays in the Kresh, it’s going to take a lot more firepower than we have to get him out of there. Even with help from Makandros and the Guild…”
“We’re not getting directly involved in the war—if there is one,” Archer said firmly. “That would be compounding the mistake Captain Duvall made.”
“But here we are, in the middle of one side’s battle group. Perhaps we should have a contingency plan in place, sir, just in case,” Reed said. “I wouldn’t need to consult with DEF or Guild liaisons—simply determine the required force levels, and if the need arose—”
Archer shook his head. “I don’t think so, Malcolm.”
“What if Elson attacks us, sir?” Reed asked.
“We have the ability to outrun any potential attack,” T’Pol said.
“As long as we see it coming.” Trip turned to the captain. “Sadir knew all about the Suliban cloaking device. It’s possible his people were working on ways not just to detect it, but build one of their own.”
Archer frowned. “How possible?”
“Not very,” Trip admitted. “A long shot.”
“Then let’s set that aside for a moment. We have more important things to worry about.” He turned to T’Pol. “Sub-Commander, could you bring these two up-to-speed on our other problem?”
Trip and Reed exchanged puzzled looks.
“Other problem?”
The Vulcan leaned forward in her chair.
“We may not be able to get back through the anomaly,” she said, and then explained.
“No,” Trip said when she’d finished. “There has to be a way to get at that information.”
“We’re open to suggestions,” Archer replied.
“The helm,” Trip said instantly. “A record of course instructions, thruster firings…We pull data from the console—”
“The one Parenda destroyed?” Reed asked.
“The data might be salvageable.”
“The data does not exist,” T’Pol said. “Helm was off-line as well when we transited.”
“Okay.” Trip frowned and thought a moment. “We need a record of our course through the anomaly, is that right?”
“Correct,” T’Pol said.
