626: Past, Present, and Future

by TC Blane and Zanh Liis
81030.13
During the Captain's Wedding Reception

-=County Cork, Ireland; Earth=-


Every time Zanh Liis attempted to take a bite of her dinner, she found that the tiny bells, situated near the centerpiece on every table by her sister-in-law Molly, would start to ring.

She thought this was coincidence. Until Keiran happened to look up and realize that, thoroughly amused by the fact that if the guests rang the bells that the newlyweds were supposed to kiss each other, Dabin Reece had not set the bell at his table down all night long. The Trill appeared to be watching, specifically, for opportunities to interrupt her meal.

As Keiran prepared to rise from his seat to 'reason' with Reece, Liis held his arm fast.

"His head'll be ringin' like Jerusalem bells if he doesn't mind his manners..." Keiran mumbled, but Liis laughed. She knew that Reece was, in his way, just showing his love for her and his joy at seeing her so happy.

"I don't mind..." She smiled at him coyly. "Food I can have any day. Wedding kisses, only tonight." As she contemplated how long she'd had to live without Keiran's affection, she knew how incredibly lucky she was to have it back now. She wouldn't pass up a single opportunity to revel in it.

Besides this was, she figured, her one chance to be open with her emotions and demonstrate her affection for him in front of the crew. Once they returned to the ship and she was back in uniform, she would resume her restrained, Commanding Officer code of behavior.

*Publicly, anyway... *

Once that restraint had carried over into private as well, keeping her at what she considered a safe emotional distance even from those who were closest to her.

She had been so deeply changed by recent events and Keiran's return, however, that she would never again completely shut off the 'hopeless romantic' aspect of her personality. It was a facet of her soul that he had clearly been responsible for creating, and one she was very much starting to enjoy.

Besides, when it came to trying to keep him at a distance, she found she was simply incapable.

"Well, then I suppose," Keiran sighed in exaggerated fashion even as he grinned at her, "That I can suffer through kissin' ya again."

As he giggled with delight, Reece's wife finally felt the need to intervene on the Captain's behalf.

"Dabin," February couldn't help but laugh too as she listened to his giddy thoughts, echoing inside her head. "Let the poor woman eat!" She finally wrestled the bell from his hand and put it into her pocket.

"Aww, man."

"After she's finished, I'll give it back."

The sound of the bells was replaced by whistles, applause and various voices shouting in Gaelic as the couple stood up from their table in the center of the room and gave the crowd what they wanted.

Dane Cristiane shook his head in dismay as he watched. He couldn't believe the woman in the wedding gown was the same Zanh Liis he had met all those years ago on DS23. But then he realized, in many ways she wasn't.

Then again, he wasn't the same man, either.

He held his barely touched plate of food in one hand and his fork in the other. Usually he'd be on his third plate by now at a party with food like this; but not tonight.

Tonight he was much more interested in digging deep and finding the courage to talk to Gira Lassiter.

He was just about to take the leap, making his way through the throngs of people in the reception tent, when he saw something and changed his mind.

Gira was laughing. Upon closer inspection, he discovered that she was having a spirited conversation at a corner table across the room. With Carrick O'Sullivan.

*I thought he was only seventeen,* Dane grumbled internally. The junior O'Sullivan looked older at seventeen than Dane did at twenty-three. *Damn him.*

He was just about to get into a good, old fashioned Dane-style brooding fit when he felt a hand slap up against his back.

"Enjoying yourself?" TC Blane asked. He had left the head table for a few moments to obtain articles needed in preparation for a short ceremony he planned to carry out in honor of the bride and groom.

"I was until about thirty seconds ago."

"Ah, Carrick's just a kid. Remember, Cristiane," Blane admonished him quietly, "No heart is won if uncontested. Or anything else, for that matter.” He handed Dane a white rose he had plucked from his table’s centerpiece. He nodded towards Gira. “Now, if you'll excuse me..."

Blane moved to the center of the room, with a large silver tone cup in one hand and a PADD in the other.

"Ladies and Gentlemen if I could have your attention please, and that includes both Captains O'Sullivan..."

Everyone laughed, and Keiran saluted TC for referring to him by his command title, which he would not carry much longer.

Keiran honestly didn't care though. At this point he would rather be a crewman on Liis' ship than an Admiral on anyone else's.

"I have something to say."

TC’s statement immediately drew Zanh’s undivided attention. She knew her 'best man' and second officer was not shy about offering advice, opinions, and his thoughts in private, but he hated public speaking. Despised it at its most base levels. In fact she would even say he feared it, yet never to his face.

The fact that he was standing up now in front of all these people, most he did not know, to speak was something special unto itself regardless of the content of what he was about to say.

He smiled at the newlyweds. “Well, looks like my job just got harder. It was bad enough that I had to be following around my Captain, pulling her fat from the fire but now it looks like I’ll have to watch over a love sick Irishman too.”

There was a burst of laughter, more from the gathered crew that understood the very true nature of the joke than the other guests.

“I was looking for a serious way to honor both of you on this very special day. My Captains, my comrades, my friends, and in a very real way, my family.”

He smiled again, his crystal blue eyes flashing.

“I think I found it.”

He approached the table and handed the silver cup to the couple, placing both their hands on it and setting the PADD on the table before them. He tapped the screen to draw their attention to the information displayed before turning back to face the rest of the assembled guests.

Keiran's eyes immediately registered recognition at the sight of the two-handled 'Loving Cup', and he shook his head in disbelief. Blane had certainly done his homework.

Liis, still amazed that Blane was willing to give a speech of any sort by choice, hung on his every word with complete fascination.

“On this your wedding day, we celebrate the Celtic spirit of the anam cara. Anam cara is translated from the Gaelic as ‘soul friend’. By entering in a partnership with your anam cara, you are joined in an ancient and eternal way with this person whom you most cherish. In everyone`s life there is a great need for an anam cara and so I ask you to toast one another by repeating the following.”

He took a moment to lean closer to the groom, quietly addressing the unspoken question written all over Keiran's face as he peered at the liquid the cup contained.

"Don't worry," Blane assured, knowing that neither Keiran or Liis drank alcohol anymore. "It's grape juice."

He motioned to Liis and Keiran to hold up the cup between them. Once they had done so he spoke in a reverent voice.

"Keiran, please repeat after me;

“Today I recognize you, my anam cara
And ask that you become a part of me, in sacred kinship.

With you, I have lost all fear and have found the greatest courage.

I have learned to love and let myself be loved.

With you, I have found a rhythm of grace and gracefulness.
Love has reawakened in my life; a rebirth; a new beginning.

With you my anam cara,
I am understood,
I am home.”

TC paused to allow the words to sink in. Keiran thought about the last two statements of the recitation especially, knowing how they would resound with Liis as he said them.

Her eyes held tears as he repeated the words, "I am understood, I am home."

Liis gazed at him affectionately. She had, at last, come home.

"Captain," Blane inclined his head respectfully, but before he continued he reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a crisp linen handkerchief, handing it to her. Liis blotted the corners of her eyes, then drew a deep breath.

She struggled to find her voice at first. But as she focused on what the words were really saying and understood how perfectly appropriate they were, she grew more confident and managed to get through them without stuttering once.

TC smiled at her proudly. He may hate public speaking with the white hot intensity of a thousand suns, but displaying her vulnerable emotions in front of others was what Zanh Liis truly despised. Still, she'd managed to do it.

“And now," Blane requested, "please drink to the love you've shared in the past.”
The couple took turns sipping from the Loving Cup.

“Drink to your love in the present, on this your wedding day.”

He watched as they did just so.

“And drink to your love in the future and forever more.”

Once more, they drank from the cup in turn. TC smiled with beaming happiness at his two friends on their special day.

“The Celts believed that the way you view your future actually shapes it. I now ask everyone here in the room to take a moment to visualize a future for the Bride and Groom. As a group let`s think of the happiness in store for Liis and Keiran. Let's put their joyous future out to the universe.”

As the guests stood to a raucous ovation, TC slipped undetected out of sight to the back of the room to enjoy the moment.

To many it seemed that he simply vanished, but Zanh Liis knew exactly where to find him.

Keiran nodded for her to go, and she slipped through the crowd to the quiet corner by the gift table where he stood at Parade Rest, taking in his surroundings.


------------------
Commander TC Blane
Second Officer/Chief of Operations
USS Serendipity NCC-2012

and

-=/\=-Zanh Liis
Commanding Officer
USS Serendipity NCC-2012