[-Author's Note-]
My version of the wedding battle, revised slightly from when I wrote it ~3 years ago.
"Afsakau nash-veh oyut-kali-tor, u'xoa T'Pol adun." Trip had called out the challenge during the wedding, turning all the assembled heads to star at him, all but hers…for she had felt him saying it before the words had even left his mouth. Now they were here, in the place of challenge, to have this out the old Vulcan way.
From a glance it was clear that Trip had an appreciable height advantage over Koss. Garbed in the ceremonial robes of the Kal'I'fee Trip's superior physique was occluded, a physique she knew from personal experience was easily a match for any Vulcan's with only minimal effort on his part. He had been the result of design and breeding carefully selected to face down the deadliest beings that Earth had ever known, and not just defeat them, but to do so with such efficiency as to strike fear into them. One night, while in the Delphic Expanse as part of a Task Group: Saber, she had found herself alone in the gym with him. It had been a long, stressful day, capped by her injection of Trellium D, as part of her regimen for building a tolerance, and she had been drawn by the need for an outlet to the manic energy brought on by the injection, and he by the sleeplessness his scar tissue tortured him with. Their relationship had turned sexual a few days before as she found she could no longer entertain the potential of losing him to Corporal Cole, a turn of events he, ironically, had never considered. On that night, she'd decided to have a rematch after their prior tumbles on the mats. She had been certain that this time she would be able to overcome his advantages in size, strength, and technique this time by the applications of intimate stimulus. She had initially flustered him with this, touching him in ways that were not appropriate to the conduct of their sparring; grasping parts of him that she knew would elicit a necessarily sexual response from him. His response had been to bodily snatch her up with one hand, hold her at the face to face level and simply threaten-promise that if she did it one more time he was going to take her into the equipment room and let her have it. She suspected he knew what he meant by "let you have it" so she, of course, persisted in the behavior and in response he jerked her up from the floor, tossed her effortlessly over his shoulder, took her into the equipment room and did exactly as he had said he would. Looking at him now in the concealing garb she wondered if perhaps he would keep the obvious physical advantage secret or if he would use it as an intimidation technique by revealing it, there was a certain natural logic in intimidation displays as they were common in the animal kingdom.
Among males it was a sign that a challenger might be accepting a risk that was not justified for the reward. There was a chance, however slight, that Koss would elect to save his own life and forfeit his claim upon seeing how out-matched he was before the battle even began. What would he do? What would he do? She suspected he would make a show of his physique and battle scars as they would immediately present Koss with a very clear message; "You are not my first, I have done this before." The first thing Trip had done upon taking his position across from his opponent was to slam the weighted end of the Lirpa into the old weather scarred stone tiles, shattering one in the process but creating a sort of depression in which the Lirpa would stand. This was a calculated move in its own right; it revealed a hint of his strength before anything began. Ahh yes, now for the second trump card, he slid his arms inside the tunic of the robe and shrugged the upper half of the garment off revealing his chest, back, arms, and shoulders. He gathered the sleeves and tied them in a knot around his waist then rolled his shoulders and neck, flaring his trapezius muscles in the process, and now he seemed positively enormous. There were a few audible murmurs produced by this act, it had been bold by Vulcan cultural standards. To his credit Koss' only reaction was to blink once. The differences were made clear now, Trip was bred for war but chose to be an engineer, Koss was an architect without the breeding or training for this sort of physical undertaking.
The gong sounded, indicating the battle was to begin. Trip just nonchalantly cracked his knuckles then slammed his right foot into the side of the lirpa's weighted end, dug into the dirt and shattered stone tile, quickly gripping the upper haft just below the bladed end and spun it effortlessly around in his hand, folding it along the length of his right arm and bringing it behind his back as he began circling to Koss' left, stepping on the balls of his feet.
So he was going to make a show of it, rather than just quickly and violently dominate him…dammit.
The longer he dragged it out, the more chance there was of Koss getting in a "lucky" blow.
"Your scar seems to indicated you have not fared well in combat in the past."
"Klingons tend to like to overrun lightly defended positions." Trip answered; his tone flat.
"It would appear you were fortunate to survive. What happened to the attacker?"
"I killed him."
"There are no firearms to avail yourself of here."
"They won't be necessary; I killed him with my hands."
Koss was attempting counter-bravado, trying to get into Trip's head, but Trip's head was a scary place where horrors from his past resided.
"Turned his own blade on him then? Choked him to death?"
"No, I crushed his head with my fists and when there was nothing of his brain pan left, he stopped being a threat. Tell me, have you ever smelled a being die? The blood, organs, whatever part of his body you have ripped or cracked open, and the inevitable release of whatever waste was in his body. It stays in your nose for days." Trip masterfully countered with psychological warfare of his own.
"Did you void yourself of any offal this morning then?"
"Come find out." Trip taunted, he had been speaking to Koss in Vulcan up to this point so all those assembled could understand.
Koss lunged, aiming the bladed edge of the lirpa towards Trip's face and throat, teeth gritting as he did.
T'Pol tried to quell her panic by thinking of the time she had seen Trip dodge faster attacks in sparring, but her heart felt like it was about to leap in her throat regardless. She immediately cursed herself for fearing as Trip stepped in and effortlessly bat the Lirpa aside with his left hand, cocking his left leg behind the right, bringing his left foot up as he did and past the right leg to trip Koss as he passed. Koss staggered, his left foot coming down hard and his torso falling forward as he just managed to regain his balance and avoid falling on his face. It would have been the perfect time to strike but Trip kept the lirpa cocked behind his back against his right arm and calmly stepped away with his back turned to the other side of the ring.
While she managed to remain verbally stoic there were several other gasps and sounds of alarm from the assembled Vulcans present.
Trip turned and looked back at Koss who had frozen in place, waiting the inevitable. Trip just sighed audibly prompting Koss to turn looking back over his shoulder from where he was using the Lirpa to hold himself up after the trip.
Trip's trip trick…ha! She almost smiled wondering If it had been her that had thought it or if he had.
"Again." Trip prompted, challenging Koss to continue the attack. His tone was pedagogical, like an instructor trying to guide recalcitrant youth on the proper methodologies and training. Koss attacked again, stepping forward and swinging the Lirpa in a wide arc. Trip caught the haft with his hand and dragged Koss forward, back handing him lightly across the face as he dragged him forward and stepped past him, moving to the other side of the stone circle.
"Wrong!" Trip chided, his voice a roar, "control your swing's distance, movement, speed…control your weapon, do not let it control you!"
He sounded like a k'a'sum'i master, shouting at students that failed to demonstrate a proper respect for their art form. Of course, there was some rationality to this; he was a MCMAP instructor certified practitioner, he had trained people in the art of killing for humans did not utilize such methods as a form of self-edification but, rather, to kill their foes.
Koss tried and failed three more times to spear, slash, or hack at Trip, and all three times his efforts were confounded. Trip cocked his head to the side, eyebrows lifted and a slight smile on his face, "Look, to keep this fair, I'll give you three chances to hit me."
There was an immediate voice of protest from the spectators but the priest lifted his hand for silence.
Trip once against slammed the weighted end of the lirpa into the tiles, shattering another and planting the weapon into the ground.
"You are mocking me."
"I'm tryin' to be fair; you ain't cut out for combat."
He was talking like Trip again, acting like Trip, and she could almost hear the thought in his head, My cousins' kids move faster than this guy.
Koss' face turned green with embarrassment and rage, he righted himself, turned, and charged. Trip just folded his arms across his chest then rocked himself to the balls of his feet, heels off the ground as Koss brought the lirpa up over his head and brought the weighted end down at where Trip was standing. Trip just rocked himself back a half step as the weight hit the tiles and rebounded a few centimeters before skidding along the stone surface. Koss almost slipped, and the blade pointed towards his chest as his own momentum carried him forward, for a moment it looked as if Koss would be killed by his own miscalculation but at the last possible fraction of a second Trip kicked the weighted end, sending the lirpa rotating upwards and past Koss' head.
"Whoa now, careful, yer tryin' to kill me, remember?"
Koss growled through gritted teeth and once again shot the blade forward in a spearing motion at Trip's face. The MCS officer simply turned on his left foot as the blade passed by and clasped his hands behind his back.
"That's two,"
Koss stepped back and grasped the lripa by the haft like and axe, swinging it in a wide arc, trying to slice at Trip's mid-section. Trip just stepped inside the blade's reach and brought up his right knee at chest height to catch the haft against his upper shin then stepped past Koss gain, back still turned as he brought his right foot up to kick Koss' back-side shoving him a few steps away as he once against crossed to the other side of the circle of stone tiles.
"Okay, that was a warm-up, want 'nother three swings?"
"Silence, human!" Koss spat.
"You're sure you wanna play it that way?"
"There is no playing here. I will kill you and I will bed T'Pol before your body is even cold to remove your taint from her."
T'Pol mentally lurched at these words, before she could even begin to process the appropriate reaction she felt a sudden overwhelming surge of fury, like being stuck in a thunderhead, a gale of aggression seemed to blow through her and she immediately smelled the biting sour and metallic odor of a human's rage and part of her wondered if the killer gene in her chosen mate triggered. She could see as much as feel the pupils in his eyes narrow to pin-pricks and the hair stood up on his arms and back of his neck. His brows drew down tight around his eyes and his mouth turned into a thin straight line. For a moment she was terrified, not for Trip but of him. She lowered her eyes, head crooked forward slightly, chin toward her chest, like women of her clan had done for generations in veneration and fear of The Destroyer; an unconscious reaction of subservience to this human avatar of Ket'Cheleb. Some of the other women present apparently smelled it too and there were audible gasps as they went wide-eyed and recoiled from the human that seemed to be seething aggression now. A glance at other women of her clan revealed they had also lowered their heads, some with elbows out, palms together top and bottom in an ancient gesture of passivity native to the Vadleni priestess, taught to the daughters of the Sokeli and the Ta'Vistar clans to calm their males when Ket'Cheleb was upon them.
He did not retort, did not make a sound, he just began swiftly walking towards Koss, arms at his sides now. Koss charged, bellowing as he did, Trip met him at the middle of the circle and grabbed Koss by the shoulder of the Tunic, kicking his feet out from under him and sending him into a tumbling flip as he heaved him back with the right hand clutching the tunic. Somehow Koss managed to complete the somersault and rolled to his feet to spring again. He lunged forward, spearing at him with the lirpa again which Trip once again side-stepped and brought his right elbow down hard into Koss' back flattening him into the rock tiles. Trip stamped his right foot against the tile, one of them cracking at the force as a small billow of dust shot away from the crushing foot. He took a halting half step forward as if preparing to lift his knee then stomp Koss' head into green paste against the rock but he stopped himself as Koss gasped for air and turned to return to his own lirpa where it still stood upright in the crushed rock and dirt. He jerked it from the ground as if It weighed no more than a common dowel and swung the heavy weighted end up across his shoulder. Still, he said nothing, just stood there waiting for Koss to arise.
It took another ten second for Koss to recover coughing and gasping as he did, the whole time Trip stood there looking down at his prospective victim. He could have finished him in any of thirty ways T'Pol could think of but she was certain Trip knew of at least five to six times as many, and possibly combinations of some of the methods. She almost wished he would just do it, get it over with, to not give him another chance.
Kill him.
Kill him!
Kill him now!
Just kill him!
KILL HIM!
He pushed off with his right foot and began circling around the stone tiles, his steps rhythmic, almost as if he was hearing war music in his head, ancient strings and percussion and the throaty calls of his ancestors meant to drive warriors into a killing fervor, but as killing was with human, often driven by the coldest pragmatism imaginable. How they fought, how humans fought; spear or sword, rifle or cannon, always moving to a hidden symphony of reactions; as cliché as it sounded, a dance of death. Her study of human history had demonstrated their tendency towards the belligerent, little was known and little pertinence given to their material culture and everyday lives beyond the martial aspects; Philistines and Picts, Saxons and Sioux, Zaporozhians and Zulus; all cultures who prided themselves on the warrior, the hunter, the tracker, the predator aspects of humanity. Indications from the fossil record were that humans prior to the agricultural revolution tended to live shorter lives, more vulnerable to issues of climate and disease and violence, but they were healthier, denser boned, taller, stronger, as if they were meant to live lives that burned as a quick flame. She had once heard him say to one of his engineers "your ancestors survived an ice age battling mega-fauna, fucking act like it" during the violent and fearful months of the war on the Xindi. His species evolved hunting and killing things bigger and far more deadly than them with sticks and rocks and that instinct was certainly on display now as he stalked Koss like prey but, in the ubiquity of the male drive he was trying to prove his worthiness by taking the toughest route possible, to showcase the superiority of his genes, to exemplify his worthiness to breed even though the potential existed that they would never be able to conceive children of their own. He started twirling the lirpa above his head, his fingers effortlessly rotating the haft and the heavy spade and bludgeon at the ends. Most there would overlook it, not considering that even a Vulcan male had to place a firm grasp on the haft to control the weighty weapon but he was managing it with nothing more than his phalanges. She felt a faint mental perception of music coming from his mind but not as some ancient music of tribes or war cultures, instead it was brass horns and a single snare and bass drum, his perception calling it forth as La Madrugá, solemn and somehow opulent. Twinges of other thoughts accompanied it, more perceptions and fragments of sensation than fully formed memories; looking out over an open field of knee-high grass, the pre-dawn grayness indicating the sun had not risen, the weight of combat gear on his body, pouches filled with injection molded thermo-plastic magazines loaded to capacity with ammunition, a side-arm holster tight on the right thigh, the sling of a rifle around his neck, rubbing against burned skin, sweat running from the brows down the left side of the nose, a piece of chewing gum ground between rear right molars, they would charge soon when the sun crested the hills.
Koss was finally up and steadied, no doubt tired of being toyed with, by all rights he should be experiencing fear now for how easily Trip had been dealing with all his attacks, by all right he should be dead now yet this human had the audacity to mock him in the worst way imaginable; by ignoring or discounting him. It was one of the worst insults one could deal to an enemy, to discount them, to view them as less than a concern. By all rights Trip could have ended this fight mere seconds after it began, but he was intent in making some sort of production out of Koss having something resembling a fighting chance. Koss lunged and Trip, immediately, let the haft slip down his hand until he was grasping just above the blade and swung the bludgeon in a wide arc, back still turned, he let it swing along the length of his arm until the haft reached his neck when he released it, allowing it to rotate along the back of his neck as pivot point then caught the bladed end again in his right hand to continue an un-interrupted arc, keeping Koss at bay.
"Fight me!" Koss howled then pushed to advance again just to be once again repelled as the bludgeon passed within centimeters of him with a bellowing woosh. Trip then immediately caught hold of the weighted end, rotating his body to present his left side then shot the blade forward, the haft across his shoulders towards Koss to move him back out of range. It was only semi aimed but still managed to trike hard against the other lirpa with a loud cracking sound, causing Koss to give ground. He continued the swinging motion several more times before finally moving in close range, closing both hands on the haft then tossing it towards Koss. His Vulcan opponent brought his own haft up to block the heavy haft that was aimed towards his chest and in that moment Trip stepped in, swinging his opened left hand in a wide-winged arc to catch Koss on the jaw with the back of his hand, allowing the momentum of the swing to carry him into a pirouette as he snatched his ricocheting lirpa with his right hand. Once again there were audible gasps, perhaps out of fear for Koss, perhaps at amazement at the peculiar genius of body awareness and control, of instantaneous understanding of all the natural mechanics and physics of what would happen when objects interacted with each other. Koss staggered, his hand coming up to grasp his jaw even as his head was turned sharply away from the blow.
Was this to be a killing by inches? Koss was fighting to stay upright as a ribbon of green blood began running down his chin from his busted lip and a great dark bruise began to form on his jaw, his mouth wouldn't close either, a good indication that his jaw had been dislocated by the blow. Koss changed strategies, spearing the blade towards Trip's feet only to have the blade end of the human's lirpa shot down to lock his blade. Trip twisted along the haft of the halberd to lock up on Koss' then with a shove and a twist he pulled the weapon from Koss' hands and sent both sailing out and away from the ring, high above the heads of the Vulcan spectators to clatter on the dirt and rock before tumbling over the side of the cliff to the ground dozens of meters below. Koss lunged, hands out, fingers curled into talons as he tried to reach Trip's face and, presumably, eyes. Trip side-stepped, muscling the left arm away with his own left forearm and bending at his knees snapped a short right hook into Koss' left ribcage. He side-stepped around the stunned Vulcan and brought his right fist up, slamming the knuckle of his right thumb into Koss' right armpit then grabbing the corresponding wrist before stepping in and planning his shoulders against Koss's chest he gave the arm a wrenching twist which produced an audible pop. Koss gurgled in pain as the right arm fell limp to his side but the assault was not yet over.
A swift kick of the right patella took Koss' legs out from under him and he collapsed, once again, to the stone tiles. Trip dropped onto Koss, straddling his torso even as Koss tried to pull himself towards one of the shattered tiles to make a weapon out of one of the jagged pieces of stone. Koss shifted beneath him, trying to flail free, sending the limp right arm up towards his murderer only to have the human catch the limb and lock it under his left arm, wrenching is obviously out of joint. Koss screeched in pain, but it only came out as a high gurgle past the broken jaw.
T'Pol watched as Trip shifted, his right leg clamping over Koss' left shoulder as he cocked his right fist back and landed a blow against the side of Koss' head. It was snake-strike quick and save for the meaty slap of his knuckles colliding with Vulcan skull dermis she would have never know it had happened. She could feel him assessing the strength of the blow, how much energy he could put in the punch to produce a satisfying sound, one that would serve to frighten and alarm, for victory lay in complete demoralization of not just Koss but his family as well. Judging from Koss' expression, he wasn't sure what happened either until the second blow connected and the cornea of his left eye immediately began to take on a celadon shade as blood started leaking into the eyeball itself. The third blow apparently relocated his jaw, which was painful to consider but presented him with a new opportunity.
"No, not like this." It was a wheezing sound, pinched with pain
A fourth blow landed and now his uninjured eye began to water and wander incoherently.
"Not like this!"
Koss' father was being physically restrained by three of his kinsmen to keep from rushing into the battleground now. Under Vulcan law if he interfered, Trip had the right to kill him on the spot and if he did survive, even if he managed to kill Trip, both he and Koss would be subject to exile. She was not concerned though, he would never get an advantage on Trip and based on what she had seen, T'Pol was convinced her human would dispatch him in short order if he got free. His fist shot forward a fifth time and Koss' eyes glossed over, head rolling back as his body went stiff. Trip extricated himself from where he had Koss mounted and reached down, pressing his fingers against the side of his neck checking for a pulse. He turned and looked to one of the Vulcan men assembled and nodded, pointing to Koss. The Vulcan nodded in turn then produced a medical bag and stepped towards the stricken Koss. Trip winked once in her direction then took three steps towards the priests before dropping to his knees, lifting his hands upward towards them as if making an offering in supplication.
"I have slain Koss, the man he was is no more."
T'Pol's head shot to the left as his mother began immediately translating his words into high Golic to the priests.
"Honored elders, allow the body of Koss to be conducted from here. There is no logic or honor in killing that which is already dead."
This was an argument over the ancient traditional basis of the kal'I'fee. In the past, if a male was to take a female from another male, the affronted party may attempt revenge killing, or, to steal her back from the mate she chose, this created systems of vendetta until the kal'I'fee became a formalized system whereby the superior male could demonstrate his right to the breeding claim and dispatch the competition in the process. It had numerous analogues among the beasts of nature. Trip had demonstrated his superiority, had demonstrated the evolutionary primacy of his claim, but it further declared that he felt neither threat nor concern about Koss' rival claim and would rather spare than kill his foe. The question was, how much were the elders willing to entertain the purpose of the ritual as opposed to the letter of it.
The three elders looked to one another, each giving a slow half-nod, confirming the ruling they all expected from one another.
"Since ancient times, the Kal'I'fee has always resulted in death." The elder spoke, eliciting some protests from Koss' family but Trip said nothing, his expression saying he understood what was being said to him even if his ability to speak Ancient Golic in an acceptable fashion was not there. "This was done because of the natural fear males experience at losing their mates. To defeat a foe and not to kill him left the potential that he would one day return. Vulcan men pitted against one another of equal stature had no choice but to remove a rival that would possibly defeat them. You have demonstrated that Koss, is not your equal, not your contemporary, but as a child before you. If you fear not for your claim over T'Pol and fear not the wrath it may bring, then do not slay him, thus Koss, as he was, dies here today in this circle and is reborn through your compassion. We honor your decision, though you are not of Vulcan. May your union be fruitful, may your life be long, may your enemies be few."
It was an ancient invocation from before Surak, a blessing bestowed upon warriors during the time of marriage. It was common for females to be taken by rival clans, to the victors went the spoils of their fertility as they tried to breed out the other clan by forming harems of many females and siring as many children as possible on them. Her own clan, Sokel, had been exemplar at this; her line had come from the son born to a concubine of Sokel's eldest son Sovshrin, a concubine that had been taken in the lands of Na'Nam and who was considered beautiful and fair and was thus given as a gift to him. Sovshrin's mate had proven to be barren, but rather than annul the marriage to take another wife he had taken concubines to sire children upon then, raised them with his mate in his household. It was said his wife lamented her barrenness and made repeated Pilgrimages to the Valdeni to seek blessing or remedy or trick by which she could become fertile. The three concubines were considered part of his household retinue and since they were denied a male of their own, Sovshrin had to attend to them in their fever as well as lying with them to produce offspring. Thus Sovshrin had two sons and three daughters unlike his brothers who, between the three of them, sired as many as a hundred offspring.
Sokel, himself, had three mates across his lifetime, outliving each of them with intervening periods of mourning that lasted upwards of twenty years. He had a retinue of concubines taken from tribes and clans he defeated in battle or as tribute from client tribes and clans but evidence seemed to indicate he rarely availed himself of them for either offspring or pleasure as taken from the accounts of their own diaries.
Sovshrin's sons were Seket and Tupek, her line was distilled from the seed of Seket, specifically his first son, Tupol for whom she was named but only members of the clan knew this. But now, Trip was part of their clan, a warrior married to the daughter of a clan to provide his seed so that she may have children and warm her bed and defend her and attend to her in all the way only a man could. Yes, there would be a Sokeli ceremony to come, quiet, for only her family, but now she must acknowledge him as a daughter of the Sokeli did a warrior she intended to lie with.
Trip rose from where he had knelt and crossed to her, taking slow deep breaths as he looked at her, wanting some form of confirmation or validation. Do you really accept me? Did I do well? She wasn't sure, however, she could behave as was dictated by propriety, still, she had to, for his sake as much as her own. She reached up to his head, tracing her index and middle finger gently over the curve of his ear and through the tightness in her throat spoke, "Parted from me and never parted. Never and always touching and touched."