Greetings III [18+]

Posted on 23 Mar 2013 @ 10:37pm by Crewman Athlen & Crewman Jaeih
Edited on on 23 Mar 2013 @ 10:52pm

3,465 words; about a 17 minute read

Mission: Episode 03 - Frontier
Location: USS Galileo: Holodeck 2
Timeline: MD4 0820 Hours

[ON]

Jaeih watched his shadow on the wall as she continued to force breath out of her nose in quick bursts; the air burned her lungs and pummeled her ribs. The taste of blood, hers and his, was tart and sweet on her lips and tongue. Words. He knew nothing of the Romulan way. Others would beat them into corners again and again; they rose despite it, insidious and unrelenting. It was what made them great: their cunning. This fight was not the one she needed. Oh, it had cleared her mind, but even a success would not have eased the savage beating of her heart nor the deep desire for blood. Faevren was the one who should have paid a cost in blood. He would yet have to pay that price. It was as inevitable as the Fethraei breaking and beating against its shores, widening year by year. She licked her lips, schooled her features, and rolled onto her back wounded and weak. "You show great skill and generosity. Your Clan would be proud."

Athlen clasped his hands behind his back and bowed. "I think that you need to talk to Faevren. I don't think you would do yourself a favor by killing him. Even if he deserves it. He is Liyar's doctor. He'd find out." Athlen decided then to apply a little bit of wry logic. "If talking proves unsuccessful or without use, the option still exists. But you can't get an explanation from a dead man." Can you return to life what you kill, what the Vulcans said, but Athlen was neither Vulcan, nor Romulan.

"Explanation," she mused, then spat a mouthful of blood to the side. "What makes you think I'm interested in one?"

"You're not," Athlen shrugged. "Which is why I'm telling you this. I know that your honor demands that he pay for what he's done. I know this. It is a strong, powerful rage inside of you." He nodded down at her bloodied form. "And to be perfectly honest, I get it. He betrayed you. Killing him, might satisfy your honor. But it will hurt your position here. Liyar would know. Your training, mental and physical, training doesn't matter with him. He doesn't even know he's doing it. It's -" he shrugged a hand upward, "It's unstable, and therefore potentially risky. But he is close, to Liyar. I know this. An explanation," he repeated with arched eyebrows. "Or an experiment in Words. The option of killing is always there. Every moment of every day, we have the Choice. But words, can be powerful in their own right. I would ask, and I recognize that you are my Elder, and that you may find my opinion worthless, nevertheless. I would ask, that you consider speaking with him first."

She watched him from where she lay; somehow, despite the blood and rapidly coagulating bruises, she appeared controlled. Carefully, she reached down into the depth inside of her that threatened to boil over and extinguish all that irritated her and brushed her rage into a compartment of her mind for safe-keeping until she had time to deal with it privately. "This is the boon you call from victory?"

Athlen nodded once. "It is."

Moments dripped by, like the blood from her lips, in contemplation. "Very well. I will hear the traitor's words." She lifted her chin, regally - an action which would have been more effective had it been executed standing. "Now get me a medkit. You seem to have broken my collarbone."

The Rigelian arched his eyebrows in an unconscious expression that most equalled, woops. It was an interesting juxtaposition of disposition, despite the fact that he could clearly hold his own, defend himself, he appeared deferential as ever, even after victory. He walked over to the computer console and took out a medical kit from the bottom shelf, using the computer display unit to log the session's end time before shutting it down and returning to the Romulan. He knelt down beside her and flipped open the tricorder first, scanning her. He frowned to himself, quirking a lip downward thoughtlessly before detaching the portable regenerator and bone knitter devices and he pressed his fingers lightly against her collarbone, just enough to examine. It was definitely broken. Athlen switched a setting on the component in his hand and then ran it over the sharp edge in even strokes, while a blue light flashed, carefully crafting her bone back together, tiny pieces of cells and structures meshing and folding as though natural. He handed her the dermal regenerator when he was done and took a separate one out of the kit for himself, running it over his face, neck and arms and used a medical wipe to get rid of the remaining blood. She might not use it, but he knew it was poor form to leave the holodeck covered in blood and bruises.

"T'an dera." She ran the dermal regenerator over her body, easing bruises and aches before they could become problematic. "We don't have a name for it," she added, climbing to her feet and dropping the used mediwipe to clean her blood off the floor.

Athlen smiled, rising with her. "I think it's pretty unique to Rigelians. We tend to boil things down to their more basic elements." Baser, some might say, but it worked well for their planet. "T'an dera is a way of exercising Catharsis with no meditative aspects necessary between the participants. It's different than assault, or a spar, or training." He shrugged mildly. "What do Romulans do when the Rage overcomes them?"

"If it's a personal matter, we fight until it's passed." Jaeih leveled a mild, amused look on him. "If it's a matter of integrity to the Empire, we eradicate the wrong like infection from a wound." As though picking up a dropped handkerchief, all grace and guile, she bent and picked up the bloody mediwipe, folded it twice, and pocketed it. "That's one half of my legacy, in any case." She kissed his cheek, squeezing his hand. "Do your people accept - I don't know another word for it - katerdis, good wishes, tributes, commendations - for good deeds done in the line of duty?"

"Yes," Athlen said, "We call it lieves karaik, commendation," he translated, brain still working in overdrive even as he tilted his head curiously. His hand tingled where she had squeezed it, psi-points resonated, small sparks against his mind. It was so strange, to him, how they'd all grown so separately, his mind never seemed to stop working, apparently, even though he was currently at a loss for words.

"Where I grew up," she told him, all unblinking, a few smudges of jade darkening her virescent skin. "We offer katerdis two-fold. Once, to the actor, and once to their family. I will speak with yours." She straightened his uniform idly, licking her thumb to rub out a dribble of blood from his chest.

Athlen, counterpoint to her, blinked a few times in a row, wide eyed. He didn't have a response to that, maybe he hadn't heard it at all. He was captivated, in a strange kind of way. "Thank-you," he said, and it might have been the right thing to say, but he wasn't exactly sure what he was responding to. He glanced down once where her fingers had touched him before meeting her eyes again. Your family, his brain then deigned to remind him. Speak to his family. He arched his eyebrows. "My family are not like me. You may find them unpleasant. Although they carry well intentions," he peeked to the side again. "Sometimes that's easy to forget." He smiled wryly at her. He stilled her hand with the briefest of touches, light and hardly there, rather without realizing it, settling his fingertips on the top of her palm before she could pull away completely. He brushed his thumb over her knuckle once before nodding solemnly again, realizing what he had done and clasping his hands behind his back. "Thank-you," he repeated.

She listened to the upper registers of his entranced state of mind, his hand on her own, as her tongue slid over her teeth. "It is not a matter of my impressions of them. It is for them to know of your contribution to the well-being of another." Her eyes glinted, menacing and pleased at once. "I will allow you to return to your work in the meanwhile."

Athlen nodded again, sufficiently recovered so it appeared and professional once again. "Yes." He offered her a small wave in farewell.

Jaeih caught his waving hand with her own and pulled him to her, the fingers of her other hand sinking into his hair. Her mouth hovered for a breath before his, the rough, biting hunger fresh and eager just under the surface of her calm stare. Her eyes were a mere few inches from his, intent. "I could make you bleed," she whispered against his lips, "in a way you would enjoy. In a way you would never forget." She looked into him through the windows of his eyes, her pupils expanding second by second, absorbing him.

Athlen's eyes were wide meeting hers, but the hesitancy from earlier had vanished, since his brain had happily decided it was apparently totally fine with being impaled on a rusty spike, or stabbed in his sleep. He inhaled sharply, allowing himself to be moved closer to her. He tilted his head to the side under her grip and twisted his wrist under hers, lightly drawing one of his nails down over her fingers. "Those are words," he challenged quietly, made reckless by the heat which had moved beyond gathering in his hands and chest, spilling down through his body.

"Words," she whispered, "fell emperors, sway allies, and tame rebellions." Smiling, not with her lips, she inhaled his exhale and loosed the snarling targra. He felt things. She let him feel: rage, hollow, fight, lust, the bite of nails, knives, gnawing flesh torn asunder from an onslaught leading to ecstasy. She knew what it was to live completely in the moment. She knew what it was to hold her fervency at bay, compartmentalizing it into a neatly labeled container in her mind. She balanced both lives, both methods of life, as she did her sanity and her loyalty - on the tip of a knife; the knife was the only weapon she knew well. Closer, messier, impaling, and penetrating; the fire of hatred was another passion to be embraced. It stumbled into and out of love. Twins of bucking, grasping energy to be used for grander purposes and personal pleasures. "I would run my tongue over the contours of your brain, to taste your thoughts. I would hold the slithering, writhing muscle of your heart and bring you."

A laugh tumbled forward from him, for what reason, mysterious. It wasn't a thing of mocking, nor even amusement. He wanted to laugh, so he did. He showed her this in return, there was no compartmentalization. It was a sieve, every minute of every day, in and back out, pushing and reflecting against others, all emotions were to be accepted. Examined. Appreciated. Hate. Love. Joy. Arousal, he let her feel, perhaps it was the source of his amusement. It had been a while since he'd felt it, in the moment, for another. He'd felt it, of course, but had no outlet, not in Starfleet, not many crewmen were his type, and those that were, usually balked at the prospect, so he'd resigned himself to meditation. Felt her amusement at that. Meditation is a highly - silly-thoughts, he decided he would stop thinking now, as the force of her thoughts and desires flew through him. He let it flow up and out, absorbed, an endless space of Catharsis. Felt her satisfaction at it as it hit his own and merged through, death and blood and gore and something deeper, that sent spikes through him, it was its own entity in many ways, like an animal pacing the cage. The bond, Marivael, it was all there. She was there, too, curious, the mindspace didn't resonate with anger or betrayal, but something akin to interest. There was no hiding, in his mind, Jaeih did not need to rifle through, it was all there. Past. Present. Future. To examine at will, depth without effort, dive in. They were the threads of society, and the threads went through him, through them, through space and time, one was only carried along them. She was all seething energy, boiling, containment, pressure, and that was good, too. It could be. She knew that. Life wasn't all about pain, it couldn't be, there was greatness in every corner of every experience if one only looked for it. He arched his eyebrows in the waking world, silently daring her to do just that.

She felt the woman, the bond, and somewhere on Vulcan, Tetrik looked up from an analysis of soil compositions. He'd never expected her to be like the Vulcan brides his family had tried to tie him to. He'd never wanted her to be anything but the halfling she was. Four minds, two bodies, Jaeih inhaled Athlen again - and slithered through his open mind, piecing together moments of pleasure, pain, and ardor from his fantasies and memories. She unravelled them before him, her lips just barely touching his. Soft beds, hard floors, agony in stillness, exhaustion, writhing, heat, cold, slick, soft, walls that creaked as though to give under pressure, wax burning then cooling, welts, bruises, the tenderness of fingertips, breath, flesh parting like butter on a warm spring day, salt, jacuarin juice dripping over contours, pulse, rise, fall - Tetrik's presence pulsed inside her mind then vanished, shuttered away behind barriers. It wouldn't do for him in the middle of a laboratory with others. Jaeih smiled. Velvet, silk, water, honey, ocean depths, river pouring, cores of planets, rages of suns, will, withstood, rise, yes, searing awareness-

Athlen wasn't sure, and didn't ruminate, on where they had moved, how, or even why. He wasn't in the physical world anymore, he could take her feelings, feel them, kicked them up through them, it wasn't metaphor in his head. It was pulsating, hearts, souls, bodies. He pressed her up against the wall and stared down at her, eyes dark. "You're trying to provoke me." But there was nothing to provoke. So he thought, and Rigelian cultural norms being what they were, he couldn't conceive of another way of thinking. He let it out, through him, no restraint, without unleashing, either. There. Awareness. Let her feel it, too. He carefully sorted down mental fingers, touched the core part of her, let himself down and through. Plucked. Vibrations. Heartbeat.

"Yes." Nothing to provoke, she thought wryly, yet she felt the holodeck's wall pressed against her spine and his breath quick and rough against her lips. The present was a moment that stretched in all directions undefined but by the rhythm of muscles throbbing and blood rushing riverlike through veins. She wanted to lick his eyes, rake teeth over skin, pull hair, feel the texture of his brain- Vibrations. Heartbeat. Shake. Tremble. Quiver. Waver. Shudder. Throb. Pulsate. Rock. Resonate. Rumble. Reverberate. Tempo. Drumming. Cadence. Pounding.

Awareness. Force meeting waves, dispersing in ripples. "You won't succeed," he muttered under his breath, running the edges of his fingers over her face, across her jaw. There's nothing to - it disappeared within the thrashing echo of his own oscillating emotions, a riotous storm flashing through his body and mind. She thought too much. Talked, too much. Words. A humorous switch in their positions. Perspectives changing, shifting, movement, matching the outside world. Skin sliding across skin, maybe, he could feel it, but he felt something chained down, responding, shaking, buzzing from within. Something that Marivael knew was there, but rarely wanted to tap into. Jaeih did. He could feel that. She wanted to rip it away. It shook and rattled in his mind. Emotions were to be accepted. Explored. But Marivael felt fear. Fear and blood and hiding. It quaked through him. He wasn't even sure if he understood. Jaeih's mind was a bright point against his. Her name was a whisper. Yes, he knew her. Not like Marivael. It didn't need to be. He accepted the experience, letting it form, and his face darkened visibly as he moved against her, turning her around against the wall and gripped her hands in one of his. His other was at her hip. No hurry. No rush. He let his mind sift through hers, within her. Mental was physical. Permeating. Insinuating, winding down, fire like lightning through them both. Image. Sound. Sensation. Piercing. Deeper. He didn't need a body. Or air. Breathed it out across her neck. One. The same. Two. "The security chief is probably watching this right now. He'd get enjoyment out of arresting us. Especially me. We should go." He spoke low in her ear. Still in control. Nothing to provoke. It was a joke, now. A challenge. A rise. He wasn't afraid. Fear couldn't exist simultaneously. He felt it dissolve away. Reckless.

She didn't struggle in his grip. Her smile was cat-like, tasting cream. She didn't ask about the security chief, the arrest, the information was there bright as sunlight through every point of contact. Arresting. So many connotations. Some of them delectable. Her pulse was an engine in full throttle. Another scrap. He'd helped her to exorcise her fury of the moment, then build the fire from embers again. Another type of burn. So much politeness in the face of blood and broken bones. She wanted to wipe the floor with him. She could use him to polish her desk. Did she have one? She'd have to find out. She exhaled against the wall, feeling the pressure of him mentally and physically at her back. "Where."

He remained, his body hovering over hers, holding little back. Wipe the floor. She'd have to try. Again. But she wanted this. She provoked it. Tried to. There was nothing - there was something. Always something, imploring him to seek out, accept, overcome. He'd seen enough snarling rage to last him an eternity, but this was different. Awareness. Balance, and not. Upside down, inside out. Through and inside and between. Snaking down, mental and physical, electric. "Quarters. That way." Then he was gone, like a ghost, unfocused and pleased, eyes shining with it. He gestured toward the door and fixed his hair idly before shutting down the program leading the way out.

She watched him go, flexing her hand as his residual heat around her wrists faded. Neck elongated. Shoulders back. Hair smoothed. She twitched her uniform straight and crossed her wrists at the small of her back. When she stepped from the holodeck, her expression was bored, eyes calm as mountains.

She followed the Rigelian at a distance, idly flexing her fingers to release a mounting tension in her muscles.

The doors to Athlen's quarters swished shut as they entered. The length of time it took between the holodeck and deck 3 hadn't seemed to diminish any of the exigency which had built up since the moment they'd begun the t'an dera exercise. It didn't either allow him to release the small tremors and cracks that splintered through his equilibrium, weaving through the tapestry of violence and impatience, only tamed through a lifetime of work. It did, however, give him an excuse to calm his body, and so he entered his unoccupied quarters at a leisurely pace with Jaeih close behind and turned, a warm smile breaking out over his features, nearly erasing any indication of the volatility underneath his skin.

As the door closed behind her, Jaeih studied his grin - all warm and welcoming. She strode to him, roundabout, a cat circling prey. No one to save you now. The purple-hued diplomatic officer's jacket was peeled open; it slipped off her shoulders, falling to the ground; sloughed skin in the wake of a serpent.

Athlen watched her in return as she approached him, all lithe angles and lines, if she could have swooped overhead and descended down, enveloped him in tantalizing darkness, she might have. Rather than frighten him, send him running, it shoved a wedge between the gates, letting the darkness through, curling fire. Who said anything about saving?

[OFF]

Crewman Athlen
Sociologist, SSC
USS Galileo

Crewman Jaeih
Diplomatic Officer, DDT/SDD
USS Galileo

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