For the first time since their rescue by the Symmetry team, Hellguard's survivors were all together in one room.
No. Not all.
Eleven were dead from the disease. Ten more were in stasis in an attempt to escape death. That made only twelve survivors out of the original thirty-three.
Only twelve. And some of them so weak from Phase III that they could not sit up on their own. They had insisted on being here anyway.
Someone might think the missing twenty-one were easy to overlook. After all, more than a dozen seats were filled in amongst the tiered, raked seating that slanted downwards to the empty lecture floor. That someone, however, would be wrong. Even with their years since Hellguard, the twelve survivors stood out in the crowd. Despite the changes in their faces and all the civilization and disciplines they had adopted, the twelve stood out. For everyone here, viewing the Romulan records was going to be very personal. Very... private. For the survivors, it was -- yesterday. And it showed.
The way they grouped together in little cliques made it worse. Somehow, Saavik had inherited Jdehn, Mekhai, and Arik despite the fact she never asked for them. But they still kept a distance from her. From where she stood on the floor in front of the first row of seats, they clumped together a few rows up and all the way against the far wall. Arik refused to look at her, and when he did accidentally, he looked wounded.
He had every right to be.
All the other hybrids filled in seats with their families against the wall closest to the hall's entrance. A'kornora, halfway up in the stadium seating with her shaggier bangs grown into a peak between her eyebrows and a small braid behind her right ear, showed she was part of the E'oDq province now.
E'oDq province: T'Pren's family lived in that region. Saavik had already searched the faces here, but she didn't see anyone related to the Vulcan woman who had cared for her on Hellguard. Although, with the scant images she had of them and their one brief conversation, she didn't know them well enough to find them.
Kf'iskjyk, her hair slicked back, wore the short, thick tunic and reinforced pants of a khu'unla handler, the great beasts descended from Vulcan's nomadic time. Sajjan started to stand and had to take the hand of a younger female who was barely more than a girl. Eitan sat in the front row next to an elderly lady that had the same eyes as him. They both wore robes in ShiKahr's style, the style most often seen offworld. Just like Micar, three seats away in the front row.
Saavik gave Micar a wide berth and he did the same with her.
That put her in the middle of the two groups, alone, separated from the one side by not taking the genetic scan and by being Vulcan from the other.
Yet, she was still a part of both of them.
She had always struggled with that fact. They all had. Life took them blissfully away from each other down new paths and allowed the illusion of putting each other behind. Life brought them back together now.
Life and, as always, the Romulans.
No one but another Vulcan would recognize the tension seeping through the chamber and trying to take control of each body in it. It formed a testament to Surak's teachings that these people kept from giving into a strangling darkness. But it took a hold; no mortal could avoid some affect.
As Surak would have said: the cause was sufficient.
This wasn't a classroom in the Academy. The stone walls, smoothed from the rock brought from Vulcan's mountains, ran gray with only mere glimpses of red. The bench seats, including their high backs, and the lecture floor were all the same material, only the dark seat cushions and the lighting from high in the ceiling gave any color and warmth. Every line in the place spoke of somber importance. It wasn't meant to be pretty. It was meant to focus the mind and senses on what was being discussed. Chambers like these were reserved for when a number of Vulcans must meet to hear or decide on issues impacting them as a people.
Tonight, they met to at last know the Romulans' minds. Finally, they'd get answers. Why had the deadly Hellguard program ever been started? Who in the Empire bore the responsibility? Was it the same talons that reached into the present through the disease to wipe out the last trace the colony had existed?
Or was it simply more torture to finish the project?
After decades since the first Vulcan was captured, they were going to know.
They would learn one other thing and that was what made the tension grow, trying to choke Surak's teachings from them: how much had their lost family and friends suffered? This time, it wasn't a written report. Everyone had been told: as brief as the presentation was, the Romulan files they were about to view contained video recordings made within the project. Now, they would see it for themselves. As Saavik had seen it first hand. As all the survivors had.
Jdehn shifted in her seat, then did it again with even more irritation. She leaned her back against the wall, sprawling on the bench. Mekhai stood behind her like some odd guard, his whole body one strained, silent shout of defiance at the room, and Arik, who darted a quick look at Saavik, sat one row in front of Jdehn. The tension would break them first. With a start, she took in that they wore the same clothes as the night they arrived in the restaurant.
By an odd coincidence, so did she. The same cream, sleeveless simple Vulcan dress, also in ShiKahr's style. Against Mekhai's leather, Jdehn's ship clothes, and Arik's blandness, she was separated again.
By dress and by bearing.
Arik wasn't the only one slipping looks in her direction. In fact, a few Vulcans looked at the four of them and then turned thoughtful, maybe even troubled, gazes away. It happened more often as others came into the room. When Sarek's aide had said T'Pau was gathering everyone involved, it included more than Saavik had first thought. Now Vulcans walked quietly in that had no hybrid survivor with them. In fact, they weren't even related to the eleven hybrids who were already dead from the disease or the ten in stasis.
Dead...
What was the matter with her? Of course that's who they were!
A few Vulcans already seated quietly greeted the newcomers and snatches of what they said reached her ears. These people had lost a friend or family member on Hellguard. It wasn't just the hybrids and their families gathered here, but the people closest to all the lost Vulcans.
Suddenly, every Vulcan, hybrid or full blooded, stood as Sarek, with Spock at his side, entered the chamber. With them came Salok, S'tvan, and every other Vulcan who had dared risk discovery and death by the Romulans in joining the Symmetry on its rescue mission to Hellguard.
Saavik subtly shifted from standing to standing with respect. No matter what ugliness happened about accepting them as Vulcan back then, one fact didn't change. They had risked death to save her life.
Behind them came Amanda, Kirk, Uhura and the medical team, as if the entrances were an orchestrated part of the presentation. At the back of the group came three members of the VSE: Commander Stron and Subcommanders T'Mes and Soluk. Soluk's dark eyes, the same color as his hair and beard, raked the group as if the Science and Exploration team had been sent as a security measure. But T'Mes touched her husband Stron's paired fingers and took a comfortable position by the door as if they merely had been sent to serve to the people gathered in the hall. She nodded in easy greeting to Saavik as did her husband.
S'tven's voice reached her ears, the haggard words snatching her attention despite his low pitch. " Are you certain you want to know?" he asked the Vulcan female next to him. They looked about the same age. "I prefer to believe my son and daughter were spared at least this one pain."
The woman whom he spoke with agreed, but added, "As would I. However, we cannot stay blind to the truth."
"Strong words," he said. "I understand your argument." He didn't want to, that much was sure. She pushed him to be Vulcan in the full sense of the word and it wasn't easy. "Would your argument be different if the truth included he or she being alive?" And his eyes strayed to Saavik.
Her chin came up even though she did not know why. She had no idea what they were talking about or why he -- and now the other female -- looked at her that way.
She didn't get a chance to find out. Arik scrambled in his seat, his long legs again getting tangled as he tried to reach his feet. Saavik turned sharply to where he stared. Komal crossed the floor in his direction. She stopped as if hit by a blow that only emphasized the darkening circles under her eyes and the added angles to her face and body from Phase III. She blinked and then started walking again.
Arik got to his feet and moved the few steps that he could, but he hadn't given himself enough room to make an escape.
Unlike Saavik. It just dawned on her that she had maneuvered her back to the empty lecture floor giving herself a clear path with Komal firmly in her peripheral vision.
The cause was not sufficient now.
Arik's back was to the wall and he gave every appearance of climbing over the seats in a panic if Komal came any closer. Jdehn rolled her eyes and gave an exasperated breath, but she got to her feet and in the path of Arik and his former tormentor.
Someone else made a sound. Someone with a Terran accent who knew how well Vulcan ears worked. "Saavik..."
Kirk's eyes drilled into her, expecting her to do what he had suggested. Volunteer, take charge, lead her fellow survivors into a group.
He had no idea of what he was asking.
Komal came up and was about to pass her when Saavik understood exactly what had made Jdehn sound so exasperated. But she had taken an oath to Surak and Starfleet and one to herself: to leave that damned colony behind.
So she turned into Komal's path.
And found, too late, Micar behind Komal and only a few steps away. Headed for her. He could not want anyone else.
Spock, who had begun to move to sit with McCoy and Kirk, caught sight of the tableau on the floor. He began climbing down.
Komal blinked at the sudden obstacle and then moved to step around. Saavik stepped with her and lifted her voice so it would reach Micar.
"No, Komal."
Eyes lifted back to Arik, still visible with Jdehn and now mostly Saavik in the way. They came back. Nobody looking at them could imagine they had once torn each other with their teeth over a scrap of food. And that had been only one of their battles. "I only intended on apologizing to him. I did not know any better in those days, but I was still wrong. These old fears and grievances... It has to stop, Saavik."
"Agreed. I do not argue, Komal, but Arik is not ready."
He had asked her to help him and she had refused.
Kirk watched her and it felt like a weight.
Micar rubbed the stump of his missing finger with his thumb and it felt like a judgment.
Komal looked past her again and Arik shied away from even that little contact. Finally her shoulders dipped in acceptance. "Not today then." She took her eyes off Arik and he sagged in relief. He might have acted differently if he could hear her next words. "But at some point before my death, Saavik."
Because you need forgiveness? Didn't they all? Which may be the real reason why Micar reached into the empty space where once his hand was whole. Did he want an apology for what he had lost or to give an apology for what he had done that caused him to lose it?
Kirk started getting out of his seat when Komal moved away, touching Micar's elbow quickly in a quiet sign to give in and take his seat. But Spock was already near Saavik, and the sight of him helped like a balm. He understood.
Although not the Romulans' lasting effect.
That made it a bad time for Spock to follow Micar and Komal's slow progress back to their seats. He watched them the whole way, his head turning in curiosity, but with his eyebrows drawn together. It was probably a misperception caused by the tension, but Micar seem to manage a pace barely a level or two above a shuffle. Phase III was taking its toll.
Or Saavik's conscience was.
Eitan got up and took Micar's elbow with permission. Now the artist managed more strength and rose back to his full height while Eitan glared at her.
She turned her back on them and avoided the eyes on her: Kirk's, Arik's -- Spock was the only one she couldn't avoid because he stepped close to her.
"Saavik."
She cut him off. "I prefer not to discuss it, Spock."
What good would it do? None. No more than their talk on bringing the Romulans to justice.
Her abruptness made him pull back, but he didn't go away. "Saavik... I have never asked specifically what happened on the colony. I understand, in general, the violence. However, Micar--"
Her head swung sharply to look up into his eyes. That by itself interrupted him. He didn't need her tired, heavy words in the air. "Must we discuss every brutality? The ones done to me? The ones I committed?"
His head reared back. Twice she put barriers between them when they had just started talking. First by refusing to promise not to seek revenge on the Romulans. Now in refusing to answer his concern.
He glanced again from Micar to Komal, taking in each Hellguard survivor who now couldn't meet his eyes, then up to Arik and finally back at her.
"No," he said at last. "We do not."
Gratitude didn't cover what it was like that he accepted her.
Subcommander T'Mes took note of something in the hall and came to attention. In a moment, most of the chamber did the same.
T'Pau arrived.
The fact she came herself instead of allowing a subordinate to present the files wasn't lost on any one in the chamber. From the corner of her eye, Saavik saw Jdehn elbow Mekhai to his feet and, still petulant, he rose.
By the time T'Pau crossed to the lecture floor, Spock had moved back to Kirk and McCoy since the seat's around Saavik's were now filled. She considered that a good thing; she wanted to be alone with her reactions. Surrounded by strangers in the dark, she could have that, but not with someone who knew her well seated next to her.
T'Pau did not change the lighting to a spotlight so that only she could be seen. She knew it wasn't necessary. Every eye and ear focused on her.
She didn't keep them waiting. "The files you will witness have been reviewed for authenticity. They have been checked for alterations to ensure they are intact and unedited. This has been done both by their sender and here on our own world."
Incredible! But as Saavik heard a few shift in the audience, she realized they had considered the possibility that the file content would be edited to serve someone's hidden agenda.
"We did this," T'Pau continued, ignoring those who had just revealed their guilt, "not only through our own technicians, but through the expertise of the one who received the message."
Uhura looked startled to be acknowledged, but she recovered quickly and nodded in respect.
"Nyota Uhura, daughter of Kasinda, agreed to coordinate and oversee each phase of the file verification. Through these efforts, what you will see has been verified. The authentication records are here for your review."
It was a brilliant tactic. By picking Uhura, T'Pau had the one person who knew what Archernar's full, intact files were keep an eye to make sure that they didn't change. And Uhura was an outsider. She had no hidden agenda or ulterior motive for altering them. T'Pau had, with one action, wiped out any argument that she had manipulated the files. Saavik marveled at the ingenuity.
With the possibility of duplicity gone, the Elder changed. She wasn't just their leader now. She was still that, she would always be that, but with it grew a personal note. A somber note.
She had bad news.
And she gave it not just because it was her role as Elder to do it, but because she suffered the loss of all those Vulcans too. She probably knew many of them. She might have even been the one to give the orders that sent one of the ships to explore that region of space. Only to lose that ship.
The weight of leadership.
"You need this warning," she said. "Not all our questions are answered. In truth, we may never know these answers."
Our questions... we may never know. Personal, indeed.
"However, our primary focus was to ascertain if the Romulans caused this disease. This question, as well as a few others, are answered. I could have simply reported on them. However, you each have the right to learn them as I have."
She signaled T'Mes and stepped to the side. The lighting now changed. The room darkened and doors slid back on the rear wall revealing a large screen that took up the entire space. It was so big, the figure on it was life size even though he stood.
His clothes were simple but of rich quality. He had autocratic features including the nose and eyes of a hawk, and the light where he was caught in his silver hair. Despite his usual mocking smile being replaced by a serious expression that rivaled T'Pau's, he was clearly Romulan.
Archernar.