Phantom Legacy

Chapter 2

Shinzon awoke to a strange feeling. He looked down to find himself entangled with the limbs of a soft body.
The memories of what had occurred the night before flooded his mind, and he noticed that the calm feeling from before was still there, but had lessened in intensity during the night.
He examined his position carefully.
His arms circled the woman's waist, while hers were wrapped across his neck.
Her head rested on his shoulder, while her leg draped across his.

Shinzon gasped softly. He seemed to have experienced more new thing in the past few hours than he had in his whole life…most of them rather pleasant.

The woman stirred in her sleep, tightening her grip on him.

Shinzon's eyes widened. He couldn't help the small smile that graced his face.
Suddenly, this bonding thing seemed much more pleasant to him.

He noticed that her grip suddenly loosened.
Her eyes were open now, and she had a sort of embarrassed look on her face.

"Um…good morning." She said with a shy smile.

Shinzon blinked a few times, but said nothing.

"I suppose we should probably get up now." The woman said after a few more moments of silence.

Shinzon nodded, but still said nothing.
He stood, when she removed her limbs from him, then as an after-thought extended a hand to help her up.

"Thank you." She said accepting it. "Oh, goodness, I haven't even introduced myself have I?" She laughed.
"You'd think I would have at least given you my name, before I give you a piece of my soul."

Shinzon looked confused, and became even more so at her laughter. "No," he said thoughtfully. "You didn't tell me your name."

The woman smiled "I am Heira. It's nice to be bonded to you."

Shinzon couldn't help but be perplexed. Probably because he had never met anyone who was as…amiable as she was. She had smiled more during their short conversations than he had in his whole life.

"I must attend to my duties." Shinzon said, suddenly remembering that he still had to explain Heira's presence on the ship.

"Yes," Heira started. "I imagine your crew will want to know why I'm here."

A thought came to Shinzon that was both unsettling, and exciting at the same time. "How far are we able to separate?" He asked.

Heira shrugged. "I'm not sure, let's find out."

She began to take slow steps backwards. When they were about ten feet apart she stopped. "The strain begins here." She said. "Do you feel a slight tingling sensation all over your body?"

Shinzon nodded.

Heira took a few more backward steps, then stopped suddenly. Shinzon grunted, and looked very confused.

"This is the maximum distance." Heira said through gritted teeth. She stepped forward, allowing both of them to relax more. "Any further would cause pain. There's also a problem with barriers. We can't be on opposite sides of a door unless it's made of something natural like wood. I don't know why, that's just how it works. "

Shinzon looked around his quarters and saw a few problems with that statement. One of them being the fact that he was still in his sleeping attire, and would need to put on his battle uniform before going to the bridge.

Heira smiled slyly and turned her back to him. "I won't peek." She said between soft giggles.

"Are you reading my mind!" Shinzon asked angrily. She'd never said anything about that!

Heira shrugged. "I get tiny flashes of your thoughts, if they're linked to emotions. You can do it to me too, if it makes you feel any better."

It didn't. He was a private person by nature, and having someone near him that had an all access pass to his mind was rather unsettling.

Shinzon sighed and took one of several Reman battle uniforms from his 'closet.'
He glanced back at her briefly, and noticed that she was still turned away from him.

He set everything out on his bed, then looked back one final time before stripping down.

"You know, it really was too easy for me to get onto this ship of yours." Heira said stretching her arms.

Shinzon's head snapped up quickly. When he saw that she was still turned away from him, he relaxed and straightened the bottoms of his battle uniform.

"How did you manage that?" He asked as he fastened the front panels across his chest.

Heira shrugged. "Apparently your ship's sensors don't notice vessels as small as mine, especially if they don't have any weapons. You should really check that out. All sorts of strange people could come aboard."

She could have sworn she'd heard him snicker softly just then, but maybe she had just imagined it.
She wished she could just turn around and see. But that wouldn't be proper, would it?

"The Scimitar is only designed to recognize vessels that could possibly pose a threat it."
Shinzon replied as he slipped his foot through his second boot.
He paused for a moment as he re-ran her last words through his head.

"Did you just say that your ship has no weapons? None at all?"

Heira nodded, but felt silly doing so once she realized he probably couldn't see that through her hair.
"Yes. I know it's dangerous considering the area of space that I'm in, but my people have never had any need for weapons. Only strong biological sensors to locate matches for our un-bonded symbiods"

Shinzon stood, now fully dressed. He walked over to the replicator, which was within Heira's field of vision.

He glanced back at her briefly, then did a double take as he noticed her eyeing him with scrutiny.

"What?" He asked self consciously, looking down at himself.

Heira blinked a few times, the looked shocked as she realized that she had been staring.
She smiled wryly then looked away, finding her boots to be suddenly very interesting.

Shinzon shook his head, then turned back to the replicator. He pressed two buttons then waited.
After a moment two rectangular objects appeared. He picked them up and handed one to her.

"What's this?" She asked examining the object. It was something covered by a plastic-like wrapper.

Shinzon looked at her strangely. "It's food." He said, taking it back from her.
He opened the wrapper and handed it back to her.
Inside was a granola looking thing that didn't seem very appetizing.

Heira smiled anyway, never one to be impolite. "Thank you. I'm not used to having packaged food; my father was weird about stuff like that. He demanded that everyone in his house eat only cooked meals….that were cooked by him."

Shinzon nodded then stepped towards the door.

Heira's eyes widened slightly. This time she was sure she caught a small smile.
She grinned and hurried after him. 'This may not be so bad after all.'

They walked down the darkened halls of the Scimitar, side by side, their steps nearly in sync.

Shinzon was counting the amount of times he had glanced over and found Heira staring at him.
This last time had been number 10 and he was ready to snap.

"What?" He asked a bit too loudly. His temper was flaring.

Heira's eyes widened. "Uh….I …I wanted to know…what is your uniform made out of?"

Shinzon looked at her strangely. "Excuse me?" He asked.

"You know, what materials were used?" She amended.

Shinzon thought for a moment, then shrugged. "I have no idea, I never asked. Why?"

Heira shrugged. "I dunno." She started. "It's just pretty."

Shinzon stopped in his tracks. Heira continued walking for a second, then turned when she realized he was no longer next to her.

"What's wrong?" She asked, noticing the confused look on his face.

Shinzon shook his head, and caught up with her. "Nothing, forget it."

They walked a bit longer, when Heira suddenly had a unpleasant thought.

"Now, your crew…" She started slowly. "They aren't going to shoot me or something are they, because I don't think I'd like that very much." She finished quickly.
Now that she was bonded getting shot wouldn't kill her, but she still didn't want it to happen.

Shinzon shook his head. "No one will harm you unless I order them to."

Heira raised an eyebrow, and caught a definite smirk as it formed at the corner of his mouth.

She gave him a playful glare, then smiled and shook her head.

They reached the bridge a few minutes later. Shinzon took a nervous breath and took the step that would alert the doors automatic sensors.

The doors opened to reveal all of the Scimitar's bridge crew waiting anxiously for their Praetor.

Heira smirked slightly.
Apparently tongues had been wagging since her arrival, or more accurately, since they had seen Shinzon's response to her arrival. Everyone on the bridge turned as soon as the doors opened.

"Praetor." One Reman said as he stood. His uniform was similar to Shinzon's in that it included the long overcoat that Heira now assumed signified rank. 'He must be important.' She thought.

"Why is this intruder being granted access to the bridge?" The man asked.

"She is aiding me with a problem that has been 'plaguing' me for some time." Shinzon replied, raising his eyebrows slightly to show his Viceroy what exactly he was talking about.
Shinzon had not yet told his crew of his ailment, thinking it better not to show weakness to the people he was supposed to be leading.
Now it seemed that he would have no need to tell them anything.

The Viceroy's face changed very little as he eyed the woman standing behind Shinzon suspiciously.

"How do you know she can be trusted?" He asked after a moment.

Shinzon shrugged nonchalantly. "She has as much to lose as I do."

Heira felt a chill go down her spine as the Reman stared at her. She felt him trying to enter her mind, and used every mental shield she had ever learned.
It was bad enough that once her new host got used to the bond he would have access to her thoughts. This Reman, who so obviously disliked her wasn't getting anything out of her head.

She sensed his anger at not being able to penetrate her mind, and then his retreat back into his own.
She let her mind relax as the 'threat' was removed.

"Just so I am clear," Shinzon started suddenly. "This woman, Heira is not to be bothered in any way. She is my guest and will be treated as such. Is that clear?"

There were murmurs of agreement from the crew. They all seemed content to follow orders. Though Heira noticed that the Viceroy said nothing.
This must have been usual, because Shinzon didn't comment on his silence. But Heira couldn't help but feel that there was another, perhaps more sinister reason behind the Viceroy's lack of speech. It also didn't help that he was glaring directly at her with those sickly yellow eyes of his.

TBC...