Malcolm and Hoshi: The Missing Scenes

Awakening

Vulcans.

Considering they’d so consistently taken the high moral line when it came to humanity’s imperfections, Malcolm thought morosely, they could give humanity lessons when it came to conniving and double-dealing.

He sat down in the empty Mess Hall and ran an unsteady hand through his hair.  After the turbulence in the shuttle he needed something to calm his stomach before he returned to the Bridge.  He thought he had time to sink a cup of tea, as long as he made it a short one.

As a rule, he didn’t much care who he was ordered to shoot at, but firing at Vulcan patrol ships in Vulcan’s atmosphere while attempting to flout the orders of the Vulcan High Command was a new one.   The fact that the shuttle had survived to limp back to Enterprise was only due to the fact that they’d been allowed to escape.  And at a guess, it would be only a short time – a very short time – before it was more than patrol ships they’d be facing.  The patrol ships wouldn’t be strong enough to menace a starship, but there was no doubt that battle cruisers would shortly take their place.  And then Acting Captain Tucker would be running very, very short of options.

The wily V’Las obviously didn’t want to start a row with Starfleet.  That’s why he was going to such lengths to drive the Earth ship away, so that he could get on with settling Vulcan’s internal disputes unobserved.  But it was reaching the point where he could claim sufficient provocation for firing on Enterprise herself, especially now that Trip was actually disobeying Starfleet orders to remove the ship.

But did they dare trust his promise that the captain and T’Pol would be returned unharmed?  If the two of them were among the Syrannites whom the High Command had evidently decided were the enemy, and were about to set about destroying, then it might well be that their deaths might fairly be considered to be collateral damage – their own fault for being where they shouldn’t.

“He won’t give a toss if they’re blown to Kingdom Come,” he muttered to himself, taking a cautious sip to see if his tea was cool enough to drink down yet.  “Bastard.”

“Guess you got that about right,” said a tired voice behind him.

He jumped.  Unsurprisingly, the tea slopped over his hand and the table.  It was still quite hot enough to smart, and he hissed a couple of imprecations quite unbefitting a Starfleet officer, shaking his hand to dislodge the drops.

“Sorry.”  Trip was on the way to get himself a cup of coffee.  He looked drawn, as well he might.  “Didn’t realize you hadn’t heard me come in.”

“Bit of a rough ride on the shuttle.  Gave me a bit of an upset stomach.”  Malcolm gave a slightly embarrassed grimace.  “I’ll be up on the Bridge as soon as I’ve drunk this.”

“What’s left of it.”  Tucker stared into his own mug as the beverage dispenser filled it.  “Malcolm, if you were in my place – if it was Hoshi down there – would you put the ship in danger to try to save her?”

“Pardon?”  He blinked.

“You heard me.  If it was Hoshi – an’ she’d married someone else – would you put the lives of everyone on Enterprise at risk, just tryin’ to rescue her?”

Oh my God, I didn’t see this one coming.  So much for being the ship’s tactical officer. 

“I don’t know,” he said stupidly.  “No, I think.  I – I hope I’d be able to say no.  No matter who she’d married.”

“Then I guess you don’t love Hoshi like I love T’Pol.”

The snipe was cruel and unfair; because he was tired and frightened and caught off-balance, he lost his temper.

“You have no bloody right to make judgements on something you know fuck-all about!  I love Hoshi more than I do myself!”

“That’s not sayin’ much!” yelled Trip, losing his own.  “I was with you in that shuttlepod, remember?”

Malcolm’s fingers tightened convulsively around his mug of tea and for an instant he actually contemplated hurling it.  Fortunately he remembered a piece of advice somebody had given him long ago – somebody he’d kissed as the life ebbed away from them:  Somethin’ you do when you’re angry is somethin’ you’ll live to regret.

“I’m sorry you had to be, Commander.”  The fury had abruptly congealed into ice.  “But the fact remains that you’re in command of a starship with almost a hundred people on board, none of whom are responsible for the fact that you’re in love with someone who married somebody else.  And if you want to kill all of them for nothing, that’s your command decision to make.  I have enough trouble carrying my conscience without carrying yours.”

“I didn’t ask to be in goddamn command!  I’m just a goddamn engineer, and they don’t teach you much about politics in warp technology classes!  But I know damn well when I’m bein’ lied to by a connivin’ bastard like V’Las, and if I take Enterprise away from here, the next time we see T’Pol and the cap’n they’ll be in caskets – if there’s enough left of either of them to put in one!”

“Better two than eighty-plus,” answered Reed, trying to keep his voice harsh.  Because one of the eighty-plus would be Hoshi.  “They knew the risks.”

Trip lifted his head and stared at him.

“How in hell did you get to be such a cold-hearted bastard, Malcolm?”

There was a small, tingling silence.

“I think I’ve finished my tea,” he said.  He put the cup down carefully.  “I’ll be on the Bridge if you need me, Commander.  I dare say the Vulcan battle cruisers will be along shortly, and they might be rather rough.  Pity Starfleet spent all the time and effort on repairing the ship, really, considering how long it lasted.”

He stood up and walked to the door.  As he pressed the control he heard Trip call him, but he ignored it.  Yes, I’m a cold-hearted bastard all right.  Call all you like, Trip, you can go to hell.  It’s not like it’s going to go on my records.  I don’t think any of us are going to live long enough for you to reach my personnel file.

His anger took him halfway to the turbo-lift.

Swearing under his breath used up another thirty seconds or so, and then he turned on his heel and walked back to the Mess Hall.

Trip was standing by one of the viewing ports, staring down at the baking red surface of Vulcan turning far below.  The utter despair on his face made Malcolm catch his breath.

Tucker had lost so much.  His kid sister, his home town, his friendship with Jon and finally the woman he loved.  He was a good bloke, battered by blows he didn’t deserve and couldn’t handle.  That was the problem with having a heart the size of an elephant’s: there was more room on it for impact craters.

Cold-hearted bastards had it easy by comparison.

He wasn’t good at speeches.  Nor at much else that didn’t involve explosions of one sort or another, come to that, but if this was going to be the last day of his life he wasn’t going to go with regrets.

He crossed the Mess Hall with rapid strides and put an arm around Trip’s shoulders.

He wasn’t sure whether there would be resistance, but none came.  The chief engineer didn’t take his eyes from the planet, but he gave a little nod of acceptance and gratitude, blinking a few times.

“Malcolm – I –”

“I know.  It’s all right.  Life’s a bitch, as you Americans say.”

“We sure got that right.”  He heaved a shaky sigh.  “We’d better get to the Bridge.  Like you said, those cruisers’ll be along any minute.”

“Look.  About the – about what you asked me.  Just go with your guts, mate.  Bottom line, that’s all anyone can do.”

“Yeah.  Trouble is, sittin’ in the cap’n’s chair doesn’t give you the solutions; it just gives you the problems.”  Trip rubbed his forehead wearily.  “Well, let’s get up there and see what happens.”  He gave the inscrutable surface of Vulcan a last anguished stare and turned away.

Maybe the Captain and T’Pol were still alive down there.  Maybe they were already dead.  Maybe nobody on board would ever know how and when they’d died.  The Vulcan government certainly wouldn’t admit to anything as acutely embarrassing as the ‘accidental killing’ of Captain Jonathan Archer, the hero of the Expanse; though the demise of a lesser star in the firmament of legend could be smoothed away more easily, since she was one of their own.  At a guess they’d both end up being proclaimed as victims of the Syrrannite conspiracy, murdered by the rebels – one more reason for the insurgency to be dealt with firmly and decisively.  Wouldn’t all Earth’s inhabitants want due justice wreaked on the killers of the very people who’d saved them from the Xindi?

But if Enterprise was destroyed in some one-sided battle, that version of events would go down as incontrovertible history.  Nobody would be left alive to tell the truth.  Starfleet certainly wouldn’t argue with it.  As for the fate of the shipherself, it would probably end up being smoothed away too, in the interests of diplomacy; the relationship with Vulcan was far too fragile and precious to be put at risk for a single starship and her mutinous crew.  After all, Admiral Gardner had given the order to Commander Tucker to leave and he’d disobeyed it.  What happened after that was entirely on his own blond head. 

Quite possibly the Syrrannites could be conveniently blamed for that too.  Some cock-and-bull story about hijacking a couple of cruisers and sneaking up on a blameless and unwary Enterprise; presumably one whose bridge crew were asleep and whose tactical officer didn’t recognize the signs of weapons powering up on approaching ships, however supposedly friendly.  What a tragic end for a noble ship and crew.  God, it was enough to make you want to write a play about it.

The sound of their footsteps was loud in the corridor as the two officers walked quickly towards the turbo-lift.  As they reached it, Malcolm glanced once at Trip.  The American’s face was now bleak, but resolute.  His moment of indecision had passed.  Whatever was to come, the Vulcan battle cruisers would find their would-be victim with a strong man in the captain’s chair.

A strong man with some terrible decisions to make.

And I bloody well don’t envy him any of them.