by Dave Stern
She wakes up in sickbay, Doctor Hael looking down on her, saying, “Elder Green? Elder Green, are you all right?”
And the images go to black.
And she finds herself aboard the Conani military shuttle, and she does not feel well, something is wrong with her, but what…
And images now that explain, images from the Antianna ship, the Barreon consciousness, scans of Elder Green, scans that see through not just the Conani shuttle to reveal the soldiers hidden inside but through the Kanthropian elder, revealing something that has been implanted inside her, a device of some sort, an explosive meant to be triggered once she boards the Antianna ship, a fallback, failsafe plan by General Jaedez, Hoshi realizes, thwarted as the Barreon consciousness causes Green to materialize wrong, the device useless, the elder dead, and…
“Interface complete,” Theera says—only of course, it is not Theera, not at all—and steps back from her.
Hoshi can find no words.
“Understanding,” the android says. “Retrieval.”
The air inside the metal dome begins to shimmer, and a form begins to materialize.
Thirty-Three
The Klingon ships had begun pulling back from Coreida.
A single message from the newly elected Governor Nala, announcing: A—knowledge of their trespass into the neutral zone, B—formation of a significant force to confront them (a lie, but one convincingly told), and C—newly restored functionality of the automated defense stations around the Procyron system (which had apparently been corrupted by a software malfunction earlier), had prompted the move.
The Klingons protested that they had been invited by the Confederacy’s former governor to help safeguard the Thelasian borders, that they had intended no offensive action, and would of course withdraw should that be the new government’s wish, though if a fight was desired…
Nala (who’d obviously had some experience with Klingons) assured them no fight was necessary to demonstrate their honor and ability.
At which point Trip, listening and observing the back-and-forth on Enterprise’s viewscreen, leaned back in his chair and cursed.
“They’re going to let ’em go.”
“The Klingons? Of course,” T’Pol said, moving up alongside him. “The whole point of this is to avoid a battle.”
“Yeah,” Trip said. “It is. For the Confederacy. But for us…we still don’t know where the captain is.”
“According to the Klingons…neither do they at this point.”
“Not exactly sure I believe them on that.”
“You have a course of action in mind?”
Trip shook his head. “Not really. What I’d like to do is go talk to that ambassador again. Schalk. See if he has any more information for us.”
“I sincerely doubt the ambassador will talk, after the way you insulted him earlier.”
“Yeah. I suppose you’re right. Well—we’ll just have to go looking for them then. Sen, and the captain and that ship—what was it called again?”
“c’hos.” T’Pol pointed. “Where, exactly?”
“Well…” Trip frowned. “Coreida, for a start. Some of the border worlds, on the Thelasian side of the Neutral Zone. Sen was governor there for a while, right? He’s probably got a network of contacts, hiding places…”
“The sector is rather large,” T’Pol said dryly. “Traveling at maximum warp, visiting each of the border worlds—I estimate it would take us upward of two weeks.”
“Well it’s a start.” Trip glared. “Unless you have a better idea.”
“I believe I do. Stay here.”
“Stay here?”
“Yes.”
“And do what?”
“Wait for Captain Archer to return.”
Trip shook his head. “I don’t get it.”
“The Klingons have lost contact with their ship. All, obviously, is not well, and I conclude that the most likely reason it is not well has to do with Captain Archer. I consider it quite likely he has taken control of the vessel.”
“That’s a pretty big leap in reasoning.”
“It is simply a matter of probabilities. And furthermore, the probability is that if the captain indeed has control of the c’Hos, he will return with it to Procyron. Where he will expect us to be waiting.”
“No,” Trip said. “You’re wrong. He’ll expect us to be at the peace conference. But I get your point. Malcolm?”
Reed nodded. “A very plausible scenario, Commander. I agree with your reasoning as well.”
“You know, T’Pol, I bet you are right. I bet right about now, Captain Archer has everything well in hand.”
The cable thrummed in his grasp.
The Klingon ship continued to drift, closer and closer.
On the viewscreen, the Antianna vessel grew, till its outlines disappeared and Archer—and the still-silent Governor Sen—found themselves staring at the giant ship’s hull. His earlier estimates as to how big the vessel was were off, the captain decided. This ship was easily five times the size of the one he and Enterprise had encountered, maybe even bigger than that. He had no idea how that was possible. The leap in engineering technology required to jump up that far in size, in scale…it took dozens of years. Not a few weeks.
There was something else that puzzled him as he looked at the viewscreen, something beyond the fact that as of yet the Antianna ship had still taken no action against them.
The ship’s hull. It was, as far as he could see, a single, smooth, unbroken surface. It looked like metal, but the ability to forge a sheet of that size, and still make it thick enough to withstand the pressures of space…
If Trip was here, Archer thought wryly, he’d be going on a mile a minute about how it was not just inconceivable, but impossible.
He looked down at the cable in his hand. He’d cleared away optical cabling from a junction port near the helm, and stripped the box down to bare metal, the corners of which were very sharp indeed.
Archer gauged the thickness of the wire that he held, how much pressure it should take to slice through it, and reach current. Considerable. It would take him on the order of a minute to do that, which was, in his estimate, just about how long they had before they physically rammed the Antianna ship.
“What are you thinking?” Sen asked.
The ship continued to drift.
Hoshi knew who it was even before the materialization process finished.
Theera.
Theera from S-12, Theera whom she had shared quarters with, Theera whom she had watched go through the mind-sifter, Theera whom she had just visited in sickbay, who was not, of course, Theera at all.
Their eyes met as she finished materializing, and Hoshi saw in them the same terror she’d seen during the power blackout, back on S-12.
And now, at last, she understood why.
“You knew,” Hoshi said. “You knew all along.”
Theera—Hoshi couldn’t stop thinking of her that way—shook her head and looked around the chamber. Her eyes fastened on the android—her mirror image—and she took a step backwards, involuntarily.
“It’s not like that, Hoshi,” she said.
“You never lost your memories,” Hoshi continued. “You never had any to begin with. You knew who—what—you were, all along.”
“No,” Theera said, shaking her head. “Not at first. At first, after the Conani took me, I was just…disconnected. I had all these thoughts in my head, these images, they didn’t make any sense at all, you can’t understand how strange I felt, I…”
“Ondeanna.” The android—Hoshi could think of her in no other way—took a step forward, toward Theera.
“Wait,” she said. “I have to explain.”
The android shook its head. “Separation must end. Join.”
“No,” Theera said firmly. “Separation must continue. I have achieved a distinct consciousness. I wish to maintain it.”
“You seek autonomy.”
“Yes.”
The andro
id paused. Frowned. “Explain.”
She nodded. “These,” she pointed at Hoshi, “they are many, and yet sometimes can function as one.”
The android paused.
“No,” it said again, and even before it had finished speaking, Theera ran forward and struck the android with all her strength. Hoshi could feel the force of the blow from where she stood. The android crumpled to the ground.
Theera turned to run, and the metal beneath her feet shimmered.
She looked down and screamed.
“No!” she said, and turned to Hoshi, a pleading look in her eyes. “Help!”
But there was no help Hoshi could give.
Metal shimmered, and swallowed her.
And then she was gone.
“Hoshi,” a voice said, and she turned and saw Theera—again—standing behind her.
She had no idea what to say.
“You killed her?” That was true, and yet—
Theera, she knew, still lived.
“New understanding,” the android said. “Kanthropian database. Confederacy records, others, all agree. The Barreon are dead. The need for conflict is ended.”
Hoshi managed, at last, to find her voice. “You mean you’re through attacking Confederacy ships? Killing innocent people?”
“We acted in what we perceived as necessary self-defense. Apologies.” The android frowned. “Do you wish us to bring them back? The individual consciousnesses?”
Hoshi blinked.
“What?”
The android repeated its question. Hoshi was speechless a minute.
“You can do that?” she asked at last.
“Theoretically, it is possible. Some corruption of electromagnetic patterns may occur, but—”
“Never mind,” Hoshi said quickly. Corruption of electromagnetic patterns? She did not want to think about the implications of that particular statement. “We’ll leave things as they are.”
“As you wish.”
The two stood there a moment, looking at each other.
“So,” Hoshi said finally. “What happens next? You’ll let the Armada—the Thelasians—know that they can stand down, that…”
“Next? Next is this,” the android said, and without warning, simply ceased to be, its body suddenly melting away into the chamber floor.
Didn’t even say good-bye, Hoshi thought.
She looked around the chamber then, and wondered what she was supposed to do.
All at once, all around her, metal began to shimmer.
Uh-oh, she thought and braced herself.
This is not a good thing.
Thirty-Four
The captain was going to time it as close as he could, trigger the short-circuit just as they rammed into the Antianna ship. He still had no idea why the aliens were letting him get this close. The only possibility that made any sort of sense was that something had gone wrong with their vessel; they had no more control over it than he had over c’Hos. Which made him think twice about blowing the ship, but on the other hand…
There was a war going on. And despite Sen, the captain knew which side of that war he was on.
“Really,” Sen said. “I believe we could survive a collision with minimal damage, and perhaps find our way aboard the Antianna ship. Providing, of course, we don’t destroy ourselves first.”
Archer ignored him, and pressed down on the thick plastic casing of the cable. Pressed it hard against the sharp metal edges of the exposed junction box. The casing cut more easily than he’d expected. It wasn’t going to take him long at all to reach the wire conduit inside. And when he did…
“Stop!” Sen shouted.
Archer reached for the control device.
“What did I tell you,” he said, without looking up, “would happen the next time you spoke without…”
“Stop cutting the wire and look at the viewscreen, will you? Before you do something completely stupid and unnecessary.”
Archer barely—just barely—kept his finger from pressing the button on the remote. He stopped cutting through the casing and looked up.
The viewscreen showed only stars.
The Antianna ship was gone.
“What…” He shook his head. “What happened? Where is it?”
Sen didn’t respond for a moment. The captain turned and saw he was frowning. The governor shook his head then, and frowned some more.
“I really don’t know,” Sen said. “I have no idea what just occurred. I was watching the screen, and one second the ship was there, and the next…”
The air beside the command chair began to shimmer.
The captain cursed, and picked up a Klingon disruptor pistol from off the deck near the tools he’d been using.
The ship might be gone, he thought, but it looks like the Antianna are coming to pay us a visit themselves.
Except he was wrong.
It wasn’t the Antianna come to pay a visit.
It was Hoshi.
She finished materializing, saw the captain, and took a step backwards.
“Are you real?” she asked.
“Am I…” Archer frowned. “Hoshi? What do you mean, am I real?”
“I mean,” she shook her head, and Archer saw exhaustion and confusion in her eyes, “you’re not an android or anything like that? You’re really Captain Archer?”
“Of course I’m Jonathan Archer. Flesh and blood. The real thing. See this?” He pointed to one of the nastier bruises the Klingons had left on his forehead.
“Yes,” she said, nodding. “I do.”
She let out a long sigh then, and visibly relaxed.
“Sir, you don’t know how good it is to see you.”
“Believe me,” Archer said. “I feel just the same.”
Sen cleared his throat.
“Ensign Sato.”
The smile disappeared from Hoshi’s face. She turned to face him.
“Governor.”
“It’s wonderful to see you, as well, I have to say. You’re looking…”
“Shut up,” she told him.
Archer handed her the control device.
“Here,” he said. “Use this.”
Epilogue
Two days later, the captain, Hoshi and Commander T’Pol stood someplace else entirely, outside the door of acting Governor Nala’s office, awaiting the chance to speak with her and other Confederacy leaders—the H’ratoi ambassador, the Pfau trade minister, and General Jaedez, among them—regarding the events of the last few weeks, and their implications for the continued future of the Thelasian alliance. Archer had in mind a proposition for them; an invitation to the peace conference he and Enterprise were on their way to. In his mind, he was rehearsing that invitation.
Hoshi and T’Pol were continuing the discussion they’d begun almost from the instant Archer and his communications officer had returned to Enterprise. A conversation on the possibility of universal telepathic communication—a way to take what had happened to Hoshi during her “joining” of the Barreon group mind and apply it to other instances of first contact.
“Imagine,” she was saying, “a device that reads not LMUs, but intent, as measured by specific brain-wave patterns.”
T’Pol looked now—as she had from the beginning—dubious.
“Such technology is inherently invasive,” the Vulcan said. “I would be opposed to its usage on general principles.”
“But…” Hoshi frowned. “If you’re sending a ship out in space—if you’re out there exploring—it seems to me you want to…”
The door to Nala’s office opened.
The governor, followed by General Jaedez and then—to the captain’s surprise—a Klingon in full ceremonial robes, walked out.
Archer was too surprised to speak for a moment.
The Klingon walked past Nala, right up to the captain, and poked a finger in his chest.
“The crew of the c’Hos,” he said. “There is blood on your hands.”
“On my hands?” Archer’s eyes
widened. “Sen is the one who…”
He frowned, and turned to Governor Nala.
“Excuse me,” Archer said. “I had hoped to speak with you in private, Governor, regarding a matter of some importance.”
“I am aware of that, Captain,” Nala said. “And I apologize for keeping you waiting. However, we have been busy ourselves, on a matter of some urgency as well. General Jaedez,” she gestured toward the Conani warrior behind her, “has been briefing us at length regarding the threat posed by the Barreon machine intelligence.”
“Threat?” Hoshi stepped forward now, and shook her head. “There is no threat. General, you were there. All those ships—and they weren’t even really ships, you know that—they’re gone now. The Barreon—I suppose we could call what we encountered out there Barreon—I’m not even sure they exist anymore, in a form we could understand. And they certainly pose no threat to you, they’re not interested in…”
“I beg to differ, Ensign,” Jaedez said, accenting her rank. “In my estimation, a threat of that size and magnitude cannot be disregarded, no matter the circumstances. We must be prepared to defend ourselves.”
“Well.” Archer cleared his throat. “Governor—that brings me to the subject I wanted to address with you. There is a peace conference taking place on my homeworld in a few days—a number of races from sectors surrounding ours, as well as some nearer to you—and while nothing definitive has been decided, there has been mention of the strategic value an alliance of all races attendant would afford…”
“Forgive me for interrupting, Captain, but if this is an invitation to your conference, I’m afraid I must decline,” Nala said. “We have, in fact, just completed an alliance of our own.”
Ambassador Schalk stepped up alongside her, and smiled.
Archer’s jaw dropped.
“With them?” he said, gesturing toward Schalk. “You made an alliance with the Klingons?”
“They are the preeminent military power in this part of the galaxy,” Jaedez said. “Their warriors, their ships, our technology…I believe such an alliance will be mutually beneficial.”
“I suppose it would be foolish of me to point out that they just tried to invade here a few days ago?”
