SOMEONE LAUGHED.

Archer, who’d been pacing back and forth in the cell from the moment they’d been put in it—a good hour ago, at a guess—frowned. He turned to seek out the guilty party.

His gaze swept along the back wall of the cell and came to rest on Rodriguez. The young man was sitting on the floor, shaking his head, a trace of a smile still on his face. Yamani, sitting next to him, was smiling too.

Archer walked over to them. Their conversation died out.

“You find something funny about our current situation, gentlemen?” the captain asked.

Both men suddenly straightened.

“No, sir. Sorry, sir.” Rodriguez wiped the grin off his face. Yamani did the same.

“Then what were you smiling about?” Archer sounded Queeg-ish to his own ears, and tried to damp it down. But he was frustrated, and he was angry. To have spent two weeks planning an escape from one prison, only to be trapped in another…

“My fault, captain,” Yamani put in.

“Go on.”

Yamani looked at Rodriguez. “I said, any minute we’d be drawing straws. To see who got to play Dwight’s part.”

Archer shook his head then, and managed a small smile himself.

“You’ve got the part, Crewman,” he said to Yamani. “I’ll let you know when you go on.”

“Thanks, Captain,” Yamani answered.

Archer resumed his pacing.

Eighteen strides before he had to turn around and head in the other direction—which made the cell roughly twenty meters wide. He figured it for half again as deep. “Cell” was maybe the wrong word, though, since the back wall was the only permanent thing about it. The other three sides were composed of a force field, a sheet of floor-to-ceiling pale yellow light that gave a nasty shock when touched.

Holding pen, Archer thought. A temporary one, probably, yet for all that it was less solid than Rava, it felt far more escape-proof. That feeling came from this ship’s crew—no Tomons or Gastornises here. The men and women who had held weapons on them as they’d marched off the Stinger had been completely silent—and utterly professional. A dozen soldiers, none of whom had spoken a word or let their concentration lapse for even a nanosecond.

They’d simply marched Archer and his crew into the cell one at a time, stripping them of weapons, communicators, and anything that might be used to fashion an escape.

And despite Archer’s protests, they’d stripped him of the UT module as well—which he found the most disturbing thing of all.

“Not a good sign,” he told T’Pol once they were all inside the cell. “That they don’t intend to talk to us.”

“Perhaps they simply intend to return us to Rava.”

Archer nodded. Covay had suggested that would be the case.

On the other hand…

There was another, far more sinister implication to what had occurred.

“Captain.” T’Pol must have caught the look on his face. “If you’re suggesting that they intend to kill us out of hand, I must point out that they have had ample opportunity to do so at any point since we lost control of the ship.”

“They didn’t want to damage their vessel before.”

“They wouldn’t have needed to. They could have opened all the airlocks.”

“They could have…” Archer shook his head. He hadn’t thought of that.

“So they want us alive.”

“Perhaps.”

“But they don’t plan on talking to us.”

“So it would seem.”

“So what do you think they intend to do?”

“Without further information, I have no way of knowing.”

Archer frowned.

And at that point, he’d started pacing. Thinking about a way out of this. But what? Another escape didn’t seem likely—not for a long, long time. After Rava, the Denari were going to be very focused on Archer and his crew. He doubted there would be many opportunities for them to gather en masse, unsupervised. There was always a way out of any prison, of course, given enough time, but Archer wasn’t sure how much time they had.

Rodriguez and Yamani might have been kidding about who got to play Dwight’s part, but the truth of the matter was they were all going to end up looking like the young ensign in a little while.

Again, the captain wondered how his captors had done it—seized control of their ship. Those last few minutes before the voice had come over the ship’s intercom, ordering them out of the vessel, T’Pol had spent in fruitless study of the ship’s underlying software protocols, ultimately coming to the conclusion that it was a part of the vessels’ control system, not a jury-rigged thing.

Across the room, a door opened, and a man and a woman entered. More soldiers, though these two were older, instantly recognizable as officers, the man Archer’s height, dark hair, dark skin, the woman a few centimeters taller, blond and fair.

“T’Pol,” the captain said as they approached the force shield.

He turned to see his science officer already on her feet and walking toward him.

They stood together as the other two approached.

Archer got a better look at them now. The man was older than he’d first thought—crows feet in the corners of his eyes, his hair a uniform shade of jet black that suggested it had been dyed—and the woman younger. They were talking animatedly as they approached. Arguing, Archer guessed, though of course he couldn’t understand a word they were saying, since they spoke in Denari.

The woman was in the middle of saying something when the man looked up at the captain, and their eyes met.

The man held up a hand, and the woman fell instantly silent.

“I think,” Archer said out of the corner of his mouth, “this is General Makandros.”

T’Pol nodded, and opened her mouth to speak.

The man beat her to it.

“Yes. I am General Makandros,” he said. “And you are Captain Archer. And you, Sub-Commander T’Pol. Won’t you come with us, please?”

Archer’s eyes widened in surprise.

Not only did Makandros know who they were, but he’d just spoken in perfect, unaccented English.

How?

 

The question burned in Archer’s mind as he and T’Pol followed the general and his aide out of the holding cell and into a corridor every bit as squeaky clean as the interior of the Stinger. That impressed the captain; whatever else was true about Makandros, he obviously ran a tight ship. A tight fleet.

But tight ship or not, how could he know their language? It had been only three weeks since Enterprise was attacked; even Hoshi would have had trouble picking up a completely new tongue in that span of time. No Earth vessel had been out this far before. Archer supposed it was barely possible that a human being had come this way aboard an alien ship, but even if that were true…unless the general was a fanatical student of language, why would he bother to learn English?

There were ways that the general could have known who T’Pol and Archer were. He could have gotten that information from Rava, for one thing. But the language…

That was a mystery only Makandros could provide the solution for. And right now, the general was talking not English, but Denari, having resumed his conversation with the woman almost the instant Archer and T’Pol had stepped out of the holding cell. Again, the captain had the sense it was an argument, and watching their body language now, he had the sense that whatever reasoning the woman was using, it was failing to convince Makandros of anything.

Still, the captain couldn’t help but regard it as a good sign that Makandros was willing to listen to such vigorous debate.

Archer was going to have to do some vigorous debating of his own to not only convince the general to let them go, but help in the search for Enterprise.

The corridor curved, revealing a door on their left.

“Through here,” Makandros said, again in perfect English, and opened the door. The woman walked through first, Archer and T’Pol a step behind. The general followed, shutting the door behind him.

They were in a conference room—a round metal table, half a dozen chairs, a viewscreen along the far wall. Two soldiers, ostentatiously armed, flanked that screen, indistinguishable from the two who had followed them down the corridor—who had no doubt assumed positions outside the conference room door.

Makandros sat. The woman did as well, on his immediate right. Archer and T’Pol took seats across the table from them.

The general leaned forward and spoke.

“Captain Archer. Sub-Commander T’Pol. Welcome aboard the Hule. I apologize for keeping you waiting, but Colonel Briatt”—he nodded to the woman next to him—“and I had urgent matters to discuss. I hope you’ll forgive me—I don’t normally treat flag officers in this fashion. Even if they have just stolen one of my ships.”

Archer had intended to draw Makandros out in conversation gradually—to find out why the general had brought them here, what he intended to do with them, what, above all, he wanted. But the trace of a smile on the man’s face irked him—and his complaint about stealing another man’s ship only made it worse.

“That’s funny,” the captain said. “You being concerned about a stolen vessel. Since my ship is the one that was attacked and taken away in the first place.”

“Yes, Enterprise.” Makandros nodded. “I was operating under long-standing orders when your ship appeared. I had no choice in the matter.”

“Wait a minute.” Archer looked at Makandros, long and hard, and felt the anger rising up inside him. “Are you saying you’re the one who attacked my ship?”

Makandros nodded. “Yes. The DEF boarded your vessel at my command.”

Archer saw red.

“We were crippled. We declared ourselves non-hostile, and yet you fired—”

“Please, Captain. As I said, I had no choice. Then. Things are different now. Allow me to explain.”

The captain got control of himself.

“Before you do that, General, I must admit to being curious. How is it that you speak English?”

Makandros smiled. “Years of practice.”

Archer frowned.

“I don’t understand,” he said.

“The other Starfleet vessel.” Makandros looked from T’Pol to the captain, and his smile slowly faded. “You don’t know about it?”

“No.” The captain shook his head, even more puzzled than before. “Other Starfleet vessel? That can’t be—we’re the first ship out this far.”

“Daedalus,” Makandros interrupted. “That was the name of the ship.”

Archer blinked.

“Daedalus? No.” He shook his head. “It can’t be. Daedalus was…”

Destroyed, he’d been about to say. But what if…

He looked at T’Pol.

“Daedalus. Starfleet’s attempt to build a cascading ion drive. Almost fifteen years ago.”

“I am familiar with the project,” T’Pol said.

“In our universe, it blew up. Here…”

“It may be,” she said. “It seems a logical explanation.”

“For a lot of things,” the captain suddenly realized. The laser pistols that seemed remarkably similar to old Starfleet issue. The familiarity of the Stinger’s control layout, and the Denari communicators.

“Our universe?” It was Makandros’s turn to look puzzled. “What do you mean, our universe?”

Archer exhaled—a long, slow breath.

“General,” he said. “We’ve got some explaining to do as well.”

 

T’Pol did most of the talking; having gone through this particular explanation twice before, she had it down to a science. Archer glanced around the table as she talked, noting that Briatt and Makandros both seemed to be following her well enough. Though the colonel looked skeptical—she kept adjusting the UT module in her ear, which had been brought to her at T’Pol’s suggestion, as if she didn’t think it was working properly. Archer could understand why. Not an easy thing to swallow, the idea that he and T’Pol—and the rest of Enterprise—were from another reality altogether.

For his part, Archer was still having trouble digesting the news Makandros had given him about Daedalus. In particular, the part about Captain Duvall turning traitor.

He’d met her on several occasions, usually in the company of her younger sister, who was in the NX program with him. Monique was several years older, already a captain in Starfleet, who’d commanded several of the early warp-1 vessels. A deep-space veteran. She’d have to be a very different person in this continuum to have done the things Makandros had described. Possible, he supposed, but he had a hard time believing it.

Part of that, Archer had to acknowledge, was the fact that he’d been, quite frankly, infatuated with Duvall. There had even been a time when he thought the two of them—

“This is the most ridiculous story I’ve ever heard in my life, General,” Briatt said, interrupting his train of thought. “A parallel universe.”

“You may be right, Colonel,” Makandros said.

“Any of your staff will be able to duplicate my calculations, General,” T’Pol said.

He smiled. “Of course. Although we have only your word about the value of this constant in your universe, is that not so?”

T’Pol nodded. “For the moment. The data is, of course, available in Enterprise’s computers.”

Which brought them right around to where Archer wanted to be.

“Where is my ship now, General? What have you done with Enterprise?”

Makandros leaned back in his chair, and spread his hands in puzzlement. “I’m afraid I don’t know the answer to that question.”

Archer frowned. “But you said—”

“I helped capture your ship, that is true. But the last I heard, Enterprise had been taken to Denari for repairs. I’ve since learned those repairs were completed, and the ship was taken elsewhere. Where”—he shrugged again—“I cannot say.”

“What about my crewmen—Tucker, Reed, Hoshi…” He ran down the list of everyone who was missing.

Makandros frowned and shook his head. “I don’t know any of those names.”

“Tucker was the engineer, General,” Briatt said.

“The one who—”

“Yes, that’s right. Thank you, Colonel.” Makandros nodded. “I remember now. One of our soldiers identified him. He escaped during the initial attack. Aboard a small craft that seemed to have the capability to…disappear.”

Archer exchanged a glance with T’Pol. The Suliban cell-ship.

So Trip had gotten away. Odds were Hoshi had gone with him—though that didn’t answer the question of where the two were now, or how the captain could go about finding them. Still—

“I’d be interested in hearing about that technology, Captain,” Makandros continued. “How you go about making a ship invisible.”

“It’s alien technology, General. Not ours.”

Makandros smiled. “Really?”

“Yes.”

Briatt snorted. “More lies.”

Archer shot her a glance. “Again, this information is all in our computers. Get us our ship back, we’ll be happy to show it to you.”

Makandros nodded. “We’ll be interested in seeing that information. However, all this—your tales of parallel universes and alien technologies—is beside the point. There is a reason I have had you brought here, and not simply returned to Rava.”

“I had wondered about that,” Archer said.

Makandros nodded. “Things have changed, as I said before. Most importantly, General Sadir is dead.”

“We know.”

“You may not be entirely aware of the implications, however. Sadir came to power in a crucial period in our planet’s history. We were weak—internal strife, political bickering, crisis after economic crisis. He made us strong. The council he installed in power—the council he ruled—enabled us to achieve great things.”

Archer kept the frown he felt inside off his face. Those weaknesses Makandros described—they didn’t sound like weaknesses to him at all. In fact, they sounded like the normal growing pains any representative government went through. Earth had certainly experienced enough of that kind of strife in its history before achieving a unity of purpose. That unity could be maintained only if it grew organically, in his opinion—not if it was imposed.

He didn’t think now was the right time for a discussion of political theory, however.

“Unfortunately,” Makandros continued, “Sadir’s death has led some of those on the Council to attempt to seize control of its power for themselves.”

Archer nodded. That too, sounded like a familiar story. When a dictator fell…

Chaos often followed.

“One of those men is General Elson, Sadir’s chief of staff. A man who I once trusted. No longer.”

Makandros nodded to Briatt, who touched a control pad embedded in the table’s surface. The viewscreen on the far wall came to life.

The screen showed a scene of devastation unlike any Archer had ever seen.

A black swath of space littered with broken, charred ship hulls. Too many to count. Some of them looked familiar to the captain.

Stingers, he realized all at once. Makandros’s ships.

“The vessels you see before you are all that remains of the DEF’s First Battalion. Two days ago, on Elson’s word, I ordered those ships to rendezvous with others under his command. The general swore he had intelligence that would lead us to the Council’s sole remaining enemy, a group of miners who—”

“The Guild,” Archer interrupted.

Makandros eyed him curiously. “Yes. The Guild. How do you know about them?”

The captain smiled. “Have you ever been in prison, General?”

“I can’t say I have had the pleasure, no.”

“Well, trust me. There’s not a lot to do in prison except talk. That’s where I learned about the Guild,” Archer said. “I take it they weren’t there, though—where Elson told you they would be.”

“No. The entire exercise was a trap. Elson’s own forces came out of the Belt and attacked my ships. Did this.” He gestured to the screen. “I cannot conceive what lies he told his troops to get them to fire on us. And then”—Makandros’s voice shook with rage, and he leaned forward across the table—“he had the effrontery to contact me and accuse the Guild of perpetrating this atrocity.”

“He wants you to retaliate,” Archer said.

“Which we would now be doing, had not one of my ships escaped the massacre and brought me word of who was truly responsible. He has to be stopped. I think you would agree with that, Captain.”

Archer nodded. He realized they’d arrived at the reason why Makandros had brought them here—what the general wanted.

He also realized something else.

Sadir—and by extension, Elson—had seized control of Denari using Starfleet technology. His technology—and Archer couldn’t help but feel responsible for that. Even though, logically, since he wasn’t part of this universe…

No. Something told him he had to think with his heart, not his head now. Logic aside, he was Starfleet here and now. He had to help put this right.

But first…

“I agree with you, General,” Archer said. “But I have the feeling you want more than my agreement.”

“You’re right.” Makandros leaned forward. “I want you to carry a message for me, Captain.”

“To…”

“There is a convoy of Guild warships nearby. What I would like you to do, Captain Archer, is carry a message to them for me. A proposal for a truce.”

“Why don’t you just communicate with them directly?”

“We have been attempting to, for some time now. With no response.” Makandros shrugged. “They have ample reason to distrust us, I’m afraid. Almost fifteen years of war—numerous betrayals of ceasefires on both sides. There is no love lost here.”

Archer shook his head. “I don’t understand, then. Even if it comes through me, why are they any more likely to believe what you say?”

“Because I am going to give you something besides a message.”

Next to him, Briatt exploded.

“General, I’ve held my tongue this long, but—”

“We’ve had this argument, Colonel. I’ve made my decision.”

“Sir, this is a bad idea. None of them can be trusted.”

“We’ll find out, won’t we?”

“Some of us will,” Briatt snapped. “Others won’t be around to enjoy that discovery, however.”

“I’m well aware we’re taking a risk, Colonel. Again, I don’t see as we have any choice.”

“Sir—”

“That’s enough,” Makandros said firmly.

Briatt sat back in her chair, frowning. She glared at Archer.

The captain got the feeling that if he and T’Pol hadn’t been present, the colonel would still be arguing her point.

“Now,” Makandros said, leaning forward. “What I propose to give you, Captain, is information. Critical strategic information regarding the disposition of the DEF within the Belt.”

Archer nodded, impressed. Nothing like showing your underbelly to an opponent to convince him of your good intentions.

“We take the ship we came in on, I assume?”

“That’s correct.”

“And just fly right up to these warships, and—”

“Not any warship. You are to insist on delivering this information to Marshal Kairn, aboard the Eclipse.”

“And if they accept your truce…”

“We’ll give you a secure com frequency to transmit their agreement. And then we—Kairn and I—will begin talking directly.”

“Sounds straightforward enough.” Archer frowned. “Unless, of course, this Kairn decides to blast us out of the sky.”

“There is that danger,” the general agreed. “Which is why it’s imperative you approach with defensive systems down, and do not charge your weapons. Give them no reason to suspect you intend harm.”

“Like a lamb to the slaughter.”

Makandros frowned. “Excuse me?”

“Sorry. An Earth reference. All it means is, you’re asking an awful lot of us.”

“I realize that.”

“You’re taking a chance as well.”

“Oh?” Makandros frowned. “How so?”

“How do you know that instead of delivering your information, we won’t just fly off and…”

Go find Enterprise ourselves, Archer had been about to say.

Then he saw a smile tugging at the corners of the general’s mouth. Why…

All at once, he got it.

“My people on Rava.”

Makandros nodded. “They are safe. Don’t worry.”

“But you have control of the prison again.”

“Of course.”

“Of course.” Archer couldn’t keep the anger out of his voice. The general held all the cards here, and Archer didn’t like it one bit.

“I’m sorry, Captain. But you may recall there were other prisoners among your people—they at least needed to be secured. And I’m told, by the way, there were no injuries incurred on either side during the operation.”

Archer nodded. No heroics, he’d told O’Neill, and apparently she’d listened. That, at least, was good news.

“So you’ll hold my crew hostage to make sure we deliver your message?”

“That is essentially correct.”

“Sir.”

Archer turned to T’Pol.

“With the crew back in custody, the general should be made aware of Doctor Phlox’s theories, I believe.”

Archer nodded. She was right, of course.

He filled Makandros in as quickly as he could.

“We’ll send medical personnel to the prison then. At once.” The general frowned, and looked from the captain to T’Pol. “Are you two suffering from this as well?”

“To some extent,” Archer said, suddenly aware of how tired he was. He must have been running on adrenaline these past few hours—which he’d have to do just a while longer.

Because Makandros and he hadn’t quite finished cementing their bargain yet.

“Supposing we do this for you, what then?”

“I help you find your ship.”

“How about if you start looking now?” Archer said.

“We have been doing just that, for the last several days, in fact.” At the captain’s questioning look, Makandros continued. “Enterprise is a very powerful weapon, as I’m sure you’re aware. It would be foolish of me not to try and locate it, especially since it may be used against me in battle.”

“You’re assuming someone hostile to you has it?”

“I am. In fact, I believe General Elson has control of your vessel.”

“You know this for a fact?”

“No. It is only supposition on my part. But Elson controls the machinery of Sadir’s government, the Kresh. It makes sense he would be controlling your ship’s movements.”

Archer saw where this was headed. Makandros wouldn’t be able to look for Enterprise until Elson was defeated. He didn’t like that either.

“No offense, General, but if I risk my neck for you, I’d like something a little more substantive in return. Something other than promises.”

“What did you have in mind?”

“Ships.” At Makandros’s questioning look, the captain continued. “Stingers. Enough to carry my entire crew—so we can all search for Enterprise.”

“We’ll have to see,” Makandros said. “As you can tell, we are at war. I cannot promise anything.”

“You’re asking a lot,” Archer said.

“I realize that.” The general sat back in his chair. “It’s the best I can do for now. If you won’t agree to help us on those terms, I’ll find another way to get that message to the Guild.”

The captain frowned. His gut was telling him that Makandros was on the level, but still…his head wanted a concrete show of the general’s good faith before committing to any course of action.

“How about my missing crewmen? Will you begin a search for them now?”

Makandros nodded. “We can try.”

“All of them besides Tucker and Hoshi were at Rava for a few days.”

Makandros nodded. “There may be a record of where they were taken. We can look.”

“Good.”

“And your other crewmen were…”

Archer gave him the whole list.

“Anyone else?”

No, the captain was about to say.

And suddenly realized that in all the rush and excitement of today’s events—today’s discoveries—he’d forgotten that there was someone else missing. Someone else close to him who he had last seen aboard Enterprise, and hadn’t heard a word about since.

“Yes, there was someone. Actually, not someone. My dog.”

“Dog?” Makandros said the word as if he’d never heard it before. “What is that?”

“An animal—a companion. My companion.” Archer described Porthos.

Briatt rolled her eyes. “That animal.”

“Now, Colonel,” Makandros said. “Just because you don’t like—”

“Wait a minute,” Archer said. “You know where he is?”

“Of course.” Makandros turned to one of the guards and spoke in Denari. The guard nodded and left the room. “A very clever creature, your—dog, was it?”

“Dog. Yes.”

“And its name is Porthos. A shame.”

“Why?”

“I had gotten used to calling it something else.”

“You had—”

The door opened, admitting the guard who’d just left the room…

And a small, brown creature who barked once and jumped into the captain’s lap.

“Porthos!”

Archer broke into the first honest-to-goodness smile he’d worn in weeks.

“Hey, boy. Hey.”

The captain scratched behind the dog’s ears. Porthos wagged his tail and licked Archer’s face. Normally, the captain didn’t like that. Didn’t let him do it without a stern warning.

Not now.

“He’s happy to see you,” Makandros said.

“Yes,” Archer nodded, suddenly at a loss for words.

The dog barked once more, and then jumped out of Archer’s lap and strode, head high, around the table to where Makandros sat, hand outstretched with something in it. A biscuit. Archer recognized it as being from the stash he kept aboard Enterprise for Porthos.

At least he’s not going to get sick anytime soon, the captain reflected.

Porthos took the biscuit and started munching happily.

Makandros started scratching behind the dog’s ears.

“He’s happy to see you, too,” Archer said.

“That’s right.”

The general looked up. The two men shared a smile.

“I’ve found,” Makandros said, continuing to scratch, “your dog tends to be an excellent judge of character, Captain.”

Archer nodded. “Funny. That’s just what I was going to say.”