Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The Cerritos was a modest ship.

Where the Sh’vhal had sleek lines and flashy design – as flashy as Vulcans ever got, anyway – the Cerritos was made of heavy curves and a smaller frame. T’Lyn watched with growing curiosity as the ship – her future ship – docked aboard the space station.

There was little more to do than gather her things and report for duty, so without further ado she picked up the small bags of luggage and her PADD and stepped out of the booth she had been sitting in. She inclined her head towards the human bartender, who gave her a jaunty wave as she stepped out into the corridor, and began the long walk to what the humans called the shipyard.

It was quiet on the station. She passed few people between the bar and the yard, so affectionately named for the places where early human vessels had docked on Earth. The moment she stepped out of the double doors and into the yard, however, it was a different story. There were Starfleet officers milling about, shouting across the expanse at each other; there were young ensigns clustered in groups, talking animatedly; and there were all manner of people doing things, from carting vital supplies aboard the ship to security officers barking out orders.

T’Lyn walked through the crowd, resisting the urge to run her fingers along the collar of her tight shirt. It was blue – the colour that Starfleet officers called Science Blue – and it sat at just the wrong spot for her to be completely comfortable. She ignored it for the most part, though. She would grow used to it with time.

She stepped into the airlock and waited patiently as she was put through the next set of doors. As she walked through them, she found herself inside the ship, in an area that resembled the cargo hold of the Sh’vhal. There were fewer people inside here, but there was an older human gentleman in yellow holding a PADD and directing people where to go, so she made her way to him.

“Name,” he asked, barely looking up from his PADD.

“T’Lyn,” she answered.

“Rank,” he asked.

“Ensign,” she answered.

He tapped something rapidly on the screen, and then jerked his head to the left. “Head over there. Your orientation liaison will meet you.”

T’Lyn offered him a flat stare and shifted her gaze to the left. There were a few people there, so she shifted her bag on her shoulder and took a few purposeful strides over. She had almost come to a stop when she was pounced upon by an excitable Orion.

“T’Lyn! Hi!” The Orion did not grab her, though T’Lyn could tell from the way her hands moved she had gone to and thought better of it. “I’m D’Vana Tendi! It’s so nice to meet you!”

“Greetings,” T’Lyn offered, taking a half-step back. D’Vana Tendi was shorter than her, with dark green hair buzzed into an undercut and skin a few shades lighter. She was wearing a blue Starfleet uniform and dark pants, with sturdy boots on her feet. She bounced on her heels slightly.

“Let me get that for you,” she said, reaching for one of T’Lyn’s bags. T’Lyn allowed her to take it, moving the bag in her right arm to her left shoulder; she had packed light, a scant few uniforms and some casual tunics, and a few personal items such as her lyre and chess set. It was still enough to fill the two bags.

“We’ll head to the bunks first and drop off your things!” D’Vana did not seem deterred by T’Lyn’s lack of enthusiasm, and led the way into the ship and to the turbolift. T’Lyn found herself, oddly enough, wanting to say something, but found she could not find anything to say. D’Vana continued chattering away, telling the Vulcan about her role on the ship and how they’d be working together, and T’Lyn allowed her to continue this way until the lift stopped off on the lower decks.

“Did you grow up on Vulcan?” D’Vana asked, making her way down the long hall.

“Yes,” T’Lyn replied. After a moment, she added, “I attended the Vulcan Science Academy in my youth and served upon the ship Sh’vhal for the past two years.”

“Ooh, that must have been so interesting,” D’Vana enthused.

“I found it adequate,” T’Lyn answered.

As they rounded the corner, T’Lyn overheard a dark-skinned woman say, “Ugh, I can’t believe we’re gonna have a Vulcan down here! It’s already bad enough with you losers, now I can’t get away with anything!”

T’Lyn arched an eyebrow at her, as D’Vana said a reproachful, “Mariner!”

“Oh hey, Tendi!” The woman, Mariner, turned around and caught sight of D’Vana with T’Lyn. She had the decency to look a little guilty as she added an awkward, “Hey, um…”

“T’Lyn,” T’Lyn replied. “And it is not my preference to be amongst humans, but I am sure we will manage.”

“I didn’t mean, like, because you’re Vulcan,” Mariner was quick to say. “You guys are just all about rules, and I like breaking them. Some of my best friends are Vulcan.”

T’Lyn was amused by the woman’s rush to not be perceived as prejudiced against Vulcans. It did not show on her face. There was a human male on one of the bunks, reading something on his PADD, but otherwise the corridor was empty.

“Boims, come say hi to T’Lyn,” Mariner turned to the male, who looked up from his PADD a little distractedly.

“Hi, T’Lyn,” he said, swinging his legs over the bunk and sitting up. “Bradward Boimler. Nice to meet you.”

T’Lyn gave him a nod, and shifted her attention back on Mariner, who had still not, particularly, introduced herself. D’Vana seemed to realise what she was thinking, because she said, “T’Lyn, this is Beckett Mariner.”

“Where is my bed?” T’Lyn asked, looking around. The corridor was lined with bunks down either side, each with a small cubby attached to it and a slide-out wardrobe. There were personal effects of all nature in each bunk. In the one closest to her, there was a photograph of D’Vana and Beckett pulling faces at the camera, and another of Beckett and a blue-skinned Andorian woman side by side. There were other images, as well, and a small necklace hanging from above the bed. It seemed oddly sentimental for somebody like Beckett Mariner to keep in their bunk, but T’Lyn did not comment on it.

“Over here,” D’Vana said, taking a couple of steps down and patting her hand against the bed above her head. “You don’t mind having the top bunk, right? If you do, we can swap!”

“This is sufficient,” T’Lyn said, dropping her bag from her shoulder and swinging it up onto the bunk. She accepted her other bag off D’Vana and added it up there, climbing up and taking a seat on the firm mattress. Mariner was bothering Boimler, attempting to grab the PADD off him and distract him from his reading. T’Lyn’s mouth twitched as she considered them. Humans were illogical, but this she had expected when she had been transferred into Starfleet.

“Do you need help unpacking?” D’Vana said, peering up at her. “When you’re done, I’ll give you a tour of the ship, okay?”

“I can unpack without assistance,” T’Lyn said, unzipping the first bag. She pulled out the first stack of clothing and paused, glancing down at D’Vana, who seemed very eager and kind and not at all like what she had expected of an Orion. “The offer is…appreciated.”

D’Vana grinned up at her and bounced on her heels again. “Okay. Just let me know if you do need help, okay? I’ll be in my bunk.”

T’Lyn placed her clothing inside the pull-out wardrobe and began stacking it neatly. There was a small set of hangers provided, so she placed her uniform shirts on them, lining them up one after the other. She placed her tunics to the left, a set of formal robes beneath them, and stopped for a moment to run her finger along the stitching of the neat lettering that lined her robes. They wished the wearer peace and harmony, and the balance of logic and truth. Her father had been with her when she had picked them out.

She returned to the bags, sliding the wardrobe back into its place and placing her lyre and chess set into the cubby. She could hear Mariner and Boimler arguing still, but there seemed to be no malice behind it; she could hear D’Vana typing away on her PADD. She paused for a moment, before sliding out a drawer and tucking her bags away inside, and then sitting back on her heels, still kneeled on the bed. She would have to meditate today. She did not know where, though – surely she could not meditate in here, in the confines of the bunk. She doubted that the other woman would know, but she thought, idly, that it may be an idea to ask D’Vana if there was a communal meditation space aboard the ship, or if perhaps there was an available holodeck she could set up to her needs. It was worth considering.

She climbed down and stopped at D’Vana’s bunk. “I have unpacked my belongings.”

“Great!” D’Vana said, sitting up. “Let’s take a look around the ship!”

“Mind if I tag along?” Mariner asked, leaning against the bunks and ruffling Boimler’s hair. “I’ve got nothing better to do until Jen finishes her shift.”

“Sure!” D’Vana said. She stopped and looked at T’Lyn. “I mean, if it’s okay with you?”

“It is fine,” T’Lyn said, looking between them. She was not bothered in the slightest by Mariner joining them. Her father had told her she should use the opportunity of being on a human ship to broaden her horizons. It was logical to meet and interact with many different people, of different species. It would broaden her horizons.

“Let’s go,” Mariner said, taking the lead. “I’ll show you all the cool spots. Tendi will just show you, like, the Jefferies tubes and the warp core.”

“The Jefferies tubes and the warp core are the cool spots,” D’Vana insisted, lengthening her stride to keep up with them. “Don’t listen to her, T’Lyn.”

T’Lyn looked between the two women, sensing the camaraderie between them. She had never had a bond like that with anyone on the Sh’vhal. She and T’Gai had played chess together a few times, and would occasionally read in companionable silence, but they were not, as a human would describe it, friends.

She stayed quiet as they wandered the ship, starting with the holodecks, of which there were three, and continuing on to the gym. D’Vana and Mariner would occasionally stop to say a quick hello to the people they ran into, but the ship was otherwise quiet. Most people, T’Lyn imagined, would be down on the station, taking some much-needed leisure time. She found herself wondering when she was going to meet her commanding officer, when they stepped inside sickbay.

“Tendi!” A Caitian looked up from her PADD, flexing her fingers. “Are you busy?”

“Showing our newest member around the ship,” D’Vana said proudly, nudging T’Lyn forward. “Dr T, this is T’Lyn.”

“Vulcan eh?” T’Ana’s tail twitched. “Tendi, go make yourself busy for five minutes. Tidy the instrument bay.”

“Yes doctor,” D’Vana said, turning away. T’Lyn watched her go, before returning her attention to the doctor.

“Let’s get this over with,” T’Ana said, jerking her head to the left. “Follow me.”

T’Lyn trailed behind her, hands clasped behind her back. She watched as T’Ana leaned against a biobed and picked up a PADD, swiping through it until she’d pulled up the Vulcan’s file. She skimmed it, humming thoughtfully to herself, and then set it aside.

“We’ve received your files from your last post, but let me check a few things,” T’Ana said. She picked up the PADD again and scrolled back to the top. “Name?”

“T’Lyn,” T’Lyn replied.

“Prior conditions, none. Previous injuries, broken ankle at age thirteen, healed on Vulcan. Allergies, none.”

“Avocado,” T’Lyn interrupted. T’Ana blinked, her ears flicking backwards.

“Doesn’t say anything in your file,” she said.

“It was recently discovered,” T’Lyn said. “While I was on a Federation station. I was treated by the medical team there, perhaps my file simply has not been updated.”

T’Ana grunted in reply and began typing rapidly, updating the file in front of her. There was a soft peal of noise, and she spun the PADD around, so T’Lyn could see that it now read ALLERGIES: AVOCADO.

T’Lyn gave her a single nod, hands still clasped behind her back. T’Ana pulled out a tricorder and waved it over her for a moment, squinting at the readings and muttering, “good enough”. She set it aside and stood with her hands on her hips, considering the young Vulcan.

“Do you know your assignment?” She asked.

“Yes,” T’Lyn replied. “I am supposed to report to you at 08:00 hours.”

“Hn,” T’Ana grunted, eyes narrowing. “What are you good at?”

“I do not understand the question,” T’Lyn replied. There had never been any considerations of what she was good at on the Sh’vhal – merely what she could do successfully. It had made for an efficient ship, even if her assignments had often been, she felt, busy work.

“What are you good at, kid? Where do you excel?” T’Ana’s tail lashed back and forth. “I run a tight ship here. I want the best in my team, and I want everybody doing what they do best.”

“Programs,” T’Lyn found herself saying. “Code.”

“Alright,” T’Ana tilted her head, nodding. “We can work with that. There’s plenty of scutwork, too. I can always use another set of hands. How’s your bedside manner?”

“I have never worked in medicine,” T’Lyn replied. “I am unsure.”

T’Ana considered her for a few moments, then waved her away. “Go. Go find Tendi, we’ll work out the details when you report for duty tomorrow.”

“Yes, doctor,” T’Lyn replied, inclining her head as she walked away. She found Tendi on the other side of sickbay, aligning a set of instruments on a silver tray. She looked up, smiling as she put the last one in place.

“Y’all done?” Beckett asked, arms folded as she leaned against the wall. “Let’s get out of here, I hate this place.”

“Mariner’s scared of the doctor,” D’Vana whispered to T’Lyn conspiratorially.

“I am not,” Beckett said, stressing the last word. “I have no problem with T’Ana.”

“I never said you were scared of T’Ana,” D’Vana teased, leading them down one of the many identical corridors she seemed to know like the back of her hand. Beckett huffed, muttering “yeah, whatever,” as she nudged D’Vana in the side. D’Vana chuckled, taking quick strides towards the turbolift.

The doors opened, and the three women stepped inside. T’Lyn stood ramrod straight, arms tucked behind her back; D’Vana shifted from foot to foot, eager to continue with her tour; and Beckett slouched against the wall, running a finger around the edge of the control panel, like she was considering pulling it open and messing around with what was inside. They stood in silence as the lift moved up a floor, and then another, before finally stopping and the doors opening.

Inside stepped a woman with dark skin, and dark curls streaked through with grey. She wore a uniform shirt of deep red, with four pips on her collar.

T’Lyn realised, both from this assessment and the way D’Vana stood to attention, that this was Captain Carol Freeman.

Since her ordeal with the admiralty and her subsequent court martial, Captain Freeman had aged considerably. T’Lyn thought of the brief moment she had seen the captain when the Sh’vhal had assisted against the Pakled ship the previous year; Captain Freeman’s hair had gained several stripes of silver, and there were frown lines across her forehead and at the corners of her mouth. She seemed thinner, though still built of compact muscle, and as she stepped inside, T’Lyn found herself wondering how exactly the captain had regained her ship and her command after the tumultuous events of the past year.

“Ensigns,” Captain Freeman said, turning and facing the door. “Mariner, what are you doing?”

“Showing our newest member around the ship,” Beckett said, intentionally dodging the question. “Mom, this is-”

“Ensign…T’Lyn,” Captain Freeman said with just a moment’s hesitation. “Our new transfer from the Sh’vhal. Welcome.”

“Thank you,” T’Lyn said. She knew, here, a human would say something like “I look forward to serving with you”, or “I’m so glad to be here”, but she did not feel those things, exactly. Eager to get into the work, yes. Happy to be here? Not exactly. The human odour was an assault to her olfactory senses, and the blatant emotionalism they displayed was deeply troubling to her. She wondered what her father had gotten her into by transferring her into Starfleet.

“Mariner, report to my ready room at 18:00 hours,” Captain Freeman said, before disembarking on the next floor. The moment the doors closed, Beckett let out a lengthy groan.

“Dinner with your mom again?” D’Vana said sympathetically.

“Ugh, she’s been so clingy since she got back,” Beckett exclaimed. “I love her, but seriously.”

“I did not realise the captain was your mother,” T’Lyn remarked, casting a sidelong glance at Beckett. “I have had a parent as a superior officer, as well.”

“Yeah?” Beckett brightened. “We should start a club.”

“Indeed,” T’Lyn replied, understanding this was an attempt at humour, even if it wasn’t one she quite understood. The turbolift stopped at the next floor and D’Vana and Beckett led the way out, back into the rows upon rows of identical corridors.

T’Lyn was not sure how she would ever orient herself on this ship. Federation ships were all the same; their halls were the same, their decks were the same, their bridges were the same. On the Sh’vhal, there had been numbers on every floor, and the layout of each had been slightly different. It had taken her only a matter of days to grow accustomed to it. On the Cerritos, as she explored yet another deck that looked identical to the five preceding it, she did not know how she would ever find her way.

They were on deck four, past the second holodeck, when they came upon a small enclave in the ship. There were two large viewing windows on either side, giving a view of the stars outside, and between them there was a Starfleet insignia carved into the wall. They approached the windows, looking outside for a moment.

“Beautiful, huh?” D’Vana said, beaming.

“The aesthetics are pleasing,” T’Lyn concurred. She stopped at the Starfleet insignia and ran her fingers over it, curiously. Underneath it was an engraving, four words written in the Standard script of Earth but not in any language she recognised. She read it over again. “What does this say?”

“It’s the old Starfleet motto,” Beckett said, smiling fondly at it. “Ad astra per aspera.”

T’Lyn blinked. The words meant nothing to her. “What does it mean?”

“You don’t know Latin?” Beckett laughed, nudging her in the side.

“There were not many opportunities to study Latin at the Vulcan Science Academy,” T’Lyn deadpanned.

“It means ‘through hardship, to the stars,’” D’Vana said, coming to stand beside them. “It came from an old Earth spacefaring agency, right, Mariner?”

“Something like that,” Mariner said, shrugging. “I didn’t really pay much attention to that stuff in the Academy.”

“Through hardship, to the stars,” T’Lyn repeated, trying to make sense of it. She did not understand the sentiment behind it, but it must have been important to the humans, to the early founders of Starfleet, to carve these words into their ships and swear by them in their lives. Perhaps, she thought, in her time working for Starfleet, she would come to understand them. For now, though, she wondered.

She looked to the stars, as though they held all the answers, but there was just the blackness of space staring back at her. She pressed her lips together and tore her gaze away, looking to D’Vana and Beckett, who were joshing around.

“Is there a meditation space aboard this vessel?” She asked, the question occurring to her again. D’Vana looked up at her.

“I think so,” D’Vana said. “We have a couple of Vulcans on board!”

“It’s this way,” Beckett said, taking the lead again. “I’ll show you. It’s on deck two.”

T’Lyn inclined her head and followed, taking careful, deliberate steps. They stepped into the turbolift and went two floors up, where Beckett led them to an unassuming door a third of the way down the hall. She stopped at it, and looked to T’Lyn.

“I take it this is the meditation space,” T’Lyn said. “I would like to go inside.”

“Of course,” D’Vana said. “We’ll wait out here.”

T’Lyn gave them each a nod and stepped inside. It was dimly lit, most of the light coming from candles, many of which were currently extinguished. There were six mats laid out on the floor, and T’Lyn stepped over them, looking around the room curiously. There was a holder, for burning incense, and small parchments with the writings of Surak on the walls. She had almost expected this to be a nondenominational space, but it appeared to be geared towards solely Vulcans, and for this T’Lyn found herself grateful. It was like finding a piece of home within the hustle and bustle of the starship.

T’Lyn breathed deep, smelling the lingering scents of the candles and incense, and felt a small smile grace her lips. In between her transfer from the Sh’vhal to Starfleet, she had stopped home on Vulcan to see her mother, and it had reignited in her the strangest emotions. She shied away from them, but she was feeling some approximation of what a human might call homesick. She longed for the crimson sunsets and the orange sand, for the shimmering cities and the staunch buildings, for places designed around logic and functionality. Nothing she had so far seen of the Cerritos had indicated it had been designed with either logic or functionality in mind, but this space, this Vulcan meditation room…it was somewhere she thought she would be frequenting often.

It offered her solace.

“The meditation space meets the requirements,” she said, stepping outside to where D’Vana and Beckett were waiting. D’Vana brightened at her remark, though she did not mean it as a positive statement, merely a statement of fact.

“Where do you want to go next?” D’Vana asked. “We could head down to Engineering, and introduce you to Rutherford!”

“Pass,” Beckett said, sounding bored. “She’s not interested in Engineering, Tendi.”

T’Lyn was not particularly invested in Engineering, that was true. She understood the basic functions of the warp core, and the many components that made it up, but she did not have a particular affinity for engineering the way she had for programming or the sciences.

However, D’Vana seemed to want to go to Engineering, and T’Lyn found herself wanting to make a good impression on the overeager Orion, so she said, “I am not averse to seeing Engineering. Who is Rutherford?”

“He’s in the next bunk over from yours,” D’Vana explained as they made their way back to the turbolift. “He’s great!”

“Tendi has a crush on him,” Beckett teased, nudging D’Vana in the side. Her green cheeks tinged a few shades darker and she shook her head vehemently.

“I do not, Mariner! Rutherford is our friend.”

“Uh huh,” Beckett said, apparently ignoring how uncomfortable she was making D’Vana, whose blush had only deepened. “What about you, T’Lyn? You got a man back on Vulcan?”

“I am betrothed,” T’Lyn replied. “As is custom. He will make an adequate partner.”

“Do you like him?” D’Vana asked, looking over curiously.

T’Lyn hesitated, and then said, “I prefer the company of women.”

“Oh,” D’Vana said. “Well, surely-”

“You can dissolve the betrothal, right?” Beckett interrupted.

“It is a matter for another time,” T’Lyn replied.

Neither Beckett or D’Vana looked particularly comfortable with this, but both chose to refrain from making any insensitive remarks regarding Vulcan culture. T’Lyn found herself oddly grateful for this; it was not a matter she particularly ever discussed at length. She was betrothed as was customary of Vulcan children, and as she had grown into an adult she had come to some realisations about herself. It did not make her any less betrothed, or any less customary of her culture, and it was something she felt she would deal with when the time came.

She was not due to be married for another ten years. And there was no way to know what would happen in that time; it was not unheard of for people to meet their t’hy’la in that time, and the dissolution of the arrangement would be made automatically.

T’Lyn had decided many years ago that it was a problem for another time.

“Let’s go see Rutherford,” Beckett said, leading them past a set of double doors and to the next turbolift. She stopped just before the lift, pointing to a map of the ship that was mounted on the wall.

“We’re here,” she said, touching a section of the map towards the top. She moved her finger down the decks, tapping the map. “Rutherford’s here. And our bunks are here, on deck eleven.”

Her finger moved again, highlighting a section of map. T’Lyn squinted at it, making a mental note of the location of deck eleven, and of the deck the meditation room was on. She knew she would be consulting the maps often, and was glad when she noticed another copy of the map on the next floor they got off on. They walked into the depths of the ship, and T’Lyn found herself face-to-face with the warp core.

It was nothing special; it was not unlike any other warp engine she had seen. It illuminated the room with a dim blue light, and emitted a soft humming sound that seemed to permeate throughout the ship, but was strongest here, in the engine room. T’Lyn tore her eyes away from the warp core, dismissing it entirely as being of little interest.

There were a few yellow-shirted engineers milling about, consulting their PADDS and talking to each other. One looked up at them approaching, a grin splitting his face, and waved exuberantly at them.

“Tendi! Mariner! Over here!” He called out to them. D’Vana bounced on her heels again and quickened her pace, hi-fiving him in greeting, while Beckett hung back a little, a knowing smirk on her face.

“This is T’Lyn,” D’Vana was saying, and T’Lyn blinked, returning her focus to the others in front of her.

“Hiya, T’Lyn! I’m Rutherford!” He held out his hand to her, like he expected her to shake it. She stared at it for a few moments, hands clenched in front of her.

“Sam,” Beckett whispered. “Vulcans don’t touch.”

“Oh! Okey dokey!” Rutherford withdrew his hand as quickly as he offered it, giving her a jaunty wave instead. “It’s nice to meet you.”

“Likewise,” T’Lyn found herself saying, tilting her head. She had not ever met a cyborg before. Starfleet was already exposing her to new things, broadening her horizons as her father had wanted. He was insistent she would fit in here, but looking at the others, she was not sure that was true.

“Rutherford!” A tall, slender man with facial hair called out from across the room. “Back to work!”

“Sorry, guys,” Rutherford said apologetically, hyperspanner in hand. “You heard the boss.”

“We’ll catch you later,” Beckett said, nudging D’Vana along. The Orion gave Rutherford a sad wave and continued on her way out of the engineering bay. T’Lyn followed, giving Rutherford a single nod as she left.

“Where to next?” D’Vana said thoughtfully, stopping to examine the map by the turbolift. “We’ve covered just about everything.”

T’Lyn thought that they had covered a lot, but perhaps not everything.

“Where are the showers?” She asked, looking to the other women.

“Duh, Tendi! Of course!” D’Vana smacked herself on the forehead. “I can’t believe that slipped my mind. Follow me!”

They got on the turbolift and went back to deck eleven, walking past the corridors of bunks and to an otherwise empty corridor. There was a room labelled SHOWERS, and one that D’Vana informed her was the bathroom. T’Lyn stepped inside the showers and looked around; there were row after row of sonic showerheads, but no stalls, no privacy. It was very different to the layout of the Sh’vhal’s showers, but something, she thought, she would grow accustomed to.

The next stop was the laundry room, which was familiar to her, laid out the way the Sh’vhal’s was. T’Lyn looked around, nodded, and followed D’Vana and Beckett out and back to the turbolifts, passing by maintenance hatches and enclaves in the ship. On the lift, Beckett said, “Deck six,” and on deck six T’Lyn was introduced to the transporter room and the armoury.

She had not been assessed for combat, in her weeks on the space station; the prevailing opinion seemed to be that those in the sciences did not need it. However, she was adept at Suus Mahna, and well-practiced at that. She had been in training since she was quite small. It was likely she was out of practice now, though – she had not kept up with it since being transferred off the Sh’vhal, and she had yet to encounter anyone to spar with on the Cerritos. Perhaps, she thought idly, she could ask another of the ship’s Vulcan crewmembers if they would be interested in sparring with her.

“Hello, T’Lyn? Earth to T’Lyn,” Beckett was saying, and T’Lyn blinked, startled out of her reverie.

“I apologise,” T’Lyn said, looking between the two women. “I was distracted.”

“That’s alright,” D’Vana said with a grin. “Beckett was just saying the tour was about over, if you wanted to head back to deck eleven or do something else?”

“I would like to meditate,” The Vulcan replied.

“Sure,” Beckett said with a shrug of her shoulders. “Suits me. You remember how to get there?”

“Yes,” T’Lyn inclined her head. “Thank you for the tour. It was…enlightening.”

“We’ll see you later!” D’Vana exclaimed as she and Beckett walked away. T’Lyn watched them go, wondering what they were doing with their free time. The Cerritos wasn’t due to warp for another hour, by her count, so they could be heading down to the station to use the last of their free time; that seemed likely, she thought, though an hour was not much time in the grand scheme of things.

T’Lyn entered the turbolift and looked around, having not observed it closely in all the times D’Vana and Beckett had dragged her in there. It was not unlike the lifts on the Sh’vhal; a turbolift was a turbolift, she reasoned.

“Deck two,” she said, and the lift started moving, carrying her up several floors. She stepped off and made her way down to the meditation room, the doors opening for her almost silently. Inside, the lights were low, but the candles were lit and dripping wax down their sides. T’Lyn walked over to them and lifted a candle from the precipice, setting it down in front of the centremost mat in the front row of the room. She dropped to her knees and kneeled in front of it, sitting back on her heels, the top of her feet flat against the floor. She stared into the flame until she felt her mind start to clear, and when she was sure she could not clear it any further, she closed her eyes.

Inside, her mind was empty. Her thoughts were, it felt, in neat little boxes, stacked away where she could not find them; her feelings drifted somewhere above her, over her, through her, but never settling around her or inside her. There was anxiety about being on a new ship; there was fear she would not fit in; there was that strange lonely feeling that came from being the only Vulcan amongst humans. She dismissed that last one; she was not the only Vulcan on the Cerritos, and she was sure she could make the acquaintance of some of the other Vulcans, even if only to have someone to practice Suus Mahna with. She wasn’t here to make friends.

The feeling she could not shake, however, was a strange sense of longing for her homeworld, for her family. It would, she was sure, fade in time, so she dismissed it too, and returned to the calm place in-between thoughts and feelings. There was nothing there, no words or emotion, just a practiced sense of zen.

T’Lyn waited for this tranquillity to settle inside her, and then opened her eyes, taking a deep breath. She held it in her lungs, letting the oxygen flood her bloodstream, and then released it, exhaling slowly. She turned her head from side to side, stretching out her neck, bending it forward until her chin touched her chest, leaning it back and leaving her pale neck exposed. Her uniform collar had ridden up again, and mindlessly she tugged it back down, until it was flush with her skin.

She rocked back on her heels and got to her feet in one fluid movement, reaching down and lifting the candle so it was cupped in her hands on its little ornate girandole. It was coloured a deep gold, and it reflected the light, the carvings in it dancing with each flicker. T’Lyn placed it back on the smooth wood and leaned forward, pursing her lips and blowing it out softly. Satisfied, she breathed in the scent of extinguished flame, and straightened, taking one last look around the room before she bid it farewell for the evening.

There was a slight shift in the vibration beneath her feet, and T’Lyn looked up, disconcerted. She realised they must have gone to warp; she did not think she had been meditating that long. She lengthened her stride, walking back to the turbolift and requesting it take her to deck eleven, where she made her way down the many identical rows until she found her bunk once more. D’Vana and Beckett were nowhere to be seen, and she didn’t recognise anyone else around her. They made no moves to introduce themselves, largely engrossed in their PADDs or otherwise talking with each other, so with that thought T’Lyn quietly changed into a loose-fitting tunic and got ready for bed.

It was early, but she had to report to Sickbay at 08:00 hours in the morning, so she settled in to rest, and, calmed by her meditative state, she slipped into a dreamless sleep.

After a complete rest cycle, T’Lyn awoke, eyes adjusting to the dim light of the lower decks. Everyone else seemed to still be asleep, so she rolled over, exhaling slowly and staring out across the corridor. She picked up her PADD and checked the time – still two hours until her shift began. With a slow exhale, she pulled back the covers and swung her legs out of bed. In the dark, she made her way down to the showers, uniform tucked under one arm.

After a quick blast from the sonic showerhead, she dressed quietly, doing up her collar and adjusting it in the mirror set along the shower wall. Her pants slid on easily, and she settled the waistband just above her hips, tugging her shirt down over it. She looked at her reflection a moment, before setting her headband over her hair, adjusting it so the length of it was off her face. She smoothed down her bangs, turning her head from side to side, and satisfied with her appearance, she decided she would go and get breakfast before the mess was crowded with the early morning rush.

In the mess, T’Lyn made her way to the replicators, requesting a small bowl of fruit and a cup of Vulcan tea. She took a seat at the nearest table and ate breakfast in silence, watching as her shipmates trailed in slowly as the morning progressed. Most made a beeline for the replicators to beg for coffee, while others still greeted their friends with stiff claps on the back and laughter in their eyes. T’Lyn took a sip of her tea and watched as a few people from her corridor wandered in – nobody she knew by name. The Orion and human women were nowhere to be seen.

She supposed she must look lonely, sitting alone and drinking her tea, spearing fruit with her fork and bringing it to her mouth, but truthfully she relished the solitude in these early hours. She was eager to start her day, settle into the rhythm of work and learn the ins and outs of Sciences in Starfleet. It wasn’t like she was unused to solitude – on the Sh’vhal she had never exactly been popular. Vulcan culture claimed to be above such concepts, but T’Lyn knew firsthand how insular Vulcan groupings could be, and she had always been on the outside. It hadn’t bothered her. It didn’t bother her now.

She finished her tea with a final swig and picked the cup and bowl up, taking it over to be disposed of. She walked out just as the crowd of people walking in increased substantially, and she searched the crowd, looking for familiar faces. She thought she spotted the cyborg – Rutherford? - and the other human male – Boimler? – towards the back of the line, but they were shuffling forward, both half-asleep as they waited for their turn to acquire caffeine and sustenance.

T’Lyn returned to her bunk to grab her PADD and check one last time before she started her shift. There was a message notification and she still had twenty minutes before she had to be in Sickbay, so she stopped, leaning against the bunk and swiping it open.

It was from her father.

I hope you have a good first day in Starfleet. Live long and prosper.

The corners of T’Lyn’s mouth twitched upwards, not quite into a smile. She tucked the PADD under her arm and started making her way down to Sickbay, resolving to reply to the message later. It was unlike her father to show sentimentality, but she appreciated it in this moment. It had bolstered her spirit somewhat, given her the confidence she needed to take on her first assignment.

She was going to have a good first day in Starfleet.

In Sickbay, there were a few people milling about, mostly focused on their tasks and the early-morning gossip afforded to each other. A few of them, T’Lyn noticed, stopped what they were doing to glance up at her, but after a few moments of silent curiosity they continued on their way, returning to the work.

T’Lyn stopped in front of Nurse Westlake and stood straight and tall, or as tall as she could muster herself up to be, anyway. Westlake glanced at his PADD while taking a contemplative sip of his coffee and said, “Wait here.”

The Vulcan did as she was told, turning her head to look across Sickbay. It was devoid of patients, devoid of anything really but empty biobeds and instrument trays. Most of the others seemed to be cleaning, a task T’Lyn did not mind, though privately she was hoping for something a little more stimulating.

“Vulcan,” T’Ana appeared, looking both exhausted and bored, the tip of her tail twitching. “Program the tricorders in storage and go around checking the parameters on the biobeds.”

“Yes doctor,” T’Lyn said. “Is there anything else you require?”

T’Ana huffed a laugh. “Start with the tricorders,” she said.

“Yes, doctor.” T’Lyn made her way to the storage closet Nurse Westlake directed her towards, pulling out a storage crate of neatly arranged tricorders. There were eight in each crate, nestled in the bottom, and there were twelve crates along one wall of the storage room, six in each row. The top two rows were lined with what appeared to be old-fashioned medical equipment, the sort of things T’Lyn had only seen in textbooks. She made a mental note to investigate further when she had the time.

Programming the tricorders was easy, once T’Lyn had gotten into the rhythm of it. She would start each one up, check its status, sync it to the PADD, input the programming, and then return it into the box, safely tucked away and loaded with the latest data from Starfleet Medical. The tricorders had to be updated every so often, with the discovery of new diseases across the Federation, and though there was some degree of automation to it, it still had to be manually added to the system.

It had barely been an hour when T’Lyn placed the last tricorder into its crate and slid it back onto the shelf. She checked the time on her PADD, exhaled softly, and got to her feet, taking a few steps out into Sickbay.

It was a little more chaotic this time around, with a few patients in beds, mostly nursing superficial burns and grazes. T’Ana was in her office, ears flat against her head as she spoke to somebody inside. The nurses were walking around with dermal regenerators, talking in soothing tones, and T’Lyn tilted her head, because certainly when injured she had never wanted to be soothed. Still, she had been given her tasks, and there were empty biobeds, so diligently she made her way over to them and started checking their parameters – that they were measuring things like temperature and heartrate correctly, that they would still respond with alarm when those things strayed out of their normal ranges.

As each patient was discharged, she checked those biobeds, too, and stopped short only when one bed did not respond as it should. She checked it again, to be certain, believing in the logic of doing things thoroughly, so they may be done correctly. When it made the same error twice, she got to her knees, pulling away the control panel and digging around in the wiring inside. Unable to locate the problem, she synced it to her PADD and ran a full diagnostic.

“There you are,” she murmured, finding the error, but before she had a chance to begin repairing it, she was interrupted by T’Ana.

“What are you doing?” T’Ana demanded, tail flicking back and forth, one ear pinned back. T’Lyn looked up from her PADD at the ornery doctor.

“This bed is functioning outside of normal parameters,” T’Lyn said. “I have run a full diagnostic and am about to repair it.”

T’Ana took a thoughtful sip from the cup in her hand. “That’s not what you were told to do.”

“If something is broken, it is logical to repair it in the most timely manner possible. I know how to fix this. I did not see the point in alerting Nurse Westlake when I could make the adjustment myself.”

 T’Ana’s eyes squinted, and her mouth twitched into what was almost a smile. “Nice initiative, kid. Go get yourself something from the replicator in my office when you’re done.”

T’Lyn put her head down and returned to the repair. It took only a matter of minutes, and when she was done she replaced the control panel and got to her feet, PADD close to her chest. She stepped inside the doctor’s office, glancing around at the anatomical décor before making her way to the replicator. She asked it for a cup of Vulcan tea, hot, and was standing out in Sickbay sipping at it when T’Ana found her again.

“I need you to prep the hyposprays,” she ordered, gesturing across the room. T’Lyn followed her gaze to where a myriad of hyposprays were stored. “Just do me ten analgesic and ten antibiotic. Those chucklefucks down in Security were sparring on the holodeck with the safety protocols turned off again.”

“Yes, doctor,” T’Lyn said, making her way across the room. She set her tea down beside her, picking it up to sip from it occasionally as she prepped each hypospray with its respective medicine. Dosage would have to be calculated by the doctor – different species reacted to different medications in vastly different ways. It was one thing T’Lyn had learned from her single xenoanatomy class at the Vulcan Science Academy. It had interested her, but she had no desire to devote her life to it.

A few crewmen in yellow shirts trailed in, nursing deep wounds. T’Ana stalked around, barking orders and hissing demands, and when one particularly tall Bajoran walked in with a black eye and a head wound she stood with her hands on her hips and proceeded to absolutely ream him in front of the whole of Sickbay.

T’Lyn straightened as Rutherford walked through the doors of Sickbay, a little unsteady on his feet.

“Uh,” he called out uncertainly, “Can I please get a doctor over here?”

T’Ana pointed to T’Lyn and jerked her thumb towards him, gathering supplies. The Vulcan stopped what she was doing and stepped out from behind the autoclave, walking towards Rutherford. She guided him to a bed, noting the way he was clutching his arm to his chest, and stayed quiet, awaiting her orders from Dr T’Ana.

“What seems to be the trouble?” T’Ana marched towards them, a menacing look on her face. Her ears were flattened and her pupils were in thin slits, her stubby tail twitching from side to side.

“It’s my arm,” Rutherford said, holding up his left arm. “My implant says it’s broken.”

T’Ana just barely managed not to roll her eyes, grabbing his wrist and straightening his arm. He flinched at the movement, but allowed her to wave her tricorder over it.

“Yeah, that’s broke alright,” she said, turning away for a moment. “T’Lyn, prep him for the osteogenesis regenerator.”

T’Lyn guided the portable machine to the biobed and began setting the parameters for human bone into it. She guided Rutherford’s arm in, hesitating only a little when he flinched, and set it down inside the machine.

“Is this gonna hurt?” Rutherford looked up to her with widened eyes.

“I am unsure,” T’Lyn said, running a preliminary scan to determine the necessary bone growth. “Pain is a state of mind. With control over your emotion, it should be irrelevant.”

“Wow,” Rutherford chuckled, his face pale, “You’ve got worse bedside manner than I had!”

“No one has worse bedside manner than you, ensign,” T’Ana said, stepping in to check what T’Lyn had entered into the machine. She made a minor adjustment, checked his arm was palm-down, and then pressed a button. The machine let off a faint humming sound as it began the arduous process of knitting bone back together.

“Stay still,” she warned him, checking something on her PADD. “T’Lyn, keep an eye on him.”

“Yes, doctor,” T’Lyn replied. She took a seat beside his bed, crossing her ankles and resting her hands in her lap.

Rutherford groaned, resisting the urge to squirm as a stinging sensation ran up and down his arm. He swore, closing his eyes in pain, brow furrowed. T’Lyn thought she saw the glint of tears at the corner of his eyes.

“Do you require an analgesic?” She asked him. He shook his head, breathing out through his nose in a huff. She considered him, and then asked herself what D’Vana would do. Talk with him, she reasoned.

But about what?

“How did you break your arm?” T’Lyn asked, still sitting ramrod straight in the chair. Rutherford cracked open his good eye and squinted at her.

“Fell down a Jefferies tube,” he said. “I was on the rungs and my foot just gave out underneath me. I fell probably two decks.”

“There is a high probability these injuries could have been worse than they are,” T’Lyn remarked.

“Guess I’m lucky, huh?” Rutherford grinned at her.

“Indeed,” she replied. Luck had little to do with it, but humans believed in the concept so readily, always carrying with them trinkets and talismans that were said to ward off danger and bad luck. T’Lyn had seen some of it on the space station, human pilots who carried with them pressed four-leaf clovers and something they called a rabbit’s foot. It had been an uncomfortable topic for her, so she shied away from it, keeping to herself as much as she could. She had only needed to wait there a small number of days before the Cerritos had docked and her assignment had been confirmed. It had been no trouble.

Rutherford groaned again, bringing his hand up to his forehead. She saw his fingers trail across his implant for a moment, like he was going to adjust it, but he thought better of it and brought his good hand down to rest on the bed. T’Lyn checked the regenerator to see how it was going. It read forty-seven percent in neat little numbers on its display, so she leaned back, satisfied it was doing its job.

“Okay, now it’s stopped hurting, it kinda tickles,” Rutherford said a few minutes later. He flexed the fingers in his good hand, and looked like he wanted to do the same with the hand inside the regenerator, but he seemed to remember T’Ana’s stark warning to stay still at the last moment and stopped himself.

“You will feel a range of discomfort throughout the process,” T’Lyn stated. He looked up at her in surprise.

“Now see, that’s the kinda thing I wanted to know when I asked if it was gonna hurt, T’Lyn,” he remarked, shaking his head. He offered a smile, though, and seemed to hold no ill will about it.

“I will endeavour to do better next time,” she replied.

“Let’s hope there’s not a next time,” Rutherford laughed. T’Lyn, after a moment, nodded her head in return.

The machine beeped once, and T’Lyn leaned over to check it again. It had reached eighty percent, which meant it was nearing the end of its cycle. T’Lyn knew from the brief overview she’d gotten from Nurse Westlake that the regenerators were not perfect – if something was broken deeply or badly damaged, it could take multiple rounds of treatment until they could be considered fully healed. She hoped that would not be the case for Rutherford, however. It had been a clean break in the medial side of the ulna. It was painful, certainly, but not life threatening, and long gone were the days where surgical intervention was necessary for such things.

“I’m gonna have to report to Billups and tell him what happened,” Rutherford groaned.

“I am sure Lieutenant Commander Billups will be understanding of your situation,” T’Lyn replied, glancing from the osteogenesis regenerator’s screen to Rutherford’s worried face.

“Yeah, I guess you’re right,” Rutherford said. “I just didn’t finish replacing the relays.”

“The work can wait, I am sure,” T’Lyn said. “First we must heal your arm. Then you may worry about relays.”

“You know,” Rutherford chuckled, “T’Ana may be right. Your bedside manner isn’t as bad as mine.”

T’Lyn’s mouth quirked upwards. “I am told you were terrible.”

“Does she still talk about it?” Rutherford said, meeting her gaze.

“She warned me not to be ‘anywhere near as bad as that Engineering kid’,” T’Lyn said. Rutherford groaned again, his cheeks flushing pink.

“I’m never gonna live that one down,” he said. “Hey, T’Lyn?”

“Yes?” T’Lyn checked the regenerator again. It was sitting at just over ninety-five percent.

“Thanks for sticking around. You didn’t have to.”

“The doctor asked me to watch you,” T’Lyn replied, leaning back. “I was simply doing my job.”

Rutherford grinned at her, but before he could say anything else, Dr T’Ana appeared, stalking her way out of her office with a coffee in hand. She took a long sip when she reached them, setting the mug down on top of the osteogenesis regenerator and swallowing hard. She checked the numbers on the machine with a soft noise of consideration, pressed a couple of buttons, and stood back.

“Ensign T’Lyn, you may go,” she said, picking up her mug and taking another sip from it. “Rutherford here will be out in about ten minutes.”

“I am willing to stay,” T’Lyn said, straightening, but T’Ana waved her off.

“Nah, head off,” she said, squinting at the display. “Your shift finishes in a couple minutes, take the early mark.”

Although T’Lyn did not want to, as T’Ana had phrased it, take an early mark, she could not deny that her stomach was rumbling and the thought of sitting in Sickbay much longer was making her skin crawl. She got to her feet, acknowledge Rutherford with a nod of the head and received a half-hearted wave in return, and gathered up her PADD and teacup from earlier. She disposed of the teacup on her way down the hallway, and made her way out to the turbolift, requesting it take her to the deck the mess hall was on. Once there, she stepped off and made her way over to the replicators, and she stood by it for a moment, debating what to get.

Eventually, in lilting Vulcan, she requested a favourite dish of hers, and was surprised when it appeared before her, exactly as she’d asked. There were some words in Federation Standard that did not meet the requirements that the Vulcan language provided; indeed, there were some words in Vulcan that could not be translated into Standard, not for want of trying on behalf of the many linguists over the years. Foods, for example, were difficult to translate. Plomeek was plomeek; there was no word for it on Earth, because plomeek did not exist on Earth. Likewise, with what T’Lyn had ordered herself now, there was no Earth word. The closest approximation would be mushroom, but even then, that would not be quite right.

T’Lyn sat down to enjoy her mushroom salad, though again, that was not quite what it was. It was a salad made of the dark leafy greens that grew in the dirt beneath bodies of water on Vulcan, a sort of a freshwater seaweed if you will, and cut up through it was a fungus that grew only on the trees outside ShiKahr in the coldest months of the year. The fungus had a sweet flavour to it, and the leaves were fresh and full of flavour, and drizzled over it was a vinaigrette of sorts. It was a favourite of T’Lyn’s on Vulcan, and, it turned out, as she took her first bite, replicated was not unlike the real thing.

“Mind if we join you?” Came a voice, and T’Lyn looked up to see the Orion and human woman who had given her the tour staring back down at her. D’Vana and Beckett, that was it. She inclined her head, gesturing with her fork for them to take the opposite seats, and they did, with plates piled high with food.

“What is that?” T’Lyn found herself asking, tilting her head at D’Vana’s plate. D’Vana grinned and held it out so T’Lyn could get a better look.

“They’re called tacos,” D’Vana said. “They’re delicious. What are you having?”

“It is,” T’Lyn started, and then stopped, wondering how to describe it in English. “A mushroom salad, of sorts.”

“It looks great!” D’Vana exclaimed, taking a large bite of her taco. Beckett was twirling a piece of spaghetti around her fork and shovelling it into her mouth, not particularly paying either of them any mind, more focused on the food in front of her. T’Lyn could sympathise. It had been that kind of day.

“How was your meal with the captain?” She found herself asking, spearing a piece of fungus on her fork and bringing it to her mouth. Beckett looked up from her plate, slurping a piece of spaghetti into her mouth, chewed, and then swallowed.

“It was okay,” she said, her mouth still half full. “Usual mom stuff, you know.”

T’Lyn nodded, though she did not quite understand what Beckett meant by that.

Beckett and D’Vana fell into conversation with a practiced ease that came from months of friendship. T’Lyn observed quietly, taking furtive bites of her salad, as the two women gossiped about the goings on behind the scenes on a Federation starship.

Gossip was illogical. T’Lyn knew that, but she still couldn’t help but lean in a little as Beckett regaled them with what Commander Ransom had really been using the holodeck for. It was nothing vulgar or even particularly wrong, but it would be incredibly embarrassing if it left this table, and T’Lyn reasoned with herself that it was logical to seek to know your superior officers better.

She decided she would continue joining Beckett and D’Vana for meals, if not for gossip, than at least for company.

The following weeks passed by in a blur of work. T’Lyn went on her first away mission, delivering medical supplies and programming new replicators for a colony in deep space. She meditated once a day, finding solace in the meditation room, and found herself sharing meals with D’Vana, Beckett and the boys, and taking part in late night conversations in the lower decks. She settled into a routine of sorts – breakfast alone, reporting to Sickbay, letting the day pass in a barrage of tasks before joining the lower deckers for a meal in the mess, and then while they enjoyed some recreational time she would go and meditate. They always made sure to say goodnight to her before bed, and oddly and illogically enough, T’Lyn found herself charmed by the humans, the Orion, and their ways.

It all passed by so quickly, she forgot entirely about replying to her father’s message, and by the time she remembered she thought instead she would call him next time she had some time off. It would please her to see his face.

T’Lyn swallowed down the last of her tea and disposed of the mug, making her way to Sickbay. She wasn’t sure what this day had in store for her, but she was, as always, ready and willing to rise to the challenge. She had learned a lot from working in Starfleet, and other species had a fascinating approach to all facets of life she had not considered before.

She considered the Orion approach to programming. D’Vana had shown her just a few nights beforehand. It had surprised her, the amount of shortcuts written into the code. She didn’t know how a code held up by so little could still work, and yet, it functioned correctly, even with more expedience than the code she had created for herself. She stepped into Sickbay and made her way to the instrument trays, deciding she would order them before she was ordered to. D’Vana walked inside, yawning, and offered T’Lyn a wave, going over to the autoclave to check its status.

T’Ana was milling about, checking patient vitals and administering hyposprays, and T’Lyn honestly expected her to ignore the ensigns working their way around her when the Caitian’s eyes fell on her.

“Ensign, you’re on the bridge today,” T’Ana said, looking up at the young Vulcan. T’Lyn blinked; this was unexpected, but not unwelcome. She nodded, and followed D’Vana out of Sickbay and to the turbolift. The Orion was babbling excitedly about bridge duty and senior science operations, and T’Lyn listened intently, trying to divulge as much information as possible.

“So we’ll be on the science station,” D’Vana said, grinning up at her. “I’ll show you the ropes and then we’ll see how you do!”

“That sounds adequate,” T’Lyn replied, looking down at D’Vana. “I will endeavour to learn the controls.”

“You’ll get the hang of it in no time!” D’Vana said, stepping off the turbolift. In a moment, she changed drastically; the cheerful expression dropped from her face, replaced by an almost stern appearance. She stood straighter, walked with more purposeful steps. She nodded to Boimler and Beckett, inclined her head towards an Andorian woman that T’Lyn recognised from the photograph in Beckett’s bunk, and then took her place at the science station. T’Lyn walked behind her, head held high, back straight, arms behind her back. She got to the science station and stood just to D’Vana’s right.

The doors opened, and Captain Freeman stepped onto the bridge. At once, everyone was at attention. As Captain Freeman took her seat, the senior staff trailed in, taking their places on the bridge. T’Ana was the last to join them, her tail lashing back and forth. She gave T’Lyn a meaningful look and took her seat beside the captain.

T’Lyn swallowed, and returned her attention to the science station.

It was not unlike the station aboard the Sh’vhal, though instead of looping Vulcan script, the data was all laid out in neat Federation Standard. T’Lyn took a moment to read it through carefully. She had no issue with Standard, but it was not her first language; Vulcan would always be her mother tongue, so with that, she took extra care to ensure she was not making mistakes when extrapolating data.

“Here,” D’Vana said, tapping one of the screens. T’Lyn leaned down to take a closer look. It was the readings from the nearest asteroid belt in this section of space. “What do you think that means?”

“There is an asteroid belt,” T’Lyn remarked drily. D’Vana giggled and shook her head.

“Try again,” she said. T’Lyn exhaled and looked closer at the readings, trying to make sense of it.

“There are raw materials in the asteroid,” T’Lyn said. “Metals. They would be useful to a mining ship.”

“Exactly!” D’Vana grinned up at her. “The Federation has a couple. So we’ll relay that information to the captain, and she’ll contact Starfleet to report it.”

“I see,” T’Lyn replied. This was not unlike what she had done on the Sh’vhal. “What else do we look for?”

“Oh, everything,” D’Vana said, tapping a few things to send a notification to the captain regarding the raw materials. “We check for anomalies, strange energies, black holes.”

T’Lyn inclined her head and viewed one of the screens. It was not difficult to make sense of the readings, once she had focused her mind to it.

“Here, try the controls,” D’Vana said, getting up out of the chair and allowing T’Lyn to take her seat.

T’Lyn’s hands wandered over the controls, familiarising herself with them. They were almost identical to those on her previous ship, and it awakened a strange feeling inside her, not unlike déjà vu. She manually inputted a long range scan and sat back, awaiting the results.

“Oh, cool,” D’Vana said, leaning over to look at the screen. “Good job, T’Lyn.”

“Ensign!” T’Ana called out, and T’Lyn and D’Vana both looked up. “Not you, Tendi. Vulcan. Come here.”

T’Lyn got up and walked over to the doctor. “Doctor,” she said calmly, taking her place at the doctor’s side. “My name is T’Lyn.”

“Yeah, yeah. I know that.” T’Ana’s tail lashed. “Stand here, pay attention, keep your mouth shut.”

“Yes, doctor,” she said.

T’Lyn stood to attention behind Dr T’Ana, watching the stars go by at warp. Captain Freeman was in her chair, bickering with Beckett, and Ensign Barnes was at the helm. Various officers were milling about the bridge, doing their duties diligently, when there was a sudden trill from the communications station.

“Captain,” someone said. “We’re receiving a distress signal.”

“What does it say?” Captain Freeman sat at attention.

“The Vulcan ship Sh’vhal is being attacked by unknown assailants.”

“Change course,” Freeman ordered, and the Trill nodded, adjusting their course and speed. T’Lyn stared straight ahead, exhaling through her nose slowly. This was unusual, but not unheard of.

They dropped out of warp a scant few minutes later to find the Sh’vhal and a path of devastation left in her wake. There was no sign of the enemy ship or perhaps ships, based on the amount of debris floating through the vastness of space. T’Lyn straightened when she saw her former ship, taking in the damaged hull, the scorch marks, the missing pieces. She found herself hoping there had been no casualties.

“Hail them,” Captain Freeman ordered.

“No response,” was the quick reply.

Captain Freeman frowned. She scanned the bridge for a moment, and her eyes fell on T’Lyn.

“Ensign T’Lyn, what is the name of the captain of the Sh’vhal?”

“Senik,” T’Lyn replied.

“Open a channel,” Captain Freeman ordered. “Captain Senik, this is Captain Carol Freeman of the Starfleet ship Cerritos. Please respond.”

There was no response.

“Captain Senik, please respond. Do you need aid? Do you have many injured?”

Silence filled the air. One could hear a pin drop.

Her frown deepened, and she turned back. “Scan for life signs.”

“There are four hundred and seventy-three life signs on board.”

T’Lyn’s pulse quickened. That was far less than the number of the Sh’vhal’s complement.

“T’Ana, ready an away team. Beam over and get as many of the survivors on board as you can. Take some of the comms officers with you and see if you can’t get their communications back online. Once I’m with their captain I’ll see what we can do about repairing the ship, or getting a message back to Vulcan for a rescue.”

“On it,” T’Ana replied, standing. “T’Lyn, with me.”

“Yes, doctor,” T’Lyn replied. She’d barely taken a step when the ship was rocked by a shockwave, and she watched, in horror, as the Sh’vhal exploded before her very eyes.

Everyone she had known was on that ship.

Her father was on that ship.

“Shit!” Beckett swore as they were thrown off-balance by the shockwave. T’Lyn stumbled, trying to steady her footing, as she watched the Sh’vhal disintegrate into millions of tiny pieces. She felt a pain, deep in her chest, and became aware of a high-pitched, keening sound. She realised, with a start, that the sound was coming from her mouth.

Chapter Text

“Get her off the bridge,” Captain Freeman demanded, and T’Ana grabbed her and hauled her away.

“You’re okay, kid,” T’Ana said, a hand between her shoulder blades. “Shit.”

T’Lyn grasped her chest, and tried to fight the surge of emotion she was feeling. She had to get herself under control. She had to stop this. She had to get back in there and figure out what had just happened. She had to-

“T’Lyn,” T’Ana said, and she stopped and looked at the Caitian doctor, her chest heaving. “You’re okay.”

“My father was on that ship,” she said numbly.

T’Ana’s eyes widened, her pupils diminishing to thin slits, and she nodded, her hands clasped on T’Lyn’s shoulders. “Stay here,” she said, heading back towards the bridge. T’Lyn stood still, feeling shock set in as she waited for the doctor to come back.

“T’Lyn,” T’Ana said, returning after a few moments. “You’re off duty.”

“No,” T’Lyn replied. “There is work to be done. We must-”

“T’Lyn,” T’Ana said, firmer this time. “You’re off duty.”

T’Lyn swallowed, hard. And then, “Yes, doctor.”

The doctor directed her to sickbay, where they entered her office and took a seat each. T’Ana had a grave expression on her face; there were no patients left to treat, nobody to save. The Sh’vhal was gone, along with the five hundred odd people on board.

It was a tragedy. T’Lyn thought, somewhat distantly, that they would have to contact the Vulcan High Council and notify them of the deaths.

It was not her place, but she found herself wanting to do it anyway.

“We must relay a message to Vulcan,” she said with urgency, and T’Ana levelled her with a steady look.

“T’Lyn,” she said, uncharacteristically gentle. “You’re off duty. This is not your problem, kid.”

T’Lyn took a deep breath in, and out. The doctor was right. It was not her problem. It was a matter for the Federation to handle. Captain Freeman was probably already talking to Starfleet, to the Vulcan High Council, to the admirals and officers who must be notified. It was something that no one would take pleasure in doing, but T’Lyn still felt, keenly, that it was her duty to do it.

Someone would have to contact her mother.

“I need to make a call,” T’Lyn said distantly, and T’Ana nodded, directing her to the viewscreen and the controls nearby, at the back of her office. T’Lyn stared blankly at it, willing herself to place the call to Vulcan, but she could not bring herself to do it.

She hit call anyway.

It gave a couple of soft beeps as the signal travelled through subspace to Vulcan, as the call struggled to connect. Moments before her mother would have answered, she panicked and ended the call, taking heaving breaths and staring at the viewscreen.

The bile rose in the back of her throat, and she swallowed, hard. It was bitter in her mouth. She ran her hands over her face, struggling to compose herself. In a few moments, it felt like her world had turned on its axis, like the rug had been pulled out from underneath her, like everything was irreparably damaged and would never be the same again.

She couldn’t do it.

Someone would have to contact T’Lyn’s mother, but it would apparently not be T’Lyn.

“Hey, kid,” T’Ana returned, a hypospray in one hand and a bottle in the other. She took a seat at her desk and directed T’Lyn to the other chair. “I brought something for ya.”

T’Lyn took a seat and looked between the hypospray and the bottle.

“This,” T’Ana said, holding up the hypospray, “Will help you meditate tonight, and hopefully improve the quality of your sleep.”

“A sedative,” T’Lyn replied.

“A mild one,” T’Ana said. She held up the bottle. “This is booze.”

“I have never tried human alcohol,” T’Lyn said, looking at it.

“This isn’t human,” T’Ana replied, uncapping the lid with her teeth. “Caitian booze.”

She poured them each a small glass and slid one across the desk to the Vulcan’s outstretched hand. T’Lyn sniffed it suspiciously, uncertain of its contents, but it had a rich, earthy smell to it, and she found herself curious.

“I thought it was not recommended to imbibe after experiencing a trauma,” T’Lyn said.

“It’s not,” T’Ana said. “But we drink to honour the dead.”

How illogical, T’Lyn thought. Still, she understood the concept of the custom, even if it did not make sense. She accepted the drink and mimicked T’Ana, holding it up first and then throwing it back. It burned as it made its way down her throat, and she swallowed it quickly. It lit a fire deep within her abdomen.

“To Senik,” T’Ana said, pouring another glass for each of them. T’Lyn accepted it.

“To my father,” she said. She threw back the next glass and wiped her mouth on the back of her hand. T’Ana leaned back in her chair, her face indicating she was deep in thought. T’Lyn allowed it, staring at the top of the desk while the alcohol burned its way through her veins, befuddling her head and making her mind heavy with thought.

To break the silence, she said, “My grandmother’s name was T’Ana.”

T’Ana looked at her, but didn’t say anything, tail twitching as she thought. T’Lyn added, “She was the one who taught me instinct is not illogical,” and T’Ana offered her a rare smile.

“She sounds like a wise woman,” the doctor said.

“She was,” T’Lyn said. She closed her eyes. She had lost her grandmother when she was quite young. Now, she had lost her father. She felt an irrational fear rising inside her, that soon she would have lost everybody, and would be truly alone in the universe. It was not a thought she could bear.

“Hey,” there came a knock at the door, and D’Vana peered in, looking between the two of them. “The captain sent me down here, Dr T. She needs you on the bridge.”

“We’ve got communicators for that,” T’Ana grumbled, but she got up from behind her desk, walking around it. She stopped to touch T’Lyn’s shoulder lightly, barely more than a graze, before she made her way outside and to the turbolift.

“How are you doing?” D’Vana said, stepping inside. “Are you okay?”

“I am fine,” T’Lyn replied automatically. “I do not need you to babysit me.”

“I’m not here to babysit you,” D’Vana said, taking the other seat in the room that was not Dr T’Ana’s. “I’m here to make sure you’re okay.”

T’Lyn hesitated. With the alcohol coursing through her veins, she felt her inhibitions lowered, and almost felt as though she could speak freely, what was on her mind. So, she said, “My father is dead. Every colleague I had for the last two years is dead,” and was surprised to find D’Vana looking at her not with pity, but with sympathy.

“Loss is difficult,” D’Vana said, reaching out and taking T’Lyn’s hand in hers. T’Lyn didn’t pull back from the touch, though with it she felt a surge of emotion from the Orion, of care and concern, and an emotion she couldn’t identify, something warm. “But T’Lyn, you’re not alone.”

But I am, T’Lyn wanted to reply. My father is dead, and my people are on Vulcan, and I will not return to them for many years.

“You can take personal leave,” D’Vana said, as though she knew what T’Lyn was thinking. “I know you probably don’t want to, but the captain wouldn’t say no if you want to return to Vulcan for the funeral.”

“Vulcan funerary practices are complicated,” T’Lyn found herself saying. “Without a body, there is little to do.”

“I understand,” D’Vana said. “Maybe we can do something here, if you like. Are there any prayers or anything Vulcans say for the dead?”

There were prayers Vulcans said for the dead, but they were not prayers in the religious sense. In the way that Vulcans wished each other peace and long life, they wished the dead to find peace at rest. It was in the teachings of Surak that it was logical to pay respect to those who had passed. It was a matter of honour – not in the way that Klingons thought of honour, but there was a Vulcan code of honour nonetheless.

T’Lyn wondered if that would be sufficient.

“I will consider it in meditation,” she said, closing her eyes again. Her head was swimming.

“You’ve gone a bit green,” D’Vana said, looking at her carefully. “Is that hypospray for you?”

“Yes,” T’Lyn said. “The doctor must have forgotten to administer it before she returned to the bridge.”

D’Vana picked up the hypospray, checked its contents and the dose, and leaned forward to press it against T’Lyn’s neck. There was a momentary sting, and then T’Lyn felt herself relaxing, her anxieties melting away into nothing. This, T’Lyn thought, was much better.

“I am going to meditate,” T’Lyn said, standing abruptly. “I must meditate.”

“Okay,” D’Vana said, getting up. “I’ll walk you to deck two. I could stretch my legs, personally.”

T’Lyn gave her a single nod and started the walk from sickbay to the meditation room. D’Vana walked beside her, but instead of her usual chatter, there was silence. The mood was solemn. They passed virtually nobody between sickbay and the meditation rooms; the few people they did see gave them a wide berth. T’Lyn had never understood how gossip travelled so quickly through the ship, but she supposed it was a matter of human nature she was not privy to.

When they arrived, they stopped by the doors. D’Vana hesitated, like she wanted to say something, or perhaps offer to stay, but instead she gave T’Lyn a quick nod, and a glancing touch on her forearm.

“I’ll be on the bridge if you need me,” D’Vana said. “Just ask for me and I’ll come back down, walk you back to your bunk.”

“That will be unnecessary,” T’Lyn said, squaring her shoulders. She understood what D’Vana was trying to do, but it was not needed.

“Okay,” D’Vana replied. “Just…don’t be scared to reach out, okay? I’ll see you when my shift’s over.”

T’Lyn inclined her head, and stepped inside the meditation room, waiting until the doors had securely closed behind her before she walked forward to her mat. She sank to her knees and closed her eyes.

She wanted to scream, but the sound lodged in her throat.

She wanted to cry, but no tears would come.

She wanted to break down completely, and yet – and yet. Her drive to do the right thing by her people, by her ship, by the teachings of Surak, it had her knowing that she could not. And yet, these were the very thoughts that left her feeling adrift.

Alone.

She bit her tongue hard enough to taste blood and clutched at her throat. The loss she felt was incredible.

Her last words to her father had been live long and prosper, and he had died a scant few months later, and now he would do neither.

T’Lyn loathed everything about this.

But loathing and loneliness were feelings, and they had no place in the logical mind, so she swallowed the blood in her mouth and willed herself to focus, instead, on clearing her mind.

She stared straight ahead, focusing on a tapestry with a passage of Surak on it, trying to absorb the message. But her mind was clouded by both alcohol and sedatives, and after a few moments she felt her face crumple, and she let out a strangled cry.

T’Lyn sank to the floor and sobbed until she was heaving in breaths, but her face remained dry the entire time.

T’Lyn awoke the next morning in her bunk with little memory of how she’d gotten there and a terrible pain in her side. She had vague recollections of making her way through the corridors in a daze, wrung out and emotionless, crawling into bed and falling into a dreamless but fitful sleep. She rolled onto her back and stared at the ceiling above, trying to find the will to get out of bed.

“Hey,” there came a gentle voice to her right. T’Lyn rolled to see Beckett’s face peering over the edge of her bunk. “You wanna go grab some breakfast? Grab a coffee?”

“I do not drink coffee,” T’Lyn replied. Beckett, to her surprise, did not roll her eyes.

“Okay, but you do drink, and eat, and you can’t mope in bed all day,” Beckett said.

“Mariner, don’t be insensitive,” came a voice below them. T’Lyn sat up and looked over the edge to find Boimler standing there, his arms crossed. “She can stay in bed if she wants to, the captain’s given her the next few days off.”

“That is unnecessary,” T’Lyn said. “I will speak with the captain when I next have the opportunity.”

“Come get breakfast,” Beckett said. “Please.”

T’Lyn pulled back her quilt and swung her legs over the edge of the bunk. She dressed quickly, in a plain blue tunic and dark pants. She had reached for her Starfleet uniform, but realised that if she was off duty, she didn’t need to wear it.

“Let’s go,” Beckett said, punching the air. She moved to sling an arm around T’Lyn’s shoulders, but thought better of it at the last second, pulling her hands back. T’Lyn did not understand the fascination other species had with touching each other, all the time. She could not think of anything worse than constant physical contact. A rare embrace from her father had been enough for her, and now –

And now she would never have that again.

The pain in her side got worse, and a heavy feeling crept through her chest.

“I,” T’Lyn stopped, bringing her hand up to the pain. It sat just over her heart. Beckett came to a halt.

“You okay?” She asked, squinting at the Vulcan. T’Lyn paused, and then nodded, dropping her hand to her side.

“I am fine,” she said. “Is D’Vana in sickbay this morning?”

“Yeah, I think so,” Beckett said, continuing on to the mess hall. “Why?”

“I was merely curious,” T’Lyn replied, her fingers brushing over the pain again. She did not want to go to sickbay while D’Vana was in there, for fear the Orion would sense her weakness. Her mind was still clouded with emotion, and she fought fiercely to bring it within the cold confines of logic.

At breakfast, Beckett watched her like a hawk, which was disconcerting in and of itself. T’Lyn replicated herself a cup of steaming Vulcan tea, the way her mother would make it, and a small bowl of plomeek soup. It seemed childish, to go to what her parents had made her when she had fallen ill in her youth, but she longed for the comforts of Vulcan, and the food and drink gave her some reassurance that even in the furthest reaches of the universe, she would always be able to find a little piece of home.

T’Lyn brought her cup to her mouth and took a sip, inhaling the earthy scent wafting off the drink. She glanced around, furtively, suddenly aware of eyes on her.

“Why are the members of the crew looking at me?” She asked quietly. Beckett looked around, frowned, and then seemed to flare with annoyance.

“Because they’re unfathomably rude,” she said, just loud enough to be overheard. A few people had the decency to look ashamed and returned to their meals, but there were still people throwing her glances in between bites.

“It is because I am Vulcan,” T’Lyn said, “And the Sh’vhal was a Vulcan ship. They believe me to be affected by it.”

“Are you?” Beckett asked, looking up from her pancakes.

“No,” T’Lyn lied. “It is a tragedy, but it does not affect me personally.”

“Your father was the captain,” Beckett lowered her voice. “It was your former ship. Nobody would think any less of you if it was affecting you, you know.”

T’Lyn pressed her lips together and stared down into her bowl of soup, finding that her appetite had vanished almost completely. She could not force herself to eat. Instead, she returned her focus to her mug of tea, hoping it would settle her stomach.

The pain in her side pounded in time with her pulse.

The crew did not stop staring at her, nor could she help but hear their whispers as she disposed of her plomeek soup and took another cup of tea to go. Beckett gave her a wave and left to report for duty; Boimler was lost in his PADD, and barely looked up when she bid him farewell. It stung, for some reason, but she didn’t dwell on it. She began the long walk to sickbay with her tea in her hands, taking the occasional deep and contemplative sip.

Upon arrival in sickbay, she found it to be in a quiet order, biobeds empty, viewscreens dark. D’Vana was deeply focused on a PADD, perched on one of the biobeds, having a conversation with the young lieutenant peering over her shoulder.

T’Lyn resolved to find Dr T’Ana and get out of there as quickly as possible. She hesitated by T’Ana’s office door, and then pressed the button just outside it, listening for the chime on the other side.

“What,” T’Ana snapped, opening the door. And then, upon seeing the young Vulcan, her face softened, just a little. “Come inside.”

“I do not mean to trouble you,” T’Lyn said, stepping into the doctor’s office. “I was merely hoping you could help with an issue I seem to be having.”

“Sit,” T’Ana said, ignoring virtually everything T’Lyn had said. Her tail twitched. “How did you sleep last night?”

“Reasonably,” T’Lyn replied. “I did not experience any difficulty in falling or maintaining sleep.”

“Good,” T’Ana said gruffly, swiping something off her PADD. “What’s the problem?”

“I am experiencing pain,” T’Lyn replied, bringing her hand up to cover the pounding in her side.

T’Ana frowned, and reached for a tricorder, pointing it at T’Lyn and attuning it to her body. She scanned her, looked at the readings, paused, and then scanned her again.

“You’re in perfect health,” T’Ana said. “Stress levels elevated, but you seem fine. Where’s the pain?”

T’Lyn gestured to the pain. It still pounded in time with her heart. If she didn’t know any better, she’d say it was her heart. T’Ana ran another scan, and sighed.

“Kid, there’s nothing wrong with you.”

“Doctor-”

T’Ana held up one hand. “You’re experiencing heartbreak.”

Were T’Lyn human, she would have scoffed. But she respected T’Ana a great deal, and she tended to trust what the doctor had to say.

“Look,” T’Ana sighed. “This is – I hate to say it, but this is normal. Grief is distressing to the heart, the mind, and the body. I can only help with some of those things.”

T’Lyn swallowed. The tea was sloshing uncomfortably in her stomach, the pain in her side was pounding harder, and she could feel a strange tightness in her chest. She found herself feeling thoughtless for wasting the doctor’s time.

“I apologise, Doctor,” she said. She got to her feet, aware she was a little unsteady. “I will not waste your time again.”

“Ensign-”

T’Lyn stepped outside the office, letting the door shut behind her, and took a deep breath. She squared her shoulders and made her way to the turbolift, careful not to maintain eye contact with anyone on her way.

Inside the turbolift, she pressed a clenched fist to her mouth, and willed herself not to cry.

“Personal log,” T’Lyn said. She wedged herself down between the janitor’s cart and the shelving, sitting with her back against the wall. She brought her knees up and rested her PADD against the tops of her thighs.

“It has been five days since my former ship exploded and my father was killed.”

Too emotional.

“Erase log.”

T’Lyn closed her eyes.

“Personal log,” she began again. “It has been five days since the Vulcan ship Sh’vhal experienced a warp core breach and every crew member on board was killed in the ensuing explosion. Since I witnessed this, the crew of the Cerritos has been extremely accommodating, at times unnecessarily so. My mother has been notified of the death of my father, Captain Senik, and I have found – I have found I am coping.”

Her voice cracked on the death of my father, and she took a deep breath.

“Erase log.”

T’Lyn paused, swiping through her PADD. She had a message from D’Vana about meeting for food later; her stomach twisted at the very thought, so she swiped it away, moving on to the next notification. A new duty shift roster. She searched for her name and assignment, and when she finally found it, she felt a flare of anger inside her. Beside her name, were the neat letters, MEDICAL LEAVE.

“Personal log,” she snapped. “Since the exploding of the Vulcan ship Sh’vhal, the crew of the Cerritos have walked around me like I am fragile, and now they have placed me on medical leave. This is unnecessary, this is unrequired, this is illogical-”

T’Lyn huffed out a breath and pinched the bridge of her nose. “Erase log.”

She was growing frustrated with herself, with this ship, with the illogical and at times ridiculous crew aboard it. She wedged herself down tighter and closed her eyes, trying to will herself into a meditative state. She took a deep breath in, held it, and then breathed out.

“Personal log,” she opened her eyes. “It has been five days since the Vulcan ship Sh’vhal experienced a warp core breach. Every crew member on board was killed in the ensuing explosion, including my father, Captain Senik. The crew of the Cerritos have been accommodating during this time. I have been placed on medical leave for the foreseeable future and intend to utilise this time to meditate and regain control over my thoughts.”

That seemed too personal, even for a personal log. T’Lyn clenched her hands in fists.

“Erase log.”

This was getting her nowhere. T’Lyn pulled herself up and tucked her PADD under her arm, making her way out into the corridor and looking around. It was empty, so she made her way to the left, back to the turbolift, where she would return to her bunk and perhaps retire for the evening. She could read, compose a piece of music, work on some programming. It seemed preferable than trying to record a personal log, which had become somewhat of a chore for the past five days. For the first day, her log had just been her saying, “My father is dead,” until her voice was hoarse.

She had erased that log, too.

“T’Lyn!” Came a voice from behind her. T’Lyn turned to see D’Vana, Beckett, and Boimler walking towards her, still dressed in their uniforms. They must have just gotten off shift.

“Good evening,” T’Lyn replied, freezing in place.

“Come grab dinner with us!” D’Vana said, bouncing on her heels.

“I-” T’Lyn started, and stopped, realising she did not have a good excuse not to join them. Still, she soldiered forward, deciding to try it anyway. “I was about to retire for the evening.”

“You still need to eat,” Beckett said, narrowing her eyes at the Vulcan. T’Lyn met her gaze and held it there, for several moments, until Beckett looked away.

“I appreciate the invitation,” T’Lyn said, “But I would rather not.”

“Oh,” D’Vana said, her face falling. “Okay. Well, we’ll be in the mess hall if you change your mind, okay?”

T’Lyn inclined her head, and watched as the three ensigns walked away. Boimler turned and waved as he left, his brow furrowed, like he did not understand why she had chosen not to join them. T’Lyn watched the Orion’s retreating figure and found there was a tightness in her chest that had not been there earlier. She felt…upset that she had disappointed D’Vana.

T’Lyn climbed up into her bunk and settled in there with her PADD, opening a program and looking at line upon line of code. This was what she did best. This was what she knew she could still do.

She began reworking sections of code, typing in new commands as she saw fit. It was going well until the code broke without warning, and she huffed, deleting the last couple of lines and trying again. It still would not cooperate. Her mind was distracted. She kept thinking of D’Vana, of the look on her face when she had said she could not join them for dinner.

It wasn’t that she didn’t want to. It was that the very thought of eating made her stomach tie itself up in knots, and she didn’t know how to make it stop, and that was all she wanted.

For it all to stop.

She thought of her personal logs again, and huffed, closing her eyes. She swiped out of the code she was working on – it could be amended later – and opened her recording again.

“Personal log,” she started, and then stopped. There were no words that adequately summed up what she was experiencing. She sighed. “Erase log.”

She tapped the side of her PADD for a moment, deep in thought. Personal logs at this time seemed so pointless, but she knew they were an important part of the running of a ship. The Federation required them on all its vessels, and the Vulcan High Council preferred them to be recorded at a minimum of once weekly. It had never been her preference on the Sh’vhal, but she had done it diligently, and –

T’Lyn froze, her fingers gripping her PADD.

There would be personal logs from the day the Sh’vhal exploded.

There would be a captain’s log from the day the Sh’vhal exploded.

She just had to find them.

T’Lyn opened her PADD, and used it to sign in to the Vulcan High Council’s intranet. Her details still worked, despite it being on a Starfleet channel. She started with the public records and found a dossier on the Sh’vhal’s destruction dated just three days prior.

It was not what she was looking for, but she settled in to read it anyway, curling around so her legs were tucked up in front of her and her head was propped up by her pillow. It was pages long, detailing everything that the Vulcans had learned about the destruction of the Sh’vhal. She felt a quirk of annoyance when she saw the statement ATTACKED BY ASSAILANTS UNKNOWN, because while that was true, she felt that Vulcan could be doing more to discover who those assailants were.

That was not the issue, however. The issue was that there had been a warp core breach, and the cause of that was still unknown – so said the dossier, when she reached the end of it. She frowned at it, reading and re-reading the last paragraph over and over, but it relayed no more information to her than what she had already gleaned. Vulcan knew no more about the destruction of the Sh’vhal than she did.

T’Lyn started hunting through files, going deeper and deeper into Vulcan’s knowledge on the Sh’vhal. She read through line after line of looping Vulcan script and typed rapidly in Federation Standard in her notes. She trailed her finger down the screen, following each sentence after the other, and at the end of it she felt no more certain of what had befallen her former ship than she did at the beginning.

She decided to find the audio logs.

It didn’t take much digging to pull some up; the crew’s personal logs for that day were easy enough to find. She scrolled through the list, looking for her father’s name, but there were none to be found. She frowned, and scrolled back up, looking at name after name of people she knew, people she had worked with, people who were now dead.

T’Gai’s name was near the top of the list. She had been recording a log not long before the ship had met its end.

T’Lyn tapped it and pulled up the log. After a moment’s hesitation, she hit play.

“Personal log,” T’Gai’s voice filled the air, melodious and sweet. “I have been working on the subspace communications channel at the request of Captain Senik. It has been a challenge, but one I welcome. I hope-”

There was the blare of an alarm, and the recording cut off. T’Lyn frowned and played it again.

She realised, with a start, that the alarm was the red alert. T’Gai had been recording right before the Sh’vhal was attacked; but unfortunately, it offered no insight to what had caused the ship to explode, or who had attacked them beforehand. T’Lyn scrolled to the very top and looked at the logs there. They were mostly incomplete, all under a minute long. T’Gai hadn’t been the only one recording when the ship had gone into red alert.

“Whatcha doing?” D’Vana’s face popped over the edge of the bunk. T’Lyn jumped, clutching her PADD to her chest.

“Nothing,” she said a little too quickly. She did not think she was doing anything wrong, exactly, but she also did not think Starfleet would approve of her digging her way through Vulcan’s semi-classified files on the Sh’vhal, and definitely not the audio logs.

“She’s probably watching porn,” Beckett smirked. T’Lyn straightened, green tinging her cheeks.

“I am not doing that,” she said. Beckett raised an eyebrow. “I am not, Mariner.”

“Whatever you say,” Beckett shrugged, raising her hands. T’Lyn set the PADD aside.

“I was reading a book,” she lied, looking between the two women.

“Then why’d you say nothing?” D’Vana asked.

“I did not think the two of you needed to know every detail of my day,” T’Lyn said, a little sharper than she intended. D’Vana balked for a moment, and then backed off. T’Lyn went to say something, apologise, but D’Vana was already climbing onto her bunk.

“I’ve got some work to do,” D’Vana said. “I’ll catch up with you guys tomorrow.”

T’Lyn sighed, closing her eyes. She could not seem to do anything right.

With a pause, she set her PADD aside, and brought her blanket up to her chest. She rolled over and faced the bare wall of her bunk. After a moment’s hesitation, she turned back, to see if D’Vana had changed her mind, but the Orion’s face did not appear, and she remained alone through nobody’s fault but her own.

They were just trying to help, she reminded herself. Their concern was unwarranted, but all these strange people wanted to do was help her, and she couldn’t figure out why.

T’Lyn closed her eyes once more, desperate to fall asleep.

T’Lyn found herself waking in the middle of the night, restless. Her eyes would snap open, and she would stare and stare at the ceiling, willing herself back to sleep, but her mind was full with grief and loneliness and she found herself, again, feeling something akin to homesick.

She pulled herself out of bed.

The Cerritos was quiet as she padded her way down the halls, dressed in her tunic, bare-footed. Delta shift was always the quietest time on the ship; they ran off almost a skeleton crew at that time, while the other shifts got much-needed rest. There was a roster, T’Lyn understood, but it had not changed in her time on the ship thus far. She made her way down to Engineering, where it was dark, the room only aglow in the dim light of the warp core.

T’Lyn took a seat on the ground in front of it and listened.

She was listening for any change, any discrepancy, anything odd or strange. Anything that might indicate something was about to go wrong. Because if she listened, and she heard something or noticed something, maybe – just maybe – she could stop it from happening again.

It was not logical, but she listened anyway.

She drew her knees to her chest, tucked in on herself, and watched the light the engines emitted. It was empty but for herself, and the warp core.

“Hey,” there came a voice behind her, and she just managed to stop herself from startling at the sound. So engrossed in listening to the sound of the engines, she hadn’t heard Rutherford come up behind her. “Can’t sleep?”

“Vulcans can go up to two weeks without sleep,” she replied.

“Yeah, but you shouldn’t,” Rutherford replied, dropping down onto the floor beside her. He stretched one leg out in front of him and brought one knee up to rest his arm on. He tapped away on his PADD, but his eyes didn’t leave her face. “You listening to the warp core?”

She shifted her gaze away. No, she wanted to say, but she did not want to lie to him.

“Yes,” she said instead.

“I promise she’s in fine working order.”

She believed him, but she did not trust that to be true. She didn’t want it to happen again, but this feeling – this anxiety – it was…absurd. It had no basis in logic.

“I…” She cut herself off before she said the word feel. “I think if I listen to it, I will hear if something is wrong, and I can stop it from happening again.”

“Makes sense,” is all Rutherford had to say. She frowned, because no, it did not make sense, nothing about this made sense.

“It is illogical,” she said.

“I never said it was logical, T’Lyn,” Rutherford said, his voice gentle. “I said it made sense.”

She frowned again.

“You should head back to bed,” Rutherford said, getting to his feet and offering her a hand to pull her up with. She deigned not to take it, and got to her feet herself instead. “I’m gonna stay down here awhile, keep an eye on things.”

She knew what he was trying to do, but instead of feeling annoyed or offended by it, she found herself grateful.

“Thank you,” she said.

“Get some sleep, T’Lyn,” he said. “Okey dokey?”

“…Okey dokey,” she repeated back at him, and a grin lit up his face.

D’Vana met her at the turbolift, yawning and scrubbing her eyes with the back of her hand.

“You did not have to escort me back to bed,” T’Lyn said.

“I wasn’t,” D’Vana lied, and T’Lyn looked to the ground, deep in thought. D’Vana was saying something about wanting to go see Rutherford, but she didn’t step off the turbolift; in fact, she followed T’Lyn all the way back to her bunk, and watched until T’Lyn was safely tucked back into bed.

“Goodnight, T’Lyn,” D’Vana’s voice was soft, kind.

“Goodnight, D’Vana,” T’Lyn replied, rolling so she was facing the wall.

“Tea, hot,” T’Lyn mumbled into the replicator, cupping her hands around the steaming mug that appeared inside. She carried it over to their usual table and took a seat, looking around for the others, but D’Vana and Beckett had to leave early for an away mission and Rutherford was nowhere to be found. On the other side of the room, though, was Boimler, and he raised a hand in greeting when he saw her. She nodded back, and returned her attention to her tea, blowing on it softly to cool it enough to drink.

“Morning,” Boimler said, chipper as ever. “Guess who’s got conference room clean up duty?”

“I assume from the excitement in your tone that you have conference room clean up duty,” T’Lyn said wryly. She took a sip of her tea.

“Damn right!” Boimler said, holding a hand up for a high five. She stared him down instead, bringing her mug to her lips, and after a moment he lowered his hand, looking bashful.

“I believe today I am assisting in hydroponics,” T’Lyn said, setting her mug of tea down. Her stomach was shifting inside her, but it was manageable so far. “Lieutenant Bingston needed assistance programming the nutrient and water supply.”

“Aren’t you on medical leave?” Boimler squinted at her.

“What I do in my spare time is no business of my commanding officer,” T’Lyn replied. “Bingston does not know the programming as I do.”

“Nice,” Boimler emphasised, grinning at her. “You’re real handy with that programming stuff, huh?”

“It is something I excel at,” T’Lyn replied, taking another sip of her tea. It was rich on her tongue, with a distinctly leafy flavour. Not unpleasant, but unexpected – it tasted almost like the real thing, not like it had been replicated. Unfortunately, the flavour was making her stomach turn.

“You’re gonna get promoted before the rest of us,” Boimler said around a mouthful of bacon. T’Lyn tried not to breathe, because the smell was making her feel faintly ill, but she tried to pay it no mind.

“I don’t believe that to be true,” T’Lyn replied. “I have only been in Starfleet a scant few months. You have served on the Cerritos over a year.”

“Maybe,” Boimler said, waving his fork in the air. “Hey, aren’t you hungry?”

“No,” T’Lyn replied. “Tea is sufficient to meet my needs.”

“Yeah, but you didn’t really eat-”

“Tea is sufficient,” she cut him off, taking another sip of the tea, ignoring the way her stomach flipped. Boimler squinted at her again, and for a single horrifying moment she thought he was going to tattle on her, but he just shrugged his shoulders and returned to his bacon and eggs.

Tea was not sufficient, but the idea of putting food into her mouth seemed bizarrely horrendous in this moment. It was not logical to not eat, but she could not bring herself to do it, so for now she was sustaining on tea and the occasional bowl of plomeek soup, when she could force her body to stomach that, as well. It was not something she had ever had difficulty with, but since the Sh’vhal-

She forced another mouthful of tea down her gullet and swallowed hard. The cup was almost empty, so she took another, final mouthful, swallowed, and set the cup aside. “I must get going,” she said to Boimler, standing. “These programs will not apply themselves.”

“I’ll see ya later, T’Lyn,” Boimler said, scraping his fork against his plate. “Have a good day.”

“Likewise,” T’Lyn replied, disposing of her cup, and leaving the mess hall.

It was a long walk down to hydroponics. It was in the bowels of the ship, not far from Cetacean Ops, and when T’Lyn made her way down there she stopped to stare inside for a moment. Rows upon rows of plants growing in all directions, a lush forest of green in an otherwise dull starship of steel greys. She walked up to the door and stepped inside when it opened, casting a glance backwards as she stepped through it. She had half expected it to not open for her at all.

She trailed her fingers along a leaf, so unlike anything that grew on Vulcan. Plants on Vulcan were hardy, full of sharp points and stinging needles, and the plants down in hydroponics had such soft edges to them. She smiled to herself and pulled out her PADD, making her way towards the main computer terminal.

“Ensign,” Lieutenant T’Mai, one of T’Lyn’s few Vulcan senior officers, stopped her in her tracks. “You are on medical leave.”

“I am here to report for duty,” T’Lyn said, standing to attention. She held up her PADD. “I have brought with me the amended code.”

“That is…appreciated, but unnecessary,” Lieutenant T’Mai said, tilting her head. “It will be repaired in due time. Please return to your quarters.”

“I wish to be of assistance,” T’Lyn said.

“You will be of assistance when you are healed,” T’Mai said calmly, looking down at her own PADD and reaching over to type something into the computer terminal.

“I have sustained no injury,” T’Lyn said. It received only a flat stare from the older Vulcan.

“Go back to your quarters,” the other Vulcan said, this time speaking their native tongue. “Please.”

“I am fine,” T’Lyn replied, in Standard. The other Vulcan was looking at her a little sadly, the way one looks at a small child who is not cooperating because they do not understand what was going on. If T’Mai called her kan-bu and kept trying to infantilise her, she could not guarantee she could keep her anger cooled by logic.

“I will send you the area of code we are having the most trouble with,” T’Mai said, looking up from her PADD. “You may transfer your amended code to my PADD now, and I will implement it myself.”

T’Lyn considered this. “And then I must return to my quarters?”

“Or to meditate, or the holodeck, or whatever you see fit,” T’Mai replied. “Just not duty.”

T’Lyn exhaled slowly, and then nodded, handing her PADD over so the lieutenant could initiate the data transfer. After the two devices had synced and the code had travelled between them, T’Lyn took her PADD back and stood there a little awkwardly.

“You are dismissed, ensign,” T’Mai said, returning to the computer terminal. In Vulcan, she said rather wryly, “Go practice your mindfulness.”

“I will,” T’Lyn said stiffly. “Live long and prosper.”

She turned and walked away, her hands clenched in fists. She did not enjoy being on medical leave, and she enjoyed it even less that everyone on the ship seemed to know about it. It was impossible to get away with anything when everyone knew about it. She didn’t know how Beckett managed it.

T’Lyn passed the rest of the day in her bunk, furiously reading what little information about the Sh’vhal’s destruction the High Council had gathered in the preceding days. She listened to more of the audio logs, but to her frustration they divulged very little – it was always the same thing. One of her crewmates discussing the ship’s operations, or their tasks for the day, and suddenly being cut off by the blare of an alarm as the ship-wide red alert came into play. They offered her no more information than what she already knew.

She listened to T’Gai’s a few more times, wishing she could reach through the confines of time and space to speak to her one last time, to engage her brilliant mind in a game of chess, to do something, to do anything, to warn her of the Sh’vhal’s impending doom –

T’Lyn curled up into a tight ball and pressed her hand over her mouth, taking in sharp breaths, the pain in her abdomen unforgiving.

She closed her eyes. Tried to convince her mind to still. Pulled herself back from the edge of blatant emotionalism she was careening so dangerously near.

There was nothing she could do, so she rolled out of her bunk, forcing herself to take one step after the other to the turbolift. She made it all the way to the mess hall doors before she stopped and inhaled slowly, exhaled even slower than that.

Her stomach lurched in protest, and she turned on her heel, walking away.

T’Lyn thought she heard someone call her name, but she ducked her head and walked faster, her shoulders stiff and rigid. The tension in her body was palpable. She refused to be caught unawares in such a compromised state, so she kept walking with no destination in mind, only with the thought that she had to get away.

On a starship however, there is nowhere to go to.

T’Lyn was sitting in Engineering, watching the warp core, when Rutherford took a seat beside her.

“Hey,” he said. “You hungry?”

“No,” she replied automatically.

“Boimler says you haven’t been eating,” he said matter-of-factly. T’Lyn’s nostrils flared. Boimler needed to mind his business.

“I have been meeting my nutritional needs,” she said instead. Rutherford dug around in his pocket for a moment and pulled a little bag out, the plastic crinkling. He held it out to her.

“They might be a little melted, sorry,” he said. “But they’re still good.”

T’Lyn looked at the bag and raised an eyebrow. “Vulcans do not eat chocolate.”

“Come on,” Rutherford replied. “What! Not eat chocolate, seriously?”

“No,” T’Lyn said. Her stomach rumbled in protest. She looked down at the bag and held out her hand.

Rutherford tipped a couple of small, foil-wrapped chocolates into her hand, and pried the wrapping off one for himself. T’Lyn used her thumbnail to unwrap one and popped it into her mouth. There was a burst of sweetness on her tongue, followed by a faintly bitter taste. She wrinkled her nose. She had never enjoyed chocolate, even when her classmates at the Academy had obtained some and spent an evening partaking in it.

She swallowed, and Rutherford grinned at her. She unwrapped the next one and brought it to her lips, returning her attention to the warp core.

“Do you want to head up to the mess hall and get something to eat?” Rutherford said.

“No,” T’Lyn replied.

“T’Lyn,” he said.

“You should return to the lower decks, and resume rest,” T’Lyn replied, drawing her knees to her chest. “I am sorry for being an inconvenience.”

“You’re not,” Rutherford said sharply, turning to face her. “I’m down here ‘cause I want to be, T’Lyn, okay?”

“…Okay,” T’Lyn said, dropping her gaze.

“Besides,” Rutherford said, “Someone needs to talk to you about the warp core.”

“I understand the basic functions of a warp engine,” T’Lyn said.

“Yeah, but you’re stressed about it,” Rutherford replied. “So go on, ask me anything.”

T’Lyn pressed her lips together, looking back into the dim glow of the engines. “What is the function of the dilithium component of a warp engine?”

“Easy peasy,” Rutherford said. “Dilithium is the power source.”

“How does it produce power?”

“By annihilating deuterium and antimatter in a fusion reaction mediated by the dilithium crystals. The crystals are decrystallised during this process.”

T’Lyn’s voice cracked. “Why did the Sh’vhal experience a warp core breach?”

Rutherford gave her a steady look, and placed his hand over hers. “I don’t know,” he said honestly, looking down. “I don’t know.”

T’Lyn closed her eyes.

“Come on,” Rutherford said. “Let’s go get something to eat.”

“I am not hungry,” T’Lyn replied, her voice quiet. Rutherford got to his feet.

“I am, and I could use the company,” he said, surprisingly cheerful. “Come on, T’Lyn.”

T’Lyn, somewhat unwillingly, got to her feet. She took one last look at the warp core, and followed Rutherford out of the Engineering bay, down to the turbolift. They made their way up the floors and to the mess hall, where T’Lyn took a seat at a table and Rutherford went to go get food.

“Here,” he said a few moments later, setting a plate down in front of her. She frowned at it.

“I told you, I do not require food,” she said. Her stomach churned at the thought of eating.

“T’Lyn,” he said, his tone gentle. “Please.”

T’Lyn considered the plate in front of her. It had a line of steamed dumplings on it, piping hot and fresh from the replicator, with a set of chopsticks and a small bowl of sauce to dip them in.

“What is this?” She asked, as Rutherford took the seat opposite her, setting down a bowl of rice and barbecued pork.

“Vegetable gyoza,” Rutherford replied. “You know how to use chopsticks?”

“We have a similar implement on Vulcan,” T’Lyn replied, lifting the chopsticks. She twirled them in her hands, before balancing them between her thumb and forefinger. She used them to pick up a gyoza and dip it into the sauce. She took a bite, chewing thoughtfully, and set the dumpling and chopsticks down.

“You don’t like it?” Rutherford said around a mouthful of rice.

“I do not…dislike it,” T’Lyn said, swallowing. Her stomach twisted. “It is sufficient.”

Rutherford took another mouthful of food, watching her curiously. She looked down at the food and forced herself to take another bite.

She chewed slowly, swallowed. Felt her stomach twist again. There was no logical explanation for her physical symptoms, and yet they persisted. She was not sick; she had not contracted any virus, had not consumed any spoiled food, and yet the idea of eating made her feel like she was going to expel everything she had ever eaten.

T’Lyn did find, though, that it was easier to eat when the mess hall was empty, when she did not have to deal with the curious looks of other crew members. She took another bite of the gyoza and looked around. It was somewhere around 2AM, Earth time, and the mess was mostly empty, but a few stray delta shift members who were on their breaks. They didn’t cast so much as a glance her way, and for that she was grateful. Perhaps she could just eat when everybody else was asleep.

Perhaps she could just not eat at all.

Rutherford had almost finished his bowl, but there were still four dumplings on her plate. She considered pushing it away, but knew that he would be concerned, and possibly tell D’Vana and Beckett, who were much more persistent in their apparent concern for her.

It was disquieting, to say the least.

“I am going to meditate,” T’Lyn said, meeting Rutherford’s gaze. “Thank you…for the food.”

“That’s okay, T’Lyn,” Rutherford said. “Come find me if you need to, okay?”

T’Lyn nodded, getting to her feet. She disposed of the remaining dumplings and made her way out of the mess hall, walking down six near-identical corridors until she found her way to the meditation room. She slipped inside and grabbed a candle, lighting it and taking a seat on a woven mat on the floor.

She had been sitting there in silence for seven minutes when the doors opened.

A Vulcan T’Lyn did not recognise stepped inside and made his way over to the front of the room. He lit some incense, stopped, and looked at her.

“I do not wish to disrupt your meditation,” he said. “Does this bother you in any way?”

“It is acceptable,” T’Lyn said. “My preference is candles, but I understand others have their own meditative practice.”

He inclined his head and took a seat on the mat beside her, kneeling and pressing two fingers to his temples. He ran them down this face, and brought his hands to rest in his lap. T’Lyn watched him from the corner of her eye for a few moments, before returning her attention to the candle.

“You are T’Lyn,” he said after a moment of silence. “Daughter of Senik.”

“Yes,” T’Lyn replied.

“I was aggrieved to hear of your loss,” the Vulcan said. “What happened to the Sh’vhal was a tragedy.”

She started, surprised by the clear emotion in his words. Eventually, she said, “Yes, it was.”

“How are you coping?” He asked.

“Sufficiently,” T’Lyn replied.

“Have you achieved clarity recently?” He asked, taking a few deep breaths. T’Lyn didn’t answer him, focusing on the candle. It was an answer enough. “I believe there are medications that may help.”

“I do not wish to be reliant on chemical assistance,” T’Lyn replied. “I will achieve a meditative status when my mind is ready to do so.”

The Vulcan inclined his head, and returned his focus to the writings of Surak on the wall. There were several minutes of silence, when he said, “Are you feeling alright, T’Lyn?”

“I am fine,” T’Lyn said, aware she was hyperventilating. She had tried to clear her mind, and then –

She had started thinking of the warp core. Of all the things that could go wrong on a starship.

She had to get out of here.

She snuffed out the candle and stood, returning it to its place. She turned on her heel, ready to leave, when the other Vulcan said, “T’Lyn, you have barely meditated.”

“I must go,” T’Lyn said, her chest rising and falling in quick succession. “It is late. I must return to my quarters.”

“You may come find me if you ever need someone to meditate with,” the other Vulcan said. “My name is Polaris.”

“Noted,” T’Lyn said, and then she left, making her way down the corridors until she came to a dead end, just a window that showed a view of the stars and the warp trail of the Cerritos. She froze and stared outside, one hand resting over her heart, which pounded steadily under her touch.

She felt absurd. She couldn’t sleep, she couldn’t eat, she couldn’t meditate. This was clearly not the right place for her. She should return to Vulcan, return to her mother. Perhaps she could find a post at the Vulcan Science Academy. Perhaps there was something out there that was a better fit.

She looked to the stars and knew she belonged on a starship, not stranded on her home planet. But if that was the case, why did she feel so…anxious?

She had to make peace with what had happened.

She didn’t know how to do that, so instead she took a deep, steadying breath, and began the long walk back to her bunk.

When she got there, the lights were low, and mostly everyone was asleep. There was the occasional dim glow of a PADD from someone reading in bed, but it was otherwise dark. She climbed into her bunk and closed her eyes.

“You okay?” There came a voice from below her. T’Lyn rolled over and looked down, where D’Vana was laying, her eyes open.

“Yes,” T’Lyn said. “I just needed to meditate.”

D’Vana nodded, her eyes drifting shut. T’Lyn rolled back onto her left side and stared at the wall. It was blank; others decorated their bunks with photos, mementos. T’Lyn had nothing.

T’Lyn had nothing.

T’Lyn took another deep breath and closed her eyes, and willed that the heaviness in her eyes would not devolve into tears.

It didn’t, but she still felt the heaviness in her heart.

Chapter Text

“Alright, T’Lyn! Ready to get back to work?”

Beckett was standing beneath her bunk, hands on her hips. T’Lyn did not groan, though she wanted to; nor did she throw her pillow down at Beckett in an attempt to foist her off, though the thought was tempting. Instead, she sat up, and opened her wardrobe and pulled out a uniform shirt.

“Good morning, Beckett,” she said, adjusting the collar so it did not chafe against her neck.

“Sleep well?” Beckett asked around a mouthful of apple, leaning casually against the lower bunk.

“My rest was reasonable,” T’Lyn said, tugging on her boots.

“Sweet. Let’s go grab breakfast.”

T’Lyn’s stomach churned. “I am not hungry.”

“Bullshit, T’Lyn,” Beckett said, and she managed to sound almost cheerful. “You didn’t have dinner last night.”

“I ate with Rutherford,” T’Lyn said. “Later.”

Beckett looked at her suspiciously, and T’Lyn had no doubts that Beckett would be asking Rutherford if that was true. She slid off her bunk and landed on the floor beside Beckett, with far more grace than she currently felt capable of.

“I will accompany you to the mess hall,” T’Lyn acquiesced, grabbing her PADD before she forgot it. Beckett seemed to accept this as good enough, and the two women began making their way down the corridors, and up the decks. They walked in silence, but it wasn’t uncomfortable or awkward, despite how things had been between them earlier. T’Lyn found herself almost enjoying it.

“So, are you?” Beckett asked, breaking their companionable silence.

“Am I what?” T’Lyn replied, glancing at the other woman.

“Are you ready to get back to work?”

“Yes,” T’Lyn said. “It is overdue.”

“We all know you’ve been working on your PADD instead of getting your shit together,” Beckett said. “Though you seem to have your shit pretty together, all things considering.”

“Work is a welcome distraction,” T’Lyn replied. “It is logical to seek tasks to occupy the mind.”

“Whatever you say,” Beckett grinned, stopping in the doorway of the mess hall. It was pretty full with members of alpha shift getting ready for the day. Beckett made her way over to the replicators, and after a moment’s hesitation, T’Lyn followed.

“Coffee, black,” Beckett was saying to a replicator when T’Lyn got there, already holding a plate piled high with food. The smell turned T’Lyn’s stomach, but she ignored it, taking stuttering breaths while she tried to think of something – anything – to order.

“Kelpian salt tea,” she requested eventually, and a steaming mug of tea appeared in the replicator. She picked it up and took a sip, welcoming the earthy flavour, and followed Beckett to a table.

“You’ve gotta have more than tea,” Beckett said, jabbing her fork in T’Lyn’s direction, eyes narrowed.

T’Lyn looked up from her mug and stared her down.

“Nuh-uh, that doesn’t work on me,” Beckett said. “You need to eat.”

“I am fine,” T’Lyn said, gritting her teeth. “I will eat when I am hungry.”

Beckett sighed, shovelling another forkful of eggs into her mouth. She chewed thoughtfully, considering the Vulcan before her, and swallowed. “Fine,” she said. “Just promise me you will eat today.”

“It would be illogical to ignore one of the basic functions of my body,” T’Lyn replied, sipping at her tea. She could feel it settling at the bottom of her otherwise empty stomach. It was an unpleasant sensation.

“It would be illogical,” Beckett agreed, almost as though she was trying to say something else instead, but T’Lyn could not parse out the hidden meaning in her words. She had found that humans did that – say something when they meant something else instead. It didn’t make sense to her; verbal communication was simply the easiest way to get a point across – so why befuddle it?

T’Lyn took another mouthful of tea and swallowed, feeling the warmth make its way down her chest and pool in her abdomen. She wanted to cite running late as a reasonable excuse to leave, but alpha shift all started at the same time and Beckett wasn’t due on the bridge for another twenty minutes. T’Lyn’s shift in medical was meant to be starting at the same time, but she somewhat hoped that if she left now and arrived early, T’Ana would have something for her to do.

“I am going to sickbay,” T’Lyn said. “My shift begins soon, and I do not wish to be late.”

“You’ve got fifteen minutes, T’Lyn, I think that’s enough time,” Beckett said, waving to someone across the mess hall.

“I would rather not take the chance,” T’Lyn said, swallowing the last of her tea. “I will see you tonight.”

“I’ll let the others know,” Beckett replied. “Dinner?”

“Perhaps,” T’Lyn replied. “We shall see how the day goes.”

With that, she took her leave, and began to make her way up to sickbay. When she arrived, it was quiet; Dr T’Ana was attending to a patient, and Nurse Westlake was in T’Ana’s office, completing a briefing based on what little she could see of the viewscreen. Most of the biobeds were empty, and there were only a few other ensigns around, mostly cleaning.

T’Lyn pulled out her PADD and checked everything one last time.

“T’Lyn,” T’Ana called out to her, looking up from her patient. “Can you reprogram beds eight through fifteen?”

“Yes, doctor,” T’Lyn replied, making her way over to bed eight. She synced her PADD to its systems and began the arduous process of correcting the code.

She had made some adjustments to the programming herself, that would make the biobeds more efficient, make them use less power without sacrificing their reliability or functionality. She was quite proud of the program in question; it had taken her three days to write, and implementing it was going to make the whole of sickbay run more efficiently.

T'Lyn’s stomach twisted. It felt as though it was gnawing on itself, and the tea had done little to alleviate the sensation. She ignored it and finished bed eight, closing the control panel and moving down to bed nine.

She kneeled on the floor and started over, syncing her PADD and beginning the code again. It wasn’t a matter of rewriting the whole of the biobed’s programming; she had simply tweaked it in places, noted areas where it was chewing up energy that could be better spent elsewhere. She paused, feeling a strange sensation of heat pass through her, and shook her head, returning to the work. In a few moments, she had finished bed nine, and moved down to bed ten.

There was a line of sweat on her brow, although sickbay was climate controlled and she was not exerting herself. She wiped it away, ignoring the churning in her abdomen, and started on bed ten. It was loading the programming when it froze, and flashed with an error message. T’Lyn frowned and removed it, wiping the data from the biobed and checking the source code on her PADD. The program still seemed to be functioning fine as it was on her PADD, and as far as she could tell it was still functioning on beds eight and nine, so she reconnected, synced, and started again. This time, it got further, and she felt the corner of her mouth twitch upwards, but only moments later the system crashed again, displaying the same error message.

T’Lyn started again. She exhaled slowly, closing her eyes and leaning against the bed. She suddenly didn’t feel right. Her face had many fine beads of sweat all across it, and she felt like she was going to throw up, but her stomach was so empty there was no way that was possible. The idea of vomiting up bile and a half a cup of Kelpian salt tea seemed deeply unpleasant, though, so she took a few deep breaths, trying to will the feeling away.

The bed got further into the code again before it crashed once more.

“This biobed is being absurd,” she said aloud, although there was no one around to hear it. Nurse Westlake was still on a conference in Dr T’Ana’s office, and T’Ana herself was deeply engrossed in a PADD, her patient laying asleep in bed two. The other nurses were nowhere to be seen – possibly on away missions, or on their breaks – and the other ensigns were still cleaning, on the other side of sickbay. D’Vana, T’Lyn knew, had left early that morning to work on a mission for the captain. It was something she was both very proud to be doing and very excited about, and T’Lyn found herself hoping to hear about it when she returned that evening. She wanted to hear of Beckett and Boimler’s day on the bridge, also, and what Rutherford had been up to in Engineering. It was a strange feeling – on the Sh’vhal she had never particularly cared for what her crewmates were doing with their days.

With that thought came a wave of guilt, and she stopped, rocking back on her heels and closing her eyes. Her stomach was in knots, now, twisting, churning, and gnawing on the great expanse inside of it. There was a burning in her chest, as though the acid was rising up her oesophagus and onto the back of her tongue. She wiped a line of sweat onto her sleeve and inhaled slowly, seeing black spots on the edge of her vision. The anxiety in her chest was rising, and her lungs felt constricted, like she could not quite take a full breath.

T’Lyn stood, and everything went black.

“Ensign!”

She opened her eyes a few moments later to T’Ana kneeling by her side, running her tricorder over T’Lyn’s form and frowning. She set it aside, grabbed a penlight from her breast pocket, and shone it in T’Lyn’s eyes. T’Lyn blinked, eyes unfocusing as the light made its way into her pupils.

Her head was still spinning, so she closed her eyes again and took a deep breath. She felt the briefest sting of a hypospray against her neck. When she felt like she could raise her head without passing out again, she opened them and attempted to do just that.

“No,” T’Ana said, pushing her back down. “Stay down.”

“I am fine, doctor,” she said, her gaze landing on the ceiling.

“Do you call this fine?” T’Ana asked, re-examining the tricorder. “Don’t answer that.”

T’Lyn wisely chose to remain silent, waiting for the doctor to give her the all-clear. After a few moments, T’Ana backed off, lowering the tricorder and looking at her expectantly. T’Lyn sat up, slowly, but remained seated on the floor, for fear the world would slip away again.

“Kid, I’m going to ask you something, and I need you to answer honestly,” T’Ana said.

T’Lyn felt anxiety, tight in her chest.

“Have you been eating?” T’Ana asked.

“Yes,” T’Lyn lied.

“I said no lying,” T’Ana replied. “You’re hypoglycaemic, and your stress levels are through the roof.”

T’Lyn remained silent, feeling her discomfort grow. Her stomach rumbled in protest.

“Kid, look at me,” T’Ana said, uncharacteristically gentle. “T’Lyn.”

“Yes,” T’Lyn said.

“Is it too soon for you to come back? I can put you back on medical leave-”

“No,” T’Lyn said, a little too quickly. “I have work to do. I am only partway through reprogramming the biobeds-”

“Forget about the fucking biobeds, please, T’Lyn,” T’Ana said, shaking her head.

T’Lyn fell silent again, drawing her knees to her chest. She felt heaviness in her eyes, like she was about to cry, but she forced her emotional response back in check. She was not about to cry in front of her superior officer.

“Go have something to eat,” T’Ana said. “There’s nutrient supplements in my office, if you don’t think you can stomach food. You’re off duty for the rest of today.”

“The biobeds-”

“That’s an order, Ensign.”

T’Lyn got to her feet, a little unsteadily, leaning on the biobed for support. T’Ana pocketed the tricorder and clasped a hand to her shoulder, briefly, before letting go.

“Eat something,” she said, her voice gravelly. “And get some rest.”

T’Lyn took the dismissal for what it was, and gathered her PADD, closing the control panel on the biobed. She stopped by T’Ana’s now empty office and grabbed a nutrient supplement out of the box by the door, unwrapping it and taking a bite once she was back out in the corridor, making her way back to her bunk. It tasted a little like peanut butter, an Earth creation she’d found she liked, so she took another bite and chewed slowly. Her head was starting to pound.

She made her way to the bunks and crawled into hers, still munching on the nutrient supplement. She found herself wishing she had thought to grab another, because despite the bland taste, it was something she seemed to be able to stomach – or perhaps it was that she was so hungry her body didn’t care what she put inside it anymore, as long as it was food.

T’Lyn stared up at the ceiling and side. She reached up to feel her neck where the hypospray had hit her, and sure enough, there was a little patch of raised skin where whatever T’Ana had dosed her with had gone in. She had her suspicions – a fast acting glucose supplement, for starters, and maybe something for her dehydration – but she knew it had been completely at the doctor’s discretion in that moment. She also knew she should be grateful, and she was, that it had happened in sickbay, not somewhere more public, and that it had been T’Ana to attend to her, not one of the nurses. It was embarrassing, though, to be seen in such a state.

And then to get called out like that, based purely on the medical fact the tricorder had provided, and not on the observations of the other lower deckers who would, T’Lyn was sure, have given a much more damning assessment of T’Lyn’s recent eating habits.

She didn’t know how to explain it to anyone. She wanted to eat, she did, but every time she sat down to eat, all food seemed wrong to her. The moment it touched her lips, her stomach would lurch in protest, and the longer she spent with it in her mouth, the worse it got, feeling every texture and tasting every flavour the dish had to offer. It had been too much, even last night, when Rutherford had given her those vegetable dumplings. Ordinarily T’Lyn might have found them delicious; she was partial to foods with umami, which the sauce contained in spades. But last night, for some reason, they had just been wrong. They had sat too heavily in her stomach, they had been too hard to swallow, their flavours and textures had been too much for her mouth to handle.

All food, it felt, was wrong. That was why she couldn’t eat, but that seemed so absurd, so illogical. People didn’t just up and stop eating for no reason; food just didn’t become wrong for no reason. There had to be a logical explanation for why she was feeling this way, but the best she could come up with was that there was something wrong with her.

Had she gone and relayed this to T’Ana, or perhaps even D’Vana or Beckett, not one of those women would have laughed at her, or told her there was something wrong with her. In their own ways, each one would have sat her down and explained the functions of grief, the stages that a person goes through, and that being unable to eat is an all too common a side effect experienced by many people - Human, Vulcan, or Orion - and that it would go away in time, but that first and foremost, they had to keep her healthy and well, and the best way to do that was for her to eat whatever she could stand.

T’Lyn did not relay any of this to either the good doctor, or D’Vana or Beckett. She felt alone enough as it was, and this whole experience had been even more alienating to her. She just wanted to go home, but where was home? The Sh’vhal was no longer of this world, and Vulcan was lightyears away.

T’Lyn’s PADD beeped and she grabbed it from the end of the bed, swiping it open and pulling up her latest notifications. An amended duty shift roster was sitting at the top, and when she opened it, it said, once more, MEDICAL LEAVE.

T’Lyn groaned and closed her eyes. They snapped open when the PADD made another noise; this notification was sent to her personal channel, not the one that could be accessed by anyone. It instructed her to report to the Counsellor’s Office at 15:00 hours.

She stared at it in disbelief.

“No,” she said aloud, without meaning to. She did not want to go to the Counsellor’s Office. There was no shame in speaking about mental health, that was true, but she was fine. Everything was fine.

The PADD beeped again. It was a message, again, on her personal channel, from Dr T’Ana.

You will be attending counselling, or you won’t be cleared for duty.

“I do not want to,” T’Lyn said to her PADD, although there was no way it – or T’Ana – could hear her. Another message came through from T’Ana.

That’s an order.

T’Lyn’s nostrils flared as she huffed and threw her PADD down on top of her mattress. She rubbed her forehead where there was a headache forming and took another bite of the nutrient supplement. She did not want to do this. She did not need to see a counsellor.

She wanted to message D’Vana and Beckett, and get their reassurances that this was absurd and she was fit for duty, but there was a sinking feeling inside her that they would instead side with Dr T’Ana, so she kept this to herself. She rolled onto her side and stared at her empty wall, biting the inside of her cheek. This was absurd, and unnecessary, and –

She felt her mind starting to spiral, so she stopped, took a deep breath, and started again. She tried to think of other things; she started reciting her preferred verses from the teachings of Surak, instead. It had soothed her as a child, and with hope it would soothe her now. There was something comforting to her about the cold logic with which Surak had approached things, with the discipline required to achieve emotional control and full enlightenment. It was something she longed for, to detach herself from her emotions completely and face reality with nothing but the level-headed confines of logic. It would be better that way, she thought, but so few Vulcans achieved such an accomplishment, even in their long lifespans. It was exceedingly rare, because the unfortunate reality was that Vulcans were a deeply emotional race, and T’Lyn found herself worrying that it would be her downfall. It had gotten her kicked off the Sh’vhal; she had little to no community amongst Vulcans; she was, truly, alone in the universe.

And now she had to go to counselling. It felt like a punishment for being a bad Vulcan.

T’Lyn shoved the last of the nutrient supplement into her mouth and chewed slowly, deep in thought. Surely if she just tried harder, she could control her emotions and this wouldn’t be a problem anymore.

She would meditate.

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath in. Held it a few seconds. Breathed out, feeling the air rush through her nose. Repeated the action a few times, until –

T’Lyn awoke to her PADD making a trilling noise.

She sat up, grabbing it from the end of the bed. It was a reminder alarm, that she had an appointment in fifteen minutes. She blinked, wiping the sleep from her eyes, and checked the time. 14:45. She had to be at the Counsellor’s Office in fifteen minutes.

She groaned and considered just going back to sleep.

T’Ana’s reminder that she would not be cleared for duty unless she went ran through her head, and she sighed, sitting up and swinging her legs over the edge of her bunk. She dropped to the floor instead of climbing down, and checked the time again, a heavy pit forming in her stomach.

She stopped in front of the door that led into the Counsellor’s Office and frowned. She looked around cautiously, but the corridor was empty, and seeing no other choice, she squared her shoulders and pressed the pad by the door, hearing a chime sound out.

The door slid open, and on the other side was Dr Migleemo, the ship’s counsellor. He stood tall and scrawny, in a tweed jacket and dark pants, his communicator over his left breast. Fine emerald feathers covered his face, lifted to the top of his head in a crest not unlike that of an Earth cockatoo.

“T’Lyn,” he said, though his pronunciation was off, more akin to Talyn than her actual name. “Welcome. I’m Dr Migleemo.”

T’Lyn inclined her head and stepped inside to a cosy room. An amber-coloured couch was in the centre of the left-hand wall, a wooden coffee table in the middle, and a similarly coloured armchair to the right. She looked around, at walls lined with bookshelves, the titles things like Understanding the Andorian Mind and A Guide to Ascension. T’Lyn quirked an eyebrow and looked back, where Migleemo was taking a seat in the armchair, PADD in hand.

“Please take a seat,” he said, gesturing to the couch. “Would you feel more comfortable with the candles lit? Some music playing? I have an excellent track of the Vulcan lute.”

“No,” T’Lyn said bluntly, taking the seat opposite him. No amount of the Vulcan lute was going to make her comfortable in this room, with its many psychology textbooks and bonsai trees.

“Alright,” he said amenably. “Why are you here, T’Lyn?”

“Because Dr T’Ana informed me I would not return to duty unless I had attended this appointment.”

Migleemo chuckled, tapping the top of his PADD with his fingers. “I think that’s not true. You wouldn’t have come unless you needed to.”

T’Lyn pursed her lips together and considered him. It was too early to make a judgement call on his intellectual capabilities, but T’Lyn was leaning towards thinking he was a fucking idiot.

She mentally chastised herself for the thought and refocused her attention on Migleemo, who was typing something on his PADD.

“You witnessed your former ship meeting its destruction,” he said matter-of-factly. T’Lyn blinked; she was so used to the crew of the Cerritos walking on eggshells around her when it came to that particular topic, the candour was almost appreciated.

“Yes,” she said. “It was unfortunate.”

“It was unfortunate,” Migleemo agreed. “How have you been since? Have you been sleeping?”

“At times,” T’Lyn said. She did not tell him about going down to the warp core almost every night.

He made another note on his PADD.

“How about your social life, how is that going? Are you withdrawn?”

“No,” T’Lyn said. “I have been spending time with four of the other junior officers from lower decks.”

“Interesting,” he said. “Have you been meditating?”

“Yes,” T’Lyn replied. She did not mention how difficult it was, or the way her mind filled with bleak and unending thoughts of everything that could go wrong when she tried to clear it.

“How about eating, T’Lyn?” He leaned forward, PADD clutched in his hands, and T’Lyn instinctively leaned back and folded her arms over her chest.

“I have been meeting my nutritional needs,” she said.

“Okay,” Migleemo nodded, typing something with rapid fingers.

There’s a beat of silence, before Migleemo looked up, his green feathers ruffled. He leaned on one fist in what seemed to be a desperate move to appear casual and receptive, but it has the opposite effect to T’Lyn – he looked desperate for her cooperation.

“Ensign T’Lyn, could you tell me a little of how you’ve been handling your grief?”

T’Lyn pressed her lips together, considering him. Eventually, she replied, “Are you familiar with the concept of kaiidth?”

Migleemo tapped something out on his PADD.

“Kaiidth,” he said. “I believe it’s similar to the human concept of que sera, sera.”

“I have not encountered this concept,” T’Lyn replied, “But in Standard, kaiidth translates to what is, is.”

“I see,” Migleemo continued to type, and T’Lyn bit down on the inside of her cheek to control the irrational urge to snatch the PADD away and review the notes herself. “You’ve been applying this concept of kaiidth to your grief?”

“In a manner of speaking,” T’Lyn replied. In truth, she had done no such thing, but clinging to Surak’s teachings was giving her some measure of control. “I cannot change what has happened. I cannot bring my father back to this life.”

“No, certainly not,” Migleemo hummed, tapping away. “Have you thought about what you would say to him, if he were here?”

“No,” T’Lyn said, her tone short and clipped.

“I think he’d tell you that when the chips are down, you should work with those around you to get back into tip top shape.” Migleemo offered her something that she supposed approximated a kindly smile. “Do you understand?”

“I believe,” T’Lyn said evenly, gritting her teeth, “You did not know my father, Dr Migleemo, and placing words in his mouth is beyond your station.”

Migleemo raised a hand and gave her half a shrug. “Maybe so, T’Lyn. Maybe so. But think of your friends. The other lower deckers. They’re comforting. They sustain you, like a hearty soup.”

At the mention of soup, T’Lyn tasted plomeek at the back of her throat, and resisted the urge to gag.

Instead, she swallowed, and managed, “This line of reasoning seems rather emotional.”

Migleemo smiled, though something about it felt disingenuous to T’Lyn, as volatile and mistrusting as she felt in this moment. “Of course. You don’t do emotions, do you?”

“Not the way others do,” T’Lyn said somewhat stiffly.

“Yes,” Migleemo’s eyes darted to a copy of Vulcan Principles of Emotional Intelligence sitting on his shelf. “So you, of course, feel nothing about the passing of your father and former crew.”

T’Lyn stared at him.

In a distant part of her brain, she realised he was trying to get a rise out of her. Some part of his addled psychologist’s brain thought that by baiting her, by riling her up and making her angry at him, she was going to experience some cathartic release of emotion, and everything would be well again.

T’Lyn did not subscribe to that theory. She found herself wishing to get out of here, as far away from this nonsensical exercise as she could, back to the safety of her bunk and the programming she’d left on her PADD.

She wondered if she’d get in trouble for just leaving.

“T’Lyn?” Migleemo prompted. “You’ve gone rather quiet. I asked if you felt nothing at the death of your father.”

T’Lyn just barely managed not to flinch at those words. There was a twisting sensation in her abdomen, but she pointedly did not clench her fists, settling her cool gaze onto Migleemo’s face.

“I was simply calculating the best way to express my thoughts,” T’Lyn said, her voice maintaining a smooth veneer of calm. “I would not say I feel nothing. However, I also would not say I am consumed by grief.”

Migleemo’s brow shot upwards, and he typed something without looking down at his PADD.

“I would say,” T’Lyn said, “That I am fine. I am experiencing hardships, but who isn’t?”

“The hardships you’re experiencing,” Migleemo said, steepling his fingers under his chin, “They’re inconsequential.”

“Pardon?” T’Lyn said, quirking an eyebrow.

“They’re difficult, that’s true,” Migleemo leaned forward. “But they mean nothing in the grand scheme of things. Do you understand what I mean?”

T’Lyn felt a flare of anger in her chest. They meant nothing to him, perhaps, but they meant a great deal to her, and was that not the point of this farcical exercise they called therapy?

“You’ll get over it, in time,” Migleemo wrote something on his PADD. “In the meantime, I am recommending twice weekly sessions.”

“No,” T’Lyn said evenly. “I do not think so.”

Migleemo looked up, surprised. The crest on his head extended upwards, the same way humans raised their eyebrows, and T’Lyn quirked an eyebrow back at him.

“This has been an insurmountable waste of my time,” T’Lyn stated, using her arms to push herself into a standing position. “I will not be returning. Thank you, Dr Migleemo.”

Migleemo stammered something behind her, but she paid him no mind as she walked outside. She stopped in the corridor, thinking for a moment, and then tilted her chin up ever so slightly.

She was going to Sickbay, to talk to T’Ana.

She squared her shoulders and lengthened her stride until she had reached the turbolift. Inside, she requested it take her to Sickbay, and clenched her hands in tight fists while she waited for it to move.

Migleemo had little to no understanding of Vulcan emotion and grief, and worse still, he had little to no understanding of her. Certainly, she could have given him more of a chance, but if he was going to spout meaningless platitudes and then tell her to get over it, what point was there in her providing him with her valuable time, or her energy?

Therapy itself was not an effort she was unwilling to make. But if it was only being offered by Migleemo, she had no interest in it. She understood that something had to change, as much as she wanted to believe that she was coping, but the steps she had to make to enact that change were foreign to her. Something she could, perhaps, discuss at length with T’Ana.

T’Lyn marched into sickbay with her head held high and her hands clenched in fists. She marched past the biobeds, past Nurse Westlake, past the ensign sanitizing the instrument tray. She got to T’Ana’s office door and stopped.

The door opened a moment later, and T’Lyn stepped inside, her boots thudding against the floor as she made her way to the chair and sat in it. T’Ana barely looked up from her PADD as T’Lyn threw herself into the chair and folded her arms across her chest.

“So,” T’Ana said, her eyes darting from side to side as she read a few lines of text, “How was therapy?”

“I am not returning to Dr Migleemo’s office,” T’Lyn replied tersely. “Ever.”

“That bad, huh?”

“He is an idiot,” she replied. She clenched her jaw, and then added, “Doctor.”

T’Ana snorted, setting her PADD aside. “I know you don’t like it, but I can’t clear you for duty until we’ve done something about what’s going on with you. You need grief counselling, Ensign.”

“I need,” T’Lyn said, “A superior officer who understands the best course of action is for me to occupy my mind.”

“And you’ll get that,” T’Ana said, her tail twitching, “When you’ve proven to your superior officer that you can return to work well rested, meditated, and having eaten a decent meal in the past twenty-four hours.”

T’Lyn glared at the desktop, unwilling to meet T’Ana’s gaze.

“I’ve been thinking,” T’Ana said, not unkindly, “I have a friend from my days at the Academy. Tovik. He’s a Vulcan healer.”

T’Lyn glanced upward, her eyes meeting T’Ana’s wide gaze. T’Ana’s pupils slitted for a moment, before widening once more.

“I can call him and talk to him,” T’Ana said. “See what he has to say.”

“A Vulcan?” T’Lyn asked. “A healer?”

“A Vulcan doctor, yes,” T’Ana promised. “I’m hoping he might know how to help you.”

T’Lyn hesitated, considering her options. A Vulcan healer might actually know how to help her, but she didn’t see how he would be able to help without examining her physically. He may understand why she could not eat or meditate, why her mind was so clouded with thoughts, why anxiety coloured every inch of her waking life. He may be able to help, and help was sorely needed.

“I do not think this is necessary,” T’Lyn said. She soldiered on before T’Ana could interrupt her. “Nevertheless, I am willing to try it.”

“Alright,” T’Ana said. “I’ll give him a call. Do you want to be here for it, or would you rather I call him alone and get back to you?”

T’Lyn blinked, surprised she was being given a choice. After a moment’s hesitation, she said, “I would rather not be here.”

“Done,” T’Ana said, typing something rapidly on her PADD. “Head back to lower decks and I’ll send you a notification when it’s done.”

T’Lyn walked back to deck eleven with her head lowered and her shoulders high, PADD clutched to her chest. She wanted to crawl inside some dark pit and have it swallow her whole; she did not wish to be seen by anyone. She felt so unbearably lonely, but solitude had never bothered her before. It was just one of the many ways she had become broken since the destruction of the Sh’vhal.

She climbed into her bunk and sat cross-legged on her bed, staring straight ahead. Her mind wandered, and her breathing evened out, and she was almost meditating without meaning to when her PADD chirped beside her.

Done, the message from T’Ana read. His ship will rendezvous with the Cerritos in four days.

T’Lyn typed back a quick reply and set the PADD aside.

She straightened her legs out in front of her and considered herself. She knew that T’Ana wanted only for her to recover; that the other lower deckers were concerned. She didn’t know how to abate their worries, soothe their anxieties, when she could not even do that for herself. She felt disconcerted, out of place, like she was existing slightly to the left of her former self. There was no way to describe the feeling that made sense to her, but there was this ever-shifting plane of reality she seemed to exist on now, and everybody else was on a different plane. There was a disconnect between T’Lyn and the rest of the world, and worse still, there was a disconnect between T’Lyn and herself. There was no solution, either.

She had hope that the Vulcan healer would perhaps have an idea of what she was talking about, or could recommend a meditation practice that would heal her. There had to be something, she thought. There had to be somebody else who had experienced this, there had to be something that could be done.

T’Lyn was afraid that she was alone, in every sense of the word.

She came out of her reverie at the sound of approaching voices, and turned her head to see Beckett and Boimler walking to the bunks. They were bickering, as was usual, but there was laughter in both their voices.

T’Lyn’s heart hurt.

She almost could not bear to see them. She considered dropping her head onto the pillow and pretending to be asleep, but it was too late; they had spotted her.

“Hey,” Beckett greeted her, flopping down on her own bunk and kicking off her boots. “How was your first day back?”

“I am on medical leave again,” T’Lyn replied, not quite meeting the other woman’s eye.

“What?” Boimler said, leaning against his bunk, blocking some of Beckett’s vision. She shoved him out of the way, sending him to the side with a half-hearted punch to the upper thigh. He shoved her back, and returned his attention to the Vulcan. “Why?”

“I…” T’Lyn stopped. She felt heat rise in her cheeks, and she looked down at the ground. “I collapsed in sickbay.”

“What happened?” Beckett straightened, concern etched all over her face. “Are you okay?”

“Yes,” T’Lyn said. She realised she could lie, and tell them she had witnessed some horrific injury that had caused her to faint, but she did not want to lie to them. She did not want to elaborate, however.

Beckett narrowed her eyes at her, leaning back on her bunk. Boimler said, “I’m glad you’re okay, but what happened?”

“It is nothing to be concerned about,” the Vulcan replied evenly. A little uncertainly, she said, “I was hypoglycaemic.”

“Dude,” Beckett exclaimed, leaning forward. “That is absolutely something we should be concerned about.”

“I am fine,” T’Lyn said firmly, rubbing at her neck where her collar sat wrong. “The doctor administered a hypospray and had me return here to rest.”

“Is that all?” Beckett asked, and T’Lyn got the sinking feeling that she knew about the visit to Migleemo’s office.

“Yes,” T’Lyn replied, meeting Beckett’s gaze. The other woman was unflinching, and held it for several moments, unwilling to look away.

“As long as you’re alright,” Boimler cut in, touching Beckett on the shoulder. She tore her gaze away from T’Lyn to fix him with a look, and furrowed her brow when he gave her the slightest shake of his head. T’Lyn knew they were communicating something between them, but she could not discern what was meant by either of their expressions.

“Hey everybody!” D’Vana rounded the corner, grinning wide when she saw them. “How were your days?”

“Oh, you know,” Beckett leaned back, inspecting her fingernails. “I got to work with my mom, Boims fucked up in front of Ransom, and T’Lyn collapsed in Sickbay.”

“How did Boimler fuck up – wait, what?!” D’Vana dropped the box she was holding onto her bed and stood on her toes so she could get a better look at the Vulcan. “Are you okay?”

“I am fine,” T’Lyn said, glaring daggers at Beckett, who merely raised an eyebrow at her. “I experienced some mild hypoglycaemia.”

“Did Dr T check you out? Are you feeling alright now?” D’Vana climbed up beside her, shining a penlight into T’Lyn’s eyes. T’Lyn swatted her away, dodging the beam of light.

“Yes, I am fine,” she said, snatching the penlight and tossing it over to Boimler, who fumbled, just managing to catch it. “It is nothing to be concerned about.”

“Still, we should probably get a meal into you. Have you eaten today?” D’Vana didn’t seem to take losing her penlight personally, because she produced another out of her pocket and aimed it at the Vulcan’s face. T’Lyn sighed and acquiesced to having her pupils checked.

“I had a nutrient supplement when I left Sickbay,” she said.

“And you haven’t eaten since?” D’Vana exclaimed. “T’Lyn!”

“I am fine,” T’Lyn repeated, closing her eyes. “Do not worry about me.”

What she did not understand was that the other lower deckers were worried about her. They had watched her intently; they had noticed that things were amiss. They talked about it when she wasn’t there. They had not yet filed a report with one of the senior officers, but if things continued the way they were, it did not seem unlikely that it would happen. T’Lyn knew none of this, but with each passing day Beckett, D’Vana and the boys grew more concerned. The only thing stopping them, really, was that T’Ana seemed to be on top of it – and they all trusted the good doctor to know what she was doing, and thus left it in her capable hands.

“Let’s go grab something to eat,” D’Vana said quickly, pocketing her penlight. “I’m starved.”

T’Lyn wanted to do a very human thing: she wanted to crawl under the covers and hide there until all of this went away.

Instead, she said, “That…would be acceptable.”

“Great!” D’Vana’s face lit up, and she glanced down at Beckett, sharing a look with her.

The other woman leaned down and pulled her boots back on, sliding her feet inside and tugging them up until they were squarely on her feet. She unclasped the top of her shirt and let it hang down, revealing her white undershirt beneath. Her sleeves were already rolled to her elbows, and she untied her hair, fluffing out the curls with a sigh.

“Let’s go,” she said, standing up. T’Lyn slid off her bunk and landed on the ground with a soft thud, turning her head as D’Vana did the same. Boimler straightened, putting his PADD on his bunk, and ran his fingers through his hair.

D’Vana chatted the whole way to the mess hall, keeping up a lively conversation with Boimler about the finer points of long-range sensors. T’Lyn tuned them out, for the most part, fixating on what she was going to get from the replicators, what she could possibly stomach. Inside her abdomen there was a twisting sensation.

“Hey,” Beckett said quietly, falling into step beside her. “If you’re not up to it, we can head back.”

“I am fine,” T’Lyn replied. D’Vana and Boimler were so engrossed in their conversation, they didn’t seem to notice that Beckett and T’Lyn had fallen behind them. T’Lyn found herself grateful for this.

“Okay, but…” Beckett hesitated, like she wasn’t sure what to say. She opened her mouth, closed it again, and then finally said, “There’s some of those nutrient bars in my bunk if you want some. You can grab one any time, I don’t care. They’re in the top drawer.”

T’Lyn paused, pursing her lips together. Eventually, she said, “I will keep that in mind.”

“Good.” Beckett seemed relieved, though T’Lyn could not place why.

They stepped into the mess hall and the Orion and humans made a beeline for the replicators. T’Lyn hung back, trying to think of something, but her mind was coming up blank. Her anxiety was rising; she felt like everyone was watching her, though she knew logically that nobody cared she was here.

She fell into the line-up, and watched as D’Vana got a plate of quesadillas and made her way to their usual table. Boimler was next, asking the computer for something called mac and cheese, and walking away with a bowl filled high with pasta with what appeared to be breadcrumbs and cilantro on top. Beckett got to the replicator, cracked her neck, and requested a burger, fries, and salad. The three of them were seated and talking when T’Lyn finally made it to the replicator.

“Vulcan tea,” she said quietly, and accepted the mug that appeared. She went to turn away, and caught Beckett’s eye, the disappointed look she was being fixed with. She sighed and turned back. “Plomeek soup, hot.”

She made her way to the table, tea clutched in one hand, warm bowl of soup in the other. Beckett’s stare had faded in intensity, but the concern was still emanating off her in waves. T’Lyn sat, and looked down at her bowl of soup.

She did not want to eat it, though it was a childhood favourite.

She took a sip of her tea, and felt her stomach churn. She swallowed, set the mug down, and stared down at her bowl. She was aware of the others eating with their usual gusto. She was also aware of Beckett’s eyes on her, watching her closely.

She exhaled slowly, placed her spoon into the soup, and brought it to her mouth.

The soup swirled unpleasantly in her gut, and the warmth seeping down her throat was constricting, not comforting. T’Lyn swallowed, hard, and closed her eyes, aware her breath had hitched in her throat.

“Are you okay?” Beckett’s voice was low. The others had not noticed anything was wrong yet – but if she left, it would become glaringly obvious that she was not okay as she was making herself out to be.

“I’m fine,” she lied, her fist clenched around the spoon she was holding. “I am.”

“T’Lyn-”

“Mariner,” T’Lyn said, and she almost instantly regretted the acid in her tone, because D’Vana and Brad both looked up.

She felt her face heating up and the prick of tears in her eyes. She forced herself to have another spoonful of the soup, even when Beckett reached for her hand to stop her. It went down as easy as the first mouthful, which is to say, it did not go down easy at all.

T’Lyn felt like she was going to be sick.

“I must go,” she said, getting to her feet and hurrying away. She left her bowl and cup abandoned on the table and marched out of the mess hall, with no idea where she was heading, just that she had to get away. The bile in the back of her throat tasted bitter, and she swallowed, hard, willing herself not to vomit. There were footsteps behind her, but she ignored them, just kept moving until she got to a bathroom and threw open the door in her haste.

It was, blessedly, empty.

T’Lyn’s stomach emptied itself of its meagre contents in seconds, and she retched, wiping her mouth on the back of her hand, and slumping against the wall. She breathed hard, gasping for air like it was escaping her entirely, and curled in on herself, bringing her knees to her chest. Her heart pounded, and she brought her fingers to rest over it, feeling the heavy beat beneath her ribs.

“T’Lyn,” Beckett said, standing in the doorway and looking down at her. T’Lyn forced herself to look up. “Let’s get you back to the bunks.”

“Let me scan her,” D’Vana pushed past Beckett, kneeling on the tile beside the Vulcan. She produced a medical tricorder from one of her many pockets and pointed it at T’Lyn, tapping the side of it and squinting down at the display.

“What does it say?” T’Lyn rasped, trying to get a look at it.

“Elevated heart rate. Elevated cortisol. Dehydration.” D’Vana looked up at her and gave her a careful smile. “It’s okay, T’Lyn.”

It did not feel okay.

T’Lyn forced herself to her feet, leaning against the wall for support, and allowed herself to be guided back to deck eleven and the bunks. The others allowed her the privacy to change, so she slipped into nightclothes, curling up on her bunk in just a loose-fitting shirt and pants. D’Vana climbed up beside her, Beckett on her heels, and the three of them squished in close.

“Here,” Beckett handed her a nutrient bar. “If you can stomach it.”

T’Lyn swallowed and looked away, playing with the wrapper with her thumb. She didn’t want to eat it, but they seemed to be the only thing that her body didn’t immediately protest. With some hesitance, she peeled it open and took a bite.

D’Vana reached forward and pulled the privacy screen down, leaving the three women in a cosy cocoon. T’Lyn ate her nutrient bar slowly, taking small bites and chewing them thoroughly before swallowing, feeling her stomach twist every so often.

“I apologise,” she said eventually.

“You have nothing to apologise for,” Beckett said firmly.

“That’s right,” D’Vana added. She paused, and her voice sounded quite small when she followed it with, “We’re just worried about you.”

“I am worried about myself,” T’Lyn murmured, leaning back against the wall, and closing her eyes, still playing with the wrapper in her hands.

It seemed unwise, the blatant emotionalism in that statement, but T’Lyn meant it. She could no longer find a reasonable or logical explanation for what was happening to her. She didn’t understand it. She didn’t know what to do.

She felt utterly alone.

Beckett’s head dropped onto T’Lyn’s shoulder, her dark curls brushing T’Lyn’s cheek. D’Vana reached out, her hand hesitating next to T’Lyn’s, but the Vulcan cracked an eye open and closed the space between their hands, grasping them together.

“We’re here with you,” D’Vana said softly. “Whatever it takes.”

“Thank you,” T’Lyn swallowed the lump forming in her throat and let her chin rest on Beckett’s head. D’Vana curled into her side, and the three of them remained silent like that, for what seemed like hours.

Four days later, The Cerritos fell out of warp at 09:00, not long after T’Lyn had awoken.

She did not normally allow herself the indulgence of sleeping in, but this was, she felt, a reasonable day for it, and as she had nowhere to be until Dr T’Ana summoned her, she took her time getting dressed, combing her hair, and brushing her teeth.

She adjusted the waistband of her loose-fitting pants, and tugged her tunic down over the top of them. The hem brushed her knees, and it sat loosely over her body, every bit practical as well as comfortable. She placed her headband on, letting her bangs fall down over her forehead, and took a moment to look at her reflection. She was not vain, but she could not help but think she needed a haircut upon seeing her unkempt fringe. She smoothed it down and sighed.

“Doctor T’Ana to Ensign T’Lyn,” her communicator sounded.

She touched it, and said, “Yes, Doctor?”

“Report to Sickbay.”

T’Lyn felt a growing anxiety, but closed up her closet and began her journey to Sickbay. She found herself, rather illogically, wishing for the others to accompany her, but Boimler, Beckett and D’Vana all had bridge duty and Rutherford was down in the depths of Engineering. She stepped onto the turbolift, deeply in troubled thought, and did not pay attention to the comings and goings of others in the lift. When it stopped at Sickbay, it took a moment for the action to register in her mind, so she was already feeling discombobulated when she stepped off and into the clinical setting that was the medical bay.

Dr T’Ana was nowhere to be seen, so T’Lyn walked to her office door and waited. The door opened moments later, and the older Caitian gestured for her to walk inside.

“Sit,” T’Ana said, pointing to the chair opposite her desk. “The Sussex will be arriving at any minute. Tovik will beam aboard as soon as they do.”

Tovik, T’Lyn thought. So that was his name.

“Thank you for arranging this, doctor,” she voiced instead, clasping her hands in her lap. “It was unnecessary. I am grateful.”

“Unnecessary my ass,” T’Ana said, twitching one ear backwards. T’Lyn chose to ignore the doctor’s choice in language; she had grown accustomed to it in her time working in Sickbay. The sentiment, however, she disagreed with.

She chose not to voice this, for fear she would be seen as belligerent or emotional. Instead, she clasped her hands tighter, and hoped the doctor could not sense her growing anxiety, which had increased exponentially. Her heart was pounding, her palms were clammy, and she was aware her breathing had quickened. If T’Ana noticed, however, she did not say anything, just sat in her chair and consulted her PADD, waiting for the Vulcan healer to arrive.

The silence was bearable, but what was not bearable was the way her insides seemed to shift, the way her chest had tightened. Just when T’Lyn thought she could bear it no more, T’Ana looked up, and said gruffly, “There he is.”

He stepped into T’Ana’s office, long white robes brushing against the floor. He had dark hair and severe eyebrows that turned up at the ends, and his expression was purely neutral, without any humour or kindness in it, but also without anger. He looked around, his light eyes taking in the expanse of T’Ana’s office, the charts of various species physiology that lined the walls. He nodded to T’Ana, who graced him with a rare smile, and then turned to T’Lyn.

“I grieve with thee,” he said gravely, holding his hand up in a ta’al. T’Lyn felt her chest tighten, and her eyes grow heavy; in the days since her father’s death, nobody had offered her the most basic of Vulcan blessings.

“Thank you,” she said in Vulcan. Tovik’s mouth twitched into a smile, and he took the seat beside her.

“T’Lyn, I am Tovik,” Tovik introduced himself. “I was formerly a Starfleet doctor, and now have a teaching post at San Francisco, on Earth.”

T’Lyn nodded, her gaze flicking to T’Ana, who had leaned back in her chair and was watching them thoughtfully. T’Ana said, “T’Lyn is one of my best and brightest,” and T’Lyn felt the slightest burst of pride in her chest.

“I am sure,” Tovik said. “T’Ana, is there somewhere T’Lyn and I may speak privately?”

“You can have the office,” T’Ana said, standing. She made her way outside, darkening the windows and closing the door securely behind her.

Tovik turned to her. He was close enough that T’Lyn could read the inscriptions on his robe, wishes of peace, harmony and good health stitched into the fabric. Fitting for a doctor, T’Lyn thought.

“It has been two weeks since your father’s passing,” Tovik said. “Did you attend the funeral?”

“No,” T’Lyn said, swallowing the lump in her throat. “There was no body.”

“That there is no body does not mean there is nothing to mourn,” Tovik’s tone was gentle, almost kind, but the logic in his words was sound.

“I could not,” T’Lyn started, and then stopped, taking a deep breath in, “I could not bear to see my mother.”

“It is logical to seek connection in a time of great loss,” Tovik said. There was no judgement colouring his tone, only curiosity. “Why did you not seek that connection?”

“My mother lost her t’hy’la,” T’Lyn said quietly, looking to the ground. Her anxiety was rising, her eyes were heavy, and there was a tightness in her chest. “It would be…wrong to make this about my own pain.”

“Your pain is real, T’Lyn,” Tovik said softly. “It is only logical to feel a loss like this.”

“Feel,” T’Lyn stressed, close to tears. “It is not logical to feel anything.”

Tovik did not dignify that statement with a response. T’Lyn felt a couple of tears slip down her face, trailing down her skin and leaving her cheeks sticky. She closed her eyes, wiping them on the back of her sleeve, and took a deep, shuddering breath.

“T’Lyn,” Tovik said, “Look at me.”

T’Lyn opened her eyes.

“It is not illogical to feel pain when you are hurting,” Tovik said. “Injuries of the mind and just as real as injuries of the body.”

“I have not sustained an injury,” T’Lyn said, gritting her teeth. “I am…weak.”

“Explain your logic,” the Vulcan doctor replied.

“Nobody else feels this way,” T’Lyn said, averting her gaze. “Nobody is hurting like this.”

“This does not make you weak,” Tovik stated. “You are strong to endure this.”

“I do not feel strong,” T’Lyn said, and then added, “And how I feel is irrelevant. I should be pursuing the path of logic.”

“T’Lyn, do you have friends?” Tovik asked, leaning forward.

T’Lyn thought of the other lower deckers.

“No,” she said. Tovik smiled, as though he knew she was lying.

“What are their names?” He asked.

She hesitated, and then said, “D’Vana, Beckett, Rutherford, and Boimler.”

“I see,” Tovik said, clasping his hands together. “D’Vana is an Orion name, is it not?”

“It is,” T’Lyn said, squinting at him, wondering where this was going.

“Did you know, in Orion culture, they follow a period of mourning? They dress in robes of the brightest emerald and cover their faces with veils, and sing laments to the dead.”

“What is your point?” T’Lyn asked.

“Have you asked your friends to observe any Vulcan mourning practices with you?” Tovik asked. When T’Lyn didn’t answer, he nodded thoughtfully. “I thought not.”

“I do not see how this is relevant,” T’Lyn said.

“T’Lyn, I am asking you to be kinder to yourself,” he said, looking down at her. “Do you long for Vulcan?”

“Every day,” T’Lyn replied, closing her eyes. She longed for the tepid sands, the scorching winds, the grit and the grime, the bustling city streets, and the logical layout of every city. The communal hubs for meditation. The rhythmic chanting of Surak’s teachings. The warmth of her mother’s embrace.

“Why do you not connect to your heritage by sharing your culture?” Tovik said. “Infinite diversity suggests that we all have something to learn from each other. I have learned much in my time among humans with Starfleet.”

“I…” T’Lyn hesitated. She did not know what to say to that. She did not know how to explain the disconnect she felt from her culture, how alienated she felt amongst the humans. She did not feel Vulcan; she did not feel like she was anything.

She felt so alone.

The tears streamed freely down her face now, and she brought her hands up to her chest, clutching at her sternum with clasped hands. She inhaled sharply and let out a little sob, and covered her face, not wanting the doctor to see this shameful display of emotion.

“It’s going to be alright, T’Lyn,” Tovik said. “You are going to be okay.”

T’Lyn could not bring herself to believe him; so much had gone wrong, and she was so untethered. She could not practice even the basic principles of Vulcan spirituality without her mind becoming borderline delusional in its apprehension, her fears multiplying and running wild through her young mind. Were she older, more well practiced, perhaps, she would have greater control over these emotions; if she were amongst Vulcans, she would have their steady presence to serve as a touchstone.

But on the Cerritos, T’Lyn was so alone.

“I have nobody,” T’Lyn confessed. “I have lost my father, and now – and now – I will never belong again. Not on Vulcan, not anywhere else.”

On Vulcan, her father had been an important influence. He had guided her back to the path of logic when her trust in her instincts strayed her too far away; he had helped her fit in amongst her peers, teaching her how to mask her feelings until she had gained better control of them. When she had received her posting on the Sh’vhal, he had given her a rare smile, and told her of his pride in her.

She had never lived up to it.

“T’Lyn,” Tovik said, shaking his head. “You are not as alone as you believe.”

“I know,” T’Lyn said guiltily, her eyes downcast. “But it feels as though I am, and I am not supposed to feel.”

“It is natural to feel,” Tovik said. “It is wisdom to know when to apply logic, and when to allow yourself the indulgence of emotion.”

“My father is gone,” T’Lyn whispered, wiping her nose on her sleeve. “I will never be whole again.”

“You are not in pieces,” Tovik said. “You may feel shattered, but you will recover. You have a community around you, who only want to see you better.”

“They want to see me better because there is no use in a science officer who cannot perform her duties,” T’Lyn remarked.

“They want to see you better because they care about you,” Tovik shot back. “Humans, Orions, Caitians…T’Lyn, these species all feel very deeply, form familial bonds with ease. You have been welcomed into Starfleet, and from what I have gathered in speaking with Dr T’Ana, there are people on this ship who care for your wellbeing.”

She considered this. The other lower deckers had all been trying to support her, in their own ways, from Beckett’s insistence that she eat, to Rutherford sitting with her in Engineering, night after night. Boimler observing her, and reporting her behaviour to the others. D’Vana offering to join her in Vulcan prayer to honour the dead.

Perhaps, she thought, they did care. She wiped the last of the tears from her eyes and exhaled slowly, looking up at Tovik. Her eyes were red-rimmed, glassy, her face streaked with tearstains, but for the first time in what felt like forever, though it had really been a scant two weeks, she felt as though she was okay.

“You are going to be okay,” Tovik repeated. “I think it is time you observe a Vulcan mourning practice.”