A/N: Ok, so...hear me out. I know it's been a very long time. Like years and years. BUT...I've never forgotten or given up on this story. I love these characters so much, and I've always felt horrible for leaving them hanging. But frankly, I've got three kids with very busy schedules and for a good long while, my writing had to take a back seat. However, I think I've finally reached the point where I can focus and give this story the attention it deserves! So, without further ado...here is Take 3 of this story.

Please note that Chapter 1 has been edited and should be re-read before moving on to Chapter 2.

Thank you - as ever! - to my beta, Xaraphis. Here we go again, baby sis!And now…on with the show!

Lake Inari, Lapland, Finland

(Stardate 2258.320)

There was nothing but darkness once the swirling light of the transwarp beam faded.

Unmoving, his arms hanging at his sides, Khan stared blankly across the frozen landscape of shadowed trees and moon-kissed snow to the cabin that he had never intended to see again. The night around him was silent, save for the sigh of the wind as it rushed over branches and through frost-stiffened needles. The cold – brutal and pervasive – seeped into him, burning his lungs with every ragged inhale.

"Stop being dramatic – it's not that cold..."

Her words, light and playful and gutting, echoed through his mind and with them, the memory of her face, pink with cold and utterly shattering in its simple, unaffected beauty. He winced away from it, eyes squeezing shut against a fresh wave of grief. It tore through him, viciously clawing at the heart that still bled for her.

She had been so happy, then – had it really only been hours ago? – so sweetly hopeful. The future had lain before them with such promise…

Until…

Until…

The smiling image of her faded, overlaid by a far more recent memory – her face still, but tear-streaked and bloodied now, and staring up at him with such fierce determination...

Khan let out a bark of rough, unsteady laughter – flinching at just how sharply it rang through the night. He stumbled sideways, catching himself on the thick trunk of a pine, its bark crumbling beneath the press of his hand. He leaned into it, breathing hard against the violent churning of his own emotions.

She had been dying – coughing blood and gasping desperately for oxygen that would not come – and she had been thinking only of him.

Khan shut his eyes, slumping beneath the weight of his own guilt.

He had failed her.

It had not worked.

The chest tube was seated and sealed…but it had not worked. He could see it in her eyes as she looked up at him, in the tears that spilled over her lashes and across her too-pale cheeks. He could feel it in his chest, in the crushing weight of his own terrible certainty, pressing harder and heavier with every increasingly desperate breath she fought to gasp out.

He was not a doctor; his admittedly limited medical knowledge was primarily theoretical. What little practical experience he possessed – particularly that which was germane to the situation – he had already exhausted. And it had not worked.

She still could not breathe. And he…

He had no idea what to do.

"Not…sorry…" Her voice was weak, the words were not. He looked down to find her fingers, slippery with blood, scrabbling ineffectually at the strap that sat across his chest – the strap of the device that he had forgotten about almost entirely in his rush to save her. He stared, paralyzed not by her frailty – even now, even like this, there was nothing frail about Rebecca Duval – but by the enormity of his own culpability.

He had done this. This was his fault.

"You…need it," she continued, the rolling lilt of her voice reduced to a breathy, croaking rasp; grasping fingers twining themselves around the strap and tugging at it as urgently as her traitorously weak body could manage. "Use…it."

For a moment, he could only continue to stare, unable to draw the necessary connections between word and action. When he did – when he understood what she was demanding of him – he went rigid, caught somewhere between shock and fury. "No," he whispered, the word tasting like ashes in his mouth.

She was telling him to save himself. To leave her.

He pulled back from her, horrified. "No!"

As was her wont, his refusal only appeared to fuel her determination – he could see it in her face; could see the effort draining what little strength she had left. "Promise…me," she insisted, undeterred. "Use it…escape…live."

"Enough!"

The word erupted from him and he reached up, hands tearing at his hair as he looked away from her – looked anywhere but at her – his composure crumbling; slipping between his fingers…like everything else that he treasured. "I will not listen to this!"

She spoke as if…as if…

"Promise…"

A gust of wind blew through the trees, an icy shock that pulled him back to the present. It eddied around him, sending a shiver down his spine and he moved away from it, spinning around to put the tree at his back, seeking what meagre shelter the thick Scotch pine could afford.

A useless endeavor – the latest in a long line of useless endeavors.

The wind shifted with him, curling around the trunk to buffet him anew, sending snow dancing across his boots and tossing strands of sweat-damp hair into his eyes. He lifted his arm, cold-stiff fingers raking his hair away from his face and knocking loose the ice crystals that had begun to form in the sub-zero chill. The tattered remains of his sleeve ghosted across his cheek with the motion and he stopped short, fingers balling into a fist as he slowly lowered his arm. With burning eyes, he traced the dark stains of blood tattooed across the pale skin of his forearm.

His blood. Blood that had marked him as superior from the day that he was born. Blood that had given him the strength and cunning to conquer and rule a vast Empire.

Blood that had proven weak – useless – just as he had needed it most.

She was dying.

Khan knew it…but he refused to accept it.

His blood had healed her once before, it would do the same for her now and damn logic for attempting to convince him otherwise. Yes, she had lost a great deal of blood. Yes, she was fading before his very eyes.

But it was not too late.

He would not allow it to be too late.

He slapped the portable transfuser down hard on the medtable beside her. His fingers brushed her skin as he tore her sleeve in two and he grit his teeth, trying very hard not to acknowledge the way his stomach clenched. She was cold. Already so much colder than she should have been…

Ignoring a sickening sense of foreboding, despite the promise of life thrumming inside his very veins, he turned her arm over and inserted the hypocatheter into the first vein he could find before repeating the process on himself. Once that was done, he activated the machine, rhythmically pumping his fist and watching with frantic eagerness as the tube trailing from his own arm began to fill with a thick flow of dark red blood.

The first, tentative tendrils of relief began to unfurl in his chest, and he allowed himself to finally believe that it might be possible; that he might yet be able to save her…

"I…love…you…"

His head jerked up, eyes finding hers. Her lips had gone blue, her skin nearly so. She was looking up at him from behind heavy lids, the doors that had so often been closed to him flung wide now as she showed him a look of such naked adoration that it stole the breath from his lungs.

Those words. That look.

He had known that the day would come when she would offer him the full measure of the feelings she held so tightly locked within the confines of her battered heart. He had looked forward to that day, eager to know precisely what it would feel like to hear her admit to what he already knew. Even more than that, he had anticipated offering her his own confession; seeing her face as he shared with her the long-cherished truths of his own equally cautious heart.

But never, in all his countless imaginings, had it ever been like this. Never had he dreamt that the sound of those words from her lips would fill him with a dread so thick that it choked him…

Khan recoiled, tearing himself from the encroaching darkness of his memory. Her words – her soft, sweet, dying declaration – haunted him. Even now, he could hear the echo of her confession through the long, dark corridors of his mind; hear it sighing on the wind...and it shattered him.

He glared down at his arm – at the tangible evidence of his failure. Mocking him. Taunting him.

Furious – with the universe, with himself – he reached across his body, running his thumb over the dried blood on his forearm, flicking it up to the crook of his elbow and pressing against the still-tender wound there. Hard, he pressed and then harder still, until fresh blood flowed from the torn flesh. It throbbed, a cruel ache that he welcomed. Relished.

He deserved the pain.

He deserved worse.

Far worse.

He knew the instant that it happened; heard her final, shuddering breath, felt the change in the air – the sudden, sharp emptiness that she left behind her. He froze, eyes locked on the machine in front of him, unwilling to look…refusing to see.

If he did not look, then it might not be true. If he did not look, then she might not be...

He turned his head, reluctant gaze crawling slowly up the length of her body, tracing the topography of her, more familiar to him now than any ever had been. When he reached her face, he faltered; the sight that met his eyes nearly bending him in half.

Her head was tipped toward him, bloodied lips parted and eyes…blank.

Empty.

With a low, agonized keen of denial, he fell forward, fingers grasping at the wrist that lay nearest to him, desperately seeking a pulse that he already knew he would not find. The spark of her had fled; her fire, smothered…and Khan had felt something, some corresponding light inside of himself, go dark. She was gone, and he had never told her…

His Rebecca was gone…and he had never felt so cold.

Swallowing hard against the ache in his chest, Khan clenched his fists, squeezing tight – so tight that he could feel the bite of his fingernails against his palm. The call of an owl, low and lonely, shattered the silence and he lifted his head, chasing the sound with his eyes. The animal – large, grey and yellow-eyed – stood perched on the roof of the cabin, staring down at him curiously, head twitching to the side as if trying to suss him out. He stared back, heart-sore and soul-weary and tired down to the very marrow of his bones.

The owl let out another whooping cry before throwing its wings wide and leaping out into the darkness, eerie and unearthly as it rode the icy crest of the night wind. It dove, hurtling toward the ground, curved talons snapping shut round its prey – a fat vole. It tore into the tiny creature, hooked beak making quick work of the rodent.

Distantly, Khan could hear the swift, strong beats of the predator's wings as it spiraled up into the night, clutching tight to its conquered prey. He watched it go, red-rimmed eyes following it until it disappeared into the darkness before falling once more to the small, silent cabin sitting forlornly amongst the towering pines.

Another icy blast of wind cut through the clearing - this one sending a shower of snow down upon his head from one of the branches above - and he shivered violently. Running on little more than instinct and sheer force of will, he stumbled forward, trudging through the snow and almost crawling up the stairs of the cabin. Throwing himself against the door, it crashed open, sending him sprawling on the floor beyond.

Lying there, breath heaving, he kicked the door shut and was immediately enveloped by her all over again. He could feel her so strongly here, her essence lingering in this place that she had loved.

This place that she would never see again.

It was the trill of the machine, still whirring away at his side that snapped him from his horrified stupor. Numb, Khan shifted his gaze from her face to find that his blood had finally reached its goal. He watched it pump into her veins and felt a cold, grim determination rise up within him, setting icy fingers into his heart and chasing away the grief that threatened to consume him. It was his strength that she needed now, and it was his strength that she would have.

This could not be their end. This could not be their goodbye.

With cold, calculating purpose, Khan vaulted up onto the medtable, ignoring the sharp pull of the wound in his side as he straddled her tiny, too-still body, knees pressing tightly to her sides.

Taking care not to dislodge the needles in either his arm or her own, he cupped his hands, one atop the other, fingers weaving together as he laid the pair of them directly over her heart and began to press, up and down, up and down…

The blood needed time – time to work, time to heal. He could give it that. He could give her that.

He would make her heart beat.

"You cannot die," he insisted, resolute gaze riveted to her face as he continued chest compressions. "I refuse to let you die."

But she would not listen; her heart remained stubbornly silent beneath his hands…and as the minutes passed, Khan's hope began to wane. And in its place, rising up from within him, engulfing him, came the despair.

The rage.

"Enough of this," he roared at her, desperately trying to force her heart into obedience. "You will wake up, Rebecca! Open your eyes! Breathe!"

Her body jerked limply with the ferocity of his movements, flopping like a ragdoll as he pumped her heart over and over and over again. Harder and faster he pressed, and then harder and faster still, until suddenly a voice screamed at him that it was too hard. Too fast. Too much.

He had gone too far in his desperation, was being too rough.

He was hurting her…

A howl – of frustration, of regret, of sheer, unbridled loss – tore from his throat, eyes burning and chest aching. His elbow buckled, breaking the rhythmic pulse of his compressions and nearly sending him sprawling atop her. He caught himself at the last moment, his face hovering just above hers, his hair tumbling into his eyes, sweeping against her nose, catching in her lashes.

It all vanished then; his anger – his raw, raging fury – it simply evaporated. In its place, rushing in to fill the emptiness that had been left behind…pain. It filled him up, crushing him from the inside out. Images of her, conjured from the depths of his anguish, flashed through his mind.

Rebecca smiling and happy as she laughed at something he had said, her lips twisting wryly, a shadow of sadness lingering behind her dancing eyes that he wished that he knew how to erase entirely…

Rebecca, so furious with him that she was nearly shaking with it, angry words flying like poisoned barbs from her merciless tongue and he could not help but think her the most magnificent creature he had ever laid eyes upon…

Rebecca, staring up at him, her heart in her eyes and her hands on his body; kissing him with a depth of passion that humbled him and left him breathless with longing.

Another sob escaped him, his shoulders shuddering as he held himself above her.

" You cannot do this," he begged, voice a ragged, rasping whisper. "You cannot leave me like this…you cannot…"

His grief swelled, overflowing the bounds of his self-control and swamping him with a tidal wave of suppressed emotion – shattering him on the rocks of his own culpability. Faces swam through his mind; so many different faces and he shied from them, shoved them away, down into the depths of his subconscious mind. He could not think of them now; could not let himself remember.

So much. He had lost…so much this day…

"Please, Rebecca," he croaked, barely able to hear the words past the howling in his heart, "please…I cannot lose you too…"

He sucked in a shuddering breath at that, feeling a foreign and entirely horrifying tremble in his arms…in his legs. His strength – ever stalwart – was beginning to flag, lessened as it was by grief, injury and the loss of blood that even now continued to pump into her body. He was failing her, even more than he already had done.

Khan let out a wailing roar, shoving himself back upright as he fumbled to begin the chest compressions once more, redoubling his efforts. Tears slipped down his face and he choked on the suppressed sobs that sat like stones in his throat, in his chest. Distantly, he became aware of a pounding from across the room; of thumping bangs and muffled shouts, issuing from the far side of the medbay doors.

They had been found out. Marcus' wolves were, quite literally, baying at the door.

His arms buckled and this time, he was not able to catch himself – he crashed forward, body crumpling down atop hers with a broken cry of frustrated defeat. He lay there for a moment, breathing hard, his forehead pressed to the cold steel of the medtable, just beside her equally cold face.

It was over, he knew.

She was gone.

Blinking hard against fresh tears, Khan turned onto his side before shoving himself upright. He reached up, grabbing hold of the edge of the small dining table and used it to pull himself the rest of the way to his feet. The force of the movement shifted the entire table, sending the chair on the far side toppling backwards.

Palms braced on the tabletop, he flinched at the crash it made...then frowned at the thump that followed. Craning his neck to glance at the far side of the table, a fresh wave of agony broke over him at the sight that met his eyes.

For there, its contents spilling out from beneath the ever-so-slightly fraying flap, lay Rebecca's old, battered pack.

Shoving the table further aside, he crashed to his knees beside the bag that held all of her most treasured possessions. Reaching for it, he ran trembling fingers over the shoulder strap nearest him, gritting his teeth.

She had left it behind.

Just as he had been forced to leave her, in the end.

His mind had gone quiet. The machine beside him continued to work, the might of Io continued to pound down the doors, but inside Khan's mind, it was silent. Eerily, sickeningly silent.

Resigned now, and almost shockingly weak, he leaned sideways, attempting to shift himself off of her, careful now – so careful – not to jar her unnecessarily. His legs gave way on him yet again as he attempted to climb down and he tumbled toward the floor, catching himself on the very edge of the medtable.

He steadied himself, planting his feet as firmly beneath him as he could manage and out of the corner of his eye, he caught sight of the hypocatheter, still seated in the crook of his elbow. Slowly, hesitantly, he reached across his body, catching the suture wing between his thumb and forefinger. For a long moment, he simply stared at it.

But then, from somewhere deep within came a low, banked pulse of anger, a mere echo of his earlier rage. He slid his fingers backwards, wrapping them around the tubing that fed into the catheter and ripped it out; flinging it away from him with far more force than necessary.

Useless. Pointless.

She was dead. There was no healing that – no curing it. He had been a fool to think otherwise.

The sounds from without were getting ever louder. They were making quick work of the doors, despite his having sealed them shut on the way in.

He was running out of time.

She would be furious, he knew; furious with him for lingering, but even now – even knowing that she was gone in every way that truly mattered – he could not bring himself to leave her.

He sighed deeply, letting his eyes slip closed as he braced himself on the table, arms splayed wide, palms pressed flat to its chilly surface. Warm blood trickled down his arm, the fresh wound burning at the edges of his awareness, joining the distant throb of the older wound in his side. It had been easy to ignore the screaming of his own nerves, first in the face of his anger and then in the face of her far greater need…but now, weak as he was, it became more difficult to dismiss.

It would be so easy, he thought. So simple to just…stay. To let them come. To let them take him.

There was nothing left for him now – nothing left to fight for. Everything he had ever cared about, gone. Everyone he had ever loved, dead. He had lost them all, every single one of them, and he…

He was tired. So very, very tired.

Promise me…

Khan lifted his head; opened his eyes to look at her – drinking in the elegant sweep of her dark brows, the gentle swell of her cheeks, the delicate point of her chin.

With one arm still braced on the table, he lifted a trembling hand to her face, brushing back her hair; freeing the strands that clung to the blood marring her cheek and chin before tucking them tenderly behind her ear. "It would be quick," he told her, voice a thin rasp, "They are many and I," he sighed, shaking his head lightly. "I am weak, Rebecca. I would fight and I would fall…and it would be finished."

He traced a fingertip across her eyelids, slipping them shut; followed the line of her nose, down over her lips, circled her mouth, pushing it gently shut. His breath hitched and he blinked hard against the sting of oncoming tears, the reality of his loss a massive, crushing weight in the center of his chest. "I do not wish to leave you," he whispered, voice breaking. "I swore to myself – to you – that I would never leave you."

Promise me…

He leaned down, laid his forehead against hers, eyes once more sliding shut. "But you would never forgive me, would you?" He nuzzled her, breathing deep of her scent, masked beneath the coppery tang of blood, but still apparent – still there. "And as I have failed you," his voice broke, the words bitter on his tongue, "more than sufficiently for one day, I shall not tempt your disapproval further."

He pulled back, eyes brimming with tears. He stared down at her through their watery burn and finality, swift and cruel, tore at him.

A sob tore from him, eyes slipping shut once more as he dropped his forehead to hers, one hand sliding beneath her, cupping the back of her head and holding her to him – already missing her so much that it choked him.

"I shall do as you asked," he murmured, a lone tear tracing a scalding path down his cheek. "But, my love," he paused, the unintentional confession – too little, too late – breaking him all over again. "My dearest love," his voice trembled around the words, so very different from what he had once dreamt; a bitter end rather than a joyous beginning, "my sweet, savage love…I shall never forgive myself for it. I shall never forgive myself for any of it."

For one last, long moment, he stayed as he was.

Then, with a shuddering sigh, he stood up…pulled away and finally, reluctantly, turned his back on her. Forcing one foot in front of the other, feeling each footfall like a knife to the heart, he crossed over to where the last remaining transwarp beaming device lay, having been carelessly discarded atop an empty medtable in his rush to help…

No. He could not think of her. He would not think of her. Not now.

Steeling himself, he activated the device, listening with dispassionate disinterest as it whirred to life. As it readied itself, he made quick work of enacting the security protocol he had programmed into it, ensuring that the onboard memory would wipe entirely once he was gone. When it was ready, he laid his finger over the trigger, letting his eyes fall closed.

Behind him, the doors began to collapse beneath the onslaught from without, the shouts and curses growing ever louder. By the time the doors finally gave way, allowing Marcus' army to pour into the room, it was almost as if he had never been there at all…

Io Facility

(later that night)

Darkness surrounded her; cradled her. It was easy there, nestled deep, deep down inside that tranquil oblivion. Easy and safe and quiet and just…

Just…wrong.

It taunted her, that wrongness. Dug at her with a stubborn persistence that she couldn't ignore – that she didn't want to ignore. And so, being Rebecca Duval, she chased after it. Followed it up, up, up through all that darkness, struggling her way towards the world beyond her sphere of comfortable nothingness with every ounce of determination that she could muster.

As she fought her way through the quicksand of unconsciousness, awareness began to trickle back in and with it, remembrance.

Remembrance…worry…and pain.

Lots of pain.

The bulk of it – the massive, aching center of it all – was her chest. It throbbed in all kinds of ways that she had never even imagined that it could; far more ways than could be explained by a single stab wound, no matter how fatal. Because it had been fatal, she could absolutely remember that much. She had known it even before the world had faded away.

He had known it too…even if he'd been bound and determined not to admit it.

Khan.

A fear like nothing she had ever known before gripped her and gripped her hard. She'd told him to go. Had he? He had been so raw, so furious – without anyone left to hold him back, God only knew what he might have done.

Please, be alive, she begged him – begged the Universe at large. Please have listened to me just this once…

"Clear this space and clear it now. Carlson, you stay."

Marcus.

His voice cut through the worry, banished the pain, burned off the lingering fog and focused her mind as nothing else could have in that moment. Fury swelled and she embraced it, drawing strength from the blistering scorch of it. Deciding very quickly that it was in her best interest to keep her eyes firmly shut – unconsciousness made a particularly effective cover for eavesdropping, afterall – she slowly relaxed her body and evened out her breathing, hoping she was at least able to manage a close enough facsimile to unconsciousness.

It wasn't nearly as easy as it should have been.

She had truly believed that she hated Alexander Marcus before. But now…

Now, she understood what hatred truly meant.

Now, she wanted his head. Preferably detached from the rest of his miserable, vindictive body.

It certainly wasn't the time for that, though. She was far too weak and in far too much pain to present any kind of real threat at the moment…and at far too great a disadvantage as well, most likely. Testing that theory, she shifted the hand on the opposite side of her body from where it sounded like Marcus was standing, unsurprised to feel the ever so slight pull of a restraint. When a tiny twitch of her corresponding ankle produced the same result, she sighed inwardly.

She definitely wasn't going anywhere or doing anything of her own choosing any time soon. Revenge was simply going to have to wait for a more opportune moment to have its day. Not exactly ideal, but still…it was preferable to nothing at all.

Hopefully it stayed that way.

She wasn't hugely optimistic on that score though – Marcus was keeping her alive at the moment, but she assumed that would change fairly quickly once he'd gotten whatever it was he wanted from her. It wasn't hard to guess that what he wanted probably had something to do with the fact that she was very much alive now when she very much hadn't been before.

"Sir…Admiral…" Carlson's voice – sharp with both exhaustion and frustration – came from just above her. "I don't even know where to start."

Any other time, Duval would have felt bad for being the cause of the Doctor's obvious stress. Right now, she was too angry and in too much pain to give a single damn.

"Luckily, I know exactly where you can start. I want an explanation – a good one. Lieutenant Duval was dead. Now, she's not. How?"

The laugh that elicited from the doctor just had to have pissed Marcus off, and Duval took some small amount of joy from that thought. "I don't…" she stopped again, gave another short, sharp bark of laughter. "Frankly, sir, I have absolutely no idea."

"That's about as far from a good explanation as it gets, Doctor."

Oh, he was pissed. Duval reveled in it, ecstatic to be the cause of his bad mood, if nothing else. At this point, she'd take whatever she could get where he was concerned.

"I'm well aware of that, Admiral," Carlson shot back sharply. "If I had a better one, rest assured, I'd happily give it to you! And maybe if you give me more than a few hours to look into it, I might be able to tell you more. But right now, at this moment, the only thing I can confidently tell you is that Lieutenant Rebecca Duval is alive."

A beat.

"And you're sure she was actually dead?"

"Very much so." Carlson sighed again, sounding absolutely exhausted. "No heartbeat, no pulse, no brain activity, nothing. Now, it's been a bit since I went to medical school, but I'm pretty sure they still classify that as dead, sir."

Marcus reached down then, fingers latching onto her wrist, finding the pulse there. Duval had never been more proud of herself than she was at that moment – she didn't move, didn't flinch, didn't give herself away at all. Of course, that was likely more due to her reflexes being as fried as the rest of her at present, but still…there was nothing wrong with focusing on the positives in life.

"And then what?"

A hand smacked down onto the medtable beside her, the Doctor's frustration made abundantly clear, and this time Duval did flinch very slightly – she held still though, praying that Marcus and Carlson were too focused on each other to pay her any real mind. "And then she wasn't dead anymore! Honestly, Alexander, what more do you want me to tell you?"

"How about how the hell that could be even remotely possible?"

"I've already answered that question a hundred times over the past several hours," Carlson snapped. "My answer hasn't changed and it's not about to change now. If you'd like a different answer the next time you ask the question, my suggestion would be for you to get the hell out of my sickbay. Until you leave me alone and let me do my job, I'm not going to be able to help you!"

Silence…and then, grudgingly…

"Fine. But I expect answers, Leah. Real answers. And I expect to have them quickly."

Carlson said nothing and Duval could hear Marcus moving away. He stopped after only a few steps, feet scuffing on the floor as he turned back. "I think it goes without saying that you'll keep her restrained at all times."

"Of course."

Another pause and Duval could feel the weight of Marcus' gaze upon her. "Keep her under for the time being," he said at last. "If she's conscious, she's a risk. But be ready to wake her up whenever I say so – I've got several things I'd like to discuss with her."

"I'm sure you do." Carlson turned then and Duval could hear the shift of her feet against the floor, heard the slight shift in the sound of her voice. There was a thump, a rattle…and then a tricorder hummed to life. "Before you go…"

"What?"

Marcus' voice came from even further away this time – nearly to the door it sounded like. Carlson was leaning over Duval now, the tricorder chirping away as the doctor continued to scan her.

"If you want accurate answers, you're going to need to give me something a little bit more to go on," she said quietly, the tricorder whirring and beeping away. "I was here when the recovery team brought her in, Alexander. They weren't exactly forthcoming with the details of what they found…"

"Check her blood," Marcus cut in, impatience sharpening his tone, "and check it thoroughly. That should be all the jumping off point you need."

A huff and Duval could feel the breeze as Carlson dropped her arms back to her sides. "If I find anything unusual, I'm going to need more than that to go on."

"If you find anything unusual, I'll give you more than that to go on. But until you find something, we're just going to leave it at that. Understood, Doctor?"

"Understood." A pause – short but significant. "Sir."

"Good. Now if you'll excuse me, I have a hell of a lot of work to do."

More footsteps. A hiss. And then…

The bite of a hypospray against her neck caught her off guard and Duval let out a hiss of her own, only just managing to keep her eyes shut, though her head jerked ever so slightly to the side. A moment later, she heard the clatter as the hypospray was dropped back on the table and then a sudden warmth as Carlson leaned over her.

"If you're gonna try to fake being unconscious, Lieutenant," she said in a rush, her voice a whisper in Duval's ear, "you're gonna need to get a whole lot better at it really quickly. Any other day and Marcus wouldn't have been remotely fooled by that act."

Duval glared up at her as best she could. "Not…quite…at my best," she managed, fighting hard not to grimace at the pain that radiated through her chest. "Been…a day."

Carlson, eyes narrowing, shook her head and huffed out a breath of pure exasperation, pointedly dropping her eyes. "A day," she echoed. "That's one way to put it I guess." She turned away, grabbing up her PADD and tapping away at it. "That was a sedative, by the way. Admiral's strict orders – you'll be kept under for the foreseeable future."

While that was an interesting little nugget of information, Duval very quickly shoved it to the back of her mind. There were far more important things she needed to know.

"Is he…alive?"

The doctor froze at the question – Duval knew the Doctor would be able to hear the fear in it and she was fine with that. She was deeply emotionally invested in the man…she knew it, Carlson knew it – hell, the entire Section knew it. There was no point in even attempting to deny it now.

Slowly, the Doctor's head came up and the look in her eyes had cooled considerably; her expression carefully blank. "Is who alive?"

Duval didn't have the energy for games. Huffing in frustration, she glared up at the doctor – about the only physical demonstration of her irritation that she had the energy for. "Skip…the bullshit," she hissed, feeling the sedative working, dragging at her. "Is…he…alive?"

Carlson didn't even flinch. She stared right back, stone faced. "I don't know. I haven't heard anything about him and I'm sure as hell not going to ask."

Frustration and fear roared up to mix with her anger, twisting her stomach until she felt sick with it. "I…don't…have the patience…for this…"

"That's your problem, Lieutenant," the doctor said quietly as she reached out and palmed her tricorder once more. Adjusting the settings, she turned it back to Duval and began to scan her body. "Not mine."

The sedative had its hooks in her now, and Duval fought against it, keeping her eyes open through sheer force of will. "I…need…to know…"

Carlson was focused on her PADD again, and there was a faint hint of a frown on her face now as she read. "I can't help you anymore, Rebecca," she said finally – and with a finality that was unmistakable. Looking up, she met Duval's eyes, her own expression caught firmly between disappointment and sorrow. "After today, I'm not sure anyone can anymore."

Blinking, breathing deep, Duval kept her eyes locked on Carlson's now definitely frowning profile, refusing to give in to the spiraling pull of the drugs. "I…don't want…help," she ground out, vaguely taking note of Carlson reaching for another hypospray. "I just want…information."

Without looking at her this time, Carlson turned back around and pressed the hypospray to her neck, the opposite side of the first. "I already told you, Lieutenant – I can't help you. Not anymore."

"Can't…or won't?"

Carlson ignored her, moving away from her again.

"Can't…or…won't, Doctor?"

Back now turned firmly to her, Carlson gave a long, low sigh. "Both. After today, there's not much of a difference, Lieutenant."

This second hypospray was clearly more potent, and before she could even begin to formulate a response, Duval's eyes rolled shut and she was under again, fading back into the darkness…