The annular confinement beam hadn’t even released Captain Taes from the momentarily oblivion of transportation, and Flavia was still talking. She had been chattering the entire walk to the transporter room without pausing to breathe or even let Taes answer the questions Flavia asked of her.

Constellation’s transporter beam deposited them in the Phravik’s shuttle bay without any of the pomp and circumstance of the night before. They arrived in their duty uniforms, and without a retinue, on the invitation of Conductor Kyelen. Taes had been told it was a K’ritz custom to share a modest meal in companionable quiet after a successful banquet. Starfleet culture might have called it a hangover cure.

“–your crew were very resourceful in designing the reception last night,” Flavia said with all of the conviction of a Praetor. “It wasn’t a simple replica of the gala Ambassador Rylgeen organised for us. No, it reflected our understanding of K’ritz colour theory, sonic rhetoric, and cultural narratology. I’m impressed. They wove a triumph from what could have been a disaster of the Phravik’s warp core breach.”

“Thank you, Flavia,” Taes said, and she didn’t do a convincing job of hiding her surprise. It touched her to see Flavia so engaged and enmeshed in their mission. It was one of the rare times they felt joined rather than parallel.

“I hope that means–”

Flavia shook her head.

“Not you,” Flavia said flatly. “Your crew excelled at creating a welcoming reception last night. You were a disaster.”

Taes balked. “Excuse me?”

“You were really very rude to Conductor Kyelen,” Flavia said, her arched eyebrows rising in emphasis. Not even a full second later, Flavia chuckled and leaned in to Taes. Her smirk was the epitome of masochistic delight.

“Honestly, I didn’t think you had it in you,” Flavia said. “Maybe I am proud of you?”

“Did she tell you I was rude?” Taes said, insisting on Flavia parsing out facts and perceptions. A couple of Taes’s interactions with Kyelen had been tense, but they had been conflicts of philosophy, not conflicts of relationship. ‘Rude’ was a very strong word.

“She didn’t have to,” Flavia replied. “I could see it with my own eyes.”

From over Flavia’s shoulder, Taes was distracted by a K’ritz crew member approaching.

“Excuse me; excuse me, madams,” he said. “Conductor Kyelen sends her apologies for not meeting you in person, but she’s been waylaid by an urgent matter. I will escort you to her quarters now.”

Taes thanked him and she followed him into the passageway. She walked behind him, allowing him to lead the way, leaving a two-metre gap between them. Flavia followed even more slowly and Taes adjusted her gait to remain beside her. The space between them and their escort grew larger.

In an undertone, Taes asked Flavia, “Where did you sneak off to last night?”

Even though Taes had been preparing the question during her sonic shower that morning, she managed to assemble it all wrong. Her clumsy choice of words sounded accusatory, and she immediately regretted falling into common Starfleet prejudices about Romulan deceit. However, that wasn’t the accusation that weighed on her.

“Hm?” Flavia asked, as if she could hardly hear Taes whisper. Flavia said, “My quarters. It was very late.”

“Really?” Taes pointedly asked. “I saw you leaving cetacean ops with Conductor Kyelen.”

Her eyes lighting up with understanding, Flavia replied, “Doctor Nelli had mentioned the mural on deck twelve. I offered to show it to Kyelen because of how it captured her imagination.”

“And then you went to your quarters,” Taes asked.

Flavia chuckled. “Are you jealous?”

That was when the laws of physics stopped making sense.

The world turned sideways and Taes crashed into Flavia. It was like the bulkhead beside them had become the deck and Taes fell onto Flavia, pinning her to the ground. A heartbeat later, gravity righted itself. Taes and Flavia crumpled into a heap on the deck, as a thunderous explosion deafened Taes. Emergency lighting flashed green and Taes could hear a klaxon from what sounded like a distance through her tinnitus.

Flavia was saying something to her, but Taes couldn’t make out the words. She tried to read Flavia’s lips, but green blood streamed down Flavia’s face, into her right eye and down her chin.

Then Taes could see what Flavia was trying to say.

“Run!”

Captain’s Log, Supplemental

The K’ritz crew member helped Flavia and me to our feet. He informed us the alarms meant the conductor had given an order to abandon ship. Through my shock, I contacted the Constellation and ordered them to begin emergency evacuation of the Phravik’s crew. The crew member was already ushering Flavia and me into an escape pod. He told us the pod only took two and launched us.

I spent the first five minutes tending to Flavia’s head wound, ripping a strip from my uniform as a makeshift bandage. I suppose I don’t really know if it was five minutes or three or ten. I only noticed that it took a long time for Constellation to beam us out of there.  A very long time.

The whole time I offered Flavia first aid, she was fighting me on it. Flavia was far more interested in the escape pod’s control panels. Neither of us had learned to read the K’ritz language, but she managed to produce holographic translations with her tricorder.

Flavia learned from the controls that the escape pod’s communications and sensors were being inhibited by radiation. I tried my combadge again and it stayed silent, but for a disappointed ‘blurp’. Neither of us said out loud where that much radiation must have come from.

I learned later the Phravik’s antimatter containment system was riddled with far more microfractures than anyone realised after the first warp core breach. The core breached again, but it collapsed into cascade failures this time. I learned later that no lives were lost, due to the fast action of the Constellation bridge crew.

I asked out loud if the escape pod was shielding us from the radiation. Flavia looked at her tricorder, then at me, and then turned off her tricorder.

Flavia said, “Not enough.”

In the tight quarters of the escape pod, Taes was belted into her acceleration seat, facing Flavia, with hardly a metre between them. She wasn’t often strapped down and made to stare at Flavia with nothing else to do but wait. Starship life was a kaleidoscope of obligation and responsibilities and possibilities. This was the opposite. This was monofocus. All there was was Flavia.

“Are you torturing me on purpose?” Taes asked, unable to wait a moment longer.

Flavia huffed out a, “Yes!” She shrugged and threw her head back. “You caught me,” Flavia said, “this has all been a ploy for me to interrogate your Starfleet security codes out of you. Is that what you think?”

Flavia’s dramatics wouldn’t deter Taes. They were a mask, a misdirect.

“You know how much I need to know what you learned from Conductor Kyelen,” Taes insisted. She shifted her weight in the uncomfortable chair. “When you were alone with her, what did she tell you about the shelkvan competition?”

Flavia said more soberly, “We didn’t talk about the competition.”

“If you won’t share the intel you learned from Kyelen,” Taes went on, “will you at least share the star charts with me when you win the competition?” Faced with Flavia stonewalling her, Taes had to think two moves ahead. Ten moves ahead.

“What intel?” Flavia asked, squinting at her as her mouth hung open momentarily. “I didn’t interrogate Kyelen.  There’s nothing more to learn. I was building relationships!  Isn’t that what Starfleet is all about? I’ll be on winning side too this time.”

Taes sighed, “So you’re not going to share the intel or the star charts.” Her breathing was becoming laboured, filling her lungs required more effort with every breath.

Flavia waggled her hand at Taes, starting with her face and then waving at the length of Taes.

“This is a lot of emotion for star charts,” Flavia accused. “I don’t believe it. Are you asking me what I learned from Kyelen or are you asking me if I seduced Kyelen?”

Slamming her fist down on her armrest, Taes protested, “This isn’t about Kyelen. This is about us! This is about trust.”

Flavia narrowed her eyes again. It may have been a performance, but the softening of Flavia’s face made it look like she was taking in what Taes was saying. She looked to the overhead, seemingly taking a moment to process.

“Are you thinking that if you and I can’t even negotiate together on this, what hope do Starfleet and the Romulan Free State ever have as allies?” Flavia asked. “Are you putting that much weight on your already-tight shoulders?”

Taes felt a sharp pulse in her temples at Flavia’s question. The question was an expression of sympathy, but it struck Taes as condescending too. It echoed in Taes’s mind like a challenge.

Shaking her head, Taes said, “I don’t know who to trust. I don’t know what I trust. I’ve been running from myself, from my crew. I’ve been so scared by who I turned into during the Dominion incursion.”

Softly, Flavia said, “You abandoned me,” and there was surprisingly little blame in her tone. Her posture relaxed, and she dropped her hands on her lap.

“I worked so hard at putting away that anger, but it worked too well,” Taes said, “My head and my heart feel disconnected. I didn’t even notice it, didn’t really feel its absence until I negotiated with the K’ritz. There was no anticipation, no fear of falling. None of it scared me like negotiating with the Holy College of Abbots, or bartering with the Remans for Kellin’s life.”

“That’s why you didn’t want to sing for the K’ritz,” Flavia said. It came across as a guess, but Taes could feel that Flavia knew it. Flavia could see it in Taes. But for a different twist of fate, Flavia could be Taes in this moment.

“You’re not helping yourself,” Flavia said. “Wouldn’t that fear of failure –of making a fool of yourself in front of millions of spectators– be exactly what you need? If anything will jump-start the connection between your head and your heart, wouldn’t it be that?”

Flavia’s question rang in Taes’s ears as a transporter beam from Constellation whisked them away.