I guess there's hope after all. Or is there? A mention of blood in this one. And I guess...prepare yourselves.
On the bridge, Uhura and Chekov were waiting anxiously for the return of their commander. They didn't talk about anything, the ability or at least the motivation to have conversations having been lost behind a veil of death and destruction.
As they heard the lift, they turned around expectantly. The doors slid open and they gasped as they revealed Christine and Spock sitting on the ground and holding on to the dead Dr McCoy.
Everyone remained silent, as Spock picked him up in his arms and gingerly laid him aside. He stayed in a kneeling position at his deceased friend's side for a moment, holding his hands after he had folded them over his torso. Then, he removed his own uniform jacket and carefully draped it over the unseeing face of his friend.
With a last glance at the now half-shrouded corpse, he stood up and took his place in the captain's chair.
Christine followed and stood next to him, much like Leonard had often stood next to Kirk, she realised.
Uhura and Chekov turned their attention back to the viewscreen and their console, with their clicking of buttons the only audible sign of life on this ship now.
Christine watched Spock, whose look was fixed on the viewscreen. She wondered what he saw apart from the depressing darkness. Was it Jim's corpse? Was it Leonard's lifeless stare? Or something else entirely that was destined to haunt the Vulcan's subconscious? If Vulcans had one.
She noticed she had been holding on to Spock's sleeve for the last minutes, not the armrest of the chair. He either didn't mind or had not even realised.
Christine had just opened her mouth to say something when Pavel's voice interrupted her thoughts.
"Captain, I have our point of entry on sensor's again, ahead!" he exclaimed with a hint of optimism. "It seems we have been flying in a loop."
"Plot a new course, Mr Chekov. We're going to try our escape from this side," Spock ordered. "But be prepared to engage evasive maneuvres."
"Aye, sir."
They all knew that their thrusters and what remained of the impulse drive were a laughable defence against debris on a collision course, and the gravitational swirls and eddies made it virtually impossible to predict movement in here.
Christine voiced what they had all been thinking. "What if it doesn't work?"
"There are always possibilities," Spock answered, looking first at her hand then up at her face.
"Well, if it doesn't work, it was nice while it lasted," Chekov chimed in.
Uhura huffed. "I don't know about you, Pavel, but I could have lived without the last day."
"We all could, Commander," Spock murmured and raised one eyebrow. "I suppose we have all earned our two weeks of shore leave after this experience."
For a moment, the gravity of the situation seemed forgotten as everyone remembered their original destination and their original plans. But then they recalled that this ship's original crew was as good as eradicated, and their friends would not spend shore leave with them.
Just as before, it was the young navigator who broke the silence, with an ominous announcement.
"Sir, debris field ahead, one big object headed directly for us at high velocity. Diameter seventy-eight metres."
Spock immediately sprang into action.
"Do what you can, Mr Chekov! Brace for impact!" he called, pointing Christine towards his science station.
The seconds stretched as the object which looked like it had once been part of a ship's hull spiralled towards them.
Suddenly, it had reached them and Pavel, who had been trying to evade the object until the last millisecond uttered a curse, as it hit their bow, the shockwaves rumbling through the primary hull. The rumbling reached the bridge, and sparks started to fly from the helm and navigation consoles.
"Console overloading!"
In a bang of sparks and smoke, the middle of their console flew apart, and the two officers vanished in the smoke. Christine held tight to Spock's station, her other hand already on her medical scanner.
A moment later, the turmoil died down again, and Christine dashed through the clearing smoke. Chekov and Uhura were lying motionless next to their seats, and the middle of the console was stripped to its inner workings.
Christine checked for Pavel's life signs and found none. She bolted over to Uhura, and scanned her, with the same results.
"They're dead," Christine reported, drawing a shaking breath as the implication hit her. "We'll be the only survivors, then."
"I'm afraid not."
Spock's voice was barely above a murmur, and Christine wheeled around. There had been something in his voice that made her heart race and stumble. And the sight she faced when she had turned made her feel as if it might as well have ceased to beat.
"Oh, Spock!"
She rushed to his side. A piece of the damaged console protruded from his torso, lodged in the centre just under the sternum. The first glance told her that all help would be too late. The pristine white of his command division turtleneck was becoming greener every second.
Instinctively, she pressed one hand on the wound around the metal but knew it was to no avail.
"Spock. Are you in much pain?"
She tried to focus her eyes on his, instead of the blood seeping from him.
"Barely," he rasped, clearly lying. "I want you to take the helm now and get the ship out of this anomaly."
"But I'm a doctor!"
"You're also in command of the Enterprise now." A hint of pride flickered through his voice. "I'm handing her over to you. You have to fly this ship if you want to survive." He fixed her with a determined gaze. His brown eyes were full of pain, as hard as he tried to suppress his suffering. "That's my last order, Christine: survive."
She nodded solemnly, blinking as her vision became blurred. "Aye. I'll do my best."
"I know. You always do," he said, struggling to breathe. "Don't undersell yourself. You have been an exceptional member of this crew: an outstanding officer, scientist, and doctor." He looked up into her eyes and smiled. "And a worthy friend. Thank you."
Christine let her tears flow freely now. She cradled his face in one hand, absentmindedly stroking his cheekbone.
"I hope you know how much you mean to me. How much you meant to all of us."
"I do," he whispered and brushed his hand against her cheek and wiped away a tear.
For an instant, she felt a wave of some strangely tender emotion that wasn't hers, as the telepath touched her.
She bent down to press a kiss to his forehead. When she moved away, Spock's hand had slumped into his lap and he had ceased to move.
The newly anointed commander of the ship turned around and took her place at the helm. The hole in the middle laid bare the blinking circuitry, and the whole panel was scorched.
She raised her hands to the controls and stopped again. Her left hand was wet and green. She hastily wiped the blood away using her uniform pants, just as Spock had done yesterday. Her hand still felt sticky as she took it back up. The blood had already begun to coagulate on her hand and a dry residue was left.
To her relief, the helm console was responsive, and the course Pavel had laid in was still effective. At least that was what the display was telling her. She shook off the paranoid thought of the ship veering off course without the computer detecting it, and pressed a button.
"Computer, estimated time of arrival at our point of entry?"
"Estimated time of arrival: twenty-five seconds."
At least there was an end in sight. Once out, she'd send a distress signal and would probably be picked up within a day.
And where would she go? Starfleet would want to have a debriefing. Her friends needed to be buried. Would they get a mass burial? If so, and not in space, then Earth was the way to go.
Except for one of them, if authorities decided. And that's where she would follow. She would escort Spock's body to Vulcan and she would hand it over to Ambassador Sarek and Lady Amanda. It was the least she could do, to bring him home and give his grieving parents a semblance of closure. She was the only living witness to their son's last days, after all.
Then, she could still go to Earth for those of her friends and crewmembers that could be given a burial. Some had not been found and would forever remain in the anomaly that had ripped them from life.
To be continued...
Yes, there's a continuation. Where there's life there's hope, right? Please read on, this might go ways you didn't expect. Or maybe you did. Anyway, keep your eyes peeled! Feel free to leave a review or send me a message to tell me if and how you liked it.