The survey had turned out to be rather routine, which probably explained Khan's ease in taking her with him rather than one of his people. He had wanted to see the Ocean of Dust for himself, since he hadn't had time to do so before, and taken some samples of the water, as initial prospecting showed that the minerals in it could be of use to some installations in the colony. The ending of their trip had been more unsettling, as Khan had flown to the northern plains and killed two bisons to bring back in the modified shuttle crates. Carol had tried not to judge, since the animals didn't seem to be anywhere near in danger of extinction. On the contrary. But one of the many advantages of synthesized food was that nothing had to die for it. With hunting illegal on Earth, it had been a little jarring to see it happen here, yet it wasn't important enough to say anything to Khan and ruin the tenuous armistice between them.
She had also brought something back from their incursion: a shell from the ocean shore. It had a tiny cinch from where she had removed a sample to investigate why its material seemed to be so hard. The excitement of the day had yet another benefit in the first fitful sleep she had had since her confrontation with Khan. The confusion and doubts had not eased in any way, but her choice to assist the colony against any attempts to eradicate it had been given her the comfort that there still were parts of her old self she could hold on to. Of one thing she was certain: she had not lied and her values were not a fraud. She had meant every word of the oath she had taken as a Starfleet officer and fully intended to stay loyal to its spirit. The Articles of the Federation were not just fragments of ideology to her; she believed in their universal value and would stand by that, no matter where she was or how great the transgressions of people she used to look up to were. She could anchor herself in that reality.
She woke up resolved to go to work, but seeing as it was too early for that, she decided to use the extra time to recap some of her combat training in addition to her morning jogging. It would have been easier if she had a sparring partner, but there were still some moves she could do on her own. So taking advantage of the warmer than normal early morning air, she left the house for that straight slip of land, where she liked to exercise, when the weather permitted. She was just beginning, when she heard Khan's voice behind her.
"Are you training for your promise to help us against Starfleet, if need be?" he asked, his voice lofty.
She spun around on instinct, taking a defensive stance with her fists thrust forward. She refrained from her rolling her eyes at him and relaxed her posture. "I am just going through my morning exercise routine," she answered caustically.
He came closer. "Were you taught hand-to-hand combat by Starfleet?"
"No, by St. Paul's Girls' School," she quipped.
"That continues to exist to this day?" he replied non-surplussed.
"Not in the same form as in your time, but essentially, yes," she answered, as if his question had been serious. "Are you going to tell me what's wrong with Starfleet style hand-to-hand techniques?"
"It's efficient," he rated, stopping right in front of her. In space between one heartbeat and the other she was on her back, his heavy body pressing her to the ground, her wrists pinned at her sides by fingers that felt like iron shackles on her flesh. "But predictable," he added, releasing her and standing back up.
Carol refused to be rattled and scrambled to her feet as well. "Not to mention calibrated for the strength of not genetically-enhanced humans."
"Strength is not the only asset in a fight."
"So says the man with how many times the physical strength of a normal human?" she retorted, smiling fleetingly, before launching herself at him without any of the restrain she would have employed while sparring with a human, trying to tackle him.
He caught her with ease, turning her around, and holding her by her twisted arms, his fingers digging painfully into her muscles. She gasped at the pressure but only tensed further in his grip. "Are you talking about the same lack of predictability you used when you equipped the photon torpedoes you designed with magnetic containment fields so powerful that when launched they could render the main core of a Constitution-class starship unstable?" she bit out, her words stilted by the breath stuttering unevenly out of her lungs.
He relaxed his hold but didn't let her go and she didn't struggle to get away. "No, but this is why I suggested the warp core of the new Dreadnought-class ships be modified to accommodate my torpedoes."
Halfway through his explanation, she whipped up her right feet and kicked him in the knee with all her might. He didn't topple over, but his grip slipped enough for her to wriggle free. He jumped around to face him again, landing in her previous defensive stance. He was actually smiling at her.
"Distraction," he muttered. "Better. Now perhaps I can teach a few things nobody already familiar with your contemporaries' combat style knows to expect."
She thought back to their conversation the other day. "In exchange for what?"
A coy twinkle lit up his eyes. "Consider it a gift. A peace offering, if you will."
Carol drew herself up in an effort to seem taller, feet planted firmly on the ground, as she glanced at him sideways. "So you want to teach me how to fight better as a sign of peace?" she asked dubiously.
"I thought you keen on this type of circular reasoning, Carol," he said, pronouncing her name with that inflection she had only him heard manage and that sounded both mocking and respectful at the same time. She wondered if he was still testing her and after a brief moment of hesitation, she agreed to his proposition.
He fought with both passion and restraint, every blow calculated yet vicious, inflicting violence with as much gusto as precision. Throughout it all his expression never faltered, remaining stone-cold and unflinching, while only his eyes burnt with his enjoyment of it. But even those glimpses of his true state of mind were rare, since dark fringes of hair flew into his face as he moved, obscuring it and making him look all the more wilder for it. Carol's heart fluttered nervously in her chest more than once at the sight, enraptured with the single-minded accuracy of his responses.
There such an physicality to him, that she was under the impression that he not only dominated their training but also the entire environment around them. It was dangerous dance, because she had soon learned that he had meant every word about the lack of routine to his fighting style. She could never predict his advances, let alone intercept them in time. He could stand perfectly still, giving no outward sign of readying for an attack, then spring into action with the speed of lighting, cutting the legs from under her, every muscle and bone in his body so in sync, that she had not once noticed even his jaw jut forward, as if it was joining the battle.
Yet he never hurt her by accident or even let her hit the ground too hard, always catching her before he did. He seemed to know the exact extent of the force he possessed and dosed it with such accuracy, that she realized that at least in this she could rely on him. She had wisely let him set the pace, following his cue, as she tried to caught on as much as she could, unsure of whether this would be a repeated occurrence, before exertion ended their session. But her body gave up long before her will did.
She found herself sprawled on the ground, flushed and panting, her muscles shaking from the effort, dizzying waves of desire tainting the exhaustion. She had never before been this intensely attracted to someone. There had been accusations of being a cold fish leveled at her in the past, but the simple truth was that one didn't get a PhD in applied physics, learned to identity alien weaponry by sound and became a Starfleet lieutenant by the age of thirty while also having much of a dating life as well. Days on Earth were simply not long enough.
Khan rolled on top of her, his body blanketing her pliant one. Alarm bells went off in her head, as his long, elegant fingers framed her face and he leaned purposefully, eyes trapping her like snakes hypnotized prey, and kissed her. His touch felt perfectly secure, as if he were very certain of his welcome, and his kiss held a note of domineering triumph. He had premeditated this. She knew it. Anger sending fresh adrenaline coursing through her system, she bit viciously at his lips until she tasted copper.
He tore his mouth away, flinging his head up, rebel locks of hair fallen over his temples and forehead, a drop of blood marring his now reddened lips, as his eyes racked over her. He looked positively savage, surprisingly more so than even during their sparring, and she saw it, written devastatingly clear in his expression. Before he could get a hold of himself, he grabbed her wrists pinning them by her head, breathing heavily through his nose. She had never in her life been the focus of such ravenous intent and coming from him, it was all the more flattering. Though she suspected only he could stare at her with such intensity, as if he wanted to devour her whole.
She had been right. He had planned this, not as part of a mind game, but because he wanted her and had gone after her by using the means most familiar to him: fighting, mock as it had been. His sharing her weakness evened the playing field. All thought of putting distance between them left her and she went lax in his grasp, letting her eyelids drop and craning her neck to lift her head in invitation.
# # #
She stumbled in her bedroom's adjoining bathroom in a hurry, aware that she was about to be late according to her self-imposed schedule at the base. Her clothes were in dis-array, stained with dirt and crushed plants the pieces of which were still sticking to the material. Her hair was in knots and a quick survey of herself, after she had disrobed, relieved that she would also need the aid of the dermal regenerator to mend at least the most visible of the marks. There were emerging finger shaped bruises on her hips, thighs and wrists, an obvious imprint of teeth on her collar bone and purplish hickeys all over her neck. Her upper arms and shoulders were covered in scratches and her lips looked swollen and bitten. Personally, she didn't mind any of them, despite the soreness, but she would rather avoid the long looks and the gossip at the star-base.
Before Khan had always held back, careful not to use his full strength with her, but today their intimacy had been a continuation of the fight, rough and violent to the point of brutality. As she was passing the regenerator over her skin, she realized Khan might have just made love to her for the first time. It should have terrified her, because if there were one thing more alarming than his disdain, then that was his interest, especially since in her case, he had solid reasons to hate her for it. However, she was on a high from the experience and the comfort of knowing he had been right there in the moment with her still held. For once she didn't want to weight the consequences. She would deal with the fall-out in the evening when she was alone with him again.
Come evening, her concern had turned out to be unfounded. They had an amicable dinner, during which they talked about the geography of the planet and he asked a few questions about her more peaceful knowledge of applied physics, since he wanted her advice on some of the installations being erected in the colony. The discussion prolonged itself well after the meal, fueled by the first wine the Augments had obtained from a species of local berries similar to redcurrant.
Carol had been surrounded her whole adult life by intelligent people at the top of their professions, still they had all been the product of the same type of education as her, sharing the same world view. While she had enjoyed the familiarity of that, she couldn't deny that it was very stimulating talking to someone who had such a radically different perspective as Khan. She didn't even realized the passing of the hours as the topics shifted from minute and technical to general and then back to the mechanical details of life in the city outside.
Her eyes were almost closing on their own and she was pleasantly buzzed by the time they had called it a night. When he had led her to his own bed, she thought she knew what to expect and was all the more astonished by him simply pulling her into his arms and wishing her a good night with chaste kiss to the forehead. But she was tired and the evening had been lovely and normal and she could always puzzle over his motivations in the morning. So she cuddled closer to him and let the sound of his heartbeat lull her to sleep.
TBC