And here we are again, lovelies!

I hope everyone enjoys the latest chapter. I have to admit, I'm only just now starting to figure out everything that happened to Addy on Tarsus, and I think I've got the balance I was looking for between horrifying and bearable. I don't want it to be so horrible that Addy could never have recovered, but I want it to be pretty terrible. Poor thing. I'm so mean to my people in my stories. Really, it's a problem. I'm seeing someone about it.

Kisses!

MD

Disclaimer: I do not own Star Trek or any part of the franchise. I gain nothing from writing this other than creative satisfaction.

Much to her surprise, Kevin had no family here on Tarsus. He'd had a grandmother when he'd first arrived four months ago, but she'd soon passed on from a bad case of pneumonia and old age. Surprisingly, instead of sending him back to Earth (where he also had no family to speak of), Kodos had taken the small boy under his wing, finding shelter for him up at the town hall. A seemingly kind gesture, but Addy found it harder to trust it as genuine. She had a harder time trusting the ginger man than most others, to be honest. There was something slimy and false about the man that left her stomach feeling unstable and disturbed. Everything about him seemed nice and considerate and everything a governor should be, but then again, Frank had seemed the same the first time she'd met him. Look how that ended up.

To say that Lillith and Henry were surprised when she returned with the small, shivering bundle of toddler would have been understating the matter immensely. And to everyone's surprise (including Addy's), the blonde teen was fiercely protective over the boy. She refused to let her relatives feed him or bathe him and damn near growled at them when they suggested she go shower and leave Kevin to them. Something primal and possessive reared its head at the thought of someone taking the boy away from her. Addy didn't remember how to connect with people anymore. She'd had to kill that part of her herself when the abuse with frank started and she'd seen everyone in the town know what was going on and choose to ignore it anyway. She'd had to learn to sense preemptively when her step-father would get nasty. She'd had to lock away her fragile humanity and go back to the dark, animal side mankind had conquered long ago. She'd learned to tread without a sound to creep past Frank. How to read minute signs from the body to detect when her injuries would be superficial or crippling. She could walk and talk like any normal human, but everyone in her small could sense something in the air around her, and it made them jittery. It was easier to hide here on Tarsus, spending so much time in the woods and on the fringe of the settlement, and it had quieted a bit when there was no immediate danger after she'd settled in.

But it was a side of her that latched on to her small charge with a passion.

Kevin had trusted her completely when his life had most depended on it, and the weight of that responsibility was something she took very seriously. So, that first night, she'd taken care of him all on her own, feeding his empty stomach and washing the dirt from his hair and cuts. She'd dressed him in one of her old, ratty t-shirts she'd used on the corvette, and he could practically swim in it, but she'd get his clothes soon enough and bring them here, because if Kodos thought he was taking Kevin away from her, he would find out he was wrong. The painful way. Her relatives left them alone soon enough, secretly relieved to see their broken and abused niece attached to something, even if the attachment seemed strange.

Kevin fell asleep instantly in her bed, caged safely in her arms, smelling faintly of the lavender soap Addy used, and Addy… well, she really slept for the first time since months before coming here to Tarsus.

Getting the clothes the next day had been harder than she'd anticipated, because she'd been right in assuming Kodos wouldn't want to let the boy go home with her to stay. But Lillith and Henry had jumped at the chance to have Kevin share their home, and Addy loved them a little bit more. After having them sign a few waivers, Addy had helped Kevin pack his bags and held his hand all the way back to the house, feeling on the verge of tears the whole way.

Life continued on as before with an unspoken agreement between everybody that this small brown-haired boy was now a part of their family, and Addy was shocked to realize she actually felt like they were a family. Her aunt and uncle included. Kevin trailed happily after Addy in her chores, and loved helped Lillith in the kitchen, boasting for days about how he could make himself a sandwich without any help. And always, that other side of Addy made sure she knew the whereabouts of the charming toddler.

She soon learned that Kevin was still interested in the great expanse of forest, despite his frightening time in it, and Addy couldn't help a deep sense of pride for the boy whenever he followed her past the line of trees without hesitation. He was, in fact, only four, so therefore much too noisy within the quiet confines of leaves and rough bark. But addy didn't mind that finding animals to track and sometimes hunt was harder now, she enjoyed his company. She taught him about the few plants she could recognize from books and ones she'd learned about herself. Which were edible, which were poisonous, and which would give him a nasty rash and fever. There were plants that could cover his scent, plants that would bite him if he got too close, and plants that sparkled in the moonlight like a little bit of outer space had fallen to the earth and grown from the dirt.

Addy showed him the constellations in the sky, and taught him how to read and write. She taught him table manners, and when it would be better to be quiet and observe than open his mouth and participate in a conversation. She shared with him all the things she had learned in all her pain, all the life skills she'd developed amid the punches and slaps so that hopefully, if there was ever a time he was in trouble and Addy couldn't help him, he'd be able to help himself until he found her.

And in turn, Kevin helped Addy re-learn the wonder in the song of a bird on the cusp of morning. He taught her the beauty in sitting and watching the sun set the green sky on fire with wild colors she couldn't name as it dipped below the horizon. He taught her the comfort of laughter and companionship and family. He taught her the value of trust and love. He showed her the universe through the open-eyed innocence that only a toddler could experience, and the fun of wasting time on silly games like hide-and-seek or tag. And through him, he showed her the love Lillith and Henry felt for her, without conditions or expectations, and that she was keeping them at a distance for no reason, because they wanted nothing from her other than her happiness.

Tarsus became even more wondrous and beautiful to her after she met Kevin.

Addy took to the forest more and more when their crop started failing, feeling the pressure to keep everyone fed, Kevin chattering behind her happily. It was on one such excursion that everything went wrong. So terribly, terribly wrong, and Adelaide's life was changed forever.

Addy peered out the window quietly as two of her companions giggled behind her like the lovestruck teenagers they were. She'd gotten on the ferris wheel in the hopes she could have some time to think in silence while enjoying the view of the fair from the air, and that hope had quickly been dashed when the operator had crammed three other people in here with her. Two of them appeared to be a young couple, and the other looked just as awkward as Addy felt, poor girl.

The two of them jumped when the girl squealed at something her boy had whispered and Addy rolled her eyes. She was counting down the seconds until she was out of this stupid cage. She hadn't expected others to be here, else she wouldn't have bothered standing in line for twenty minutes and paying the credits.

With a frown, she looked down at the plush black horse in her lap. It looked exactly like Bones' Andalusian back in Georgia, down to the glossy white socks and stripe through an otherwise pitch black tail. She remembered that mild horse with a fond smile. Bones was convinced the horse was mixed with some other breed by the strange markings, but Midnight's body was completely that of an Andalusian, so he was stumped with nothing to go on. Regradless, Bones was besotted with the animal, almost as much as he was with his daughter Joanna, and Addy had seen why when she'd gone home with him on their leave right after the Nero incident. And, when she'd seen the plush toy as a prize at one of the booths, and quickly laid claim to it thinking it would help her in her apology since she was so shitty with words sometimes, but now it seemed… childish. It was silly to think a child's comfort toy would mend the problems between Addy and her best friend in the whole universe. She glared when the girl's voice dipped low in an attempt to be seductive and the boy chuckled, dragging her from her thoughts, and shook her head.

Adelaide couldn't be more grateful when she was off the stupid ride a few minutes later. She quickly resumed her slow walk through the bustling crowd, holding the plush of Midnight to her chest, and not really sure what she was doing. She should be asking around about Kodos' acting troupe so she could get him, and get off this planet and be done with this mess sooner than later, but… but…

She wasn't exactly sure how she was going to apprehend him, either. What was she gonna do, just waltz right up to him say, "Hey Kodos, remember me? You tortured me and put me through unimaginable anguish and scarred me for life. I'm here to arrest you for all that murder you committed," and expect him to come all meek and complacent? She snorted derisively to herself and the thought. No, he would definitely put up a fight, and though that thought sent her in to a panic, Addy kept herself from crying with the thought that she wasn't a child anymore. She wasn't helpless. And she wasn't alone. Well… she wouldn't be when she went to go get him. Right now she was very much alone, because she had the uncanny ability to push people away when she needed them the most.

'What even is my life?' Addy complained to herself. Her communicator beeped with the alarm she'd set to remind her when it was time to ring Spock. Had it been two hours already? She pulled it out with a thoughtful frown.

"Kirk to Spock," she said, walking away from the crowd for more privacy.

"Spock here," came the cool response soon after.

"Hey. Just… checking in…" God that sounded lame! No way was her pesky first officer let her get away with that.

"I am aware as you made me privy to your plans before beaming down to the surface of the planet, Captain. You are stating the obvious." Yep there it was. Addy smiled in spite of herself.

"My mistake," she murmured.

"Indeed. Has there been any progress in your pursuit of the target?" Addy lost her smile and sighed wearily.

"No, Spock. The four of us have pslit up to cover more ground, but this fair is pretty big. Bigger than I thought, so it might take longer than we expected."

"Aye, Captain."

"That doesn't change my plans, though. I'm still bringing us back in an hour's time, with or without this fucker. I wanna see what we found out and regroup before sending out another party."

"An admirable plan of action, Captain. You are being abnormally cautious with the parameters of this mission, and while I comment your forethought, I admit it is mildly perplexing to see you act so out of character." Addy froze and looked down the small device in her hand, as if Spock was using it to see right through her. Shit, how much had he seen? Well, fuck, with how she'd been acting lately, he'd probably figured out she at least had some past experience with Kodos. He had a genius brain anyway, and was so freakishly smart, it intimidated her, and Addy wasn't intimidated by intelligence easily. She'd met plenty of Vulcans in her time, too, that were less than impressive. But Spock… Spock was something else. She panicked when she realized she'd been silent too long and cursed at herself for her blunder.

"Uh… yeah. Well, the stuff on this guy was, uh… was pretty bad so… Well, you know, I didn't want any of my people getting hurt by underestimating him in his old age," she tried, knowing there was an off tone in her voice that she just knew wouldn't escape Spock's notice.

"Indeed," he said thoughtfully (he always sounded more emotional when it was through the communicator), "I concur with your reasoning. When dealing of a criminal of his caliber, it is best to be overly-cautious so as to prevent unnecessary loss."

"Y-yeah, well, uh… gotta run! See you in an hour. Kirk out."

"Cap –" Addy slammed her communicator shut, cutting off her first officer before he had the chance to poke and prod more at things he had no business touching. She shoved it deep in her pocket and buried her face in the soft horse in her hands. A wave of nausea passed over her, and she gagged, battling the urge to empty her stomach in the grass next to her, which subsided soon enough and was replaced by another shock of uncontrollable rage. Addy shivered, squeezing her eyes shut as a couple tears slipped through her eyelids. She whimpered as a voice inside her mind screamed and thrashed around, furious and frightened, and the warring impulses to both ignore it and give in were giving her a headache. She felt so overwhelmed and helpless. Her world was crashing down around her, and she couldn't breathe. She couldn't breathe.

Fuck. She couldn't breathe.

Addy dropped the plushie and clutched at her chest as her vision swam and she fell to her knees. Her panic shot to new heights. Sweat beaded on her forehead and neck and she took great gulping gasps of air to battle the panic attack overcoming her system. Her limbs quaked, and her head spun wildly. There were so many things going wrong for her, she didn't know what to do, or how to even stand on her feet anymore. She felt like the ground beneath her feet was swallowing her whole until she fell through the cracks right to the core where it was so hot. It was so hot, and so dry, and there was so much blood as the hands slipped over her skin, and that laughter. Oh god, that cackling laughter as he drove into her over and over again, and it hurt, it hurt so much, she prayed to everything, so prayed for death to come and take her away from this nightmare because she was so young, and so hungry, and she'd only been trying to keep them safe. What had she ever done to get such a shitty draw in life? But it never stopped. It dragged on and on through her whole life, through an age of the stars, and it carried through the whole universe, tainting the black emptiness until it was ugly and impure, and dirty, so dirty, no one would ever want her again. Why couldn't she just die?

Adelaide threw up violently, and seeing as she hadn't eaten recently, it was nothing but pure stomach acid, burning the back of her throat and making her cough. Her stomach rolled, even as she stopped puking, and she sat back on her rear end heavily, gasping. She looked up to the clear sky, at all the twinkling stars laughing down at her and cried silently.

She hadn't seen Kodos in 10, almost 11 years now, and he still had the power to make her feel like a child.

Pathetic.

"Addy, why're we hiding?" Kevin asked, hiding on the fringe of the forest behind Addy's back. She watched through the leaves of the berry bush she was crouched behind as five grown men stormed her house, and the blood drained from her face as she heard the screams of her aunt and pained cries from her uncle. Then silence.

"Be quiet, Kevin," she snarled harshly, her eyes stinging. She could sense the hurt from the small boy, but he remained silent, and for that she was eternally grateful because just then the men exited the house and looked around, presumably for her and the small toddler she was shielding. She narrowed her eyes as they looked curiously at the forest and exchanged some words. One of them pointed near exactly at the spot she was hiding, and her heart stopped for a couple beats when she thought he could see them, but the other one shook his head firmly and they left soon after. She let out a slow breath of relief, but didn't move from her spot until she'd counted four minutes after the car had driven away.

Addy cautiously raised her head over the bush, and seeing no danger, ducked back down to speak to Kevin. He'd heard the same screams from the house she had, and he looked terrified.

"Addy, what's going on?" he asked, looking up at her with wet eyes. "I'm scared."

"I know, Kev, but don't worry, I'm going to keep you safe," she promised, and her tone was so determined and full of conviction, that he looked instantly better. But his eyes kept flicking back to the house. "But right now, you need to stay here. You need to stay right here and stay very quiet. There are bad men that will hurt you if they find you. They will take you from me and hurt you very bad, do you understand?"

Kevin's lip trembled dangerously but he nodded silently. Addy wrapped her arms around him in a tight squeeze that she hoped was comforting to him.

"I'm going to go the house. I need to check on Aunt Lil and Uncle Henry and get things for us, but I will come right back."

"No!" Kevin cried out, making Addy tense with how loud it was, and he tightened his hold around her waist. "Please don't leave me alone!" Addy shushed him and pulled him back so she could look down at his face.

"Kevin, I need go back to the house. I have to get food for us, because we have to hide, and I can't take you with me," she explained calmly. He looked away from her back at the house and down at the forest floor before muttering quietly.

"What if the bad men find you and hurt you?"

"They won't." Kevin looked up at her doubtfully. "They won't."

Despite how young he was, he knew there was no stopping Addy from anything she was determined to do and nodded hesitantly. With a kiss to his forehead and a pat on the head, she cautiously stepped away from the cover of the forest and looked around anxiously. She could feel her heart pounding and her arms and legs were taught with energy. Taking a deep breath for courage, she slipped off her shoes so she would be quieter and ran across the open expanse of land, not stopping until she reached the back door. She waited for the shouts of someone that had seen her and the sound of footsteps chasing after her, but much to her relief, they never came. She slipped through the door and passed through the kitchen (she'd return to raid it later), heading for the stairs up to her room and froze.

Lillith and Henry's bodies were left carelessly on the living room floor, bleeding out on the carpet. Henry was face down, a large burn hole in his head where a phaser had killed him instantly, but Lillith had fallen on her back. Her face was contorted in an expression of such instinctual terror, that for a moment, Addy had to look away. She felt sick, and nearly threw up, but she kept her stomach settled. She didn't want anyone to see she'd been here if they came back later, and she didn't want to waste time by cleaning her own vomit. Steeling herself, she looked back at the gruesome sight and felt her heart harden. She vowed a quick death to the fuckers that did this.

With a silent prayer for her dead relatives, she stepped carefully over their growing pool of blood and dashed up the stairs. She pulled both of her bags out from under the bed and stuffed only one with as many of hers and Kevin's clothes as she could fit. She thought about it for a moment, and then grabbed her stuff form the bathroom as well, because she reasoned she didn't know how long they would be hiding and staying clean would help keep them healthy longer. She gave her room one last look before running down the stairs and navigating her way through the blood and to the kitchen. In the second bag, she threw as much food as she could fit, neatly packing mason jars and fruit so she could make the most of the small space she had to work with. In another smaller bag hanging by the back door, Addy stuff a few more things that she'd missed, and wondered how far she could get with this much weight on her back.

Without looking back, Addy left the house and calm as she could, walked back to the forest, not breathing right until she was in the darkness of the trees and saw that Kevin was indeed in the same exact spot she'd left him. He cried when he saw her, and she sat down her luggage to hug him and rub her hand up and down his back. When he'd collected himself, she slipped her shoes back on and gave him the smallest bag to carry while she put the food on her bag and carried the one with their clothes in her hand. In her other, she held on to Kevin and guided him through the maze of bushes and trees, following the flow of water to her cave. She unloaded her bag and again told Kevin to stay and left with the promise to come back and the need to find out what the fuck had happened.

It took her two hours to walk through the forest back to town, but when she did, her blood ran cold. She could hear the screams, and smell the singed flesh, even from this far away, and confusion and anger filled her veins. There was careless killing right in the streets. Men, women, and even children lay on the red dirt, bleeding out and soaking the earth until the ground nearly looked black.

Addy dashed over to the closest house she could find and peeked through the window, growling at what she saw. A woman with bright, fiery hair was begging to a man that had a glistening phaser jammed in her face as she held a child with the same color hair behind her. Without even thinking, Addy picked up a rock and threw it through the glass of the window and ran around fast as she could to the back of the house where she slipped silently through the door. The distraction would have made the man walk over to the broken window to investigate, giving the blonde teenager enough time to slip into the house. All the houses had the same basic layout, so the back door led her into the kitchen, where Addy pulled a dirty knife out of the sink and crept to the doorway of the living room. She felt the air around her charge with electricity and the hair on her arms stood up, and she growled as she carelessly ran through the door, knowing a phaser had just been shot. The redheaded woman lay dead across her screaming child, and the man didn't even see Adelaide coming.

With a cry of rage, she jumped on him and stabbed the knife through his right eye, feeling the sickening squelch of flesh and the hot blood run over her hands. The sharp smell of iron and copper filled her mouth, and she gagged as the corpse fell to the floor. With shaking hands, Addy stood to her feet and looked down at her read hand. She hadn't meant to kill the man, she'd just… Well, she hadn't really known what she'd planned to do. It wasn't like this would have ended any other way. She'd just wanted to protect the mother and her child, and then she'd felt the air change after the woman had been killed, and lost it. That dark something inside purred in pleasure as the man's blood reached her shoes, and she put the information to the side to deal with later. She'd just killed a man, and it would catch up with her, but there was a small child here to deal with, and she couldn't have a meltdown just yet.

Adelaide knelt down and wiped her hand on his clothes, wiping away as much of the offending red color as she could, and searched his body. She took his phaser, sticking it in the waist of her pants, the cool metal resting against her skin as a heavy reminder of her terrified expression of her aunt. She also found a small PADD in his pocket and pulled it out, scrolling through the messages and bulletins to try and figure out what had gone wrong. What she found made her expression turn cold.

"Dear citizens of Tarsus,

As some of you may have already noticed, our crops or failing. Our best botanists have told me it is a fungus unlike anything they have ever seen, and it is spreading through the soil, infecting families all over, despite the distance. Seeing as this has put the whole colony in danger I have taken the necessary action to prevent the continued survival of those capable and worthy. Through a special computer program, I have determined that this beloved group of family I hold dear to my heart can survive this horror as long as half of you are willing to give up your own lives for us. Trust me when I say your sacrifice will not go without the respect and proper mourning due from all of your friends and family that you so courageously save. I have randomly chosen names from the database of those I believe are necessary to forfeit for the good of Tarsus IV. Please know my choices are nothing personal and are completely objective.

Thank you for your co-operation. You will not be forgotten.

Your governor,

Lieutenant-Commander Kodos Welch"

Addy ended up rescuing twenty individuals, all bringing them to her cave. She was happy when she started finding so many, but despaired with every new body she led just inside the forest with the instruction to be silent and wait for her, because she'd packed food for this many people. She'd only gotten enough for her and Kevin, and only for a couple days, maybe a week if they made it last. So with every house she went in, she also raided their fridges. Some of the kids she got were older than her by a couple years, and they didn't much like the way she dealt with them like they were hers. Like she was their leader. But, again, she would deal with that later.

Addy also ended up kill six people that day. After a reading a message like that, she hardly even felt bad, too. She understood better than anybody the survival instinct and what it would drive humans to do just to stay alive, but this… This wasn't survival. This was murder.

And they wanted to kill Kevin.

That night, Addy went over all the food she'd collected and figured they could last 3 weeks before she'd start to worry, if they were careful. She looked around at all the crying, traumatized children, and the beast inside her head growled in approval at the size of her pack. And when she wrapped Kevin in her arms to (not) sleep that night, she let her tears fall hot into his brown hair, images of blonde curls matted with blood against a worn carpet running after her through her dreams.

And now we start to get into the nitty-gritty stuff. Brace yourselves, everyone. It's going to be an ugly ride.

Peace.