“Hail the newcomers, Sidra, Hernandez said.

“Theyre priming their weapons, Thayer shouted, her voice ragged.

“All available power to hull plating! Hernandez barked. She wondered if the systems remaining power would be enough to resist even the first shots of the new arrivals, or if this was to be Columbias last stand.

A moment later, all four of the Klingon vessels fired, but only one seemed to be taking aim at either of the Starfleet ships.

The other three had directed their disruptor blasts at the fourth cruiser, the last of the original trio that had attacked Draylax.

Caught in a withering crossfire, the cruiser erupted instantly in a series of conflagrations that might have been brilliant enough to damage every optic nerve on Columbias bridge had the main viewers luminal filters not intervened to prevent it.

“What the Hernandez couldnt even finish her thought.

A moment later, the newly arrived trio of Klingon cruisers abruptly turned about and sped away, accelerating to warp almost instantly on a direct heading toward Klingon space.

Hernandez looked around at her bridge crew. “What the hell just happened here?

“I was hoping you could tell me,Archer said from the audio speakers.

Focusing on the screen, Hernandez watched as the last molecular fires from the destroyed Klingon ships expanding debris field silently burned themselves out several hundred kilometers over Draylax.

Something extremely strange had just happened here, and the only people who might supply the answer to the mysterythe Klingons aboard the three just‑departed battle cruiserswere gone, leaving nothing but destruction and questions in their wake.

SIXTEEN

Friday, July 18, 2155 Enterprise NX‑01, near the Draylax system

T HE AFTER‑BATTLE REPAIRS, which mostly centered on Columbias rather extensive but thankfully nonfatal damage, had made for a long day that had challenged the combined engineering teams of both Enterpriseand Columbia. And now, despite the lateness of the hour, Jonathan Archer found that he couldnt sleep. Lying on the bed in his night‑dimmed quarters, he felt a desperate need, almost a physical hunger, to talk to someone about his current problem with the Klingons.

At least someone other than Porthos, whom he noted was still watching him in the semidarkness, his large black eyes alert as he lay on the pillow in the corner he used for sleeping. Though he knew he was anthropomorphizing, Archer couldnt help but read the beagles vaguely quizzical expression as one of canine concern about the current pensive state of his human.

Still recumbent, Archer reached across the bed to the small com panel mounted on the wall nearest to the bed. He hesitated as his fingers made contact with the button.

Archer paused for a moment. While he certainly had the authority to interrupt his senior officers off‑duty activities when circumstances warranted, even in the dead of ships night, he didnt consider his personal feelings of isolation and loneliness to be sufficient cause. And despite the unprecedented emotional closeness he and his first officer had come to share over the past few months, he hadnt forgotten the ingrained tendency of Vulcans toward a certain standoffishness. He also knew how emotionally stressed TPol had been lately, perhaps as much by Trips feigned death as by the need to keep the truth behind it concealed from all but a small handful of her crewmates and friends. Considering all shed been through since shed first set foot aboard Enterprise,she deserved to be allowed to continue doing whatever she needed to do in order to keep body and katratogether.

He resigned himself to dealing on his own with the Klingon problem.

He sat up with a sigh, and Porthos regarded him with an expectant look and a wagging tail for a moment before launching himself into Archers lap. Scratching the dogs head behind the right ear, he said, “Porthos, how do you feel about trading jobs with me?

Porthos tipped his head and whined, and his swiftly wagging tail abruptly dropped out of warp.

Archer chuckled. “Sorry. Youre way too smart to fall for that. Get some sleep. Oneof us should.

He patted Porthos near the rump, and the dog jumped back down and returned to his sleeping corner while Archer finally gave up on the idea of slumber entirely. Sometime during the few minutes it took Archer to doff his bathrobe and don his standard blue duty uniform, the beagle had closed his eyes and drifted off into what looked like a bottomlessly deep slumber.

Archer looked on wistfully as the sleeping animals paws jerked three times, probably in response to the appearance of a sprawling dream‑pasture, a wish granted by some merciful canine Morpheus. Until he got to the bottom of this mess with the Klingons, he seriously doubted hed be able to follow Porthoss wise example.

Moving quietly, he crossed the small room to his desk and took a seat in front of the computer terminal there. He entered his personal com access code manually, along with a particular subspace frequency, and then drummed his fingers on the desk for several seconds while the screens ship status updates vanished.

Archer ceased his drumming when a blood‑red Klingon trefoil emblem appeared, standing out starkly against a background as black as space itself. A moment later, the alien sigil was replaced by the scowling visage of a middle‑aged male Klingon dressed in a warriors battle armor. For an absurd moment, Archer wondered whether everybody on QonoS dressed like that, right down to the receptionists in the lobby who answered the incoming com transmissions and whoever came in at night to mop the floors and empty out the wastepaper baskets.

“NuqneH, Terangan? the frowning warrior said as Enterprises linguistic translation matrix took a beat to calibrate before beginning its continuous real‑time translation stream. “What do you want, Terran?

Noting that the man on the other end of the comlink had a conspicuously smooth, humanlike forehead, Archer knew he would have to proceed with no small amount of caution. After all, any Klingon who bore a permanent reminder of that particular crisis was bound to have a chip on his shoulder when it came to dealing with humans.

But he also understood Klingons well enough to know that they preferred plain talk to beating around the bush.

“I am Captain Jonathan Archer of the Starship Enterprise. I must speak with Fleet Admiral Krell immediately regarding the Draylax situation.

“I am Captain Qapegh, Fleet Admiral Krells adjutant,the Klingon said with a pronounced sneer. “You have already been privileged to speak with the admiral very recently. Why should I permit you to do so again so soon after the previous occasion?

Although Archer never broke eye contact with the Klingon on the monitor, his hands moved busily across his desktop keyboard as he composed a covert text message just out of the line of sight.

Cant afford to let myself look like a timid beggar,Archer told himself as he fixed the other man with his hardest, most withering stare.

“I called before to seek an explanation for the Klingon Empires hostilities against Draylax, he said, discreetly hitting the “transmit key as he spoke. “Admiral Krell has yet to provide a satisfactory one.

Though Qapegh bared his sharpened teeth aggressively, he appeared impressed by Archers audacity nevertheless. “You risk much, human.

“Its all part of the service, Sparky.

The Klingon suddenly broke off from Archers stare, apparently not out of intimidation, but rather because something outside the Klingon com systems field of view had just demanded his attention.

“You havetarg‑ backed a text transmission onto the subspace channel you used to reach this office,Qapegh said, his face adorned in undisguised surprise as he looked back in Archers direction.