Lieutenant Harvey kept his eyes focused intently on the ground. His nerves were going haywire and he was just waiting for something to happen. For the man with the dangerous aura to somehow break his bonds, to then break through the cell that contained him, and attack. Why had he been put on duty here of all places? He was a young and inexperienced - yet when he reported for his orders he had been assigned as a guard to the one prisoner currently held on the new Federation base located on Betazed.
Prisoner 1-I-9-F.
There had been an announcement made to the whole staff of the base as soon as he had arrived and been awaken. And Lieutenant Harvey had been thoroughly petrified by his superior's stern warning of this man. And for him to be put on guard duty so soon after, was making him sweat and silently panic at the sight of the man.
He was large and pale – from lack of seeing the light of day in years – and he sat ram rod straight without saying a word or acknowledging anything. In fact, when Lieutenant Harvey had come to relieve the other guard he had looked him up and down without comment and then turned his eyes away to the wall. And that was that. But Lieutenant Harvey had a nagging feeling that there was danger; that he needed to flee and tell the first person he saw that Prisoner 1-I-9-F was not as Admiral and Commanders had described. He was worse.
He trusted his instinct, just like Admiral Jackson. This was why Jackson had specifically had him assigned to guard duty, though Lieutenant Harvey was completely unaware of his involvement. While reviewing his employees' profile, Jackson had come across Lieutenant Harvey's profile and seen his unique abilities.
Lieutenant Harvey was Lumerian and so had empathetic abilities. Immediately plans had been formed and now the young lieutenant was aiding in the process. As soon as his shift was over he would be called to the Admiral's office to relay all that he had felt in that room. But the only thing the lieutenant would be able to tell him was that he felt as if he were in danger.
Because he could not feel any emotion from Prisoner 1-I-9-F.
Uhura's eyes burned as she gazed at the screen. Spock had asked for her assistance and she was currently situated in Kirk's quarters. Inside sat Kirk himself, Spock, Bones, and Uhura. This was supposed to be a "brainstorming" meeting about finding anything about Khan but they all sat quiet. Uhura wasn't sure what they all expected. The man had had been in cryostasis for the majority of the last few centuries. He didn't exactly have time to make friends, especially given his lovely personality.
"There is something. Something. He wasn't underneath Marcus 24-7. He had to do something other than plot." Kirk chewed on a pen.
"Highly illogical," Spock murmured. There was nothing on the screen yet Uhura still stared. Her fingers rested on the pad, ready to jump into action the minute a thought occurred. "Perhaps the former admiral had him under surveillance," Spock's eyes traveled toward Uhura to search for anything that would imply that in past records. But she seemed frozen. "Uhura?"
Suddenly she violently pushed back from her station, startling everyone in the room.
"God, you scared the hell out of me!"
"Are you alright?"
"Hm?" Bones had fallen asleep and he groggily acknowledged the change in the room before slipping back into rest.
"Something!" Uhura turned toward Kirk, eyes bright and once again active. "You said something."
"Yes…and?"
"It's not something; it's someone." She began to gesture about her epiphany only to be greeted by blank stares.
"He was not a sociable person. I do not think he had the time to anything of the sort. He had other things to be concerned about."
"Why? What was he concerned about? People. People! He couldn't just ignore everyone around him; he thrives off of relationships."
"He was -excuse me, is- an arrogant ass who thinks he's better than everyone. Uhura, he doesn't like normal people." Kirk tiredly rubbed a hand over his face.
"Think about it. Logically," She looked at Spock while she said that. "He needs relationships. He hadn't been around people in centuries. It would be naïve to think he wouldn't talk to anyone. We know that he manipulated at least one person already, Thomas Harewood. So who is to say that there aren't others? There has to be others. He talked to people. He was around people. He interacted with people. He needed to. We've just got to find them."
There was another silence as Kirk and Spock seemed to silently converse about the idea. Uhura was beginning to feel irritated. They were acting as if they had any ideas themselves!
"What are you waiting for," Bones grumbled as he stretched. "She's got an idea so use it. You got anything better?"
"Thank you," Uhura turned back to the computer without waiting for them to agree with her. They all knew they were going to go with it. She started to look for any images from common surveillance on earth. That was how they had first seen him. Some street camera had caught a glimpse of him. She would just need to find more, even if it took her all night.
The search took her all night and well into the morning. 14 hours of work, with small bathroom and food breaks in between. They all worked on separate computers and PADDs while they attempting to find some new aspect of Khan: Bones searched for any archived medical reports all the way back to 1980; Spock researched everything he could about augments as a refresher course about human history; and Kirk went out and tried to seduce information out of Admiral Jackson's secretary (for some unnecessary reason).
Finally, at 4 in the morning, Uhura began to notice a trend in his sporadic appearances and she focused on persons in the area. And that's when she got a concrete image of Khan with someone – a tenant in the building across the way from the camera
"I've got someone."
"Really? Who?" Kirk was the only one to respond because Bones had once again slipped into a coma and odd as it was, Spock had followed suit.
"Miss Delilah S. Warren. She lives in downtown San Francisco. I'm sending you and Spock the address."
"Finally an excuse to get back to earth. These Betazed women are beginning to scare me. Spock, get up."
Author's Note: First off, thank you for all of the support by favoriting (that's not a real word but it will be for my purposes) and adding this story to your alerts! It makes me really happy to know that people are enjoying my new style of writing. I'm trying to be detached because of the atmosphere of the story and so as it moves along and more emotions come into play I will start to use more descriptive words and the conversations will become more advanced.
Now, you guys finally get to meet Miss Delilah! I've been dreaming of her and what she'll be like. So in my head I already have all of the chemistry between her and Khan and I just love it. I was thinking about what to name her for the longest without giving it any real thought. So when it came to give you all a name I just pulled one out of thin air. I was in between some type of flower or Delia so I went with Delilah. The S stands for Something Special (no that is not the meaning. It has a purpose and you'll find out later.). I was also stuck between naming her Peace or Warren (mainly because I just love the sound of Warren Peace i.e. War and Peace.) but I ultimately thought I'd go with Warren because Peace just seemed too…ironic considering who she's going to be with. In my head I was thinking that years and years later there would be some spawn of the two of them, maybe a great grand kid, named Warren Peace and then my common sense came back and told me to stop being stupid. For the big reveal of Khan's prison ID origins, it goes like this: In the original series Khan was placed into cryostasis in the year 1996. I just alternated every other number with the corresponding letter in the alphabet. I almost had him called Prisoner 1996 but why not get technical (for awhile I got too technical and his ID was about 15 characters long.). Can anyone guess why Kirk is scared of the Betazed women?
Oh, and one more note. Grammar. My grammar is horrible and I try to write to the best of my abilities but my mind works faster than my fingers and I sometimes end up wording sentences wrong, skipping letters and words, or just utterly failing. Forgive me. Everything will be edited at the end of the story to ensure that the best quality will be the end result. Until then, bear with my subtle issues.