Fire On High (24 page)

"Very well." Kebron paused as if steeling himself and then said, "Thank you." And he pointed.

"You're welcome," said a bemused Si Cwan on cue.

Kebron turned and walked away, the door sliding shut behind him.

"Now hold on a moment!" called Cwan, not about to let it go at that. He followed Kebron out into the hallway. He didn't walk right next to him, because Kebron's size, stride, and general swing of his arms as he walked usually precluded that. So Cwan hung about a foot or so back and to the right. "What was that all about? You can't just come in, say Thank you,' and leave."

"I just did." As was not unusual when he was walking with a purpose, the floor under Kebron rumbled slightly under his footfall.

"You didn't say why you were thanking me,"

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"Unnecessary."

"Not to me it's not," and he grabbed Kebron by the arm.

The massive Brikar stopped and, without looking at Si Cwan, rumbled, "You so very much do not want to do that."

Si Cwan released Kebron's arm like a fiery bri-quette, but he took the opportunity to step around Kebron and stand squarely in his path. This could, of course, have backfired somewhat since Kebron could had walked right over him without too much difficulty, but he was hoping that wouldn't happen. "Kebron—Zak—what's going on?"

Kebron made a sound in his chest that came across like rocks tumbling around in a clothes drier (although neither of them had ever seen, or even heard of, a clothes drier, so the comparison would have been lost on them). "I feel constrained to thank you . . . for your help."

"My help?" Si Cwan said blankly.

"You prevented Morgan Primus from escaping the ship. That was not your job. It was my job. Mine, and my people. We fumbled it. You recovered it. So I am thanking you because I feel it is the right thing to do."

It was rare that Kebron ever uttered that many sentences together, and the significance of it was not lost on Si Cwan.

"No one blames your security force for losing track of Morgan. The ship was going haywire at that moment. It was—"

"Inexcusable. I owe you, Cwan. And I do not forget my debts. So thank you."

"You're welcome," said Si Cwan. "And who knows, Kebron. I've made mistakes in the past, I admit that. I
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don't pretend to be perfect. Perhaps we've gotten off on the wrong foot, you and I. Perhaps this is the beginning of a new and improved relationship between us. Perhaps we can put aside our differences and genuinely build a basis for a true and lasting friendship." And he stuck out a hand for Kebron to shake.

Kebron stared at the open, outstretched hand, and then he looked Si Cwan squarely in the eyes. "I don't owe you
that
much," he said, and walked away, leaving Si Cwan shaking his head in amusement.

Dr. Selar glanced across sickbay and saw someone unexpected. Mark McHenry was there, talking to Dr.

Maxwell and touching his back with a pained expression. Maxwell actually seemed to be smiling as McHenry spoke, then nodded and indicated that McHenry should get up on a med table. McHenry did so and proceeded to remove his shirt while sitting up, as Maxwell stepped over to a rack of instruments. As Selar approached the two of them, while McHenry was sitting with his back to her, she could see that Maxwell had taken the neodermic applicator off the wall. The applicator was designed to create a graft of new skin, and was primarily used for quick and easy repair of abrasions. In short, it was a high-tech Band-Aid.

Maxwell saw her coming and looked at her questioningly. Selar, for her part, was looking at McHenry's back. There were scratches across it, as if he'd been clawed. She casually gestured for Maxwell to hand her the applicator, which he promptly did.

Upon closer inspection, she could see that the cuts raked across his back. There were five of them, each
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running parallel to one another in a diagonal path.

Being a fairly bright woman, it did not take Selar long at all to figure out just exactly how those cuts had come into being. Without a word she began to run the applicator across them. Automatically disinfecting the wounds, it left a trail of pink new skin behind it.

McHenry let out a low sigh. "Ahhhhh . . . that feels good. Magic hands, Doc." Selar said nothing, and McHenry continued, "I have to tell you, that Burgoyne . . . s/he's a wild one."

"Mmm," Selar said noncommitally.

"I shouldn't. I mean, I really shouldn't. I know that.

I'm kinda weak-willed when it comes to that depart-ment. Guess I don't have to tell you about what that's like, right, Doctor Selar?"

Selar was taken aback. She had been caught off-guard by McHenry's affect of inattention.

"Only problem is," admitted McHenry, "I feel like . . . like I'm taking advantage of hir, you know?

Because I'm not what s/he wants, I know it. I'm not who s/he wants. But I think s/he's afraid of how much s/he wants who s/he wants, because s/he's never felt like that about anyone. I wish I were a strong-willed enough man to insist that s/he do what's right for hir, but I'm not 'cause I'm having too much fun. So I go along with it, even though I know that what s/he really wants is to be with . . . someone else. This . . . someone, hell, I figure she'll never admit that she wants to be with Burgoyne as much as Burgoyne wants to be with her. They're going to have a baby, for crying out loud! I mean, I'm a modern sort of guy. It's not as if my mind or morality is stuck in the twenty-second century. But these people have a bond, both emotional and familial. You'd think that would mean some-206

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thing. You'd think they'd want to work together, not be so petrified of intimacy or commitment that they'd give each other a wide berth." He sighed again, but this time it wasn't with pleasure. "I knew Christiano, y'know. We used to hang out. Decent enough guy considering he wound up as just a hand. If I learned anything from that, it's that life is just too short not to go for something that you really want."

Selar had absolutely no idea what to say. She had wanted to have a talk with McHenry, to ask about Burgoyne. She had heard about what had happened in Engineering, heard of Burgoyne's heroics in saving Ensign Beth. The entire experience had been a terrifying one overall, and although Selar was far too stoic to actually be terrified, she still felt a great deal of concern for Burgoyne. She had wanted to go down there, to ask personally if s/he was all right, to say something . . . try to make some sort of connection, even though she wasn't sure what to say and was even less sure whether Burgoyne wanted that connection.

And here she had wound up having a talk with McHenry, or a listen at least. Except she felt as if she were an eavesdropper. Selar was a highly moral individual, and this entire business now seemed sneaky and wrong to her. She stepped back and then saw Dr.

Maxwell watching out of the corner of her eye. She gestured for Maxwell to come over, and handed him back the applicator and quickly slipped away. He watched her go, shaking his head, and then leaned over to finish the skin application on McHenry's back. Selar, for her part, retreated to her office.

"Everything okay back there?" asked McHenry.

"Certainly," Selar said. "But Dr. Maxwell will continue your treatment."

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"So . . . so what did you talk about?" Maxwell asked, after Selar had left.

"Nothing," McHenry said easily. "Nothing important at all. Trust me, Maxie, it's nothing that you have to know."

"I have to know."

Robin Lefler had entered the brig and was now standing opposite her mother, leaning against a corner of the wall. Morgan wasn't even looking at her, though.

"Mother, did you hear me?"

"Yes, I heard you. You said you have to know."

"Mom . . ." She tried to find the right words. "The other day, when Engineering went haywire . . . we could have died then. All of us. Now, I'm not afraid of dying, Mom. I'm really not. It's not like I'm eager to, you understand. And it's not like, if someone tries to take me down, I won't go kicking and screaming.

Believe me, given the choice, I'd rather be dancing on the dirt than lying under it, you know? But I . . . I don't want to die in ignorance. For years I thought that my life was simply unfair and tragic, but at least I was used to that. Now, though, I find that it makes no sense. I don't know why it makes no sense. I don't know why anything anymore. I backed you up when it came to talking to the captain. You have no idea how difficult that was for me. No idea at all. But I did it as a gesture, to show you that I was capable of trusting you. Now . . . now I need you to trust me, Mother. I need you to tell me what's really going on. The truth of everything. Will you do that for me, Mother? Will you please do whatever you can to try and help my life make sense again? I want . . . I want to go back to
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being the woman I was. I was happy once. I can't be happy, ever again, until I know and understand this.

Please. Please do this for me. If you've ever done anything for me in your life. If you've ever really, truly believed you loved me: Be honest with me."

"You won't believe it," Morgan said quietly.

"I will."

"You won't." She looked up at her sadly. "Your father didn't believe. Not at first. At first he thought I was just crazy. And then, when I . . . when I proved it to him . . . he was afraid of me."

"Afraid of you?" Robin couldn't quite believe what she was hearing. "How could he be afraid of you? You were his wife! The mother of his daughter! He adored you, he—"

But Morgan was shaking her head vehemently.

"I'm telling you that you will react in exactly the same way, Robin, and I just can't bring myself to risk doing that to you . . . and to me. Not again."

"Mother, I'm in Starfleet. My life is risk. I can handle it. I swear to you I can."

"You won't understand—"

"I'm not a child, dammit!''
Lefler fairly howled in frustration. "Don't you get that? Don't you understand that—"

And then Morgan was on her feet, and in a cold and deadly voice, she said, "And don't you understand that I'm not who, or what, you think."

"What are you saying, that you're not my mother?"

"No. No, I am. I have been many things over the decades, but you know, the fact that I'm your mother is probably the thing that I take greatest pride in."

"Over the decades. Mother, what are you talking about?"

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Morgan took a deep breath. "I am . . . older than you think."

"Okay, fine," Robin said, throwing up her hands in frustration. "Fine, don't tell me. I don't know why I bothered. I don't—"

But then Morgan grabbed Lefler's arm and spun her around to face her, and there was fire in her eyes.

"You wanted the truth, little girl?" she said in a voice so dark, so frightening, that it was barely recognizable as that of her own mother. She was speaking with an odd accent, one that Morgan couldn't even begin to place, although it sounded very faintly like a cross between Scot and British. "You wanted it? Here it is, and you will listen to every damned word. I was born centuries ago, reached maturity, and discovered that I did not age any further . . . and did not,
could not
, die."

"That's . . . that's impossible," said Lefler, trying to pull away. "No one can live that long."

"No human, but not no one. While I was raised on Earth by human parents, I soon realized that I was from somewhere else. I was very adept at creating identities for myself, living in them for a time, then faking my death and moving on. I even joined Starfleet for a time, at first hoping to find my people, then thinking that misadventure would do what the years would not.

"But it didn't work. I have an . . . an aura about me that protects me from mortal harm."

"An aura," said Lefler tonelessly.

Morgan nodded. "I tried a phaser at full disintegra-tion; it didn't harm me. I thought of setting a transporter to disperse my molecules through space, but I'm afraid that, somehow, I'll retain consciousness in
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a demolecularized form, floating like a ghost—an even more terrifying state than my current one."

"I should think so."

And Morgan—Morgan, who did not lose her temper, Morgan who was the epitome of coolness and control—slid into a white hot fury and faced Lefler, shouting, "Stop it! Stop patronizing me!"

The sound of her voice was like a rifleshot as Lefler went down. A security guard was immediately at the door, prepared to go in and stun Morgan for the purpose of hauling Lefler out, but Robin put up a hand. "Stay where you are!" she shouted. "I'm fine!"

"The hell you are, Ches'. The hell you are, you are light-years away from 'fine,' " retorted Morgan.

"Don't you get it? I was tired! Tired of watching loved one after loved one die while I went on and on and on!

You would think that after centuries of it I'd get used to it, but no. Every single loss was like a knife to my heart. I couldn't take it anymore. I just wanted to end.

And my body wouldn't let me . . . except in ways that would be so high risk that I was terrified to try them for fear that they'd leave me worse off than when I started. I wanted something safe, certain. Don't you get that?"

"I get it, I get it," said Robin. She watched her mother from as far away as she was able to get from her. "You're not human. You've been around forever."

Her immediate anger spent, Morgan sagged down onto the bench. "I wandered the galaxy for a time, slowly despairing," she said, sounding as much as if she were talking to herself as to Robin. "Then I returned home, met your father, and fell in love. And after we married, for the first time I knew enough love
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that I saw a future for myself. I had you. And as I watched you grow, my love, I realized I couldn't stand to watch you get older . . . grow up. I've lost so many people that I loved, but every day I watched you get older, it was . . . it was more than I could take. So I faked my death earlier than I would normally have and left. I left because I was selfish, and determined to find a way to put an end to my miserable existence.