Title: Long Day's Journey into Night

Author: Nemo the Everbeing

Author's Note: Okay, it's bad when my villain creeps me out. Still, I didn't want a raving lunatic; I wanted someone infinitely more terrifying. I wanted someone you could understand. Someone you could forgive. What happened was, well . . . just read. Sorry if this ended up really disturbing.

Chapter 5

Spock's mind screamed and railed against the black wall which surrounded his mind. For an instant, he had thought he felt some strange searching, about to find him. The wall had blocked the signal from the outside so quickly that Spock couldn't be sure what the searching presence had been, though. It had, he was convinced, been a Vulcan, though how Kirk could have possibly procured a Vulcan was beyond Spock. The Vulcan was gone now, though. Driven back by the darkness.

He wondered why it even mattered to him that something was attempting to seek him out. Leonard's mind was gone, and Spock's mind was isolated and alone. It was emotion and it contaminated every fiber of his being, until every particle was saturated in despair. He felt hollow, and nowhere within was there a trace of his bondmate. Leonard was dead.

Some vicious voice within whispered that Spock had wanted events to turn out this way. He had never desired Leonard as a presence his head, with the illogic and the emotions. The human was a poison to Spock's Vulcan system. Death was the ultimate release, the voice whispered. It was Spock's wish. It was why he hadn't protected Leonard, why wasn't able to save him. It was what had led to their argument, what had led him to say what he had and to drive Leonard off.

He remembered the look in those blue eyes when he'd said that he had no choice but to bond with Leonard: an utter, uncomprehending shock, the look of a man who has been knifed in the back without any warning. Spock had let the human draw the conclusions which he hadn't directly stated, and the doctor had done so. The horrible, frightened pain on his face had told Spock more than what a thousand words might have.

Now Leonard was gone, and it was all Spock's fault. The Vulcan felt unfamiliar constriction in his chest and a tightening in his throat. What would life be, he wondered, without his irritating, nagging, brilliant, wonderful Leonard? Spock felt he should die. When someone lost something as great as this, they should die, too. It was not logical, but it was right.

"Leonard," he breathed, and stared at the floor.

"I'm sorry about that," the woman said. "I had to. I couldn't take the chance that he saw anything."

"I do not understand why," Spock said, trying to master himself. Before this woman he must appear as immobile and unresponsive as a statue. In such a telepathic state, she was most likely an emotional parasite. He risked a glance at her, but instead of seeing the confirming hunger, all he saw was a very young woman biting her lip and watching him with large, sorrowful eyes.

"Why I couldn't risk him seeing me?" she asked, walking over to crouch before Spock and look up at him. He desperately desired to snap his bonds and then her throat, but the wire which held his arms behind his back would sever his hands from his wrists before they released him.

"Why you have resorted to murder," he said.

She cocked her head. "I'm doing it for you. I can tell that you don't want all those women. All the attention. I'm taking care of them for you. It's logical."

"Was killing Leonard logical?"

"Eminently. There are always innocent bystanders caught in the crossfire. It's a sad fact, but one that must be accepted. I'll make it up to you, though." She smiled, and there was a sadness in that smile. "It's sometimes ugly, the things we do for those we love."

Spock's eyes narrowed. "I do not believe you comprehend the meaning of that word."

She calmly picked up an old-fashioned scalpel and slashed his arm. It was not a deep cut, but was certainly meant to convey a message. His blood welled and she smiled wistfully. "It's such a lovely shade of green. Do they make clothes in that shade?" She retrieved a spotless white handkerchief from her bureau and wiped the scalpel on it. "I think I should get this framed," she mused. Then, she met his gaze. "I know what love means. Love is sacrifice. Love is pushing aside judgment and morals and everything that you thought meant something for one person. Love is a completely worthwhile insanity." Spock stared at this woman, this psychotic killer, and her words hit home. Leonard, he thought. "Most people," she said, "think that love is sunshine and roses. They're wrong. Love's only worth anything if we don't want it to begin with, if it hunts us down, pursues us until we just can't run any more. We don't choose love. It chooses us, and rips up open. Then it stuffs our insides back in, sews us up, and we smile while we bleed out."

Spock closed his eyes against his thoughts. This was wrong, he thought. It would be so much simpler to hate this woman if she weren't right. Was it terrible that a psychotic understood this concept of love, a concept he had been grappling with since his bonding, better than he did himself? Was it terrible that she should have to explain it to him?

It was most assuredly terrible that the explanation only came after the same woman who was informing him what love was had murdered the only being in the universe that fit the criteria of love.

"You understand," she said. "You couldn't not. You feel it the same way I do. You hate it the same way I do."

Spock didn't trust himself to answer.

"It's why I have to do this. I have to get rid of the women who come after you with no concept of what love really is. They think it's simple and easy. Their presumption is killing you, Spock." She shrugged. "So I'll kill them first. It's an even trade."

"It is what you humans call a 'devil's deal'," Spock argued. Her psychosis ran deep, he thought, if she had come up with such elaborate rationalizations for it. No wonder she passed the psych evaluations. In her mind, she was not insane. In her mind, she was one of the very few rational beings alive. Somehow, that disturbed him more than if she had been simply a raving lunatic.

She nodded. "Sometimes we have to play the devil if we're to succeed."

He stared at her delicate, pretty face and her large, honest eyes and asked, "What are you?"

"That's the question, isn't it?"

"And the answer?"

"I'll tell you when I know." She glanced at the chronometer on the wall. "It's almost time for my shift. I really can't afford to be late."

She moved to the door, and glanced back over her shoulder. She looked sad, but determined. "I need to resume work tonight. I'm sorry you have to see, but I couldn't let them accuse you of a crime you didn't commit. It's better they think you're dead." She looked away. "There are other telepaths on board, Spock. I have to leave the barriers up around the room. I trust you not to call for help, but in case something should accidentally happen, I'm going to keep the room muffled, as well."

Spock stared at her.

She bit her lip and then said, "I really do love you." Before she said anything more, she turned and hurried from the room.

When she was gone, Spock stared hard at the door. How was it possible that this woman had such extensive mental powers? How could she possibly be human? If she was not, how could she possibly have hidden her identity as an alien amongst the crew? Could she have convinced all medical personnel into thinking something that was not true? What being could possibly have that sort of influence?

He quirked his lips. There were far too many unanswered questions about this woman for his taste. The only thing he could say for certain was that she was extremely powerful, profoundly disturbed, and had a deep connection with a feeling Spock had never been able to identify within himself. It was a combination he couldn't consider at positive. One wanted a sadistic killer to be a clearly drawn being of pure evil. Even Vulcans wished that, because shades of gray were confusing. They were painful. It ripped Spock up inside when he found himself actually empathizing with his bondmate's murderer.

It always came back to Leonard. Especially after the woman had crouched there, looking up at him, imploring with her eyes that he understand, that he know what she felt. And he had. As she had spoken he could only think of Leonard.

He had never chosen to love the human. It was the antithesis of logic, the opposite of everything in which he believed. Love had run him to the ground, though. He fought even unto the end, never really understanding what had him until it was gone. Until the woman had murdered the man he loved, and then succinctly explained precisely why it was that he loved the doctor.

Love had picked him, for whatever reason, just as it had picked Leonard. The human had probably not understood any better than Spock, just for different reasons. The man was so skittish that some part of him hadn't believed in love. When it had happened to them, that part of Leonard denied it. That part waited for Spock to confirm its worst fears. And Spock had done so without remorse or hesitation as soon as he had been asked to compromise.

As soon as he had been asked for a public admission of an emotion he had yet to comprehend. Spock had not acted logically, he realized with shame, but fear.

Spock was desperate to clear his mind and set all his racing thoughts in order. He leaned back in his chair, and attempted to slip into a meditative state. Perhaps he could slip past her barriers if he concentrated. Perhaps he could reach Jim.

He isolated the pain in his wrists and pushed it aside. He isolated the sounds in the room and pushed them aside. He narrowed his focus until he had encapsulated his breath. Then he let his mind float free. The world was dark and close, and within it, Leonard sat. Impossible as it was, Leonard sat in his mind, picking at his fingernails.

"Leonard?" he gasped, amazed. It couldn't be. Leonard was dead, but this phantom seemed so very real.

"Heya, Spock." Something was off. The timing, the glance, the tone. All of these resembled his bondmate, but they were imitations. They lacked sincerity.

"You are not Leonard," Spock said.

"Nope. I'm you."

"Explain."

The apparition which resembled Leonard smiled and shrugged. A chair appeared behind him, and the apparition sat. "I'm in you, Spock. Your human half and Leonard's remaining influence all rolled into one fantastic package."

Spock knew without looking that there was a chair behind him. He sat, as well. "Why are you here?"

"It's your meditation, Spock. You conjured me."

"Why?"

Leonard rolled his eyes. "Oh, for God's sake! I swear, for such a smart man, you're remarkably dense." Enunciating each word as if talking to a dull child, the apparition said, "You miss him. You're worried about him. You blame yourself for his death, so you conjure up a ghost so you can say what you need to. So you can say everything you never got the chance to tell the real McCoy, so to speak." He shrugged. "You really botched that one good, my fine Vulcan friend."

"I know," Spock said. He stared at the phantom. "If you are a part of me, why can I not feel you?"

"What do you expect when you bury me under a pile of logic and numbers? Until you bonded with Leonard, I was the silent silent partner. The one who sat back and watched."

"Watched?"

"You and him. In the end, it was always about you and him." He sighed. "Every argument, every near-death experience, didn't you feel that split-second longing for something you couldn't even put your finger on? Something a psychotic had to explain to you, and we'll talk more about the twisted perversity of that later."

"I never felt—"

"Don't lie. Not about that and not now. For God's sake, the man is dead." Spock flinched slightly, and his human half plowed on. "The least you can do is admit your feelings posthumously. And you did have them, Spock! Think: the Galileo incident, Capella IV, the giant amoeba, Twentieth Century Rome—Hell, you were that close to finally breaking down and kissing him. You all but told him that you wanted to."

"That was you."

"Uh-huh. That doctor was a man after my own heart. I thought he was a good influence on you."

"To expose my human half too readily is to invite disaster," Spock said.

"And to completely suppress me is to invite mental breakdown. To say nothing of heartache and regret."

Spock glared at the apparition. "I can see now why we have never conversed before."

The apparition laughed. "You love to argue with him. Why do you resist arguing with me?"

"You are not him."

Leonard stopped laughing. "No, I'm not. He's dead, and I'm all that's left. The little voice in your head echoing the man you love in pale imitation." His face, though still holding Leonard's form, took on a timeless look of distant sorrow which the doctor had never worn. The being was statuesque, regret carved for all eternity in incorruptible stone. "I'm just you, Spock," the phantom said, "but I'm the closest you'll ever again find to him. So make your apologies, Vulcan."

Spock's mouth fell open and they stared at one another. "I'm sorry," Spock finally said, choking on the words.

"Why?"

"Because I loved him, and I didn't tell him enough. Because he died thinking I had rejected him, simply because I feared." He stared at the apparition. "I feared, and I lost him."

The apparition spread its arms in a gesture of benediction. "I forgive you."

Spock shook his head. "It is not your forgiveness I desire. You're just his shadow."

"I'm his ghost. And my acceptance of your apology is just as sadly lacking as I."

"I know."

"I wouldn't have bothered telling you if you didn't."

Spock was jolted out of his reverie to blink up at the woman standing over him.

"Have you been meditating since I left?" she asked. "I'm sorry to break you out of it."

He stared at her and didn't speak. He worried that his voice would tremble.

"You're in pain," she said, mouth opening softly. "You're in so much pain."

"You're an empath," he said.

"You're changing the subject."

"I do not wish to discuss the subject."

She nodded. "I understand. That sort of pain isn't something you want, but you'll cling to it nonetheless. It's a secret pain." At his suspicious look, she said, "I won't pry, Spock. That sort of pain is your own. It's none of my business. At least, not until you come to trust me a little more." She opened her mouth to say something more, and then turned, saying abruptly, "It's time I got to work." She began to remove her clothing with deft, steady fingers.

"So you do your work without clothing," Spock said, remembering Leonard's comment about Lizzie Borden. The memory was a knife in his gut, and every remembered gesture, the way those blue eyes had lit up with sudden inspiration, that smile, all twisted the knife further. "How do you accept the fact of murder? How do you reassure yourself when your skin is covered in blood?"

"I reassure myself with the knowledge that it'll wash. A little water, a little soap, and it all washes."

She crept over to the bed and Spock followed her with his eyes. Lying unconscious on the mattress was a pale young woman named Lieutenant Rogers. He had assisted her with a paper on Vulcan linguistics roughly three months prior to that moment. He distinctly remembered that she smiled at him when she didn't think he was looking.

The woman at Rogers' bedside picked up her scalpel and glanced at Spock. "It all washes."