Chapter Nine: Walking Death
It had been a while since Phlox had had more than one patient in sickbay at once, but now he had to deal with Lieutenant Reed's extensive injuries – he was still unconscious – and Kamea, whose malady seemed more psychological than physical. Phlox set her arm – she had dislocated her right shoulder – and spread a healing salve over the odd-shaped cuts he'd discovered on both palms, but other than that she was fine – physically. Captain Archer claimed that she'd been quite lucid when he and T'Pol found her on the Andorian ship, but she seemed to have retreated into a semi-catatonic state; she was rather uncommunicative and in fact had not said a word since the captain had brought her to sickbay. She allowed Phlox to bind her wounds without even looking at him, instead concentrating on a spot on the wall directly in front of her, and refused to answer any questions about how she and Lieutenant Reed had received their injuries.
So when she spoke, several hours later, Phlox jumped a little, surprised by the sudden noise in the relative quiet of sickbay. He hadn't even been paying attention to either of his patients. Kamea had barely moved since being brought in, and Lieutenant Reed was still unconscious, though resting comfortably, so Phlox had seen no problem with returning to his experiments.
"Will he be all right?" Kamea asked.
Phlox turned to find that she had gotten out of bed and was standing beside Malcolm's. She was, quite unnecessarily, clutching her right arm with her left arm. She brought her gaze up to meet Phlox's, and he was astounded by the change in her appearance. He hadn't really noticed before, but her skin was sunken and drawn, and her eyes were dull and haunted. He knew of course that her ordeal with the Andorians must have been horrifying, but she looked as though she was a walking, talking corpse.
He shook his head to clear the sudden, ghastly images that accompanied that phrase and smiled as reassuringly as possible. "Yes," he said. "He'll be fine."
She did not look at all reassured. She returned her gaze to the unconscious lieutenant. "He's so pale." She shivered. "Pale like death."
Phlox went back to his experiments, bringing his attention back to the PADD he'd been examining before the interruption. "He lost a lot of blood. With adequate rest and physical therapy, there is no reason why he can't return to his duties in a week or two." He paused, skimming the information on the PADD. "Lieutenant Reed has been through far worse than this, I assure you."
Kamea made a noise of disbelief in the back of her throat but kept her eyes trained on Malcolm. "Somehow, I doubt that."
Perhaps it was the defeat in her tone that made Phlox look at her once more. She stretched out her good arm to touch Lieutenant Reed's forehead tentatively, then she ran her fingers through his hair. She crouched down, placed her lips directly next to his ear, and said, "Kaumaha."
Then she returned to her bio bed and resumed staring at the wall.
The next morning, while Phlox was checking Lieutenant Reed's vitals, Kamea spoke again, in the same halting, disjointed tone of a woman who had completely lost her way.
"I feel like I'm losing my mind," she said. She didn't meet Phlox's eye. She played with her fingers instead.
Phlox went over to her. "How so?" he asked, trying to be soothing. She had, after all, just been through a terrible ordeal, and some sort of breakdown was to be expected after experiencing a trauma like that.
"I can hear these…voices…in my head." She tilted her head to the side, until it was almost parallel with the ground, and dusted the blankets of the bio bed with her hair. "I think it's my father. He's always been there, really, he's just never been this clear before."
Phlox cocked an eyebrow, both at her words and her behavior. Perhaps he should do another neural scan. With her unusual brain functions, she could very well have blown a synapse or something may have misfired in one of her zones. He considered informing the captain but ultimately decided against it. Captain Archer would be told when Phlox had something to tell. As of this moment, he had only Kamea's odd behavior and his gut instinct, but he couldn't go to the captain without some kind of proof.
He convinced her to go into the x-ray chamber for another scan, though it really didn't take much convincing. She nodded once and then became thoroughly engrossed in the movement of her hair, tossing her head from side to side so that her hair swung back and forth. Eventually Phlox managed to coax her into the chamber and take the necessary scans. When he released her, she returned to her bed and proceeded to chew on her hair.
The scans were not promising. Phlox studied them laboriously for several hours before he reasoned that it was time to call Captain Archer.
They met in the captain's quarters, just Phlox and the captain, because Phlox wasn't sure if Kamea should hear this information just yet, but he also didn't think it was prudent to let the entire senior staff – with the exception of Malcolm, who was still unconscious – know of this sudden turn of events. Also, it was rather late.
"What seems to be the problem, Doctor?" Captain Archer asked when Phlox finally arrived in his room.
Phlox wasn't quite sure how to explain it, but he did the best he could. "Essentially," he said, after describing the long and confusing process to the mystified captain, "Kamea's abilities are advancing."
Captain Archer raised an eyebrow. "Advancing."
"Yes," Phlox said, handing the captain the PADD that contained the information about which he was speaking. He had transferred all of the pertinent graphs and data into it before leaving sickbay. He pointed to the areas of the brain about which he was speaking. "She explained that, in times of great emotional upheaval, different zones of her brain are accessed."
The captain nodded in understanding. "I remember."
Phlox pursed his lips but otherwise ignored the interruption. This was important. "When she first arrived on the ship, I took several readings of her brain activity. I determined that she was using thirty-three percent of her brain, which is almost three times the norm."
"What's she using now?" Archer asked, crossing his arms and leaning back slightly to examine the data. From the tone of his voice, Phlox could tell that he did not expect the numbers to have climbed all that much.
Taking a deep breath, Phlox answered. "Fifty-six percent."
Had Archer been drinking at that moment, he most assuredly would have spit his beverage across the room. He looked at Phlox with wide eyes and an open mouth, sputtering incoherently. "Are you sure?"
Phlox nodded, somewhat impatiently. He did not like the implication that he was not capable of doing his job accurately. "I ran the scans three times, Captain. There is no mistake." He took the PADD from Archer, pressed a few buttons, and brought up two readouts of Kamea's neural activity, which looked similar to echocardiograms – one was from two months prior and one was from earlier that day. The spikes on the latter were much more frequent and pronounced than those on the former, and Phlox pointed this out to Captain Archer. "She is also experiencing some delusional behavior."
Archer just looked at him. "Delusional?"
He clearly expected an explanation, so Phlox elaborated. "She claims to be hearing voices. And she is acting in a most bizarre manner."
The captain scrubbed his hands across his face. "Everything about her is bizarre, if you ask me." He ran his fingers through his hair and exhaled deeply. "Should she be isolated?"
Phlox shook his head. "I don't think so. She doesn't seem to be a threat to anyone. In fact, she can be released, though I should continue to monitor her, to be safe."
"Of course," Archer said, resting his hands on the back of his neck and dropping his head back to look at the ceiling. "Whatever you think is necessary." There was a pause, and then the captain asked, "How's Malcolm?"
"Lieutenant Reed is resting comfortably," Phlox said, his normal good cheer returning. "His condition is stable, and his vitals are excellent. He should wake up at any moment."
"Well, that's good news at least," said Archer. He looked at Phlox. "Did she tell you what happened?"
Phlox shook his head. Kamea still refused to answer any questions about what had transpired on the Andorian vessel. "I'm sorry, Captain. It seems as though we'll have to wait for Lieutenant Reed to wake up before we know what happened."
Archer sighed. "You should probably get back to sickbay. If something is seriously wrong with Kamea, I don't want her alone with Malcolm for too long." He shuddered suddenly. "You had to see that cargo bay, Doctor. I don't think I've ever seen anything like it in all my years on Enterprise." He turned to look at Phlox. "And she didn't even seem to be disturbed by it. Acted like it was no big deal."
Phlox raised his eyebrows at the captain's cluelessness. If he were to venture down to sickbay and take a look at Kamea now, he wouldn't even presume to believe that she wasn't disturbed by what had happened. He pursed his lips and pondered how best to respond to that statement. "We all deal with traumatic experiences in different ways, Captain," he said.
When he returned to sickbay, Lieutenant Reed was still asleep but mumbling incoherently – something that sounded like "Stinky" – and Kamea was gone.
Kamea wandered the corridors of Enterprise aimlessly, having no final destination in mind. It seemed a silly thing, but she had lost all sense of purpose and was merely walking so that she would have something to keep herself occupied. If she stopped for even a moment, say to rest her legs, she would completely fall apart. So it was vital that she keep moving, no matter how much her muscles protested, no matter how much she wanted to crawl into bed and sleep for a thousand years – because sleep wouldn't come, she knew.
Her arm hurt. Her legs hurt. Her head hurt. Her chest hurt. Her heart hurt. In short, everything hurt. Normally, the pain would have been a good sign – meant she was still alive. But now it was a sign that she was doomed to forever drown in the darkness of her past. It surrounded her, consumed her, closed her in, and no matter which way she went, no matter which direction she turned, she ran into herself.
Or, at least, the shell of a being she had become. She had seen her reflection in the doors to sickbay. She looked like walking death, which was a pretty accurate description of how she felt at this point in time. She could no longer maintain the ruse that she was actually living her life; soon it would become apparent to everyone on board that some sort of robot had taken control of her body and was going through the motions of her daily routine. She could no longer use the excuse that she was fine, because it was obvious to everyone with eyes – and probably even those without – that she was most definitely not fine, that she was in fact very slowly succumbing to the darkness that plagued her every minute of every day of her life.
And she just wished that damn darkness would reach up and swallow her completely, so she could stop pretending. She was so sick of pretending.
Her father's voice still echoed in her head, though it was much louder now than it had ever been before. Before, she was able to simple ignore it – brush it aside. It would be impossible to do so now, when the words were so clear. She could almost see him, walking alongside her, shaking his dark-haired head in disbelief. I'wak mesukh-yut t'on, he was saying. The present is the crossroads of both. He wasn't using the tone of a father passing on loving advice to his daughter. He sounded like he was chastising her for her vulnerability. Vulcans do not give in to fear, he said. You are afraid, daughter, and nothing more.
She wasn't afraid. She was tired. So damn tired. Why couldn't he see that? Why couldn't he just let her be?
Kamea stopped walking – somewhere in the lower decks, near the observation room, where the corridors were usually completely empty, especially at this time of night – and collapsed against the wall, sliding slowly to the floor as her legs gave out from underneath her. She covered her ears with her hands, shut her eyes, and rocked back and forth.
"Hele ma kahi 'ē," she said to her father, who she could see even with her eyes clamped firmly shut. "Ha'alele ia'u ho'okahi."
She spoke in Hawaiian because he hated it. He had never grasped the complexities of the language the way her mother had seemingly effortlessly learned Vulcan, and so Kamea often used Hawaiian when she wanted to tell her mother something she didn't want her father to know. He would have preferred she speak Vulcan, but Kamea didn't live on Vulcan. She would most likely never go to Vulcan. So why bother to speak it?
She had lied to T'Pol and the others, when she said that her father hadn't wanted to teach her anything about her culture. The truth was that he inundated her with all sorts of information until she felt her head would burst and spew forth names and dates of Vulcan scientific achievements. She was the one who didn't want to learn about her father's heritage. No one saw her as Vulcan, no one believed she was Vulcan, even her own parents persuaded her to masquerade as a human, so why should she care?
Lorian's eyes were before her – mirror images of her own, bright liquid pools of an unnatural blue color swimming before her own eyes like fish in an aquarium. You cannot hide from what you are, he said, in that flat, detached tone he always used. No one else seemed to be able to hear the emotion in his voice, but she could read his inflections expertly. Now, though, he seemed cold and logical, like all the others.
She wasn't hiding from what she was. She wasn't.
She brought her knees up to her chest and buried her head between them, now using her elbows to cover her ears and grasping the back of her neck with her hands. "Kia'i ia'u."
Now she could smell him, like he was actually standing in front of her, though she knew that was impossible. He smelled like sandalwood and salt water, which she always thought was weird because he hated the ocean. He had wanted to move to the American southwest after Kamea was born. He consented to live on the islands because it was easier than trying to convince his wife and daughter to move. Humans could be just as stubborn as Vulcans, after all. Your actions are not logical.
Logical. Ha. She made a noise of disgust in the back of her throat and tightened her grip on her head, her rocking becoming more pronounced, more violent, as she slammed her body repeatedly against the wall. She ignored the renewed bursts of pain in her dislocated shoulder. Nothing about her life was logical. When had logic ever come into play in her life, or even her parents' lives? He had some nerve, lecturing her about logic, when he was about as illogical a Vulcan as there ever was in the history of their entire damn galaxy. Logic, indeed. Damn logic, damn Surak, damn the Vulcans, and damn her father.
Nam-tor wak vah yut s'vesht na'fa'wak heh pla'rak.
Kamea's eyes snapped open. The great sodding bastard.
"Hele ma kahi 'ē!" It echoed off the walls, and when Kamea uncurled to lash out at the phantom of her father, an explosion rocked the corridor, throwing her backwards from the force of the blast.
Pain seared through her body, radiating from her injured arm. White spots flashed before her eyes, and she fought a fresh wave of nausea. She crouched on the floor on her hands and knees, struggling to breathe. When she had recovered, she craned her head sideways and saw that there was a gigantic hole in the bulkhead directly before her.
The realization hit her so hard that she was almost sick again. She had done this.
The empty corridor filled quickly as crewmembers raced over to discern what had happened. She felt several pairs of arms lift her to her feet, but she wasn't able to remain standing and slumped against whomever it was who had helped her. She recognized the scent as Rostov's, but it was like something out of a dream. Her vision was blurred, ethereal, like a photograph that was out of focus.
"Kamea!" Rostov said. He gripped her by both shoulders and she grimaced. "What happened?"
She stared at him, trying to bring his face into focus. What the hell was wrong with her? She shook her head to clear it, and he must have assumed that she was saying that she didn't know what had happened, because he asked, "Are you all right?"
Her vision finally cleared, and she saw what a mess she had made of the corridor. She looked up at Rostov. "No. I have to go."
She pushed herself out of his grip and stumbled down the hall and away from the chaos.
Archer paused outside the door to Kamea's quarters, debating – for what seemed to be the fiftieth time – whether or not he should do what he was about to do. He had heard, of course, about the incident in the corridor near the observation deck, and after what Phlox had told him about Kamea's abilities beginning to advance, he suspected that she had something to do with it. So, against his better judgment, he went to see her early the next morning, before most of the crew had even gotten out of bed.
He knew she would be awake – it wasn't like she slept – but the idea of calling on her so early seemed somehow inappropriate to him. Still, that didn't stop him from going, and now here he was, standing in the corridor outside her room. He took a deep breath, steeling himself for the conversation that was about to occur. He raised his hand to buzz his presence.
"Come in," Kamea said, before his fingers had even touched the doorbell.
He tried not to be shocked, but it never ceased to amaze him that she could sense another's presence like that. He would kill for that ability. Well, perhaps that was the wrong choice of words. He shook his head – best not to think about that – pressed the button to open the door, and stepped across the threshold and into her room.
It was almost completely empty.
Gone were the Vulcan tapestries that had once adorned her walls. Gone were the many old, paper and binding books on the shelf above her bed. Gone was the wilting lei that hung on the back of her desk chair. Gone was the surfboard that usually sat in the corner by the window. Gone were the pictures that she had taped on the bulkhead directly beside her bed. Her clothes were stacked in neat piles on the bed, which had been stripped of its sheets, and the crates they had pulled out of her ship were half-filled on the floor.
"What are you doing?" he asked, though the answer to that question was painfully obvious.
She turned to look at him, and he thought she looked terrible. Perhaps it was the lighting in the room – it was awfully dim in there, a light bulb must have burnt out or something – but there were great, big bags under her eyes, and her face looked sunken and drawn, as though her skin had been stretched to fit over her bones. "I'm knitting a sweater," she said.
Archer raised an eyebrow. She had somehow managed to keep her sense of humor.
"You're leaving us so soon?" he asked, surveying the damage she'd already done to her quarters. All of her belongings were either packed or very close to it. She must have been up all night.
He almost rolled his eyes. Look who he was talking about. Of course she'd been up all night.
"I can't afford to let what happened to Malcolm happen to anyone else," Kamea said, placing her clothes into one of the chests.
Archer sputtered incoherently for several moments before he was finally able to spit out anything that resembled words. "What happened to Malcolm? You saved his life, that's what happened."
He thought he saw tears in her eyes, but he could have been mistaken. And in the next second, when she turned to look at him, her eyes were dry – just hollow and dead, like the rest of her. "His life wouldn't have needed saving if it weren't for me." She sighed heavily and returned to packing. "I've put you all in danger. It's best if I leave now."
"For who?" Archer asked.
She stared at him incredulously. "For everyone. I've made enemies, Captain. Not just the Andorians. The longer I stay, the more I risk being found. It's a risk I don't intend to take – not any more. I've stayed too long as it is."
He surged forward and grabbed her by the wrist, whirling her around so that she faced him and causing her to drop the shirts she'd been holding. "You can't keep running, Kamea. You may not exactly be safe here, but we can protect you. You won't survive on that ship for very long."
She narrowed her eyes at him, and for a moment he thought he saw some spark of life return to them, but it was gone almost as quickly as it had appeared. "I managed okay before I came to Enterprise. I'll manage again."
She reached down to pick up another stack of shirts, but he angrily knocked them off the bed and onto the floor. "And what about Enterprise?"
"What about Enterprise?" she asked, calmly bending down to pick up the fallen shirts.
He wasn't sure he liked this side of Kamea. The pliant, calm, detached person kneeling before him was not the girl he had come to know. She lacked the passion, the raw emotion, the personality that he had begun to grudgingly respect. This new person living in Kamea's body was willing to give up, and the Kamea he knew would never have accepted defeat so readily.
"What will become of her once you leave?" he asked. Kamea stared blankly at him, and he continued. "Since you've come aboard, you've saved her from hull breaches, catastrophic explosions, and several hostile alien races. If you leave, she'll lose one of the most brilliant engineering minds I've ever had the pleasure of knowing." He paused, attempting to gauge her reaction. She gave him none. "You can't just leave her."
"Damnit!" she said, hurling her shirts against the wall. Archer jumped at the sudden force of her fury. As much as he'd been trying to get her to become emotional, he must say he wasn't really expecting it. "I can't stay! Malcolm almost died because of me! I won't let that happen again!"
"So don't," he said, pumping as much anger as he could stand into his voice. "Don't let it happen. But if you leave, you can't protect us. These enemies you mentioned, they may still come after us."
She said nothing, her chest still heaving from her outburst, but he could tell that she was mulling over what he had told her.
"You're in no condition to go anywhere alone," he said, in a calmer tone. "Look at you. You can barely stand."
She turned to look at him, her eyes once again dull and lifeless.
He straightened and puffed out his chest in what he hoped was an intimidating manner. "I'm the captain," he said, "and I hereby order you to stay on Enterprise. At least for the time being, until we can get you some help."
Her eyes flashed, briefly. "I don't need – "
"Then it's settled," he said, not letting her finish. He made his way to the door. It slid open, and he hovered in the doorway. "You'll stay on board and continue to do the fantastic job you've been doing in engineering, and Phlox will try and figure out a way to fix whatever is wrong with you."
She growled, low in her throat. "There is nothing wrong – "
He stepped into the hallway. "Incidentally," he said, turning his head to look at her over his shoulder, "Malcolm's awake." She pulled her head back in surprise, and her whole demeanor changed instantly. "Just thought you would like to know."
The door slid shut with a hiss, and Archer couldn't help but grin. He had a feeling Kamea would be around for a while.
A/N: I apologize for two things.
1) The amount of Vulcan and Hawaiian (mostly Hawaiian) phrases used in this chapter (translations are listed at the end of the Author's Note), but I figured that since it was Kamea and her father speaking to each other, that's how it would go. I had meant to translate all of Lorian's words into Vulcan, but I'm not that skilled at it, and also I'm lazy.
2) How long it took for me to get this up. But I'm applying to grad schools in the fall, and I need to have a superb portfolio if I any whisper of a prayer of getting accepted to my top choice school, and I had a great idea for a story, which is what I've been working on much of this week. But I did say I would have this up for you this week, and here it is.
I have plans for one more chapter, which I hope to get up by the end of next week, provided I don't go crazy before then. After I finish chapter 10, this story will be complete, only to continue in Part 5.
Kaumaha -- Sorry.
Hele ma kahi 'ē – Go away.
Ha'alele ia'u ho'okahi – Leave me alone.
Kia'i ia'u – Watch me.
Nam-tor wak vah yut s'vesht na'fa'wak heh pla'rak -- Time is a path from the past to the future and back again.
As always, Surak's sayings are courtesy of the Vulcan Language Dictionary.
And, as always, thanks so much for the reviews!
