#ltnsingh ; asks

[ltnsingh]

@owedfavors asked: “stop changing the subject.”

" It's not important, " La'an returned, the glance she offered in retort almost one of negligible pleading. It was almost second nature, to dance around the details: to put up a fence instead of committing to some unknowable stripe of vulnerability — to taking chances. But it would have been fruitless to deny that she'd been toeing a line, purposely deferring to the subject of anything else.

Even if she did, Una had seen her in her worst moments, on her darkest days. She'd seen her at her most afraid. That she didn't know, intrinsically, when she'd turned to deflecting or downplaying out of a need for self - preservation was practically inconceivable.

The spectre of her ancestor, a little boy whose shivering fingers had been stained with crayon smudges rather than blood — who she'd defended for the sake of space and time, knowing the goriest, most frangible particulars of his eventual crimes, and who he'd be in every indeterminable timeline. How many lives would be lost because of him. How, despite herself, La'an had felt a grain of sympathy for the lost and lonely child in him — changed absolutely nothing.

" It's... a bit of a delicate subject, " she yielded, simply. The graveness of what still went unsaid, however, cast a comfortless glint in her eye. " In the temporal sense. "

[highaver]

@ltnsingh asked: ∗ 22﹕ sender finds receiver injured / bloodied .

The brief swell of fear in his chest abated the moment he realised it was La'an who had just stepped into his view. Balfour lowered his phaser, quite unable to stop himself from sighing with relief at the sight of her. He didn't make for much of a good sight himself - roughed up and bruised, he'd certainly seen better days. For once, whether he still had a pretty face was the least of his concerns. In all the chaos, his leg had been caught under some heavy debris that he wasn't strong enough to move by himself.

"Oh, I've never been happier to see you." He shifted wrong, twisting his knee in such a way that the pain stole the air from his lungs for a moment. Balled fists pushed against the large bit of metal that was currently pinning down his leg. "It's crushing my knee, help me get this off."

[nursc]

@ltnsingh asked: “ This IV itches. When am I getting it out? ”

when am i getting out? do you know what you are doing? i’m fine, let me go. if they didn’t leave in a post-scarcity society, there is no doubt in her mind she could have become a billionaire by now by making patients drop a dollar each time they said one of these forbidden phrases.

she could have retired long ago. moved to a far-flung planet with overwhelming flora where no one tried to rip their iv’s off before their treatment was halfway over. now, she didn’t blame la’an’s restlessness — the old-fashioned medicine was not the most comfortable, but it was the most effective when treating this particular infection.

❛⠀⠀⠀when the iv runs out... ⠀ ⠀ ❜ ⠀ ⠀ a pause for dramatic effect. gentle blue eyes narrow, a tired glint reflected in them,⠀ ⠀❛⠀⠀⠀i'll consider your situation. ⠀ ⠀ ❜

hurt/comfort prompts.

[cptnpike]

@ltnsingh asked: It's my job to know.

for an instant, it is not la'an who stands in front of him.

another figure appears. she stands in the same position on the threshold of his ready room, a padd with information that he was hoping wouldn't leak so quickly clenched in her hand, as she waited for him to confess to his latest foolhardy plan. even the indignant tone directed at him has the same cadence.

it is not an unfamiliar sight. in fact, it used to be a regular occurrence. on the off chance she isn’t one step ahead of him, number one is adept at twisting his plan into something infinitely more sensible.

except, the figure in front of him is not number one. well, more accurately, not the same number one. she does not hold his secrets or know where he stashed an illegal shipment of chili pepper in his ready room. she is a familiar, welcome sight in all other situations, but in this short instant, when her image and his memory merge in front of his eyes, his first officer feels like an intruder.

❛⠀⠀⠀i’m just mulling it over,⠀ ⠀ ❜⠀ ⠀ he says, motioning for her to sit in one of the chairs with a tired wave, ⠀ ⠀❛⠀⠀⠀i kept you out of the loop so you’d have fresh eyes at the briefing. catch something we missed.⠀ ⠀ ❜⠀ ⠀

the west wing, dead irish writers,sentence starter meme.

[owedfavors]

⤷ ✧ @ltnsingh said, ❝ about time someone hit him. i'm sorry it wasn't me. ❞

her lips don't curl in a smile, but neither do they press into a frown. for a moment, the only indication una gives of having heard the story is the faint lift of an eyebrow. it's a silent challenge: are you sure that's how you want to feel about it? aloud, una merely warns, ❛ should anyone ask me if I knew about this incident, my answer will be no. ❜ pretending a conversation never occurred, after all, is easier than sorting through starfleet code to determine if she is, in fact, responsible for reporting the incident — and then, if she is, determinedly ignoring it.

❛ you know, there are other options for setting him straight. ❜ more interesting options. from anyone else, the words might suggest the pursuit of appropriate, official channels. una has something far different in mind.

[mirrcr]

@ltnsingh asked: ‘ you can’t get rid of me that easy. ’ / pike c:

eyebrow pinches just slightly upward, a wisp of humor curling his lips as his first officer stalked forward, blocking his path. honestly, he thought he’d gotten the best of her this time. his utter failure goes to prove an old instructor right once again: christopher pike, you have no talent for deception. you are clever as the devil, but you’ve got none of his cunning.

❛⠀⠀i’d never dream of it, commander, ⠀ ❜ ⠀ he says, half-teasing, half-serious, equal times impressed and annoyed with her for seeing right through his attempt of circumventing the rules to sneak out of his own ship. ⠀ ❛⠀⠀i was just... stretching my legs. ⠀ ❜

[nursc]

@ltnsingh

❛⠀⠀⠀now, now, mr. kirk isn't even here to defend himself. don't you find that a little unfair? ⠀ ⠀ ❜ ⠀ ⠀ she replies easily, lips curving into an indulgent smile as she clears a spot on the table for her to perch on, toe skimming back and forth on the carpet as she glances sideways at la'an, not exactly rushing to accuse her of anything, but not masking her worry.

the ever perfect, ever put together chief of security seemed ruffled.

❛⠀⠀⠀and i didn't ask if you were fine. the lady doth protest too much. ⠀ ⠀ ❜

@nursc asked: the garbage and the smell of sadness really pull the whole thing together . (To la’an!)

" I'm fine, " came La'an's immediate deflection; a knee - jerk one, held steady and easy through years of fine - tuning, though she was almost sure the opposite was quite apparent from the disarray that'd befallen the briefing room — and the deep, traitorous furrow creasing into her brow. " And I am not the one behind this mess. " While the scattering of crumbs and unsealed packs of abandoned, matter - synthesized popcorn certainly reeked of self - neglect, her own troubles, undiscussed and mulled over for weeks, had been better left locked up behind closed doors.

" Actually, I think there's only one person on board this ship that we can rely on to routinely be this sloppy. "

[ltnsingh]

@stcrdate asked: are you actually suggesting they're from the future? from lorca

" I am, " la'an yielded, with no absence of quiet authority. no lack of uncomfortable certainty to back her seemingly arbitrary claim.

if her service to starfleet had taught her anything, it was that what she might have considered impossible wasn't always, regardless of her initial reluctance to believe. that, with evidence, the improbable wasn't necessarily impracticable, but instead an extraordinary thing that had yet to be witnessed, or else expertly pioneered. something implausible, until proven otherwise, the way first contact between disparate species had once been, the way warp technology had once been.

the way her own escape from the gorn's sacrificial raft had been.

" we've scanned the most base components of their weapons, their ship. these alloys don't exist in our time, sir. "

[ltnsingh]

@stcrdate asked: just keep breathing, you'll be fine. - from ortegas

" I'm breathing, lieutenant, " came la'an's nearly instantaneous retort, a quick, ragged dismissal of her friend's gentle prompting.

that, on its own, was consummately true: that, despite the smell of death that'd followed them back to the enterprise on their armor, on their skin — the undeniable stench of rusting gorn steel, of spilled and curdling blood — there was still a tangible inflow of oxygen. that her twisted perception of it, thinning with every inhalation, had simply been distorted by a cold, spectral shiver of displaced incapacity, and of countless old traumas; slivers of feelings and fractured memories, enmeshed with the new, that she'd squashed down with reason, with the weight of her phaser still in her holster — with the acknowledgement that this time she hadn't succumbed to the same terror, malnutrition, the innate acceptance of death that'd burrowed into her bones as a child.

just like then, she'd come away still breathing. still miraculously alive, while so much of the cayuga's crew hadn't had the luxury.

" I just need a moment. that's all. "

[ltnsingh]

@nursc asked: it's a big stupid jellyfish.

" Bit of an oversimplification, but — I suppose. " Christine wasn't completely wrong, given the basis of her observation; still, there was more to it than that. More nuance. More risk attached. " Except the neurotoxins it releases would literally be enough to put a whole klingon squadron to sleep for a month. "

[ltnsingh]

@prcspcr asked: sit down for a second and talk to me.

" I'm fine, lieutenant, " came La'an's almost immediate rebuke; a cool dismissal of Spock's offer, not quite rising to a snap or verbal lash, but not entirely without its brusque undertone.

Now wasn't the moment for peeling back layers of her still raw self for the sake of what vessel - hopping Dr Sanchez had called growth. Far from it. Seizing such moments of vulnerability only seemed possible in the abstract, in the preserved pages of centuries - old psychiatric texts, in the warmth of Dr M'Benga's enquiring eyes. The reality of opening up, even a fraction, was much more arduous. Much more terrifying.

" I didn't ask for mandatory Starfleet recovery assistance sessions from an on call shrink to talk about my feelings, and I don't need my crew to take his place, either. "

[ltnsingh]

@highaver asked: you're working too hard.

" I don't get what's so wrong with actually enjoying work, " La'an countered, without pretense: just a steady, unvarnished matter - of - factness. That was a sentiment that couldn't be disputed — a fact that, even when paired with the atypical quiet that would inevitably ( and soon ) sweep the ship for what might amount to a long weekend on Earth, could never be deemed anything less than true. Not when there were duty rosters to organise and crew evaluations to appraise, with no distractions. Just the Enterprise's ever - dependable and sturdy structure; Just the reassuring, timeless hum of her warp core. A little overtime, in the meantime, never hurt anyone. Not in the way other people did.

" I guess I just don't see the point of going off on shore leave. Everything I need is literally on the Enterprise. "

[ltnsingh]

@nursc asked: gag.  for your muse to place their hand over my muse’s mouth, to try to keep them quiet. ( for the undercover plot ?? )

If anything was a testament to her crewmate's brilliance, it was the split second's delay between the glimpse La'an had caught of herself in passing in a pane of Valakian glass and the recognition of herself beneath the sharp protrusion of browbones and cheek ridges: Fine details that, despite her hesitation to undergo any transformation, made all the difference between standing out, the picture of a starfleet officer trailing an anomaly through an otherwise peaceful alien populace, and seamlessly blending in.

Still, Christine's genius couldn't help that the physical alterations that had allowed their surreptitious passage were only temporary. Neither could it slow the progression of the feeling of fire consuming every nerve ending in the left side of her face, or the unwelcome sensation of the sinew underneath being exposed to the not entirely unfamiliar composition of the m - class planet's air — like a crudely forged Klingon bone saw had begun the task of neatly cutting into her cheekbone.

It was only when Christine ushered her to where they might go unseen ( where they might go unobserved in return ), her hand so briefly splayed over her mouth to silence her surprise, that La'an relented an admittedly pained huff of a sound.

" Disguise is starting to wear off, " she breathed, once she could, unhampered. " But I'm telling you — I don't need an anaesthetic. I just need you to buy us more time. "

[ltnsingh]

@cptnbatel asked: you don't need to.

" I do, " La'an pressed, regardless.

In the wake of the Cayuga's decimation by the Gorn, a single unit comprised of their hunters, hell - bent on wiping out an entire populace to brutally further their own, the number of survivors — whether they'd avoided being slain by the untamed younglings themselves or the remnants of the ship they'd once served on burning up on entry into Parnassus Beta — had sunk, heart - achingly, into the single digits.

Where those left behind enumerated few, those lost, gone before they'd even reckoned with the shock of invasion and mass slaughter, still made themselves known in the vast, deathly - silent spaces left behind. Spaces that, soon, would be filled with green crew, transferred in from other ships, distant starbases: places untouched by the phantasmal, dried, years - old blood La'an could still sometimes make out under her own fingernails, or the smell of it, fresh and spilled in nauseating abundance, on too - newly set concrete.

" I have... experience with surviving the Gorn, " she offered, like the shrill of their snarls didn't run her blood cold, or simultaneously flint a deep - seated spark of contempt in her. In all technicality, that rang true on more than three discordant occasions. But the very first, when she'd still been young, helpless to save her family or herself, helpless to do much more than accept her impending demise in the name of her capturer's archaic ritual beliefs — that had been a living hell that almost nothing, for a time, could have expunged from her, mark of Cain and all. " I want to be where I can help. "

[ltnsingh]

@fasciinating asked: ❛ do you remember anything? at all? ❜

What she remembered was nothing short of gauzy: Indistinct and scattered around the edges, save for the distinction of light and darkness, like the details of what she'd borne witness to — the crew of the plundered Federation ship they'd gotten to too late; a not insignificant portion of them, slain in droves while the barely healed scar carved into her by the gorn, decades prior, pried itself open, an inch at a time — had been observed through a pane of blood spattered, mottled shatterproof acrylic or a rolling film of smoke.

In the disarray of memory that'd yet to completely come back to her, she recalled the intermittent strobe of light, the chaos echoing through the science vessel's desolate halls, the dark closing in. The terrifying futility of phaser fire and frenzied footfalls. And then, until she'd slowly gained consciousness, predominantly unharmed save for a smattering of miraculously superficial wounds... nothing.

Nothing.

No matter how outwardly unruffled Spock came off as, there was no reconstituting the chunk of time she'd lost ( or the things better left pushed into the recesses of her unexplored subconscious, for the time being ) into something not worth her building presentiment.

" I remember the terror those people felt when they realised that they had nowhere to hide, " she supplied, simply as she could without unravelling more than she dared. " And... I remember blood. A lot of it. "

[ltnsingh]

@nursc @cptnpike asked: alright, well. bad news travels fast. ( from @cptnpike I’m too lazy to switch blogs ❤️)

" I'm afraid that's not the only thing that's travelling quickly, captain, " La'an offered, nothing about her observation lacking in uncertainty, in uneasiness: a sentiment shared, she was sure, by Dr M'Benga and his team.

If word had spread throughout the ship the way gossip did, without nuance or control, like an unhampered deuterium fire, the unforeseen uptick of admissions to sick bay — nausea, fever, nosebleeds, all seemingly spontaneous and rapidly sweeping through the crew quarters, regardless of deck — almost had it beat. No matter where it had started, what constituted its place of origin, controlling its advancement had swiftly become her top priority; a task complicated by the fine sheen of cold sweat beginning to make itself known at her temple.

Adjusting the her position of her hands, folded together behind her back, La'an made to subtly clear her throat of its gravel.

" Sick bay is at sixty percent capacity and rising, and we haven't yet pinpointed the source of the contagion. "