The shuttle hovered above the mountains and then descended above the vast fields of snow that occupied the planet's southern pole. The snow did not glimmer in the light of Ceti Alpha system's red giant star like it would have under Earth's Sun; instead it was dull and dreary: a seemingly endless sea of white beneath ashen skies. Nothing moved on its eerily still surface. It did posses, however, a kind of savage beauty that was nothing short of spell-bounding. Previous scans had indicated that the snow covered a thick ice cap populated by giant snakes that were the only ones capable of surviving in that hostile environment. Such weather passed for serene, but often this land of permanent winter was agitated by violent blizzards and snow storms.

"The drifting winter snows shall whelm it," Khan murmured at her side.

Carol grinned. "More Moby Dick?"

He arched an eye-brow. "No, this one is from Pierre: or, the Ambiguities. I know you're not an admirer of Hermann Melville, but I thought you knew he wrote other books besides Moby Dick."

Carol chuckled. "Oh, I did know. I just didn't think you did!"

He glanced at her briefly and regaled her with a tiny smile. "For the longest time, I chose not to," he said sounding so serious, she was actually tempted to believe him.

# # #

Carol weighted her communicator in her right hand, trying to come to a decision. She felt both punch-drunk and wide-awake, in a dream-like state between excitement, disbelief and concern. She was going to have a child. She and Khan. She had never before been more certain that she loved him. His lovely, alabaster-sculptured face floated in her memory together with the familiar intensity in his eyes whenever he looked at her, as though she was just as vital to him as his family and the air he breathed. For the first time since the fervent confession of his feelings for her, their inhuman strength did not trouble her. Someone who could love with a passion bordering on viciousness would do anything to protect the child he had never hoped he could have. She pressed her left palm against her belly again. A daughter. She was to have a daughter.

She yearned to tell Khan of the wonderful news, but at the same time it did not feel right to do by communicator. She wanted to tell him in person, take in his reaction fully and seek the reassurance of his embrace.

"There it is." McCoy voice was exceptionally loud in the quiet sick bay. He held out a data tape to her. "A list of doctors who can supervise your pregnancy, the results of the scans I took of you and your daughter and my entire research on the serum I synthesized from augment blood, but I wouldn't use it while you're expecting."

"Why not?" she asked while taking the proffered data-storing device.

"Your baby is part human and has a genome unlike anything anyone has ever seen before. There is no telling how she will adapt to your body or how your body will adapt to carrying her, for that matter. All I can recommend at this point is caution... and don't skimp on your vitamin shots. If you feel like sleeping, sleep for as long as it takes. If you feel like eating, eat. If you can't work an appetite, don't force it. Have some hypos instead."

"What if I feel like working?"

"Then don't," he said severely, training the full force of one of his mighty frowns on her. "I mean it! You need to take it easy for both your sakes."

"Alright, I get the message." She twirled the tape he had given her in her hands. "Any medic on this list you'd recommend in particular?"

He sighed, seeming pensive. "Maybe Dr. Niwara. She's Caitian, but she studied Denobulan genetic engineering among other things and she's been working mostly on remote colonies and outposts. But I should warn you: if half of what I heard about her is true, she's got more than a bit of a temper and a lot of issues with authority."

She was about to answer him, when the doctor's computer beeped with an incoming call. McCoy rolled his eyes.

"It must be Jim again," he grumbled. "Do you want me to tell him to get back to his job and let me do mine?"

Carol shook her head no with a smile. "He's just worried. After all, I did faint right under his eyes. Thanks for the recommendation," she said pocketing the data tape.

McCoy grunted a "not at all" and went to answer his captain. Carol lay back on the biobed to rest for a minute longer, before she had to face the world again. Despite the doctor's ministrations she was still feeling a bit queasy. Normally she hated being told to scale back her work, but she would have to alter her thinking now that she had to take care for both herself and her unborn baby.

"Carol," McCoy called to her from his computer. She looked to him. "Congratulations," he added with a slight smile.

# # #

The call had arrived about fifteen minutes after Doctor McCoy had released her from sickbay. She had been in the throes of explaining her loss of consciousness and receiving well-meaning wishes, when Admiral Pike had asked to speak to her in private. He had first contacted the augment freighter that had brought her to Nausicaa, using frequencies Kati had provided him with, and Otto had told him he could find her aboard the Enterprise of all places. They were talking just now in the captain's ready room, which Kirk had graciously put at her disposal for this purpose. Carol had initially been glad to see Christopher Pike, whom she greatly respected, but once the greetings and the polite inquiries had been over, a cloud appeared on the horizon.

Carol sat back in her chair, regarding the admiral speculatively. He didn't look any happier about the situation, his mouth set in a grim line. "Did he give any indication at all as to why exactly he wanted to speak to me about this?" she asked. "This seems like an internal Starfleet matter."

Pike sketched a vague gesture with his hand. "It is an internal fleet matter, but no, he didn't say why wanted to talk to you. If I had to speculate, I'd say he misses you."

Carol sighed heavily. "In that case, he knows which frequencies to use." She looked away, mulling over the possibilities, her hands placed protectively over her stomach. The trip all the way Earth would be a long one and probably not at all advisable in her condition, but with her father in confinement, there was no other way to go about it. "I'm not trying to be difficult, Admiral."

When she glanced back to him, his eyes were full of sympathy. "I didn't think you were, Doctor Marcus, and believe me when I say that I didn't want to ask, either, but our armistice with the Klingon Empire has been holding up surprisingly well and there have been talks of a permanent peace treaty, maybe even a cooperation accord... ."

"Which might not happen, if they found out that the former head of Starfleet tried to have bio-weapons built to kill them all," she finished for him.

"When I ordered an in-depth investigation be conducted into the projects your father oversaw personally during the war, I had high personal hopes that the clandestine base on Ceti Alpha V had been the only illegal operation he had run. Then last month we discovered that he had been attempting to have the agent responsible for Tellurian plague as well as several other pathogens modified to affect only the Klingons. So far we know he has been using one of the cold stations on the outer frontier as basis of operations, but he refused to disclose which one. It's not just a potential information leak that concerns me, but also raids from pirates, privateers and the Orion Syndicate. With former admiral Marcus' protection gone, one of the scientists working on this outpost might be tempted to sell the biological weapons on the black market. In the wrong hands, they could cause the death of billions. So it's imperative that we find out more as soon as possible."

He had a point and she knew it, though she wished she hadn't. Despite everything, the Federation was still her home and she didn't want it plunged into another war with the Klingons, any more than she wanted her father to cause more harm than he already had or several deadly viruses unleashed on an unsuspecting Alpha Quadrant. Unfortunately, that also meant she could not tell Khan about the baby just yet. If he knew, there was no way he would have had a conniption about her undertaking a stressful trip to Earth to confront her father and the ghosts of her painful past. Part of her agreed, the words almost on her tongue. She should tell Pike she was pregnant and needed to be someplace familiar and reassuring and think of nothing else but this unexpected gift bestowed upon her, but she couldn't. As much as she wanted to, she could not place her own good or even that of her unborn child above the welfare of billions. Besides, Earth had some of the best hospitals in the explored space. She and the baby would be just fine.

# # #

Khan and Carol's home on the new colony by the Morningstar Mountains was smaller and more modest than the one they had had on the settlement that had been destroyed by the Klingon raid her father had caused. Khan had initially planned it to be more comfortable for what he assumed were her needs, since he himself preferred to live in positively spartan conditions, but she had insisted that if they kept things to a bare minimum, the dwelling would be ready sooner and so she could move out of Kati's house and back with him more quickly. Besides, after a year in the cramped living quarters of a Constitution-class ship, any house seemed scrumptious by comparison. But still he managed to sneak things like the gorgeous Risan vanity piece he had gotten her past her radar. It wasn't quite ostentatious, but she could tell he was coddling her.

It wasn't unprecedented within their history, but she noted he had stepped it up since her return to the augment planet. Perhaps it was his quiet way of expressing gratitude for her forgiveness, an off-shot of 20th century mores or just his way of showing affection. Either way, she didn't want to appear inconsiderate and refuse his tokens of attention. She just didn't know what the appropriate response was supposed to be and whether she should reciprocate or not. He certainly didn't seem to expect her to. So she had just resorted to letting him know he didn't have to buy his way into her good graces and that his willingness to work on their relationship was good enough for her. Though he conveyed that he did understand, the gifts kept coming. Sweet as the gestures were, they still made her uneasy. They seemed too much of an over-indulgence, given the harsh circumstances of life on Ceti Alpha V.

She was considering another talk, as she combed her hair in the perfectly-polished Risan mirror. But not tonight. It was already late and she was weary. She was tiring with startlingly ease lately. She grinned deprecatingly at her own reflection, wondering if she was growing old. But there was no gray in the gold in her hair, which was reaching to her shoulders again and she thought to keep it that way, watching the strands cascade almost hypnotically as the brush straightened them out. Her musings were interrupted by a slight hiss, as the door of the bathroom adjoined to their bedroom opened, and smiled. Khan came into view, fresh from his shower, hair still wet, clad only in a large towel wrapped around his hips. Their gazes met in the mirror and held. He came to stand behind her chair and gently pried her brush from her fingers to set it on the vanity table.

"You're beautiful," he murmured, brushing her hair out of the way so he could pepper the right side of her neck with light kisses. "My golden queen." He bit teasingly on her ear, his free hand resting on her thigh beneath the material of her night-gown. His eyes were still fixed on her reflection in the mirror.

Carol grasped his wrist to stall him. "Not tonight," she said. "I'm really tired. Do you mind?"

His hands slid off her. "Of course not." He pressed a kiss to the top of her head. "How about I give you a massage to help you sleep?"

Now that he mentioned it, a massage did sound wonderful. She stood and turned to put her arms around his neck. "Sometimes I think you're too good to me."

He kissed her chastely on the lips. "Nothing is too good for you, Carol."

A few minutes later she lay on her front on the bed, Khan's long, elegant fingers digging into the tense muscles of her back, rubbing soothing circles into them, methodically working out the kinks embedded in them. It felt heavenly and she began to drift off, just as she remembered she was supposed to discuss something else with him.

"I finished today the second analysis of the ice samples we took during our trip to the south pole. It's the purest water known to both the Alpha and the Beta quadrants, purer than even the famous Altair one. If we could find a way to extract it in large quantities, it would have a high trading value. We should look into that and soon. The Orion colony is bound to have considerably bigger needs than ours and we really can't postpone setting up a medical facility for them... ."

"Carol," he interrupted in a bemused tone, stroking a hand through her hair. "You are allowed to take a break every now and then."

She yawned into the pillow. "I know, but this is important."

"It will not become any less so by morning, which is when we are going to discuss it at length," he assured.

Sleep pressed heavily on her eye-lids and so she closed them, muttering a not yet fully-formed idea about new technology and pressing concerns. She thought she heard him chuckle but couldn't be certain. The pads of his fingers were pressing lightly into her nape and it felt so relaxing. She let herself dose off.

TBC