This story takes place directly after the main events of Star Trek: Into Darkness, beginning before the USS Enterprise disembarks on her five-year mission.

Please note that, for the purposes of this story, Spock and Uhura are not, nor have they ever been, a romantic couple. Other than that, the stories of the first two movies remain unchanged.

This is a slow-burn, Spock/OC story.

*This story is Rated T. However, later chapters may be Rated M or Rated MA. Chapters with an alternate rating will be clearly marked.


STAR TREK: SABOTAGE

"Sail Forth- Steer for the deep waters only. Reckless O' soul, exploring. I with thee, and thou with me. For we are bound where mariner has not yet dared go. And we will risk the ship, ourselves, and all." –Walt Whitman

PROLOGUE

"Day one-thousand and ninety-eight," Mila Harker droned into the camera. Her bedraggled image stared solemnly back at her from the dusty monitor, and for a moment, she could not help but dwell on how her blue eyes peered dismally out from her sunken cheeks and dark, oily hair. "The stardate is somewhere around 2253," she sighed, exhaustion seeping deep into her bones at the thought, "I'm not really sure anymore."

Outside, heavy rain began pelting down on the wrecked shell of the escape pod, the sound echoing loudly through the innards of the small transport. She grimaced as a chill wind gusted in through the tarp that hung limply over the jammed bay-doors. Shivering, she pulled her thick, leather coat closer to her thin frame.

"It's been two-hundred and forty-four days since Jacobson died," her voice caught in her throat, and she coughed, blinking back the water in her eyes, "I'm the last one." She paused, dropping her head, "I'm the only one still alive."

Again, Harker was quiet, her eyes focused unseeingly on the muddy floor. "The days are getting shorter. The suns don't seem to be rising as high," she continued, swallowing down her despair as she looked back to the recording, "I've been lucky so far. The weather has been temperate. But, I'm not sure that that's going to last much longer. It's getting colder by the day. After three years, it appears this godforsaken planet is entering the winter leg of its orbit."

She glanced uncertainly at the swaying tarp. "There are a few positive things to report," she began somberly, shifting on her seat, "I managed to fix the water filtration system, which was surprising, because I couldn't read the damn instructions. By the way, whoever decided to write the operations manual in Vulcan, you SUCK." She made sure to put extra emphasis on the last syllable, before continuing, "And, the Klingons haven't returned to the surface. The last sighting was effectively ninety-two days ago."

There was a loud crack overhead, followed by a blinding light that engulfed the ship for a split second. Harker's head snapped up, thunder roaring so loudly that the console shook. "The storms are getting worse, too," she observed, "Maybe that's why they've stayed away for so long."

She rubbed her hands together, blowing hot breath into her palms as she continued to glance around the ceiling, "Emergency systems are still operational. And, the Search and Rescue Transponder still appears to be functional."

She dropped her gaze back to the camera lens, focusing on the single red, glaring light staring back at her, and a wave of panic suddenly boiled up inside her. She took a deep breath through her nostrils, struggling to reign her emotions back and continue.

"I'm having anxiety attacks," she stifled, "No doubt, a symptom of continued isolation."

A dry, subjugated chuckle abruptly forced itself from deep within her throat. She rubbed her eyes and sighed. "Who the hell am I kidding?" she muttered to herself, "No one's coming. I don't even know why I'm still doing this."

She leaned forward, shaking her head incredulously as she hit the off switch.


The twin, red suns rose over the heavy canopy the next morning, and Harker was relieved to find that the sky had finally cleared after the night's storms.

She rubbed her eyes groggily as she pulled back the tarp. The red glow of the planet was particularly heavy this morning, settling into the fog as it crept over the scarlet earth. Stepping out into the damp dawn air with a huff, her boots immediately sank into the mud, and she cursed, grumbling irritably as she slogged her way over to the rain barrel. It was full, she noted. At least, the miserable weather had been good for something.

She continued through the deserted camp, forcing herself not to look at the graves as she trudged passed them. Two rows of wooden crosses. Fourteen in total. And, she had buried every last one of them.

She had buried her mother and two sisters within a day of the crash. Her father and younger brother within six months after that. The others had all been a blur to her.

In total, there were five men, six women, and three children buried in their little cemetery. And out of them, as far as she was concerned, only Isaac Jacobson had ever really belonged in space.

Jacobson had been the reason that they had lasted as long as they had. Their doomed ship's Chief Engineer, he had been a retired Starfleet Lieutenant. He had created their shelter, and had gotten their emergency systems up and running. He taught them how to collect rain water to drink, how to ration their supplies, and how to forage and snare food. And, in the end, when it had just been she and him, he had protected her with his life.

His grave was the freshest, and it had been the hardest to dig. The red, clay-heavy soil still bulged up from the forest floor, and every time she looked at it, she was forced to come to terms with the fact that she was alone.

That there would be no one to dig her grave.

It was almost laughable to her now, how so many of the people onboard the U.M.S. Sagan had believed that they were ready to take on the final frontier. How her parents had truly thought that Jesus was the answer to all human/alien tensions. The sheer arrogance of it all was infuriating, and Harker was still bitter about how they had dragged her, a sixteen-year-old, along on their ridiculous crusade. Her and her three younger siblings. They were dead and buried, and she was still hopelessly livid with them.

The Sagan had carried over two-hundred missionaries and their families passed the edge of Federation space, and where were they now? Of the hundreds onboard, she knew of only fifteen that had survived the initial Klingon attack. Of those fifteen, six died when their escape pod had crashed on this inhospitable, uncharted rock. The others had all died, one by one, as they were hunted down by Klingons. The monsters seemed hell bent on killing every last survivor, like it had become a sort of sport for them. And, she was the last one standing.

She was nineteen now. Or was she twenty? Time was becoming harder and harder to keep track of. Counting days did not seem to mean anything anymore.

All that mattered now was 'one more'. One more day. One more night. Repeat.

She rounded the back of the transport, opening the rear hatch and pulling out the small, solar powered stereo she kept stored there.

The quiet was getting to her. There were no birds on this planet. No insects chirping in the trees. There was nothing but the sound of the howling wind as it tore its way through the forest, and Harker was starting to think that it was the silence that would inevitably send her over the edge of sanity.

She set the stereo on the trunk of a large tree, jamming her thumb down on 'play'. The Beastie Boys suddenly erupted from the speakers, screaming through the woods, "I can't stand it! I know you planned it! I'mma set it straight, this Watergate! I can't stand rocking when I'm in here! 'Cause your crystal ball ain't so crystal clear!"

Harker stripped off her heavy coat, tossing it down to the raging speakers. She shivered again as the cold air touched her bare arms, but she ignored it, stretching them above her head as she strode towards her homemade sparing target.

"While you sit back and wonder why, I got this fucking thorn in my side! Oh my god! It's a mirage! I'm tellin' y'all! It's sabotage!"

Bouncing on the balls of her feet, she reached behind her, clasping onto the leather grips of the curved, baakonite blades holstered snuggly against the small of her back. Effortlessly unsheathing them with a soft snikt, she stalked towards the large barrel and its tree bark armor.

Jacobson had fashioned the twin karambits for her, crafting them from of the outer blades of a Klingon's bat'leth. She had dragged the alien sword back to camp after killing its owner, though she fully admitted that saying that she had killed its owner was a misrepresentation of what had happened. Yes, she had been the reason for the Klingon's death, but she had not plunged the blade into his chest. The clumsy thing had done that all on its own, stumbling over its enormous feet.

Harker had only two advantages over this place. She was small. And, she was fast. Very fast.

Originally, she had tried to learn to use the bat'leth itself, but had quickly discovered it to be too heavy, and too large, to be a practical weapon. It had been nearly as long as she was tall, and after only a few minutes of caring it, her arms had ached from the strain. Jacobson had then taken it, cutting the sword down into two sets of knives. He had spent days grinding away at the hardened metal with his tools, until they had fit each if their hands perfectly.

"So-so-so, listen up 'cause you can't say nothin'! I'd shut you out with a push of my button! But I'm out and I'm gone! I'll tell you, I keep it on!"

She spun the blades in her hands smoothly as she bobbed along with the angry beat, before swiftly swinging them forward with skilled precision. The hooked knives sliced through the bark with ease. She brought them across the barrel again, and again. She spun, and she struck, and she kicked, until her muscles burned and sweat beaded along her hairline.

That was thanks to Jacobson, too.

Besides being a former Starfleet Lieutenant and engineer, he had also been an accomplished martial artist. It had been his true passion in life. He had been practiced in everything from judo, to karate, to taekwondo, and had even been familiar with the Vulcan martial arts of Suus Mahna and Sha'mura. And, over the past few years, he had taught her everything he knew.

Every day, for hours on end, he had drilled them into her, emphasizing the disciplines and philosophies behind the movements. That was how she would survive, he had told her. That was how she would live.

"'Cause what you see you might not get! And we can bet so don't you get souped yet! You're scheming on a thing that's a mirage! I'm trying to tell you now! It's sabotage! Whaaaa!"

The ground under her feet began to quake.

Harker slipped, falling ungracefully into the mud and landing roughly on her back. Glancing up at the sky with her pulse pounding, the earth continued to vibrate violently under her, and a dull roar rose steadily in her ears. Within seconds, the sound was unbearably, excruciatingly, loud, and she was forced to drop her knives. Slamming her hands onto either side of her head, she screeched in pain, the vibrations building with the reverberations until she thought she was going to be shaken apart.

The Klingon Warbird ripped passed, the massive ship tearing over the tree tops with extraordinary speed. Gone as quickly as it had appeared, the ground stilled, and the roar vanished. Harker gaped after it with her palms still clenched to her ears, and her heart fluttering frantically in her throat.

"Oh, God…" she gasped mutely, a chill shooting up her spine as she hurriedly grabbed the blades and sprang to her feet.

She snatched her coat, slamming her palm down onto the stereo's 'off' button as she threw it around her shoulders. And, she ran, disappearing into the trees as fast as her legs could take her.


She stayed hidden for the next three days.

Cautiously, Harker crawled on her hands and knees through the mouth of the small cave, her fingers and toes numb from the thick layer of icy mud under her, but she pushed her discomfort aside. The cavern was concealed on a tall, rocky slope, with its only opening covered by the split roots of an ancient tree. While, inside, it was just large enough to lay down alongside a small store of food and water.

The hiding spot had served her well, even if it did feel like she was creeping out of a tomb.

She stood unsteadily, slowly climbing down to the bottom of the incline with her calf muscles stinging from the effort. The Klingons never stayed for long when they came, and three days was the longest she had ever stayed away from the camp. She prayed silently that it had been long enough as she began the long trek back to the escape pod and the hopeful, blinking light of the Search and Rescue Transponder.

Admittedly, Harker new very little about Klingons. She understood that they were a warrior race. That they hated the Federation. And, over the past three years, she had even managed to pick up some of the language. But, why they insisted on coming back to this empty planet every few months to terrorize her was a mystery.

It took her a better part of the day to reach the campsite, hiking through dense foliage and thick, sticky mud. She was exhausted, having been too afraid to sleep, even within the relative safety of her hiding hole. Her stomach growled, and her head spun with thirst, having run out of supplies a day ago, but also having been too skittish to risk exposing herself for something as trivial as a drink of water. However, when the suns had risen that morning, her parched tongue and burning stomach had finally won out, and she had decided to stumble out of her cave and back to the encampment.

She stepped through the ferns at the clearing's threshold, and her heart immediately plummeted into her gut.

The rain barrel was on its side. She sprinted towards it, fresh dread pounding through her veins as she skittered to a stop, sliding over the slick, wet clay. She dropped to her knees at its gaping mouth, crestfallen.

It was gone. All of her stores of fresh water had been poured uselessly into the dirt.

"No…" she uttered in disbelief, looking around her frantically, "No. No! NO!"

Massive Klingon boot-prints marked the uneven ground, three times the size of hers. She ran her fingers up her temples and clenched her hands into her tangled hair, leaping to her feet and spinning in panic. Everything was in shambles. The shelters had been torn apart. Chunks of wood, plastic, and metal littered the site, with what little supply of freeze-dried food she had left thrown carelessly in all directions, spotting the mud with specks of silver.

A sharp chill erected itself along her spine, and she paled as horrified realization dawned in her eyes. "Oh, no…" Harker darted to the transport, throwing open the tarp and lunging inside, "NO! NO! NO!"

She screamed wordlessly in utter anguish, clasping her hands around the shattered remains of the emergency transponder and hauling it to her chest. The blinking light was dead. The signal was dead.

Staggering back out into the cold afternoon, breathless and terrified beyond words, tears began to fall freely down her face. This was it. No one would ever find her now. She would die here. She would rot here. And, no one would ever know.

The image of her limp body exposed to the elements, decomposing and putrid, flashed into her mind, and her stomach churned. Her flesh would liquefy, until only her bones remained. A naked skeleton, laid out indigently in the little cemetery. Fifteen bodies, with only fourteen crosses.

Her legs failed her and she crumpled to her knees, staring in dismay at the graveyard. The crosses were broken. The Klingons had left them in splinters. All symbols of the offending god, destroyed.

"No…" her voice was small.

A massive shadow slid over her.

She could hear it panting behind her, the sound almost like a growl. Like a wild animal that had cornered its prey.

Her fear dwindled, rapidly transmuting itself into wrath. Slowly, she reached up under her coat and grasped tightly onto her knives. Her hands were steady and sure, declaring with a hiss, "SoHvaD vItlhap ghe''or HItlhej!"

It roared.

Harker dove to her right as the creature brought its bat'leth down. The sword missed her by inches, its point digging down deep into the mud and sticking. The Klingon grunted, vexed, as she sprung back onto her feet with the karambits poised and at the ready.

It whirled around, reaching out for her with its immense, taloned fingers, and she parried. Jumping up and bring the hook of her right blade down into the crook of its elbow, she yanked its arm downward, slashing upward with her left. Crying out in unbridled fury, she felt the razor edge slice easily across the alien's eye and boney crest, sending maroon blood spurting across her face and chest.

The Klingon howled, jerking away as Harker dropped back down. She summersaulted forward, digging the curved point of her right blade into the back of its knee. It screeched, the sound unnatural as she tore the knife out. And, the giant toppled over, striking out wildly with its fist as it fell.

It felt like she had been struck in the chest by a battering ram.

Harker felt her ribs crack as she flew off of her feet, tumbling end over end into the dirt. The air was torn from her lungs as she landed awkwardly onto her back. Coughing, she gasped desperately as she tried to right herself, but the world around her began to spin and faded at the edges.

She could hear the monster dragging its injured leg as it stalked its way towards her, having reclaimed its bat'leth. She could her the rage in its breath.

Harker stared up at the Klingon defiantly as it stood over her, her heart pounding anxiously in her ears. She was in awe of its sheer size. It stood over seven feet tall. Solidly built, it was clothed in bulking armor, and must have weighed over three-hundred pounds. Its skin was midnight black. Its eyes just empty pits. Its bloody crest pierced with half a dozen glinting, bronze rings.

"Ha'DIbaH!" it thundered, bringing the heel of its wounded leg into her stomach.

She doubled in on herself, wrapping her arms around her core reflexively. She tasted blood on the back of her tongue as she collapsed back into the mud, still glaring up at the alien as it prepared for the killing blow, raising the bat'leth high above its head.

"Ha'!" she bellowed at it boldly, blood spilling from her mouth, "qem 'oH!"

Suddenly, there was a blast of reddish-white light, and then the Klingon was lying on the ground.

Harker froze, her voice caught in her throat as she stared at the giant's unmoving form, her brain racing to process what had just happened.

Sluggishly, she rolled onto her stomach, warily inching her way towards the Klingon. She pushed two of her fingers into the side of its boot, fully expecting for it to kick back. But, the leg simply wobbled lifelessly back into place.

"Over here!"

Harker flinched. She whirled her head around, and the world began to spin again. She collapsed, laying her temple on the earth as the trees rapidly came in and out of focus.

There were legs moving towards her. Strong legs. A man's legs. Wearing black slacks. She furrowed her brow as they got closer, unable to decide whether or not they were real. And then, he touched her. His hands gently grabbed onto her shoulders, carefully turning her onto her back as he gazed down at her.

All she could see in that moment were his kind, blue eyes, wide with alarm. "You'll be okay," he hurriedly assured her, "You're going to be alright. Just hold on."

"Captain Pike?" she heard someone calling in the distance.

"Here!" Pike called back urgently, "Over here!"

Her eyes slid down to his golden shirt, locking intently on the Starfleet emblem shinning on his chest. Hot tears began streaming down her cheeks, leaving streaks in the layer of filth caked on her pale skin.

He gingerly wiped them away with his fingertips, brushing his thumb along her cheekbones soothingly, "It's alright. It's going to be alright. We're going to take you home."

She choked, and with every ounce of strength she had left, Harker threw her arms around his neck. Sobbing hysterically into his shoulder, she smeared his pristine uniform with clay and blood, but he did not push her away.

Pike held her just as tight, his heart pounding against hers as he laced his fingers into her hair, whispering, "We're going home."


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*Klingon translation:

1. SoHvaD vItlhap ghe''or HItlhej! = I'll take you to Hell with me!

2. Ha'DIbaH! = Animal!

3. Ha'! qem 'oH! = Come on! Bring it on!