The Good That Men Do - Andy Mangels [63]
Phuong’s dark eyes seemed almost to glow with an inner fervor as he continued: “During the eleven years I served in Earth’s diplomatic service, wishful thinkers have treated my take on the Romulans like the ravings of a delusional paranoid. But the bureau saw the Romulan threat with clear eyes. Its directorate was willing to listen- and more importantly, was willing to do something. The Xindi attack taught us the importance of being out here, of being proactive. That’s why our role in keeping Earth safe will become even more critical as the Coalition moves forward and Earth comes into contact with God only knows how many more new potential adversaries in the years ahead.”
Phuong’s impassioned speech gave Trip a momentary chill of recognition. And despite his current extreme vulnerability- being in deep space with a spy who would no doubt kill him if he perceived him as dangerous to his mission- Trip realized that he simply couldn’t let it pass without comment.
“The last time I saw anybody look as intense as you do right now was the time I nearly got killed by John Frederick Paxton.”
Trip half expected an extremely angry response. But instead, Phuong laughed, the sound coming from deep in his belly.
“Stick with the bureau long enough, Commander, and there’s no way you could mistake us for Terra Prime,” Phuong finally said once his laughter finally died down. “The bureau doesn’t want humanity to shy away from alien contact. Or to expand through the galaxy as exploiters or conquerors. We only want the human race to face whatever’s out there with open eyes, open minds, and a pragmatic attitude.”
Trip absorbed Phuong’s apparently heartfelt sentiments with no small amount of relief. Turning back toward the ever-unfolding starfield that lay before him, Trip resumed studying the image of Adigeon Prime. Although his apprehensions about what lay ahead- particularly about what awaited him in the Adigeons’ surgical facilities- hadn’t entirely abated, they had at least receded somewhat.
Maybe I really did make the best decision I could have by agreeing to come out here, he thought. And the sooner we get the deed done, the sooner I’ll be able to tell my folks and T’Pol that “the rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated.”
That was assuming, of course, that he’d find a way to survive a sojourn in entirely unknown space, while hiding and spying among deadly adversaries, people that no one from his planet had ever even laid eyes on before….
Seventeen
Monday, February 17, 2155
Enterprise Nx-01
THE PALE BLUE DOT on Enterprise’s bridge viewer gradually resolved itself into a disk, then grew still further until it became recognizable as the frigid, perpetually snow-blown desert that was Rigel X- the planet where the Orion’s slave ship’s trail had abruptly ended.
Jonathan Archer had been here before, on his very first mission aboard Enterprise, in fact, and the recollection wasn’t a pleasant one. Since he had hurriedly departed from this place in the midst of a running firefight- and gotten shot while doing so- Rigel X wasn’t high on the list of locales he wanted to revisit anytime soon.
“Delightful planet, Captain,” Malcolm Reed said, with no small amount of irony. Sitting at the tactical station that faced the bridge’s center from starboard, he seemed to have read Archer’s mind better than even Theras could have.
“I suppose ending up at Risa was too much to hope for,” Archer said dryly as he rose from his command chair and strode toward the image of the dark, frigid world that now lay only a few hundred kilometers beneath Enterprise’s ventral hull. Had the star Rigel, visible beyond its tenth planet’s limb as a small but bright disk, not been a blue supergiant, this world would have been as thoroughly frozen and uninhabitable as Pluto. Though quite distant from its primary star, Rigel X provided a marginally livable environment that supported a large population