Captain Jonathan Archer looked at the magnificent vessel he would soon command through the inspection pod's window and could only find one thing wrong with her. She was too well armed.

"Sometimes I feel like I'm already taking her into battle Trip." Archer said to his pilot, friend, and soon to be chief engineer Charles Tucker the third.

"There's no helping it cap, Starfleet's a military branch these days. And the military needs it's ships tough. Besides, our mission won't be any different than if we had built her with the original design. So what's the problem?"

Archer had to admit that Trip had a point, the vast majority of Enterprise's design was still relatively unchanged. However, the ship had gone from three to twelve Phase Cannons, its hull plating had been greatly strengthened, its torpedo tubes had been redesigned to fire the newly invented Photonic Torpedoes, and it had been modified to accommodate a new energy shield system that was still being perfected, now completed, at the time construction had begun.

Archer took a moment think before giving Trip a very honest answer. "Our mission then was only to explore for the sake of exploring and learning everything there is to know. Now it's to find potential resources and allies." He then turned to look back at the Enterprise, "And with that much firepower at my disposal I wonder if the people we find will become our friends because they want to, or because they'll feel they have to."

Trip chuckled before replying, "We're still explorers captain, we just have a little extra protection against people who don't want to be friends. Nothing more to it."

"Since when did you vote for Terra Firma?" Archer jokingly remarked. He knew how much Trip truly hated the two previous administrations and the political party they represented. Even hinting a connection between his beliefs and theirs often got an enraged response out of him.

However, to his credit Trip only responded with a brief glare of annoyance before replying. "It's not like we're going to have our weapons powered up and ready to go whenever we meet another ship out there, and the Vulcans still have us outclassed in the weapons department. So if you ask me, the odds of us sticking out because of the power of our weapons is very small."

"You know as well as I do that those knew weapons and shields wouldn't have been developed in time to add to Enterprise's design if Shinji Okeda hadn't become president and exploded the military budget. And it wasn't to make exploration safer."

Trip cringed at that reminder, but held firm to his argument. "Yeah, I know. He wanted to get us ready to invade Vulcan at some point. But at the same time I think we are still better off with at least half of these armaments. The various pirate attacks on civilian transports prove that the galaxy can be a tough place at times."

"Maybe you're right, but it still makes me think that arming ourselves to the teeth without having a real enemy is just a step backwards for us." Archer replied.

Trip shrugged and nodded his head slightly as he replied. "You might be right there, but at the same time the Vulcans are just as responsible for that step backwards as Terra Firma. Perhaps more. They did try to sabotage your dad's engine fourteen years ago after all."

"And held back a lot of valuable information before that too. But reacting to that scandal by voting in two Xenophobic presidents was still overkill in my opinion. Hell, we might even be at war with Vulcan by now if they had ever gotten a majority in the United Earth Senate." Archer replied before slightly slamming himself back into his seat. "I just worry what will happen to our mission if those mad men were to ever be voted back into office while we're away."

Trip whistled before exclaiming, "No need to get that dark on me captain. I for one don't think that will happen, and if it does I don't want to think about defecting to Vulcan or any other aliens we run into out there. At least not yet anyway."

Archer chuckled himself and was about to ask how well Trip's Vulcan was when he noticed blue and green flashes out in the distance. Flashes that were now getting closer.

"What's that?" Archer asked as he pointed at the display just as one of the blue flashes began heading their way and suddenly impacted into the spacedock's shields.

"Holy cow! Are we under attack?!" Trip exclaimed as he jerked the pod's controls to fly it away from the shield perimeter, and closer to Enterprise. But in doing so Trip had accelerated more than he needed to and was unable to keep the pod from bumping into the ship.

Archer activated the pod's comm unit. "This Archer to Spacedock 1, status report."

Two long agonizing seconds passed before the dock master finally responded. "There is a firefight between one unknown alien vessel and nine pursuers, also of unknown origin. They suddenly appeared on our scopes less than two minutes ago and started shooting at each other. Both sides have ignored all attempts at hailing them and a full squadron of Planetary Defense Fighters has been launched to intercept them. ETA tell contact, one minute. We're doing what we can to divert all traffic away from the combatants in the meantime."

Archer and Trip turned to look at each other before Trip remarked, "And you thought we didn't need big guns." They both then looked outside just as the alien ships flew past the spacedock.

The first intruder actually seemed to do its best to avoid contact with civilian vessels and only returned fire when its pilot seemed certain that no other ships were in the line of fire. Despite being outnumbered and picky about when to return fire the pursued pilot was skilled enough to disable two, and destroy one, of its attackers.

The other six pursuers on the other hand did not seem to care who or what was in the way of their goal. It was because of this that Starfleet's twenty-four Planetary Defense Fighters chose to initially ignore the pursued vessel and engaged its remaining attackers instead. Although outnumbered the lead attacking vessel was about half the size of the soon to be launched Enterprise it had just flown past and was much harder to bring down than the others. Because of that, three of the smaller vessels were able to continue their pursuit and ultimately force their prey into earth's atmosphere where they were intercepted by six more fighters that had been on a training exercise.

Despite this assistance, the pursued pilot was unable to keep his, or her, ship in the air and ultimately crashed in a cornfield outside the city of Broken Bow in the province of Oklahoma.

The larger vessel in orbit had been able to track its target's descent even while being hammered by Starfleet's fighters. At some point its captain must have decided that the enemy pilots death had to be ensured and beamed down five person elimination team just before it was destroyed.

Of all the attacking ships only the one disabled by their target survived as it seamed to simply disappear from sensors as soon as its compatriots were attacked by earth forces.

Klaang hopped out of the wreckage of his ship and took a second to say a silent prayer of respect for it before running in the direction of the local population center he had glimpsed during his descent.

Klaang had spotted several Vulcan ships as he approached deeper into the system while trying to elude the Cabal strike group. Enough to be certain that they had a sizable presence on this world, one large enough for him to safely assume that the natives were almost as soft as them. Which meant he could most likely "find" new transportation off world with ease.

He started walking at first, confidant that his attackers were too busy fighting or dying to be able to follow him on the ground. While obviously inexperienced, the pilots that came to his aid showed enough skill for him to know that the Cabal ships couldn't possibly land on this planet. And even if they did defeat the natives the Vulcan vessel he detected approaching the scene would certainly finish them off. However, the unmistakable sound of a transporter beam caught his attention and he froze in the middle of the field of tall plants. A second later Klaang caught the unmistakable stench of Sulaban and instantly began running for what looked to be a tall storage building to his left just outside the crop field.

While every fiber of Klaang's warrior soul screamed for him to turn and face his enemies, he knew that the information he possessed was far too important to risk losing in a fight and so continued to run. All the while praying that the shot that kills him didn't hit his back, forever marking him as a coward.

"I must live for the sake of the empire. The Empire is all that matters." Klaang continuously thought to himself as he finally exited the crop field and saw a small Vulcan like creature, he knew it was not vulcan because of the clothing it wore, coming out of a small building, probably its home, only for it to dart back inside when one of Klaang's pursuers fired in its direction.

Klaang continued to the taller building, hoping to use it as a fortified position to help him survive until the native reinforcements arrived. Although he felt dishonored by relying on aliens, he knew that he had no better option. A fact made even more clear when one of the enemy disruptor bolts singed his left shoulder as he arrived at the building's door.

Klaang turned, took out his own disruptor pistol, and quickly fired upon his attacker striking her in the right shoulder. Klaang then entered the building and quickly sealed the door behind him. He looked around and saw a ladder to his right leading to another door on a walkway above.

Thinking that he could snipe at his pursuers from above, Klaang quickly began climbing. It was then that he noticed the smell of methane and knew he needed to leave before the Sulaban begin cutting their way inside. "Why would the Vulcans have trade relations with a species primitive enough to still collect methane?!" Klaang screamed inside his own head.

He had reached the upper door when he heard the Sulaban begin cutting away holes at various points down below. Knowing that he wouldn't have much time before the building ignited, Klaang blindly leaped as he opened the door and was halfway to the ground when the methane ignited.

Klaang was scorched and broken when he regained consciousness a few moments later. He struggled to get back to his feet and was fired upon by the very Sulaban he had wounded earlier. Thankfully, she was in no better shape than him and missed. Klaang pointed his own weapon at her and was enraged to find it too damaged to fire. He could do nothing but watch as his attacker got closer for a certain kill shot. "At least I will die facing my killer, die with honor." He thought to himself as he tried to charge at his opponent.

He thought it was a miracle from Khaless himself when the Sulaban assassin collapsed to the ground before she could fire. A smoking hole in her back.

Klaang looked up to find the native he had seen earlier pointing a primitive looking energy rifle at him. Evidently he was the one that had just saved him. The creature looked almost identical to a Vulcan, with the only physical difference being less pointy ears, and was rambling senseless gibberish as he shook relentlessly.

"I was saved by a creature "this" pitiful?" Klaang thought to himself in astonishment. Deep in his heart he knew that his ancestors weep at the shame of this moment. Even so, he reminded himself that all that truly mattered at the moment was his mission and strove to swallow his pride for the moment.

However, the pitiful creature still shook with fear and rambled on incoherently as Klaang hobbled his way towards him. When Klaang demanded that it stop talking it fired. And Klaang saw only black.

Captain Jonathan Archer almost felt like he had arrived at a military fortress rather than a hospital when he stepped out of the shuttle that had brought him to Starfleet Medical's roof. On the way, he had counted at least twenty-four of Starfleet's new Planetary Defense Fighters flying in defensive formation above the building and had seen numerous Global Police Force officers and World Army troops setting up fortifications on the ground as the shuttle was landing on the roof.

A pair of Starfleet Security officers escorted Archer from his shuttle to an observation room where President Andrew Kimmel, Admiral Maxwell Forest, and General George Casey were observing several doctors, one of them a Denobulan, operating on a fierce-looking alien with dark skin and large cranial ridges, a species unknown to him.

"Mister President? I knew things had to be serious when the Admiral ordered me here, but to see you here in person?"

"I am here to make sure our arriving guests understand just how serious we are in defending our sovereignty."

"Is there more trouble with the Vulcans that I'm not aware of sir?"

It was General Casey who answered first. "If you call opening fire on our troops on our own soil trouble, then I guess you could say that."

"What?"

This time it was Admiral Forest that answered. "The individual being operated on in that room was the pilot of the ship you saw being chased earlier. When neither side answered our hails we sent up a squadron of fighters to intercept them. His pursuers quickly opened fire on our fighters when ordered to surrender. We destroyed them, but his ship was already badly damaged and crashed in a cornfield just outside the city of Broken Bow in Oklahoma. The larger vessel then sent down a small team to make sure he was dead before it was destroyed."

"How do the Vulcans fit into this?" Archer asked in genuine confusion.

It was President Kimmel himself who finished the impromptu debrief. "We sent two teams to either rescue or apprehend any survivors, but when they got there our friend here had already killed most of his pursuers only to be shot by the farmer who owned the field. That farmer was then subdued by a Vulcan retrieval team that had arrived to do our job for us. When our troops arrived they refused to give us either the Klingon, the name of this man's species, or the remains of the two ships. When I was informed of the situation I ordered our troops to place the Vulcans under arrest, they resisted and lost. Thankfully both sides had their weapons on stun."

To say that Archer was shocked with the Presidents rather brutal response to the Vulcan refusal would be an understatement as the man not only campaigned on a platform of renewed cooperation and trade with the Confederacy of Vulcan, and any other species out there, but has legitimately spent the first year of his six-year term repairing relations that were damaged by the last two Terra Firma Presidencies. In fact, such a decision would have been perfectly natural for either of his last two predecessors, the first of whom officially converted Starfleet from a civilian organization into a third branch of the military.

"What exactly were the Vulcans trying to claim the crash site for anyway? They know we still haven't completely forgiven them for what they tried to do fourteen years ago. Why risk angering us again now?"

President Kimmel turned to look at the injured Klingon in the other room before answering. "The Klingon Empire is apparently one of the largest and most powerful governments in the known galaxy. It is one of the most hostile ones too and has already conquered and enslaved several other species. The Klingons themselves are also apparently quite prideful and easily offended. Ambassador Soval told me that the Empire would likely not trust us at our word with what happened to their man's ship and immediately attack us in retribution. He supposedly was only trying to save us from a very lethal attack."

From the moment Archer had entered the room the President had been doing most of the talking, and by the looks, on the faces of Admiral Forest and General Casey, it was clearly intentional. "Mr. President, I understand that this is an emergency situation, but why exactly was I ordered here in the first place? Particularly since I get the impression that you already have made up your mind on how to handle this."

Archer could see a smile form on the edge of Kimmel's face just before he spoke again. "Tell me. Do you know why you and Admiral Forest in particular were allowed to keep your original ranks when Starfleet was converted into a military organization? And why you were allowed to advance in rank normally while he wasn't?"

President Kimmel was suddenly touching upon a rather uneasy subject within Starfleet. When relations with the Vulcans suddenly soured fourteen years ago it had allowed the Xenophobic Terra Firma party to rise to power and begin a crusade of rapid militarization. A crusade that would have been total, and some claim would have been the end for democracy, had they ever been able to gain a majority in the United Earth Senate. During that time President Shinji Okeda drastically enhanced the military spending and chose to militarize Starfleet instead of creating an entirely new agency from scratch. Not everyone in Starfleet agreed with his militant agenda and many of those who openly expressed any form of dissent, like Forest and Archer, were either removed or demoted.

"The Senate protected the vast majority of Starfleet from political retaliation. That included then Commador Forest. I on the other hand was spared completely because of my father's work on the Warp Five program. The fact that he was stonewalled by Vulcan interference played well into President Okeda and then President Reeve's agendas. That being said, I have no doubt that I would never have been given command of Enterprise if you hadn't won the election against Martha Long."

"I assure you Archer that your political opposition to Terra Firma was literally the only reason why you were never given the job sooner. Even Okeda's appointees were in your favor. Carl Reeves was the only one keeping that job open. No special treatment was given to you on my part. Although, I admit that Maxwell's promotion to Admiral and Starfleet's Chief of Staff was."

One look at General Casey's face was all Archer needed to know that the President's display of favoritism was not completely welcomed, or accepted, in the military's upper ranks.

"That truly is comforting to hear sir, but why bring it up now?"

"You're about to find out Captain." President Andrew Kimmel then pressed a button on what looked to be an antique watch on his right wrist and a few seconds later Ambassador Soval and two of his aids, an older male and a far younger female, entered the room escorted by six heavily armed Army Rangers.

Ambassador Soval was quick to speak first. "Mr. President I am surprised to be speaking to you directly."

"I felt that the unique nature of this situation required my immediate personal attention. Especially given the nature of our relations over the past fourteen years."

"I suppose you're correct about that. How is the patient?"

"We just arrived ourselves and were discussing how the four vessels were able to get so close to earth before finally being detected. So I am happy to say that we will all learn that answer at the same time." President Kimmel then turned around and pressed a button on the wall speaker. "Doctor Phlox what is the current condition of your patient?"

It was the Denobulan doctor that responded while still operating. "We are just about finished repairing the damage to his heart. Once that is done I am proud to say that he will be in critical, but stable condition. Given time I would expect him to make a full recovery."

The President let go of the speaker and turned to face Soval and his aids. "As you can see, there isn't much reason to worry about this man's survival. However, there is a reason to worry about whether or not I should put the three of you under arrest for that truly insane violation of our sovereignty today. I know what you said about protecting us, but I call you a liar. Admit it, you thought that with Terra Firma no longer in power that you would be able to reassert control over us."

Soval took a second to compose himself before speaking. "As I have said many times before my people have never controlled, or tried to control yours. We have only ever sought to guide you on a more peaceful path than what we found you on."

"I wouldn't call the deliberate sabotage of our Warp Five program, and likely many other projects, guidance. Neither would any other human."

"Again, I truly had no knowledge of that incident..."

"Trust me, Ambassador, that is the only reason you were never arrested by my predecessors. Regardless, the fact remains that the Confederacy of Vulcan once again violated United Earth's sovereignty barely a year after promising to never do so again in exchange for the early release of your operative. That will have severe consequences, exactly how severe will depend on how you answer my questions."

"Mr. President you can't seriously think..."

"What I think right now is that I am looking at the representative of a supposed ally that has now violated my world's sovereignty twice and unilaterally reneged on an agreement it only recently made. I can only imagine how other worlds are going to react upon hearing that. Don't think for a second that I can't use this to damage your government both politically and financially."

Archer had to admit to himself that the look of astonishment on the faces of Soval and his two aids was more than enough to justify voting for Kimmel the last election. "If only dad was around to see this himself." He thought to himself as he struggled, successfully, to keep from making his amusement evident.

Soval seemed to realize that President Kimmel was giving him a chance to avoid such a blemish on his people's reputation, never mind his own for causing the situation that made it possible, as he regained his composure. "Very well, you might have a point. What do you want to know?"

"I assume that you have been in contact with the Klingon Empire. Have they been able to identify this man, and explain what he was doing in United Earth space?"

"The Empire informed me that his name is Klaang, but refused to give any more information than that. They want us to return him as soon as possible. And they may have mentioned they will consider the confiscation of technology he possessed, likely referring to his ship, to be an act of war."

"I take it that they don't want us finding and studying whatever stealth device his ship was using. Did they mention his pursuer's technology?"

"They refused to talk about his pursuers at all."

"So their stealth technology is up for grabs then. Perfect. Now I know you have images of those ships before they were destroyed, I sent them directly to you before our teams engaged each other after all, do you know what species they belong to?"

"That would be a no. Although my engineers have told me, based on our own scans of the incident, that it would appear that the vessels are custom made from various different ship designs. Quite brilliantly put together I might add too."

"If I were to allow them access to imaging scans of the debris we recovered, would they be able to identify what part comes from what species?"

"It would be better if you would simply let them examine the wreckage themselves."

"And give them a chance to hide a valuable piece of technology from us? I am well aware that was another reason why you sent that retrieval team of yours. No one in the galaxy couldn't figure that out on their own eventually."

"Mr. President with all due respect, you seem to be acting a lot like your predecessors."

"My predecessors were paranoid idiots that believe all alien species are out to either enslave or exterminate humanity. They may be wrong about most things, but even idiots can be correct on occasion. And one thing they have always been right about is that we have historically trusted Vulcans far too much over the years. But that just means that United Earth needs to finally expand its horizons and make more friends and allies elsewhere."

President Kimmel then finally did what Archer had begun to suspect he was going to do for some time now. Use him as a political prop piece.

Kimmel walked up beside Archer before continuing his little speech. "For that reason, I am ordering Captain Archer and his crew to deliver Klaang back to his people and help United Earth form as many trade and defense treaties with as many warp-capable species as possible along the way."

"Mr. President I know you're angry, but you can't use that anger to justify a decision as rash as this one. Please calm down and reconsider."

For years Jonathon Archer heard those words spoken to him and his father when he was a child, spoken to his friends and colleagues as an adult, and even during the dark times of military transition. It was at this moment that Archer finally broke his silence. "Why? So that you can keep us bottled up on Earth and our colonies? So that you can mold us into perfect copies of yourselves? So you can find new ways to betray us over and over again? So you can continue to look down on us as though we're nothing more than ignorant children? Tell me, when are you ever going to respect us enough to make our own decisions?"

It was Soval's female aid that answered Archer's barrage of questions. "When you can prove that you have grown past your volatile nature."

Archer was about to give the Vulcan woman a piece of his volatile mind when President Kimmel's left hand landed on his shoulder and he spoke instead. "With all due respect Ms...?"

"T'Pol." She answered.

"With all due respect Ms. T'Pol, how exactly can we prove that to you when you refuse to even give us a chance to try? To be honest, I have wondered for some time now whether or not Vulcans have treated other races with the same type of contempt you have shown us in recent years, and whether or not they responded to it as well as we have. This is a perfect opportunity to find out." Kimmel then turned to face Ambassador Soval again. "Whether you like my decision or not is irrelevant and aside from waging war against us, there is no way you can stop us. Not anymore." The President then turned around and gestured for Archer, Forest, and Casey to leave out the other door with him.

Once the door closed behind them the President spoke as he headed to the nearest elevator, presumably to reach his own shuttle on the rooftop. "That wasn't just a performance gentleman, what I said in there is the complete truth. Captain Archer, you have your orders, how long will it take you to implement them?"

Archer took a moment to properly compose himself and think before replying. "The ship and crew should be ready to depart in three days, but I haven't been able to find a qualified doctor anywhere. The last two administrations made it very difficult for people to learn how to properly treat other species, even in Starfleet."

"You have my permission to hire one of the doctors from that medical exchange program we agreed to recently. Anything else?"

"We still need to know where the Klingon Empire is and contact them ahead of time to avoid any misunderstandings. Something tells me that Klaang's people wouldn't respond well to uninvited guests."

"Agreed. Admiral Forest, I'll leave it up to you to get Soval to cough up his people's star charts and help us get in direct contact with the Klingon Empire. Do whatever it takes to get the job done, except for canceling the mission of course."

"Of course Mr. President, but I have to warn you that we will most likely have to free the Vulcan retrieval team and at least Klaang's ship to get his cooperation." Admiral Forest replied.

"Fine, but let them know that they will never get their hands on the pursuit ships. Ever."

"I understand." Archer knew how much Forest hated being tasked to smooth things over between Soval and hostile Presidents and could tell by the look on his face that the man dreaded the coming negotiations with Soval.

The President got into the elevator and turned to address them one last time. "Get to it gentleman. Humanity is counting on you."

After the elevator doors closed general Casey spoke for the first time in a while. "He isn't exaggerating. Before you two showed up he gave me and Admiral Forstead orders to prepare earth and our colonies for an imminent invasion from either the Klingons or the Vulcans. If you fail or screw up in any way either one of them will likely use that as an excuse to contain earth by force."

"What makes him think the Vulcans would go that far?" Admiral Forest asked in confusion.

"United Earth Intelligence has intercepted and partially decoded enough messages between Soval and his superiors in the Vulcan High Command to know that they are extremely worried about us turning out like another species they refer to as Andorians. Apparently, they have been in a cold war setting with them since before making contact with us. The President is worried that the Vulcans might try to subdue us with force before we can become a significant threat like the Andorians are to them now. I agree."

Archer didn't like the sound of that at all. "Wait a minute. I have never particularly liked Vulcans myself, but I have never once gotten the feeling that they ever wanted to rule over us, or in any way do us harm before. Even the sabotage fourteen years ago was only meant to slow us down, not actually stop us."

"It seems that the last two administrations spooked Soval's superiors into rethinking that policy. But I have to agree, it is still a rather drastic action to take on their part. That said, I have seen the intelligence material myself and can confirm its authenticity."

"Why haven't I seen this information?" Admiral Forest did not even try to hide his anger at being left out and Archer could understand why. Being looked down upon for not being a career military man like the rest of his peers is one thing, but to be completely left out of the loop of something this important was taking things too far.

"I thought director Harris had." The look of surprise on Casey's face could not possibly be more genuine, and if Matthew Harris was the one in charge of that intel Archer wasn't very surprised Forest was left out of the loop.

"General it would be faster if you sent a copy of the information to Admiral Forest yourself. It would seem that Director Harris still hasn't forgiven him for past events." Archer explained quickly and politely.

"What do you mean?"

"He means general that Harris has decided that he would rather be fired from his post than cooperate with me ever again. I removed him from Starfleet fifteen years ago for some questionable behavior. The President ordered him to let his vendetta go and he has apparently chosen to disobey that order. Good day general." Admiral Forest and Captain Archer then left the general to carry out their orders.

When Soval and his aids returned to the Vulcan compound he wasted no time in reporting the result of his meeting with President Kimmel to the High Command. And as he had expected their reaction was not good.

Administrator V'Las in particular was extremely displeased. "Are you sure that there is nothing you can do to change his mind?"

"I am afraid that the best we can hope to accomplish is to negotiate the release of our security personnel when they inevitably come asking for our star charts. Which we have already agreed to hand over when they announced the original launch date."

"I am concerned that the humans might try to form an alliance with the Andorians if they ever come in contact with them. Their combined military strength would be more than enough to overwhelm us once Starfleet's first two waves of ships are operational. We simply can't allow that to happen, at any cost."

"With all due respect Administrator, tensions with United Earth wouldn't be as bad as they are if we hadn't tried to sabotage their development. We might be able to smooth things over if we could finally discover who actually ordered that operation and hand them over to the humans for prosecution."

"If only it were that easy. I have spared no expense in finding out who did that ever since becoming Administrator. Whoever it was covered their tracks well."

That is an understatement if Soval ever heard one. Even the caught saboteur himself was of little help in finding the culprits. He had received valid orders, but the person who supposedly issued them never actually did. The whole thing had become a strange labyrinth of false leads and dead ends. Which did uncover enough cases of corruption to ruin V'Las's predecessor and secure his own rise to the office.

"If we can't stop Enterprise, maybe we can keep an eye on it. Tell me Soval, does anyone on your staff have previous law enforcement experience?"

"A couple. Why?"

"I'm thinking that we need someone on that ship that can potentially hinder its alliance-building mission if needed, particularly if they ever come in contact with the Andorians."

Soval didn't like where this conversation was going. "Administrator are you asking for me to plant a spy on Enterprise. The flagship of our own ally?"

"No. I am giving you a direct order. Make it happen. It could be the only thing that prevents a war between us and humanity."

"What do you mean?"

"If humans become any more aggressive towards us, we might have to bring them in line before they are strong enough to potentially harm us."

Soval and V'Las talked for another five minutes before they had to move on to other duties. When the communication broke Soval sagged in his seat and began to wonder if his people were ever in the right for holding the humans back for as long as they did. Maybe if they hadn't things wouldn't be so grim right now.