A/N: Here it is at last! The third and final instalment of Kassai Lydana's story. Many thanks as always to my friend Kretolus, who will no doubt be extremely happy to see this :D
Hope you like it, folks!
Kassai Lydana, Rear Admiral in Starfleet Intelligence, stood to attention before the desk of her commanding officer, Vice Admiral DeVare. The cherubic admiral's face, normally bright and smiling, was scowling at the young woman in front of him, his eyes dark with concern.
"I wish I could say I wasn't sorry to see you here, Lydana," he told her, "but the events that have been brought to my attention...are somewhat disturbing."
Lydana stared straight ahead, her eyes unfocused, and apparently favouring her right side.
"Sorry to hear that sir," she said flatly, her voice lacking the usual vitality that DeVare was used to. He sighed heavily, and turned his attention to the PADD in front of him.
"So what happened to you?"
"I fell, sir," she answered in that same cold, dead voice.
"You fell?" His tone was dubious, at best, and he read a list from the PADD. "Let's see...a black eye, three broken ribs, fractured clavicle, a number of torn ligaments in both legs and a dislocated shoulder. Care to change your answer?"
"It was a long fall, sir," Lydana answered numbly.
So complete was her fugue that she barely even flinched when DeVare slammed his hands down on the desk.
"God dammit, Lydana!" he shouted. "You are an Admiral in Starfleet, and as such you represent us wherever you go. That means when you turn up at Quark's, get drunk and start a bar fight with Klingons, people are going to notice!"
He sighed again, returning his attention to the PADD in front of him.
"And that isn't even the most disturbing thing here. What's this about trying to deliberately break into the Mirror Universe?"
"It was a failed experiment sir, nothing more."
DeVare's lip curled in annoyance, and nodded at her.
"Yes, and a damn good job it did fail, or else I may not have been able to protect you from the repurcussions." He pinched the bridge of his nose, taking a deep breath before looking at her again.
"Lydana...what is going on?" he asked, his voice softer. "I know that Subadmiral S'Vae's death was particularly traumatic for you, but you can't allow yourself to lose the plot like this." He massaged his temples with his fingers, closing his eyes for a moment. "Perhaps you should explain what happened after you were released?"
Lydana's eyes finally lowered, staring straight at DeVare with little emotion. For someone who had seen her at her best, it was harrowing to see Lydana at her absolute worst. He could see in those eyes not just pain, but a willingness to end everything simply because she felt she had lost it all.
However, she didn't reply to him, instead just staring with those cold, lifeless eyes.
DeVare stared back at her, before tossing the PADD aside and leaning forwards again.
"Take some time off, Lydana," he told her softly. "Go home. Or perhaps go to New Romulus, spend some time with your adopted family, grieve, get it out of your system. You are no good to us like this, and if what I've heard is true, we are going to need you at your best very soon."
"Is that an order, sir?" she asked, her voice as lifeless as her expression, and he gave her a choppy nod.
"You're damn right it is. Get out of her, Lydana, and I don't want to see you again until you're fit to return to duty."
She saluted in silence, even that simple action lacking any emotion or energy, and she limped out of the room.
"Come back to us soon, Lydana," DeVare said aloud to the empty office, "we're going to need you out there very, very soon."
Lydana stood at the shuttle dock, staring at the vessels flitting in and out of the station without truly seeing them. Since the defence of New Romulus, nothing had felt right – her whole world, her very reason for living, had been torn away from her.
Loraya S'Vae, Subadmiral in the Romulan Republic and Lydana's own wife, had sacrificed herself and the ruin of her ship to destroy an Elachi command dreadnought, which gave the rest of the allied fleet the opening they needed to destroy the rest of the opposition.
But for Lydana, all that mattered to her was that her wife, her first and only love, was gone.
She still had a store of information, regarding the Mirror Universe and a large section on time travel, and she knew she hadn't exhausted all her options. The Mirror Universe was, admittedly, a bad idea – although the people who inhabited it were the same, their lives and personalities were often drastically different. If Lydana had succeeded in breaking through, she had no guarantee that the Loraya of that reality would be anything like the Loraya she knew.
That, then, left time travel, to try and find Loraya before the defence of New Romulus, and save her from her fate.
Lydana couldn't care less about the timeline, the Temporal Prime Directive or any other rules and regulations. All she wanted was her wife, alive and safe once again. Anything else was irrelevant.
After leaving the shuttle dock, Lydana walked absently around the rest of the space station, lacking in any purpose or direction.
That was, until she found out a Rhode Island-class science ship was in one of the drydock cradles, undergoing some routine maintenance.
Small, fast and agile, she realised that such a ship might be just the thing she needed. Without expression, she nodded to herself and headed back to the shuttle bay, eventually finding the craft that was heading to the dock she wanted. As the shuttle began its journey, Lydana focussed on formulating a plan – this would be difficult, and could potentially end her career if it failed, but if it worked...
It was worth the risk. Anything was worth it, just to bring her back.