What do I love about summer? That I can update that much faster... until the summer semester starts, of course.
So this chapter is interesting to say the least. Really, I have no idea where it came from. I was all intending for Nia to behave herself, but she just... refused. So this happened and I was forced to try and keep the character reactions as in line as possible.
You have been warned. Now, read and enjoy!
Despite Nia's expectations to be able to work in the lab immediately after leaving the medbay, McCoy had other ideas.
"You still need rest," he stubbornly insisted.
"I've been resting," she grumbled at him. "I don't need any more.
The doctor sighed. "You've been dozing in here for a couple hours, yes, but that is not the same as rest."
Nia could see that arguing was going to get her nowhere, so she rolled her eyes and left the medbay. She was going to her lab.
McCoy sputtered behind her as she left. Both ranking officers next to him stared after her in equal surprise.
"Well, that was unexpected," Kirk said, his tone falsely cheery. "I don't think I've ever seen someone just storm out before."
With a growl, McCoy rounded on the two men. "I want her to rest. If I have to make it a mandate, I will." He focused on Spock. "Why don't you go talk some sense in to her? She's your girlfriend, after all." And with that, McCoy left the pair to stand in the middle of his medbay.
Spock turned to Kirk. "Captain, I will report for bridge duty momentarily."
As the Vulcan left, Kirk told him, "Take your time, Commander."
STSTST
When Nia left the medbay, she attempted to head straight for her lab. Part of the way there, she was intercepted by a certain half-Vulcan.
He called her name and she stopped in the hallway to turn and look at him. As he approached, she muttered, "I know that might have seemed disrespectful, but I do not need to rest. I've rested enough. I need to see the damage that has been done to my research."
He didn't reply.
"I mean, come on, I think I would know if I needed more rest. I'm Paladian. I'm fine." She glanced at his face again to find him still staring at her. "What?" She snapped.
"You should not go to the labs," he stated.
Nia froze, jaw clenched. "You too, huh?" She started to walk again.
"You have not had enough time to recover from your recent ordeal in order to look at the situation objectively," Spock told her as he began to follow her.
"Excuse me?" Color rose in her cheeks as fast as her eyebrow did. She stopped walking and starred at Spock. "You're questioning my objectivity?"
"Yes," he said.
She began to fume.
Before she could get any words out, he continued "Without objectivity, any data you obtain will be tainted by your bias."
"My bias? Are you kidding me? I've been biased from the start!" She responded incredulously.
Frustration started to pick at Spock. He easily held it at bay. He tried to further reason with her. "Both Ensign Jenkins and Crewman Michaels are capable of furthering your research in your absence."
She gaped at him. "Are you taking my work away from me?"
Not knowing how she made that conclusion, Spock opened his mouth to speak.
Nia cut him off. "This is my work. Mine. My people. My planet. You will not be taking this away from me." The fierceness of her voice was lost on Spock.
"Both individuals are capable scientists and –"
"I'm not? Is that what this is about? I've made so little progress that I must be terrible at my job?"
With the wild accusation, Spock was uncertain how to respond. The color of Nia's face was beginning to concern Spock. He'd never seen her so pink before. "It is clear you are not currently capable of rational thought."
Furious, she whispered, "Oh, I assure you, I am perfectly capable." She spun on her heel and entered the open turbolift. "You can't keep me from my lab."
Spock might have followed her if Nia hadn't physically blocked him while the doors closed in his face. He barely glimpsed the shocked look of the two crewmembers standing behind her.
As soon as the doors shut, Spock lifted up his PADD to access the security for the labs.
STSTST
Slightly calmer after her 'victory' against Spock, Nia quickly walked the rest of the way to the labs. As she approached, she paused for the few seconds it would take to punch her code into the keypad outside the doors.
Nothing happened.
Frowning, Nia punched her code in a second time, taking her time to make sure each number was put in correctly.
Still, the doors didn't open.
A new anger growing, Nia vainly punched her code in for a third time. When the doors remained shut, Nia let out a shrill sound of frustration and slammed the palm of her hand against the doors.
"Dr. Sargent?" A familiar voice came from behind her.
Nia turned to find Michaels standing behind her, a startled expression on her face. She just stared at the younger woman expectantly.
"Aren't you supposed to be resting?" The brunette asked. When she got a glare in response, Michaels reflexively took a step back. "You don't have to answer that," Michaels rushed to say. "Stupid question. You obviously wouldn't be here if that were true."
Feeling slightly mollified, Nia sniffed lightly and muttered, "You got that right."
With a smile, Michaels stepped closer. "Are you going into the lab?" She gestured to the closed doors. "Oh that reminds me!" Excited, the crewman held up the small tablet in her hand. "I found one of your spare PADDs in my room, the one that had some of your notes on it that I had forgotten to load in to the Enterprise mainframe. Good thing, huh?"
"Let me see!" Nia's excitement equaled the brunette's. Turning the device on, Nia proceeded to flick through the screens with a speed that baffled Michaels. "This is great. Really. It doesn't have everything I need, but it's a better starting point than I had before."
"You mean 'we'," Michaels gently corrected. "I want to find the answer just as much as you. Especially after meeting Paladians that aren't as crazy as you." The smirk was teasing in nature.
Rolling her eyes, Nia nodded. "I blame Earth for feeding my madness." Her tone hid the warmth that filled her stomach at Michaels' statement.
"Had to start off with a seed, though."
"Very true."
Once again Michaels gestured to the doors. "Are we going to go in or what?"
Acting surprised, as if she forgot, Nia gestured to the keypad with the PADD in her hand. "Yeah sure." The not so subtle hint was that Nia's hands were too full for her to punch in her security code.
Michaels took the hint and punched in her own code. The doors opened without a problem and Nia followed her assistant inside.
The sense of victory returned.
STSTST
Nearly two hours after Nia and Michaels got to work with the once again necessary retesting, Ensign Jenkins walked into the lab. When she caught sight of Nia, she froze just inside the doorway.
The Paladian looked up and caught the look on the other woman's face. "What?" She asked confused.
The woman was silent for a moment, as if debating her next statement. Finally, she asked, "What did you do to your hair?"
Nia smiled, flattered. "It's a traditional braid that my mother," she raised a hand to her head, "put in – what in the world?"
"Yeah…" Jenkins drew out the word slowly.
Appalled, Nia raised both hands to cover and attempt to smooth down the frizz she could feel.
Both Michaels and Jenkins jumped forward to stop her.
"You're just making it worse, sweetie," Jenkins said with a wince.
Michaels was having a hard time keeping a straight face. "I wasn't going to say anything, but you kind of looked like Einstein."
Horrified, Nia tucked her head under her arms as if hiding would undo the damage already done.
The blond Ensign rubbed a hand over the frazzled scientist's back. She leaned in close to give her a comforting embrace, but pulled back with a wince. "Um, not to pour salt on a wound, but when was the last time you showered?"
Nia looked up slowly, face a ghastly grey in color. "I don't remember. Oh, no," she whimpered.
Trying to cheer her up, Michaels sympathetically. "Don't worry, Dr. Sargent. It's just us girls here. It's not like Commander Spock saw you and your rumpled mess. We are all g- Dr. Sargent? Are you-? Oh no," Michaels eyes went very wide as she took in Nia's reaction to her words.
A snort escaped Jenkins. When both women looked up at her, Jenkins had to clamp a hand around her mouth to keep another from escaping.
It didn't work.
"Alright Jenkins, it isn't that funny." Michaels tried to defend Nia.
The other woman just shook her head. "Oh, but it is," she insisted. "You see, I was wondering why the commander had banned Dr. Sargent from the lab." Giving Nia a very pointed look, the ensign continued, "Now, it all makes sense."
"He banned you from the lab?" Michaels was incredulous. "But I let you into the lab!"
Nia was wondering if it would be feasible to somehow glue her hands to her face. She'd need help with eating and drinking, and maybe walking, but at least she'd never have to show her face again. The idea was becoming increasingly appealing.
Jenkins pursed her lips. "Listen," she said. "Why don't you take a couple hours off? Get cleaned up and rest if you need it. Michaels and I can get some work done while you are gone."
"That sounds good," Nia squeaked through her hands, "but I am not walking through the halls like this. And I'm not going on the turbolift." Closed in spaces and strong smells never mixed well. How did she notice the first time in the lift?
Jenkins started snorting again as Michaels winced.
"It's not that funny," Nia whimpered.
As Nia sat with her hands semi-permanently covering her face, she missed it when Jenkins produced a comb.
"Now," the woman started saying, "you are going to do the minimal to fix your hair, then you are going to go straight to your quarters. Got it?"
Finally, Nia lowered her hands enough to look at them. "I can't leave you two with so much to do, just to fix my appearance. This is too important."
Ensign Jenkins stared at her a moment. "Let me put it to you this way," she leaned in close, "if you don't leave, I'll have Lieutenant Commander Scott send a copy of the lab's security feed to NiPila."
Nia frowned. "How is that supposed to scare me?"
Jenkins just shrugged as she shifted away. "Guess I was wrong about Drella. The woman I thought I met would take one look at the way you currently look and –"
With a snarl, the snatched the comb from the woman's hand. "Give me that thing."
Both ensign and crewman shared a smug look as Nia began to meticulously pick the knots and frayed ribbons out of her hair. Slowly, but surely, the white locks became more presentable. To keep her hair tame, Nia then pulled the voluminous white mass back in a tight pony tail.
Finished, she sighed. Both human women looked up at her as she asked, "You are sure you don't need me?"
"Of course we need you," Michaels stated, "but you need some R&R more."
The irony of letting Jenkins and Michaels continue her work without her didn't escape her notice. Shoulders slumped, Nia stood from her stool. Cleaning up did sound good. Only one thing gnawed at her now.
I'm going to have to talk to Spock.
Eventually.
STSTST
If Nia received any strange looks on her way back to her quarters, she didn't catch them. For the most part Nia had her eyes trained on the floor.
The room was quiet when she walked in and surprisingly empty. Odd. Nia had expected to find Wena still sleeping.
Well she's either in the mess of the medbay.
Shrugging, Nia decided it wasn't vital and pushed back the discomfort at the sudden absence of her friend. Her time would be better spent cleaning up her appearance instead of fretting. She halted though, when she caught sight of herself in the mirror. Her previous horror slammed back into her at full force.
"I look like a medbay escapee," she whined.
Her dress was a rumpled mess and the bottom hem torn in places from her scuffle with Nikolai. Dark spots of what Nia knew to be her own blood could be seen on the purple fabric covering her collarbone. It must have dripped there when her face was cut.
There was only one clean spot on her face, the spot where McCoy wiped away the blood on her chin. Her pink lips were chapped and almost ashy in look, while her nose and left cheek were appallingly shiny from a buildup of facial oils. Her right cheek and the left side of her forehead had matching smears of a dark substance. Probably soot or some sort of dirt from when the shuttle crash landed.
Even with being combed, Nia's hair was still matted and unkempt in appearance.
Tearing her gaze away from the mirror, Nia knew the only solution was to get cleaned up as soon as possible. Yet, when she pulled off her dress, she froze again.
While she'd been sore, she hadn't realized the extent of her bruising. She had dark yellow and honey brown bruises across her chest from when the safety harness of the copilot's chair pulled tight during impact.
McCoy probably knew there were bruises, but since her dress hadn't been removed, must have decided to leave them. Nia could always have Wena look them over later, if they became a problem. There were other bruises too, some on her arms and legs, but those were very minor. Probably from rolling around and trying to get to the phaser that had fallen to the shuttle floor before the Russian did.
Shaking her head at, well, everything, Nia turned away from the mirror once and for all. At this point, even a sonic shower sounded wonderful.
STSTST
When Nia felt clean enough to get redressed, she decided to get a short nap too. Two hours later, she woke up feeling infinitely better than she had when she'd left the medbay earlier. Again, she was surprised that Wena wasn't there and hadn't returned yet.
Getting up, she dressed herself in a fitted tee and khakis that felt soft and cool against her skin.
She had more energy than earlier too. Felt lighter, even. And she was absolutely ready to work in the lab.
Nia didn't hesitate to leave her quarters and never paused in the hall. However, if she had thought about it, she might have. Because she hadn't thought about it, Nia was caught off guard when her code still wouldn't let her into the lab. Letting out a puff of air, Nia gently rested her forehead against the closed door.
Even if she got one of the scientists to let her it, it still wouldn't solve the main problem. And the main problem was that Spock had blocked her from the lab for a reason. She'd let her emotions get in the way and had refused to heed his instructions. As her superior in the Science Department, he was well within his rights to request that she be well rested and clear headed when working in the lab. Locking her out had seemed extreme, but after thinking about it…
Her decisions hadn't been top notch as of late.
Nia had only gotten into a wrestling match with Nikolai after he'd crashed the shuttle that she was only on because she'd ran away from Michaels in order to get the opportunity to beat the tar out of Nikolai. She's stormed to the shuttle bay without any second thought or care, and had then sat down next to the armed mercenary with the same mindset. Before that, she'd stormed the bridge, punched Nikolai, and broken her hand in a completely unnecessary tussle.
All these led up to her storming out of the medbay in utter disrespect of McCoy's medical authority. She'd even gone so far as to block Spock from following her into the turbolift like a child having a temper tantrum of not getting her way.
Spock had to be frustrated with her, or else his Vulcan stoicism is far better than she could have ever imagined. Really, she couldn't see how his Vulcan logical mind wasn't fed up with her illogical Paladian one. Hadn't she been illogical from the beginning?
Touching him when he was grieving?
Sleeping in the lab?
Wasting significant time because she wasn't paying attention in the lab?
Sparring with Sulu? That one had the whole ship in an uproar.
And of course, let's not forget that the first conversation Nia had with Spock was after she'd gotten embarrassed and made a fool of herself because she was eating a "loud" lunch.
It wasn't until Nia stopped walking that she realized she'd even started. Looking up, she saw the door to her quarters in front of her. Her subconscious must have known that she needed a quiet place to sit with the way her conscious was working through things.
Once inside, Nia slumped against one of the walls next to the door. She ran her hands over her face and head.
She loved Spock. She had no doubt of that. Not after her epiphany as she watched a planet come closer with a frightening speed. Yet, she didn't tell him that. No, she didn't even show him any ounce of affection once back on the ship. Instead, she turned around and behaved in a way directly contrary to what she should have.
She was disrespectful, illogical, and immature. To face Spock now, she would have to face the facts.
Insecurity plucked at her, tried to convince her that she'd screwed everything up.
Nia shook her head. This wasn't the first time she'd behaved irrationally and it was doubtful to be the last. In reality, if Spock couldn't handle it then she had no reason to expect him to. For all she knew, he might like her illogical tendencies in some odd way… maybe.
First order of business, she needed to apologize to him. The sooner, the better, or she was going to chicken out. He would be on duty now, though. Nia bit her lip in thought. Grabbing her PADD, Nia paused for only a moment before typing out what she felt was an acceptable message. Apologizing over a message wasn't ideal, but at this point she felt it better to do than to wait. She'd speak with him again later, but this might help get the 'ball rolling' as it was.
Message finished, Nia hesitated before sending it. Chewing her lip again, Nia quickly added a last line and sent the message before she could change her mind. She wanted him to know she was sincere.
Realizing that now she was going to be filled with nervous energy until he responded, Nia decided go to the gym. She'd take her PADD with her too, so that if he – no, when he sent her a reply, she could quickly respond. If need be.
STSTST
Despite her strong desire and constant checking of her PADD, Nia was left hanging.
Her PADD didn't chime. No alert popped up.
Spock never responded.
She did, however, discover that her lab status was reinstated. It didn't give Nia a clear indication of Spock's response, but perhaps he found it illogical to respond. Either way, she was determined not to spend time worrying over something that was potentially trivial.
After all, there was the home of five billion Paladians to save.
A/N: There you go. The first real fight, of sorts. What do you guys think should happen? What do you think will happen? It will definitely be interesting, to say the least.
Thank you to all who have voted on my poll so far. I'm going to wait until the end of "Reach For the Stars" before I make my decision.
Thank you to cherylnixon for your review! I'm glad you found this story too! And of course, thank you to all who have added this story to their alerts and/or favorites.
- Spirit Speaker