Kirk figured it would be a good idea to tell Wendy about the new arrangements before she went to visit Leo the next day. Apparently he figured wrong.

"What do you mean you separated them?" she asked indignantly.

"It means I put them in different cells," Kirk immediately regretted his smart-ass reply.
"Don't get smart with me, mister," she poked his chest. "Khan is essential to Leo's psychological well-being. She was improving! Now she's going to slide downhill!"

"I'm sorry, Wendy, but this is the only thing that seems to keep Khan in line."

"So you're using her against him. Just like Admiral Marcus."

"I'm trying to keep my crew safe, Wendy. They come first."

"Well if they'd paid attention and not provoked him, nothing would have happened!" Wendy said like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"He wasn't provoked, Wendy, that's my point!" Kirk retorted. "You know what; I think you've gotten too close to those two. I don't want you visiting Leo anymore."

"Don't be ridiculous, Jim. This is the only chance I'll get to hear the other side of the story. Besides, what if Leo tries to do something? I'm probably the only one who can talk her out of it!"

"You will not, under any circumstances, visit them again. That's an order."

"But Jim-" she started

"That's an order, Lieutenant," he cut her off.

Wendy pursed her lips. "Yes, captain."

Khan sat on the edge of his bunk and listened to Leo pace in the next cell over. He kept his eyes shut as he tried to take deep, calming breaths. Perhaps he shouldn't have hit that guy. He'd always been a little over protective of Leo, even though he really didn't need to. She was perfectly capable of beating the guy to a bloody pulp herself.

"Leo, stop pacing," he managed to grind through clenched teeth. There was swearing in Russian as the footsteps stopped.

"You should watch what you say," Khan replied calmly.

"Oh like anyone here speaks Russian," Leo spat. "They only speak weird alien languages like Klingon. And asshole."

Khan chuckled despite himself. The footsteps started again and Khan sighed.

"Leo," he said a bit more calmly.

"I didn't spend four months by myself in this bloody jail cell, doing everything I could to see you again, so I could hear your voice through a bloody wall!" she punctuated this statement by kicking the wall that separated their cells.

Khan was about to try and calm her down when Kirk walked into the brig, and things only escalated from there.

"How are you doing?" the captain asked, albeit a bit sarcastically. Leo growled something in Russian, and Kirk looked to Khan for a translation.

"You don't want to know," the Augment leader replied.

"I'm willing to let you two spend some time together, if you can behave yourselves." The last part was directed at Leo, who continued to stare at him without blinking.

"Captain, I have a request," Khan said, preventing Leo from saying anything else.

"A request?" Kirk asked in disbelief. "You have a request?"

Khan ignored the captain's tone of voice. "If you decide to reunite us, Leo and I will need . . . privacy."

"Privacy?" Kirk repeated, raising an eyebrow.

"Leo and I have been lovers for many years. It stands to reason that eventually something will happen which your guards will not care to see," Khan explained.

"Then I'll just keep the two of you apart."

"That's a rather cruel thing to do to two people who are facing a death sentence."

"It's not a death sentence," Kirk explained with exasperation. "You're just going back in cryo sleep."

"Close enough," Khan's response was almost a quiet growl.

"You killed a room full of innocent, unarmed people. Why do you deserve any sympathy?" Kirk asked coldly.

"Because we're people too," Leo answered from her cell. "We deserve–"

"No," Kirk cut her off. "You don't deserve anything. Neither of you do. You forfeited that right three hundred years ago when you decided to start a war."

"It's that kind of attitude that brings conflict," she answered evenly. "No one is truly innocent in war. And it's so much easier to give into that anger, than to set it aside."
"Says the woman with anger issues," the captain retorted.

Leo narrowed her eyes, but before anything else could happen, a cadet peeked his head inside the door and announced that the captain was needed on the bridge.

"I don't want to hear any more out of you two," Kirk said on his way out.

Leo clenched and unclenched her fists several times to keep herself from lashing out. She'd rarely been this angry before, but she'd always had a way of venting that anger. Now she was locked in a cell with nothing breakable in sight. Khan walked over to the wall that separated the two cells.

"Leo, solnishka, it's going to be alright" he said softly in Russian. Partly so their conversation couldn't easily be eavesdropped, but also because he knew that Leo would have trouble speaking and understanding English in her anger.

There was silence from the other cell. Khan looked over to the guard station for any indication that something was wrong in Leo's cell but all he saw was a man trying very hard not to listen in. Khan rolled his eyes, but at least it meant she hadn't given herself a heart attack. He tried again.

"Leo, talk to me."

"You don't know it's going to be alright," she eventually replied, also in Russian.

"Yes I do."

"How?"

"Because I'm going to make it alright. I failed once, but I promise you that I won't fail you again."

"If that's the case, we're going to need a strategy."

Khan glanced over at the guard station to make sure they hadn't been listening in. They hadn't, but even if they were, he was sure that none of them spoke Russian. He still wanted to make sure they weren't interrupted.

"Not here," he whispered. "We need to find a place where there's no possibility of being heard."

Leo nodded. "Let me worry about that."

"I can't still can't believe you didn't consult me about this!" Wendy said to Kirk, practically jogging to keep up with him as she followed him down the hallway.

"I'm the captain, Dr. Cole," he replied. "When it comes to the safety of my crew, I don't need your permission."

"And I'm trying to tell you that the crew was never in danger!"

"He punched a medical officer, Wendy!" Kirk finally stopped and spun around to face her.

"But separating them is hardly a fitting punishment," she countered. "They're not toddlers."

"Well they're acting like toddlers!"

"No, you're acting like a toddler."

Kirk stared at her in shock for several moments, his mouth opening and closing as he tried to come up with a rebuttal. Wendy just stared back with narrowed eyes and crossed arms. Even someone as dense as Kirk could tell that she was beyond angry. He took a deep breath.

"I am the captain of this ship, Lieutenant Cole. If you don't like my decisions, that's too bad. Because they're final."

"Fine," Wendy replied shortly before turning on her heel and walking away.

I'm so sorry guys, I thought I'd already posted much of what's in this chapter. And I'll be working on this more often again.