I've never written for a Klingon before. Truth be told, I've avoided it for a number of reasons, the main one being that they're just damned tricky to get into the heads of, even Worf. How do you write for a Klingon who has lived amongst humans for so many years? Anyhow I guess this is my first attempt, and is set just after the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "The Enemy"; an episode which has always sat in my mind as one of particuarly murky moralty, and complicated reasoning. Please pardon my spelling of "Honour" by the way: I'm British. Standard disclaimers apply.

Honour Bound.

It was entirely reasonably that he be sent with the Romulan.

Humans would consider it so, and he'd been amongst them long enough to appreciate their… consistency. He was the Head of Security. To allow one of them, even one who apparently (somehow) fought alongside a Federation officer down on that planet, free reign on board of the Starship Enterprise... the very idea was ridiculous.

La Forge, however...

Geordi did not have to be here. In fact he should not have been here.

Klingons appreciated such willpower. So, for that matter, did many humans. However they also saw the lack of logic in walking around with a pronounced limp and disorientation when you were relieved of duty; had other places to be, a Doctor who knew how to repair such problems quickly and efficiently, and...

Well. He had lived amongst humans long enough. Geordi should be in sickbay at most, and returning to his post in engineering at least. He shouldn't be here and Worf knows that Geordi does not doubt his ability to restrain himself in the Romulan's presence.

He'd prefer to avoid physical contact, anyway.

But they had passed Deck thirty six, and sickbay, and continued to the transporter room in an uncomfortable silence. A Klingon, and Romulan and a Federation Officer, walking the corridors of the Starship Enterprise.

It sounded like the set up of one of Commander Riker's jokes.

To the Romulan's credit, he kept his face turned forwards. He didn't glimpse at wall panels, or try to gleam any information from his surroundings. If he had any weapons on him, then they remained concealed and untouched, though it would have been foolish of him to try anything, and Worf did not anticipate it. He seemed... almost calm. Untouched. Lost in thoughts that had nothing to do with escape or the glory of the Romulan Empire.

Probably nervous damage.

Still. Commander La Forge and the Romulan are alive because of each other. That knowledge was thankfully strange enough to them to keep them quiet all the way throughout the ship. There is no communication or "small talk" except for when Geordi calmly points out that Bochra should be careful of the exposed circuitry being worked on by engineers outside of Transporter Room One (who turned and stared at the three of them in bewilderment). He mentioned that they're reworking some old systems, and that it was taking longer than expected...

The Romulan didn't respond.

But then, Worf hadn't expected him to. Bochra was Romulan. Their tongues dealt in nothing but lies, "Honour" that Worf's kind would not call Honour at all, and plans to further their own desires, at the expense of everyone else's. Had Geordi not been necessary he would probably be dead. Had Worf not been necessary, the other Romulan would be alive. In many ways a Cold War wages on between them. This is nothing but a temporary ceasefire.

Besides, they would have nothing in common to talk about. They would be unable to connect as they had needed to on the planet. Then survival had been the issue. Worf couldn't think of anything Geordi could have to say that would interest a Romulan.

Still.

'What else are you gonna tell them?' Geordi asked quietly, and... It seemed a genuinely curious question. Nothing more and nothing less. The Romulan hesitated, glimpsing back and forth between Geordi and Worf. He shook his head.

'...I don't know. The truth?'

'Always worked well enough for me.'

'They might not... accept it.'

Geordi smiles with little humour. 'No surprise. But we'll know, won't we?'

Silence. But the look on the Romulan's face was not one of disagreement or disgust, more of a vague confusion. Nerve damage indeed. Worf gave the command to Energise, and as the Romulan disappeared in the haze of a transporter's grip, LaForge let out a sigh of relief. 'We'll know, Bochra... but I dunno how many people here are gonna believe it either.'

'I suppose that they'll have to,' Worf said dryly.' After all... You are still here.'

'And very glad of it too, thanks for reminding me.' Geordi nodded to the Transporter Chief and left the room with a slightly more pronounced limp than he had when he entered. Worf followed.

Humans were a peculiar species, driven on by their own weaknesses and complications. They had come from carnal origins as had Worf's people. Rather than harnessing and adapting to those instincts, however, they had suppressed them. Reworked their minds with empathy and patience. Deep down they longed for revenge, yet often extended their hands in compassion to their enemies. they understood duty, honour, justice... yet tempered all these things with mercy. They demanded equality for all, yet a man like Captain Picard would not, could not, order one man to do something against his will to service another. No matter if that act was harmless and the alternative was death.

Would Geordi have implored to that Romulan's good will, had his parents been murdered in an honourless massacre? Perhaps yes, perhaps no. Like said, Humans were complicated.

'I will escort you to sickbay.'

'Afraid I've been converted, Worf?' Geordi smiles as they walk, much more slowly this time, down the corridors, past the confused engineers and into the Turbo lift. The question is asked completely without malice or accusation, but it's more... blunt than is characteristic for Lieutenant LaForge. 'Deck Thirty Six.'

'That is not why I offered. And sickbay is not on Deck Thirty Six.' Engineering was, he added silently. LaForge knows his duty.

'I know. Thanks, but I'd like to check out engineering first, see how things are going.'

'Your team is coping well enough considering your absence. Besides which, your VISOR problems...'

'It seems to be okay for now. I think most of the damage will fix itself with enough time. I'm probably going to be off duty for a day or two anyway.'

'Doctor Crusher would be a better judge of that.'

There was silence for a moment but for the Turbo lifts engines, and Geordi seemed unusually interested in the image display showing lift's whereabouts in the ship. Worf wondered whether his refutable of sickbay has as much to do with duty as he'd thought. 'I'm just... not sure I want to go there right now it'll be... Well, there'll be questions and... My nerves are weird, you know? I'll probably accidentally thwap one of the nurses on the nose or something. Now that'd be embarrassing.'

'You have shown no signs of muscle spasms. And if you expect one then Doctor Crusher also stocks sedatives. Besides which...'

Geordi held up his hands in a gesture of surrender. They were only shaking slightly. 'Okay, okay, fair enough. Sickbay it is. But I blame whatever happens in there on you.'

Dishonour and Geordi LaForge were not, as humans said, words that you would commonly find in the same sentence. But humans did not understand Honour in the same way as Klingons. And Geordi did not understand the stench of burning flesh, lives taken without honour in darkness and cowardice. Earlier today, a Romulan cur paid in blood for the crimes of his race, and Klingons would call this justice.

'Are you alright?'

Worf blinked, honestly surprised by the very nature of the question. After all, it hadn't been him down on that planet. 'Me?'

'Yeah. You just walked down a corridor with a Romulan. We had a conversation in front of you. Well. Almost a conversation.'

Worf glimpsed at Geordi. 'You mentioned repair work. I would hardly call it a conversation.'

'Well it's more than I ever figured I'd get out of one of them in my lifetime.' Geordi smirked. 'And I'm not you. Was it hard for you, having them on board? Knowing what some of their people did to yours?'

The question was honest and open. Another thing humans valued was honesty, even though they lied a great deal. With Klingons, when to be honest and how honest to be often come down to loyalty and honour... most things did. A human might have been offended by Geordi's bluntness, but then, Worf was no human. 'Yes. It was. Was it difficult for you?'

'Considering I was about to die and the guy had a disruptor pointed at me, yeah, it was.'

'He threatened you?' ...Perhaps he should have checked the centurion for weapons.

'Of course he threatened me, Worf. Fortunately since we were both expecting to die within a few hours we... eventually found a way of communicating that didn't involve threats and insults. Nothing like arguing philosophy when your synapses are turning to jelly.'

'Humans are an unusual species. In some ways I imagine your actions and beliefs elude me as much as they do Data.'

'Don't let him hear you say that.' Geordi chuckled. 'And I wouldn't worry about it. Not that you would. Sometimes human behaviour eludes me a lot too. Just like it eluded Bochra...' Geordi paused, clenching and unclenching his fists as if testing his weakened nervous system. 'I still don't understand it... and Maybe he'll start to think about it a little now, too.'

'You truly believe so?' Worf's scepticism is genuine.

'I don't know. The idea's been planted, Worf. You can hide from things you don't really get, but when someone sticks an idea in your head... You can hate it as much as you like, but you can't just ignore it.

'Planting an idea and making someone believe in it are two very different things.'

'I don't think you can really make someone believe anything.'

'The Romulans do.' And Worf knew as soon as he has said it that it wasn't entirely right. Forcing someone to believe was a matter of training and manipulation, sometimes of huge swathes of people. Enforced obedience and fear as a means of ruling. But fear and respect are not the same for any species; Geordi was correct, once an idea was planted the idea remained, and the idea of human mercy was not one any man, Klingon or Romulan, could forget.

'...I would not have survived.'

'Sure you would, Worf, this is you we're talking about. You can survive anything.'

'No. We would have killed one another.'

'You don't know that. I didn't know what was going to happen down there. Heck, Worf, if somebody had told me yesterday that I was gonna be stranded on a planet with a Romulan centurion—' Geordi hesitated as a jerking movement shifted in his left shoulder, 'Ha. See? What did I tell you? Muscle spasms.'

'With all due respect, Geordi... you do not understand.'

There was another silence, uncomfortable and still. 'No, I guess I don't... but you could try explaining anyway.'

Well. Why not? '...The Romulan who was on board the ship died. He required a ribosome infusion from a crewmember. I was the only compatible donor.'

'...Ah.'

'I declined to cooperate.'

'I'd guessed...' Geordi said quietly. 'Do you regret it?'

Regret. Another human quality. He is not certain how true it is for Klingons. He was taken away before he was old enough to understand, and now much of their world is strangely alien to him. 'I cannot. His end was a result of his misguided beliefs. Of his loyalty to a dishonourable empire.' His mouth curled slightly into deeper frown. 'The Romulan claimed that he wished to die with his hands around my throat, with his blood unsullied by my own. He no more wanted my aid than I wanted to give it. So you see, Geordi, that I may not have survived on that planet as you did. Bochra's presence might almost have been a blessing... It would have meant that I died in battle, as is every Klingon's wish.'

'Well... there's that I guess.' Geordi says. And the strange fact is that he means it. The Klingon desire to die, awake and proud, with his hands around his Bat'leth is an alien one to most humans. Yet Geordi seems to understand it. Or at least, he understands what it means to Worf, and that is enough.

There is another silence. Worf thinks of how unusually long the turbo lift seems to be taking.

'I'm gonna ask a question,' Geordi said eventually. 'You don't have to answer me if you don't want to.'

'Of course. Ask.'

Geordi took a deep breath. 'When I was down on the planet... When my VISOR cut own, that Romulan centurion was my eyes. The only reason either of us were able to get out of there alive was because... well, we needed each other. And Bochra had to set aside his own beliefs –his own convictions– in order for us to do that. I... guess I didn't so much. Getting out alive seemed more important than what either of us thought... We were united, because we both wanted to survive. And that's a pretty basic instinct. The need to stay alive.' He paused. 'It makes me wonder about Klingon beliefs... In some ways they're like Romulan beliefs in that they put their honour above their own lives. Or a twisted idea of honour anyway. Maybe that's the difference between Klingon pride and Romulan. I guess every species thinks that their way is the best way but... a lot of us can accept it as not being the only way. Romulans don't. Or at least, I didn't think they did, until Bochra was my eyes for me. Then he proved that he could, when it suited him.'

Worf considered this. 'Did you speak of these things with the Romulan?'

'No. I was trying to convince the guy not to shoot me. Bringing up the Klingons beliefs or... or any or my own beliefs probably wouldn't have helped me with that. But as you've probably noticed, brushing with death leaves a guy with little patience for subtlety and bull, Worf. I just wanted to know what you thought. I wonder whether... up here, without the same danger, the opposite happened. Whether what you both believed was more important than life. Did you mean to give him what he wanted? Death as opposed to dishonour?'

It was a thought Worf had tried not to mull over and Geordi's choice of wording was blunt and to the point. Indeed, brushing with death had worn away the human's patience to a blade's edge.

'The Romulans desire would not have affected my choice.'

'I know. But that's not what I asked,' Geordi said.

...Perhaps the Romulan would have called Worf's choice Justice. He had wanted to die with his blood pure, and his hands at a Klingon throat. Better to die as himself than to pollute his body with the flesh and blood of an enemy. A Klingon might almost call that honour.

How odd. That their two races could have something so fundamental in common.

'I... am not sure.'

'Yeah, neither was Bochra.' Geordi said softly, and then the turbo lift door opened and Geordi patted his shoulder before exiting. Doctor Crusher was predictably waiting to drag him into sickbay the second he appeared. Worf left him there and signalled the turbo lift to return to the bridge.

Humans. A complicated race. Quite willing to question their convictions at every turn, not because of a weak will or spirit, but because of the desire to adapt. Today some very old beliefs were forgotten, and because of that, a human and a Romulan survived. It was likely that nothing would change. Bochra was one man, and at that, he was no Jean Luc Picard, William Riker, or Sergey Roshenko. He did not hold the influence and sway of his convictions: all he had was a few vague doubts and uncertainties that time, and the words of his superiors, would soon drown out. The seed would wither. But perhaps, to Geordi, that did not matter. He was at ease with merely having planted it.

Many years ago a pact was broken, and blood was spilled on a ignominious battle ground. A six year old Klingon boy had stumbled from the rubble and smoke into the stares of shocked Starfleet officers; one of whom had picked him up and carried him through the rubble into safety.

Human compassion. The human need to reach out the hand of peace, which Klingons had so scorned for centuries.

On this ship today the debt of his dead parents had been slightly rebalanced. Klingons would call this justice. His parents –his human parents– would not.

And Worf was no longer certain that his actions had ever been about Klingon justice in the first place.