January 2366

Chapter 5

The hot sun beat down on B'Elanna's shoulders as she lunged forward, her arms positioned as though she was holding a giant beach ball. After a month of practicing the Mok'bara with her grandfather each morning in the family courtyard, she'd finally memorized the ten-minute-long initial practice. Sneaking her hand out of position, B'Elanna wiped the sweat from her brow – how was it so hot at only one hour past sunrise? – before picking up her leading leg and drawing her knee near her chest, her arms moving into a Y shape above her head. She held the pose to the count of five.

A month… in a month she had gone from Starfleet cadet to kitchen help. Even as things were falling apart at the Academy, B'Elanna had held onto the dim hope that it would all work out: that she'd become an engineer and work in research and development on ground breaking technologies. That, in the grand scheme of things, it would matter that she had existed. But now? She could count on one hand the people who would care whether she lived or died.

Out of the corner of her eye, B'Elanna could see her grandfather taking up the same position. He was dressed in the typical loose fitting white jacket and pants of a Mok'bara practitioner – a contrast to B'Elanna's green tank top and black, skin tight, shorts. Ma'Leth had suggested that she replicate the traditional garb, but B'Elanna refused. Half of the duffle bag she'd brought to Qo'noS had been workout clothes from her track and field days – there was no point in replicating more when what she had was perfectly serviceable.

As B'Elanna began to kick her lifted leg out and bring her arms down into a T shape, she saw her grandfather waver, then set his raised leg down. B'Elanna had never seen her grandfather lose his balance. Not that she faulted him – she'd only made it through the initial practice once without stumbling.

B'Elanna held her pose, waiting for Ma'Leth to reassume his. The old man lifted his leg, but immediately set it back down. He then tried to step to the side, but stumbled and collapsed on the red dirt.

"VavnI'!" B'Elanna broke her pose and rushed to him, her bare knees scraping against the ground as she dropped to his side. His eyes were opened but unfocused. "VavnI'? What happened? Are you alright?"

"Lanna," Ma'Leth mumbled. His eyes focused on her face, but he looked confused. Beads of sweat dotted his blanched skin. "Why… why am I on the ground?"

"You collapsed." B'Elanna pressed the old man's shoulders down when he tried to sit up. "Don't move. I'll get Dar'Rok, and we'll take you to the medical center."

"No." Ma'Leth pushed her hand away and sat up, heaving a breath. "No, don't bother your uncle about this." He cleared his throat and began dusting the red dirt of his white jacket. "It's just the heat. Run inside and get me some water."

By the time B'Elanna returned, Ma'Leth was no longer sitting in the middle of the courtyard, but on a bench in the shaded patio. B'Elanna handed him the water and sat next to him. She looked him over; the color had returned to his cheeks and his eyes seemed alert.

"Stop staring at me like I'm dying," Ma'Leth chided, dumping the remaining water over his thick, grey hair. "I'm just an old man who got overheated. Nothing to worry about."

B'Elanna couldn't help but feel like her grandfather wasn't telling her the whole truth. "Are you sure?" Ma'Leth turned to her. He does look like he's back to normal…

"I'm sure. But I think I'll forgo our sparring." He clasped her on the knee as he rose. "You should finish the initial practice. Then we will head over to the restaurant."

B'Elanna watched him as he walked back inside the house. Nothing about his gait gave her cause for worry – his color had returned and the confusion passed quickly. B'Elanna rose and headed back out into the courtyard. It does seem like he just got overheated, she thought as she picked up from where she'd left off, arms outstretched and leg lifted perpendicular to her torso.

But it isn't any hotter than yesterday… or the day before…

=/\=

How is it so warm even at night? B'Elanna wondered, not for the first time, as she walked through the dimly lit streets between the restaurant and home. The muggy night had been little relief from the hot kitchen, and B'Elanna was dreaming of a cool shower, followed by dinner in front of her climate control unit.

As she opened the heavy wood door, B'Elanna saw that the main room was fully lit – odd, since Miral was having dinner with a friend and B'Elanna had just left her grandfather at the restaurant. "Hello?" B'Elanna's voice echoed through the high-ceilinged room.

"In here."

Miral was at the kitchen table, a plate of meat and vegetables before here. B'Elanna crinkled her nose at the smell, annoyed that working in the kitchen still hadn't desensitized her to the reek of Klingon food. "You're home?"

Miral took a large bite. "I am. Is it a problem?" she spoke through the mouth full of food – a habit of Klingons that B'Elanna had never been able to abide.

"No, it's just that VavnI' said you would be out with a friend."

"Jarek had to cancel."

"Who's Jarek?" B'Elanna walked around the table to the replicator. She began to flip through the human menu.

"He's my man-friend."

B'Elanna paused her scrolling. She'd never heard the word 'friend' gendered like that before.

Before B'Elanna could press her mother on the ins and outs of Klingon grammar, Miral asked, "When will your grandfather be home?"

"He said in about an hour. Speaking of him," B'Elanna keyed in the command for two tacos al pastor, "something strange happened with VavnI' today."

Miral glanced up. "What happened?"

B'Elanna placed her meal on the table, and took a seat. "This morning, while we were practicing Mok'bara, he collapsed."

"Is he well?"

B'Elanna shrugged. "He said he was just overheated."

"Hmph," Miral grunted before returning her attention to her food.

B'Elanna gnawed on her lip. How can she be so dismissive of this? "Is that it? I tell you your father collapsed and all you say is, 'hmph'?"

"You just said he was fine."

B'Elanna shook her head, feeling her frustration with her mom rising with each passing second. "No, what I said was that he said he was just overheated."

"Was it hot?"

"It's always hot! He's never fainted before!"

"Maybe he had not drunk enough water. Maybe he had too much blood wine last night. Why do you doubt him?"

"I don't know…It just all came out of nowhere. And he didn't look well when he first came to - really pale and confused."

Miral picked at her food, crushing a tuber against a strip of meat before popping it in her mouth. "Lanna, he just gave you a scare - this is all. Your grandfather has spent seventy-three years in his body. Let him be the judge of if he is well or not."

B'Elanna looked anywhere but her mother's condescending gaze. "So, you're not concerned at all?"

"I will save my concern for where it is needed. For example, you have yet to sign up for any of the preparatory classes I suggested."

The fucking classes. At the end of B'Elanna's second day in Qam'Chee, Miral had come home with a stack of PADDs and a schedule of classes that B'Elanna should sign up for; to prepare herself for the university exams that would take place in six months. B'Elanna had taken the PADDs from Miral and placed them on her desk – where they remained untouched.

"I know," B'Elanna replied, her focus on squeezing lime over her tacos rather than her mother. "I'm just… I just want to take some time off."

"Time off?"

"Yeah." B'Elanna looked up at her mom, who clearly wasn't supportive of this notion. "I… I want to figure out what I want to do, before I waste more time in school."

"You do not wish to be an engineer anymore." Miral's tone had an air of finality to it that made B'Elanna's skin crawl.

"No… I don't know…" B'Elanna huffed.

"Lanna," she said, reaching across the table to take her daughter's hand. "You've always wanted to be an engineer. What changed?"

B'Elanna pulled her hand away. "I don't know."

"So, this is it? You're going to wash dishes and chop vegetables for the rest of your life?"

B'Elanna's head shot up at the change in her mother's tone. "No," she growled between clenched teeth. "I just want to take a minute to decide if being an engineer is still what I want. Why is this so hard for you to understand?"

Miral leaned back, folding her arms across her chest. "This is not hard for me to understand. What I don't understand is why you are different now."

B'Elanna shot up from her chair. "I'm not different!"

Miral stood as well, holding her hand out to silence her daughter. "You are! All you talked about through secondary school was studying engineering at the Academy. You worked hard to get there; you proved anyone who doubted you wrong." Miral's tone softened. "And I was so proud of you. Even when you had problems, you overcame them with honor."

B'Elanna crossed her arms tightly against her chest and stared at the floor. She'd never heard her mom talk like this. But the use of the past tense – was proud – caught in her mind. The other shoe was about to drop.

"But last semester?" Miral's voice took on a sharp edge. "Disciplinary hearings? Suspensions? To say nothing of your grades. A C- in interstellar history? This is what I do not understand, B'Elanna. What has happened to you?"

B'Elanna wanted to scream. What had happened? Nobody had given a fuck about her at the Academy. Her best ideas were shot down without consideration – by the elitist professors and stuck-up students. It was like the ridges on her forehead were a dunce cap. And the exhaustion… even on the nights that she had gotten enough sleep, she'd never been as tired in her life as she had been those last six months at the Academy. It had gotten to the point where it was a struggle to even get out of bed.

"What happened to me?" B'Elanna lashed out. "I got stuck in a system that didn't allow for any original thought! Any idea I came up with wasn't good enough for those assholes. Anytime I spoke up, I was the problem! They expected me to sit down and shut up and I refused to!"

"Maybe they expected you to act like an adult rather than a sulky child!"

"I can't deal with you right now!" B'Elanna turned on her heel and headed for her room, her footsteps echoing off the stone floor.

"Run away! Like you did from the Academy!" Miral yelled after her.

B'Elanna slammed shut her door and screamed.

=/\=