BEST NON-VOYAGER STORY (5-way tie)
Title: RITUAL OF PURGING
Author: Acidqueen ( a.q @ gmx.de )
Series: TOS
Code: T'Lar/Saavik; Spock/Saavik implied
Rating: R (angst, death)
Disclaimer: Paramount/Viacom owns Star Trek, I own my brain. No infringement is intended, and no money is being made.
Summary: T'Lar has to heal in Saavik what had begun with Spock's pon farr on Genesis in ST III.
Archiving: My own website at http://www.syredronning.de , ASCEM, all others ask, please
Feedback: Yes, please.
Note: Part of the Femme Fuh-Q Fest - http://www.oocities.org/femme_fuhq_fest/
And it is also part of the author's personal K/S, S/Saa universe.
Acknowledgment: Special thanks to Lyrastar for the beta! All remaining errors are mine!
by Acidqueen
The rocks were rough, the walls high to the tunnel's ceiling, and the path was steep. Shady yellow and red lights danced over the roaring river that flew far underneath. She was standing on an edge and looked down on the water that made its dirty way fast through the stony riverbed. Suddenly she saw his naked body tumbling through the whirling waves, thrown against rocks and spurs on its way. His arms were tied around his bent legs, his body coiled, and she knew in all certainty that he was dead, drowned and battered by the wild river, killed by whatever enemy had thrown him into it. In despair she clutched the small hand that held hers and turned her head to look down. It was a child, standing with her on the path - it was herself, just as she had looked when he had found her so many years ago.
"Why?" the girl asked, meeting her gaze.
"I do not know," she answered, her voice dull and flat, as flat as when she had pronounced another death. Everything became slow motion as her eyes followed the dead body until it moved out of sight, leaving on its way only some green stains, which were washed away immediately.
She looked down again, and the girl's face shifted, dark strands now clinging over a boyish face, an intense gaze from dark eyes under upswept brows. And then the child disappeared without another word, leaving Saavik alone in the shady world of this underground that would become her grave too.
She sat up with a start, her heart pounding in her chest painfully. Spock. No, he wasn't dead. It had been just a dream. Pulling her legs up and clutching her arms around them, she rocked herself for a while. A dream. He was alive. She had seen him three days ago, walking, even talking some words. His gaze was still missing some of the liveliness it had had before, but it would come back, the humans said. He would be the old one again soon, the humans said. She had considered them illogical before she had understood it was only hope that spoke, not belief.
He had died because she had not acted. And David had died because she had not acted once again. Double guilt and double death. Not what she had thought her first mission would be like.
She was thankful for the interruption as it knocked on the door, a knock that centered her spinning thoughts into a focused, manageable pain. It was Amanda.
"Saavik-kam, we just received a message from T'Lar. She wishes to speak to you as soon as possible."
Saavik looked at her in confusion. "T'Lar?"
"Yes," Amanda nodded, and then hesitated for a moment. "Do you want something fresh to wear? I am sure I have some robes that would fit you…"
"No, thank you," Saavik replied. "I have all I need."
Amanda left and Saavik stepped into her sticky, dusty Starfleet uniform, the one possession that she had been able to rescue. And maybe she would give it up soon too, be it by order of SF command or by her own decision, but for now it was the thing in her life that held her upright. It was what she had worked for for so long, her goal for many years. It had shattered on the harshness of reality, spilling bits and pieces to her feet like a broken dish. Maybe she would lose it all, but not today. Today she would be as strong as any Vulcan should be. She was Saavik. She had survived. And she would survive over and over again, she promised herself.
The promise held until she looked at the glass front on the main door when she passed it, where
feverish eyes stared at her from a hunted face she did not perceive as hers. Vulcan mind rules bowed
before exhaustion that went so deep that she couldn't remember the day it had not been like this, so
many layers of it had wrapped around her existence.
Outside the Vulcan heat embraced her, fueling the flames in her further. Why she didn't take a flitter, she didn't know - in fact, only now she realized that she hadn't even asked where T'Lar would expect her. She stopped in the middle of the street, unsure if she should go back, but also unwilling to burden Amanda who had enough guests to take care of, such as the admiral... She had avoided him over the last days, not knowing what she could tell him. Condolences were only an insult in the light of her failure, and he would surely read her guilt in every word, that guilt for doing nothing, and thus choosing Spock and herself over David. Hadn't she told Kirk that it was her duty to rescue civilian personnel, even at her own expense? That far goes your oath, Saavik, she thought to herself, and turned towards the city again, determined to find T'Lar on her own.
This is your punishment, a voice spoke in her mind as she walked through the shadeless streets. You have betrayed everything you ever believed in. You have acted selfishly, and others have paid the price. Is this what you learned from him, and how you pay him back?
I saved him in the end, she debated with the voice. He would not have survived without me.
He would have lived anyway. But you chose to join him in his burning.
I saw it differently. Who knew it would all be over so fast.
What will you do when he remembers?
Saavik sagged onto the pavement in a sudden rush of the fever that went higher now, filling her with fire from within. She forced herself upright, thankful for the empty streets. No one was so foolish as to walk here in the midday sun. Nobody but the one who had to. Pay the price, Saavik.
"Pay the price," someone said behind her, and she spun around.
"David..." she whispered.
He fell down on his knees in front of her, looking up at her with eyes full of disbelief.
"Pay the price," he repeated with a breaking voice, and pulled the Klingon dagger out of his chest. But it was green blood that flowed down his white clothes in thick streams, pooling on the sands and becoming a roaring river, streaming along her dusty boots, rising up to her knees, her hips, and she would drown in the greeness and she wondered why she had never learned to swim as Spock had recommended, and so her last thought was that this would be the logical payment in the end.
"Saavik," someone said, and she felt her arms held, her body shaken, and it was all so green as her eyes opened though they had been open all the time, and it was he, and what would she do if he remembered?
"No," she cried and tried to free herself, struggling against the grip and finally giving up, letting herself drift into the river.
"Saavik," someone said. "Saavik, wake up," the voice ordered, but she would not to fall prey to another vision. The darkness was safe. Nobody would find her here. The darkness was her childhood friend and loneliness her shield. Nothing to lose besides one's own miserable life. Stop fighting, Saavik, and pay the price.
Someone came to her, into her. A whisper in her mind, calling her out of her seclusion. Wake up, Saavik of the Sundered. Return to the light. It was an order, and resistance vanished under the remarkable power that was behind these thoughts.
The ceilings were high and the room barren and all that the windows showed was the red evening sky. She was lying on a large soft bed, curled under a thick blanket like a foetus, all clothes gone. She shivered as she realized that the fever had still its hold on her, and for a second she feared that the old woman next to her was just another fake image.
"Sa'avik," the woman said, now pronouncing the name in correct Romulan with a small pause in the middle of a long a, the way Saavik hated to hear it. This was not her, but the child who had been left behind on a deserted planet, not only once, but twice, and was buried together with the shadows of her past.
"I am Saavik," she forced through her dry lips, claiming her real name with this statement. "Who are you?"
"I am T'Lar," the woman said.
"I apologize...you looked so different that night," Saavik murmured.
"Grandiose appearances are part of the rituals," T'Lar said. "Here, we are alone, you and I."
"And why am I here...with you?" Nothing was right here. And yet, nothing was wrong either. A circle in squares in circles in squares, Saavik thought as her eyes fixed on the ornaments of the light robe, the Old High Vulcan writings unreadable to her.
"With every end, a new beginning," T'Lar said. "You are here because you need to undergo the Ritual of Purging."
Saavik tensed as she felt her thoughts spinning again. Circles in squares... "A ritual?"
"In the fal-tor-pan, I have seen you in the memories of the reborn one, and I know what has taken place on Genesis."
Saavik coiled up on this statement, burying her face into the cushion.
"Do not be ashamed," T'Lar said softly. "You did what you thought necessary. But it was a dangerous thing to do, less for him than for you. His mind could not connect with you as it should, and so you were pulled into the burning without relinquishing it later."
"So this is the fever...the burning?" Saavik asked in a low voice. Pay the price, something inside of her insisted. This was the price. Since when did she think so humanly, in terms of sin? Something was wrong here. This was not her place. She stood up in haste, shedding the blanket on the floor on her wake, but her legs gave in under her instantly. T'Lar caught her with surprisingly strong arms.
"We will burn it, here, now, you and me. As it was the duty of the priestesses since the days of the first Vulcan, woman will lie with woman to heal what was wounded, to end what has to end."
Saavik felt the robe cling to her body, and the fever came over her again, making her pull back from the unbearable touch. Too much, it was all too much...the touch and the heat and T'Lar's hands, still on her sides. She struggled out of them, dropping back to the bed.
"I don't want a woman."
"This is not about what you want, Saavik. This is about what your body and soul need now. And only another woman can heal you. Did you have contact with any men these last days?"
Saavik shook her head. "Barely, I can't stand company since our arrival here." She looked up, blinking. "That was the burning, too?"
"Yes," the old priestess replied. "Your soul cries for reborn one, but he is unreachable. Other men are an annoyance, to be avoided. You need to heal, and I will show you the way."
Once again Saavik fixed her gaze on the ornaments that went down the middle of T'Lar's robe, realizing that it was the truth. Control left her in another bout of fever, and she clamped her arms around the woman's waistline and pressed her head against her belly. T'Lar cradled her like a child, an unexpected gesture from the Vulcan priestess. A hand brushed through her freely falling hair, another closed around her shoulders and held her tightly as she began to shiver. They remained like that for a while, the only movement in the room the woman's fingers still brushing through Saavik's hair.
Finally T'Lar stirred. "Lie down," she said. "I will join you soon."
Saavik was barely able to release her arms, so much did it hurt to lose contact. Her hands rested on T'Lar's hips as long as possible, but the woman stepped back. "I will join you soon, Saavik," T'Lar repeated reassuringly. "I will not leave you alone."
Trembling Saavik lay down on the bed and pulled the blanket up to her throat, tightening her hands into the fabric. Her body felt hot and chilled at the same time with a thin layer of sweat covering her skin. Not for a second did her eyes leave the figure of the elder woman as T'Lar now swiftly moved through the room, lighting some candles, closing the curtains, and finally returning to her with a cup.
"Drink this," she said.
"What is it?" Saavik asked.
"You would not know its name," T'Lar said. "But it will kindle the fire higher, allowing us to extinguish it tonight."
Saavik half-rose and took the cup. The drink was almost like water, and she drank it, finding that her thirst was not sated afterwards. "Do you have some water for me, please?" she asked when she gave the cup back.
"As much as you want," T'Lar said and pointed to a water reservoir next to the bed. "I will feed you some more."
After another three cups Saavik dropped back onto the cushion. T'Lar sat down next to her, caressing her head again. Saavik looked at her.
"Don't you want to join me?" she asked.
T'Lar twitched her mouth. "I will do so, oh hectic youth." She stood up again and opened her robe, revealing her naked, aged body underneath. But it was nothing she was ashamed of, Saavik could feel. It was what it was. And to Saavik she looked beautiful tonight. Never before she had seen an old woman in this way; on Hellguard, there had been no elders, and later she had never had the opportunity. If she had ever wondered what her grandmother would look like, it was like this. The skin loose from the loss of muscles, showing the signs of deterioration, little green age spots and wrinkles. Age had an odor of decay, she could not deny it. But it was a nearness to death that lacked the anger and the loss of the ones she had encountered before. Old age spoke of cycles near fulfillment, of experience and contentment. Here, death would be nothing but the oasis where a long journey would end one day. But this night was for living.
A tongue of fire licked over Saavik's body and she extended her hands toward T'Lar. "Come to me, Elder, I beg you."
T'Lar took her hand in another surprisingly strong grip for a moment, and then she climbed onto the bed and stretched out beside Saavik. Putting one arm under the younger woman's head, she took her into a lose embrace. And when Saavik put her head on T'Lar's shoulder, the priestess rocked her gently, murmuring unknown but calming words into her ears like a mantra until Saavik fell into a light sleep.
There was fire, Saavik thought as she awoke, and like a jolt she sat up, breathing heavily. The room was dark and barely lit, but there was fire, she could feel the flames tangle along her skin. She watched her own hand as she rubbed along her naked arm, but it felt cold and clammy to the touch. Bewildered she clamped her head with both hands, trying to grasp reality. The flames were there again, but now down in her body, hidden from view. She clutched her hands to her abdomen, pressing against it to still the burning, but the fire began to dance around her then, mocking her in her defeat.
Hands shifted over her back and got hold of her arms, pulling her back down again.
"All is well, Saavik," T'Lar murmured. "This is the burning. Let me cool your flames, young one."
More hands were on Saavik's body; they seemed to multiply as the woman touched her. Saavik began to lose track of time and surrounding; reality drifted away, a blurred vision against her true existence that was nothing but fire, burning her from inside out. Like molten lava it claimed her, her womb, her chest, her legs, and her heart in the end. It consumed her bones, her sinews and skin from every blood vessel to every nerve cell, and she soon would flow away like water from a broken glass, all limits gone. Only the other one would be able to save her, to shelter her essence in an urn that was not burned away by the all-surrounding heat, and so she drowned herself into the female universe that held her, the power of life itself. Man might melt her, but she would come back again, clean and fresh as the winter wind.
For now though, it was still the summer heat that claimed her, and she arched to find release in the whirlwind of emotions that swashed through her. To rise again, the fall is necessary, someone whispered into her mind. And fall she did as her first climax shook through her, leaving nothing but a small tensed ball of self for a long second. It was only the beginning; she had not known that one could vanish into nothingness like this, but every climax seemed to rip away a part of her, leaving her with less in the end: less burning, less feeling, less...soul. In the end, she did not know what might be reborn from the cool sea of emptiness that was her. But then she crystallized; glittering pieces of her former self met and joined, building a brittle cathedral of light to become her body. And when the final crystal had added itself, full existence unfolded from the womb again; ice became flesh, light became shade, dream became reality. Her body slacked, arms hanging loosely to the side and legs entangled in the blanket. She was still held, the other one's presence a protecting awareness over her shivering limbs. And she was so cold, so endlessly cold that she couldn't help but cry.
"All is well, Saavik," T'Lar murmured into her ears once more. More blankets were pulled over her, and she weakly emptied a cup of water that was held to her dry lips.
"Is it always like this?" she asked. "So...full of destruction?"
"There is no such thing as destruction," the priestess answered calmly. "What is destruction for the one, is the beginning of life for the other. Entropy claims life, just as nature rebuilds it again. The endless circle, Saavik."
Saavik nodded tiredly, her mind drifting away into sleep already. Circles in circles...no, there was only one circle. And it had a start and an end point when she drew it. She rubbed over the sand to extinguish the first circle, and then drew another with her fingertip. Start and end, she whispered in her dream, and ran her hand over the sand, distributing the small grains so that nobody would see her circles anymore. She raised her head from the ground and saw an ocean of blue extend itself until the horizon. Its regular waves swashed onto the beach, coming closer until one slap of water reached the former circles at her feet, smoothing the disheveled sand on its way back so that all there was left in the end was a virginal plain of white...
When she awoke again, it was already morning. The windows were open and the sky was red and yellow, speaking of a sand storm the night before. The bed beside her was empty, but her feelings of loss were gone. She felt at peace with herself like she had never felt before, and not even the knowledge of what had happened on Genesis could shake her confidence. What was, was. There was a solution to everything, and a new beginning with every ending. Life had her back, and for a while she did nothing but cherish the calmness that filled her, her body lightly touched by the soft winds that brushed along the open windows. Finally she stood up, surveying the empty room. Her uniform lay on a nearby chair, clean and neatly folded. She stepped into it with the feeling of homecoming; this was her, this was her way. And she would pursue it with all her might.
When she left the room, she met only silence in the empty corridors that smoothly led her towards the main gate. She would have liked to thank T'Lar, to tell her about the gratitude she felt for healing her, but she knew that the priestess did neither need nor want to hear it. All that was left for her was to leave now, to step out into life. And that was what she did.
Epilogue:
When the visitor was announced a day later, T'Lar was not surprised - she had expected T'Pau already.
The old matriarch entered the room slowly, age bowing her formerly straight back slightly. But the sharp intelligence in her eyes had not gone dull over time and gleamed just the way it did two hundred years ago. For a moment their gazes leveled at each other - they were two of a kind, and this meant defending each one's sphere of influence just as lematyas defended their dens in the desert against competitors.
"So she has gone through the ritual," T'Pau stated without further introduction.
"Yes."
"All ties to Spock are cut? And to the unborn child?"
T'Lar folded her hands. "Yes. All that it was, body and soul, are merged in Saavik again."
T'Pau inclined her head a fraction. "In a way, it is regrettable. But to let her give birth to the heir of the House at this point would have changed the way of the universe."
"Indeed. Their time has yet to come," T'Lar replied, gazing out of the window. In the faraway distance, two small figures were standing on the edge of the cliff that hung over the Forge, and although even Vulcan eyesight did not reach that far, she instinctively knew who they were.
"As it is predicted," T'Pau agreed behind her. "We did what we had to do. I will leave now. Peace and long life, T'Lar."
Her steps went away, and T'Lar was alone for a moment. But there was still another one to heal, and he was already standing in the door, a presence like a mental lighthouse. She turned to greet him.
"Welcome, Admiral."