I do not own nor profit from Star Trek or Gene Roddenberrys creations.
Khans eyes grew wide with excitement as he saw the torpedoes appear in the storage bay. "Finally." He whispered. Marcus was still frozen in fear standing near the back of the bridge.
"Don't think I have forgotten about you." Khan hissed. He stalked towards the older man, ready to kill. He grabbed his head, and began to squeeze. "You... Should have let me sleeep." He hissed.
"KHAN!" Safiya cried. "Don't, not this way!" She reached for Khans hand, and as if he were powerless, his grip lessened, and Marcus fell to the floor unconscious.
"Why, Safiya." Khan shivered in anger. His face was contorted in rage. "I should kill him for EVERYTHING he has done to me!" He held her head the same way he had held Marcus', but gingerly, question in his eyes.
"Khan, I need him alive. Please, I can't have you kill him." She begged.
"Why does it matter? Why should I even care, Safiya, what it is that YOU want, when here, you've been playing me like a pawn." A flash of danger came across his face.
"I never played you, Khan." She choked.
"Don't LIE Safiya! Is Marcus telling the truth? You were to investigate me? What, take me back to 8, and use me for their own experiments?!" He threw her away from him, unable to look into her beautiful eyes anymore. Safiya stumbled but caught herself on a console.
"Marcus is only partially correct." Her voice was low, trying to keep her hearts agony at bay. "8 had been trying to get eyes on this project ever since it came together." She held her stomach, trying to control the butterflies that that were flapping wildly.
"They planted the seed to have Marcus bring me on, but, I didn't realize he was going to bring my mother into it that day. That crossed the lines for me. But, alas, I was brought in, but from day one, I was meant to investigate the Admiral. When my superiors found out about the project, they wanted to learn more about you. They didn't realize how deep the Admirals treason was. On the surface, it was a new high tech fleet, but they would have never agreed to turning the fleet from exploration and science to military and conquest."
She hung her head, tears starting to come out. "Addams was one of ours, in 8, and it was false information that I was investigating you, to throw them off of my trail. Only my direct officer knew of the real plans. It was his jealousy, that drove him to try and drive that wedge between us, even if it meant he would never have me. As long as I didn't have you."
Khan listened hard, trying to find deception in her voice. He heard her work to suppress her tears so she could continue.
"Khan, you are the stick thrown into my bicycle wheel. Yes, 8 wants you, but I have the power now to try and protect you. If you kill the Admiral, Khan, I lose that power. I need to bring the Admiral back. Alive. James T. Kirk and his crew will need to be able to return alive, for the blood of an entire crew would fall to your hands from this point." She finally had the courage to look into Khans eyes.
He was pained to see her, knowing that a part of that pain came from his roughness, hurting more than just her physical being. She must have been thinking for so long how she was going to get her way in the end. At the end of the day, she would have to give up something, or rather, someone.
"What makes you think they won't have my head as soon as I step back on Earth?" Khan spoke lowly.
"I can't guarantee they won't try you for murder, Khan, but, I can at least talk to my commander."
"What makes you think your commander will listen to you?"
She looked down at Marcus. "Because he is also from Abydos. He was on the way to being an Elder, until he met Marcus, and enlisted in Star Fleet. I think that is why he wanted me in 8, to have something familiar. He took me under his wing personally from day one, as soon as he saw my name on the roster. He definitely took a personal interest in me, whether it was because of my father, or because of my home, doesn't mean much now. But I think, if I tell him more of you, and of your position, it is likely he may reduce or even waive many of your charges." She finished.
"You keep mentioning 8, Safiya. Elaborate, please." He moved closer to her.
"It's... Its a secret agency within the fleet. Many people work off the grid, hidden, you would never know an 8 if you met one, unless you knew them as an 8 already. We are near the end of the rabbit hole. There are a couple other deep sectors, though they generally specialize in certain areas. Khan, I don't want to give you up, I don't. I have been trying to figure out just how to get around this, but I just don't know."
"Walk with me." He took her arm as they walked down the storage bay.
Khan approached the torpedoes, excitement in his heart. "What is the meaning of this?!" He turned to her, yelling, grabbing her arms roughly.
"Khan-"She was thrust upon one of the torpedoes. The timer was flashing, stopped at 00:00:03.
"I get it... Did you mean to blow my crew apart? Destroy them?!"
"No, Khan, it's o-one of the safeguards... Without the proper sequencing, it won't detonate." She shivered, terrified by his anger, knowing this could very well be her last mission. "Only I know the sequence, otherwise, this torpedo is useless. It's to keep them safe."
Khan made quick work to open the torpedo, wanting to evacuate his crew, but came face to face with emptiness.
She knew she would be blamed for this, so she did the only thing she could think of while he was registering these events through his anger. She ran.
The bridge was the only decently secure place from Khans fury as she hailed the Enterprise.
"Jim! Jim!" She cried, seeing the somber crew. "Tell engineering to enter this code into the manual override console. I don't have much time. Ready?" She looked around, hoping she at least had enough time for this.
"Shipwide." Jim told his comms. "Can you hear me Chekov? I'm sending you an override code." He called, Chekov confirmed.
"Alright, in the manual override console, enter this code: A59gt4breset23011nc1701". Your systems are going to go off, don't worry, they'll come back, get to earth ASAP!" With that the connection was terminated, as she waited to face Khan.
"Safiya, if you do not open the bridge, the consequences will be... Severe." Khan drew from the lift.
"Only if you hear me out first." She called, hoping to receive some sort of reason from him.
"I won't make guarantees, now OPEN UP!" He banged loudly on the door.
Safiya drew a deep breath, and silently said goodbye to her mother, though she would never hear her. With the push of a few buttons, the door slid open, and in infiltrated the man that could take her life in the blink of an eye. He pressed her between the wall and his solid chest.
"Where, are my crew." He growled.
"Khan, they are safe. I could not risk them coming on board, but I promise you, they are safe." He punched a hole in the wall next to her head.
"GIVE THEM TO ME!" He screamed, and Safiya shrunk to the size of a child under his suppressing wrath.
"I can't" She squeaked. She hated seeing him like this, knowing that it was her that he was so angry at.
A sadistic look sat in his eye. She barely looked past him with enough time to see the Enterprise hightailing it back to Earth, the reset giving them if anything, enough power to get home. Khan was so focused on her, he didn't even care about the Enterprise.
Safiya took a deep breath when he drew back, storming to the Admiral, tying him up with a shirt ripped from one of the dead crewmen.
"Khan, Just understand that at the end, your crew will be safe, and I will do what I can to save you." She spoke coldly, before setting a destination for Earth.
"Don't bother saving me, because if you do, rest assured I will hunt you down for the rest of your life until my crew is recovered." He cast her a deathly glare. The passion he had for her was diminished, replaced by an unknown emotion to her. Her heart broke, knowing that things were unlikely to be the same between them. The only way his arms would be around her again, would likely be in a deathly grip. He would never stroke her cheek gently again, make love to her wanting body.
"I wish by now, you would have had enough trust in me to know I would do nothing to harm your crew." She sighed, waiting to approach the blue and green marble that loomed ahead.
"Trust you? You are more like your father than you are willing to admit." He spat, giving her an amused chortled.
"If that is how you see it, then sure, Khan. Sure." It angered her to be compared to him. "Because I am the only one who got you into this mess."
"If it weren't for you, I would have never gone so far as to destroy the brass. When I thought I lost you, that is what threw me over the edge. The kindest thing I've found since my awakening, gone? I did not want to accept that. Had I not attacked the Admiral after he told me of his involvement of your assault, I would not have had to worry about him destroying them. But because I cherished you, I lost control. For you, I lost control. Because of you, I lost control. I should have never made the mistake of getting involved with you. You should have never made the mistake of getting involved with me." He turned away from her, a finality in his voice.
"I knew from the first day, the danger I was dancing too intimately with, but, no matter what happens from here Khan, it was never a mistake to me." She saw his shoulders slump a little before squaring themselves again, but still he refused to look at her. He sat, staring out of the glass, staring at his fate.
Two Weeks Later:
Safiya stood before her superior commander in her home. They had been going over everything that had taken place on her assignment, getting her ready for trial. Her commander didn't want her to be at work, and so chose that anything they did would be in a comfortable place for her. She had been dancing around her personal relationship with Khan, knowing it was frowned upon to get too personal with work, no matter how bad she would have rather been in Khans home.
"So, please, go over again, what happened when you were boarded onto the Vengeance?" Akkare asked, scrolling through his PADD.
Safiya sighed, rubbing the bridge of her nose.
"The Admiral admitted to his crimes, and revealed my ties to 8." She looked at the older man, as he typed. "He was intent on destroying the Enterprise, not allowing her crew to return, firing on their ship, and preparing to fire once more." She tugged at the wrists of her sleeves.
"What then?" He looked over his glasses at her.
"Khan was roused from being stunned by Scotty, and from there, took over the bridge. The Admiral was outnumbered, and was in no position to fight. Khan held the bridge, and hailed the Enterprise, offering to return her crew, in exchange for his own." She sipped her tea, the events playing in her mind over and over. "He sent back all but the admiral and myself."
"Why do you think he did that?" He rubbed his chin thoughtfully, having an inkling of the truth already in his mind.
"His intent was to kill the Admiral, and finally have revenge for the hostage of his crew. I was retained, I imagine, as I had the most knowledge of that ship and her programs. I had intimate knowledge of the weaponry."
"But Marcus was not killed."
"That's obvious. I persuaded him to spare the Admiral for trial."
"Speaking of the weaponry, it was documented that the torpedoes were stopped mid-countdown. What can you say about that?" He eyed her.
"Sir, I was dropped into this charge to look into the Admiral and his doings. I was not asked to partake in the creation of a war against a formidable enemy. To me, had those torpedoes been used, then I would have felt directly responsible for the war that would have followed." She looked deep into his honey eyes. "It was the only way I could have prevented the Admiral from destroying us, without directly letting him know I was against him."
"So, all this time, he thought you were looking into Khan?" Akkare resumed writing.
"Yes sir. He had no knowledge of my true purpose. He was, however, protective of Khan in some capacity. He was not interested in giving Khan up to any other project or sector in Star Fleet. Khan was, to him, a personal investment. One that he was clearly not willing to share."
"As for Khan, what are your thoughts of him?" Akkare put the PADD aside.
"Sir?" She looked up.
"I have been around for many years, Safiya. Many many years. I know you better than perhaps you wish to admit. I realize that this was a lot deeper for you than you are letting on, and so I wish to know, what are your thoughts of Khan."
Safiya stood up, holding her abdomen, not knowing what to really say. "Akkare, I don't know what to tell you. A part of me wants to confirm that he is as dangerous and fierce as we know him to be from our history. He will sit and wait patiently for the right moment to strike so he may seize what it is he wants most. This is evident in his plotting and planning to reclaim his crew. His family. Even now, I believe he will go to the ends of any galaxy to recover what he has lost."
She looked out of the window, sun streaming in, bathing her.
"Of course, there is the other side of me, that says he did everything out of love. Desperation and love."
"Augments don't love, my dear. They are unable." Akkare shook his head in pity.
"No, Akkare, believe me when I say this. Augments, as I have observed in Khan at least, do in fact love. In fact, the peril is that their emotions, all of them, are so much stronger than what we experience. Like Vulcans, perhaps even deeper, but we will not know. Love among humans is a powerful thing, now intensify that to know what he felt." She sighed again.
"I firmly believe it was love that drove his actions, and I would bet everything I have on that." She looked back at Akkare with a fierce gaze.
"Well, the trial will begin soon, and you know you will be called to the stand, for both the trials of Admiral Marcus, and Khan." Akkare got up, and placed a gentle hand on her shoulder before pulling her in for a hug.
"Get your mind together, Safiya. I know this is hard for you." He had very few words of comfort to offer her as he took his leave.
She read through the documents of the case, re-familiarizing herself with the details that she already knew so well.