Ad Astra :: Star Trek Fanfiction Archive ^{Beam me up, Scotty.}

Chapter Text

Captain’s Log, Stardate 2261.13. We are finally moving in the direction of truly uncharted space. We’ve stopped at Starbase 12 to pick up a number of specialists to finish outfitting the Enterprise. Weapons, enhanced shielding, more powerful sensors, and an archival vault. They will be with us about six weeks until we reach the very last Federation outpost, then make their way to other assignments as we travel on into the unknown.

Lieutenant Mira Romaine had always considered herself more of a librarian than anything. She liked neatly shelved artifacts, preserved parchment, and plenty of time for detailed research. But she had to admit that being aboard a starship was a thrill. The Enterprise, no less! The first days aboard this temporary assignment had been a blur, away from most of the regular crew while Mira and those she’d come aboard with got a crash course in starship life. Uniforms, quarters, action station assignments, evacuation procedures, water conservation, gravity loss and decompression protocols, emergency medical self-care, vaccine boosters, a subdermal monitor for mandatory daily caloric and exercise requirements, radiation badges, and on.

It was quite a lot for a librarian to take in. Fortunately she’d already found some friends in the junior officers. Unexpectedly, she’d also found one in the department head she’d be working with most closely to set up the communications relay between the Yorktown Central Archive and the Enterprise’s vault. Lieutenant Uhura was well-liked and incredibly busy, but gracious enough to welcome Mira as a friend over meals or in the rec room.

“Is that the chief engineer?” Mira asked her curiously one evening. Uhura glanced over her shoulder at a lieutenant commander who was at a table across the room, absently inhaling a pile of what looked like both breakfast and dinner while working on three different padds.

“That’s Scotty,” Uhura said fondly.

“It occurred to me the other day that there are about a million ways space is trying to kill us, and that there is one person aboard this ship who is responsible for making sure that doesn’t happen. And that’s him.”

“You’re not wrong, but it’s a little frightening when you put it that way,” Uhura said with an amused smile, then dropped the cheerful teasing for a moment of somber reflection. “He feels it. Every second. Don’t for a moment think he doesn’t.”

“In good hands?” Romaine asked, because space was both exhilarating and terrifying.

“Always,” Uhura said fervently, then shot the engineer an exasperated look. “Even if he looks like he doesn’t know what time it is or what shift he’s on.”

“I hear he has four doctorates.”

“He does,” Uhura said. “Like them brainy, do you?” she asked slyly.

Mira blushed. “I won’t deny it. He is pretty cute too.”

Nyota laughed, moving to stand. “I’ll introduce you.”

“No! No no no,” Mira said. “I don’t want to bother him.”

“A little bothering is good for him. Besides, he asked me, two days ago, who you were. I told him to forget it, because you are way out of his league. But if you’re interested … Just a sec.”

“Oh, god,” Mira murmured to herself, burying her face in her hands. When she looked up, Scott was grinning down at her.

“Mind if I join you?” he asked. “I’m Scotty.”

“I’m Mira,” she said faintly, gesturing for him to sit. “And I’m also possibly slightly mortified.”

“I’m not,” he said. “I’m delighted. First time in space, lass …?”

She’d been half-afraid that their conversation would be nothing but warp engines and antimatter, but Scotty was surprisingly easy to talk to. Good at asking perceptive questions about her life, and happy to fill any awkward silence with a funny story. Also happy, it seemed, to abandon his mountain of paperwork in favor of a long talk.

“You havenae been tae the observation deck?” he asked her in disbelief. “Well, we can fix that right now,” he said, and led her off somewhere to what must have been the outer hull of the ship.

“That’s stunning,” she said in awe as the stars streamed by. She put her hand on the window, and even through the highly shielded transparent plating, she could feel the chill of space.

“Warp four,” he said, the first time he’d mentioned anything even remotely technical. He tapped his ear. “You can hear it, in the pitch of the engines, and feel it in the vibration of the hull.” He put his hand over hers against the window.

“Maybe you can feel it,” she laughed at him, then took his hand and tugged him over to one of the couches. She put her head on his shoulder and watched the stars. “Are you going to kiss me?” she asked, smiling up at him.

He squinted down at her and pretended to consider it. “I was thinkin’ about it.”

“Good. Because I’m definitely going to kiss you.” She wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him down, smiling against his lips. “Anyone going to walk in on us?” she asked when they came up for air.

“I abused my command codes and locked the door when we came in,” he admitted.

“Mmm. Smart man,” she said, and let her lips and hands wander. 

His hand was up her skirt, and hers down his trousers, when he pulled away and sat up with a shaky groan. “I am a terrible person and an old spacedog,” he said, leaning his head back. “You tell me. Too fast?”

She shifted her position, straddling his lap so he could not mistake her.  “Seems about right to me. If it’s about right to you?” she asked, tilting her hips to make him gasp. He pulled her near to kiss her again, hands moving to support her hips as their urgency increased. 

“Okay, wait wait wait,” he said breathlessly between kisses. She pouted at him. “There are technically two people who could walk in on us, of the Vulcan and CO variety.  My quarters are just that way,” he gestured over his shoulder. “And also, I have one of the four real hot water showers on this ship.”

“Oh, nice!” she said appreciatively, running her hands down his chest. “After sonics for the last weeks, way to sweeten that pot. Big enough for two?”

“If they were standing close,” he teased.

“That is the plan.” She smiled at him, re-buttoned the front of his trousers, then stood and smoothed her tunic, leaving him sprawled and aroused on the couch. He looked up at her, eyes flicking to the hem of the skirt riding up her legs.

“God, you are beautiful,” he said reverently.

“You should see the rest of me,” she said wickedly, and sashayed out of the room. Then she poked her head back in, less sultry but more endearing as far as he was concerned. “Your quarters are …?” she asked.

“Aft,” he said.

“Mmm. That’s very interesting, Mr. Chief Engineer. Which is which way, exactly, from here …?”

He laughed at her and stood, then offered her his arm. “Left, Ms. Romaine. Let me show you.”

Three days later, the Captain asked her to present the plans for the archival vault to the senior staff. “It’s an impressive project, Lieutenant,” the Captain said at the end of her presentation. “Stable archival storage, full scanning, and direct uploads with Yorktown station?”

“Yes sir,” she said proudly.

“Good. It’s a big part of why we’re headed out there,” Kirk said. “You should know that you’re empowered to enlist anyone you need to assist, up to and including the Chief Engineer. I don’t know if you’ve met Lieutenant Commander Scott? Scotty can be a grump but I assure you he’s harmless.”

“I’d be happy tae help the lieutenant out with whatever she needs,” Scott smiled faintly at her, almost mischievously. “Wherever. Whenever. Happy tae be of service.”

She looked down, her lips twitching. “Thank you, commander. I’m sure it will be a pleasure for us both.”

Kirk’s gaze flicked between the two of them. “Fantastic,” he said.

“We really are excited about this,” said she earnestly, with the air of someone pulling themselves back on track. “The ability to safely transport and accurately catalog the things you will discover in the deep space portion of your mission is invaluable. Scientists everywhere are already queuing up experiments they’d like you to perform, objects they’d like you to collect, to say nothing of the things you’ll find that we can’t even imagine. It’s a very exciting time to be a scientist, sir, and I’m tremendously honored to be a small part of it.”

“We appreciate that, Lieutenant,” Kirk said. “It’s an exciting time to be an explorer too. Thank you for your report, we’ll look forward to the finished project. You’re dismissed. You too, Scotty.” Kirk gestured at the floor, toward the secondary hull. “There’s something off about the harmonics today and it’s making me crazy, please fix it.”

“Aye,” Scott grumped, mischief gone. “There’s some cavitation in the coolant system. Givin’ me a headache too. I’ll get it sorted.”

The door slid shut behind him, and Kirk whirled on the rest of his staff. “Okay, was someone going to tell me they’re sleeping together?” Kirk asked.

“Who?” Sulu asked.

“Romaine and Scotty?” Chekov questioned, puzzled. 

“Obviously. Right?” Kirk asked. “Seriously, no one else sees that?” 

Spock raised an eyebrow; McCoy shrugged. Uhura sat very, very deliberately still.

“Yeah,” Kirk said, waving a finger in her face. “Spill.”

Uhura shrugged nonchalantly. “I may have set them up. Introduced them. A couple days ago. What they’ve done since then I have no idea.”

Kirk rolled his eyes. “Best gossip in weeks and you’re all no help,” he grumbled, and waved them all away good naturedly. “Get back to work.”

Nyota bolted down the hall as soon as she was clear of the door, and caught Scotty before he got to the lift, snagging his arm. He made an undignified squeak of surprise as she pulled him into an empty briefing room.

“Scotty …” she chastised, disappointed. “You already had sex with her?”

“Uh,” he said, blushing.

“She wasn’t supposed to be a shore leave fuck!”

“No!” he answered, appalled. “No, no, no. I wouldnae … I was being a perfect gentleman when …” he ran his hands down his face. “Shit. I’m shit, arenae I? She’s kind, and smart, and, god, so gorgeous. And other things I think I’ll keep tae myself, for now.” 

“Just … don’t be a horndog, okay?” Nyota sighed.

He shrugged sheepishly. “I really like her. I wouldnae hurt her, I swear.” She shot him a look, studying him hard. “I’ve got …” he stammered. “Trouble with the coolant system. So if I could just …” 

“Oh, Scotty,” Uhura sighed, and let him pass.

She caught Mira over lunch. “You already slept with him?!” 

Mira winced. “God, is it all over the ship already? I didn’t think he’d say anything.”

“It isn’t. He didn’t. He wouldn’t,” Uhura assured her. “I just know him really well.”

Mira smiled. “I really like him. And not for nothing, he’s got really, really good hands. Like. God, amazing. And,” she gestured vaguely, blushing happily. “Yeah. Fantastic.”

Uhura blinked. “Right. I’ll take your word for it.” She sighed. “Look, Mira, Scotty’s practically the nicest guy you’ll ever meet, but he’s got this self-destructive addictive streak. Which you should know usually manifests in the form of whiskey, rewriting the laws of physics, drugs, warp cores, anonymous sex, dangerous transporter experiments, and starships. But it also means that when he falls in love, he falls hard. Just don’t hurt him, okay?”

Captain’s Log, Stardate 2261.47. The Enterprise has been contacted by a station calling itself, roughly translated, the Memory Alpha Library Archive. They have been having mysterious equipment failures. We’re pushing into the outer fringes of Federation influence. The station is non-Federation and very much non-human, but the systems are familiar to us, as is the alliance that operates the station. Fortunately we have an information technology expert aboard in Lt. Romaine. I’m sending her and Lt. Cmdr. Scott down to see what they can do. Hopefully the two of them will be able to keep their hands off of each other long enough to get something done.

Romaine wasn’t quite sure what was wrong with the library computer. She suspected it was a couple of issues all coming to a head at once; it seemed that researchers weren’t always terribly good at regular maintenance, no matter the species. Scotty was off looking at the power system, some form of fusion reactor, in case there was a surge somewhere. She was up to her elbows in the computer bank that lined the backside of a wall in one of the research alcoves, chasing an over-temperature reading, when a pair of arms wrapped around her waist.

“Mmm,” she said happily. “That had better be you, Scotty, and not Dr. Haazaath.”

Scotty kissed the back of her neck, his breath tickling. “Ever had sex in a library?” he whispered in her ear.

She turned and looped her arms around his neck. “Yes,” she said mischievously, then backed him into the computer bank for a deep kiss and a positively porngraphic grope.

“I am beginning to suspect that yeh arenae nearly the good girl yeh pretend tae be,” he said breathlessly, nipping at her throat. “Sex in a library?! Anyone could walk in.”

“True,” she said. “You have to be quick.”

“Oh, god,” he groaned, his hands under her skirt. “You arenae wearing any knickers.” Voices in the hall interrupted them before they could get any further.

“Next time,” she whispered, fingers trailing teasingly. The door slid open as she stepped away with a wicked smile and turned back to her repair project. “Redirect your power flow please, Mr. Scott. There really is something odd here,” Mira said, impressing him with her ability to move smoothly back to the engineering while he was still struggling to get blood back to his brain “How was the reactor?”

“Dodgy,” he said, refocusing with effort. “I need some parts and some tools. I’m going tae head back tae the ship; I’ll be back in a half hour.” She snagged him for another kiss, which he finally broke away from reluctantly. “I am in so much trouble,” he breathed, then called the ship for beam out.

He got distracted by a question from one of the techs in environmental control, so was still in Engineering an hour later when red alert sounded.

“Who is in command of the Engineering deck?” the Captain barked from the bridge.

“Scott, sir! I’m aboard. What …?”

“We’ve got to extend the shields, Scotty. There is some kind of energy surge coming at us at warp speed, and it appears that Memory Alpha isn’t shielded!”

“Warp speed? Sir that isnae anything natural,” he said, scrambling hard. “Done, sir, but we’re stretched thin!”

“All hands, Station Memory Alpha, brace for impact!” the Captain called over the comms. The ship rocked violently, her superstructure groaning dangerously with the added torque of the station. Scott grimaced at the control board; the shields were seriously depleted and the antimatter reactor overheating.

“It’s coming around again. Scotty, divert all power to the shields !” 

And he really, really didn’t want to say it, but he had to. “We cannae take this, sir. Three more hits and our shields will be gone. Just two more and we’re looking at a breach; I cannae hold the antimatter containment with this kind of strain.”

“Mr. Scott is correct, sir,” Spock said from the bridge.

“We, what, turn our back on the station? Ms. Romaine is aboard, to say nothing of fifty scientists.”

“Maybe we can fire on it, draw it away?” Sulu suggested.

“Scotty?” the Captain asked.

“All I know is that if I lose antimatter containment we’re all dead. Ship, station, all,” he answered heavily.

“Good point. Pull our shields back, Engineer Scott. Mr. Chekov, prepare to fire, Mr. Sulu, evasive maneuvers!” 

Scotty closed his eyes, feet rooting him to the deck with practiced skill against the lurching maneuvers. In these moments, balanced between infinite possibilities while the bridge decided their fate, there was nothing for him to do but let the chatter from the bridge wash over him over the open line, the voices overlapping: “evasive maneuvers! phaser having minimal effect! it's turning away from us, sir, ignoring us. Try photon torpedoes! No effect, sir. It is still heading toward the station... Memory Alpha, brace for impact!”

A pause, then Spock. “Impact on the station. The energy seems to have been … absorbed into it. No further readings at all; it is as if it has vanished.”

Then Uhura’s voice: “Memory Alpha, Memory Alpha, report please. Please respond, what is your status? Lieutenant Romaine, Enterprise, please come in. Communication equipment appears to be operative but no response Captain.”

Scott opened his eyes, knowing perfectly well that communication silence usually meant there was no one left alive to say anything.

“Doctor McCoy, Mr. Scott, report to the transporter room,” Kirk ordered. “We’re going to beam over to the station.”

McCoy and Kirk glanced up at the engineer when he arrived, both of them worried. Kirk grabbed his arm. “No communication from the station or Ms. Romaine. This could be very bad, Scotty. If you’d rather stay …”

Scott headed for the pad. “I can stand here worrying, or face it head on. I’ll face it, sir.”

They materialized aboard the station, and it was strewn with bodies. Scott swallowed hard, and glanced at the Captain, who simply nodded. Scott ran for where he’d last seen Mira.

McCoy and Kirk paused next to a scientist struggling for breath, a terrible sound coming coming from her throat. She was bleeding from her eyes, her nose, her ears, and her skin seemed lit from the inside, flashing in unnatural colors before she died.

“I found her!” Scott called from down the hall, cradling Romaine. “She’s alive!” Beyond miracles, she was breathing, although deeply unconscious. “Mira? She willnae wake, Doctor.” McCoy knelt next to her, scanning her briefly. 

Her eyes and mouth opened, but she was not present, and the same terrible sounds poured from her throat. She closed her eyes again, but was still clinging to life.

“Bones?” Kirk asked.

“I have no idea. Let’s get her back onto the ship,” McCoy said urgently. Scott scooped her up in his arms. They paused beside each other as they transported, then sprinted down the halls of the Enterprise toward sickbay. Scott eased her onto a bed, and her eyes fluttered open.

“Scotty?” she murmured, present and conscious, and he grabbed her hand.

“Right here. Hey, no, no, dinnae try to sit up. Just rest and let the Doctor look at yeh.”

“What happened?” she asked weakly.

“You were attacked by something, Lieutenant,” the Captain explained. “Aboard the station. We’re not quite certain what happened. You reacted differently from everyone else.”

“No one else passed out?” she asked ruefully.

The Captain exchanged a look with the engineer and the doctor. McCoy nodded. “No one else survived,” Kirk answered gently.

The men grabbed her as she tried to sit up again. “Don’t move,” McCoy ordered crossly.

“There were fifty researchers aboard that station!” she cried. “Why am I alive?”

“We’re glad you are,” Scott said gently, wiping her tears away with his thumb.

McCoy finished his scan. “Beyond the initial unconsciousness, and the strange sounds when we first found her, I’m not seeing anything.”

“Sounds?” Mira asked.

“It sounded like you were trying to tell us something, but it wasnae any human language,” Scott said. She frowned at him, puzzled and disquieted.

“You can go ahead and sit up, slowly,” McCoy said. “But if you feel dizzy, nauseated, anything, lie back down.” She nodded, a little pale, but made it upright, Scotty hovering at her side. “Take it easy for ten minutes. If you’re okay then, I’ll release you to your quarters.”

Kirk and McCoy left Scott to comfort her and stepped into McCoy’s office.

“Why is she alive, Bones?” Kirk asked sharply.

“I don’t know, Jim. It could just be chance. Enough energy to kill fifty people but not the fifty-first?”

“A force that was going to blow our shields apart in a few hits? Unlikely. Maybe there is something else. Anything notable in her medical file or psych profile?”

McCoy pulled up her information on his computer. “Fully medically transitioned trans female. Healthy and in shape. Highly intelligent, highly motivated. Creative, curious, mentally pliant, skilled at creating order in complex systems. Highly empathetic, very slightly pre-cognitic. Nothing that would seem even remotely relevant.”

“Thoroughly human.” Kirk said, stating the obvious. 

“The only human aboard the station. That may well be the answer, although I have no idea why.”

Kirk sighed heavily. “Do what you can to make sense of it, Bones. We’ve got some time for investigation, but before too long we are going to need to contact the alliance and let them know what happened. I don’t love the fact that we are the mysterious strangers where fifty people died except, conveniently, our crewperson. Suspicious-looking at best.”

“Why do we always get in this kind of trouble?” McCoy grumbled, and headed back into the main medbay. “Your vitals are all normal, Lieutenant,” he told Romaine. “Scotty, take her back to her quarters. Or yours, I don’t care which. Just take it easy for the next 24 hours. Shower, food, sleep, then check back here.” He handed across medpatch for the back of her hand. “Sedative so you can sleep a solid eight hours. Put it on just before you go to bed.”

She stood, steady on her feet, but gratefully let Scotty wrap an arm around her and lead her to his quarters. 

She headed straight for his shower, longing for the comfort of the hot water. She sat in the floor and let it pour over her, hoping it would wash away the cottony thickness that had settled into her brain. She didn’t feel capable of anything; her limbs felt distant and disconnected. She held up her hands, and wondered, vaguely, why she felt surprised to see them. It was because, of course, it had been so long since they had possessed hands.

What?! She shook herself.

Scotty, concerned, finally came in to get her. He shut off the water and pulled her upright. “You’re shaking, lass,” he said, toweling her dry and wrapping her in his bathrobe.

“I can see them all, dead, on the floor,” she wailed.

“You were unconscious on the station,” he said gently. “You didnae see it. But it isnae hard to imagine, I know. Try not tae; it doesnae do them or you any good.”

“I’m not imagining it, Scotty,” she said angrily. “I can see them!”

“Okay,” he said tenderly.

“And I keep thinking … thinking I see you on the floor too, Scotty. That you’re dead, and that I’ve killed you. And everyone else. I feel like I’m panicking; I can’t breath. I feel like I’m floating outside myself, that my body isn’t my own. Not much of a brave Starfleet Officer, am I?”

“None of that, now,” he protested. He took her hands and gently traced the lines of her palms. “This happened tae yeh two hours ago, lass. Give yourself some grace. Plenty of time tae work through it all. As far as being brave … it’s just space.”

She frowned at him, and he shook his head, searching for the words. He pointed out the small porthole that his rank afforded him. “The light from those stars traveled a billion years tae reach our eyes. And later today, the Enterprise will go tae warp with a flash of light that someone will see a billion years from now. Out that window is everything that is, and was, and will be.” He paused and looked at her. “And sometimes that feels like home, and sometimes it feels like madness. Walkin’ in the stars is nothing but brave.”

He tucked her into his bed and smoothed the sedative patch onto the back on her hand. “I’ve got to check on the shield generators. Rest, aye?” he said, and kissed her. “I should be back before yeh wake, but if you need anything call down tae Engineering.”

Mira closed her eyes, and when she opened them again she was walking down the hall of the Enterprise. She trailed her fingers along its gleaming walls, and stepped over the bodies strewn everywhere. They’d have to take care of those; they were repulsive. This was a good host. After so long, they were whole again.

She stopped next to Kirk, staring into his lifeless blue eyes. “Thank you for your ship, Captain,” she mocked him.

“Let Mira go!” a voice growled behind her, and it was the Engineer, Scott, bleeding heavily. How annoying.

“She’s dead,” Mira told him cruelly. “Or as good as. Formless, helpless.” Killing the engineer was not difficult. Enjoyable, almost. But when it was done, there was a sound, and it was not right, not right at all, and some memory stirred in the back of her mind: the warp engines, overloading.

“What did you do?!” she screamed at the lifeless lump on the floor, and kicked him, but it was too late. She—they—launched themselves out of the girl’s body, only just in time to escape the subspace-shattering blast.

Mira opened her eyes into the dark, terrified, her heart pounding wildly. Where?!? Scotty’s quarters. A dream. But she knew it wasn’t. That was no dream. That was the future, and there was something inside of her. She knew it with perfect, unshakable clarity. She hit the communication panel by Scotty’s bed.

“Engineering,” came a voice. Not Scotty.

She cleared her throat. “Is Lieutenant Commander Scott available?” she asked, with as much calm as she could muster.

“The Chief is buried in the shield generators. Is this an emergency? Who is this?”

“Lieutenant Romaine,” she said.

“Ah, well,” and there was just the slightest hint of disdain and annoyance in the voice that the boss’s girlfriend was calling down. “I’ll make a note that you called, Lieutenant, and have him call when he’s done.”

Her face burned, anger and fear and frustration and kill the engineers first, and—good god. Mira pressed her hands to her face, and made another call.

Nyota Uhura walked in a few minutes later, and Mira was not surprised that Scotty’s quarters were keyed to let her in. Nyota sat in the bed beside her, and took her hands.

“What’s happening, Mira?”

Mira swiftly explained her visions. “Scotty says it’s just space getting to me,” Mira sighed. “But I know myself. I know when my body isn’t right, when things aren’t fitting. I know this isn’t me.”

Uhura tilted her head. “You’ve only known Scotty a few weeks. You haven’t seen him when … look, Scotty’s experiences inside his own head make him distrust his own reality. He doesn’t understand that kind of certainty, but I do,” she said. “If it’s not coming from you, it’s coming from somewhere else. And we don’t know what happened to that energy cloud.”

Uhura helped Mira get dressed and walked her down to sickbay, and swiftly overrode McCoy’s infuriatingly paternal “well, darlin’ sometimes after something traumatic…” with a demand for a brain scan.

“What the hell?!?” McCoy said, staring at the results five minutes later. “This is impossible. Her hyperencephalogram has changed. Dramatically. It’s as if her thoughts are not traveling on the established neural pathways of her brain.”

“There is something inside of me,” Mira insisted, amazed at how calm she sounded, because she certainly didn’t feel it. “It’s been there since I left the station.” McCoy nodded in agreement and urgently called up to the bridge for the Captain and Spock.

“Doctor,” Spock said when they arrived, raising an eyebrow. “Why are you looking at the energy signature for the cloud that attacked the station?”

“The … what? I’m not, these are Lieutenant Romaine’s brain waves,” McCoy sputtered.

“Fascinating. And concerning. Because …” Spock brought another file up on the computer. “Her brainwaves and the energy signal of the cloud are a perfect match.”

The door opened, and Scott walked in, wiping coolant off his face. “Doctor, have you seen Mir … whoa,” he said, caught off-guard by the group. “What the hell…?”

Mira felt herself stand, and a nasty smile crossed her face. Then her mouth opened, and words that didn’t belong to her spilled out:

“Then we shall explain, before we kill you. We are the last hundred of Zetar. Of the pure Zetar. They dared to take our bodies and banished us. We have searched for a millennium for one through whom we could see and speak and hear and feel. Others have always fought us, and so died because they could not abide our glory. This one was open. Foolishly so, but sufficient for our needs. We will hollow her, and take this body, and this ship. And return to Zetar to seize what is rightfully ours.”

Kirk glared across at the Zetar, spinning color in his officer’s eyes. “She isn’t yours to take. And neither is this ship. She has a life of her own, and she isn’t giving it to you. Fight them, Lieutenant,” he urged.

“I’m trying, sir,” she said, sliding to the ground with a groan. “Scotty don’t touch me! They will kill you!” she cried sharply when he jerked forward, and Kirk grabbed him. 

“You won’t let them,” Scott said fiercely, but she shook her head desperately.

McCoy was scanning. “She could kill us all in this state,” he warned.

Mira stood again. “They are making me go to the bridge, Captain,” she managed. “What should I do?”

“Let them begin to function through you,” Kirk said, circling her cautiously. “Let them use your body. They haven’t had one in so long that it might allow you to hold onto your mind, and we can control that moment.”

She nodded tightly, and they all followed her down the hall, onto the lift and up to the bridge.

“Stay with us,” Scotty murmured to her. “Hold on.”

“I am Mira Romaine,” she said tightly, pained. “I will be who I choose to be. Who I choose to be!”

“We will not give this body up,” the Zetarians said, clearly speaking to her. “We will destroy you, if you try to remove us.”

“Sir,” she said shakily when they arrived on the bridge, shoving her torment back. “What do I do?”

Spock had gone to his station and focused internal sensors onto her. “They have not synced with her completely; she keeps displacing them. Lieutenant, when you are yourself, what are you doing?”

“Thinking of everything I want to live for,” she gasped. “Every strong emotion I’ve ever felt, good and bad. They can’t seem to deal with it. Love, and lust. Anger, embarrassment. Grief. Fear. Excitement, happiness. Joy.”

“Captain, humans are capable of sharing emotional states, particularly in proximity and in groups,” Spock said urgently. “It is real and measurable. Consider worshippers speaking in tongues at a religious revival. A rioting mob. Concert-goers spontaneously singing together. It is a collective state that amplifies the underlying emotions.”

Mira cried out in pain, falling to her knees, and Scott stepped toward her.

“Scotty,” Kirk warned sharply.

“She willnae hurt me,” he said, kneeling beside her. He paused, then took her hand. He breathed sharply, painfully, and Mira suddenly snapped upright, seizing both of his hands tightly and looking urgently into his eyes.

“She’s fighting them, Scott said hoarsely, and reached to cup her face with shaking fingers, clearly struggling hard against something. Blood started dripping down his face, and Mira’s. Ears, eyes, nose, and they were dying. “She’s borrowing my mind, to shove them out. Maybe no’ the right choice; not going tae be enough,” he groaned.

Nyota stepped forward without hesitation and put her hand on Scotty’s shoulder. Mira and Scott gasped. 

“No!” the Zetarians shouted through Mira’s mouth, her eyes flashing in a kaleidoscope of color as they dug in.

Mira shoved them back. “Yes,” she said fiercely. Spock reached for Nyota’s shoulder, then Kirk for Spock, and McCoy for Kirk. Everyone on the bridge rushed forward, hands on shoulders, elbows, backs, surrounding Mira. 

“Get more people up here!” Kirk said urgently. Uhura toggled a switch on the communication’s panel with her free hand, and a few moments later the lift opened, carrying more people. Everyone stepped inward, making room. The lift opened again; more crew.

“You aren’t the only collective here,” Kirk said fiercely. “We are the crew of the USS Enterprise. Let her go!”

“NO!” they howled.

Mira stood, and Scotty with her, keeping a firm grip on her hands. “If you’d come to us for help there would have been those who would have volunteered,” she said sadly. “Who would have jumped at the opportunity to learn what you can teach. But instead you take. You kill. We see your minds; you are without remorse or kindness,” she was weeping, but resolved and firm. “We cannot allow you to continue. We will not allow you to do to others what you did to the crew of the station, what you are trying to do to me. A hundred of us; a hundred of you. We will end you.”

Mira looked around the packed bridge, at Scotty, and Uhura, at her Captain, and saw their agreement. She had never noticed it before, but the Zetar had done something to her, and she felt it now: the fierce wave of feeling, crew standing together. The Zetar had her mind and body, but not her heart. The crew felt everything—fear and love and rage and joy, courage and sorrow, hope and despair. Everything that it meant to stand together, wild and alive, against an indifferent universe.

She threw their faithful hearts against the Zetar, displacing them entirely, formless, into the cold void. There was no time for them to become the energy cloud they’d been, and they dispersed into nothing without even a last scream.

The crew gasped, then looked at each other, blinking. Mira slumped, and Scotty and those nearest grabbed her. There was little room on the bridge, stuffed shoulder to shoulder with the officers who had responded without question to the call for help. 

“Okay, those nearest the lift, start making your way out!” Kirk called.

“Aye, sir,” they said from the perimeter, and the bridge began to empty. Scotty gentled Mira to the floor, and McCoy began scanning her.

“Fascinating,” Spock said. “When the Zetar broke into her mind, they enabled her to hold us in a momentary emotional collective. Impressive, especially in an untrained human mind.”

Mira smiled faintly. 

“I think that was a compliment, but I cannae be sure,” Scott said to her, kissing her knuckles, teary and amused and vastly relieved. 

“Well done, Lieutenant,” Kirk said. “Just be still, and we’ll get you down to medbay.”

“Thank you, sir,” she whispered, and passed out.

After everything, being summoned to the  Captain’s office still managed to be terrifying, Mira considered ruefully two weeks later, and touched the bell.

“Come in,” Kirk called, and looked up with a warm smile. “Ms. Romaine. Could I offer you some coffee? I also have tea, entirely because of Mr. Spock and Mr. Scott, not because I can stomach the stuff.”

“Coffee would be wonderful, sir,” she said, and wrapped her hands around the warm mug.

“I saw your report that the Enterprise Archive is done, and took a walk though it this morning. It’s just as impressive as you promised.”

“Thank you sir,” she said proudly.

“I got a call yesterday from Yorktown station,” he continued. “You put in for the Archive position there.”

“Yes sir,” she said, sitting upright. “It’s my dream posting.”

“Not the Enterprise?” he asked in mock hurt, and chuckled at her when she blushed. “Apparently my recommendation has a little sway, but not nearly as much as your qualifications. My understanding is that the position is yours, if you want it. But before you take it, you should know that Commander Spock, Doctor McCoy, and Engineer Scott all agree that you’d make a valuable addition to our permanent crew here. It may well be the first time the three of them have ever agreed on anything. You don’t have to say yes, Lieutenant. It’s a five year mission, and that’s not for everyone. But it’s yours, if you want it.”

Romaine carefully put her coffee down. “I thought there was a chance this might be coming, sir,” she said. “I’ve thought about it. Talked about it. Not with Scotty because this decision needs to be mine, but with Lieutenant Uhura and other friends here, my family. I’m flattered, sir, but no. I can’t say no to Yorktown. And, not for nothing, Scotty and I might be able to make a go of it…but not on the Enterprise. He’s wonderful and kind, but his heart and head is too tied up here for anything more than a fling. I’d rather wait for him to come home.”  

She paused, then continued quietly. “This thing, with the Zetarians. It’s a defining moment in my life. I can feel it. I’ll have to come to terms with it, and decide what it means for my story. And to you, all of you … I can see it is different for you, sir. Another one of a long string of strange occurrences. Logged, processed, set aside, and onto the next thing. Explorers are their own strange breed. I’m a librarian, sir. So thank you. But no.”

Kirk smiled at her, then stood and offered her a warm handshake. “It all sounds logical to me. We’ll be sorry to see you go, but you’ve proven yourself to be wise and strong, in both mind and heart. You can trust your decisions, and I trust them too. Three days until we put you off. I don’t imagine I’ll see you again, Lieutenant. Best of luck to you.”

“Thank you, Captain,” she said fervently, and there was a pang in her heart to turn away from the wilder road, but she was certain in her choice. “It’s been an honor.”

Captain’s Log, Stardate 2261.63. Second star to the right, and straight on until morning.

“I’ve got this one, O’Neil,” Scotty said, walking into the transporter room. 

“Aye sir,” O’Neil said knowingly, and stepped out.

Scotty smiled at Mira. “Got everything?” he asked, nodding at her three duffle bags piled on the pad, ready for beam down to the station.

“I think so,” she said with forced cheer. “If not, I guess I’ll do without.” She looked down. “I wasn’t sure if you’d be here to say goodbye.”

“Why wouldnae I be here?” he asked gently.

She looked up at him. “I meant to tell you. I got the Yorktown Archive position. I’ll catch a ride back into Federation space on the Hood in a few days, and should be there in a few weeks.”

He smiled at her. “I knew you’d get it. There’s no one better. Congratulations, Mira. You’ll be brilliant. I’ve nae been to Yorktown, but I’ve seen the specs. Impressive. It wouldnae surprise me if the Enterprise rolls in sometime mid-mission to resupply.”

“Call me, when you do?” she asked shyly.

“I was hoping I could call yeh before that.”

“I’d like that,” she said, and stepped into his arms one more time. “Thank you, Scotty,” she said, and kissed him. “For this. For everything.”

He traced his fingers over her face. “Thank you, Mira,” he said tenderly, then stepped away to the controls. “Be safe, be well. Send me a message when you get to Yorktown, aye?”

“I will,” she said tearily, positioning herself on the pad. “Safe journeys, Scotty.”

He nodded. “Energize,” he said, because he didn’t trust his voice to say anything else, and she dematerialized. He confirmed safe transport, and watched his instruments as she cleared the pad aboard station. Then she was gone, onto new adventures. Alone in the transporter room, he rubbed his face. “Okay,” he said aloud to himself, then sighed a deep breath and toggled a switch. “Bridge, transporter room. Transport complete. We can disembark.”

“Transport confirmed, transporter room. Confirm disembark.” It was Uhura at the conn this evening, and he was grateful for her voice. “Warp four, Scotty?” she asked. 

“We’re leaving the last of Federation space,” Scott said. “I can give yeh an hour or two of warp six, and maybe a wee bit more. Where are we headed?”

She laughed. “The Captain ordered second star to the right. How Chekov interpreted that, I really can’t say. Warp six, aye.”

Below his feet, Scott felt one-quarter impulse, pushing back from the station, then the low, powerful rumble of the nacelles initializing. The tug, behind his chest, of spacetime folding, breaking Ensteinian physics to carry them forward at 216 times the speed of light itself. The engineer closed his eyes and listened, content enough, as his fair beauty sang into the mysterious void.