The Space Between Darkness

by Lady Dawson and EssentiallyRei

Part II: Emily Conner

Personal Log: Emily Rose Conner

Stardate 2258.140

It's been three months since I left my universe—which I've been referring to in my head as the "Other World"—and two months since I helped Jim and Spock destroy the Narada and one month since I took the post aboard the Enterprise as its—her?—Chief Tactical Officer. Captain Rodriquez, the former Chief, told me that he believed I was ready for this position for no other reason that I wasn't sure that I was.

Hmm . . . thinking back on it, his words remind me eerily of Aslan when he was talking to Prince Caspian in the second movie . . . odd . . .

But now that I'm here, I feel more and more like everything is falling into place. Ironically, I feel more at home here than I ever did in my universe—though, with my estranged brothers and drunkard mother, that's not saying much—and despite having an illicit relationship with my commanding officer, I'm glad that I was able to remain here.

Jim was really the one to suggest starting a personal log; I wasn't sure about the idea, because I'd never kept a journal back home, but he pointed out that Joni started having trouble differentiating between Joni Bennet and Joni the Vulcan. There might come a time when I might start having the same trouble and might want to go back to my personal logs to keep it all straight.

He ignored me when I pointed out that Joni's struggles came from the mind meld she shared with Spock. But he's probably right—sometimes, when I looked back on my life before the Enterprise, it feels like another person entirely.

It's been awhile since I've heard from Jo; all I seem to get are messages . . . and they're so short that they barely tell me anything about how she's actually doing.

Stardate 2258.145

Got a call from my mother today; strange how her counterpart here is very, very similar to the one back in the Other World—and just as unpleasant and disagreeable and she wasn't even drunk this time when she called, which was surprising. After Matt died on the Defiant at the Battle of Vulcan, I would've thought she'd hit the bottle even harder.

Worst thing about Star Trek technology is that when I hung up on her, she knew exactly what I did and I couldn't just pretend that I got disconnected. Bradley called an hour later just to scold me about hanging up on her.

Got to love family . . .

Stardate 2258.147

Ever since I came here, I've been trying to work out which parts of my brain are Emily Conner of the Other World and which parts of my brain are Star Trek Emily. Obviously, the Tactical parts are ST Emily, but most of my past here is just good. I kind of feel like an amnesiac who's just feeling my way through my old life, trying to remember pieces of memories that I don't really remember.

I know Joni remembers some of her Vulcan childhood because of the mind meld, but figured that it wouldn't work that way for me because my childhood here was so similar to my other one, except obviously Jim was in this one.

But it turns out . . . there was a pretty but difference between my life here and my life in the Other World.

I was never adopted here.

Yeah . . . Jim was pretty shocked when I mentioned that and, after the initial confusion and checking some records, we confirmed what neither of expected: my parents never adopted me in this reality. Here in Star Trek, I actually am the biological daughter of Dean and Alicia Conner and the biological sister of Bradley, Matthew, and Andrew.

That kind of freaked me out a bit; I mean, why would my parents be my bio ones here, but not in the Other World?

Not that I really know much about my other parents; my adopted dad was a doctor, like Matt was, so he told me the story. He was working late one night when this girl showed up out of nowhere, about nine months pregnant, and about to give birth. She took off in between delivering me and Dad taking me to the nursery, never to be seen again; she didn't even stay long enough to name me—or say who the father was.

And that's okay; my dad was more of a father to me than that guy ever was—and even here, Chris picked up the pieces after he died, treating me more like a daughter than a niece.

Still . . . I can't help but wonder what happened to them here; what happened to the girl, since she never showed up that night to give birth to me. Does she even exist here?

Stardate 2258.151

Jim, the idiot, got himself half beaten to death by some natives on the planet we were observing, so rather than face me and McCoy, he surrendered himself to the inevitable and gave himself up to Sickbay. Though, truthfully, he probably wouldn't have made it to his quarters; it took both me and Spock to haul his ass to Sickbay.

McCoy fixed him up real quick, but knocked him out with a sedative so he'd actually sleep off the injuries, then told me to go to my own quarters and get some sleep.

I don't know how he found out I haven't actually used my quarters for sleeping since boarding the Enterprise.

Not that I would probably sleep; it's not that I don't trust McCoy, it's just that I'd spend most of the night worrying about Jim anyway. Spock seemed to notice my distress and, in an effort to distract me, asked me if I played chess and if I would "partake in a game with him." Obviously, those were his words, not mine.

So surprised was I by his offer, I said yes without even thinking that I hadn't played chess in years and that was not with a board that had six different boards on it. I think Spock spotted my blank expression—though there's not much that man doesn't miss—and proceeded to explain the rules.

Even though I was white—and went first—I still lost three games that night. Not just lost, but lost miserably. Spock told me that I played quite well, for a beginner, though.

If he had been anyone else, I would've thought that he was just trying to make me feel better, but as its Spock, I have no choice but to believe him.

Stardate 2258.155

So I made the decision earlier that I wanted to try to learn the Vulcan language; don't ask me why, but I wanted to do something to honor the people that had been killed at the Battle of Vulcan. This seemed like a good way to do it, so I asked Uhura if she would teach me.

Honestly, I thought I offended her, the way that she looked at me in stark surprise, then suspicion, and asked me why. When I explained my reasoning, though, she mellowed a little bit and told me that if I was interested, then she'd be happy to teach me and to come to her quarters after our shift.

Turns out that Vulcan is a lot harder than learning French or Spanish or even Chinese; half of the words are unpronounceable by humans. Even Uhura, the Communications officer, has trouble with some of them.

Which is probably why, when Spock came in about halfway through the lesson and inquired what we were doing, offered to take over the lessons, because apparently Uhura was pronouncing the words wrong. So now Spock's taken over my Vulcan lessons and has instructed me to show up promptly after our shifts. Honestly, though, I'm kinda relieved; Spock can get a bit grating, but at least with him, I know what to expect. Uhura still gives me those looks every time she's around me, like she's expecting me to pull one on her or something—

Jim V/O: "You know why that is, don't you?"

Emily V/O: "No, why?"

Jim V/O (Laughing): "She still hasn't forgotten that one that you pulled over back in Riverside, when Chris recruited us after that fight in the bar."

Emily V/O: "Why, what happened?"

Jim V/O: "Oh, yeah . . . you wouldn't . . . well, I was being a perfect gentlemen with her, just talking with her—"

Emily V/O: "You were flirting with her, I get it. What's that got to do with me?"

Jim V/O: "Well, you see, while I was having a gentlemanly conversation with her—hey, don't roll your eyes at me, Lieutenant! That's an order. Anyway, while I was having a gentlemanly conversation with her, you come up behind me and put on this upset girlfriend act, all but crying and saying, 'James Tiberius Kirk, I don't believe you! I stay with the baby all day and come out and find you flirting with some girl?'"

Emily V/O (Laughing): "No!"

Jim V/O: "Yep! And Uhura was not happy when she found out that, not only was there no baby, but we also weren't a couple—at the time, anyway. Plus, Cupcake overheard and decided to come to your defense."

Emily V/O: "Oops. I'll have to apologize to her later for that."

Stardate 2258.159

I'm starting to think that Jim was right about Star Trek Emily affecting my brain more than I think it is; I was leading an away team to observe a planet today, with some of my—and it's starting to feel less strange to think of them as 'my'—Tactical Officers, including Pavel and Sulu.

And it turns out that, even when Jim's not leading the mission, we still somehow manage to insult the alien species that we were observing, ending up having to make a race for the shuttle that we'd gone down in, rather than just beaming down. Spock insisted, because while they have spacecraft, they haven't developed beaming just yet.

Pav got hit first and I ran back to haul him up, half-carrying him back to the shuttle while, out of the corner of my eye, I spotted more of our pursuers and yelled a warning at the others, but it came a split second too late.

Not thinking twice, I yanked out my phaser, firing at the attackers and downing both of them before carrying Pavel over to the others. Hendorff and Wilhelm were okay, but Sulu had been hit. He was still conscious, but in no condition to pilot the shuttle, leaving me with no choice but to take control of the shuttle as we made our escape.

He talked me through everything, telling me where every button was, but as his words washed over me, something stirred in me that I haven't felt in awhile, but the first time it happened was in Jim's Kobayashi Maru, when I first got here.

The feeling of not knowing what I was doing, but my hands . . . they were already moving, before Sulu even spoke, and some part of my brain understood it, even if I didn't.

Sulu complimented me when we got back, saying that he hadn't seen a raw talent in a pilot in any of his classes, and that he wished that he'd had even a fraction of my skill when he'd been learning to pilot. I was surprised to hear that and wondered if Star Trek Emily had any piloting experience that I was just tapping into.

Jim answered that one right away when I asked him; he said that I never learned how to pilot here, so it literally was the first time I'd ever flown. But it had felt so natural . . .

And I can't help but wonder . . . if it wasn't Star Trek Emily that was the pilot . . . then where did that natural ability come from?

Stardate 2258.160

So after that last mission, McCoy insisted on dragging me down to Sickbay so he could make sure that I was actually okay after being in a "damn firefight" and when I insisted I was perfectly fine, he told me to "quit being so damn stubborn, Emily; you're getting worse than Jim and that's saying something."

That's when the subject of Jim came up and he started asking me all kinds of questions about he and I together and, in a big brotherly way, asked me if Jim was treating me all right and I nonchalantly commented that we were figuring things out, since I was still getting used to this universe.

McCoy dropped his hypospray at that one and I looked up to see this dumbstruck look on his face; that's pretty much when I realized that I hadn't mentioned anything to him—and guessing from the look on his face, Jim hadn't either.

He began sputtering and staring at me in a completely confused way, so I launched into an explanation of what had happened and how Joni and I found our way to the Enterprise (best I could anyway, since Jo and I still don't really know what happened). At the end of it, he shook his head and remarked that it was hard to believe that Joni wasn't actually Vulcan, because she was pretty damn close sometimes.

"Oh, that's because of the mind-mend she and Spock did," I told him. "It caused a telepathic link between them; they kind of share one brain now."

McCoy actually looked like he might have a heart attack or something from the shock, but he settled for sitting down in the chair next to the examination table while I watched him, slightly worried and wondering if I should call Christine Chapel, his head nurse.

When I asked him, though, he shook his head, telling me that he was fine and to just give him a minute.

It took him a good five minutes before he finally looked back up at me and asked me very seriously how I was handling all of this. The question caught me off guard; I guess it was the first time that I've really considered how I was feeling about being here; I mean, I'm happy I'm here, with Jim and everything, but I guess I never thought about what I was actually feeling. Ever since I came here, I've had a multitude of emotions, some of which I never thought I'd ever feel again.

But about being here, I have to admit that I've never been happier. The Enterprise, her crew, exploring new worlds and new civilizations . . . if I were given the choice, then I would pick being here every time, as opposed to the Other World, something I have to admit that, before, I would have said no, but now that I'm here, I almost wish I had given Star Trek a chance besides that one movie. My dad tried to get me to watch some, but they always felt too sciencey to me.

Still, I feel slightly ashamed about how easily I was able to adapt here, without giving any thought to my other family. Granted, they're the same ones as here, but they're not exactly the same ones. Matt wasn't a Medical Officer in a space program; he was just a doctor in Iowa and . . . I'm ashamed to admit to it, but I haven't given the slightest thought of what might have happened to him back there. Is he even still alive there? Or did he, like his counterpart, suffer a tragic death?

See, this is why I don't like thinking about this stuff; this is all just going to slowly drive me crazy. I can't predict what would've happened in the Other World and as far as I can tell, I'm not going back there, which as far as I'm concerned, is only a good thing. I'm happier here than I ever was there.

But . . . but I miss Joni . . .

I love Jim and McCoy and Spock and I get along all right and Scotty's great, but none of them really understand traveling to another dimension like she does. And she never answers her calls . . . just those damn messages that don't sound at all Vulcan. Or like Joni.

And I can't help but feel like . . . a darkness is coming.

AN: Hey, guys! Sorry for the long update, but hope you enjoyed Emily's log! And not to worry, the sequel is coming soon, EssentiallyRei and I have big plans for it. Now, just a reminder, the sequel will be posted on our new author page on fanfiction, but I will put an author's note on here, telling you guys when it's been posted and where to find it. But for now, I hope you liked Emily's log and don't forget to review!

Lady Dawson