FIC: Beneath a Paper Moon ENT [NC17] Reed/Hayes (1/4)
Title: Beneath a Paper Moon
Author: Gaia
Rating: light NC17
Pairings: Reed/Hayes, Archer/Tucker (implied), Hayes/Sato, Reed/OC (sort-of), Tucker/OC.
Warnings: AU (Hayes lives, no Trip/T’Pol, no finale, yippee!), FutureFic, Violence, dub-con, h/c, a small bit of inoffensive hetsex.
Wordcount: ~31,800
Spoilers: Hatchery, Harbinger, Countdown, the Communicator.
Disclaimer: Ent characters aren’t mine, but the Hil’aka are. I make money from neither. The chapter epigraphs are all from ‘Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner’ owned by Samuel T. Coleridge, not me.
A/N: I apologize for any mistakes or problems in this fic, and not for making all of the changes I probably should have. It’s been rotting (in an unreadable file format) in cyberspace for a while now. I thought I’d better post it, even if it’s not my best and could use a lot more work. Special thanks to Kylie Lee, for betaing at least part of it (and trying valiantly to improve my writing, instead of just correction errors) and taking such good care of the entslash archive, and _workinprogress for figuring out gmail’s bizarre attachment-coding foible, letting me actually post this fic. I especially want to apologize to Kylie, because though I know this would be a much better story if I made all the changes she suggested, I think I’d have to stick around a few more weeks than I’d like to if I wanted to make this perfect.
Summary: Stranded alone on a planet where war is outlawed and violence is punished by death, Reed and Hayes struggle to make a new life for themselves.
BENEATH A PAPER MOON
By Gaia
1.
The many men, so beautiful!
And they all dead did lie:
And a thousand thousand slimy things
Lived on; and so did I
Matthew Hayes stares up at the stars, remembering a world far away and nights long past. Reed is sitting behind him, smoking something that smells an awful lot like his grandfather’s nails, thick and yellowed from tobacco - Matt chooses not to comment. Reed can have whatever petty indulgences he needs to get through this.
They sit back to back because the wind coming down off the mountains at night is cold and because they don’t need to look at each other in the darkness. The night is thick and it keeps them from ever sharing too much, from seeing how deep the forlorn timber of their voices really goes. There is a moon on Hil’al, but it isn’t crafted of white moon rocks that reflect the light of a far-off sun. It’s black as the blackest obsidian - a void traveling through the sky, projecting darkness instead of light.
Matt thinks that this is what death must feel like - cut off from anything and everything, but without the comfort of absolute darkness, just enough light to know that it’s all wrong.
Rostov is dead. Chang is dead. So is Walters. And it was just two days ago that they watched McKenzie’s head hit the hard near-mahogany of the platform with a thud too dull for the violence of it. Standing there alone, buffeted on either side by the bulbous forms of the Hil’aka, Mac looked delicate for the first time since Matt recruited her out of Basic. She looked like she was drowning in those shifting, almost gelatinous bodies. Reed averted his eyes out of respect, but Matt held her gaze. He can only hope she was able to draw strength from it.
They should be dead, not their subordinates, they both know. They know it as well as they know that nobody is coming for them. They are alone with each other and a moon that doesn’t shine.
They can’t talk about it. They’re not even brave enough to try to blame each other because it’s all pointless now. Nothing they say will be able to change what happened - so many mistakes and no turning back.
There’s only going forward and Matt doesn’t know where to start. “I grew up in New Mexico. You didn’t need a telescope to see the stars there, in the desert. I used to drive out there and pretend I was Luke Skywalker in the desert of Tatooie. Sometimes I’d bring a sketchbook.”
“You could become a cartoonist. You could make pottery,” Reed offers, hollowly.
“I could take you down to the marketplace and sell you as a slave.” Matt rolls his eyes. He needs to snipe a Reed, if only so he can pretend nothing’s happened.
“You would have to fight me first.”
“Well, I wouldn’t want to risk damaging the merchandise.” Matt gives a hollow chuckle, which Reed returns like an echo. For a while, they let it float into the darkness, seeing how quickly the night swallows it up.
After the silence becomes hollow and oppressive, Matt continues. “What about you, Lieutenant? What are you going to do?”
“I used to want to be a writer, but I doubt the Hil’aka will appreciate the subtle art of historical fiction.” His voice is filled with more disdain than he knows the Hil’aka deserve. They have done the unthinkable - they have eliminated war before the advent of space travel. Their methods are draconian, but, Matt wonders, isn’t it worth it? Is it not for the end of war that he and Hayes fight? Surely they don’t fight for its continuance.
“It’ll be fantasy to them,” Matt points out.
“But that would mean becoming some dancing monkey, a curiosity for these people.”
“What’s so wrong with that?”
“What do you bloody-well mean, ‘what’s wrong with it?’ Major, need I remind you that it was only five days ago that I was holding on to you to keep you from punching that trainer and getting yourself beheaded like . . .”
“It’s one thing to pedal your unique point of view and completely another to sign away all your rights and become a zoo exhibit just so you can fight again.”
“What are you going to do then?”
Matt has no idea. What’s a soldier to do, living on this planet where commerce is more fierce than the long out-moded system of war? He sighs. “I’m afraid I don’t know, Lieu . . . Malcolm.” Ranks are outlawed along with warfare. It’s going to be a hard habit to shake, the barrier of professionalism. “What about you?”
“I was thinking of signing up on one of the trans-oceanic merchant vessels.”
“I thought space was the only thing you cared to sail.”
“When I was younger my father wanted me to join the Royal Navy, like him, and his father before him, and his father . . . you get the idea.”
“And it’s going to take being stranded on a primitive alien planet with no other marketable skills to get you to fulfill the destiny of your distinguished heritage?”
“When I said I’d rather die that follow in my father’s footsteps, I guess I was lying. I wasn’t lying about hating it, though.”
“Your first duty is to survive,” Matt tells him, fiercely.
“Not a MACO slogan, surely.”
“No, but I think it applies.”
“Indeed.”
“So, do you think you can give it up?”
Reed gives a dry chuckle, lost to the darkness. “I can do without ever feeling your boot connect with my face again.”
“That’s not what I’m asking, Malcolm, and you know it. I mean everything: the history, the lingo, the technology, the structure.”
“I’ll do what I need to. Yes, it was my life, but I like to think that I’m more than that - that if there were suddenly peace in our side of the galaxy, I’d be content with it.”
Matt hangs his head. Everything is suddenly so heavy. For once in his life, there’s no one to tell him what to do - Reed certainly won’t.
He left Earth because the Xindi were a threat, true, but if he’s being perfectly honest himself, on empty nights traveling between stars, no moon in sight and a glass or two of good ‘ole Jack Daniels to keep him company, he knows that’s not the whole story. After the signing of the Hanoi Accords, there was precious little for him to do on Earth other than readiness drills. He was restless, desperate for another Democratic Republic of Korea, for another neocolonial war in Greenland. “I don’t know if I can say the same.”
<<<>>>
They wake to the sharp bark of the Er’ala at dawn. The sky is a fierce almost neon blue, except the ugly bruise of the moon marring the peace. They part ways with a handshake and two bittersweet smiles. Reed goes down to the docks and Matt back to that trainer whose lights he almost punched out.
They’re both good enough tacticians to know that the last thing the only two aliens on the planet should do is to split up, but that kind of strategy has been outlawed and there is no superior to come in and check in on them - they are free to be as stupid as they please.
<<<>>>
2.
Within the shadow of the ship
I watched their rich attire:
Blue, glossy green, and velvet black,
They coiled and swam; and every track
Was a flash of golden fire.
After all these years, Malcolm finally understands what Trip had to go through on a daily basis down in engineering, the captain and the bridge crew pushing the ship to her limit and the engineers left holding the smoldering pieces together.
The Hil’aka run their ships the same way the run their justice system: with impunity. A day makes all the difference in the world. It’s the difference between those Sil’ala fruits in storage rotting and a successful delivery, between a prominent businessman in Ren’al choosing the Mish’ara over any of the other thousand competitors, between fortune and bankruptcy, and bankruptcy on Hil’al is something you never want to experience. It’s a three strike system - the first is a painful red tattoo in the constantly shifting opaque blob that is a Hil’akan body, the second is the amputation of one of the stump-like protrusions that seem to function as the Hil’akan arms, and the last is the same punishment as for sedition and incitement of war, the same McKenzine and Chang faced.
It’s sink or swim, and Malcolm really hates swimming.
Luckily, he’s relegated to the role of mast-rat. The Hil’aka are ground-dwellers that never completely left the sea, it seems. In fact, he’s not sure they made it past the whole ‘primordial ooze’ phase. To them, Malcolm is a valuable asset, despite his unfamiliarity with the stars or the trade winds or the basic operations of the ship. He’s a quick learner, even with Captain Mish’a keeping him from the books as he does.
He seems to think that when he learns all of the trade, Malcolm will leave to acquire his own ship, despite the fact that he already pays Malcolm for the five Hil’aka he was able to fire and replace with a single strangely-shaped tak’ai (foreigner). Of course, Malcolm needs more pay just to get the same services as a Hil’aka - for the lab equipment to manufacture necessities like soap or sunscreen, for the expensive cloth that the Hil’aka use only for decoration or for its unique feel on the great big gelatinous sensory organ that is their slick almost-transparent skin, for the luxury food he can actually eat, instead of the thick, almost dirt-like sludge the other sailors consume. The Mil’akan food only succeeds in making Malcolm throw up for about three days straight, almost getting him fired.
But even with all those expenses, Malcolm is fast on his way to building himself a fortune, introducing the idea of the use of new materials for sails and slight adjustments to their shape that allow the Mish’ara to be the fastest ship on the whole trans-Way’al route.
For his part, Mish’a is tolerant. Malcolm is just another cog in his great entrepreneurial design. As long as Malcolm does his duties, Mish’a will make the necessary inquiries and supply stops to keep him on board, for a small handler’s fee, of course. In fact, after the initial awe of seeing Malcolm climbing up through the rigging, the other sailors haven’t given him a second thought. They let him to himself most of the time as they play word games and write poetry he doesn’t understand, or take long swims in the ship’s wake, just shadows darting in and out of the waves, flashing green or purple or yellow, depending upon their mood.
It’s only Tar’a (the first-mate, as far as Malcolm can gather, considering that direct discussion of ranks is deemed inappropriate) that asks him why he does not swim and why he stays up nights when the Hil’aka are hibernating beneath deck and stares up at the stars. It was Tar’a that stayed up, despite the utter lethargy the Hil’aka seem prone to after a full day, to take care of Malcolm when he caught a strange bug from a batch of contaminated Sil’ala fruit. Malcolm has begun to think of him as the father he never had, as he explains patiently to Malcolm the new night sky with the disturbingly dark moon, allowing him time for wonder instead of charging straight ahead to the next constellation. It is Tar’a that listens to tales of spaceships and great men past with patience and wonder. It is Tar’a that helps Malcolm sign his own name, unable to leave marks on the thin parchment of all Mil’aka documents with just his hands. And in the rare times they are in port, Tar’a takes Malcolm touring through great sprawling cities filled with crystalline pools with colorful forms in transit and through bazaars loud with shouted bartering and a thousand subtle colors that Malcolm cannot understand. And it is Tar’a the flashes the dark mauve of his displeasure whenever someone approaches him about his most interesting pet, or stares out of the seemingly abyssal-dark protrusions the Hil’aka consider eyes.
Malcolm often dreams of Enterprise, of great adventures, of Trip grinning at him playfully as they stalk their way through some alien forest or Captain Archer’s strong profile against the starry backdrop of the viewscreen or Porthos scratching at his leg on an away mission until he consents to throw a ratty old Frisbee for him. Other times he dreams of T’Pol’s marvelous bum or Hoshi Sato in that skin-tight silk dress she was forced to wear while greeting the Kjorkarinian ambassador. Those times, he wakes to sticky sheets, like he’s a teenager again. Only Tar’a asks questions when he must wash them in the ocean, and Malcolm is too embarrassed to tell even this kindly old alien.
Other times, on hot sleepless nights, he wonders about Major Hayes, and how he’s faring with these strangely militant pacifists and their flashing colors and accommodating but distant manner. He sometimes wonders if he’d be happier with human contact, if he and Hayes had stayed together like he knows they should’ve. But this strange detachment is good, he thinks. Hayes would have only been a reminder of all the mistakes they’ve made. And all they ever did was fight anyhow. The Hil’aka don’t fight. Malcolm doesn’t even realize how much he misses it. The numb sense of dislocation suits him, and he finally understands why generations of Reeds took to the alluringly dangerous but solitary sea.
<<<>>>
“Mal’colm, I know you were very sad when you first came to us, yes? But now you are so . . . brown. What does it mean?” Tar’a joins Malcolm sitting up against the main mast as he munches on a Sil’ala fruit for lunch.
Malcolm smiles. Before he managed to manufacture sunscreen, he was burnt beet-red, which signifies pain to the Hil’aka. “It means that I’ve seen a lot of sun.”
“Sun?” Tar’a flashes a slight yellow: surprise.
“The sun makes my skin change color, not my moods.”
“And here, I had thought that you were becoming much happier.” Tar’a turns a confused grey to match the clouds floating forebodingly on the horizon.
He sighs. “I am happier, Tar’a.” He still misses his job, his friends, not having to struggle so hard just make his basic needs understood. Strangely, he misses the moonlight. But he’s getting a routine now. He has the sea and enough money to survive and at least one friend. He’s beginning to think that he might survive this, after all.
“I am pleased to hear so, Mal’colm. You happiness means much to me.”
“And yours means much to me.” He finds, strangely, that the words are true. That’s all friendship is, he supposes, to care about the happiness of another. He’d just never looked at it that way before, having been taught that that friendship was an obstacle to duty, nothing more.
“If the happiness of others means much to you, how could you have . . .” Tar’a does the Hil’aka equivalent of a blush, turning slightly orange. “How could you be a . . . a killer.” The Hil’aka believe that the drive to war is a disease
“I was a soldier, Tar’a. We didn’t kill because we liked it.”
Tar’a blinks. “Then why would you do such a thing?”
“It was my job. I did it because our world is not like yours. There are people who will kill you or your kind if you don’t kill them first. It was something I did well, just as you sail well. Was it not my market-destiny to do so?”
“War is a waste of resources.” Tar’a seems angry, or perhaps disappointed, the flash of color is too quick for him to tell.
“War is sometimes necessary.” But even as he says it, he knows that Tar’a won’t understand. His world is too small and the only aliens he’s ever met have been, on a large part, friendly. You can only put down your arms if everyone agrees, not just one tiny group, or country, or planet, or galaxy, even.
“Do you miss it?”
He thinks about firefights, phase pistols unleashing concentrated lightning, his heart hammering in his chest, the rush headier than cocaine and so much better, the knowledge he could kill a man with his bare hands if he pleased. He thinks about tinkering with the phase cannons, or looking at battle plans, new and old, feeling his mind stretch to imagine the possibilities, of going down hard on the mat, the solid crunch of bone and flesh beneath his flying fist, the satisfying ache of his muscles afterwards. He thinks of explosions, a thousand colors, fire billowing outwards like Guy Fawkes Day.
But then he thinks about bodies, eyes glazed and lifeless, burned, or bloody, or misshapen. He thinks about screams, of the sound of bombs exploding too close, of watching innocents, eyes wide, caught in the crossfire. He thinks about exploding ships, of T’Pol with a gun to her head, of Trip and the captain stumbling in bloodied and bruised, of the sickening crunch that marked Hawkin’s death, of the way Rostov screamed when he went down, of Hayes, lying motionless on an operating table with so many tubes coming in and out and a bandage on his chest, holding his insides in.
“No. I don’t miss it.”
<<<>>>
One day there’s a storm. The wind’s screaming and the rain pouring so hard that he thinks that they might as well be underwater, for how wet he is. The waves tower above them and for the first time in his life, Malcolm begins to understand why people believe in God and why sailors pray.
Below him, Mish’a is shouting orders to the crew, all flashing a bright blue in fear and not bothering to conceal it. He thinks that Tar’a might be yelling for him to come down, but he’s paralyzed, legs twined around the mast, hands twisted around the ropes so tight he must be bleeding. But he can’t let go. The ocean is angry below him and God, he can’t let go. He’s more afraid than he’s ever been, no matter how many scary aliens were threatening to shoot him or beat him or kill his entire race. He can’t fall into the water. He can’t.
Then he hears the crack and the mast is going down. Despite the rush of the wind in his hair and the feeling of falling, he can’t bring himself to let go of his hold on the rigging, paralyzed in fear. He’s screaming into the fury, hitting the water with a slap and sinking with the heavy mast into the darkness.
His lungs are bursting, his limbs flailing, but he can’t find up. He can’t think. He can’t be anything other than fear. The water stings his eyes - more salty than Earth’s and he’s bleeding, but the cold of the deep dark sea is so pervasive that he can’t tell from where.
This is how he’s going to die. Ironically, this would make his aquaphobia not-at-all misplaced and if he’d joined the Royal Navy like his father wanted him to, then he wouldn’t be stuck here in the first place.
He can’t say that he’s going to die without regrets, because he has a lot of them. He regrets that their military gung-ho stupidity got Chang and McKenzine killed. He regrets Matthew Hayes, because he knows that it doesn’t matter if you’re a human or a Mil’akan, because you’ll abuse your property all the same, and penance or not, Hayes has signed his soul away. He regrets never apologizing to the man. He regrets missing the waterpolo game he promised to watch with Trip and the captain after he got back from the mission. He regrets never meeting his newborn nephew. He regrets that his father will never know how good a sailor he’s become. He regrets that he’s going to die and nobody will care, except maybe Tar’a, in his own Hil’akan way, which might not even count.
And then he sees a golden glow in the darkness, a light shining so bright that he knows it has to be what they call the ‘light at the end of the tunnel.’ There’s nothing more he can do. It’s stupid to die like this, but he has lived a life full of adventure. He’s resigned to his fate, so he swims towards the light.
Instead of judgment, or angels, or all those who crossed over before him standing there, accusing, he finds a soft body, a slick caress, water pooling and bubbling as they break the surface.
Tar’a has surprisingly warm skin, and it’s not as slimy as he thinks it should be. They’re rising through the airlock and into the hull of the ship and he’s gasping in great gulping breaths and letting Tar’a hold him up.
“I see why it is you don’t like the water.” Tar’a says, and Malcolm wishes that the Mil’aka could smile, because he knows that Tar’a’s would be radiant.
<<<>>>
3.
All in a hot and copper sky,
The bloody Sun, at noon,
Right up above the mast did stand,
No bigger than the Moon.
Matt Hayes no longer thinks about himself as Major. He no longer thinks about himself as Matt or Hayes either. He’s simply ‘Tak’ai’ now, the foreigner too afraid to fight. Blue is fear and his body is all black and blue now. They won’t let him rest until he bleeds. He forces his opponents to push him up against the thick metal posts that hold up the awning just to get some reprieve.
He never thought he’d tire of a fight. He’s been beaten beyond and inch of his life by one of the ‘information specialists’ down in Colombia. He’s had a goddamn hole put in his chest from an alien lizard. He’s been stabbed, slit, broken, and battered and still come back for more. He’s military and proud of it. Each wound is a symbol of a sacrifice made in blood for peace and justice and stability on his planet or for his planet. Each one meant something and he came back because he still had a job to do, because despite all the scars and breaks and nightmares, he still hadn’t found a mark with enough meaning to make him feel complete. So he keeps searching. But now he knows that he won’t find that here. Here the fights are pointless. And he’s immune to the adrenaline rush now. Maybe when he stops fighting he’ll go into withdrawal. If they ever let him stop . . .
He tells them that he’s too weak to fight tonight. He tells them out of reflex because they’ll never believe him. His opponents are other Hil’aka with ‘the madness.’ They are so far gone that they have signed their lives over to caretakers. They have consigned themselves to violence because if the state got a hold of them, they know they would be executed.
And Matt did the same. He too, was cursed with ‘the madness,’ consumed by war-lust, not because he ever enjoyed the sound of riffle fire, or the resounding crack of snapping someone or something’s neck. He got addicted because that’s what he’s always done and he doesn’t know how to do anything else.
Now, as he lies curled, bruised and hurting in a clean but practically empty cell, he knows that despite all the marches and the machismo, the reason he’s here is fear: he was afraid to step outside of the box. He was afraid to be someone else, just as he was afraid to defy the captain’s orders that time when he got infected by the insectoid hatchlings. He wasn’t lying when he told Reed that he just wanted to do his job all those times when Reed wanted to play politics, the game Matt’ll never understand. He just wants to do his job, even when now that job is meaningless.
“Tak’ai, today is important fight. People pay big money to see you, no?” This fights are underground but held in broad daylight. They take place in an open arena in the desert, away from the tributaries, easily policed. They’re not exactly illegal, because as long as no damages are done, people’s property is their property and Matt belongs to Raj’a.
“I can’t, Raj’a.” Really, he can’t. He can barely move. His knuckles are bruised and sore and his right pinky has been sticking out at an odd angle for so long now that he doubts it will ever heal. He can’t breath properly and the bruising on his right side doesn’t fade. He hopes he hasn’t damaged any organs, but he can tell by the pain in every breath that there are a few ribs floating around there somewhere. It hurts to talk and he can forget trying to smile. He only sleeps because of exhaustion, otherwise the aches would keep him up and sweating all night. “I’m sick. You need to let me heal.”
“You are a funny one, Tak’ai. You beg me to let you fight even though you are a puny little male who is always white. And then you turn so blue. Why are you afraid, Tak’ai? You love to fight. You know it. I know it. And most importantly the customers know it. You are so very strange. But you know you are my favorite. Come now.”
The door opens and Matt stagers out. He has no other choice. Raj’a is firm but gentle. They will push him and prod him but never so much as hit him to get him to fight. Once he’s in the arena, though, all bets are off.
He didn’t understand why ‘violence and sedition’ was so heavily punished until he got in the arena for the first time. With the Mil’aka, it truly is warlust. It’s a disease and those who have it will keep fighting and beating, bludgeoning and crushing each other with their great big bodies until the enforcers pull them apart.
Raj’a only keeps them from killing each other because he thinks having his assets die would be a waste of resources. He has a staff of doctors - the best in Mil’aka medicine. And, Matt supposes, if you are a Mil’aka with incurable violence, there is no better place to be. But to him it’s hell. One man’s paradise is another’s purgatory, or something like that.
So he walks forward, wondering if this time truly will be his last, all the while knowing that there’s nothing he can do about it. Raj’a is not a bad man. As far as food and accommodations go, he takes care of Matt’s every need. One time, when Matt got a pretty serious hit to the head and was concussed and bleeding over everything, Raj’a stayed in the cell, just holding onto him and comforting him when he cried out nonsense. He even flashed a light blue the entire time, out of fear for his charge. Sometimes, Matt thinks that if things were different, they might have even been friends.
He steps into the arena, looking up at all the featureless faces, crystal clear and brilliant in the sun, waiting in silent anticipation. Those that are teetering on the brink come here. Like pedophiles hanging out in schoolyards, they come here so that they don’t snap and do something someday. They must live their lust vicariously.
The sun is beating down on him. Today the fight must be staged in his advantage, because the awning is open and he is much more resilient to the desert than the Mil’aka, who lose water fast through their gelatinous skin.
He cannot tell from appearance, but from the way the stands are filled to the brim and the fact that the awning’s open, he judges that it must be Sir’a, the farthest gone of all the Mil’aka. Matt can tell them apart only by their fighting style, and Sir’a fights like the essence of madness, unpredictably, but with such overwhelming strength that Matt finds it hard to get a single blow in against him.
Today, Sir’a is deep dark royal purple. He’s angrier than Matt has ever seen before and ready to charge, which he does the second Matt enters the arena.
The first thrust is easily parried. Matt ducks out of the way, more agile than the thundering Mil’aka. He rolls to the side, despite the explosion of pain that causes in his chest, and manages to jam his hand firmly into the soft flesh of Sir’as back. The Mil’aka cries out in pain, flashing red just briefly, before the purple deepens even more. He throws Matt off with ease, sending him tumbling into the rough sand of the arena floor. Pain sears through his side and Matt knows that the damage he’s not thinking about just got worse.
As Sir’a leans over him, he delivers a good kick to the midsection, the sharpened tips of his boots making a nice cut into the slick skin. Sir’a howls in pain and Matt struggles to his feet, stumbling forwards to land another blow to the head. But he is too dizzy from the pain in his side and the heat to notice one of Sir’as limb-like appendages coming up to meet him, throwing him back against one of the columns. Matt hears a sickening crunch, his vision blurring white with pain. He thinks the pain is in his left arm, but he can’t really tell as it all fades to black.
<<<>>>
4.
O happy living things! no tongue
Their beauty might declare:
A spring of love gushed from my heart,
And I blessed them unaware:
Sure my kind saint took pity on me,
And I blessed them unaware.
Malcolm does not see Tar’a flash golden again for a long time. He never stops to ponder what it means, thinking only that it was a way for Tar’a to find him in the dark. They go about their daily routines, Malcolm climbing through the rigging, repairing the damned masts, the rest of the sailors cleaning up the derbies on the deck and sorting through stores for anything salvageable. They make several more runs before he sees that brilliant golden color again, and when he does, he’s momentarily stunned by how such bright luminescence could remind him of death.
But he supposes it’s appropriate, because when he finds Tar’a alone in the forward section of hull, the golden color is accompanied by a low moan, almost a keen. He has just returned from captain Mish’as cabin and seems . . . subdued somehow. Probably something to do with local politics, Malcolm’s sure.
“Tara’a, what’s wrong?” He takes a deep breath, bracing himself for this. He’s not good at this stuff. He has trouble enough with humans, let alone a different species with completely different emotional cues.
Tar’a continues to moan and the gold intensifies. “I will never find myself an acceptable mate.”
Malcolm nearly balks. He most definitely was not expecting that. He’d thought that Tar’a was far too old, and definitely far too wise to bother with such things. “I’m sure you will do just fine.”
“No, Mal’colm. You could not possibly understand. I am so hideous. No one would want me to bare their children. No man would want me. I am so deformed.”
Wait . . . no man? Huh? He always thought that Tar’a was a man. “Excuse me?”
“My color spectrum is so broad. I can’t seem to express myself. They will all think that I am hideous and inarticulate, without class.” No wonder Malcolm has an easier time understanding Tar’a. He thought it was only because they spent so much time together. “My only friend is a tak’ai who only comes in red, white, and Earth-colored.”
“Thanks for the compliment.”
“You are welcome.”
“Why are you so concerned about finding someone, Tar’a? I’m single and probably will be for . . . well, on this planet, forever.” Not that he wouldn’t mind something other than his right hand for a change.
“My mother insists. I can’t remain on this ship any longer. I must marry and only then will I have enough capital to get my own ship and my own business.”
“Oh. Well, I’m sure you’ll find someone. You’re a lovely person. You just have to wait for someone to see that.” He sounds like a bad Valentines Day card, like those novellas and self-improvement guides for giggling teens. He sounds kind of like Trip, actually. But he can’t think of anything else to say. Tar’a has just turned his entire perception of the world on its head. He thought she was an old man and she turns out to be a very young woman, anxious about finding a spouse. He supposes he can log this as just another mistake, another hopeless cross-cultural misunderstanding like the many they’ve experienced since they got here.
“Thank you, Mal’colm.”
And then to gold melts into a deep forest green, showing her contentment. Gold must mean sadness, he thinks - so much different from what he’s used to.
And then she turns, and if he’s not mistaken, there’s something different about her eyes. They’re not as dark.
“Will you do something for me, Mal’colm?”
He hesitates only briefly. She’s a friend. It doesn’t matter how wrong he was about her place in society. She’s been nothing but kind to him for as long as he’s known her. “Of course.”
“Let me hold you.”
He nods, still unsure, as she envelopes him, great gelatinous body molding to fit around him. It feels like sinking in a pool of Jell-o, only he’s not having trouble breathing. She’s warm and vibrating just slightly and colors are flashing in a rainbow around him. It’s like he’s floating and sinking and flying all the same time and he can almost feel something. It’s not pain. It’s not happiness, or contentment. It’s a new feeling altogether, neither wonderful nor mundane. The closest he can find is melancholy, but without any particular sadness.
And after how long, he does not know: seconds, minutes, hours, eons, she releases him.
“Thanks.”
<<<>>>
He doesn’t know enough to know, but he thinks that Tar’a has been avoiding him. Of course it could just be something to do with the Mil’akan politics that he always tries to ignore. The other sailors are obsessed with Tar’a all of a sudden, keeping her busy more than her actually trying to avoid him. Yet he misses her presence.
If he’s made a mistake by their last conversation, he wants to right it. She’s his only friend on this world, and after Enterprise, he’s come to depend upon having friends. But he doesn’t want to risk offending her more.
He finally resolves to ask Mish’a, rapping reflexively on the solid wooden door to his office even though the Mil’aka use low whistling noises instead.
Mish’a calls, “Come in, Tak’ai,” nevertheless. Mish’a has always been accommodating, willing to recognize that Malcolm doesn’t know their culture and patiently explaining things to him. That’s why he’s here now.
“What can I do for you? Another stop, perhaps?” He appears hopeful.
“Not this time, Mish’a. Actually, I just have a question.”
“Go ahead. Today is a hurried day and soon I would like for you to check on the Northwest sail, please.”
“Indeed. I was simply wondering about a Mil’akan behavior that just happened to me. I have never experienced it before.”
“Certainly, Tak’ai. Please describe.”
“I . . . er . . . well, this individual asked to me to hold him . . . or her. I agreed, not wanting to offend them. And they sort of . . . enveloped me, flashed lots of colors . . .”
Mish’a strands abruptly, great jiggling form looming towards him as he flashes bright with anger. “Who did this to you Mal’colm?” This is the first time Mish’a has called him by name, and it startles him that Mish’a even knows it.
He feels suddenly uncomfortable, backing away even though he knows that Mil’akan law forbids an attack. “Why?” he almost squeaks. “What does it matter?”
“You have . . . Blar’ax! How does one say this? It is not polite, but how else to make you understand?”
Malcolm is afraid now. Whatever this is, it’s serious and he knows what happens to serious on Mil’al. He backs up until he’s pressed back against the door.
“Just say it.”
“You were . . . that is how we Mil’akans initiate sexual . . . . You were raped.”
“What?!” He was not raped. Tar’a would not do that to him. He trusts Tar’a. Tar’a would never hurt him. “I refuse to believe it.”
“You were not partnered to the one who did this, yes?”
“No, but . . .” But they were friends? If that truly had been rape, then . . . what kind of friend takes advantage of a friend’s ignorance?
“You were unaware of the consequences of the act, yes?”
“Yes, but . . . but . . . if I hadn’t been, then would there be a difference?”
“I would have to dismiss you both for violating the terms of your contract. But, if you were an unwilling participant, then you can take this before the courts. The offender will be executed, but deservedly so, and you will be recompensed with a percentage of their earnings.” Mish’a began to pace. “I cannot believe that one of my own women would take advantage of such a innocent little young male such as you . . .”
“Women?”
“Yes, women. All those serving in the market are women,” which explains why the UT always translated pronouns as masculine. He idly wonders what the feminists would have to say about that. “Men are to be neither seen nor heard, only traded for. Do you know what kind of paperwork I had to fill out to get you, Tak’ai? Luckily, there were no rules on the books for off-worlders. Now, perhaps, I am wondering if I have made a grave mistake. Please, Tak’ai, tell me the name of the one who has violated you so that we might seek justice.”
Even if it was wrong, even if he’s horrified and betrayed, he cannot condemn Tar’a to the same fate as Chang and McKenzie. He can’t have another body on his head. He just can’t.
“No.”
“If you do not tell me, Tak’ai, the law states that I must dismiss the entire crew, if I know that two have violated their contracts.”
“I . . . I don’t wish to prosecute. It was consensual. I was just confused. I would have . . . I led her on. I just wasn’t sure of the full extent of the . . .”
“If you are sure, Tak’ai. I do not wish to do this, but if you continue down this line of thought, you will be dismissed as well. You do realize this.”
“Yes, I realize this, but I can’t bloody-well see her executed because I can’t keep my mouth shut, can I?”
Mish’a ripples a readish yellow, the Mil’akan equivalent of a sigh. “If this is what your kind considers honor, Tak’ai, you are a species destined for bankruptcy.” Bankruptcy, indeed. They were already thinking of eliminating the money system back on Earth. If only they should be so lucky out here. “You must give me a name.”
Malcolm lowers his eyes. “Tar’a.” It still feels like a betrayal, even if he knows the other options are far worse.
Mish’a turns so many colors all at once that it blends almost brown to Malcolm’s eyes.
“Tar’a? She would never . . .”
“I know,” Malcolm sighs. “I think it must have been a mistake.”
“I told her that next time in port we would being going to all the adequate houses, looking for a husband with a good dowry. I told her not to follow any foolish ideas about beauty and souls and other such nonsense. What was she thinking? Now I must . . .”
“Tar’a is your daughter?”
“Of course she is. Why do you think the crew indulges her so? She is so young and so foolish. I wish . . . No. It is the law and without the law there would be nothing but war and chaos and bankruptcy. No, I am afraid, Tak’ai, that I must dismiss you both.”
And that was Mil’akan ruthlessness - her own daughter. But there was nothing that Malcolm could do about it.
<<<>>>
“I’m sorry, Tar’a. I didn’t know. I wish you had asked. I wish you had told me. God, we made such a mess of things.” It’s not the first mess Malcolm has made since coming here either.
He tries to comfort her, not sure where to place his hand that’s not indecent, but he needs to touch her, needs to dim the shimmering gold that’s so bright that it’s almost blinding.
“My career is over, Mal’colm! I was as foolish as my mother says. I thought that even though you are just a tak’ai, things would work out between us and I would not have to go through the humiliation of coupling with a low bidder.”
“It’s okay, Tar’a. I still wish you had told me, but I understand.”
“Nobody will hire us now. We will go three-times bankrupt, Mal’colm.”
“Then we’ll just have to build our own ship. With you knowledge and my ability to climb the rigging, we should be able to make it work. I used to be an engineer of sorts.” He neglects to mention that all he ever built was weapons, unless Trip was in a real pinch and needed an extra pair of hands down in engineering. “I can build us the fastest ship on Mil’al. And the laws of market-forces dictate that we will find business, no matter how much of social pariahs we are.”
Tar’a turns to him and she is so bright green he almost has to close his eyes. He smiles.
PART II
Author: Gaia
Rating: light NC17
Pairings: Reed/Hayes, Archer/Tucker (implied), Hayes/Sato, Reed/OC (sort-of), Tucker/OC.
Warnings: AU (Hayes lives, no Trip/T’Pol, no finale, yippee!), FutureFic, Violence, dub-con, h/c, a small bit of inoffensive hetsex.
Wordcount: ~31,800
Spoilers: Hatchery, Harbinger, Countdown, the Communicator.
Disclaimer: Ent characters aren’t mine, but the Hil’aka are. I make money from neither. The chapter epigraphs are all from ‘Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner’ owned by Samuel T. Coleridge, not me.
A/N: I apologize for any mistakes or problems in this fic, and not for making all of the changes I probably should have. It’s been rotting (in an unreadable file format) in cyberspace for a while now. I thought I’d better post it, even if it’s not my best and could use a lot more work. Special thanks to Kylie Lee, for betaing at least part of it (and trying valiantly to improve my writing, instead of just correction errors) and taking such good care of the entslash archive, and _workinprogress for figuring out gmail’s bizarre attachment-coding foible, letting me actually post this fic. I especially want to apologize to Kylie, because though I know this would be a much better story if I made all the changes she suggested, I think I’d have to stick around a few more weeks than I’d like to if I wanted to make this perfect.
Summary: Stranded alone on a planet where war is outlawed and violence is punished by death, Reed and Hayes struggle to make a new life for themselves.
BENEATH A PAPER MOON
By Gaia
1.
The many men, so beautiful!
And they all dead did lie:
And a thousand thousand slimy things
Lived on; and so did I
Matthew Hayes stares up at the stars, remembering a world far away and nights long past. Reed is sitting behind him, smoking something that smells an awful lot like his grandfather’s nails, thick and yellowed from tobacco - Matt chooses not to comment. Reed can have whatever petty indulgences he needs to get through this.
They sit back to back because the wind coming down off the mountains at night is cold and because they don’t need to look at each other in the darkness. The night is thick and it keeps them from ever sharing too much, from seeing how deep the forlorn timber of their voices really goes. There is a moon on Hil’al, but it isn’t crafted of white moon rocks that reflect the light of a far-off sun. It’s black as the blackest obsidian - a void traveling through the sky, projecting darkness instead of light.
Matt thinks that this is what death must feel like - cut off from anything and everything, but without the comfort of absolute darkness, just enough light to know that it’s all wrong.
Rostov is dead. Chang is dead. So is Walters. And it was just two days ago that they watched McKenzie’s head hit the hard near-mahogany of the platform with a thud too dull for the violence of it. Standing there alone, buffeted on either side by the bulbous forms of the Hil’aka, Mac looked delicate for the first time since Matt recruited her out of Basic. She looked like she was drowning in those shifting, almost gelatinous bodies. Reed averted his eyes out of respect, but Matt held her gaze. He can only hope she was able to draw strength from it.
They should be dead, not their subordinates, they both know. They know it as well as they know that nobody is coming for them. They are alone with each other and a moon that doesn’t shine.
They can’t talk about it. They’re not even brave enough to try to blame each other because it’s all pointless now. Nothing they say will be able to change what happened - so many mistakes and no turning back.
There’s only going forward and Matt doesn’t know where to start. “I grew up in New Mexico. You didn’t need a telescope to see the stars there, in the desert. I used to drive out there and pretend I was Luke Skywalker in the desert of Tatooie. Sometimes I’d bring a sketchbook.”
“You could become a cartoonist. You could make pottery,” Reed offers, hollowly.
“I could take you down to the marketplace and sell you as a slave.” Matt rolls his eyes. He needs to snipe a Reed, if only so he can pretend nothing’s happened.
“You would have to fight me first.”
“Well, I wouldn’t want to risk damaging the merchandise.” Matt gives a hollow chuckle, which Reed returns like an echo. For a while, they let it float into the darkness, seeing how quickly the night swallows it up.
After the silence becomes hollow and oppressive, Matt continues. “What about you, Lieutenant? What are you going to do?”
“I used to want to be a writer, but I doubt the Hil’aka will appreciate the subtle art of historical fiction.” His voice is filled with more disdain than he knows the Hil’aka deserve. They have done the unthinkable - they have eliminated war before the advent of space travel. Their methods are draconian, but, Matt wonders, isn’t it worth it? Is it not for the end of war that he and Hayes fight? Surely they don’t fight for its continuance.
“It’ll be fantasy to them,” Matt points out.
“But that would mean becoming some dancing monkey, a curiosity for these people.”
“What’s so wrong with that?”
“What do you bloody-well mean, ‘what’s wrong with it?’ Major, need I remind you that it was only five days ago that I was holding on to you to keep you from punching that trainer and getting yourself beheaded like . . .”
“It’s one thing to pedal your unique point of view and completely another to sign away all your rights and become a zoo exhibit just so you can fight again.”
“What are you going to do then?”
Matt has no idea. What’s a soldier to do, living on this planet where commerce is more fierce than the long out-moded system of war? He sighs. “I’m afraid I don’t know, Lieu . . . Malcolm.” Ranks are outlawed along with warfare. It’s going to be a hard habit to shake, the barrier of professionalism. “What about you?”
“I was thinking of signing up on one of the trans-oceanic merchant vessels.”
“I thought space was the only thing you cared to sail.”
“When I was younger my father wanted me to join the Royal Navy, like him, and his father before him, and his father . . . you get the idea.”
“And it’s going to take being stranded on a primitive alien planet with no other marketable skills to get you to fulfill the destiny of your distinguished heritage?”
“When I said I’d rather die that follow in my father’s footsteps, I guess I was lying. I wasn’t lying about hating it, though.”
“Your first duty is to survive,” Matt tells him, fiercely.
“Not a MACO slogan, surely.”
“No, but I think it applies.”
“Indeed.”
“So, do you think you can give it up?”
Reed gives a dry chuckle, lost to the darkness. “I can do without ever feeling your boot connect with my face again.”
“That’s not what I’m asking, Malcolm, and you know it. I mean everything: the history, the lingo, the technology, the structure.”
“I’ll do what I need to. Yes, it was my life, but I like to think that I’m more than that - that if there were suddenly peace in our side of the galaxy, I’d be content with it.”
Matt hangs his head. Everything is suddenly so heavy. For once in his life, there’s no one to tell him what to do - Reed certainly won’t.
He left Earth because the Xindi were a threat, true, but if he’s being perfectly honest himself, on empty nights traveling between stars, no moon in sight and a glass or two of good ‘ole Jack Daniels to keep him company, he knows that’s not the whole story. After the signing of the Hanoi Accords, there was precious little for him to do on Earth other than readiness drills. He was restless, desperate for another Democratic Republic of Korea, for another neocolonial war in Greenland. “I don’t know if I can say the same.”
<<<>>>
They wake to the sharp bark of the Er’ala at dawn. The sky is a fierce almost neon blue, except the ugly bruise of the moon marring the peace. They part ways with a handshake and two bittersweet smiles. Reed goes down to the docks and Matt back to that trainer whose lights he almost punched out.
They’re both good enough tacticians to know that the last thing the only two aliens on the planet should do is to split up, but that kind of strategy has been outlawed and there is no superior to come in and check in on them - they are free to be as stupid as they please.
<<<>>>
2.
Within the shadow of the ship
I watched their rich attire:
Blue, glossy green, and velvet black,
They coiled and swam; and every track
Was a flash of golden fire.
After all these years, Malcolm finally understands what Trip had to go through on a daily basis down in engineering, the captain and the bridge crew pushing the ship to her limit and the engineers left holding the smoldering pieces together.
The Hil’aka run their ships the same way the run their justice system: with impunity. A day makes all the difference in the world. It’s the difference between those Sil’ala fruits in storage rotting and a successful delivery, between a prominent businessman in Ren’al choosing the Mish’ara over any of the other thousand competitors, between fortune and bankruptcy, and bankruptcy on Hil’al is something you never want to experience. It’s a three strike system - the first is a painful red tattoo in the constantly shifting opaque blob that is a Hil’akan body, the second is the amputation of one of the stump-like protrusions that seem to function as the Hil’akan arms, and the last is the same punishment as for sedition and incitement of war, the same McKenzine and Chang faced.
It’s sink or swim, and Malcolm really hates swimming.
Luckily, he’s relegated to the role of mast-rat. The Hil’aka are ground-dwellers that never completely left the sea, it seems. In fact, he’s not sure they made it past the whole ‘primordial ooze’ phase. To them, Malcolm is a valuable asset, despite his unfamiliarity with the stars or the trade winds or the basic operations of the ship. He’s a quick learner, even with Captain Mish’a keeping him from the books as he does.
He seems to think that when he learns all of the trade, Malcolm will leave to acquire his own ship, despite the fact that he already pays Malcolm for the five Hil’aka he was able to fire and replace with a single strangely-shaped tak’ai (foreigner). Of course, Malcolm needs more pay just to get the same services as a Hil’aka - for the lab equipment to manufacture necessities like soap or sunscreen, for the expensive cloth that the Hil’aka use only for decoration or for its unique feel on the great big gelatinous sensory organ that is their slick almost-transparent skin, for the luxury food he can actually eat, instead of the thick, almost dirt-like sludge the other sailors consume. The Mil’akan food only succeeds in making Malcolm throw up for about three days straight, almost getting him fired.
But even with all those expenses, Malcolm is fast on his way to building himself a fortune, introducing the idea of the use of new materials for sails and slight adjustments to their shape that allow the Mish’ara to be the fastest ship on the whole trans-Way’al route.
For his part, Mish’a is tolerant. Malcolm is just another cog in his great entrepreneurial design. As long as Malcolm does his duties, Mish’a will make the necessary inquiries and supply stops to keep him on board, for a small handler’s fee, of course. In fact, after the initial awe of seeing Malcolm climbing up through the rigging, the other sailors haven’t given him a second thought. They let him to himself most of the time as they play word games and write poetry he doesn’t understand, or take long swims in the ship’s wake, just shadows darting in and out of the waves, flashing green or purple or yellow, depending upon their mood.
It’s only Tar’a (the first-mate, as far as Malcolm can gather, considering that direct discussion of ranks is deemed inappropriate) that asks him why he does not swim and why he stays up nights when the Hil’aka are hibernating beneath deck and stares up at the stars. It was Tar’a that stayed up, despite the utter lethargy the Hil’aka seem prone to after a full day, to take care of Malcolm when he caught a strange bug from a batch of contaminated Sil’ala fruit. Malcolm has begun to think of him as the father he never had, as he explains patiently to Malcolm the new night sky with the disturbingly dark moon, allowing him time for wonder instead of charging straight ahead to the next constellation. It is Tar’a that listens to tales of spaceships and great men past with patience and wonder. It is Tar’a that helps Malcolm sign his own name, unable to leave marks on the thin parchment of all Mil’aka documents with just his hands. And in the rare times they are in port, Tar’a takes Malcolm touring through great sprawling cities filled with crystalline pools with colorful forms in transit and through bazaars loud with shouted bartering and a thousand subtle colors that Malcolm cannot understand. And it is Tar’a the flashes the dark mauve of his displeasure whenever someone approaches him about his most interesting pet, or stares out of the seemingly abyssal-dark protrusions the Hil’aka consider eyes.
Malcolm often dreams of Enterprise, of great adventures, of Trip grinning at him playfully as they stalk their way through some alien forest or Captain Archer’s strong profile against the starry backdrop of the viewscreen or Porthos scratching at his leg on an away mission until he consents to throw a ratty old Frisbee for him. Other times he dreams of T’Pol’s marvelous bum or Hoshi Sato in that skin-tight silk dress she was forced to wear while greeting the Kjorkarinian ambassador. Those times, he wakes to sticky sheets, like he’s a teenager again. Only Tar’a asks questions when he must wash them in the ocean, and Malcolm is too embarrassed to tell even this kindly old alien.
Other times, on hot sleepless nights, he wonders about Major Hayes, and how he’s faring with these strangely militant pacifists and their flashing colors and accommodating but distant manner. He sometimes wonders if he’d be happier with human contact, if he and Hayes had stayed together like he knows they should’ve. But this strange detachment is good, he thinks. Hayes would have only been a reminder of all the mistakes they’ve made. And all they ever did was fight anyhow. The Hil’aka don’t fight. Malcolm doesn’t even realize how much he misses it. The numb sense of dislocation suits him, and he finally understands why generations of Reeds took to the alluringly dangerous but solitary sea.
<<<>>>
“Mal’colm, I know you were very sad when you first came to us, yes? But now you are so . . . brown. What does it mean?” Tar’a joins Malcolm sitting up against the main mast as he munches on a Sil’ala fruit for lunch.
Malcolm smiles. Before he managed to manufacture sunscreen, he was burnt beet-red, which signifies pain to the Hil’aka. “It means that I’ve seen a lot of sun.”
“Sun?” Tar’a flashes a slight yellow: surprise.
“The sun makes my skin change color, not my moods.”
“And here, I had thought that you were becoming much happier.” Tar’a turns a confused grey to match the clouds floating forebodingly on the horizon.
He sighs. “I am happier, Tar’a.” He still misses his job, his friends, not having to struggle so hard just make his basic needs understood. Strangely, he misses the moonlight. But he’s getting a routine now. He has the sea and enough money to survive and at least one friend. He’s beginning to think that he might survive this, after all.
“I am pleased to hear so, Mal’colm. You happiness means much to me.”
“And yours means much to me.” He finds, strangely, that the words are true. That’s all friendship is, he supposes, to care about the happiness of another. He’d just never looked at it that way before, having been taught that that friendship was an obstacle to duty, nothing more.
“If the happiness of others means much to you, how could you have . . .” Tar’a does the Hil’aka equivalent of a blush, turning slightly orange. “How could you be a . . . a killer.” The Hil’aka believe that the drive to war is a disease
“I was a soldier, Tar’a. We didn’t kill because we liked it.”
Tar’a blinks. “Then why would you do such a thing?”
“It was my job. I did it because our world is not like yours. There are people who will kill you or your kind if you don’t kill them first. It was something I did well, just as you sail well. Was it not my market-destiny to do so?”
“War is a waste of resources.” Tar’a seems angry, or perhaps disappointed, the flash of color is too quick for him to tell.
“War is sometimes necessary.” But even as he says it, he knows that Tar’a won’t understand. His world is too small and the only aliens he’s ever met have been, on a large part, friendly. You can only put down your arms if everyone agrees, not just one tiny group, or country, or planet, or galaxy, even.
“Do you miss it?”
He thinks about firefights, phase pistols unleashing concentrated lightning, his heart hammering in his chest, the rush headier than cocaine and so much better, the knowledge he could kill a man with his bare hands if he pleased. He thinks about tinkering with the phase cannons, or looking at battle plans, new and old, feeling his mind stretch to imagine the possibilities, of going down hard on the mat, the solid crunch of bone and flesh beneath his flying fist, the satisfying ache of his muscles afterwards. He thinks of explosions, a thousand colors, fire billowing outwards like Guy Fawkes Day.
But then he thinks about bodies, eyes glazed and lifeless, burned, or bloody, or misshapen. He thinks about screams, of the sound of bombs exploding too close, of watching innocents, eyes wide, caught in the crossfire. He thinks about exploding ships, of T’Pol with a gun to her head, of Trip and the captain stumbling in bloodied and bruised, of the sickening crunch that marked Hawkin’s death, of the way Rostov screamed when he went down, of Hayes, lying motionless on an operating table with so many tubes coming in and out and a bandage on his chest, holding his insides in.
“No. I don’t miss it.”
<<<>>>
One day there’s a storm. The wind’s screaming and the rain pouring so hard that he thinks that they might as well be underwater, for how wet he is. The waves tower above them and for the first time in his life, Malcolm begins to understand why people believe in God and why sailors pray.
Below him, Mish’a is shouting orders to the crew, all flashing a bright blue in fear and not bothering to conceal it. He thinks that Tar’a might be yelling for him to come down, but he’s paralyzed, legs twined around the mast, hands twisted around the ropes so tight he must be bleeding. But he can’t let go. The ocean is angry below him and God, he can’t let go. He’s more afraid than he’s ever been, no matter how many scary aliens were threatening to shoot him or beat him or kill his entire race. He can’t fall into the water. He can’t.
Then he hears the crack and the mast is going down. Despite the rush of the wind in his hair and the feeling of falling, he can’t bring himself to let go of his hold on the rigging, paralyzed in fear. He’s screaming into the fury, hitting the water with a slap and sinking with the heavy mast into the darkness.
His lungs are bursting, his limbs flailing, but he can’t find up. He can’t think. He can’t be anything other than fear. The water stings his eyes - more salty than Earth’s and he’s bleeding, but the cold of the deep dark sea is so pervasive that he can’t tell from where.
This is how he’s going to die. Ironically, this would make his aquaphobia not-at-all misplaced and if he’d joined the Royal Navy like his father wanted him to, then he wouldn’t be stuck here in the first place.
He can’t say that he’s going to die without regrets, because he has a lot of them. He regrets that their military gung-ho stupidity got Chang and McKenzine killed. He regrets Matthew Hayes, because he knows that it doesn’t matter if you’re a human or a Mil’akan, because you’ll abuse your property all the same, and penance or not, Hayes has signed his soul away. He regrets never apologizing to the man. He regrets missing the waterpolo game he promised to watch with Trip and the captain after he got back from the mission. He regrets never meeting his newborn nephew. He regrets that his father will never know how good a sailor he’s become. He regrets that he’s going to die and nobody will care, except maybe Tar’a, in his own Hil’akan way, which might not even count.
And then he sees a golden glow in the darkness, a light shining so bright that he knows it has to be what they call the ‘light at the end of the tunnel.’ There’s nothing more he can do. It’s stupid to die like this, but he has lived a life full of adventure. He’s resigned to his fate, so he swims towards the light.
Instead of judgment, or angels, or all those who crossed over before him standing there, accusing, he finds a soft body, a slick caress, water pooling and bubbling as they break the surface.
Tar’a has surprisingly warm skin, and it’s not as slimy as he thinks it should be. They’re rising through the airlock and into the hull of the ship and he’s gasping in great gulping breaths and letting Tar’a hold him up.
“I see why it is you don’t like the water.” Tar’a says, and Malcolm wishes that the Mil’aka could smile, because he knows that Tar’a’s would be radiant.
<<<>>>
3.
All in a hot and copper sky,
The bloody Sun, at noon,
Right up above the mast did stand,
No bigger than the Moon.
Matt Hayes no longer thinks about himself as Major. He no longer thinks about himself as Matt or Hayes either. He’s simply ‘Tak’ai’ now, the foreigner too afraid to fight. Blue is fear and his body is all black and blue now. They won’t let him rest until he bleeds. He forces his opponents to push him up against the thick metal posts that hold up the awning just to get some reprieve.
He never thought he’d tire of a fight. He’s been beaten beyond and inch of his life by one of the ‘information specialists’ down in Colombia. He’s had a goddamn hole put in his chest from an alien lizard. He’s been stabbed, slit, broken, and battered and still come back for more. He’s military and proud of it. Each wound is a symbol of a sacrifice made in blood for peace and justice and stability on his planet or for his planet. Each one meant something and he came back because he still had a job to do, because despite all the scars and breaks and nightmares, he still hadn’t found a mark with enough meaning to make him feel complete. So he keeps searching. But now he knows that he won’t find that here. Here the fights are pointless. And he’s immune to the adrenaline rush now. Maybe when he stops fighting he’ll go into withdrawal. If they ever let him stop . . .
He tells them that he’s too weak to fight tonight. He tells them out of reflex because they’ll never believe him. His opponents are other Hil’aka with ‘the madness.’ They are so far gone that they have signed their lives over to caretakers. They have consigned themselves to violence because if the state got a hold of them, they know they would be executed.
And Matt did the same. He too, was cursed with ‘the madness,’ consumed by war-lust, not because he ever enjoyed the sound of riffle fire, or the resounding crack of snapping someone or something’s neck. He got addicted because that’s what he’s always done and he doesn’t know how to do anything else.
Now, as he lies curled, bruised and hurting in a clean but practically empty cell, he knows that despite all the marches and the machismo, the reason he’s here is fear: he was afraid to step outside of the box. He was afraid to be someone else, just as he was afraid to defy the captain’s orders that time when he got infected by the insectoid hatchlings. He wasn’t lying when he told Reed that he just wanted to do his job all those times when Reed wanted to play politics, the game Matt’ll never understand. He just wants to do his job, even when now that job is meaningless.
“Tak’ai, today is important fight. People pay big money to see you, no?” This fights are underground but held in broad daylight. They take place in an open arena in the desert, away from the tributaries, easily policed. They’re not exactly illegal, because as long as no damages are done, people’s property is their property and Matt belongs to Raj’a.
“I can’t, Raj’a.” Really, he can’t. He can barely move. His knuckles are bruised and sore and his right pinky has been sticking out at an odd angle for so long now that he doubts it will ever heal. He can’t breath properly and the bruising on his right side doesn’t fade. He hopes he hasn’t damaged any organs, but he can tell by the pain in every breath that there are a few ribs floating around there somewhere. It hurts to talk and he can forget trying to smile. He only sleeps because of exhaustion, otherwise the aches would keep him up and sweating all night. “I’m sick. You need to let me heal.”
“You are a funny one, Tak’ai. You beg me to let you fight even though you are a puny little male who is always white. And then you turn so blue. Why are you afraid, Tak’ai? You love to fight. You know it. I know it. And most importantly the customers know it. You are so very strange. But you know you are my favorite. Come now.”
The door opens and Matt stagers out. He has no other choice. Raj’a is firm but gentle. They will push him and prod him but never so much as hit him to get him to fight. Once he’s in the arena, though, all bets are off.
He didn’t understand why ‘violence and sedition’ was so heavily punished until he got in the arena for the first time. With the Mil’aka, it truly is warlust. It’s a disease and those who have it will keep fighting and beating, bludgeoning and crushing each other with their great big bodies until the enforcers pull them apart.
Raj’a only keeps them from killing each other because he thinks having his assets die would be a waste of resources. He has a staff of doctors - the best in Mil’aka medicine. And, Matt supposes, if you are a Mil’aka with incurable violence, there is no better place to be. But to him it’s hell. One man’s paradise is another’s purgatory, or something like that.
So he walks forward, wondering if this time truly will be his last, all the while knowing that there’s nothing he can do about it. Raj’a is not a bad man. As far as food and accommodations go, he takes care of Matt’s every need. One time, when Matt got a pretty serious hit to the head and was concussed and bleeding over everything, Raj’a stayed in the cell, just holding onto him and comforting him when he cried out nonsense. He even flashed a light blue the entire time, out of fear for his charge. Sometimes, Matt thinks that if things were different, they might have even been friends.
He steps into the arena, looking up at all the featureless faces, crystal clear and brilliant in the sun, waiting in silent anticipation. Those that are teetering on the brink come here. Like pedophiles hanging out in schoolyards, they come here so that they don’t snap and do something someday. They must live their lust vicariously.
The sun is beating down on him. Today the fight must be staged in his advantage, because the awning is open and he is much more resilient to the desert than the Mil’aka, who lose water fast through their gelatinous skin.
He cannot tell from appearance, but from the way the stands are filled to the brim and the fact that the awning’s open, he judges that it must be Sir’a, the farthest gone of all the Mil’aka. Matt can tell them apart only by their fighting style, and Sir’a fights like the essence of madness, unpredictably, but with such overwhelming strength that Matt finds it hard to get a single blow in against him.
Today, Sir’a is deep dark royal purple. He’s angrier than Matt has ever seen before and ready to charge, which he does the second Matt enters the arena.
The first thrust is easily parried. Matt ducks out of the way, more agile than the thundering Mil’aka. He rolls to the side, despite the explosion of pain that causes in his chest, and manages to jam his hand firmly into the soft flesh of Sir’as back. The Mil’aka cries out in pain, flashing red just briefly, before the purple deepens even more. He throws Matt off with ease, sending him tumbling into the rough sand of the arena floor. Pain sears through his side and Matt knows that the damage he’s not thinking about just got worse.
As Sir’a leans over him, he delivers a good kick to the midsection, the sharpened tips of his boots making a nice cut into the slick skin. Sir’a howls in pain and Matt struggles to his feet, stumbling forwards to land another blow to the head. But he is too dizzy from the pain in his side and the heat to notice one of Sir’as limb-like appendages coming up to meet him, throwing him back against one of the columns. Matt hears a sickening crunch, his vision blurring white with pain. He thinks the pain is in his left arm, but he can’t really tell as it all fades to black.
<<<>>>
4.
O happy living things! no tongue
Their beauty might declare:
A spring of love gushed from my heart,
And I blessed them unaware:
Sure my kind saint took pity on me,
And I blessed them unaware.
Malcolm does not see Tar’a flash golden again for a long time. He never stops to ponder what it means, thinking only that it was a way for Tar’a to find him in the dark. They go about their daily routines, Malcolm climbing through the rigging, repairing the damned masts, the rest of the sailors cleaning up the derbies on the deck and sorting through stores for anything salvageable. They make several more runs before he sees that brilliant golden color again, and when he does, he’s momentarily stunned by how such bright luminescence could remind him of death.
But he supposes it’s appropriate, because when he finds Tar’a alone in the forward section of hull, the golden color is accompanied by a low moan, almost a keen. He has just returned from captain Mish’as cabin and seems . . . subdued somehow. Probably something to do with local politics, Malcolm’s sure.
“Tara’a, what’s wrong?” He takes a deep breath, bracing himself for this. He’s not good at this stuff. He has trouble enough with humans, let alone a different species with completely different emotional cues.
Tar’a continues to moan and the gold intensifies. “I will never find myself an acceptable mate.”
Malcolm nearly balks. He most definitely was not expecting that. He’d thought that Tar’a was far too old, and definitely far too wise to bother with such things. “I’m sure you will do just fine.”
“No, Mal’colm. You could not possibly understand. I am so hideous. No one would want me to bare their children. No man would want me. I am so deformed.”
Wait . . . no man? Huh? He always thought that Tar’a was a man. “Excuse me?”
“My color spectrum is so broad. I can’t seem to express myself. They will all think that I am hideous and inarticulate, without class.” No wonder Malcolm has an easier time understanding Tar’a. He thought it was only because they spent so much time together. “My only friend is a tak’ai who only comes in red, white, and Earth-colored.”
“Thanks for the compliment.”
“You are welcome.”
“Why are you so concerned about finding someone, Tar’a? I’m single and probably will be for . . . well, on this planet, forever.” Not that he wouldn’t mind something other than his right hand for a change.
“My mother insists. I can’t remain on this ship any longer. I must marry and only then will I have enough capital to get my own ship and my own business.”
“Oh. Well, I’m sure you’ll find someone. You’re a lovely person. You just have to wait for someone to see that.” He sounds like a bad Valentines Day card, like those novellas and self-improvement guides for giggling teens. He sounds kind of like Trip, actually. But he can’t think of anything else to say. Tar’a has just turned his entire perception of the world on its head. He thought she was an old man and she turns out to be a very young woman, anxious about finding a spouse. He supposes he can log this as just another mistake, another hopeless cross-cultural misunderstanding like the many they’ve experienced since they got here.
“Thank you, Mal’colm.”
And then to gold melts into a deep forest green, showing her contentment. Gold must mean sadness, he thinks - so much different from what he’s used to.
And then she turns, and if he’s not mistaken, there’s something different about her eyes. They’re not as dark.
“Will you do something for me, Mal’colm?”
He hesitates only briefly. She’s a friend. It doesn’t matter how wrong he was about her place in society. She’s been nothing but kind to him for as long as he’s known her. “Of course.”
“Let me hold you.”
He nods, still unsure, as she envelopes him, great gelatinous body molding to fit around him. It feels like sinking in a pool of Jell-o, only he’s not having trouble breathing. She’s warm and vibrating just slightly and colors are flashing in a rainbow around him. It’s like he’s floating and sinking and flying all the same time and he can almost feel something. It’s not pain. It’s not happiness, or contentment. It’s a new feeling altogether, neither wonderful nor mundane. The closest he can find is melancholy, but without any particular sadness.
And after how long, he does not know: seconds, minutes, hours, eons, she releases him.
“Thanks.”
<<<>>>
He doesn’t know enough to know, but he thinks that Tar’a has been avoiding him. Of course it could just be something to do with the Mil’akan politics that he always tries to ignore. The other sailors are obsessed with Tar’a all of a sudden, keeping her busy more than her actually trying to avoid him. Yet he misses her presence.
If he’s made a mistake by their last conversation, he wants to right it. She’s his only friend on this world, and after Enterprise, he’s come to depend upon having friends. But he doesn’t want to risk offending her more.
He finally resolves to ask Mish’a, rapping reflexively on the solid wooden door to his office even though the Mil’aka use low whistling noises instead.
Mish’a calls, “Come in, Tak’ai,” nevertheless. Mish’a has always been accommodating, willing to recognize that Malcolm doesn’t know their culture and patiently explaining things to him. That’s why he’s here now.
“What can I do for you? Another stop, perhaps?” He appears hopeful.
“Not this time, Mish’a. Actually, I just have a question.”
“Go ahead. Today is a hurried day and soon I would like for you to check on the Northwest sail, please.”
“Indeed. I was simply wondering about a Mil’akan behavior that just happened to me. I have never experienced it before.”
“Certainly, Tak’ai. Please describe.”
“I . . . er . . . well, this individual asked to me to hold him . . . or her. I agreed, not wanting to offend them. And they sort of . . . enveloped me, flashed lots of colors . . .”
Mish’a strands abruptly, great jiggling form looming towards him as he flashes bright with anger. “Who did this to you Mal’colm?” This is the first time Mish’a has called him by name, and it startles him that Mish’a even knows it.
He feels suddenly uncomfortable, backing away even though he knows that Mil’akan law forbids an attack. “Why?” he almost squeaks. “What does it matter?”
“You have . . . Blar’ax! How does one say this? It is not polite, but how else to make you understand?”
Malcolm is afraid now. Whatever this is, it’s serious and he knows what happens to serious on Mil’al. He backs up until he’s pressed back against the door.
“Just say it.”
“You were . . . that is how we Mil’akans initiate sexual . . . . You were raped.”
“What?!” He was not raped. Tar’a would not do that to him. He trusts Tar’a. Tar’a would never hurt him. “I refuse to believe it.”
“You were not partnered to the one who did this, yes?”
“No, but . . .” But they were friends? If that truly had been rape, then . . . what kind of friend takes advantage of a friend’s ignorance?
“You were unaware of the consequences of the act, yes?”
“Yes, but . . . but . . . if I hadn’t been, then would there be a difference?”
“I would have to dismiss you both for violating the terms of your contract. But, if you were an unwilling participant, then you can take this before the courts. The offender will be executed, but deservedly so, and you will be recompensed with a percentage of their earnings.” Mish’a began to pace. “I cannot believe that one of my own women would take advantage of such a innocent little young male such as you . . .”
“Women?”
“Yes, women. All those serving in the market are women,” which explains why the UT always translated pronouns as masculine. He idly wonders what the feminists would have to say about that. “Men are to be neither seen nor heard, only traded for. Do you know what kind of paperwork I had to fill out to get you, Tak’ai? Luckily, there were no rules on the books for off-worlders. Now, perhaps, I am wondering if I have made a grave mistake. Please, Tak’ai, tell me the name of the one who has violated you so that we might seek justice.”
Even if it was wrong, even if he’s horrified and betrayed, he cannot condemn Tar’a to the same fate as Chang and McKenzie. He can’t have another body on his head. He just can’t.
“No.”
“If you do not tell me, Tak’ai, the law states that I must dismiss the entire crew, if I know that two have violated their contracts.”
“I . . . I don’t wish to prosecute. It was consensual. I was just confused. I would have . . . I led her on. I just wasn’t sure of the full extent of the . . .”
“If you are sure, Tak’ai. I do not wish to do this, but if you continue down this line of thought, you will be dismissed as well. You do realize this.”
“Yes, I realize this, but I can’t bloody-well see her executed because I can’t keep my mouth shut, can I?”
Mish’a ripples a readish yellow, the Mil’akan equivalent of a sigh. “If this is what your kind considers honor, Tak’ai, you are a species destined for bankruptcy.” Bankruptcy, indeed. They were already thinking of eliminating the money system back on Earth. If only they should be so lucky out here. “You must give me a name.”
Malcolm lowers his eyes. “Tar’a.” It still feels like a betrayal, even if he knows the other options are far worse.
Mish’a turns so many colors all at once that it blends almost brown to Malcolm’s eyes.
“Tar’a? She would never . . .”
“I know,” Malcolm sighs. “I think it must have been a mistake.”
“I told her that next time in port we would being going to all the adequate houses, looking for a husband with a good dowry. I told her not to follow any foolish ideas about beauty and souls and other such nonsense. What was she thinking? Now I must . . .”
“Tar’a is your daughter?”
“Of course she is. Why do you think the crew indulges her so? She is so young and so foolish. I wish . . . No. It is the law and without the law there would be nothing but war and chaos and bankruptcy. No, I am afraid, Tak’ai, that I must dismiss you both.”
And that was Mil’akan ruthlessness - her own daughter. But there was nothing that Malcolm could do about it.
<<<>>>
“I’m sorry, Tar’a. I didn’t know. I wish you had asked. I wish you had told me. God, we made such a mess of things.” It’s not the first mess Malcolm has made since coming here either.
He tries to comfort her, not sure where to place his hand that’s not indecent, but he needs to touch her, needs to dim the shimmering gold that’s so bright that it’s almost blinding.
“My career is over, Mal’colm! I was as foolish as my mother says. I thought that even though you are just a tak’ai, things would work out between us and I would not have to go through the humiliation of coupling with a low bidder.”
“It’s okay, Tar’a. I still wish you had told me, but I understand.”
“Nobody will hire us now. We will go three-times bankrupt, Mal’colm.”
“Then we’ll just have to build our own ship. With you knowledge and my ability to climb the rigging, we should be able to make it work. I used to be an engineer of sorts.” He neglects to mention that all he ever built was weapons, unless Trip was in a real pinch and needed an extra pair of hands down in engineering. “I can build us the fastest ship on Mil’al. And the laws of market-forces dictate that we will find business, no matter how much of social pariahs we are.”
Tar’a turns to him and she is so bright green he almost has to close his eyes. He smiles.
PART II