Stay I

Posted on 10 Jan 2013 @ 5:07am by
Edited on on 10 Jan 2013 @ 5:10am

4,826 words; about a 24 minute read

Mission: Episode 02 - Resupply
Location: USS Galileo: Corridors
Timeline: MD16 1550

ON:

Liyar resisted the urge, truly resisted, to punch something. He hadn't done it in years, since he was a teenager, but still the urge persisted on. How dare Sekhet employ such tactics. Liyar wasn't just upset, or angry. He was furious, and the blackened, miserable aura followed him around as he stalked down the halls to his office, angrily grabbing the work PADDs and then storming back out. You could almost see the dark cloud thundering over his head if you looked hard enough. He turned a corner sharply and headed toward the turbolift. He entered it and jammed his finger against the close button.

"Deck two," he called again. This was private. It was not his fault the counselor was incompetent. He was perfectly capable of handling his own business. He did not need to be on Tarinol, he did not need to crawl to Dr. Ni Dhuinn, who rampaged at him for no logical reason, and show her a medical history that would require questions and he by law should not have had to answer! They would judge him, just like his peers had always judged him, wondering when the day would come that he would eventually snap even after he had proven he was good enough to ascend, good enough to teach, good enough to work in the V'Shar. He was not ill!

He raged internally, unaware that the doors had opened again to reveal the taller than average, but still shorter frame of the science officer. He willfully forced himself to calm down, unclenching his fists behind his back and inhaling deeply. "Lieutenant Panne," he greeted lowly, nodding a bit in acknowledgment.

Maenad's brain was computing so much at once that she had to stop herself. She got off the lift on deck two and immediately went still in the corridor. She felt betrayed, like Starfleet had had second thoughts about her ability to run the fleet's leading science vessel. Her duties were now split, and she had less responsibility than she had had before. The ship's scientific research was to be done under someone else's discretion while still apparently being under her supervision. That sounded more like coddling than reality, however, because when it came down to the letter, research was no longer her field. Being a researcher by trade, and a damned good one if the captain hadn't noticed, she had accepted this assignment so that she could continue her research, so that she could make more of a name for herself, and so she could do what she was prone to do: explore, learn, to better herself and by extension scientific knowledge as a whole.

Why hadn't Saalm, who in her mind was no longer Lirha, consulted with her about this, about her abilities, about her thoughts of having the most crucial aspect of her department given to someone else? Why hadn't she refused the transfer? Why didn't she make this Pendleton simply a primary assistant of hers? Starfleet and Saalm couldn't trust her with supervising her own department's work, it was abundantly clear, and she was deeply hurt by this revelation. Why didn't she stand up for her? When she had first come aboard, Captain Saalm had told her that she was not going to judge her on her previous assignments, but she was certainly feeling judged now. She was now less than she was, and there was not a thing that she could do about it. Standing there in the corridor, she was very close to gathering her things and leaving Starfleet forever. At least the academic community respected her and, although it might have been brutal, it was honest. She could teach at any university she wanted, she thought, and she would have her own courses and her own curriculum. She would be given free-range as she saw fit. She knew when to quit; she was better than this, and she was certainly above this kind of heartless treatment. She'd been broken enough in her life. She had to draw the line somewhere.

Just before she had decided that she would be sitting in her Nantes living room that evening sending out resumes and letters of intent, the swoosh of the opening turbolift behind her and that familiar voice that was Mister Liyar spun her around. Her damaged eyes met his honest ones and she held them longer than was normal for a greeting. Her lips quivered. She opened her mouth to say something, but nothing came. She might never see him again, and that thought made her acutely aware that if she were to never see the Vulcan again she would be just as damaged as she then looked.

Glossed and wet, her screaming eyes darted between his, hoping for something that she could not name, but pleaded for anyway. Finally, her lungs gave rise to speech. "Liyar," she said, "How would you feel if you never saw me again?" She had called him Liyar, dropping the prefix for the first time since she had known him.

Liyar felt his brain come to a halt as she whirled about and faced him. There may, in fact, have been the sound of one of the old rail cars he used to jump screeching to a grinding stop as the gears of his mind abruptly sputtered and closed. This was demonstrated in only a blink. For the first time in his entire internal diatribe, he realized that Sekhet might have been correct in ordering the psi-test as the full scale of her turbulent emotions crashed over him. While he'd come to recognize her chaotic emotional state as normal for her, this seemed far beyond the scope. Even, of those which occurred when Kiri had collapsed. He let out a breath that he hadn't realized he'd been holding and stepped out of the lift, aware that it was stalled for any other passengers, a brief glimpse of concern touched his eyes, his own emotional state rather volatile as it was.

"Never see you again?" he repeated her words, eyebrows drawn together. He didn't know what had prompted it, but he could tell there was something despairing in the way she'd said it. "I would," he started, and paused while he tried to get his thoughts in order, make some sense of what was happening. Whatever previous rage he'd been feeling seemed to dissipate, or maybe it was forgotten. He could feel it humming out of her, a negative-tone blaring through his consciousness. "I would feel regret," he answered honestly after a few more moments of silence. "What has prompted this?" he asked. "Why do you believe you are leaving?" he asked again, maybe a bit redundantly, but she sounded so certain, he couldn't help but wonder if something horrible had happened. The sensations he could feel from her end certainly alluded to it.

Her eyes had never left his. She had to be absolutely certain. And she was. If she'd ever smiled in her entire life, she did right here in that corridor, outside that turbolift, in front of this Vulcan. "Oh," she sputtered, then whispered "Mister Liyar," because if she'd used her voice it would have made an embarrassing sob. The wetness in her eyes released into tears that streamed down her cheeks. She wrapped her arms around him in what was probably one of the tightest hugs she'd ever given anyone. "Thank you," she said after a long time.

Liyar blinked again. "I do not understand," he confessed, awkwardly patting her shoulder with his unoccupied right hand while she attempted to crush every bone in his body. Which he had learned was a Terran expression of affection. She had done it once before. It was, a little familiar to a fleeting mental touch. Reassurance, or connection. First she had hit him with a gigantic wall of horrifying anguish, and now, the emotion was reversed somewhat. "What has happened?" he asked (now, she was crying, which didn't help the confusion front). "You cannot be leaving," he said, though it was meant to be a question, it was a little flat.

Maenad released him, sniffing and wiping her eyes in her palms, then the back of her hand, and then on her fingers. She even used the arm of her uniform. She knew that Liyar often felt her thoughts. Being what he would call psi-null and what she would call 'normal', she was not at the moment bothered by it. There was no sense in getting angry with someone over a bodily function that was as to them as hearing was to her. He probably knew everything, she thought. Well, the gist of it. Still, she remained smiling. Her makeup was smeared and she probably looked a little scary, but she knew that around Liyar that didn't matter. He didn't judge. He couldn't. He was honest.

"I," she started. "I'm not-- I'm not going anywhere." She breathed a heavy sigh of relief. The corridor was not a place for the kind of conversation that they were about to have, so she pressed her lips together, trying to both look away from his eyes and suppress her beaming smile. "Would you like to come to my quarters? I mean, if you aren't busy with your foolish economic projections," she was only joking. "We can talk there."

Liyar nodded and gestured outward for her to lead the way. "You did not disrupt me," he started, and then simply ended with that. They made their way down the hall and he followed her through her doors. Once they shut, he leaned against the wall, regarding her pensively, waiting for her to speak. Why would she leave? Who had given her that impression? It did not make sense. It had to be someone. The Galileo was hours away from launch. He hadn't noted any particular distress in the science department or the Galileo itself. In fact, that morning, he'd walked out of her quarters with the lingering sensation of her contentment. What had changed?

Maenad left Liyar where he stood leaning against the wall, heading for the sofa. She fell into the corner of it and, after kicking off her shoes, threw up her heels onto the coffee table, letting her skirt hang from her legs in the gap between the couch. She was still upset, but Liyar's presence helped her. She held her temples between an index finger and thumb as she retold what had happened during her meeting with Captain Saalm. "Captain Saalm has informed me that we have a chief research officer coming aboard. His name is Lieutenant (Junior Grade) Jacob Pendleton. He is going to be responsible for all scientific research and development on the ship. He will have full use of my labs, facilities, and resources. He will also have access to my staff, which I will have to delegate to him. He will be a member of the senior staff, and as such he will attend senior staff briefings. He will apparently report to me, but he will also be independent of me and independent of my department." She lowered her hand. "Without responsibility over research or exclusive jurisdiction over my department, I believe my role as chief science officer has been compromised." She slowly shook her head, staring across the room the Vulcan's direction. "I feel helpless, and I don't know what to do."

Liyar pressed the tips of his fingers together in a pyramid. "I do not understand." It was the catch-phrase of the day. "If he is to be subordinate to you, how is he to be independent of you?" Liyar contemplated that internally. He could not comprehend the difference in their roles. "This sounds like a very redundant position," the Vulcan finally said, tilting his head and moving to sit down on the arm of a chair across from the couch. "Have you expressed your concerns to Captain Saalm? How are the dynamics of your ability to command your department going to be affected by this alteration?"

It actually made her feel better that Liyar did not understand. For someone with his apparent clarity of vision to be just as confused as she was gave her a bar to compare herself with. "He is not subordinate," she corrected. "He reports to me with what he is doing and what he needs allocated to him. In many ways, I feel as if the science department will be subordinate to him. And yes, Captain Saalm informed me of all of this just now." She sighed, wondering if she had been too cold with her. Probably not, she decided. "I was very short with her. I expressed my concerns more clearly than I perhaps should have, but I think that I was justified. She reassured me that my duties will not be affected, but I wonder whether she knows what she is talking about," she both hear and feel the jaded iciness in her own voice. "I am a researcher. My department researches." Maenad threw up her hands in a frustrated resignation. She sniffed.

"I assumed so," Liyar said. "Have you spoken to this individual as of yet? Perhaps they have a more comprehensive understanding of what they believe they are to do. It is possible his tasks may be delegated to less immediate areas of concern," Liyar pointed out.

Maenad waited a moment before responding. It was possible that Liyar was right, but she doubted it. "I feel betrayed," she told him. "I feel Captain Saalm has no faith in me. I feel like Starfleet thinks I am unsuitable for the position. That was why I asked you about leaving; how am I supposed to perform like this? If my title is only a token, then what am I supposed to be?" Her head was starting to swim again as she could feel herself becoming worked up, so she stopped talking and took a few deep breaths through her nose.

Liyar felt the words, as the Terrans might have said, hit home, and nodded. He had his fair share of people having no faith in him over the past few hours. He folded his hands over one another and pressed the tips to his chin. "I believe that it would be a loss to the department here, were you to depart. You are a highly capable scientist. I do concur that there is a distinct concern with this individual's position. His duties and requirements must be made clearer. Your jurisdiction over his movements must be outlined in detail. You cannot have half of your department doing the work that you are meant to do," he said, and the confusion in his voice was evident now. "Neither can they do something separate to what you are instructing."

Maenad nodded and blushed a little as she flicked her wrist in Liyar's direction. She knew she was a highly capable scientist. Even in her current condition, even with her now feeling worthless and unappreciated by everyone and everything but Liyar, she still knew that. She agreed with everything that he had said, but it was out of her hands. "Are you sure that you have time for all of this?" she asked him. "It seems like I keep running into and dragging all my worst problems with me."

"It appears that my time is not at a premium," Liyar said blankly. "Counselor Carlisle revoked my duty clearance. It is pending an extended evaluation. I no longer have any pressing concerns." He decided he delivered that very calmly, though his eyes went a little colder.

The Vulcan's ability to just say that like he did, like he were talking about a bus schedule or something, transferred the stress onto Maenad. She allowed the back of her head to recline over the cushion she was sitting against. The air in her lungs deflated as she sunk back and looked out through the top of her slanted window. It was exceedingly rare that an officer was prevented from serving because of a psych evaluation. Either Liyar was in some serious trouble or Carlisle was incompetent, she thought.

She had quickly figured out for herself that Liyar was unlike any Vulcan she had ever met, but was he so different that he was unfit for duty? How well did she know him? Not that well, but she thought she had a good idea of who he was. "Why?" she asked him. Her eyes had closed, but she leaned over the back of the sofa.

"I failed to answer a question," Liyar replied flatly. It was the best answer he could come up with, as far as he understood the situation. "She was inquiring into my personal affairs. As I am Vulcan, it is contradictory to my nature to divulge such information frivolously. She states it is a necessary part of the evaluation." He let out a breath. "Counselor Sekhet took my referral, and changed the status to conditional. Unfortunately, it appears he is no less respectful of my privacy." And now he had two, possibly three or even four people poking around where they weren't wanted, if Blake and the medical staff were also to be informed. He shook his head.

Maenad opened her eyes and looked at him, sitting up straight. Her legs were still on the table, however. "Come and sit," she patted the empty spot on the couch. It seemed to her like Liyar had been difficult and Carlisle was only trying to do her job, but she didn't want to make any suggestions yet. "What did she ask you?"

Liyar walked over and sat down, posture impeccable as ever. "Simply what I stated. She desired to know my emotional perceptions of events. I assume she believes that exploring emotions comprehensively is healthy to Vulcans."

"Like what?" she asked, a distant smirk forming. "What personal question did she ask that you most did not want to answer?"

Liyar was stubbornly silent. He did not think he was difficult, or resistant, or any other nonsense Sekhet had come up with. Hedging a little in his head, he relented, enough to answer her question. ''My perception of my difficulties with outworlders. As I had already given her a suitable answer, her only motivation was an emotional exposition. I informed her that was private and I did not wish to discuss it.''

So Carlisle wanted to know what Liyar thought of non-Vulcans and he didn't want to say. She sighed quietly, thinking that was a ridiculous question for him to avoid. It was a loaded question, but she didn't know why it would bother him so much. "Mister Liyar, my impression of psychological evaluations is that they just want to know if you have clarity of mind. They ask stupid questions that sometimes make you hate yourself, but you just answer them anyway. If you answer questions, even if you lie, you will pass. I have lied in all of my evaluations and have never failed one."

''As a Vulcan, it is important to me to attempt honesty as much as is possible. However,'' he admitted, ''There may be some veracity to that statement. It did not seem that Counselor Carlisle was genuinely concerned about my perception, only her own interpretation. Nevertheless, I do not believe I would be very... capable of it.'' He looked up, tilting his head.

"Of course she is not personally invested in your problems. Nor in mine, nor anyone else's. I find counselling to be both incredibly dishonest and beneficial at the same time. My view is if they're going to pretend to care about me, I'll give them the satisfaction of making their job a little easier." She laughed quietly. "But, that's not my point. Just say the minimal possible response that you think would allow her to move to the next question. Or, change the question so that you become to the one in control of the session." She looked to the ceiling in thought, her hands in her lap. "If she asks you about difficulty with outworlders, which is an incredibly vague question, ask her to be specific. You have different impressions of each race you encounter, so how can you give a single response toward all of them? You seem to like me and I'm an outworlder, but there are other humans who are also outworlders I'm sure you don't like. You have different impressions of Romulans than you do Rigelians, Cardassians - everyone. Give a simple non-aggressive response to each of them and I'm sure she will move on." Maenad shrugged.

"Indeed. I did attempt to answer the question passively, but she did not accept the response I gave. I suppose I will have ample time to, practice." He was supposed to report twice a week. He wondered internally how he managed to wind up in this situation. He blinked his eyes upward before settling them back on her again. "What do you think you will do with regards to Lieutenant Pendleton?" he asked, apparently deciding to use that changing the subject advice as early as possible. "You stated that you were considering leaving this vessel."

Upon hearing her own implication spoken back to her, she realised how ridiculous she had acted. Well, had she? As the thoughts came back to her and the ready room replayed in her mind, she felt her anger coming back. "I would rather serve where I have the full confidence of my superiors," she said flatly.

"It will be important for you to work with Captain Saalm and Lieutenant Pendleton to draw the lines with regard to his position and his duties," he agreed with a small nod. "Determining your boundaries and reactions for this assignment can be its own test of leadership," he pointed out. "Whether or not you have their confidence does not reflect whether or not you deserve it. It may be possible to resolve the situation." What that was, he couldn't say. He knew he did not understand hardly anything about the emotional implications of what was happening.

Maenad sat quietly for a good minute, hardly moving. She was blank. She picked at the cuticle around her right thumb until it started bleeding enough to make her stop. "You're right," she finally said. "I will continue on as normal," she said. "And if either of them has a problem, I will deal with them." She turned her head to face him, to look into his gentle brown eyes. Were they gentle? Were they anything? Well, she thought they were. "I still think this is unfair."

"Yes," Liyar said, as if that were quite an established fact. "On Vulcan, such a situation would constitute a challenge of command," he revealed, injecting a small bit of wryness purposefully into the statement. "Which would result in physical competition. Fortunately, this is not Vulcan. A challenge to your command in Starfleet is a test of your abilities in its own right. I believe you have the ability to handle the situation. It is not fair, or easy, but it is possible," he said, looking back at her pensively.

Blushing a little, Maenad looked away from him with a thin smile. "You're too kind to me," she said faintly. "Physical competition?" she said after a moment. "That doesn't seem logical. What if one is legitimately the better candidate but is physically weaker?"

"My statements are logical," Liyar 'reminded' her, without any ire. "And you are correct. It is not logical," Liyar agreed. "Between a superior and subordinate officer, a social contract exists that demands a certain level of..." he looked around as if attempting to pick out the word. "Respect. Challenges in that way are very rare, but they do occur, most commonly in families. The 'legitimately better'," he repeated, "Opponent is the one who retains the most clarity when the situation occurs. If they are capable of defending themselves and taking ahold of the situation, their abilities are validated. As you say, the premise is rather illogical. Most Vulcans never experience such an event in their lifetime." It was why there were many who tended to have their lives dictated to them, falling into a specific social order designed by the way their planet simply survived and moved. Quite simply, most Vulcans didn't feel the urge to go against basic social conditioning.

"Have you?" Maenad turned back to face him. "Have you ever been challenged, or have you ever challenged anyone in this way?" She was legitimately curious.

"Once," Liyar said with a nod. "The event was precipitated by a decision on my part to directly defy my parents' wishes."

"You?" she asked, a little excitement creeping into her voice. She drew in one of her legs to sit on it, leaving the other on the coffee table. It made her skirt crumple highly up her legs, but she didn't notice, nor would she have cared. "What did you do? Did you win?"

"Me," Liyar said dryly. He imagined that most people would find that amusing. People had, he noticed, a misconception about Vulcans, that they were boring. "There was no 'winner', but I believe that I would have been classified the loser by any impartial judge. My mother intervened shortly before a fatal blow occurred. I rejected my father's command for me to ascend immediately upon reaching the age of majority. I planned on attending the Vulcan Science Academy instead."

"A fatal blow?" Maenad asked. "Your father would have killed you?" She couldn't hide her disapproval.

Liyar realized at that moment that it wasn't exactly common knowledge to outworlders, this aspect of their functioning. It wasn't logical. The Shi'kahri were always more metropolitan, mainstream. They wouldn't discuss it. But for Liyar, it had been a normal part of his life in Miri'kahr. Hiding such a thing under the veneer of logic did not make sense to him. "Yes," Liyar said matter-of-factly, but it was a little quieter than the last bit. He had no idea how they'd ended up on this particular subject, but he kept his face neutral as he elaborated. "I challenged his authority. This triggered the Rage and culminated in combat."

Maenad tilted her head a bit. "Well, good thing that he didn't," she said softly.

"I often think so." Liyar folded his hands over one another again. He wondered, looking at her, it seemed as though she genuinely cared. He would not have expected that when they first met. He knew that he would very much regret it if she were to leave, and found he was irrationally pleased that she was going to be staying. In true custom, this revelation came with about the same degree of excitement one might give a stray rock.

"I would like to think that your mother intervened because she loved you, but that might be my human bias." She thought, looking at him again. She didn't have children or any siblings, so she didn't know either way, but she thought that somewhere in Vulcans there was familial love. There had to be some kind of love between a mother and her son.

Liyar pressed the tips of his fingers to his chin. "Most Vulcans will tell you they do not experience love. It is an emotion, and according to Terrans it is a particularly powerful one, and therefore not something Vulcans are inclined to. However, from my own experience, I do not believe Vulcans truly comprehend the concept," he admitted calmly, not belying the regret his words seemed to portray at face value.

Maenad was still watching him as he spoke. "Yes well," she said began, "Not all humans fully understand it, either," she said, a tone of regret somewhere in her voice. "It is very hard." Had Maenad ever felt love, she didn't know. She had had affection. She thought that she had loved, but she didn't think that she had ever been loved back in the way that she had given. It pained her to think about it and at that moment she wasn't sure whether to pity or envy the Vulcan.

"Yes," Liyar could only concur. "It is." He let that fall silent, apparently content with simply sitting and observing their surroundings. He thought, for a moment, that he could understand the ghost-edges of it, but it had only come after a rather terrible price.

OFF:

Lieutenant (JG) Maenad Panne
Chief Science Officer
USS Galileo

Lieutenant (JG) Liyar
Diplomatic Officer, VDF/SDD
USS Galileo

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