A/N: This will probably be the only update this week, as I'm going on a trip and don't know what my internet access situation will be.
-Chapter Eighteen-
The landing of the ship jolted Anthea out of a daze. She had a sleepy-but-awake Nolan tucked against her side. He held a handful of her hair in his fist. She'd once shorn her hair off when he was tiny, so that he couldn't grab her hair, but now, she didn't mind. If he needed the extra security, she'd let him have it.
The door opened and two armed Klingons, with disruptors in hand, barked at her. She didn't need to speak the language to understand this time. They wanted her to get up.
With Nolan in her arms, she was marched down the corridor of the large ship and out to the planet surface. She had no idea where they were, but she didn't guess it was Qo'noS. For one, the moon in the sky was intact. It was dark, well after sundown, and difficult to make out any details of where they'd landed. There were trees, and lights flickered between them, illuminating crude structures that seemed to be hastily erected scattered through the forest. There were Klingons everywhere.
"Mama," Nolan whispered. "Dwagons!"
She kissed the top of his head. "I know, baby."
Koloth appeared and led them to a small building that resembled a shed. There were no windows, but the wooden planks making up the walls had large gaps. She and Nolan were unceremoniously shoved inside, and the door slammed shut.
The inside didn't look much better than the outside. A single, flickering light hung from a crossbeam on the low ceiling, bathing the interior in a weak, ugly light that tinged everything vaguely yellow. There was a thin pallet on the floor in one corner, and bucket in another. A single pipe with a simple on/off tap snaked down the wall, from a small cistern she'd glimpsed briefly outside. The meaning of the bucket was fairly easy, and she grimaced.
Holding Nolan against her hip with one arm-he was getting a little heavy for this, she realised-she prodded the mattress with a foot, hoping there were no vermin living in or under it. Vigilance was difficult with as tired as she was, both physically and emotionally drained. It was hard to tell in the dim light, but nothing seemed to move near the bed.
Reluctantly, she set Nolan on the bed. Immediately, he did his potty dance, so she took him over to the waste bucket.
He made a face at it. "Yucky!"
"I know, sweetheart, I'm sorry."
The toddler unhappily did his business, with Anthea holding him up. The poor thing didn't have any shoes, since she hadn't put any on him the morning they'd gone to the cabin.
The pallet was uncomfortable, the floor beneath made of dirt, and every rock seemed to dig into Anthea's back as she exhaustedly flopped down on it. Her head hurt again, no surprise there. At least they'd let her keep the first aid kit, but there had only been a handful of pain relievers in it, and she had one pill left.
Nolan burrowed against her and she held him close. His hair was in need of a trim, and the way it fell across his forehead made him look so much like a miniature Khan that it hurt.
She looked up, through a chink in the roof, and saw a star winking high in the sky. For all she knew, that star was CX-431, or Sol. Still, it was the first one she'd seen.
"Star light, star bright," she whispered. "First star I see tonight. I wish I may, I wish I might, have the wish I wish tonight . . ."
Five days, now, since Anthea had vanished, and Khan felt every second tick away. It was too much like those days when he sought his vengeance against Marcus, and he knew that if he didn't find her soon, he was going to end up killing someone aboard the Enterprise with his bare hands.
He had, after all, been specifically created to be a brutal warrior. As much as he tried to control it, the bloodlust was in his very DNA.
"Does anyone have a proper blade, or are we too civilised for that?" Khan asked, as they left yet another system behind, no closer to finding his wife than they had been when they'd left Sitara.
Kirk arched a brow. "We have phasers."
"I am aware of that, Captain. But I am not in the mood for bloodless warfare, Kirk. I intend to slaughter every one of them, and I want a blade for that."
Kalim flinched. Khan whirled, slamming him into the wall, an arm across his throat.
"Perhaps I should start with you?" he demanded.
"Khan!" Kirk yelped. He was baffled by the sudden turn. "That's Kalim, one of our sec-"
"He is a Klingon, Captain," Khan growled. "I suspected before, but he just now confirmed it. Are you all truly that blind? He reeks of it."
Kalim bared his teeth, the ones Khan had noticed before were unusually even, as if ground down. "Let me go!"
"Make me," Khan retorted. "Tell me, Kirk, does your doctor still have that tribble he ressurrected with my blood?"
"How did you-"
"My wife, Kirk. She tells me everything."
Kirk let out an explosive breath. "Okay, say you're right. What do you need the tribble for?"
Still effortlessly holding Kalim, Khan turned to the captain. "Do you not know? How tedious you lot are. Bring me the tribble, Captain, and I shall prove it."
The entire bridge crew watched them with trepidation. Kirk stared at Khan for several long moments, then leaned over and paged Medbay. "Bones, can you bring that tribble to the bridge, please?"
They waited in tense silence for McCoy to arrive. When he appeared, he held the chirping ball of fur in his hands. "Not exactly my usual equipment," the cantankerous doctor said.
"Bring it here," Khan directed.
When McCoy got within five feet of Khan and Kalim, something odd happened. The tribble he held bgan to writhe, squealing as if in pain. Kalim hissed at it and tried to break free from Khan's grip, which was a useless attempt.
"What the hell?" McCoy blurted.
"Klingons and tribbles, natural enemies," Khan drawled. "How did I know it was Kalim, Kirk? His hair and skin are typical of a Klingon, though his lack of head ridges is not. His teeth are filed down to resemble a human's, though he did it wrong. Only a higher-ranking crew member, ideally placed as a spy, would have been privy to my information, in order to pass it on to the group that kidnapped my family. You only have two new officers on the bridge, Kirk. This . . . man, and the Andorian female at the communications station beside Uhura."
McCoy handed the tribble to a somewhat perplexed Spock and pulled out his tricorder. He used it to scan Kalim. ". . . I'll be damned. He is a Klingon."
Khan focused his attention on Kalim. "Tell me where they are, and I will make your death a short one."
Kalim said something in Klingon and spat in Khan's face. The augmented human wiped the spittle off with the back of his hand and responded in the same tongue.
"Wait, what's he saying?" Kirk demanded.
"It's best left untranslated," Khan told him. "Is that really what you're going to go with, Kalim?"
"Everything I do is for the Empire!"
"Wrong answer," Khan snarled. He twisted, bearing Kalim to the floor, landing on the Klingon with a knee to the chest.
His hands were a blur of motion, too fast for Kirk to follow. Kalim shrieked, high and long, a sound none of the Enterprise crew had heard a grown male of any species make, let alone a Klingon one.
Uhura winced and averted her eyes. Several other crew members looked ill.
"Khan!" Kirk barked. "We don't torture-"
"Pain is all they know, Captain," Khan interrupted. He dug his fingers harder into whatever tender spot the Klingon had, right under his ribs. "It is all they will respond to. Believe me. I have plenty of experience with extracting information from them."
"Yes, you were one of Starfleet's best operatives, were you not?" Spock interjected, speaking for the first time. He still held the disturbed tribble in his hands.
"The best, Mr. Spock."
The Klingon on the floor said something that made Khan grin. It was not a comforting expression, and several of the crew took a few large steps back. Khan replied in Klingon and grabbed the front of Kalim's head, slamming his skull into the floor.
"Uh . . . Well." Kirk stammered and cleared his throat, thoroughly rattled. They'd had a Klingon in a senior crew position for over a year? What else had he spilled to the enemy? "If you . . . really need to . . ."
He trailed off awkwardly. "Don't do it on the bridge?"
Khan lifted Kalim to his feet. "Gladly. Perhaps I'll show him my old quarters in the brig."
He left, dragging Kalim along. When the bridge doors closed, the tension in the room palpably dropped.
McCoy was the first to speak. "That man is crazier than my cousin Jeb, and he thinks he can talk to rocks."
Kirk didn't want to think about what Khan was doing to Kalim down in the brig, but he knew the man was right. Klingons weren't known for compassion or reason beyond their own code. He didn't like the idea of torturing Kalim-if that was even his actual name-but Kirk couldn't see an alternative.
"While I do not condone torture," Spock told him, "one could say that as an enemy party, Kalim is not a member of Starfleet and is subject to Khan's jurisdiction as a prisoner of war."
Kirk stared at his first officer. "Sometimes, you worry me."
The bridge door slide open, and Khan stepped in. "Permission to come on the bridge, Captain?"
"Uh . . . granted."
Khan was freshly showered, and dressed in borrowed Starfleet attire, eerily identical to when he'd first been aboard, two years before. His black hair was slicked back, and it wasn't 'til then that Kirk realised the engineered human had been wearing it loose, a marked change to the Khan he'd met the first time.
"There is an outpost three sectors away, towards the galactic core," Khan said without preamble.
"And? Why'd they do any of this?"
"Their moon, Praxis, has been destroyed, as you know. It is causing the death of their planet, and as such, they are searching for a new home. They see no problem with raiding any civilisations they come across, which is what occured on Brinthini."
Kirk frowned. Beside him, Spock inquired, "And your colony?"
Khan didn't look at the Vulcan. He was still angry for his trickery, and for besting him in battle. "They came specifically for Anthea, as we knew. Our theory was correct. They know that I am the one who took out their patrol on Qo'noS. There was a survivor." Khan clenched his teeth. "Kalim overheard our discussion regarding . . . my abilities, and he passed that information to the second Bird of Prey. It is apparently a new standard procedure for them, in case they meet hostiles such as Federation ships or a race called Cardassians? No matter. They sought to lure me into a trap and capture me."
"But you have left your colony," Spock pointed out.
"With an army of my kind, Mr. Spock. You saw what one can do, what twenty can do. Imagine what nearly seventy are capable of."
"I am aware," the Vulcan intoned. "And that is what concerns me."