Acts of Aggression
No ship should go down without her captain. But the daughter of Admiral Marcus will not be so lucky. (Khan/Carol AU).
Pain. A searing, blinding pain radiated from the pulverized bone in her leg and soaked her system with a mixture of adrenaline and endorphins. She was fortunate to be alive, but her gratitude was buried beneath the cries of her hysterical nervous system and the fact that something far worse was brewing just a few feet away.
"Let us play this out logically, Mr. Spock." Hissed the voice of Khan, causing her to flinch from the palpable threat it possessed. "Firstly, I will kill your captain to demonstrate my resolve, then if yours holds I will have no choice but to kill you and your entire crew."
They weren't going to survive this encounter, Carol realized. She knew the feeling that overwhelmed her now. She had felt it only too often during her studies at the Academy… when the timer to detonate approached zero during a weapons simulation. She would feel a wave of resignation wash over her, shortly followed by anger at herself for not being quicker. For not being better.
This time, the consequences were real. This time… she wasn't walking away.
"I will target your life support systems located behind the aft nacelle," Khan informed the Enterprise, his tone like the rumble of thunder. "And after every single person aboard your ship suffocates, I will walk over your cold corpses to recover my people."
He paused then, briefly, as if to enjoy the silent terror of the hundreds of people currently at his mercy. "Now, shall we begin?"
Commander Spock had only one choice at this point. She knew this, and Khan, judging by the tug of satisfaction appearing in the corner of his mouth, certainly did as well.
"A wise choice, Mr Spock." Khan remarked, his tone now unbearably smug. Carol desperately wished she had smuggled a photon grenade with her just to be rid of him and the anticipation of death. "I see all 72 torpedoes are still in their tubes. If they're not mine, Commander, I will know it."
"Vulcans do not lie." Came the Commander's monotone reply. "The torpedoes are yours."
"Goddamit, Spock…" she seethed, wishing now that he would have given Khan the inconvenience of waiting for them all to perish. Or, even better, activated the Enterprise's self-destruct sequence. Anything was better than this…
"Well Kirk," grinned Khan, throwing the Captain to the ground. "It seems apt to return you to your crew."
When the spiraling light of a transporter beam started to circle the Captain and the man she knew only as 'Scotty', Carol couldn't help but look forwards to at least facing the end of her days surrounded by the remarkable people she had befriended. Her hopes of officially joining them had long since passed, but death in the line of duty was nothing to scoff at.
"After all," She heard the madman say, just as her companions disappeared from sight. "No ship should go down without her captain."
He couldn't have forgotten about her, Carol realized with an intensifying sense of dread. A woman with vibrant blonde hair clutching a broken leg is simply not the sort of thing that goes unnoticed on the bridge of the most advanced starship in the galaxy.
She gazed up at him, merely a few steps away, and found him regarding her with glacial blue eyes.
"Carol Marcus," he drawled, rising from his chair. "Such an unfortunate name."
Either he took his time reaching her, or the seconds it actually took for him to reach her was perceived much more slowly by Carol. He would have towered over her even if she had been standing, which made her position on the floor even more disconcerting.
"You know what is going to happen to you." He stated calmly, as though discussing her brutal murder by his hands over tea.
"Yes, Commander." she replied shakily, hating herself for instinctively referring to him by title instead of as the monster he truly was. But when he kneeled down, his face level with hers, all emotions except fear left her mind in an instant.
Wordlessly, he lifted her from the ground. Carol bit down hard on her lower lip as her broken leg swung painfully with each of his footsteps, daring herself not to cry out as he sat her on his lap in the command chair. Images of the Enterprise and the missiles sitting in the ship's cargo bay were projected before her eyes.
"First, I want you to watch as I destroy your comrades." He spoke into her ear softly, grabbing her chin with his hand as she tried to look away. "Arm missiles and target USS Enterprise."
"Arming missiles." Replied the Dreadnought class ship.
She struggled against his hold, managing to tilt her head downward so that her vision held only the image of the torpedoes. The torpedoes that were flickering red.
Her body became rigid. Years of training as a weapons specialist gave you only one pressure point. One trigger that made you immediately react.
Flickering red.
"Oh –" she caught herself fast, returning her gaze to what she had presumed was a doomed starship. But Khan had seen this breech in her typical behavior. Moving her to the side, he followed where the path of her gaze had been and noticed what he never would have before.
"JETTISON CARGO!" he roared, whipping her arms behind her back and pressing her body against the console. With an arm around her waist, he then smiled at her. And Carol was certain she had never seen anything so terrifying.
"Hold tightly, my dear."
A/N: I seem to be having too much fun with stories centering around these two lovelies. Please leave a review if you have a chance. Should also be posted to tumblr soon.