HI! TWO CHAPTERS IN ONE DAY?! WHO AM I?
Anyway, I feel like everything's going very fast and I am NOT sticking to my plans...!
You get a bit of Ali's backstory in this chapter, but not much -
'Sir, they are weakening. I don't know how much more they can take-' Sulu lurched to the side as another blast rocked the ship.
'They are still firing, Lieutenant – we must fire back, otherwise the ship will be destroyed and the Romulans successful. Fire weak shots, scare them off.' Kirk's hair had become looser, and it hung over his face. His face was moistening, he had been thrown about a fair bit.
'I don't think they're getting the hint, Captain.' Spock muttered, lowering his eyes into the scanner in front of him. Kirk gave him a withering look.
He tapped the button beside him, initiating the intercom to the sick bay. 'Report status, Bones?'
'Lieutenant Holmes is in critical condition, Sir,' McCoy was almost whispering into the com. 'There isn't much that can be done for him now.'
Kirk's face fell. 'Try and keep him alive. The Romulans are putting up a fight, we're trying to scare them off – but it's doing more bad than good.'
'Understood.' The other end of the line went dead, and Kirk lifted his finger from the button the same second as another phaser sent him flying across the bridge.
'I heard you, you know.' Sherlock murmured, his eyes dead of emotion, his face pale.
'Sherlock...' Bones looked away. He should have known – if his theory was correct, he had android-capable hearing.
'Oh, it's fine,' he said sarcastically, 'I knew it was coming, not many people can survive a bullet to the abdomen and an internal shattering now, can they?'
'You don't even care, do you?'
'It doesn't bother me that much.' Sherlock's eyes widened as he almost fell of the bed again. Bones caught him by his legs and pulled him gently back on. He still winced.
'You're leaving your life behind, your crew, your girlfriend, who thinks the absolute world of you – and you don't... care?'
'Oh, of course I care about leaving Nalien. However, we are both fully equipped with the mental strength to deal with each other's deaths, and we have been since we were in the Romulan labratories. It was so clear that one of us, at any time...' he trailed off, and looked away. 'Everything else is bareable.'
'Lieutenant, keep at it with trying to contact them. I do not want to destroy that ship!' Kirk ordered, getting back onto his chair for the fifth time. 'Damage report!'
'Minor damage to decks fourteen and fifteen, Sir.' Sulu reported. 'Shields still holding.'
'Fire small phaser, aim at the side of the ship rather than slap in the centre.'
'Aye, Sir.'
'Take aim,' there was a slight pause. 'Fire.'
The beam of light erupted from the ship, and focused on the Romulan ship for a suspiciously long amount of time before it disintegrated with a forceful explosion.
The bridge stopped everything they were doing and stared, shocked.
'Lieutenant Sulu,' Kirk growled after a second.
'The phasers were weak, Sir. There was no way our beam could have destroyed that ship so quickly.'
'But it did, Lieutenant,' Spock muttered. 'There is no longer a Romulan ship to oppose, which leaves us with the logical solution that our beam destroyed it.'
'Contact Starfleet Command, Lieutenant. Inform them of our predicament. Tell them we were never meant to destroy the ship.'
Nalien felt the particles dematerialise and then materialise her. The hot, moist and red interior of the Klingon Bird of Prey was replaced with the familiar grey setting of the Starship Enterprise's transporter room.
She laughed in delight, making her face sting and her head throb. The room felt wonderfully cool, and she pressed her cheek to the transporter platform's surface. She was shaking, and as she tried to get to her feet and support herself on her own she fell three times. Eventually she fell onto the wall, and she was able to move across the wall to the door, then to the turbo lift, and eventually into sick bay.
'Bones..' she whispered. McCoy spun around. His eyes lit up, and a grin spread across his face.
'Nalien!' He rushed over and caught her as she fell for a fifth time. He held her in a brief hug before moving her to the bed closest to him. He could see, even though her skin was dark, that she was bleeding badly. Her skin jolted wherever it was touched, and he was shaking uncontrollably.
'Look, Sherlock,' he said, frantically working around Ali, finding her wounds and cleaning them gently. Sherlock's head turned slowly. His eyes sparkled, but he did not have the strength to smile. He watched as his girlfriend's chest moved up and down, faster than it should, then slowing slightly as she realised she was safe.
He felt the overwhelming desire to close his eyes. His breath quickened, and it hurt him to breathe. Bones turned around in time to see his hand fly to his throat, then his chin, and finally his head. His eyes scrunched closed, pressing on his head with both hands.
Ali turned her head. 'Sherlock,' she whispered, reaching her hand out to touch his arm. Tears slipped from his tightly shut eyes as the agony encompassed him, and his mouth opened. 'Sherlock!'
She tried to sit up, but she was too weak. 'Bones!' she cried, in hope that he could do something to save him. He watched with sadness in his bright blue eyes, but he couldn't do anything, and Ali knew that.
She reached out her hand again. 'I'm sorry,' she whispered. 'I'm sorry I wasn't there. I could have helped you.'
Sherlock winced. 'That would have been impossible, Ali.' Sherlock said softly. His face contorted in pain once more. He moved his head towards her, saw her outstretched hand. 'I was deteriorating, all the while. There was nothing that could have been done.'
'I...' she paused, wondering if what she was about to say would be good for either of them. 'I need you.'
Sherlock's face crumpled and he breathed in shakily. 'I don't want to die.'
'I know, I don't want to lose you,' as her eyes closed, she felt them prickle and eventually sting as the tears spilled from them. She reached her hand out further, and it took everything Sherlock had to touch hers.
'I love you.'
'Starfleet Command have been informed, Captain. They are trying to find a solution.' Uhura said clearly.
'Alright, Lieutenant. Thank you. Cancel red alert.' Kirk ordered, his head in his hands.
'Aye, Sir.'
The comm on Kirk's chair buzzed. 'Captain, McCoy here.'
'Bones?'
'Nalien has returned, Captain. She's in sick bay, I've given her a hypospray...' Kirk's heart skipped a beat. Ali was back! He had not the time to worry about where she had been or how she had got back, but she was back.
'You sound down, Bones.'
'Lieutenant Holmes is dead, Jim.' Kirk's face fell. Spock's head snapped up from the scanner, and Uhura covered her mouth with her hand.
'I'll be down in a minute.' He pressed the button and killed their connection. He stood. 'Spock, Uhura, join me.'
'Aye, Sir.' they said together.
Nalien was in no position to talk. She stared up at the ceiling, in a clear daze, her heart clearly broken.
She had returned, from a devastating time away from her ship and her home, and had suffered great pain and torture only to come back and find her boyfriend dying. She couldn't even cry, her face hurt too much and she just felt numb.
Bones had removed his body, and they would have a ceremony for him when Ali was up for it.
Uhura sat on her bed, stroking her blood encrusted hair and whispering to her words of comfort and sympathy in Swahili. Spock watched from afar, but the look in his eyes was unmistakable.
Kirk was trying to get information out of her. She would just stare, not hearing or not listening.
'Nalien.' Spock muttered, standing with a sudden thought. 'May I meld with you?'
Her eyes moved and found his, and blinked in recognition. She nodded slightly.
He stepped forward, and Uhura stood to allow him passage. He looked into her eyes constantly, and reached his hands down, placing them on her forehead. 'Your mind to my mind, your thoughts... to my thoughts...'
Instantly he flinched away, the second he finished his quote. Ali kept her eyes shut, but it was clear she was feeling stress. Uhura resumed her position next to her, putting her hand on her shoulder.
'The emotion, Captain,' Spock breathed, staring at Ali with wide eyes. 'If I had stayed much longer my mental state would have deteriated and I would have become mad.'
'That bad?'
Spock sighed, the emotion rattling him. 'Bad is an understatement. She is broken, Captain.'
'Did you get anything from her?'
'I got everything, Jim. That split second was enough to recount her entire life story.'
'She was fourteen when her parents were murdered by the Romulans, who invaded her village in the Eiktra* of Vulcan,' Spock began, seated around the table in the briefing room. Kirk, Uhura, Scotty and Bones were seated around him, as Nurse Chapel had agreed to keep a watch over Ali whilst they discussed her past. 'Three months later, they returned and took her and her brother to a base in Romulan Space.
'She never saw her brother again once they arrived and were taken into a cavenous room full of young boys of different species, who, Nalien later discovered, were all thought to be Oracles of the Universe. There, she met Sherlock Holmes, a young and very sick boy who was never tested on.
'Nalien was tested for her powers, like she was in the Klingon ship – but since they weren't there, and this is true of both instances, she was rendered useless.
'I was a young lieutenant at this time, and I was part of the rescue mission to save these surviving young people, as was Doctor McCoy. It appears our memories were wiped afterwards, as I have no recollection of this whatsoever.'
'I don't either, are you sure it was us?' Bones asked from opposite him. The rest of the crew in the room were in deep concentration, trying to understand what Spock had told them.
'Her memory is quite clear. It was most definitely us. You nursed both Nalien and Lieutenant Holmes back to health, but Holmes was always weaker than her – as he was not an Oracle.'
'What is an Oracle of the Universe, Mister Spock?' Uhura asked softly, worried that interrupting him would agitate him.
'It appears they are a incredibly rare race that have powers unimaginable to our minds. Nalien is apparently the only one left, but she does not know how to harness this power. This means she is as ordinary as all of us. She-'
'Doctor McCoy!' Chapel's voice sounded over the intercom, frantic and panicked.
'Nurse?' Bones said into his communicator.
'It's Lieutenant Chahine, Sir – it looks like she's having a siezure!'
*Eiktra: the Eiktra means 'plains' in Vulcan, and it is the vast desert landscape where many little villages (African style) that are led by tribes. Yes, it is a feature of my imagination and no, it does not actually exist.
So... i tried being angsty, and I'm absolutely shit at it... anyone got any tips? More will come later, *warning*
Ahahaha, I've added some mysteries into the story that i hope to expand on later on.
Everyone seems to be reading the first chapter and not reading the rest ;-;;; thank you everyone who has stayed on :)
Spread the word, Heretic is in town.
