Although his mind whirled with emotions and questions, he seemed to fixate on one thing: No matter how much Coridan Prime might not want Enterprise’s assistance, Archer felt that they could stop the oncoming devastation threatened by the Romulan attack.
But it all depends on exactly how I decide to spend the next seventy‑two hours,Archer thought. Gardner’s orders notwithstanding.
The door chime sounded, startling Archer out of his unhappy reverie. He pressed the comm button on his desk.
“Come in.”
The door slid open with a quiet hiss. T’Pol stood in the threshold, her hands behind her back and head tipped inquisitively. The intensity of her gaze, however, far exceeded mere curiosity.
She knows I’ve been keeping her out of the loop,Archer thought as she stepped inside the ready room as the door closed behind her. A frisson of guilt clutched at his heart as Archer considered how much he had kept from her. The fact that circumstances justified his secrecy made him feel a little better about having misled a first officer who had served him so loyally for the past nearly four years.
She raised an eyebrow. “‘Lazarus,’ Captain?”
Archer rose from behind his desk. Deciding that she deserved to know as much of the truth as possible, he said, “It’s the code name of a covert intelligence source working inside Romulan space. One that I trust implicitly.”
“Indeed. And I presume from the raised voices I heard through the door that this source has just imparted some rather important information.”
Her remark rattled Archer, until he reminded himself of the uncanny acuteness of Vulcan hearing–and that her frankly inquisitive demeanor meant that she probably hadn’t actually heard any of the details of the exchanges he’d just shared with Legate Hanshev and Admiral Gardner.
Speaking in quiet, even tones, he brought her up to date about the doom that now hung suspended, like some cosmic sword of Damocles, over Cordian Prime.
T’Pol sat on the low sofa near his desk, her back ramrod‑straight as she stared pensively through the ready room’s viewport at the warp‑smeared stars beyond. Archer remained standing, watching her uneasily.
“Seventy‑two hours,” she said finally, her gaze remaining light‑years away as she continued to consider the ramifications.
He nodded. “More or less.”
“And neither Admiral Gardner nor Legate Hanshev will sanction our involvement in trying to prevent it.”
He chuckled, but without any real humor. “That’s a wonderfully understated Vulcan way of summing up the situation.”
Her only reaction to his good‑natured jibe was to turn away from the stars and fix her gaze upon his.
“What are you planning to do, Captain?” she said.
He sighed. “That depends on what my exact options really are. How soon can we reach Cordian Prime at maximum warp?”
“Approximately forty‑nine hours.” Her answer revealed that she, too, had been giving the subject of Coridan Prime a great deal of thought ever since it had first come up eleven days earlier.
“So I might actually be able to do something to stop this,” he said, cautiously allowing a small flame of hope to kindle itself in his breast. “Assuming that the Romulan attack arrives later rather than sooner, that is.”
“And also assuming that Enterprisecan successfully locate and intercept the attacker. Of course, in order even to make the attempt you will have to violate Admiral Gardner’s direct orders. For the third time, I believe.”
“I wasn’t keeping score,” Archer said. He could see now that he really had no choice at all, or at least no good ones. Meekly following Gardner’s orders simply wasn’t an option. His career in Starfleet was important to him, but it couldn’t compare to the billions of lives that would be forfeited should the Romulan attack succeed.
Archer wished fervently that Trip was at his side right now. It was only after his chief engineer’s departure that he had begun to appreciate how reliant he’d become upon his old friend, particularly when truly difficult decisions loomed directly ahead.
Then he glanced at T’Pol’s Starfleet‑blue collar, where three bright commander’s pips glinted beneath the ready room’s white overhead lighting.
He looked up into her eyes, which were set into an attentive yet inscrutable Vulcan mask.
“What do youthink I should do, T’Pol?”
Her answer came after only a moment’s hesitation. “While there’s still any chance at all of success, I believe you should do what you’ve more than likely intended to do since before this conversation even began.”
Archer felt a grin begin to spread itself slowly across his face. “That’s the ‘logical’ decision you’d make if you were in my place?”
Something not quite identifiable disturbed the tranquil surface of her features, like a tiny pebble tossed into a still pond. “Captain, some things are…larger than logic.”
He smiled at her. “I promise not to spread around what you just said.”
T’Pol nodded in quiet dignity, then rose from the sofa. She walked directly past him and came to a stop at his desk, where she placed her hand beside the desktop comm button.
She turned and regarded him with a deferential expression. “If I may, Captain?”
He made a simple be‑my‑guest gesture toward the desk.
She punched the comm button. “T’Pol to Mayweather.”
“Mayweather here.”
“Ensign, bring the ship about. Set a course for the Coridan system. Maximum warp.”
“Aye, Commander.”
In for a penny, in for a pound,Archer thought as he and his first officer moved toward the ready room door. Both of us.
Whatever happened, they would face it together.
Forty‑Four
Sunday, February 23, 2155
Enterprise NX‑01
“THERE!” Malcolm Reed cried.
Archer turned his command chair toward the tactical station, watching his armory officer’s intense expression as the lieutenant moved his hands rapidly across his console.
“Put it up on the screen, Malcolm.”
Looking forward over Travis Mayweather’s shoulder toward the main viewer, Archer saw a computer‑rendered diagram of the ten planets of the Coridan system. A deceptively delicate red line was rapidly inscribing itself across the diagram, beginning outside the system, from the general direction of the Romulan Star Empire.
As the line grew, extending itself forward, the gentle parabola it described put it on a direct course for the most populous world in the system.
“No answer to our hails, Captain,” Hoshi said, seated at her communications station on the bridge’s port side. “No sign of an identification beam. No navigational beacon, either. Whoever they are, they don’t want anybody to know they’re coming.”
Belligerency confirmed,Archer thought, gripping the arms of his command chair tightly as he studied the tactical diagram on the screen. This was the engraved invitation to war that Admiral Gardner had evidently been waiting to receive. The attack on Coridan Prime had come, just as Trip had warned him two days earlier.
“Intercept course, Travis,” Archer said. “Maximum warp.” He felt in his gut that they were probably too far away to stop the attacker, but that wasn’t going to stop him from trying.
“Aye, Captain,” Mayweather said as he hastened to enter the appropriate commands into the helm console. The vibration of the deck plates suddenly intensified, growing more urgent as Enterpriseresponded obediently to the ensign’s spurs.
“That thing is moving fast,” Mayweather said, studying his console’s readouts. “My navigational sensors are still having trouble clocking it accurately.”
Archer rose from his command chair and faced Malcolm again. “ Howfast is it going?”