ENT - 012 - Kobayashi Maru

THREE

Vulcan Year 8737 (2135 A.C.E.) Trilan (Vulcan outpost settlement)

TP OL FLATTENED HERSELFagainst the moist wall, struggling to keep her ragged inhalations under control. She wasnt certain what had happened to the others. It had been at least a quarter of an hour since she had heard any screams, or anything other than the sound of her own heartbeat and rushing bloodlife-giving fluid that she felt certain might be betraying her even now.

She had been one of six agents of the VSharthe Vulcan Security Directoratethat had undertaken this mission, but she knew that their prey had already dispatched at least two of the others. Their squads leader, Denak, had disappeared down a hole in the ground; the fact that the hole had sealed itself almost immediately lent credence to the idea that Denak had been takenand had not fallen victim to a simple misstep.

The two other VShar agents had similarly disappeared as theyd made their way through the dank caverns that housed the Frislen, but TPol had nimbly managed to avoid capture. She tried to tamp down the voice inside her that fairly screamed, You havent been takenyet. In this context, the feeling of fear was less an emotion than a primal survival instinct. She allowed it to settle upon her like a warm but ill-fitting cloak.

To catch something as primal as these creatures, I must think like them,TPol reasoned. It was, in fact, one of the most basic lessons of intelligence and espionage work; to infiltrate, one had to learn to think like ones opponent, even to the point of becoming one of them if necessary.

She knew that she could never becomeone of the Frislen, unless she contracted the contagion that had ravaged them. From what the Security Directorates files had indicated, that would require both intimate sexual contact and a significant blood-to-blood transfer; the majority of the Frislens victims were not transformed, however, but served instead as food for their cannibalistic appetites.

Despite their savagery, the Frislen were apparently not without technological defenses, as the VShar team had learned shortly after disembarking here. A targeted electromagnetic pulse had rendered not only all of their scanning and communication equipment useless, but their weaponry as well. The pulse should have been their cue to leave, as TPol and Eskren had reasoned, but Denak had ordered them to move into the caves that apparently housed the Frislen. They were armed now only with smaller weapons barely suitable for hand-to-hand combat, although TPol knew that she could throw the hand-length tricheqon her belt with deadly accuracy. Once, at least.

TPol felt her boots come into contact with something on the floor, and she crouched defensively, peering into the darkness around her. One hand moved forward, and her fingers connected with something crust-covered and tubular. Further exploration told her that what she had stumbled upon was the skeletal remains ofsomething. She couldnt be certain what it was. It wasnt humanoid, but it was too large to be one of the smaller creatures that were indigenous to this world.

A sehlat,she finally reasoned, exploring further and finding not only clumps of fur and gristle, but also the sharp tusks that were indicative of adolescent-to-fully-grown members of the urso-feline species that this forbidding worlds Vulcan settlers had brought with them.

Her mind racing, TPol quickly began removing certain parts of the sehlats skeletal structure. She winced as she broke several of the bonesthe sound of the cracks was like cannon fire in the tunnelsbut her fingers told her that she had guessed correctly about the brittle condition of the remains.

A short while later, TPol heard sounds nearby. She couldnt tell from which direction they had emanated, but she assumed she was now being stalked anew. Crouching lower, curled almost into a ball, she quickly finished making her preparations, then stood. Shaking, she used a bone fragment to scratch the top side of her shoulder, where the fabric of her sedmahhad already been torn. She felt the blood well up immediately; she had been cut deeply enough to bleed, but not enough to cause nerve damagenor, she hoped, to affect her defensive abilities.

Knowing that the Frislen could detect her scent even more strongly than before, TPol sprinted forward into the darkness, barely able to see the tunnels around her. She sensed movement behind her, but dared not whirl around to face her pursuers. The only thing she knew for certain was that the farther into the caves she got, the closer she would come to their nest.

The floor abruptly gave way in front of her, and she pitched forward, falling into a shallow fissure or ravineor a trapand she felt the creatures leap on her the next moment, their hands pummeling her over and over again, their nails slashing at her. She struggled against their powerful limbs, but after an indefinable length of time allowed herself to go limp. She focused her conscious mind inward, ready to wake up fully with the speed of a charging le-matyafrom behind her meditative shield against both mortal terror and physical pain.

They carried her with them instead of dragging her, and she was grateful for that, even as she continued to focus herself on what was to come. Eventually, she heard screams she could identify as coming from Vekkr, but as they came closer, the wailing subsided into guttural cries and moans. She hoped silently that if she should survive the mission, she would be able to find the strength to deliver a painless death to any of her comrades who had become infected.

She remained limp as a rag doll as her captors unceremoniously dumped her against something hard, allowing her to land in a semiseated position. Vekkr was mostly silent now, though in her meditative state, TPol could hear several of the other sounds that were reverberating through the dark, rocky chamber. Within her mind, she withdrew, as if she were a hungry, ravening Underlier waiting to strike from below the baking sands of Vulcans Forge.

A rough hand grabbed her face, its jagged fingernails digging into her chin. TPol allowed herself to come back to full consciousness, but willed herself not to tense up into a defensive posture that the creatures might notice. She opened her eyes, however, and found herself staring into the ravaged face of what appeared to be a female humanoid.

Her features were vaguely similar to those of Vulcans, but her eyes were more prominent and seemed to have multiple lids, nictitating from the sides as well as from top to bottom. The womans ears tapered to graceful points at their tips, but everything else about her external pinnae struck TPol as less than aesthetically pleasing; they were flattened backward, were roughly the same size as the womans entire face, and were covered in bulging greenish veins.

In a movement that might have been a smile had she had lips, the Frislen woman allowed her mouth to tilt upward on the sides as she noticed TPol studying her. Four rows of rotted teethwhich included sharpened, predatory incisorsfilled her oral cavity.

“You will be mine, I think, the woman said, speaking in a perfect Vulcan Standard dialect.

TPol was less interested in what the statement meant than she was in keeping the woman talking. As naturally and fearfully as she couldshe didnt really have to feign the trembling that had overtaken hershe peered around the woman into the dimness of the cavern beyond. She saw three more of the Frislen, as well as the remains of Yekda, and the body of Vekkr, on top of which lay a fifth Frislen, who was moving languidly, almost as if in a drunken state.

“What are you planning to do with us? TPol asked, hearing the quaver in her own voice.

“You will be mine,the woman said again. “That one belongs now to Gromstl, she said, gesturing toward the creature atop Vekkr. “The others, she added, sweeping a clawed hand toward a grate in the floor that apparently covered a prisonlike pit, “will be food. Or fun. Or they will belong,too.

TPol understood that the womans emphasis on the word “belong meant that she intended to infect TPol.

“Why are you preying on the people here? TPol asked.

The woman tilted her head, a scabrous tongue sliding against one of her forward rows of sharpened teeth. “To survive. To feed. To procreate. To be a reminder, always.

TPol didnt know what the woman meant, but needed to keep her talking until the time was right to move. “A reminder of what? That savagery exists in the worlds we inhabit? That sentient beings can debase themselves to the level of carnivores or parasites?

The woman pushed TPols head back roughly and rose to a crouch as she released a noise that might possibly be interpreted as laughter if it hadnt sounded so much like howling. She looked around at the others, then returned her gaze to TPol, who had gathered her arms close in around her torso, clutching herself the way a frightened child might.

“Perhaps one of these days we should allow someone to returnto tell the others what we really are, the woman said. “The origins of what you call the Frislen. Before the experiments, the mutations, the banishment.

The woman leaned in close, fixing TPol with her dark, predatory eyes. “They would tell how wewere once you.

In that moment, TPol allowed her entire being to suffuse itself with every bit of energy she had kept in reserve. Flashing her arms out, she pulled the broken sehlatribs out from where she had concealed them inside her sleeves, tight against her forearms. With a quick slashing motion, she used the jagged tips of the bones to cut the throat of the woman, rolling herself aside even as the ichorous green blood began to spray.

As the dying Frislen woman clutched at her throat, TPol drew the short tricheqfrom the boot where she had hidden it and threw it at one of the other creatures in the cavern. It pierced his forehead, dropping him instantly.

TPol had barely managed to regain her footing before one of the remaining Frislen roared toward her, on the attack. She swiped her foot out in a wide kick, hoping that her second makeshift weapon would work as well as the first. The sehlattusk she had strapped to the side of her boot sliced through her attackers torso, and before his forward momentum had entirely spent itself, the Frislens innards were spilling out upon the rough cavern floor.

A keening sound swiftly filled the chamber, and TPol whirled again, expecting to be attacked by the other two creatures. But the one making the sound was exiting the room through a tunnel, his body slipping effortlessly into the darkness. The other one, the creature atop Vekkr, seemed neither alarmed nor particularly conscious of what had just transpired nearby.

TPol noticed only now that she could hear the voices of Denak and Ycha calling out to her. Pushing aside the still bleeding body of the Frislen woman whose throat she had cut, TPol looked down into the pit below the grate. Despite the darkness that enfolded the pit, she could see her comrades, at least in silhouette. She quickly cut through the improvised twine that held the grate in place, moved it aside, then reached down to grasp the hand of Ycha.

The green blood that still rained down on them from the dying Frislen woman made getting a grip difficult, but within a minute, TPol had finished extracting both her fellow agent and her mission leader.

Denak quickly counted the corpses, and listened as TPol told him about the Frislen that had escaped into the adjoining chambers. “There are many more of them than weve seen so far, Denak said gravely, pointing toward numerous cavelike openings that could have served as berths for sleeping or hibernation. “We probably dont have much time before were beset again. And theyll be angrythis time, instead of merely hungry.

He pointed to some fabric remains that still clothed skeletons in a shady corner. “Get some torches going with those scraps.

As Ycha scrambled to comply, TPol retrieved her tricheqfrom the Frislens forehead. A quick scouting of the cavern revealed several of their partys other fallen weapons: both the useless depowered component devices and a few other tricheqs and bladed weapons.

As she returned Denaks weapon to him, she saw him holding one of the sharpened sehlatbones over the back of the Frislen who lay atop Vekkr. The creature hadnt even noticed that anyone else was nearby, much less the danger that loomed above. Under its form, a bloodied Vekkr lay unconscious, or worse.

Denak stabbed the weapon down through both figures, piercing through their hearts almost simultaneously. The creature atop Vekkr thrashed for a moment, then twitched in its death throes; TPols ravaged comrade hadnt moved at all.

“Even had Vekkr lived, he would have been infected, Denak said simply to TPol. “He would have become one of them.

Ycha came over with torches, and the dry fabrics ignited quickly.

Weapons in hand and torches held aloft, the trio swiftly plunged into the caves and, TPol hoped, toward their freedom. Should they make it, TPol knew that Denak would probably call in a military air strike on the region, to bombard the caves with some kind of contained plasma fire. Nothing that lived down here would survive such an attack, nor would any trace of the Frislenor their crimesremain.

Sparing one final glance backward as they departed, TPol pondered exactly what the cryptic words of the Frislen woman had meant.

“They would tell howwe were onceyou.

How different was the statement from Denak?

“He would have become one ofthem.

Even from her brief time in the Vulcan Security Directorate, TPol knew that the Vulcan people had buried many dark secrets in their past. As they moved through the blackness, she understood with perfect clarity that the Frislen woman had believed herself to number among those secrets.

What other secrets have we hidden? And when will another one come out of the darkness to consume us?

TPol shivered, telling herself that she might never discover the answer to that question if she didnt concentrate on getting out of this place, now.

Sunday, July 13, 2155 EnterpriseNX-01

Though she knew it was illogical, TPol shivered slightly. She finally moved over to her bed and pulled the neatly folded gray blanket from the end of it, wrapping it around her shoulders. She returned to stand near the viewport, outside of which the blackness of space and the bright streaks of stars had become almost monotonous in their constancy.

Although the temperature in her quarters was certainly high enough that she neednt have bothered with the blanket, its presence around her provided an immediate and undeniable sense of comfort. The feel of the finely woven synthetic fabric between her fingers evoked a vivid tactile memory of Trip and the time they had lain together on her bunk, the sweat cooling on their naked bodies after they had made love; Trip had pulled this same blanket up, over the pair of them, though hed smilingly lamented all the while having to remove any portion of her beauty from his vision.

The Vulcan science officer and the human engineer, the High Command and Starfleet, a highly unlikely pair. “The ice princess and the good ol boy were among the nicknames she had heard whispered more than a few times, as they walked through the corridors of Enterprise, though she thought that the Starfleet and MACO personnel who had uttered them would have been both appalled and embarrassed had they known that she had heard them. And she sometimes wondered whether they might have been more appalled and embarrassed still had they known that she and Trip had actually consummated their now-undeniable mutual attraction.

The self-absorbed direction of her own ruminations surprised her, though she couldnt deny having had similar thoughts before. But today she could identify no convenient infirmity or injury upon which she might blame this private lapse, no obvious reason behind her increasing fixation on the irrecoverable past. She knew that her emotions were always close to the surface, however deeply she had meditated last evening. She could only wonder whether that night with Trip had had a far more profound impact upon her than she could have known.

Is this what humans experience when they “fall in love?she thought.

Thanks to Trips protracted absence, her memories of their brief time together had become as irrepressible as they were bittersweet. And the fact that the last year had brought her more than enough reason to grieve apart from Trips departure hadnt helped; she had lost her mother, TLes, during a raid against the Syrrannite sect at Vulcans Takarath Sanctuary, then had faced the death of Elizabeth. It didnt matter that her infant offspring had been a cloned hybrid created with her and Tuckers DNA by the rogue geneticists of the Terra Prime separatist movement; little Elizabeth had nevertheless been theirchild. And now both TLes and Elizabeth were interred beneath the broiling sands of Vulcan, on the grounds of the rebuilt sanctuary.

TPol had not been back to Vulcan since the funeral ceremonies for Elizabeth, only a few months ago. Trip had been with her then, his arm still immobilized in a neurotherapeutic sling to treat the wound hed received during the fight against the Terra Prime terrorists. TPol had pushed him away at first, fighting the pain that had threatened to bring all of her carefully suppressed emotions surging to the surface. But their mutual loss of little Elizabeth had eventually brought them closer together in spite of her reticence.

What they had attempted to build between them afterward was torn asunder a short while later, when Trip had taken an assignment for a covert Earth intelligence agency that was connected in some remote fashion to Starfleet. In order for him to infiltrate the Romulan Empire, he had been forced to fake his own death, with the aid of Captain Archer, Doctor Phlox, and Lieutenant Reed. TPol had not been told the truth until later, when Trip visited her on Earth, just prior to Archers speech at the signing of the Coalition Compact.

Trip had given Archer a note for her, and she had subsequently met him in a chamber underneath the stadium where the signing ceremony was being held. There, she had learned of his mission, and had seen that he had been surgically altered to resemble a Vulcan. It was only during their talk that she realized that if he was actually supposed to be a Romulan infiltrator, then the old stories of Romulans and Vulcans being kindred species must be true.

Oddly, TPol found herself unsurprised by the revelation; from past experience, she knew that Vulcan history was teeming with secrets, and that the Romulans were not the only Vulcanoid race to have become separated from the ways of its forebears. The Syrrannite sect had had it easy compared to what she had learned about the Frislen decades agoand about other races, during the time since.

That knowledge of the connection between the Romulans and the Vulcans carried with it an awful burden, however; if the secret connection between the Vulcans and the aggressive Romulans were ever made public, the distrust of other Coalition members toward Vulcan could split the fledgling alliance apart, thus rendering all of its members more vulnerable to dissension from within, attacks from without, and war from either direction.

Trip had assured her that the secret of the Romulan-Vulcan connection would be safe with him, and that as few others as possible would learn of it. Archer had since discussed the matter with TPol, having come to many of the same conclusions that she had. But they hadnt discussed it as much as they might have before Trips “death, even if Archer had taken obvious pains to leave both Phlox and Reed out of those particular discussions.

Having once worked as an intelligence operative for the VShar, TPol fully understood the need for subterfuge and secrecy in espionage, but she nevertheless couldnt deny that her exclusion from the initial plan to fake Trips death had created a fracture in her relationship with Archer and the others. She had sacrificed everything to join the crew of Enterprise,even resigning her position in the Vulcan High Command. What more could she have done to prove her loyalty to Archer? Shed always admired the captain, even if she did sometimes disagree with his often emotion-laden decisions. He, however, apparently had felt that he could not trust her quite as fully, and therefore had initially denied her the peace of knowing that Trip wasnt, in fact, gone, but rather was simplyaway.

Archer had tried to become more friendly with TPol since Trips “passing, but she felt that those efforts had sprung as much from his own lack of people close to himan innate loneliness that accompanied any command positionand from his feelings of personal guilt as they did from any specific desire for friendship. She couldnt deny that there was a certain logic to his actions, and she therefore allowed some degree of camaraderie to develop between them as they worked together. But until Trip returnedor she found a way to reconcile Archers betrayal of her trustshe knew that an emotional wall would continue to stand between her and Archer.

That wall stood even higher between herself and both Phlox and Reed. It wasnt as if either of them had reached out very much to her socially anyway, and the distance they both kept from her was consistent with the fact that their spheres of daily responsibility aboard Enterpriseoverlapped either very little or not at all with her own. Only during briefings or interdepartmental meetings were they generally all in one place, and during those times, TPol put forth an extraordinary effort to keep herself on point and focused on ships business.

TPol grasped at the IDIC symbol that she wore on a chain around her neck at all times, even under her Starfleet uniform. The pendant had been a gift from her mother, and it served as a constant reminder of the Vulcan credo, “Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations. TPol wasthat symbol aboard Enterprise. Certainly, humans of virtually every imaginable color and background served aboard this vessel, but besides herself and Phlox, no other nonhumans were present.

It wasnt that she wanted to isolate herself from others, even taking into account her sometimes ambivalent feelings toward Archer, Phlox, and Reed. TPol had cultivated friends and companions when she had lived and worked on Vulcan. But they were like her, suppressing their emotions, putting logic at the forefront. Only with Trip had she found on Enterprisea human whom she felt accepted her Vulcan attitudes, even if he did not share or necessarily even understand them. To the others, she must have seemed inscrutably alien.

The device attached to her desktop terminal let out three short beeps, pulling TPol out of her morose reverie. The irony behind the fact that she had been preparing to send a scrambled subspace transmission to Denak at the Vulcan Security Directorateand thereby covertly breaking Starfleets communications protocolswas not lost on her. In fact, it seemed somehow fitting, given that the last several years of her life aboard Enterprisehad brought her into multiple secret arrangements, clandestine and covert operations, governmental and religious subterfuges, and more. She hoped that one day in the future, Enterpriseand her crew might resume the pure exploration of the cosmos. Today, however, galactic politics in the known regions of space were simply too unstable to allow for that possibility, and Trips ongoing spy mission in Romulan territory stood as mute proof of that unhappy fact.

She pulled out her chair and sat before the terminal on the desktop, composing her thoughts. She hoped that she could still trust Denak, but until she knew for certain, she remained determined not to give too much away. Tapping the viewscreen, she took note of the tiny digital countdown screen linked to the subspace com-scrambling device. She had approximately four minutes before her activities might be discovered by anyone monitoring outgoing signals from Enterprise.

The mans face that appeared on-screen looked significantly more haggard than the one in TPols memory, and sometime in the last several years, Denak had apparently lost an eye and part of an ear. He was standing outdoors on a balcony of some sort, the shifting red sands of their homeworld visible in the distance behind him.

“I am surprised to hear from you, TPol,Denak said. “It has been twenty years since theKishaltriq celebration, has it not?

TPol nodded, knowing that it had, in fact, been longer. But the fact that Denak had mentioned Kishaltriqmeant that he was in a safe position to talk. “I hope you and your wife are faring well, she said. That was her verification response, since they both knew that Denak was not only a widower at present, but was also fast approaching the age when not even the fierce hormonal firestorms of Pon farrcould furnish any real impetus to seek a mate. TPol understood his insistence that she adhere to such time-honored security protocols whenever they communicated; if either of them were under duress, or not in a safe zone, the personal banter would have seemed innocuous enough to anyone who might be listening in.

Denak nodded curtly, his expression bland. “I truly am surprised to hear from you. Once you resigned your commission, I expected you would sever ties to

“I am Vulcan, Denak, TPol said, interrupting her erstwhile superior. “And I have only a brief time to communicate with you. Speaking plainly, I need to know about any anomalous military or intelligence activity that Vulcan may be undertaking within the Romulan Star Empire.

Raising an eyebrow, Denak shook his head slightly. “Such things are somewhat out of my immediate area of knowledge, TPol, though it is not an entirely unknown subject to me. Ido know that we have taken Captain Archers theories about imminent Romulan aggressionfar more seriously than has the Coalition Council. With this in mind, we have agents investigating all the various acts of interstellar piracy, as well as every recent outworld attack.

TPol nodded, choosing her next words with extreme care. She didnt know whether or not Denak knew about the relationship between the Vulcan and Romulan peoples, nor did she want to jeopardize any mission that Trip was currently involved in during his covert tenure inside the Romulan sphere of influence.

“Are your agents working fromwithin Romulan circlesor are they investigating only in a defensive sense?

Denaks eyes narrowedhis ocular implant made for a fair approximation of his missing eyeand he seemed to study her closely for a moment. “We are engaging in purely defensive maneuvers is the answer most anyone in the Vulcan intelligence hierarchy would give you, TPol. But because youve saved my life on more than one occasion, I shall simply say that it would be illogical for us not to attempt to understand the goals and capabilities of the Romulan Star Empire by studying them from within. Precisely how that is being done is a matter somewhat beyond my clearance level, but I know that such operations are indeed under way. And that they are being done at tremendous personal risk to the individuals involved.

“Could you enlighten me as to whichindividuals may be involved? she said.

He paused for a moment, then added, “You might look into associates of Captain Sopek of the Vulcan High Command.

She frowned. “Dont you mean the lateCaptain Sopek, Denak?

Something that almost resembled a small smile came to the older mans lips. “Reports of Sopeks death may have beengreatly exaggerated.

“I appreciate the information, Denak, she said, wondering precisely how Sopek might be involved in Romulan espionage; only two years ago, following the Andorian attack on PJem, Sopek had used his influence with the Vulcan High Command to keep TPol aboard Enterprise. She resolved to investigate Sopek whenever time and duty permitted it.

“I only have a few moments more before the subspace scrambler may be detected, she added quickly. “Please contact me again at this frequency should you discover anything further that you think would be helpful. She tapped the screen, sending him a specific frequency graph.

“I will expect you to do the same, TPol,Denak said. “As I noted, many of us believe that the Romulan threat issignificantly more dire than even Vulcans government officials and representatives seem to understand. Or will admit. If you learn anything that might help raise awareness within the new administration, you have my word that I will contin

The screen went blank as the timer reached zero, and TPol knew that the scrambling device was already erasing any trace of the transmission from the ships com logs and computer backup subroutines. She wished that she had been able to speak to Denak for just a little longer. But for now, she had some slim threads to follow.

It seemed clear that at least someVulcan military or intelligence operatives were working covertly within the boundaries of the Romulan Star Empire, which meant that at least some knowledge existed on Vulcan of the connection between the two long-sundered peoples. She had no reason to believe that Denak was aware of that connection, however; nor did she feel that he was holding back any important information.

Which meant that he also didnt have any information concerning Trip, or the specifics of his mission for the covert Earth-based intel bureau. TPol cared intensely about the future of Vulcan, as well as that of the Coalition of Planets and the safety of the Starship Enterprise. But she also knew that deep within her, no matter how much she tried to repress her emotions, her actions were being guided, illogically, by fear.

And by loss.

Where is Trip now, and what kind of danger is he facing right at this moment? And when will he be back?

TPol knew she couldnt rest until she found the answers.