ATTENTION

Breaking my habit and writing the Author's note first rather than last because there are important things that I must explain.

The first being that you will see a character by the name of Nolan. That is intended to be our very own Dr. Watson.

Second of all, calling me new to the Star Trek fandom would be a colossal understatement. I went and saw Into Darkness and it blew my mind, and this little idea wouldn't leave me alone. So please read this with the knowledge that this is solely based on the information you receive from Into Darkness, and not anything else. Because I'm a bad person I guess. XD And who knows, I might revisit the idea later.

So without further ado (please don't kill me if I messed something up. Gold star for trying?), enjoy. (:


They say that you don't dream while you're in a coma, and certainly not while you're in one of the cryogenic sort. But Khan dreams. He thinks. He feels. He is conscious without being conscious and it is a blessing and a curse, because he knows somewhere in the back of his mind that the others, his crew, his family are all the exact same way all around him.

But that isn't his focus at the moment.

His focus at this moment is his dream.

It's only one dream, one that he's been having for the past three hundred years. One, it seems, that he will continue to be having for an indefinite amount of time forward.

In the dream he is on a planet whose name he cannot remember, but it looks remarkably like Earth. Just, without all the people on it. In the dream, there is only one person on the planet aside from himself. His name is Nolan.

Nolan has been his best friend for as long as he can remember. At some point, before they all made the decision to sleep, they became more than that. Nolan, with his sandy blond hair and warm blue eyes. Looking at him, it is hard to believe that he is just as capable of ruthlessness as Khan, or any of the others. He's a little pudgy, because Khan likes to imagine him that way. The way he should be. Not so thin and sinewy. In Khan's dream, he wears sweater vests and slacks and likes reading the paper in the morning like he used to.

Except this is a real paper, ancient even in Khan's time, things you could touch and feel and turn. Make into a paper hat. Khan did that once, for Nolan. Just to see him smile. Nolan was ridiculously ecstatic.

In the dream they're in a meadow, and Nolan is dressed smartly in that sweater vest and those slacks. Nolan dresses in yellows and browns in Khan's mind, while Khan is all in black or navy blue. They sit on the grass together, Nolan leaning up against him fondly, their legs stretched out in front of them as they watch the midday sky become night, and the stars come out one by one by one.

In the dream, Khan does not know their names. He does not know anything about them except how bright they are and how far away they appear to be from each other, and that they make Nolan happy to make pictures out of them. So they make pictures.

Sometimes in the dream there is wine, and they have sex that Khan's physical body cannot even feel due to cryo. But it still feels nice.

And sometimes, when Khan is not dreaming, he thinks about the time he woke up. When he battled the Enterprise for her precious cargo. Knowing that Nolan was in one of those capsules, not being able to get to him- and then believing Nolan to be dead- oh, Khan remembers. He remembers rage. Cold, numbing rage. There was nothing else. Absolutely nothing.

But he knew now. That somewhere, somewhere near, Nolan slept as well. And something in Khan was not- not happy, nowhere near- but momentarily content. Pacified, to know that Nolan and the rest of his people were safe. For now, that was enough. But when he next awoke- and he definitely would- there would be nothing to stop him.

Nolan, what are you going to do when we wake up?

Me? I'm going to brew a cuppa and take a shower and go for a run and- and I don't know.

That sounds nice.

Yes?

Yes.


Aha thought you escaped the end note. You didn't. 8D

But all I really have to say is that I know about Tribbles and that is the extent of my Star Trek knowledge.

That, and that I want one.

I would name it Tim.

CARRY ON.