Chapter Text
The last couple of days had been rather quiet on Enterprise. They had visited a nebula two days ago, nothing exciting.
Archer didn’t mind too much. This little break meant his engineers had time to bring all the systems up to date. Sooner rather than later they would end up in some kind of conflict and then they would need the ship in peek condition. He hadn’t imagined their journey would be quite so full of conflict, but so far, they had held themselves rather well in the last year.
“A ship just dropped out of Warp.”, Mayweather interrupted his captain’s thoughts.
“Do we know who it is?”
“No. But they’re hailing us.”
“Well, then open a channel.”
Hoshi, the communications officer, nodded.
‘Is this the Earth vessel Enterprise?’
“It is. I am Captain Archer. And who do we have the plessure with?”
‘I am Garol of Enoch.’
That surprised Archer a little. Less than a week ago they had first met the Enoch, a nomadic species, and had traded with them. He hadn’t expected to be visited so soon by another Enoch ship.
“What can we do for you?”
‘Nothing. I have been tasked to deliver a passenger to you. I hereby declare my task for fulfilled.’
“I’m not quite sure I understand. Why would you be asked to deliver this passenger to us?”
‘It is a female of your species, who the Enoch have granted refuge until she could be returned to her own kind. I have done so now and would request you to take her on board your ship. I assure you, you will find her to be quite pleasing company.’
Though he frowned a little about this assurance, he agreed to welcome Garol and this mystery passenger on Enterprise.
A couple of minutes later, Archer, Hoshi and Reed, who had insisted on coming as well, stood in Docking Bay 2, waiting for their guests. The door opened and the Enoch entered, followed by a human woman. She was tall and lean and had the distinctive posture of a fighter. Most people found her to be threatening and rather kept their distance. Something she was more than fine with. But Johnathan Archer wasn’t most people. For him, it took all of his self-control not to rush forward and hug the woman.
“I knew you weren’t dead.”
Relieve was clearly audible in his voice and even if it hadn’t, the grin on his face had given away his joy. Her reaction was less emotional, it was almost cold and factual.
“And I knew there was only one to command the pride of the Starfleet.”
“You know each other?”, Malcolm asked.
“You could say so.”
“I have done my duty. I will now return to my ship and go on with my way.”
“Thank you for your service, Goral.”
The woman put her hands together in front of her chest and bowed slightly, the Enoch did the same, then turned around and left without another word. The woman turned back to the crew, examining them for several seconds before turning back to the Captain.
“This ship is quite impressive.”
“She is.”
Neither Hoshi, nor Malcolm knew what to say while their captain and this woman just stared at each other.
“Can I at least get a hug after all these years?”
With an expression that would make a Vulcan envious, she stared at him, but then sighed, “You may.”
She didn’t move toward him but Archer was happy with her not moving away when he put his arms around her, hulling her close.
“I missed you, Josey.”
“I… missed you too.”
That actually made him let go of her again so he could look at her face. The expression had only softened a little, but it had.
“You have changed.”, Jon observed with a worried frown.
When Josey didn’t answer, he turned to his crewmembers.
“You can return to the bridge, I’ll show Josephine around. And tell Trip to meet us in the mess.”
“Charles?”
“Yeah. He’s my chief engineer.”
“A good choice.”
The two walked down the corridor in one direction, Malcolm and Hoshi in the other.
“Wow. That woman is colder than the entire High Command.”
“Yes, but have you seen the captain’s face? And the way he hugged her? They must know each other well.”
“Maybe, but whatever was between them, it seems rather one-sided. I’m not sure this woman even has emotions.”
“Where do you think she came from?”
“You think she’s a boomer?”
“Taking refuge on an Enoch ship? And why only her, where’s the rest of the crew?”
“Guess we’ll have to wait until the captain decides to share with us.”
By now they had reached engineering, where Trip would most likely be.
“The captain wants you to meet him and this Josephine woman in the mess.”
Trip had been working when his crewmates came in but froze when he heard Malcolm, almost dropping his tool.
“Did you just say Josephine?”
“That’s what the captain called her, yes. Why?”
For a moment, Trip seemed to be at loss of words before he started laughing and pulled Hoshi into a hug out of sheer excitement.
“That’s the best news I heard all week. Hell, all year!”
“Who is she?”
“Josephine Archer! She’s the captain’s little sister. Everyone thoughts she was dead. Should have known he was right. That girl is something!”
“Girl? Have you even met her? That woman scares me!”
Hoshi’s confession didn’t surprise Trip much.
“Yes, I have met her. Couple of times back in the day. Phin is as tough as they come. She was in the last year at academy, I was a newbie, though she’s a year younger. I remember that one time… one of other cadets had been making advances for some time and she kept ignoring him. And one time he made the mistake to touch her. All she said was ‘If you want to keep that hand, you’d be well advised to take it off me.’ Apparently, he didn’t, and she broke it, together with his nose. And probably his pride. Boy, she had fire.”
“You sound like you admire her.”
“Oh, worst crush I had during academy. I mean, she scared me, but… she’s just… wow.”
“I assume captain didn’t like that.”
“We didn’t know each other than. I met him couple of years later. Only realised he was her brother when he told me about his baby sister who had joined the Astraeus with only sixteen.”
“She was part of the Astraeus crew?”
“Jup. And she went missing five years ago along with the over sixty others. Nobody heard from them since. I was there when the captain got the news…. I’m glad she’s alright.”
“She seems so different from him.”
Both Reed and Trip had to agree to that. Their captain was a passionate, kind man, his sister however seemed to be neither.