I hate Word! For those of you who read this earlier, I did upload at school (because I was really bored and figured I might as well make use of my time) and all the 'special formatting' that Clippy puts in all disappeared. I'm being picky, I suppose; however, I wish the damn paperclip would just stop formatting things and let me do it the old fashioned way. I like my own way of punctuating things. So here is the new improved version (on a Mac without Clippy.) ~Catspaw
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FRANKENSTEIN'S DAUGHTER
"He suffered not...not the ten-thousandth portion of the anguish that
was mine during the lingering detail of its execution...impotent envy and
bitter indignation filled me with an insatiable thirst for vengeance."
~Mary Shelley, Frankenstein
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"Good morning, Malcolm, how are you today?" said Amata carefully and
precisely as the lieutenant walked in. Malcolm, not expecting such a
coherent greeting, stopped and stared while the two women laughed.
"Very well, thank you!" he replied. "You've gotten a lot better since this morning!"
"We've been working all day on proper grammar," Hoshi said. "She's picked up a lot of words from simply hearing the crew talk. After you went on duty we sat in the Mess Hall for a few hours and just listened." Amata smiled her unnerving grin.
"So what else did you do today?" Malcolm directed the question at Amata; Hoshi smiled in encouragement.
"We went to the Mess Hall. I listened to many people speak. I met the Cook and he gave us some pie. Then we went to Sickbay. I helped Doctor Phlox feed his pets. And then we walked the Porthos," she answered, obviously proud of how much she had improved.
Malcolm raised an eyebrow at Hoshi. "Did you notice she has an accent?" he asked.
"What is an accent?" Amata asked.
"It means you speak in a certain way," replied Hoshi, and added to Malcolm, "She picked it up from you, Lieutenant; no one else on the ship has a British accent."
He shook his head. Trip was going to have a field day with this one. "At least she's not imitating Commander Tucker," he said dryly.
"I have to go on duty," Hoshi said, smiling. "I started teaching her the alphabet. She's a very fast learner. We're on what already?"
"M," said Amata. "Emmm for MMMalcolm." She picked up a set of flashcards and held them out to the lieutenant. He flipped through them, noting with amusement that Hoshi had put pictures of things-and people- from around the ship on the cards instead of the human trademarked C for Cat and B for Ball.
"V for Vulcan?" he asked. T'Pol's stern face glared at him from below the printed letter.
Hoshi shrugged. "Why not?" she said. "I'll be off at 1700 hours. The captain wants to talk to us after my shift. See you then." Waving at Amata, she left, heading for the bridge.
"So, do you want to move on to N?" asked Malcolm. His own picture from the personnel files (he'd always hated it) stared up from the M and made him nervous. N for nervous, he thought wryly.
"No," said Amata. "I have to tell you something." She had stopped smiling and looked instead uncharacteristically grim. "I know how to say it now."
"What is it?" he asked, dropping into the chair vacated by Hoshi.
"Talehg amata dhguh, dhu shabta habbat," she said, and the words came smoothly from her mouth, lacking the hesitation that marked her newlylearned English.
"Are your memories coming back?" he asked, leaning forward in the chair. "Why didn't you tell Hoshi? She could program the translator to allow you to speak in your own language so you don't have to go through all this."
Amata stared at him in confusion. "Memories coming back?"
"Of where you came from," Malcolm said. "Of who you are!"
"Where did they go?"
"The doctor said you had amnesia, er, you couldn't remember anything about your past. Your life."
"I remember past," Amata said, and Malcolm could tell that he'd only confused her more. She seemed be working from a different set of facts than he was and neither could figure out the other's base premise. "I remember past...before the little ship. I remember all, but I do not know how to say it."
Malcolm shook his head, not comprehending. "You don't remember your language?"
"I never had language!" she said, frustrated. "I learn how to speak from Hoshi and Malcolm. Not from before. No language before. But I remember. He spoke language. And I remember what He said. Talehg amata dhguh, dhu shabta habbat."
"What does that mean?" asked Malcolm, now completely lost. "You never learned any language, but someone spoke to you and you remembered it?"
"Yes. His words. Amata is what He called me. Test.experiment.The last experiment, best of all." She cast a frightened look at the still-confused Malcolm. He got up and put his arms around her, tentatively, as he would have hugged Madeleine when she was still little, and to his discomfort she threw her arms around him and held so tightly he feared for his ribs.
"You are an experiment? What kind of experiment?" he asked as he eased the pressure of her arms just a little bit.
"I do not know how to say it." She shuddered in his arms. "Malcolm!
Friend! He was not friend. In before, there were other amatas.
Experiments. Not last like me." Again she shuddered convulsively.
"What happened? How did you get out into that little thing in space?"
"He put us out in space. All amatas, out into space. To end."
"Die," whispered Malcolm. "He put you out into space to die. He did something to you so you don't remember your language and put you out into space to die."
"Never had language. He made amata."
"Your father? Parent?" Malcolm couldn't remember if they'd explained the concept to her; there were no children on board, so he doubted the subject had come up. "Er...when two people get together and make another person." Brilliant explanation, genius. "Er...baby? Little version of us?"
Amata shook her head violently. "No. Made amata...I do not know how to say it!" She pulled away from him and would not meet his eyes. "Made, made, made!"
Malcolm sighed. Bloody cultural differences. For a moment they sat silently, him trying to figure out what she was trying to say, her trying to figure out how to say what she wanted, and neither succeeding.
"What is this letter?" she asked finally, holding up the next card.
Malcolm saw a giant red N dangling before his eyes, over a field of stars. "N for night, I suppose," he said. "The N is for exactly what it sounds like...ennnn." And with that they left the subject aside for the present, though Malcolm could not get the thought out of his head that N, rather than night, stood for 'not understanding.'
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He does not understand, she thinks, and though she racks her brain to try and formulate the words, they will not come. They dance about in her brain, just out of reach, taunting her.
You do not know how to say it!
She remembers the cold lifepod, remembers trying to speak and call for help. How silly she was, she thinks; you wouldn't have been able to do it anyway, even if your voice had worked and your mouth not frozen.
It is her fault; he is smart, he will know if she can only tell him. It isn't that she doesn't remember; it is that she never knew. But she can't put the thought into words; she knows it in a deeper part of her mind, the part without words.
The stars move by the window of her little room. It is hardly more than a closet, but Malcolm and Hoshi have named it hers.
She looks at her cards and repeats the words that go with the letters.
N for night, O for orange, P for Porthos.
Q for questions. And answers are as far away as distant A, back at the beginning just like the answers to her own questions. Unreachable from the position of the middle Q, the beginning of the alphabet exists but is out of grasp.
She must learn them, so she can tell him. Then maybe he will help her; within her mind she sees Him, and clenches her fists. She will learn so
Stars outside, and darkness within.
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"She's a little skittish yet, I think," said Hoshi cheerfully, "and doesn't like to talk to anyone except Malcolm and me, but we feel she'll get used to Enterprise soon."
"Anything coming back to her? Language? Memories?" asked Archer.
Malcolm jumped skittishly; his chair scraped across the floor, and Archer swung his gaze to the lieutenant. "Malcolm? Has she said anything to you?"
Reed, ears reddening, looked distinctly uncomfortable. "Er, as a matter of fact, I did have a rather interesting conversation with her earlier this afternoon...She wanted to tell me something, but she waited until Hoshi left. I'm not sure if she wants to trust anyone else with it."
Both Archer and Hoshi looked suddenly intensely curious. Malcolm sighed. "But I suppose she really didn't get her point across anyway, so it doesn't matter." He explained to them their failure to understand each other. Archer leaned forward on his elbow, forehead wrinkling, when Reed mentioned that the mysterious 'he' had thrown her out into space to die.
"The stopping block...she kept saying he 'made her'," said Malcolm. "Not like a parent...I've been thinking perhaps some sort of genetic manipulation or cloning, but of course she wouldn't know how to say that."
Archer fell silent for a moment, his eyes blank, and Malcolm gazed at the captain. He knew his captain, as any good officer should, and could tell when the man knew something that he wasn't telling. The two officers shared a glance; Hoshi had picked up on the captain's expression as well, and, silently, they waited.
The com beeped. (Inwardly Archer sighed in relief, because he was not sure how to explain to the two what Amata was. He, of course, knew precisely what 'made' referred to, and had specifically chosen to keep it a secret between the doctor and himself. That was not bound to go over well.)
"Archer here, what's up?" he asked, leaping out of the chair so quickly that Malcolm and Hoshi stared, astounded, now really wondering what the Captain wasn't telling them.
"We are receiving a hail, Captain, from the Mdaran Interstellar Police," came T'Pol's clipped voice. "They wish to speak with you."
"I'll be there right away," said the captain, and with a nod to his officers exited his ready room.
A green, scaly face with eyes reminiscent of a cat's awaited them on the
viewscreen. Reed nodded to Ensign Johnson, manning the armory
station, and stood behind her, watching the Mdaran policeman intently.
"Are you the leader of this vessel?" he (it? She? Reed couldn't tell) asked,
tone quite a bit more polite than some of the species they had met out
here.
"Yes, I'm Captain Jonathon Archer," the captain replied. "What can I do for you?"
The yellow, catlike eyes swept across the bridge; Malcolm caught the gaze for a moment and felt a twinge of déjà vu. "I am Inspector Zhaan Rel Maidal of the Mdaran Interstellar Police. We have been pursuing a fugitive through this area of space recently, a Dr. Imran Yedel. Are you familiar with this area?"
Archer shook his head no, realized they might not understand the motion, and reiterated, "No, we're from a planet called Earth a good distance away from here."
"Ah, yes, indeed; I didn't think I'd ever seen your species before," said the inspector. "Yedel is a very dangerous criminal, captain. He's wanted for numerous charges of murder, abduction, and desecration of grave sites across this sector, as well as political bribery, terrorism, and embezzlement. Several governments have issued warrants for his arrests besides my own."
"Can you give us a description?" asked Archer. "We'll be happy to provide you with any information we can, or help if you need it."
"Thank you for the offer, Captain, but we do not wish to put you in danger. What Yedel does to the crews he kills..." The alien shuddered. "He is trying to make the ultimate killer, Captain. He cannibalizes parts from living beings as if they were machines, and throws out the remains of the bodies after he has mutilated them," said the inspector. "We would appreciate any information you can give us, and my communications officer is sending you descriptions and charts, but your ship couldn't stand up to Yedel's. His weaponry is far more advanced than your own; you would merely become victims of his latest experiments."
Reed realized that his captain was looking at him, ready to stop any protest he might have about 'inferior weapons,' but he had not even registered the slight, too preoccupied with the inspector's earlier words. The captain, faint relief crossing his features, turned back to Inspector Maidal.
"Thank you for the warning," said Archer cordially to the inspector. "Do we have the transmissions, Ensign?" Hoshi nodded.
"I hope your explorations prove fruitful and interesting," said the inspector. "Please exercise caution, Captain." The viewscreen clicked off with a faint pop, and they were left staring at the stars.
"Captain, I need to speak to you," said Reed immediately, his tone cold. "In private, if you would."
He caught Hoshi's questioning glance, and mouthed, 'I'll explain later' to her as captain and lieutenant left the bridge.
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"Some sort of bloody Frankenstein!" Malcolm growled. "I could have understood her if he'd just bloody told us!"
Hoshi, nearly running to keep up with his furious pace, panted, "Well, don't take out your anger on Amata! It's no wonder she couldn't tell you, she never knew how to speak in the first place!"
"Her eyes!" cried Malcolm, stopping so abruptly that Hoshi slammed into him. "That's why the Mdarans seemed so familiar! They're eyes from a Mdaran corpse."
"It's not her fault," said Hoshi again, harshly. "Now stop acting like a child and calm down!"
"I'm not mad at her," explained Malcolm. "I'm angry that the captain would keep information about her, who we are teaching to speak and read and generally function as a living being, to himself! What if we'd, oh, I don't know, fed her something one of her parts was allergic to?"
Hoshi couldn't help it; she burst out laughing and Malcolm, realizing how
he sounded, joined her. "You sound just like my mother!" she said.
"That's it, the mother hen urge!"
"Don't ever call me that around Trip," Malcolm warned between gasps, and Hoshi just giggled harder. "Come on, then, papa hen, let's go tell our duckling that we've figured out what she was trying to tell us."
"Hens don't have ducklings," said Hoshi incredulously as they came to Amata's little makeshift cabin. "They have chicks."
They knocked on the door, still faintly chuckling. No answer.
"Amata?" called Hoshi. "Are you awake?"
Still no answer, and they glanced at each other, no longer laughing at all. Malcolm tapped the security override into the keypad, and the door hissed open to reveal...chaos. Little bits of flash cards were strewn around the room, floating up and down in the rush of air from the door. Amata sat huddled in the corner, clutching M for Malcolm and H for Hoshi, angry growls choking out of her shaking chest.
"I do not know how to say it!" she cried in a huge voice. "I studied and studied, all about the ship and you and everything and I can't understand why you don't understand me!" Malcolm, cautiously, stepped forward; she launched herself from the floor at them, fists flying. Malcolm caught the full force of her swing and tumbled backwards onto Hoshi. Amata leapt over them and rushed into the hall.
"Malcolm! Are you all right?" cried Hoshi, clumsily sliding out from under him. He shook his head and grimaced at the motion as a jolt of pain blared through his skull.
"She's got quite a punch," he said, putting his hand to the already growing bump and feeling blood oozing between his fingers. "Security to deck two," he added, reaching up to the com on the wall. Hoshi, on her feet already, hauled him up and they set off down the hall after the fleeing Amata, whose angry howls still reverberated through the corridors.
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Well, let's see, the next chapter may be up by Sunday, Tuesday at the latest. Review and tell me what you like, what you don't like; I love feedback! oh, and go see www.deathtoclippy.com if you don't like Word either.