329: Undertow

by -=/\=- Zanh Liis
80613.1730
Following Soul Searching

-=Conference Room One, USS Serendipity=-

The door closed behind TC Blane, and Salvek sighed softly.

No good could come of having an in-depth conversation with the Captain at this moment.

He was still gathering his wits after the very disconcerting meeting that he'd had with Keiran O'Sullivan earlier. He'd been doing fine, even as he grappled with trying to determine if there was any truth at all to the tall tale that the Security Chief was spinning.

Doing fine, that was, until O'Sullivan had mentioned Kellyn, and Arie.

Salvek didn't like to think about his family and Temporal Investigations in the same context- ever. Doing so cut through to the very heart of his studied Logic- and the thought of any harm ever coming to either of them again due to defects in the timeline came dangerously close to constituting more than the Vulcan could bear.

"Salvek, you worry me." Zanh declared pointedly. She pushed away from the table and stood. She steadied herself, hands flat against the gleaming surface as she prepared to pry out of him what was so wrong. "Start talking."

"Liis," Salvek slipped, a rare moment of unguarded emotional response seizing him- and called her by her given name. He cringed, expecting that her response would be swift and definitive.

She did not disappoint.

"Okay. That is it. Either you tell me what is going on right now or I confine you to Sickbay until I find out who you are and what you've done with the real Commander Salvek." The thin veil of the humor Liis clung to in moments of impending panic was stretched thin to the point of rending.

Salvek looked away.

"What the hell is wrong with everyone this morning? First O'Sullivan, and now,"

"You saw O'Sullivan today?"

Now Liis really was worried. Salvek interrupted her, and that was something else he was not known to do.

"Yeah, earlier. Hours ago. In the lift. He was very upset about something, but he didn't want to talk about it. I honored his wishes for the time being and left it at that." She paused, "Why?" Her expression turned quickly from concern toward anger. "What are you keeping from me?"

"Zanh Liis," Salvek began again, begging in his way to speak to her more as his old friend than as his commanding officer. "I am uncertain now is the time to discuss this with you." He then asked a question that Liis was unsure she had ever heard him ask her before. "Do you trust my judgment?"

That he even felt the need to ask scared Liis senseless.

"Yes. Of course. Don't be ridiculous. Whose judgment have I ever trusted more?"

Salvek was satisfied this was the right tack to take, for the moment. "Then please, trust me in this, Captain. I promise, I am keeping the situation at the forefront of my attention and the moment I am able to discuss the situation with you," he locked intense, dark eyes on hers. "I will. You have my word."

"Your word is all I could ever ask for," Liis fought the urge to yawn, and rubbed her eyes. Suddenly, having been up forty-eight straight hours had caught up to her.

"You must rest, Captain. Please. Do not make me contact Dr. Breaux and request a medical directive."

"Well today's your lucky day. For once, I'm too tired to argue with you. I'll go. Soon as I drop MiM off to see Jariel, I'll sleep."

"Six hours minimum, Captain."

She raised two fingers to her forehead and snapped them toward him. "Aye aye sir."

-=Later=-

-=Quarters of Captain Zanh: the moment the sensor anomaly is first detected on the bridge=-

Liis tried to remember when she had ever been this tired. Not since waking up in the hospital on Bajor after she'd come so close to dying had she felt this completely devoid of all physical strength and ability.

She felt weak, and that was something she hated beyond description.

As she exited the shower, she stood before the mirror and observed the deep, dark circles under her eyes. "Woman, you're getting old." She sighed. She brushed her hands through her hair, and as she did so, for a moment she thought the reflection in the mirror changed.

Her eyes must be playing tricks on her, she decided, due to exhaustion. She shook her head briskly from side to side.

A moment ago she'd seen her own, weary and expected face staring back at her, now for an instant, once again she saw herself as she appeared years ago, with darker hair that fell in a curtain to just above her shoulders, and wearing the standard TI issue uniform.

She shuddered and blinked. When she opened her eyes again, the reflection had returned to normal, and she felt relieved.

*I am so far beyond tired, it's pathetic.* She thought, as she lumbered from the bathroom toward the bed. Too worn out to dress, she fell, still wrapped in a large bath towel onto the surface. Too spent to pull up the blanket, she simply closed her eyes.

Just as she was about to lose all consciousness, she sat upright once again.

Someone was in the room.

A voice called her name softly. A familiar voice. Male. But as out of it as she was, she couldn't put a face to it.

"Jariel?" she asked instinctively, but then she remembered, Jariel couldn't speak. What was the matter with her? How could she forget something as simple as that fact?

Angry at herself, she clenched her eyes shut. If she wasn't out cold in another two minutes, she was going to have Breaux come equipped with a hypo carrying enough sedative to knock her flat until Tuesday.

She fought for sleep as she continued hearing a running dialog of overlapping voices in her mind. . .her own, and those of others...

*Vox, I can't work with the man. He's impossible.*

*You're going to have to learn how, Liis. He's your superior, and your partner. Deal with it.*

*But Keiran's out of his mind, don't you see? He's a man with nothing to lose. The chances that he takes,*

*He's your mentor, and you will see this through, or your days in Temporal Investigations are over.*

*Don't ever scare me like that again, Zanh Liis, do you hear me? I won't have any partner of mine going out on their own and getting killed because they wouldn't listen!*

*I do listen, but you never let me talk!*

*Zanh Liis, you say more without a single word than any woman I've ever known.*

*When did you become my best friend, O'Sullivan?*

*I was your best friend the moment I laid eyes on you, Liis, you just didn't know it yet.*

*I can't do this, Keiran. I can't keep pretending it isn't there. It's between us, every hour, every day we work together.*

*What am I supposed to do, Liis? Keep lying to you?*

*Try the truth!*

*Truth? Fine. I want you. I don't know how to stop wanting you.*

*So what do we do about it?*

*You could give in.*

*So, I give in. What happens tomorrow?*

*To Hell with tomorrow. You must understand that nothing, nothing matters to me, but you.*

Liis began to perspire, her body temperature rising as her mind spun faster and faster with words she could make no sense of. Each exchange seemed somehow tied to a deeply held memory, even though she could not recall when she had ever actually heard them spoken.

With her brain hyperstimulated to the point of overload, Zanh Liis' consciousness was overtaken completely by the images of an intensely vivid dream.

In the dream, she was standing in the middle of a large, green meadow. As she looked into the distance, she saw blue skies, wispy white clouds, and the burning brilliance of Earth's sun overhead.

A pair of strong arms enclosed her tightly from behind, and she smiled. She wrapped her hands around the arms as they embraced her. "It's so beautiful here," she whispered, "I'm so happy."

She felt warm breath against her cheek, and then the brush of lips against her skin.

"You've made me the happiest man alive, Zanh Liis. If you only knew how much I," the voice behind her was familiar, but different than she was used to hearing it. She turned around toward that voice. Looking up, she saw his face.

Keiran O'Sullivan, appearing to be at least a decade younger and healthier than he was as she knew him in reality, was the man standing over her shoulder.

Still trapped within the dream, Liis did not question this. Instead she pulled him closer, turning her face up toward his and leaning in close, knowing if she did, he'd be unable to stop himself from kissing her.

"How much you what?" She taunted him, suggestively pressing her body against his.

"How much I love you, Liis."

Liis threw her head back, reveling in the intensity of his affection. They had been through so much together. To see him so happy in this moment meant more to her than she could explain.

She had thought she could never love again. That after the worst had happened and all had been lost, there could be no way she could ever feel love toward anyone other than Jariel. Yet here Keiran was, the polar opposite of the Vedek who was now lost to her forever- and she found that somehow, she loved him too.

She began to list the things she loved about him in her head, as he kissed her face and neck. Softly, Keiran whispered in her ear about how the very earth they were standing on would be the location of their bedroom, once the house was built. Then, overwhelmed with happiness, he stopped making sense, lifting her from the ground and swinging her around as effortlessly as if she were a doll, repeating the same two words over and over.

"Liis, my Liis, my Liis."

Liis loved the way he said her name. With the twist of his brogue, somehow it ended up sounding much more like the Standard word "lace" than "lease" which was the correct, Bajoran pronunciation.

She loved his wicked wit. His analytical, brilliant mind. His Hell bent determination to protect her.

She loved the way that she disappeared into the safety of his massive frame when he embraced her. . .she loved him.

Slowly, he set her down. After they finally stopped kissing, Liis smiled at him anew. "You're really going to build me a house?"

"A home. For our future." Keiran's expression changed the moment that he spoke the word 'future'. His smile vanished, and he held onto her with nearly crushing strength. He shivered, as though suddenly afraid she'd be stolen away by a phantom threat that only he could see.

"If you remember nothing else of me, for the rest of your life, Zanh Liis," he whispered, "remember, I love you more than you'll ever know."

As the dream ended, Liis tried to lift her head, but found it too heavy. For a moment she felt the sharpest pain she had ever experienced. She struggled to reach for her communicator to call for assistance, but was unable.

As she began to black out, the very last thought to cross her mind was a question.

Was she dying, or had she finally, completely lost her mind?

-=Hours later=-

The next thing she was aware of was the sound of her name begin called, repeatedly, by Salvek's rising voice over the comm.

[Captain, please respond.]

"I'm up, I'm up." Liis tried to orient herself as she returned his hail. "What?"

[You were due to return to the bridge fifteen minutes ago, Captain. Are you all right?]

"Oh yeah," Liis lied, certain that one thing she didn't want to do was tell anyone about the troubling dream she had just had. "Just fine. Sorry, I slept through the alarm. I'll be joining you momentarily. Zanh out."

After throwing on her uniform, Liis cast one glance back at herself in the mirror before heading out the door.

She sighed with relief, seeing the face that she was used to was the only one staring back at her from the glass.

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