The Cold Wind II: Taniwha (Ch 03 - 05)
#2 of The Cold Wind II: Taniwha
Chapter Three
When they were alone, Antonio smiled at Vasya and gestured around the cramped module. "Well, I'm all yours, man. Wanna give me the two-dollar tour?" He was a little surprised when the cosmonaut hesitated and almost appeared a little flustered. "Is there a problem?"
"Nyet problem. Do not concern yourself. You hungry after trip, da?" Quickly changing the subject, Vasya turned and pushed off to another hatch placed midway along the length of the command module, stopping briefly to make sure the marine was still following close behind him.
The comment 'I'm all yours' had sent all sorts of mental images flooding through his mind, most of them extremely x-rated.
After clambering through the hatch into the supply module, he pushed over to a storage locker and pulled out a couple of foil-wrapped plastic trays. Clinging to a handrail for support, he slid them into the compact MHU (Meal-Heating-Unit) and activated the heating sequence.
"I'm jealous, Vasya. You make moving around in zero-g look so damned easy. Hey, what did your Commander call you? Prapperchick or something?"
"Praporshchick - rank in Russian Army. Similar to your rank, maybe. Moving weightless not difficult," Vasya shrugged expressively, "will come with practice. Tell me, Antonio, you drink, da?"
"Uh, sure, but not while I'm on duty. If the Commander -"
"It is tradition. You not mess with Russian tradition, nyet?" Vasya interrupted him with a grumble and swiveled to face him with a frown creasing his normally jovial features.
Laughing, the marine shook his head. "When you put it like that, no. I guess not."
"Excellent! Here. Take these, follow."
Beaming a smile at him, Vasya retrieved a couple of small plastic sipper-bottles from a small locker and floated them over to Antonio before pulling the food-trays out of the MHU, cursing in Russian when steam from one leaked out and scalded his fingers. He pulled himself over to another hatch and opened it, managing to slip through with practiced ease without touching the sides.
While Vasya secured the hatch behind him, Antonio had a good look around the interior of the cramped auxiliary docking module he found himself in. "Whoa! What a fucking view!" he whispered, awestruck.
There were several rectangular view-ports made of a thick armored glass set all around the large external hatch, which provided a spectacular view of the Earth floating serenely several hundred kilometers below them. Pressing his face up against one of them and straining slightly, he could make out the rear half of the shuttle Aries still docked on the far side of the collection of large, ungainly cylinders, struts and solar panels that made up the Valentina Tereshkova.
Once he'd done playing wide-eyed tourist, Vasya handed him one of the food trays and watched with satisfaction while he peeled back the foil and tucked into the food hungrily.
"This is good," he muttered, mouth full. "Not like the slop they fed us on the shuttle."
"Beef Stroganoff, potatoes, steamed red-cabbage with real butter. Condemned men eat well in Mother Russia."
"What do you mean, condemned?" Antonio stopped chewing and stared at him with narrowed, suspicious eyes.
Peeling the foil off his own tray, the stocky Russian cosmonaut said nothing and avoided eye contact while he carefully shoveled the food into his mouth with short, controlled movements while they slowly floated around.
A couple of minutes later a small tremor shook the bulkheads, causing Antonio to look up from his meal in alarm. Vasya calmly pointed out one of the view-ports toward the Aries as it disengaged and slowly drifted away from the main docking module, small puffs of reaction gas jetting out of the maneuvering thrusters. Abandoning his meal temporarily, the marine pressed up against the view-port and watched as the shuttle slowly dwindled into the distance. It soon became lost to the eye against the backdrop of clouds above some landmass on the earth below. Satisfied, he returned to his meal, casting an occasional glance at the now-brooding cosmonaut.
Pulling a small plastic bag out of one of the multitudinous pockets on his flight-suit, Vasya snagged the two now empty food-trays out of the air and stuffed them into the bag, securing it with a small clip attached to his belt. He looked up to see the marine watching him closely.
"What did you mean before when you said 'condemned'?" When he merely gave a curt shake of his head, Antonio reached out and gently but firmly grabbed hold of his arm. "C'mon man, there is something you're not telling me. Spill!"
Vasya sighed, secretly grateful for the warm human contact but determined not to react and give any hint of his internal conflict away. "I have, how you say - reservation? - about mission. Know nothing about alien. Alien, Antonio - make you nervous also, da? Why demand meeting with 'warriors'? Having nuclear weapon on Valentina Tereshkova not reassuring," he stopped to consider for a few moments and then shrugged before continuing, "but understand need for caution."
"Good questions. I guess that's why we've got that egg-head from NATO joining us tomorrow. He's the one that's trained for this sorta shit. As for the nuke... Just insurance in case these aliens get uppity, I figure." Realizing he was still holding Vasya's arm, he released him and blushed. "Sorry, man."
"Is no problem, friend. We drink to success of mission then, da? Here is mud in face!"
Antonio laughed while awkwardly twisting the cover off the drinking straw attached to his sipper-bottle. "That's 'mud in your eye', not face," he corrected, noticing the Russian frowning at him again while the cosmonaut expertly opened his own drink.
"Eye? Really? Strange Americans!" Knocking back a good mouthful of the contents of his sipper-bottle, Vasya made a mental note to thank the ground crew who had slipped a small container full of the top-shelf vodka into the supplies on the last Progress resupply ship.
In the mission briefings he had attended with Irenei, there had been many theories as to why the aliens had approached them in the secretive and almost paranoid manner they had, and why they had insisted on the humans making the trip out to meet them rather than them approaching the Earth. Also, why the aliens had specifically asked to meet with warriors; that last demand had been made particularly clear. The leading theory amongst the so-called experts was that the aliens, calling themselves Vanguard, were here to lay down some sort of ultimatum related to the disappearance of their previous vessel, if indeed it had been theirs and not belonging to yet another alien race. As for forcing the humans take a trip out past the moon to meet them, it was thought to be to assess the technological level humans had reached. Perhaps some sort of lofty or arrogant threat assessment.
While they floated around the small module occasionally sipping at the vodka, Antonio had a good stretch before regarding Vasya with open and frank curiosity. "Changing the subject a bit, you're a good looking young guy. You got a girl back home?" he nodded in the general direction of the planet below them.
The cosmonaut shrugged and gave him a mischievous smile. "I am career military, da? Nyet girl. Boy sometime maybe, but nyet girl."
Antonio blushed and laughed nervously - damned Russkies and their weird sense of humor! "Yeah, very funny man. I meant like in girlfriend, wife or something, y'know?"
Managing to look slightly offended, Vasya pouted at him. "Is truth! I left nice boy - Nikolai - behind. Has very nice behind, also! Nikolai is big boy, very active in bed," he waggled his eyebrows suggestively. "But not meant to be, maybe. He is son of Vice-Admiral. Could be trouble if discovered, so you keep secret, da?" he said with a straight face.
Wide-eyed, the marine choked when a mouthful of vodka went down the wrong way, burning his throat and making his eyes water. Slapping him on the back with one hand while he braced himself against the bulkhead, Vasya laughed uproariously - the sound almost deafening in the enclosed space.
"Ah - you Americans still have old-fashioned 'do not ask, do not tell', da? We are more enlightened in new Russia. Things not perfect," he shrugged, "but is better than nothing."
Recovering from his coughing fit, Antonio shook his head incredulously, still not 100% sure if his leg was being pulled by the peculiar young Russian military man. "Nah, man. They got rid of that 'don't ask' thing decades ago. Although there are still a lot of people in the corp who have a shitty attitude about it all, and I reckon that'll never change. Does your Colonel know about... y'know?" he waved his hand vaguely toward the Russian who floated opposite and watched him with a slight grin on his face.
"Colonel Putin was officer who make recommendation for this mission," his smile faded slightly before he continued in a softer, slightly strained tone of voice. "Irenei, Vasya serve together during Siberian Incursion. Can hold my own. I trust will not be problem between us, nyet?"
"Naw, not a problem; just surprised me is all. Geeze, the Siberian Incursion? That was some heavy shit, man," Antonio appraised him with a newfound respect.
His eyes clouded with emotion and memory, Vasya smiled sadly. "Da, but let us not talk of such matters. What about Antonio, da? Has big, big marine someone waiting when mission over?"
"Not at the moment. Had a few girlfriends, but I move around a lot, y'know? Anyway, now that we've eaten and gotten to know each other a little, why don't you show me around the rest of your ship then, huh? Everywhere I turn there's another hatch leading god-knows where!"
Smile firmly back in place, Vasya indicated for him to lead the way out of the auxiliary docking module and back into the main body of the Valentina Tereshkova then dogged the hatch close behind them. Smaller than most of the other manned orbital stations, the tour didn't take long and soon they found themselves back in the command module with time on their hands. The NATO negotiator wasn't due to arrive for another few hours and the only thing left to be done was to secure the backpack nuke from where it was temporarily secured and into the heavily shielded propulsion module. Heavily shielded, it was hoped the aliens wouldn't be able to scan the interior and contents of that particular module.
Unlike the chemically powered American spacecraft, the Russians had instead opted for a nuclear-powered ion-engine to power theirs. Requiring only a fraction of the fuel of conventional rocket motors favored by many other nations, it reduced the weight of the Russian craft significantly and made space-travel a much more efficient, albeit much slower, proposition.
Not content with being slow and steady, in addition to the US marines the shuttle Aries had also brought up several massive chemical-propellent rockets which had been strapped onto the exterior of the propulsion module and wired into the control systems by the NASA engineers. If all went well they wouldn't be necessary, however the powers-that-be had insisted they were provided with additional thrust capability in case they needed to make a quick getaway for whatever reason.
Despite its name, the backpack nuke was the size and weight of a small fridge. Although weightless in zero gravity, it still had considerable mass which made it awkward for one person to handle alone. There were smaller versions available, however they packed much less of a punch and given the nature of the mission it had been decided to err on the side of 'a bigger boom is better' if something went wrong. It was a trade-off; they didn't want anything too large that could have been seen as threatening by the mysterious aliens waiting for them on the far side of the moon, but in locating it in close proximity to the Russian's fission reactor, the yield in an explosion would be much greater than the bomb alone.
"If you can open the hatch and be ready to grab it when I push it over," Antonio suggested, fussing with the straps temporarily securing the nuke to a bulkhead near the main docking module.
Once they were removed, he gingerly pushed the large box-shaped weapon toward Vasya who was waiting beside the access-way to the engine module. Carefully maneuvering it through the narrow hatch with only a couple of fingers getting painfully jammed in the process, the two men drifted slowly down the access-way toward a far hatch.
At one point the marine straddled the weapon and made some hollering and whooping noises while they slowly drifted along the access-way. Raising a single, dark eyebrow, Vasya stared at him for a few moments and frowned slightly.
"Why you sitting on nuclear weapon?"
"Don't mind me, man. Just having a Doctor Strangelove moment," Antonio laughed and slid off, floating alongside again.
"Doctor who?"
"No, not Doctor Who - Doctor Strangelove," Antonio explained patiently, a little disappointed the joke had obviously gone sailing right over the Russian's head. "Y'know, the movie, where that crazy American guy rode a nuclear bomb into the middle of a secret Soviet missile base, blowing it to... Oh. Ah, never mind."
Vasya snorted, secretly amused. The marine was so cute when he was flustered. Reaching the far end of the access-way, they squeezed the weapon through another tight hatchway into the surprisingly spacious engine module. After they'd finished securing it to one of the bulkheads, he pushed over to a control-panel and studied the small screen built into it.
"Something wrong?"
"Nyet, checking load on reactor. It powers electrical systems in addition to engines." He turned to see the marine stifling a yawn. He patted him on the butt when he floated past, heading back to the hatch with a lecherous smirk on his face. "Bed time for baby boy, da? Tuck you in nice tight. Maybe if you lucky Vasya kiss you goodnight."
"In your wet-dreams, man!" Antonio laughed and slapped his hand away while attempting to wriggle away from the leering cosmonaut. When they re-entered the command module they found Commander Hardy hanging in front of the communications console, reading some report displayed on one of the many monitors. "Not tired, Sir?"
"There will be plenty of time to sleep once we're underway. Has the package been secured?"
When Vasya rolled his eyes melodramatically at the rather lame code name for the backpack nuke the Commander pretended not to notice, with only a slight deepening of his frown belying his annoyance.
"Yessir, all tucked in and sleeping like a baby."
"Good, good. You're relieved for now, Oh-Man. Grab some shut-eye, you look like you need it." He was about to turn his attention back to the console when his nose twitched and he sniffed at the air. "You haven't been drinking, have you?" he speared an accusing look at Vasya then back at his subordinate.
"Uh -"
"Smell is cleaning solvent spilled in supply module. Your comrade made terrible mess of meal!" Vasya interrupted hastily while pushing off toward the crew module.
"Yeah, must have got some on me earlier. So clumsy sometimes. If there's nothing else, Sir?" Antonio saluted quickly and pulled himself at a rapid clip toward the open-hatch through which the cosmonaut had just disappeared, stifling a curse when he banged a knee into a handhold in his hurry to get through.
Satisfied, Commander Hardy turned back to the screen and continued reading the situation report tight-beamed from their superiors a few minutes earlier. "Damned sloppy Russkies," he muttered under his breath.
A few minutes later inside the dimly lit crew module, an amused Vasya watched from the comfort of his anchored sleeping bag while Antonio struggled to get his flight-suit off in the weightless environment. "They not cover this in mission training?"
"Naw. Our so-called training was all about handling weapons in free-fall and emergency pro-ceeeedure shit," the marine muttered distractedly after finally managing to beat his flight-suit into submission. "Not the practical stuff of how to eat, shit or sleep in a space-ship. How the hell are we supposed to get into this fucking thing?" Antonio glared at the shapeless mass of the Russian-made sleeping bag slung between two bulkhead support girders.
"Let Vasya assist you, comrade."
Grinning, he clambered out of his own bag and clamped himself against a bulkhead using his thighs. Reaching out, he placed his hands firmly on either side of Antonio's chest to steady him, fingers gripping just shy of the marine's nipples. With the additional assistance, Antonio succeeded in snagging his legs into the sleeping bag's opening and with a bit of wriggling around was able to slide into it without further incident.
"Thanks man," Antonio gave him an embarrassed grin - it probably wouldn't have been quite so bad if the Russian hadn't been gently stroking his chest with the tips of his fingers all the while...
"Piece of pie."
"Piece of cake. It's cake, not pie."
Vasya nodded solemnly at Antonio's correction and settled back into his own sleeping bag, visions of the well built, half-naked Latino marine burnt into his memory. "Sweet, sweet cake, da."
Half an hour or so later just when he was beginning to nod off to sleep, he heard the marine begin to moan softly and struggle around inside his sleeping bag. Blinking sleepily he looked over and saw that Antonio's eyes were closed and that he appeared to be asleep. 'Probably dreaming,' he thought to himself. After a few seconds Antonio calmed down again so he closed his eyes and tried to get back to sleep.
What must have been only a few minutes later he was startled completely awake by a muffled yell and the sound of the marine thrashing around in a panic. Quickly slipping out of his own sleeping bag, he pushed off the bulkhead over to Antonio who had torn his own sleeping bag wide open. The marine was clinging to a bulkhead support girder, covered in sweat, panting heavily and looking around the module wild-eyed. When he reached him, Vasya was surprised when the marine grabbed him and pulled him into a tight embrace, sending them both tumbling gently through the air before being brought to a halt against the opposite bulkhead. Hesitantly, he ran the fingers of one hand slowly through Antonio's sweat-damp crew-cut hair in an attempt to reassure him.
"Ssssh, it is alright, friend. You are safe. Vasya has you now."
"I... I could feel myself slipping, falling into the dark with no-one around to reach out to," Antonio whispered hoarsely with a shake of the head.
"It was bad dream. I have you now, you wont fall," he whispered in a quiet and reassuring voice all the while holding the marine close to him. "Is common sleeping in space to dream of falling. You will adjust, have patience," he explained softly while stroking the marine's back, slick skin cold against the palm of his hand.
It took a minute or so for Antonio's breathing to return to normal and when it did he released the marine with reluctance and backed away slightly.
"Everyone freaks out a bit, first time?"
"Da, everyone. Even brave Vasya awhile it took, first few times," he smiled self-consciously and gave what he hoped was a reassuring nod.
Truth was he'd never had any problems whatsoever adjusting to the lack of gravity after he had joined the Russian space program, however the shaken marine didn't need to know that. Some people adjusted without any problems right from the get-go, others... well, there were a few who just never quite figured out a way of coping with the extreme disorientation of microgravity. At least the marine didn't appear to get space-sick, he wouldn't have wished that awful symptom on anyone.
"Just hope the Commander and The Fish didn't hear me squealing like a little girl, I'd never hear the end of it," Antonio lamented while frowning at the shredded remains of his sleeping bag.
"Comrade Valentina Tereshkova, she is, how you say, well insulated, da? Could have loud, monkey sexy-time party with nobody any wiser."
Antonio broke into laughter, the tension from his wound up muscles dissipating and leaving him feeling more than a little drained. He raised an eyebrow and gazed at him with mock suspicion. "We heard lots of rumors about what you Russkies got up to on the old International Space Station before it broke up a few years back. Loud, monkey sexy-time parties wore it out, eh?"
Vasya shrugged. "Russia first man in space. Russia first woman in space. Hell, Russia first dog in space. First sex in space? Also Russian. Not with dog, however," he said with a grin.
"Have you...? In space, I mean?"
"Sadly, nyet," Vasya pouted at him before his expression slowly twisted back into the lecherous smile the marine was becoming rather well acquainted with. "Unless you like to change that, da?" he joked.
Surprising him, Antonio reached out and gently grasped the sides of his head with both of his hands, staring into the cosmonaut's light-grey eyes. "I'm not gay," he spoke softly before pulling a startled Vasya into a brief kiss, "but thank you. For being there for me I mean, not your, uh, offer," he finished, as their lips separated.
Releasing him, Antonio smiled sheepishly and looked away, surveying the torn wreckage of his sleeping bag that was flapping around slowly in the stray air-currents circulating around the module.
Somewhat bewildered at the unexpected nature of the show of gratitude, Vasya blinked in confusion, wondering what in hell had just happened. Despite finding the marine attractive, he had no illusions his flirting would be taken seriously and had been carrying on just for the fun of the chase, not under the expectation the man would respond.
"You take my sleeping-bag, I - I not tired. Also prepare for arrival of Progress resupply vessel," he stuttered.
Pushing off against the bulkhead and over to the hatch, he grabbed a hand hold and paused briefly while staring back at the marine who was awkwardly attempting to pull himself into the remaining sleeping bag. The dim light in the module gave a satin sheen to Antonio's still sweat-damp skin, making him almost glow slightly.
Hanging off the bulkhead, he had to fight the sudden urge to rush back over and... 'And do what? The man said he wasn't gay,' he thought to himself. Shaking his head, he opened the hatch and slid through, closing it with much reluctance behind him. 'But what about that kiss? Some kiss for a straight guy,' a small part of his mind screamed at him while he prepared the docking module for the arrival of the Progress vessel carrying their mission specialist. It was a thought that haunted him over the next few hours while he busied himself with make-work.
Chapter Four
The Vanguard Tau Ceti colony battleship Lightning-Strike settled into geosynchronous orbit around the far side of an undistinguished looking rocky moon. The single moon orbited a larger, primarily water covered planet that its native inhabitants referred to as 'Earth'. Why they had decided to name their world after a type of dirt was frankly a bit of a mystery to the battleship's crew, however the naming conventions used by the natives were of little interest; they were there on business, not exploration.
While the main fleet was withdrawn back to defend the Core-worlds, colonies like Tau Ceti were left to defend themselves against the Arbiter attacks. Faced with this abandonment, each of the abandoned colonies desperately attempted to locate allies to aid them, often banding together with other colonies for strength. Tau Ceti was an outpost at the extreme edge of the Vanguard Empire and didn't have any neighboring star systems to call on for assistance, so they decided to cast their nets further afield and take a chance on a rather outrageous idea.
The Tau Ceti Elders had known about Earth for some time, the colony having been the launch site of the ill-fated reconnaissance mission to the alien home-world several decades earlier.
After much debate among the Elders it had been decided to send an official mission to this... Earth... in order to investigate whether these humans could be useful as an ally against the impending Arbiter threat. While the Tau Ceti colony was a long way from the Core-worlds, word of the New-Home battle had managed to reach even them, and it had been speculated by some that the rumored alien influence in the epic battle had actually been human in origin.
There were many Elders who had violently opposed any interaction with what they perceived to be an inferior alien race. They held the strong belief that they were not being thrown to the space-wolves by the rest of the Empire; that the Vanguard military would shortly be returning in force to defend them against Arbiter attacks. However even this belief was not quite strong enough stop them from sending this desperate mission anyway, just in case. Especially after Arbiter scout-ships had recently been detected near the outer planets of the colony system.
After several weeks of study, well hidden from any human sensors behind the planet's sole satellite, a carefully coded signal was tight-beamed from the Lightning-Strike to specially selected locations on the planet. Once the signal had been sent, the battleship pack-leader sat back and awaited a response. The response, when it came, was guarded and suspicious, however the powers-that-be on Earth had wisely acquiesced to the request for a meeting.
They had observed with interest the rather primitive vessel that had been swiftly assembled in low Earth orbit from what looked like spare parts and bits of junk. Equipped with a surprisingly efficient nuclear fission-powered ion engine, the craft completed several orbits of the planet while its velocity increased before being flung out on a slow, hyperbolic orbit toward them. Riding a plume of diffuse plasma, the vessel wasn't fast, but it obviously gave the humans plenty of time to prepare for the coming meeting. Using chemical propulsion would have gotten the humans to a rendezvous a lot quicker, however they were understandably wary of their intentions, knowing that the Vanguard were considerably more advanced.
Chapter Five
Obscuring-Darkness was lying on his back underneath one of the med-bay diagnostic tables with two hands full of severed optical data cables, and a third clutching a small diagnostic datapad. His remaining hand was holding a cable-splicing tool which had just malfunctioned and sliced through the thick bundle of cables with a bright flash of intense laser light. Temporarily dazzled, he lay there cursing softly. It was going to take at least a couple of hours to identify and reconnect the myriad of cables, not to mention track down and identify the original problem which had brought him to the med-bay in the first place. With a resigned sigh, he laid the datapad and splicer down and studied the two bunches of cables with annoyance, small sparkles of communications data light visible in some of the strands.
He was about to roll out from underneath the table when the med-bay hatch slid open and he heard someone enter, talons scraping on the metal decking. Judging by the erratic movements and pained grunting, it wasn't one of the medics. Seconds later, he heard a high-pitched keening followed by the sounds of something heavy hitting the deck, hard. Releasing the severed cables, he swiftly scrambled out from under the bed and leaped to his feet just in time to observe a couple of the on-duty medics rushing toward the door. Struggling, they lifted a rather battered young warrior off the deck and managed to heave him onto a nearby diagnostic table.
Choking back an anguished cry, he recognized the injured warrior now lying motionless on the table. He rushed to the warrior's side only to be pushed back by one of the medics.
"Your presence here is unnecessary and distracting," the medic hissed at him in annoyance before turning her attention back to the warrior. "Go and... repair something."
Properly admonished, he backed away to give the medics the room they needed while peering around to try and catch a decent glimpse of his friend.
* * *
He had first seen the attractive young warrior board the battleship as a new recruit, fresh from some colony world he neither knew of nor cared about. Newly posted himself from one of the smaller orbiting habitats in the Tau Ceti system, he had found no familiar faces amongst the crew and had been hungering for someone friendly to talk with. He had attempted to befriend some of the other engineers, however they were mostly older and not being interested in some raw recruit had quickly made it clear they were uninterested in socializing with him.
With his role as an engineer he had access to most of the vessel's systems and databases, which he had then used to surreptitiously stalk the object of his desires over a period of several months. As a result of this he had gotten to know the warrior quite well from afar, although much of what he had learned broke his heart.
It seemed that the young warrior had been taken under the tutelage of an older warrior by the name of Chases-Tail. Chases-Tail had a reputation of befriending new recruits before launching into a systematic attempt at reducing the unfortunate victim to nothing more than a piece of meat, to be traded around to the other senior warriors for their own perverted entertainment.
It was a fairly common occurrence on many military vessels, primarily amongst the warrior caste as they were more prey to their atavistic urges and dominance games than the engineers or medics. As far as the senior warriors and pack-leaders were concerned, every new warrior went through hazing rituals on their first posting - it was supposed to toughen them up and make them better warriors. What wasn't talked about or acknowledged was the number of suicides among the new recruits who were not able to cope emotionally with the extremes of physical or sexual abuse. Then there were the rumors about those that simply 'disappeared' entirely when a hazing ritual went too far.
This wasn't the first time that Invokes-The-Storm (he had gone to great lengths to ascertain the warrior's name) had ended up in the med-bay. Usually it was for nothing more than a few cuts and heavy bruising, but it appeared as if things might have taken a more serious turn this time around.
Invokes-The-Storm had quite literally tripped into his life a few weeks earlier in a chance encounter. Obscuring-Darkness had been kneeling in a corridor, head and shoulders inside the inspection hatch of a data-cabling conduit while fixing a balky optical-repeater, when the distracted warrior had come sprinting down the corridor. The warrior had tripped over his exposed tail and had gone crashing clumsily into a nearby bulkhead. After picking himself off the decking, the warrior had mumbled a quiet apology and was about to continue on his way when Obscuring-Darkness had grasped the opportunity with all four talons and stopped him.
Straightening up, he blocked the warrior's path and began his spiel, oft-practiced in private but still unable to meet the warrior's gaze and instead fumbled nervously with one of his tools. "Please do not depart so swiftly," he reached out a forward hand with the talons folded back in a sign of peaceful intent. "I have been desiring an opportunity to communicate with you for some time now."
"For what purpose, hrrr?" Invokes-The-Storm flinched away from the gentle touch and was staring around with all four eyes wide with fear and agitation, half expecting the peculiarly acting engineer to strike out at him.
Swallowing with some nervousness of his own, Obscuring-Darkness released him and stepped back while fighting the urge to grab the young warrior with all four of his arms and embrace him tightly. Signs of bruising were still evident on Invokes-The-Storm's face and arms. "My designation is Obscuring-Darkness. I have... observed you on several occasions and arrived at the conclusion you might desire company -"
"Impossible! It is imperative that I not be observed fraternizing with you and must depart immediately. I am sorry," the warrior interrupted him before he swiftly fled down the corridor.
Stubbornness was a character trait that ran very strong in Obscuring-Darkness' clan. Disappointed but not discouraged by the warrior's skittish behavior, he went to great lengths over the following weeks to ensure that he engineered several more encounters in order to make himself more familiar and hopefully less threatening to the object of his desire. He even managed to share a brief meal with the warrior one day, squeezing in a short conversation before Chases-Tail had turned up and dragged him away.
* * *
Back in the present, he watched with trepidation for several minutes while the medics treated the battered warrior before returning his attention to the damaged diagnostic table he was supposed to be repairing. By the time he had completed repairs to the cables he'd severed and had then tracked down the original fault that he was supposed to be fixing, the medics had finished healing the worst of the damage Invokes-The-Storm had suffered at the hands of his tormentors. Packing his tools away into his bandolier, he stopped by the recovery-net assigned to the unconscious warrior and knelt down beside it, laying a hand very gently on one of the warrior's. A hand on his shoulder jolted him out of his reverie, and he swung his head around to find the ship's senior medic standing behind him and regarding him with frank curiosity.
Docile-Until-Provoked had recognized the unconscious warrior immediately being a repeat patient, although the engineer was not someone he was familiar with. Only once before had anyone visited the young warrior while was incapacitated, and that selfish, manipulative visitor was only interested in how quickly the warrior would be back on his feet. His curiosity piqued, he had surreptitiously observed the engineer's more concerned behavior for several minutes before he approached.
Rumbling quietly he gave the engineer's shoulder a gentle squeeze. "He will recover, although his injuries this time around are considerable." Swinging his head around he regarded the repaired diagnostic table for a few moments before returning his attention to the engineer. "You have been successful with your repairs, hrrr?"
"Indeed." He returned his gaze back to the unconscious warrior. "I reconfigured the controllers for the electromagnetic coils in the scanner array and adjusted their alignment. They should no longer cause you any difficulties when performing scans," he said while distractedly indicating some technical diagrams on his datapad with another hand. "May I inquire what happened to him, hrrr?"
"You are a... friend of his perhaps, hrrr?"
"Correct." he paused slightly before continuing, unable to meet the medic's eyes. "Hrrr, actually no... Not exactly. Just someone I... I share a work-shift with on occasion."
Docile-Until-Provoked wasn't fooled in the slightest. He'd observed the way the young engineer had been looking at the injured warrior, the gentle touches, his body unconsciously taking a protective stance while he stood watch beside the recovery-net.
"Dislocated forward arm, leg fracture, severe bruising around his face and stomach. There are also signs that he has been repeatedly sexually violated."
He carefully watched the series of emotions flicker briefly across the engineer's face and the small tell-tale body language signs while he explained the injuries, noticing the thinly disguised rage and sorrow. Releasing the engineer's shoulder he turned and lumbered back toward his office, pausing briefly by the door and suppressing a small smile when he turned around.
"His recovery is best aided by rest," the medic noted while watching the engineer begin to lumber with obvious reluctance toward the med-bay exit, "and someone he can trust to stand by him while he recovers."
Acknowledging the medic with a grateful gesture and snap of his jaw, Obscuring-Darkness returned to the recovery-net and hunkered down onto his haunches. Reaching out, he again laid a protective hand across that of the unconscious warrior.