And perhaps Trip’s death signified that the time had finally arrived to move past such impulses.

She started to fold Trip’s uniform, but found herself, without cause, pulling it close to her face. She inhaled deeply, directing the residual musky scent of her former lover on the garment.

Ever since she’d come on board Enterprise, she’d been tolerant of the assault of smells that swirled around her: the humans, Captain Archer’s dog, and even from the machinery that ran the vessel. But now, as she smelled the ghosts of Trip’s sweat, mixed with the slight ozone tang of the engine room, she found the odors comforting.

The door to Trip’s quarters slid open, but T’Pol didn’t turn to see who was entering.

“Need any help?” Captain Archer asked, leaning against the bulkhead beside the bed.

T’Pol began refolding the uniform, handling it as though it were a precision scientific instrument. “No, thank you.”

Archer gestured toward the case she had been preparing. “For his parents?”

Nodding listlessly, T’Pol asked, “Will they still be coming to the ceremony?”

“We didn’t talk long, but I’ll try to make sure that they do. I think they know that Trip wouldn’t want it any other way.”

He chuckled mirthlessly and reached forward, pulling a small Frankenstein monster figure from the shelf. “Don’t forget this,” he said, holding it out for her.

T’Pol took the figurine and studied it in silence, remembering the first time she and Trip had watched the original film version of Frankenstein. He had shown it to her as a thank‑you for the Vulcan neural pressure therapy sessions she had been performing on him to help him get over his insomnia. It was during the viewing that they had first touched in a far less formal–and decidedly nontherapeutic–manner. Just Trip’s hand over hers, but she had not pulled away, nor questioned his intentions as she might have just days earlier.

Aware that the captain was watching her expectantly, she said, “I’d like to meet them.”

“His parents?” asked Archer.

“Yes, I’d like to meet them.” T’Pol stared down at the figurine in her hands, stroking it.

Archer moved past her, toward the head. T’Pol could sense that he seemed nervous, as if afraid of saying the wrong thing. “They’re a little eccentric. I think you’ll see where Trip got his sense of humor.”

“My mother was somewhat eccentric, as well,” T’Pol said.

Archer stared away from her. “I wasn’t around her for very long, but I could see that.”

T’Pol placed the Frankenstein monster figure into the case. “Trip told me that as time went by, I would miss her less.” She sat down on the bed, feeling her mind clouding with unwanted emotions again. “Though she hasn’t yet been gone for a year, I think he was wrong. Because I find myself missing her more with each passing month. Why would he tell me that?”

Archer spread his hands awkwardly. “‘Time heals all wounds’…but ‘Absence makes the heart grow fonder.’ I guess it’s a little tricky.” He moved over toward her. “Emotions have a way of contradicting themselves.”

T’Pol could feel the pain rising again inside her, pushing against her eyes and her sinuses. “And you wonder why we suppress them?” She looked down, forcing herself not to give in to her feelings, pushing back against them as hard as they pushed to escape.

Archer sat on the bed and leaned toward her. “When I took command of Enterprisealmost four years ago, I saw myself as an explorer. I thought all the risks would be worth it…because just beyond the next planet, just beyond the next star, there would be something magnificent. Something…noble.”

He paused, as if searching for the right words. “And now, Trip is dead…and we’re out here chasing aliens who want to stop our exploration, who don’t care about noble ideals, and who never had the good fortune to know Trip.”

Archer turned and looked toward the viewport, and into the inky space beyond it. “In a few weeks, I have to go give that speech at the Coalition Compact signing ceremony. I have to talk about how all the risks were worth it, about how worthwhile it’s all been…”

“Trip would be the first to say it wasworthwhile,” T’Pol said, her voice barely wavering as she swallowed still more of her sorrow.

Archer looked at her and smiled, but his expression contained no joy or mirth. She could see in his eyes that he was conflicted, that something else, something deeper, was troubling him. It was a look of regret and uncertainty. He opened his mouth as if to say something further, then looked away, to the viewport and the warp‑distorted streaks of starlight beyond.

Finally, he stood and walked to the door. “I’ll leave you to finish here, T’Pol. But if you need to talk to me–even if you need to let down your famous Vulcan guard–you’re welcome to. I won’t tell.”

T’Pol regarded her captain for a moment. She wondered what he would think if she revealed that one of the last things she had told her mother before her death was that she didn’t want anything further to do with her. How would Archer feel if he were to learn that when she had first learned of little Elizabeth’s mixed parentage, she had wanted nothing more than for the child to disappear?

What would his reaction be if he knew that Trip and T’Pol had decided to break off their relationship completely on Vulcan, but that she had found among his belongings an undelivered letter written aftertheir journey to Vulcan–a letter in which Trip had described his deep and full love for her, and the pain their separation was causing him?

And worst of all were her own traitorous thoughts, full of love and other emotions as well, all of which brought her anguish every time she considered life without Trip.

And now, she had no choice but to forge ahead alone. Her mother, her child, her lover. All gone.

She swallowed and blinked, masking her shame behind what she hoped was an impassive Vulcan mask. “Thank you for your offer, Captain. But I believe I can deal with such things on my own.”

The words seemed to echo in the air after Archer exited.

On my own.

T’Pol lay her head down on one of Trip’s pillows. Then, silently, agonizingly, before she could halt them, tears rolled down her cheeks.

Sixteen

Saturday, February 15, 2155

Deep space

“ADIGEON PRIME,” Trip said as he idly studied the image of the blue‑green planet displayed on Phuong’s secondary library‑computer monitor. According to the Branson’s navigational computer, their destination lay some eighteen hours away at their current speed. “Don’t know a lot about the place.”

Seated in a relaxed fashion in the pilot’s seat, Phuong cast a grin in Trip’s direction. “That may be because the Adigeons don’t like to call a lot of attention to themselves. They’re businessmen.”

Trip shifted in the copilot’s seat, struggling vainly to get comfortable as he turned to face Phuong. “Don’t businessmen need to advertise?”

“Not when so much of their business depends on…discretion,” Phuong said.

Trip nodded, understanding. “So they’re criminals.”

“That’s oversimplifying things quite a bit, Commander,” Phuong said, shaking his head. “Let’s just say they often act as third‑party brokers to many interstellar business entities who value their privacy. Including the Romulans, who are notoriously secretive about their military and civil affairs and their strengths and weaknesses. You might describe the Adigeons as a sort of cultural and intelligence membrane between the Romulans and the other societies with whom they sometimes have to do business. Sort of like the old Swiss banking firms back on Earth.”

“So our plan is to use the Romulans’ own Adigeon Prime business agents to infiltrate them,” Trip said. “I guess the Adigeons’ discretion must come with a price, and that it’s a price the bureau was able to pay.”