REV2: TOS A/U Deep Elem Blues, K/S h/c, 3/3 [PG13]

[Greywolf the Wanderer]

Here's the last part. Comments as always are welcome, please email me
a copy though, cos out here in the boonies newsfeed is wierd.
For disclaimers and so on, see part 1.

(This is for Jess, for writing "Beside the Wells", thereby
giving me the balls to finally write *this* one down.)

Deep Elem Blues, part 3 of 3
(TOS A/U; K/S; h/c)
(PG-13, for Violence and Other Unpleasantness)

He ought to run the scans again. Jim walked over to what
he thought of as the ops console; he concentrated for a moment, and
the memory of what to do came sharply into focus. Now he was
glad of all the times her vanity had kept him on this bridge,
crouched immobile at her side, while her crew carried out her
orders. That, and the hyperaware focus the wire let him reach
on demand, were making their escape possible.
And the fact that, with the throat patch and earpiece, he was
able to speak to the ship as one of *them* would have spoken.
He had loathed the patch, at the time she'd had him fitted
with it -- as he'd loathed almost everything of hers. But now, it
just might save their lives. He *knew* her, almost as well as
he knew himself. He was sure she'd left booby traps in the
ship's operating system -- but the ship still thought he was one
of them. He sounded right, he knew the right codes -- and none
of the traps had sprung.
Jealous of their power as the masters were, none of the
overseers had dared to question why !Mzh!w*hee wished to launch
at such an hour. It *was* her scheduled day of departure, after
all. No call was made to the barracks where her crew was
sleeping; it was presumed that they were already aboard. He had
answered, when they queried the ship, in the voice of her first
mate. The throat patch did have its uses.
She was dangerous to annoy; even the overseers trembled
before her. No-one had challenged him, or insisted on a vid. They
had checked out of local traffic control on autopilot; Jim just used
the settings that *she* had always used. So it was that he had
used their ways against them, and gotten Spock and himself away.
Scan still showed negative, as it had since their departure.
Hopefully it would stay that way. He'd never actually piloted
this ship before, and he'd certainly never fought in her.
He wondered, for a moment, what had become of !Mzh!w*hee,
whether or not she could track them through the ship's cloak.
He didn't think so, but there was nothing he could do but put as
much distance between them as possible. The very first thing
he'd done, on clearing the atmosphere, was engage the cloaking
device. Immediately after that, he'd made a series of rapid
course changes, hoping to fool any who sought to guess their
path.
But oh, gods, he wished he could have killed her. Maybe then
he'd have *felt* more like a free man...
For a moment, despair overwhelmed him, the crushing weight of
the future threatening to drown him. He couldn't bear to face
that, so he made it go away; tap, tap, slide, and peace washed
through him, blessed calm returned. With the terrible ease of
too many years of practice, he made it all go away. Some other
time, he'd deal with that. For now, he had work to do.
*Sure, Jim.*
Something moved, then, at the edge of his vision, and he
whipped around, lightning fast -- but it was only Spock, asleep,
talking with his hands again. His face was drawn into a grimace
of pain, his eyes tight-shut.
Listening to the bond, Jim could feel fear and desperation; he
sighed, and reached to take the other's hand, feeling Spock's
fingers hot and dry against his own. He had replaced the clumsy
splint with a lightweight cast, earlier. The physical contact
showed him what the dream was, as it poured through the bond
and into his own mind....
--: He is *cold*. *So* cold -- he cannot stop shivering, as
the overseer's green-skinned hands strap him into the hated
chair once more. Around his neck, the iron of the collar is
cold -- it burns against his skin. He tries, as he always does,
to avoid their hands, but he is held motionless, while the
contacts are stuck to his head, the back of his neck, his
hands... With every touch their loathing fills his thoughts, as
foul as the smell of death in the hot sun, as cold as the ice in
the deepest pits of Hell. If they knew that he could see this,
they would kill him in an instant.
When they first test the power feed, his muscles lock with
a jolt. The pain is so intense his mind just... stops -- and when
they power it down, he has bitten his cheek again. The sharp
copper taste of blood in his mouth makes him choke. They watch,
sneering, in silence as the power is turned back on. And it
arches him up against the bonds, every muscle in his body
screaming for relief -- but none comes. When they release the
switch, he hangs limply in the straps, as if all his tendons
have been cut. His breath whistles harshly in his throat.
Again and again they throw the switch -- today, in total
silence. Some days they ask questions, some days not -- he has
never understood why they do one or the other, and he could not
answer them if he wanted to, for he has almost no words, and he
cannot use the signed speech with his hands tied down... Today
it seems is only for punishment, though as usual, he does not
know why or what for... They do not tell him. They have never
told him. Perhaps they find it entertaining...
He fights, as he always does, to stay silent; it is the only
thing he has left -- but in the end, as they always do, they
break him. And he cries out, wordlessly, hoping for mercy...
but there is none to be had. The green-skinned men only laugh,
and reach for the switch again. :--
Jim gasped, and sat bolt upright, his heart pounding, his
breath coming in tight little gasps. God, it was so *real*...
He had actually bitten his own cheek; it throbbed, in
counterpoint to the pain in the dream. He could *still* feel
it. The Vulcan, hands curled now into white-knuckled fists, was
tossing and turning, still caught in the dream. His breathing
was ragged, uneven.
Very gently he drew two fingers down the other's face.
<<Spock -- t'hy'la -- wake up!>>
One last jolt, a gasp -- and the black eyes opened wide.
Strong fingers gripped his arms, and Jim knew he would have
bruises there by morning. He didn't give a damn. He reached
for the Vulcan and pulled him in close, trying to warm him up,
stop the shivers... Scarred and hesitant fingers reached for
his own face; wide black eyes locked their gaze with his. And
slowly it passed, as awareness returned and the dream broke
apart. More than he had ever wished for anything, Jim wished
that he could just make all of it go away. The old plea of
childhood -- *make it never was, Dad*... He looked into the
other's eyes, and shuddered. <<God, Spock -- is *that* why your
voice is so rough?>>
A long pause. Finally... <<...yes...>> Old shame darkened
the Vulcan's thoughts.
Hot bright anger bloomed in Jim's mind. <<The bastards! If
I'd known, I'd have killed every damned one of them!>>
The black eyes locked with his. Once more, Jim could feel
how hard it was for him to speak, to find the proper words, to say
what he needed to. <<If you... tried, we ...would not
...escape...>> The Vulcan looked away for a moment, then
nervously raised his eyes. But whatever he saw on the human's
face, it was not what he'd feared. For a moment, he visibly
fought for control; finally he raised an eyebrow, his thoughts
still tinged with shame. <<I am... sorry, Jim. I wished...
not, ...for you... to see that.>>
Jim moved his hands, as if to brush it all away. <<It
doesn't matter any more. It was only a dream, Spock. Feel this.
*Know* this. They're far behind us now. We're free, and we're
*never* going back there! From here, even if they catch up to
us -- we can blow this ship up, maybe take some of them with us.
They *can't* take us prisoner again. Whatever else happens,
you've seen the last of that place.>> Jim sat silently, then,
filling his eyes with the sight he'd never thought to see --
Spock, alive, and both of them free.
Spock had always possessed a certain fine-boned, almost
patrician cast of feature; now, it was as if he had been through
some forge, which had burned away everything but the very
essence of the man. His cheekbones were razor-sharp under the
olive skin, and there were large dark shadows around his eyes.
His pallor accentuated the oddness of his colouring; he looked
more alien than he had ever done before. But this was Spock; he
was *here*, and they had escaped. For now, it was more than
enough.
Spock drew a breath, slowly, his nerves beginning to steady
down. <<I -- I thought... I was -->> Even in the mindspeech,
he still had to fight for words. Jim could feel his frustration, as
what should have been easy took such effort. It was a little bit
easier than it had been, but he had a long way to go, yet.
He had lost the mind rules; he wasn't controlling his pain,
and he couldn't go into the healing trance. He needed specialized
treatment, and Jim didn't have the knowledge for that. With the
wire boosting him, he could reach Spock's thoughts, through the
bond that they had shared for so long. But he couldn't give
back to the Vulcan the knowledge he had lost, for Jim had never
learned those things himself. He could use the ship's autodoc
to treat simple physical injuries, but this -- this was out of
his league. All he could hope for was that time, and rest, and
his friend's own strength, could heal him in the end. Jim
himself didn't dare go near a hospital -- there was no way any
Federation hospital would let him keep the wire, and he doubted
he would survive the loss of it. Wireheading had been illegal
since the Eugenics war.
In any case -- he wasn't interested in going back. He didn't
want pity, or scorn, for the choices he had made. He wanted
only his freedom, and Spock's, and to be left in peace.
In the Federation, he would be seen as a wirehead, an addict,
someone to be put in a rehab clinic whether he wanted to go, or
not. Jim knew that he was, in some ways, addicted to the wire.
He enjoyed the boosted times entirely too much. But it had been
a part of him for so long, now. He couldn't really remember,
how it used to be, before. He didn't think it was anyone's damn
business, how he lived his life. And he never wanted to be in
another hospital as long as he lived.
Now, though, he smiled, looked down at the Vulcan, and
said, "Hey, don't worry about it -- I've had bad dreams myself,
enough times." He spoke aloud, relishing the chance to speak
normally for once, without using the hardware. "Listen, I thought
you'd like to know -- we've been under way for 12 hours now, and
there's no sign of them on scan."
Spock frowned for a moment, and then replied, his own
voice still a harsh whisper. "Thank ...you. ...Good." Then he got
up, cautiously, not trusting his bad leg, and went to get himself a
cup of tea.
He looked a little stronger, now. He was much more alert...
God. Maybe they were actually going to get away with this.

-----///-----

Jim was in trouble. Spock could *feel* it. The human had
been running on pure nerves for days now, aided somehow by the
device that he carried. He couldn't quite see what it was; somehow
Jim always managed to keep a hand over it, if it wasn't tucked into
a pocket. But he could feel the results -- a fine-drawn edge of
nervous energy, maintained, somehow, long past the point where
anyone else would have collapsed. Even if Jim had been Vulcan,
such an effort would have been dangerous -- but he was human.
If he kept this up he could kill himself.
Once or twice Spock had tried to bring it up, picking out the
words in his slow and careful way, but Jim would have none of
that. He simply changed the subject, or bounced out of his seat
and pretended to be busy with ship's controls. Spock did not
understand -- if it was so obvious to him, how could the human
not see it also?
For himself, the Vulcan felt much better. He had eaten his
fill, several times; he had slept luxuriously, spent far too
long in the 'fresher -- comforts he'd not had access to in
years. Jim had laughed, at one point, on finding him asleep on
the deck, but he had been more comfortable that way. The bed
was *too* soft and giving; he had finally put the bedding down
on the floor, where he slept like a dead man. It was still
softer than his bunk in the camp had been.
He was warm enough, and clean -- and his body was
beginning to heal, a little. Between the rest and good food, and the
treatments Jim had been able to administer, he was getting
stronger every day. This morning, he had asked Jim to cut down
on his pain medicine, and was encouraged to find that his
discomfort was only mild, at worst. That alone was amazing; he
had hurt for so long, he'd forgotten what it was like *not* to.
His thoughts were growing clearer all the time. He had taken
the splint off his knee this morning, and Jim had replicated a
walking stick for him, so that he could get around better.
Even his words were beginning to come a little easier, with
practice -- not as freely as the signed speech, but enough to
communicate, at least.
But Jim -- Jim was burning himself up. Somehow he just
kept going, on and on and on. His hands had developed a fine
tremor; his face was pale, save for great dark hollows about the
eyes. He wasn't eating at all, as far as Spock could see, and it
had been four days since they made their escape. Four days, in
which, every time he woke, he saw Jim, hunched over the
controls; four days of running, cloaked and silent, through
first the masters' territory, and then the fringes of Rihannsu
space. How much longer could he keep this up?
Finally the Vulcan took matters into his own hands. The
human was at the conn again, working their way through a tricky little
debris swarm -- an asteroid belt, really, but without a sun to
call its own. They came to the end of it, and he let his hands
fall to his knees and just sat, staring vacantly at the screen.
He didn't seem to notice, when Spock sat down at the copilot's
station.
So he reached out and took Jim's hand, and held it between
his own. Touching in that way, he could feel the depth of the
other's exhaustion, along with the strange hard-edged energy of
whatever was driving him. An image of a piece of wire came into
his mind, but he did not understand what it meant. He just
stayed there, until finally the human dropped his gaze from the
screen and turned to face him. His face looked more like that
of a skull, than a man.
Spock met his gaze, and reached cautiously for the right
words. "T'hy'la -- enough. It is... enough; ...stop this."
Bloodshot hazel eyes locked on to worried black ones, and
the weight of the other man's despair hit Spock like a thunderbolt.
The breath caught in his throat; there was so much of it --
despair, and shame, a black hatred of the masters, loathing for
himself... and underneath it all, that strange, driving energy,
like an engine running near its redline... For a moment, it was
all he could do not to tear his hands away and shield his
thoughts. But he did not.
He kept his shields down, despite the flood of sensations,
trying to make Jim *see* -- <<No.>> He made his thoughts as
clear as he could; this was no time for the hesitation of spoken
words. <<You ...are *not* like them.>> He looked down for an
instant, then forced himself to meet Jim's eyes again, to be
honest. <<Jim, I... I, also, hate them. But if you... kill
yourself, t'hy'la -- if you kill... yourself, they win.>> And
he held that thought, and his knowledge that it was true, in a
place where the human could not ignore it.
Jim dropped his eyes and looked away. <<You don't know
what they did.>> The thought was bleak, bitter. <<You don't know
what I am.>>
<<No. I... do not. But I do... not care. You have... given
me back my life.>> He pointed toward his neck, finally freed
from the cold iron of the collar. He would still bear the scars
-- but the skin was beginning to heal, now. <<For the rest... >> and
another small piece of his past returned to him, an idea
from his birth tongue, <<Kaiidth! What is, is. It... is done.
You are still... t'hy'la.>>
The human stared at the floor for a time; then he met Spock's
gaze again, and smiled, a tight, bitter grimace. <<Am I?>> he
thought. <<Watch, then, and learn.>> And he pulled a small
device from his pocket, held it on his open palm. It was a
remote control of some sort, a smooth, oval blackness, studded
with miniature control surfaces. He curled his fingers over it,
made one quick, sliding tap on its surface --
-- and the despair was gone, in an instant, as if it had never
been. He tapped it again, and the mood returned, full force.
He did something else, and Spock felt it lift, just so far, and
stop. It was more bearable now. He touched it once more, and
his mindtouch grew much louder and clearer. A question that
Spock had not even found the words to ask was answered.
<<There. No point in making you feel it, too.>> He dropped
it into his pocket again. <<I'm wired, Spock. I can do whatever I
have to do -- but it's all a fake. Smoke and mirrors...>> He
tried to block their contact, then, but it was too late -- the
Vulcan had seen the rest of it in one sharp intuitive flash;
!Mzh!w*hee, the surgeons, the things that she had made him do --
and the time she had taken it all away.
Jim's mindtouch shimmered with returning pain. <<I can't
function any more, without this -- this *thing*. *You* saw,
what I turned into without it. How can you tell me that you
value *this*?>>
And Spock saw another part of it, then, the thought that
burning himself up would solve it once and for all. He did the
only thing he could think of; he dropped the last of his shields
and left himself open, undefended. <<Because I do.>> He
reached out, touching one finger to the human's cheek for just
an instant. <<That "wire" -- changes nothing.>> He hesitated,
reaching for the proper words. He had to get this right.
<<There is... a link, between us -- a bond, as... my people
would say. How could I *not*... value that?>> And he sent an
image of his own, then -- how it had been to be alone, and
counted of less worth than any herd beast. <<You... came
back... and got me.>>
<<But I could have done it so much sooner!>> came the
thought, and again, the harsh self-loathing.
In the human's mind, he saw regret, for all that he had
endured, for the years of wasted time. He answered the only way
he could. <<Could you? You... saw me die. Felt... me die.
Were they... >> He lost the words for a moment, had to fight to
get them back. <<...were they so careless, then? Or... were
you watched, ...as I was, close-held... through every minute? I
-- can *see* it, Jim. I will *not*... judge thee. If this...
if this... were a test, then... I failed, too.>> And he made
Jim see, how it had been with him. They had named him beast,
and he had accepted it -- and in many ways, it had been true.
It had been all that he could do to survive at all. <<It was
the same... for you. We did as... we had to. We... survived.>>
There was silence then, and a fierce scowl on the human's
face as he thought it over. Spock waited, quietly. He had argued as
well as he could; now it was for Jim, to choose what he would do.
He waited. He glanced around the ship's cockpit, noting red
lights across the board -- and remembered that to the masters,
that was the equivalent of green lights on any Federation ship.
They were still running cloaked; in that mode, engine noise was
minimal, and the loudest sound he could hear was his own
breathing.
He didn't know where they could go, from here. They had
been StarFleet officers, once -- but Jim could never return to that,
not with a wire in his head. And Spock realized that he did not
want to rejoin StarFleet, without the human. It would not be
the same -- and in truth, he didn't know if he could pass the
entry exams, in his current condition. He was not eager to try,
or to see, perhaps, pity, on the faces of those he had known
before. He had shamed himself, in that place; he had shamed the
culture in which he'd been raised. He had forgotten the
Traditions; forgotten the Tenets of Surak. He had lived as
little better than a beast. How could he face his former
crewmates and meet their eyes? It was all he could do to meet
his own eyes, in the mirror.
He did not want his parents to see him like this, so damaged,
so useless. Especially not Amanda. She would grieve all over
again, as she must have grieved when he was lost.
No.
Everyone thought the two of them were dead. Perhaps it
might be best to leave it that way. He didn't know. If he returned
to Vulcan, they might be able to help him regain what he had
lost -- but at what cost? He had never really felt that he
belonged on that world, never been accepted as one of them. How
much more so would he be outcaste, as he was now? And for Jim
to go there -- no. The wire was an abomination, by Vulcan
tradition. They would never agree to let him live there,
without trying to remove it -- and that choice was not theirs to
make. No. Vulcan was not an option. Surely there were places
where the two of them could go, honourable ways to earn
themselves a living. Surely there were other places where he
could get the help he needed...
Finally, after what seemed like a long time, Jim stirred, and
met his gaze again. There was a look on his face that could
almost have been called a real smile. He spoke, his voice soft
but clear, in the quiet cockpit. "I don't know if you remember
this -- Omicron Ceti III? The spores?" Spock thought about it,
and realized that he did remember, somewhat dimly, now that he
had been reminded of it. It had been the first time in his life
that he was truly happy -- and he had left it behind, willingly,
to help this man. Working together, they had rescued both crew
and colonists from the pleasant trap of the spore world -- but
not without cost. He nodded, still thinking about it.
Remembering. There were so many things that he had forgotten...
"So," said Jim. "Remember me asking you, if we were both
in the brig for fighting, who was going to get the job done? I
guess that maybe this is the same kind of thing..." And now he
did smile. "You're a stubborn man, Spock -- did I ever tell you
that?"
The Vulcan made a show of considering it. "I believe...
that you did," he said. His voice was still scratchy and hoarse. "I
-- have found it... a necessary ...attribute... " The very
tiniest of smiles might have crossed his face. Then he reached
for the human's hand once more. It was still difficult, to
speak aloud for very long.
<<Now, t'hy'la -- will you ...sleep? It would... be wise, to
do so.>> And he showed Jim then, what he looked like. <<If...
if you would live, then... you must rest.>>
Jim scowled, and Spock could see that it worried him, the
idea of letting go like that -- but they both knew it was necessary.
Eventually, the human took the control out of his pocket. His
fingers danced across the pads a moment; then he looked up.
"You're right, dammit. I don't like it -- but you're right."
He got up and walked to one of the bunks in the back; Spock
followed him. He sat down on the bunk, and set the control on
the single small shelf by his head.
"OK. Now listen -- when I do this, I'm going to crash, hard.
You won't be able to wake me up easily, maybe not at all. Can't
be helped. But you have to promise me this -- if anything goes
wrong," and he pointed to a single stud at the control's center,
"you'll hit this, and wake me up. That'll do it. And don't
worry about messing me up; I've locked out all the rest of it.
If nothing happens, it's set to wake me by itself, in about
eight hours.
"Will you promise me that?"
Spock didn't much like it, but he knew Jim was right. The
ship didn't recognize Spock, and he didn't know either the codes, or
the controls. If something happened, Jim would be the only one
who could fly them to safety. He said, "I... agree." And
then, feeling something else was called for, " ...sleep well,
...t'hy'la."
The human swung his feet up and stretched out. He
reached up and tapped the control, just once -- and was gone,
instantly. One brief spasm rippled through his body, and then he went
limp and started to snore. The Vulcan watched him for a time, then
pulled the blankets over his legs, and returned to the cockpit.
There he sat down again, to watch the stars, and think.

-----/end/-----

That's it. That's all he wrote...
Submitted for your approval

Greywolf the Wanderer
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