Mestral’s Legacy: Chapter 32

They didn’t say much on the way back. For one thing, T’Pol didn’t handle the choppy water well; combined with the spray of water that was coming over the bow of the little power boat, that meant she was fast becoming a very wet, very green, and very unhappy Vulcan. For his part, Jonathan loved the way that the boat launched itself off of the waves, splashing down into the troughs with a stomach-lurching freefall. He tried to keep those instances to a minimum in deference to T’Pol’s increasingly unhealthy complexion, but the weather wasn’t cooperating.

By the time they reached the dock their clothes were soaked through. The storm seemed to have held off until they docked because as they made their way back to the house, the skies opened up and disgorged sheets of rain that reduced visibility to a metre in every direction. Despite this they found their way back to the house and dripped their way to their respective showers. Having cleaned, warmed, and reclothed themselves, they met in the living room over hot tea to go over the results of the scans.

There was something nagging at him about the scans of the two children that he was looking at, but it took him a while to put his finger on it.

“57% Vulcan, 34% Human–T’Pol, that’s only 91%.”

“Scroll down to the end of the report.” He did so, and frowned: 9% unidentified DNA sequences–codon frequency atypical in all possible reading frames. No further data flashed at the end of the report.

“So what does unidentified mean? The sample is too degraded?”

“No, it means precisely that: unidentified. The sample is in fairly good condition, however 9% of the sequences are unidentifiable as either Human or Vulcan,” she said, sipping her tea.

“The Human genome was sequenced over 150 years ago,” he pointed out.

“Yes”

“The Vulcan one had to have been done well before that.”

“Over 2000 of your years ago” He blinked at that. He tended to forget how old of a race the Vulcans were. “The unidentified sequences are from an unknown species.”

“Alien DNA,” he said; “This sounds like one of those old tabloid stories.”

“Nevertheless–”

“Nevertheless, you’re telling me Alaia and Vorak’s daughter had DNA from an unknown alien species.” They digested that in silence for a while. He was going over the percentages in his mind, when a further thought occurred to him.

“Feel free to correct my understanding of genetics, but aren’t about half of the genes contributed by the mother and about half from the father?”

“Correct,” she said, waiting for him to come to the same conclusion as she had.

“57% Vulcan is more than half. Where did the extra 7% come from?”

“Her mother, presumably,” T’Pol said, avoiding his eyes.

“Alaia? Are you telling me she’s part Vulcan?”

“That is the logical conclusion.” T’Pol had a niggling suspicion as to how and when that had happened; if she was right her family–her ancestors–bore some responsibility for those genes.

“Where did the alien DNA come from?”

“Lt. Naliek appears to be a hybrid of several species.”

“How did that happen?” T’Pol arched her eyebrow, indicating she thought it happened in the manner that most DNA was exchanged.

“That’s not what I was asking,” he said, glaring at her darkly.

“You should learn to be more specific.”

“How does a human end up with Vulcan DNA–you know what I mean,” he said forestalling a lecture on interspecies DNA exchange, they’d both explored how that worked, an exercise that now seemed long ago and far away.

“I believe I already shared that information with you.”

“Did I go deaf for part of this conversation, because I don’t remember that.”

“We have not discussed it today,” she agreed.

“T’Pol, so help me–”

“Carbon Creek.”

Jonathan looked at her for a long moment, considering what she was implying. “You said that was just a story.”

“Vulcans do not tell stories.”

* * *

Long after Jonathan Archer retired for the night, T’Pol stayed up analysing the scans from the cemetery. Of the thirty or so scans, most contained some combination of Vulcan, Human, and alien DNA, but the percentage of Vulcan DNA was low except for Vorak and Alaia’s children. The Vulcan DNA had come from another Vulcan, several generations earlier. Judging from the dilution effect and accounting for selective pressures, it had likely been introduced 100 years ago: Mestral. Did they know? Did they realise that they were not human?

T’Pol turned her attention back to the scans of the two children. It was unusual for Vulcans to mate with aliens, but not unheard of–sometimes it was unavoidable. Bonding with an alien was an altogether different matter, an unacceptable choice to most Vulcans. T’Pol switched off the scanner. The scans had been sent to Phlox to compare with the database of alien genomes Enterprise had collected. With nothing left to do until morning, T’Pol put the scanner away.

Setting up several candles on the floor, she lit them and turned off the lights before settling herself on the floor. The storm continued to rage outside, occasionally flooding the room with light as lightening rent the sky, followed almost immediately by the rumble of thunder. The storm was overhead. T’Pol closed her eyes and tried to shut out the alien world around her. Concentrating on releasing the tension in her body, she started with the muscles in her toes and worked her way up. Her efforts were continually frustrated by memories of the previous night. As she attended to each muscle, the imprint of his touch came to the surface. T’Pol attempted to sequester the memories–hot, swirling water, firm muscles, cool skin; fingers teasing, stroking, sliding–but they eluded her, drifting out of her reach and then rushing back to torment her. T’Pol opened her eyes, her breath ragged, and sat in the darkness, rain pelting the window. The room was flooded with by a flash of nature’s pyrotechnics, and she saw her comm sitting on her desk

Unprepared to explore what was on her mind, she sat down at her desk and activated the comm. The High Command was still hoping that she would return; there was no other reason to force her to stay on Earth for six months while Enterprise launched–no reason other than punishment. Despite Vulcans’ air of superiority, the High Command was a bureaucracy like any other; it was likely that her computer account had not yet been inactivated. As if sensing her thoughts, the consulate crest appeared on her console; she typed in her password and waited. After a pause, the prompt appeared and she entered her query.

* * *

Deep in the bowels of the Vulcan Consulate was the communications and information storage facility. Located in a sub-basement, it was cool and quiet aside from the quiet hum of the equipment as it processed the flow of information generated by the Consulate and gathered from the alien world outside. It functioned unattended, instructions for the collating and filing of information coded into the equipment when it had been installed years ago, shortly after the Consulate had been built. Occasionally the instructions were amended when different research programs arose, or an unanticipated question required the collection of further data, but the machines themselves were unattended.

This was why, then, it went unnoticed when the snippet of code was executed as a long dormant file in the Justice Ministry was accessed. As instructed, the inquiry was traced and logged. The information was encrypted by an unauthorised algorithm, disguised as a regular statistical report, and then sent to an account that did not officially exist. It’s purpose served, the code removed all traces of itself and its activity. The machines continued to hum unperturbed by the small burst of activity that had consumed 1.2 picoseconds of computational time.

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