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The Middle Watch (0000-0400 Ship’s Time)
Agon Zh'qithiq moves slowly through the early morning hours in the small settlement known by everyone as Grisha’s Folly. His eyes are alert as he brushes past the denizens of the small crowded marketplace and entertainment district.
As he moves to his appointment, he wonders how the hell that he had managed to get himself into this situation, where he was furtively meeting with the so-called ‘silent partner’ in the Sunset Grille. One that his wife knows of only slightly.
A summons by the usual method, an actual paper note left under a stump outside the back door of the bar had brought him to his world.
Written in his birth language. His hand moves to the concealed, old-style Type I phaser stuck in the front of his belt. He pats the area, reassuring himself that the tiny, but powerful weapon is still there.
He stops, feeling the feathery hair at the base of his skull prick up. He stops, then looks in the window of a small, all-night noodle shop. As he does, he focuses on the reflection. With the crowd, he can’t tell if anyone if following him.
Still, twenty years in the Fleet, even as an engineer on an Excelsior, plus his last year or so of living on the border had given him a sense when something was off.
But he couldn’t find what was off.
Other than the fact that he was going to meet someone who had a certain reputation.
A reputation of making unwanted people disappear.
As well as one of being extremely paranoid.
He turns and starts to move towards the alley next to the noodle shop. As he passes into the small space, he stops as he feels something hard against his lower spine.
“Don’t move,“ says a modulated voice.
Agon breathes out. He keeps himself completely still, with no movement towards the phaser.
“Good boy,” the voice says. Something trips in his mind.
“Yes ma’am,” he says. he feels the person on the other end of whatever weapon is stuck in his back stiffen, briefly. “What do you want?”
“I want to talk to you about my investment,” she says.
Agon carefully exhales. “So you’re my ‘partner’?”
“I prefer to call myself your boss,” she says.
“My wife would object to that.”
“Then it’ll be our little secret then.”
“So why am I here?”
“Have a little job for you,” she says.
He says nothing.
The hard object moves away from his spine. “Let’s get a drink, dear,” she says.
He turns around.
A figure stands there, definitely female. She wears a dark hooded jumpsuit with a cloth around her face. Dark eyes gaze at him; he can just see feathery dark hair under the hood. His eyes narrow at the small stylus for writing on a PADD. He gives her a sour look, but gazes at her, trying to take in as much information as he can.
She is taller than most women. The skin that he can see is a dark bronze. He feels his eyebrows raise as his eyes lock on hers.
They are flat and angled up from the center.
His ‘silent partner’ is of Vulcan extraction. This is confirmed when her head turns slightly and he can see the outline of the pointed ears in the tight hood.
Agon had known many Vulcans in his life, including meeting Captain, soon-to-be-Ambassador Spock and his father Ambassador Sarek. He knew their cadences of speech, even if the owner hadn’t been a typical Vulcan, if there was any such thing, like T’Varilyn, the late beloved partner of two unique personages in their own right. One of whom is on this world, probably either sleeping fitfully, or getting reacquainted with a certain oversized, overconfident asshole of a Starfleet security commander.
This, unless he was ready to turn in his washed-up Starfleet engineer’s card, was most probably a Romulan.
Or as the locals in these parts along the Neutral Zone call them, Rihannsu.
“Come along,” she says. She turns and walks away.
The husband and partner of a Deltan watches her walk in front of him, admiring her gait.
Yeah, that’s it. The ol’ gait, he thinks.
He doesn’t realize that he is being watched as well from behind. There is a bit of the same admiration for his ‘gait’, but also something else.
Siobhan Lincolnton retreats slightly into the shadows. She bundles herself tighter into the old hooded Starfleet fatigue coat against the chill. As she does, the pain of her shoulder wound slices through her body. She manages to stifle her groan, if not her wince.
The chill hadn’t come just for this hemisphere’s winter on Leelix III. She starts to move out to follow them, making sure that she keeps her distance.
Morning Watch (0400-0800, Ship’s Time)
The watcher follows the young officer with his eyes. He smiles to himself; her tradecraft is very good for a ship driver. Although she’d had to learn harder skills in the month that she and others of her Group had spent as guests of the Klingon Free Systems on Vostus. Especially in the days leading up to the escape, when their resistance had been more active, rather than passively watching and listening.
The timetable had been sped up when he and another had learned that the Klingon House was going to slaughter them all.
Agon comes out of the bar that he had gone into with his ‘partner.’ He had looked around, checking for tails, then headed back to his own bar and possibly his bed. A few moments later, the ‘partner’ had come out.
The young officer, Lincolnton, had decided not to follow Agon back in the direction of the Sunset Grille. She was starting after the contact, keeping her distance.
The watcher only hopes that she won’t get too close. The contact isn’t anyone to be trifled with, and in spite of everything, she doesn’t know Lieutenant j.g. Siobhan Lincolnton from a criminal looking to relieve her of anything of value or a Tal Shiar agent looking to stick an honor blade into the side of her neck.
It could fatal for the young officer, who the watcher has no idea what she was doing following that dumbass Agon.
It might be time to send in the B-team to intercept Siobhan, without grievous bodily injury to anyone. He’d thought that was the reason why Siobhan was off of the duty rotation, in addition to recovering from her injuries, from what he’d been told by his source.
A source who had been contacted through other channels by someone close to the captain, looking to get at least another warship assigned.
He stops as he realizes that Siobhan has broken off and turned towards the naval docks. He stops, then checks his communicator. He sends a text to a certain commcode. There is a terse acknowledgement.
Forenoon Watch (0800-1200 Ship’s Time) - Alpha Shift on Duty
Decker climbs up onto the flight deck. She is fifteen minutes early for the watch. She starts as she realizes that Kaylin Stone-Hunter is already seated in the command chair. There is no one else at the control station. Commander Stone-Hunter points at the pilot’s seat, the console recently repaired. She sits down and runs her eyes over it, checking the repaired patches, noticeable but serviceable.
“Good morning,” Kaylin says in a flat voice. “We’re on alert-five, so run up diagnostics on the engines and control systems. The last two hours of the watch, you’ll be down in CIC getting more familiar with the Cohort and weapons systems. Hopefully this is the last day that we’re the only ones that are on alert-five; those damned boomers can take some of the burden. Since the Patrol has seen fit to extend the time the other Groups are deployed elsewhere. We’ve got this subsector.”
Decker doesn’t reply to what might just count as a ‘mood’, but sets to her work. As she works, her mind wanders to last night. The time she had spent with Theelia, just talking at the bar, then dancing, had done more for her than any two-minute drill against a wall with an arrogant engineering ensign, convinced he was all deities in the Alpha Quadrant’s gift to coitus.
She smiles as she completes the runup, moving to bring up the specs on the Cohort system. She hears an exclamation from behind her. Her mind trips back to the night before, once again.
“Kahless’s Four Balls,” Kaylin says. “If you start whistling, I’m going to bring back keelhauling as a punishment. What’s got you so fucking chipper?”
Decker looks down, but realizes that Kaylin had said this in a much lighter tone than when she had come on, an hour-and-a-half ago. She looks up and sees Kaylin in the reflection of the flight deck viewports, with the viewscreen deactivated.
Her squadron commander is smiling. She tries to think of a reply.
Kaylin supplies it for her. “Well, I’m pretty sure it wasn’t Ensign Mortenson. Decent engineer, but a bit too convinced of his own perfection.” Her reflection shakes her head. “In all things.”
Decker hopes that Kaylin can’t see her blush in the reflection. Does everybody know about that? she muses. If so, our ‘captain’ has a big mouth.
Kaylin holds up her hand. Decker turns and faces her. “Don’t worry. There’s no gossip. But I make it a point to know what’s going on in my squadron—especially on my lead ship.”
Decker nods. She is silent for a moment. Trying to figure out a way to say what had given her so much calmness and life, after the battle.
“You were at the Sunset Grille last night,” Kaylin says. “You were with Theelia.” She stops, as if realizing what that had sounded like.
“Yessir,” Decker replies.
“Let me guess. Theelia worked a little magic on you.”
Decker exhales sharply. “It wasn’t like that, Commander,” she manages. Her memories of the evening in the bar once again flood back to her.
“I didn’t say it was,” Kaylin chides. “I grew up with a Deltan, who was being fostered. I know them pretty well.”
“We just danced,” Decker replies after a moment, realizing how lame that sounds. “We talked at the bar, then danced. I felt…
Kaylin nods as she trails off, her smile growing warmer. “You felt relaxed. Alive again, if you will, after the battle.”
“Yes,” Decker whispers.
“That’s what Deltans do for their friends and family. It’s not just about the sex, contrary to popular belief.”
“What do you mean?” Decker asks.
“It means that you might just have been chosen by Theelia to be one of her ‘persons’,” Kaylin replies.
“Her person? Do you mean a bonding or something? That she has her eye on me?”
Kaylin laughs at Decker’s confusion. “No, Deck. Not exactly. It is a bonding of some sort, but not necessarily one that’s sexual or even romantic. It’s called prelanka-tere in their language. It translates as the ‘bond of the mind’.” The smile turns warm.
Decker says nothing to that. Kaylin takes a deep breath.
“How did you feel after the dancing and the talking?”
Decker thinks for a moment, trying to put the emotions and sensations into words. Finally, she says, “I felt good. Relaxed. Comfortable.”
“Was it physical? Or emotional, or even spiritual?” Kaylin presses gently.
Decker nods and smiles. “Maybe all three.”
“The body, the heart, and the mind,” Kaylin remarks.
Decker feels her eyebrow raise, but says nothing in reply.
Kaylin pushes forward. “Did what you feel physically seem to come from her pheromones, or something else?”
Decker blushes at that, feeling the heat on her face. “It started as that, then went a little deeper. I could feel what she was feeling. When we were dancing, I started seeing things in my mind. More of just concepts rather than actual pictures, but definitely something different.”
“It was weird, right?”
Decker thinks about her reply. “It was, at least a little bit. But when we finished dancing, I felt relaxed.”
“Why were you on edge? The battle? Mortenson?”
“All of the above, plus thoughts about others.” Decker hopes that answer satisfies her.
It doesn’t, it appears, but Kaylin doesn’t press for details.
In fact, she remains quiet for a couple of minutes. “Deltan pheromones aren’t just chemical. There is a psychic aspect to them. They’re not manipulative, like an Orion female’s can be, they’re just a part of who Deltans are. For reasons you can probably tell, they do keep themselves aloof from most species. Unless they feel something about someone. Something that feels ‘right’ to them.” She takes a sip from her coffee. “That may not be the word. They trust that person. And they’re willing to help them if they sense distress. They won’t do anything that goes deeper, unless they feel that person is accepting of it.” She grins. “You may have gotten a little bit to the next step. The prelanka-gere, the bond of the heart. They’re kind of interchangeable in what order they go. Except for the last. The body’s always last.”
“So I guess I was? Accepting of it?”
“Yep. Sounds like it.”
“This Deltan that you grew up with. Did they help you like this?”
Kaylin smiles wistfully. “She did. She helped a great deal with the angsts of being a teenager. We grew close, where we helped each other. Deltans get just as much out of this as those they help do.” She looks away. “We grew up in a large partnership family, with so many different personalities. The adults accepted her without reservation, but sometimes the children of different couplings could be difficult.”
She looks at Decker. “Eventually we did get to explore more physical aspects of this. When she felt I was ready, and when I was of age in my culture.”
Decker wonders if her eyebrows are going to grow into permanent parts of her hairline. “Really?” she asks, as casually as she can.
“Yeah.” She stops. “The prelanka-dere. That is the aspect that caused them to take that oath in Starfleet.”
They both fall silent. “Why?” Decker asks, though she suspects the answer.
Kaylin smiles. “Because most species, or at least some members, want to go for ramming speed after they are first exposed to the pheromones, which are called the Threads, by the way. And a lot of times, if they do, they find that they can’t handle what comes next in the act of intercourse. When the next level that I spoke about, the Link, comes into play.”
“The images and what-not.”
“Yep. The oath is a hammer, when maybe only a little maturity is needed. But not everyone is able to handle that next step. There’s occasionally been serious mental and emotional issues when things aren’t handled.” She reaches out and touches Decker’s hand, patting it. “Not everybody is like you.”
Decker stares at her. “What do you mean?”
“Well, it doesn’t seem like you went insane, although,” she says archly, “I can’t really tell.”
Decker ignores that, listening patiently.
“Plus, how you and Theelia connected seems to have been good for you, in helping you with recovering from what you did and experienced in the battle. You feel stronger?”
After a moment, Decker nods. “I do.”
“Then I guess that advanced degree in psychology that Theelia got from the Academy is actually paying off.”
“She’s Starfleet?” Decker asks incredulously.
“Yep. Damned good navigator and pilot, in addition to what degrees she has.”
Decker notices that she stops talking at that. As if there is something deeper.
Something that isn’t her story to tell.
“So,” Kaylin asks, looking at her fingernails. “Did she relieve any of those other stressors that you had?”
Decker purses her lips, wondering if she can tell a superior officer to go to hell. “Not directly, though it certainly helped.” She looks away, unable to meet Kaylin’s eyes. “Along with something in her office, that she sent me to while she got back to work.”
Kaylin’s eyes widen. “Damn, Sinclair, you must’ve really made an impression. She doesn’t usually invite anyone to use the Couch the first time they meet.”
The intense blush actually raises her body temperature, Decker is sure. She looks away, shoving the memories of the office-visit out of her head, lest she reveal herself.
Suddenly, both of them look up. They are both suffused with an incredible warmth, moving through their whole bodies. They look at each other.
Decker recognizes the feel of the warmth, from yesterday. With something else cutting through her heart, her mind, and her body.
Despair.
When she had needed to leave the sickbay, as Doctor McCoy worked on repairing Captain Chandra’s wounds.
Her eyes tear as she sees the look on Kaylin’s face. A look that is not a product of the intense overspill of pheromones, though that is there, too.
A look of pain—close to grief.
A look of memory.
Kaylin gets up and runs for the hatch and ladder down into the ship.
First Dog Watch (1600-1800 Ship’s Time) - Delta Shift on Duty
Chandra looks out over her command, from the vantage point of the conning platform above flight deck. The platform is empty; it’s only used when the cutter is floating on top of an aquatic environment and needs to go dark.
She closes her eyes, wondering how long this might be part of her command. If she will even have a command, after what had happened earlier in the day.
She feels the ladder vibrate from the flight deck. Leonard McCoy’s head pokes up, then looks at her. He struggles to move up on the platform; she doesn’t hesitate to pull him up.
Even though she would rather be alone. She had spent the rest of the shift and most of this one touring the other ships, especially the four new Avenger-class cutters of the torpedo squadron. It hadn’t calmed her after the general release of her pheromones.
No, she thinks, The broadcast of them.
She had immediately kicked Grasp out of her cabin. She’d seen hurt in his eyes, before they’d transitioned to a blank, militarily correct expression. There had been nothing amiss when she’d awakened. Her Threads had been in their normal low burble, what Siobhan had termed ‘on stun’ when they had been recovering together on the Enterprise-B, after Vostus. She’d looked over at Grasp lying there, as his eyes had come open. She’d made to move over to bring him awake even more, along with other parts of him.
At least one of which was already wide awake and poking her in her hip.
She’d heard the commotion from outside her cabin, an instant after Grasp had jumped up, his back against the wall, his blue eyes wide. She’d felt the burst from her pheromones; in the Link, she could feel more than Grasp being affected.
McCoy moves closer to her. He’d kept his silence and he doesn’t even say anything as he slides over to her.
Demonstrating to her that he isn’t afraid of any of whatever-the-hell-that-was.
Her mind returns to what had happened. She’d immediately showered and left the Comstock, meeting the other crews. There had been no more instances of what had happened. She hadn’t even been able to face Kaylin.
“You’re fine, Chandra,” McCoy says. She relishes his accent, even though it is a reminder of someone else’s.
Someone she has probably lost forever.
Chandra looks at him. “You and I have a different meaning of that word, Doc,” she says.
“Yeah, but mine carries more weight. I was one of the surgeons who put parts of your brain back together, but one who has known you and those who love you a good long time. I say that you’re fit for full duty.”
“I just blasted my entire ship with pheromones, along with the more intense part of my physiology.”
“And was anyone harmed?”
“No. But I don’t know if I can remain their captain, if I can’t control myself.”
McCoy’s response is terse, but elegant. “Bullshit.”
Chandra stares at him. He doesn’t break her gaze. “Your crew, the ones that you kept alive on that hellhole would follow you to hell and back. They already have. Some of them were kept alive emotionally and mentally by your use of the Link to strengthen them. Even though it cost you a great deal of your own strength, especially when the guards bound you and locked you in a hole, so that you had no contact with anyone. A fate that could’ve killed you slowly, if Croft and T’Varilyn hadn’t gotten you out of there.”
She starts to say something, but thinks better of it. She turns as she feels the presence of another Deltan coming up on the conning tower.
Djinn is soon standing next to the two of them. His golden eyes are fixed on hers. She stares defiantly back at him.
“Well, I’ll leave you two to it.”
They remain quiet, neither of them wanting to give in and say something first. As McCoy manages to get back down on the ladder, he looks up at them both.
“Somebody say something, dumbasses.” He is gone after that.
Chandra slumps slightly. “Go ahead. Give me your worst, Trah-Ehbray,” she says in their shared language.
“Why would I do that? I’m your brother and a healer. I would only give you my best, leh’Ta-Ehbray,” he says. His eyes bore into hers. Little sister.
“So what’s your opinion, as a Deltan healer? Am I fucked up for good?”
“Is that a technical medical term?” he asks dryly. “No. I don’t think you are. My considered medical opinion, along with others, is that you suffered stabbing trauma to the part of your brain that governs your Threads and your Link. That portion has been repaired, and it has mostly healed, but it will take time, just like any other injury to heal completely. You are, however, physically fit for full duty.”
“What about mentally?”
He stares at her. “That’s not my area of expertise. But other Deltan healers-mind healers think that you are. They also think that if you were on some shore-duty, or something that wouldn’t keep your brain engaged, would be detrimental to the healing of your Threads and Link. The essential part of you, along with the rest of that powerful brain, under that thick skull.”
“I don’t know how powerful it is. I seem to have let it be ruled by my smaller brain. My yani’ar’ta.”
He smiles at the use of that particular word. “I don’t fault you that. Just your taste. I didn’t know you were into dunderheads.”
“Asshole,” she says in Basic. There isn’t a word that translates as well in Deltos. Except maybe yani’at, which is generally used in another context entirely.
He looks at her and holds out his hand, palm up. For a moment, the old defiance returns. Finally, she reaches into the pocket of her trousers and pulls out the hypospray containing the suppressant that McCoy had found. He takes it and pockets it. He reaches over and kisses her, then holds her forehead to his.
As he turns to leave the conning station, she asks, “You got time for a drink?”
“Already got one scheduled. Then I’m headed back home. Jan’aan’na, the others, and the kids are waiting on me.”
“Give them my love. Who do you have a drink planned with?” she asks, curiosity getting the better of her.
He smirks at her before his head disappears below. “With your security officer. Thought I’d give a dunderhead a try.”
She starts to curse at him, then catches herself. “I hope you choke on your drink,” she says, laughing.
Chandra hears his laughter as well, as he descends into the boat. She feels lighter than she has in long while.
Second Dog Watch (1800-2000) - Alpha Shift on Duty
Kaylin moves up into the flight deck, followed by Siobhan. Decker turns from where she is seated in the command chair. One of the chiefs is at the pilot’s console, a younger crewmember at the secondary console. They were no longer on ready-5, the USS Devastator, the squadron leader for the Avengers, had taken over that duty.
Decker narrows her eyes at their dark clothing. She gets up and walks over closer to them at Kaylin’s signal.
“What is this?” Decker asks.
“Stretching our legs,” Kaylin replies.
“Both of you? With dark clothes?” She points at their thighs. “And phasers?”
“Never you mind. Hopefully when I come back, I’ll have another ship.” She grins and touches Decker’s cheek. “And you and Chuckles here,” she says, pointing to Siobhan, “can have your own ship with the Captain (L).”
Decker narrows her eyes, skeptical to the last.
It has just gotten to the winter’s dark when they move down the ramp. They walk in silence for several blocks outside the installation. Kaylin can tell that Siobhan is brimming with questions, but keeps her counsel.
They come to a civilian docking bay. Kaylin looks at it for a moment, then checks her PADD. The coordinates that she’d been sent match.
She looks at Siobhan. “I don’t guess I could get you to stay here,” she says.
“Not even if you order me to,” Siobhan replies.
“That’s what I thought,” Kaylin says. “Dumbass.”
“Takes one to know one, Commander. You sure you want to do this?”
“Yeah,” is all that she says in reply.
“I know you’re taking Chandra’s offer to solve the problem seriously. But do you think that you’re actually going to get a Free Commando ship to join Starfleet? Even the Border Patrol?”
“Who the hell do you think brings that Romulan ale in that you have a taste for, Shiv?”
“I thought you got that through Agon,” Shiv replies.
Kaylin only smiles.
Shiv stops as they come into the bay. Kaylin’s eyes widen as much as Shiv’s.
They both stare at a relic. She stares at the clean, triangular lines of an old Goddess-class gunboat. The same type that Kaylin’s mother had made her name in for forty years. The forerunner of the various Cohort-equipped classes of cutters.
Unlike the Aerfen, this one is pure matte black, without the representation of the firebird painted on it.
A very tall, muscular, man, his south Asian origins plain, steps down from the ramp. His full black beard and mustache twitches.
“I take it you’re the ones that contacted our broker for this commission?”
Kaylin keeps her expression even. “Maybe,” she says.
“Well, either you are, are you aren’t,” he says in a deep voice. A deep voice with a great deal of impatience in it. “You’re paid up for several months, no questions asked, so we’re at your disposal.” His expression hardens. “As soon as I find out some things.”
“I thought you said no questions asked,” Shiv says dryly.
He looks at her, as if she is a bug to be squashed. “Watch your mouth, kid,” he says. He looks back at Kaylin. “I’m Oscar Freetown. Captain of the Free Vessel Starlight. What’s the gig?”
“I guess your little motto has been changed to ‘some questions asked’,” she says. “Okay, that’s fair.” She grins, then walks up to him. As she does, a shorter figure steps out. A young woman with dark hair, light tan skin and a smattering of freckles over her nose stares at them with black eyes.
Her eyebrows and the ears that poke out from the curly hair show her origin. As does the Romulan style disruptor that is holstered under one arm.
“My first mate and navigator. D’Shaya t’Rrallion.”
Well, that could make this even more interesting to explain to Chandra. Or to my mother, Kaylin thinks.
She shrugs. “Where’s the rest of your crew?”
“Don’t need any. Everything that we can’t perform, has been automated.” He takes a step towards her, looming over her. “Now what’s the job?” he asks. “For the last time.”
She reaches out and places her hand on his chest. “Back off, Sasquatch,” she says. She gives him her sweetest smile. “Welcome to the Border Patrol,” she says.
“Oh, fuck no,” he starts.
A disruptor bolt strikes the hull near the ramp. Shiv drops and comes up firing her phaser. Kaylin hears her cry out as she lifts the phaser with her right hand, the one connected to the currently-perforated shoulder.
Three figures, large, and with visible ridges on their foreheads dive for cover. Four more come up from another angle and open fire on them.
She feels ice grow in her heart as she sees catches a glimpse of a distinctive insignia on one’s cloak.
“What the hell did you do to piss off the Klingon Free Systems?” she yells at Freetown, which clearly isn’t his real name.
“Nothing that I know of. I got a winning personality. Didn’t I hear that Starfleet pissed them off a few months back?”
Kaylin doesn’t say anything, wondering if it could be them.
Any of the 17th. They had killed the leader of that faction’s House—Klinzhai.
Daymia had died at Shiv’s and Kaylin’s own hands on Vostus. Dropped into a slush deuterium tank, with her own blade in her chest.
As she moves over to take cover with Shiv, they both happen to glance at a figure moving up behind two of the Klingons.
Their eyes meet in amazement as they recognize the figure.
A human male with gray hair and an auburn-blonde bit of hair around his lips.
Kaylin closes her eyes, then opens them, locking with his green eyes. She knows that there are gold flecks in them, having seen the eyes up close. The gray hair is new, within the last year.
She wonders how the hell she is looking at James Blackthorne. A man known as Croft ever since his days at Starfleet Academy.
A man once loved by her Group commander. Possibly still loved, is she knows her foster sister.
A man now in deserter status from Starfleet.