Here is the next installment. A few of the loos ends get tied up, while a couple... Oh, you'll see.
Many thanks to my wonderful beta Amodestpoet. He's cool.
Please, read and enjoy!
The light filtering in through the trees was enough to rouse Nia. She shifted, felt the scratch of the rough bark behind her, and stretched her arms over her head as best she could. Despite her Paladian genetics, her sleep had not been easy. She'd slept very lightly; afraid she would move too much in her sleep and fall from the branches.
Weariness plucked at her limbs until she forced herself to eat a ration bar followed by some water. She mentally beat back the lingering tiredness and began her climb back down to the forest floor.
She kept moving the whole day, not even bothering to stop for lunch. She barely paused to take care of her body's other basic needs. She ate her rations bars while moving and drank her water at the same time. She was fortunate enough to come across a small stream where she could refill her water bottles. It was good she had advanced hiking bottles. The technology in the cap purified the water very quickly.
Being alone in the woods bothered her more the second day than it had the first. Maybe it was because it had only been a half a day hiking, maybe because she was still in shock over what had happened in the city.
An image of Starfleet blue and dark hair crossed her mind's eye and her stomach lurched.
Maybe there was more to being alone that bothered her.
There was little else to occupy her thoughts. She couldn't think of Layla without thinking of what happened to Nethi. She couldn't think of the reception without thinking of Wena, nor the wedding ceremony itself without thinking of Spock.
Nia tried to focus on what she might find when she got to the cave, to the 'Hidden Kingdom'. She wondered if Mar was already there and if her childhood friend was actually a spy for the attack or rebellion or whatever was happening in the city. It certainly seemed like it by any means, though she hadn't exactly been paying attention. She'd been distracted by -
Sighing, Nia shook her head. And here she was back full circle again, trying not to think about Spock and thinking about him anyways.
Late in the day, Nia was forced to stop again and climb a tree. She was sure she would find the cave early the next day.
STSTSTST
When Sarek was beamed aboard the Enterprise, his demeanor was startled and caught off guard by the sudden change of events occurring on the planet below. He'd heard over the newsfeed about the death of Chancellor Laki and that two Starfleet officers were suspected in her death.
Once he was on the Enterprise, he was not surprised to find that his son was one of the suspects.
Not at all.
Disquiet did settle in him upon hearing the news. The disquiet grew as the ship fell out of contact with her captain for several hours. In fact, it was nearly a day before they heard from him again.
Sulu was gracious enough to allow the Ambassador to stand watch on the bridge, the entire crew waiting for some sort of signal from their captain.
When it finally came, an audible sigh of relief permeated the entire bridge crew.
"Captain, it's good to hear your voice," Sulu said.
There was a loud crackle of static as someone else's voice broke through. It sounded like a crowded room to Sulu.
"We got through!" Cried an unknown woman, accent clearly Paladian.
The captain could be heard once again, "Sulu, can you get a lock on my position? On those around me?" More sounds could be heard through the static, presumably people shuffling away.
"Captain, I'm reading that there are two other lifeforms in your direct vicinity." The only thing that made sense to Sulu was that the captain and commander must have been searched and all forms of communication technology removed from their bodies.
"Beam us up and notify Dr. McCoy that Commander Spock is in critical condition."
The relief that had previously permeated the air of the bridge soured and faded away.
Sarek found himself oddly short of breath as he turned and exited the bridge without uttering a word.
It was a breach of protocol, but Sulu couldn't bring himself to care.
The sight awaiting McCoy and Sarek in the transport room was both disturbing and horrifying to the other officers present.
Spock was laid out on a stretcher, the front of his blue shirt an outstanding shade of green. He was unconscious and even then his face was still placid and empty of emotion. It was disturbingly similar to when McCoy would imagine seeing were the man's eyes just shut.
Dr. Verde hovered next to him, green spread up to her elbows and smeared across one cheek where she'd swipe a lock of hair out of her face. Her own jade eyes blazed with a fierceness McCoy had not yet seen, a determination that he was certain was reflected on his own.
Kirk… Kirk was just angry. McCoy saw no fear or concern in his eyes, just raw anger and frustration.
The blond man stepped down off of the transport pad as McCoy leapt forward to take control of Spock's care. His medical staff closely followed him. Sarek wisely stayed out the way, but his eyes tracked the movements and expressions of the group. Dr. Verde spoke quickly as she told McCoy as much as she could about his son's condition.
Kirk paused beside him for a brief moment. "We know who is responsible. I promise you he'll be brought to justice." He didn't wait for a response from the Vulcan, knowing and not wanting to hear his illogical statement being taken apart. Instead, he turned to the transport technical and spoke quickly and urgently. He was going back down to Palad, with a new communicator and phaser.
The medical team left shortly after Kirk did, heading straight for the medbay. Sarek followed.
"How long?" McCoy asked.
Wena shook her head. "Half an hour?" she guessed. "You got plasma bags for him?"
McCoy grunted affirmatively. "Stocked up, considering his unique physiology."
Nodding her agreement and then pausing, Wena realized that something was missing. An older Vulcan was following them, obviously concerned despite the blank expression, but Spock's Paladian fiancé wasn't.
"You tell Nia?" Wena asked.
"No, I did not," McCoy snapped at her. "I think we both have bigger concerns than keeping a weepy fiancé out of the medbay. For heaven's sake, let's save the man's life first."
Taken aback by the gruff tone, Wena just nodded. She didn't exactly agree, but couldn't find it in her to come up with an actual argument.
With the Enterprise already en route to Palad, it had seemed optimal timing for Sarek to be assigned to renegotiating the treaty between the Vulcan peoples and Palad.
The timing no longer mattered to Sarek though, not when his son was being ushered into the medbay after being greviously injured. He was prevented from following all the way and was stopped just before the operating room by a nurse he recognized from his previous voyage on the Enterprise. She respectfully guided him to where he could sit and wait.
He didn't miss her worried glance towards where the others disappeared.
She turned her gaze back to him. "Is there anything I can do for you, Ambassador Sarek?"
Clearly she also recognized him.
Opening his mouth to reply, he was cut off by a dark haired woman dressed in Science Department blue rushing into the medbay.
"I heard about Spock? Is he ok?" The questions seemed to burst out of his mouth.
The nurse told her calmly, "McCoy and Verde are working on him now, Michaels."
"Christine? Wait, how is Wena here?"
"She's in there too and I don't know."
The brunette sighed and ran her hands through her hair. "You know they still haven't found Nia – Dr. Sargent yet?"
The nurse sighed sympathetically. "I'm sorry."
The woman, Michaels, just shook her head. "I swear, I'm not going to let her out of my site after this until she marries that man. So McCoy better do his job," Michaels told the nurse firmly.
"I have been assured he will," Sarek finally spoke up. "I take it you are acquainted with my son and his betrothed?"
Michaels stared at the Vulcan man in shock. How she didn't see him before he spoke would remain a mystery. Son, he said son. He's Spock's father! Still surprised, Michaels stumbled over her words as she tried to spit them out. "Y-yes. Yes. Sorry, yes I am acquainted with Commander Spock and Dr. Sargent."
"Dr. Niniane Sargent? The Paladian scientist – "
"- leading the investigation on Palad's problem with their crops? Yeah that's her," Michaels confirmed. Exhaustion suddenly plucked at her and Michaels sat down next to the ambassador. "Nia will be glad to meet you. When they find her, of course."
"She is missing?" Sarek asked, prompting the woman to speak more.
Michaels nodded. "I'm sure you've heard about the rebellion mess going on right now down there, well Nia disappeared in the middle of it. She had a communicator on her, but it's not working anymore. She probably dropped it and it broke or something if she – if she was there when the fighting broke out."
When she fell silent, Sarek silently instructed, "Tell me more."
"That's all I know about what's happening now."
"Then tell me what you do know."
Michaels smiled a little at that. That, she could do.
STSTSTST
Frustration was a mild emotion compared to what Kirk was currently feeling.
He'd had enough.
Enough of this espionage and spy crap, enough of rebellions and evil governments, and enough of his crew being put in danger.
He had enough of a traitor still being in command of a Starfleet ship.
When he beamed back down to the planet, Kal, the Paladian man who had initially helped Kirk and the others was waiting for him.
"Your man, Captain?" Kal asked.
"In capable hands," Kirk replied. "But I can't notify his wife-to-be," he said, purposefully using the Paladian term he'd heard Nia use recently.
Kal looked at him, surprised. "Why?"
"She's missing. She was supposed to meet us in the same square where the fighting started," Kirk told him.
Kal frowned. "But there have been no other Vulcans…" his voice trailed off before his eyes comically widened. "Dr. Sargent! She is who you are looking for?"
Caught off guard, Kirk responded affirmatively.
Kal opened his mouth as if to say something, but paused. Then, he changed his mind and asked, "You wish to speak with our leader, yes?"
Knowing that getting information from a lower-ranking individual was going to be difficult and in some ways pointless, Kirk agreed. Kal turned away from him and Kirk followed.
They moved swiftly through the building, hovercrafts, and pieces of remaining stalls. The pair maintained a steady alertness, despite the area being in the control of the rebels currently.
Eventually, Kal ducked inside a building, voice barking out, "Savti! Savti!" More words followed in the man's Paladian dialect.
A panel in the back wall slid open to reveal only what Kirk could describe as a panic room. Kal ushered him inside and the wall closed in behind the blond captain. Kal didn't follow.
Looking around at the set of new faces, Kirk asked, "Savti?"
One gentleman raised a very thick, silver eyebrow, pink eyes suspicious. "Captain Kirk?"
Kirk shifted his stance to fully face the man, still wary. "Yes, that's me. Kal brought me here. I assume you're the man in charge?"
"Only in this district," Savti replied. "Skolis Breko is the one stepping forward to take Chancellor Laki's place."
"As head of the rebellion?"
"Yes."
"So this was planned and not a result of Chancellor Laki's assassination?"
Savti smirked. "This has been planned for a while. We only needed one last piece and you delivered it."
Frowning Kirk stared hard at the man. "You needed the research that Dr. Verde and Dr. Sargent are in possession of."
"More accurately, Starfleet needs the research one of our operative is possession of," Savti told him.
"Where is Dr. Sargent?"
In a very human expression of body language, Savti lifted his shoulder in a shrug. "I know not of her whereabouts. However, she is due to meet one of our operatives. That operative will make contact once she does."
Suspiciously, Kirk asked, "Why are you telling me all this?"
"You were arrested by Paladian police," Savti stated. His lips then spread in a small smile. "But you were taken into the custody of Starfleet, a different ship and captain than your own. That captain,"
"Meyers," Kirk growled.
"Yes, Meyers has made frequent trips to Palad and spoken almost exclusively with Chancellor Narsow." Savti fell silent as he waited for the human captain to draw the conclusion for himself.
It didn't take long.
"'The enemy of my enemy is my friend'." Kirk quoted with a quiet sigh. He settled down into the offered seat. The other men in the room were studiously ignoring Kirk and Savti, some were working on what appeared to be calculations, others were running communications.
"An appropriate idea." Savti cleared his throat. "What has happened to Captain Meyers? Will he not cause trouble for your ship?"
A grin slowly spread across Kirk's face, just barely reaching his eyes. "Oh he'll cause trouble, but we'll be more than ready when he does. My crew has already contacted Starfleet Command to request backup, but we'll see how needed they are."
At Savti's confused look, Kirk chuckled.
"I don't understand."
"Do you know much about Vulcans?"
Savti shook his head. "Unfortunately, no. A fact I'm expecting to change soon."
"They are geniuses with computers. The Excalibur was in desperate need of a software update, which my First Officer was all too willing to provide."
Savti nodded his understanding this time, though his expression shifted from relief to a darker one. "I understand your officer was injured?"
"Yes, and he's Dr. Sargent's betrothed or husband-to-be. There is a desperate need to contact her," Kirk implored.
Raising his hands helplessly, "I have to wait just as you do."
Frustrated again, Kirk ran a hand over the top of his head. "Alright then, until then, you can fill me in on just what is going on around here."
STSTSTST
Either Nia's memory of her childhood was off, or she was in much better shape than she'd expected. Maybe it was both. As it were, just as the light was beginning to fade from the day, Nia came across the mouth of the cave. She'd found "The Hidden Kingdom".
Wary, she stepped into the mouth of the cave, wishing she had a light of some sort with her. It was dark and who knew how stable the low sweeping rock walls were? The ceiling was definitely lower than she remembered, evidence that Nia had grown taller since she was a child. She stepped into the cave until the furthest point where she could still see light pouring in from the front of the cave. Unfortunately, that wasn't very far.
She set her pack down and settled herself in a sizable rock. In her pack, she knew she had a firestarter and emergency blankets, and plenty of ration bars. She even had plenty of water.
What she didn't have in her pack was a timer. Something to tell her exactly when Mar was going to show up. Mar and whoever else was involved in this mess. She rubbed both hands over her face and sighed in frustration as anxiety plucked at her again, having never fully receded, and her thoughts turned to Spock, Wena, and Kirk again.
Another chill stole across her body, and reflexively she pulled out an emergency blanket to block further shivers. Wrapping the thin fabric tightly around herself to activate the low level warming technology, Nia sighed and shift until she was wedged comfortably, or as comfortably as she could get, in a corner that supported her head too. She sighed and the sigh turned into a yawn.
"You still fall asleep anywhere, huh?" The voice said, jerking Nia to wakefulness faster than the computer alarm in her quarters on the Enterprise.
She blinked blearily up at the person speaking to her and her mind registered the smiling face of Mar. Well, first it registered her bright pink eyes, then it registered the rest of her features.
Nia looked around as she sat up and realized that she had both fallen asleep and gotten too hot in her sleep. Trickles of twilight barely reached the bunched up blankets around her waist.
"Long couple of days." Nia muttered by way of explanation.
Mar nodded, smile softening and no longer reaching her eyes.
Nia wondered what she said that caused that kind of dimming. Then she wondered what Mar knew that caused that kind of dimming.
Nia slowly straightened up, stretching out her back muscles as she did so. "I believe it's time you told me why you wanted to meet me here."
"You are correct. Come, there is much we need to discuss and do, and I am willing to gamble that you are eager to hear news of your family and crew." Mar ushered Nia deeper into the cave. As she did so, she handed Nia a second light to guide the way around the rocks.
Relief and trepidation warred inside Nia. "You have heard news of Spock? Of Wena? The Enterprise?"
"Come," was all Mar said in response.
Annoyed, but needing to focus on her footing instead of conversation, Nia followed.
Her gut told her Mar was stalling.
Nia was hesitant and desperate to find out why.
A/N: I have to say, this chapter was hard to write. Like, really hard. I don't know why, it just was.
Anyways, what do you all think? Good, bad? Confusing as all heck or causing tension of the nail-biting kind? Let me know!
Many thanks to those who reviewed the previous chapter, including: Teddy Bear 007, Amodestpoet, elmoisemo6, ReflectedNightmare, rozzi80, and LabyFan23. You guys are great.
Thank you to everyone who is following this story! I have noticed!
- Spirit
PS - Teddy Bear 007 - It was a reference. Do you know what from? It isn't Star Trek.