Here it is, pretty much as it first came out, in one evil swoop the evening of the 22nd of December 1999 (and until about 2 the next morning). I sent it out by email that night, then, fixed a few spelling mistakes the next day. As it is now, it's still over 99% pure unfiltered emotion.
Christmas Ship (1/1)
No, it's not how it sounds. Hankie and tearbucket alert. This is pure excercising of demons, I'm tired of seeing this - or the news footage they're discussing at the end (what the Brisby crew saw when walking through the 'Christmas' ship, every gory detail), to be precise - in my nightmares, so maybe my staying up until this awful hour typing will help clear my mind enough to let me sleep. ANGST AHEAD!
This is set in the same universe as 'Homecoming'. It's sort of a side story, a Gap Filler. (I hate those stores, their merchandise is ugly and never fits me anyway. There's never a hole for my tail! Fill them all in with dirt and then plant trees and grass, I say.) Please don't read if you don't like horror. It deals with some of the telepath war, and the sort of events that went on during that time, and a little bit afterwards. Kindof. I did it in one stretch, all tonight, and now I'm going to sent it on so maybe I can get some sleep without nightmares. 'Night, all.
- Gok
*emphasis marks*
[indicates thoughts]
Flashbacks are indented.
~~~~
"Levi . . . it's ok. No matter how it ended, she's safe now. The dead can not feel pain. Or sorrow, or loss. None of them are afraid now. None of them are hurting. Kat reminded you often enough, in the time before." Shannon's voice was as gentle as her hand on his shoulder, but he still could take little real comfort in it. He just stared mutely at the computer screen, as if he could *will* the data displayed back into nonexistence, his hands under his chin with the fingers extended to hide the trembling jaw. Sighing, she leaned over to place a meek kiss on the side of his forehead, resting against him momentarily before walking softly away.
She knew, from his posture, and from the way his blocks locked up - not from the training every normal must undergo, but from pure instinct - that he needed to face this challenge alone. She had to leave, even if it was just for a little while. He would need her later tonight, because she was the only one Kat would have trusted enough to ease the pain physically; the small infilling of sealing putty in the cracks in the dam. Closing the doors to the bedroom behind her softly, she walked out into the suite's main room with weakened feet, sat down on a rough-clothed couch and cradled a pillow into her belly, dismissing the guards with a flick of her hands. When they had left, she sat and cried, completely alone and miserable.
An old, old prayer ran through her mind, one that the grandmother of a neighbor from her childhood home had taught her when Shannon, at the age of 6, had found a nest of dead baby birds. A eulogy, for lives lost before even being found.
Today was the second day they had been on Proxima. Shannon, Levi, Lyta, all of them. A lifetime had passed, it seemed. The first hashings of their trade mission had begun, during the press conference a few hours before. The first hashings of their souls had been hinted at 43 days before, when for the first time in several long, brief, wonderful, terrible years, silence descended upon them, with only a tenuous lifeline to sanity which was being held for them by Lyta Alexander. Then, one day before, Levi had reached his soul out in search of an answer he wasn't sure he wanted, knowing full well that he would be whipped into submission one way or another. Shannon had hoped for his sake, and for the sake of their departed Kat, that the wound to his soul would not be a deep one.
She was wrong.
Kat had been found.
By the Psi Corps.
Over the course of their traveling, and even after the Founding, well into the present day, the citizens of the Sanctuary system has kept a nervous ear perked for rumors, for whispers from beyond their home; unable to trust anything not a proven fact (often not even then), but still, they were too close to their primal ancestors to not listen to stories and reports. So they listened, and feared, and each one prayed that it was not a member of *their* family, that it was not a friend *they* knew who had been among those caught by the Corps, or by any of the other agencies with similar agendas for telepaths.
The news Levi Steele has just found in his searches would make over 64 million sentients sigh in relief. It was not 'one of theirs' who had been found. The emblem, the image, the outrage that had flared through all the Alliance almost 2 years before was not *their* wife, or *their* daughter, or *their* sister. They would sleep a little better, able to take the faint hope of not knowing with them into dreams.
Levi had just lost that option. It was *his* wife that the universe, unknowing of her real name, had nicknamed 'Mary', when a sensor on the EAS 'Jonathan Brisby' had noticed there was something in a place it should have not have been in. The date by the earth calendar was December 23 when the curious crew took a shuttle over to investigate the mystery ship. Before noon on the 25 of December, Christmas day (the time for forgiving, the time for happiness and family and tables full of good food and chairs full of friends), before noon, the entire universe had sat in front of its vidscreens, and it saw under the hood of the grim reaper and stared into his eyeless sockets, and it saw.
A baby, who had been placed in the manger, his mother only a few feet away, eyes open to see him there.
Before the end of the 29 of December ended in Geneva, the firestorm that had flickered to life some months before - when the final words of Ruth Harrison were spoken to the universe - exploded into a fireball, consuming everything in it's path. Some children, some old men, some old women, some who were innocent of that particular crime, they all were consumed in the political firestorm that climaxed over those few last days.
And every member of the then-former Psi Corps was burned, too. Every decision-making member that was found was put on trail. The time of hiding things was over, the time of looking the other way and the time of pretending not to notice, it was all over, and the war ended soon after. Telepaths rejoiced in freedom . . . those that were left.
Some did not know right away, but they rejoiced when they learned. But not every telepath was able to be happy. Katarina Steele, her two youngest children, and every living being on board that ship, none of them could be happy. They were dead, left for display as a symbol to other rogues of what would happen to those foolish 'few' telepaths who tried to leave the Corps.
[It was Kat.] And so Shannon Ramsey cried, harder than she would have if it had been a stranger, instead of a dear friend. Shannon cried for what could have been, and she cried for what was. After a time, she began to form thoughts again. [I will have to tell the children. It is their right to know. They have a right to know their mother received a good burial, in the end.]
It . . . it had been Kat.
[**WHY?!**]
The universe didn't answer her question.
~~~~
"Mama, I want another hug before you go!" Timothy demanded from where his face was buried in his mother's shoulder, and she obliged by tightening her arms just a little more. As it was, they were full of two teenage daughters, one husband, a very anxious friend, and of course, 10 year old Timothy.~~~~Al'shi'arn. A minbari word. It did not seem to translate at first, but after a time, the cultural experts had found a near-suitable phrasing in english, based on a very old poem about love. They translated it as 'compass-moving', because the poem spoke about a man's love for his wife being like a compass, a tool used to draw circles: even if the two points were spread apart, they were still joined by the arc. It was a tradition followed by some cultures that if one member of a pair must leave, the other acts as a firm anchor, and the great distances are lessened by the bond between the lovers.
So it was for Katarina and Levi, when the ranger scouts brought much-longed for news of their youngest child's safety in a gathering-area, they decided that Levi would remain behind, and Kat would go in one of the few remaining ships to get her and the other refugees. The decision was made by consensus of the family, not an easy task when there was not only two, but three lives at stake. If Kat were discovered traveling from Sanctuary, she would be taken and killed by the Corps, or by bounty hunters. If she was lucky. If she was not lucky, they would take her on her return, and their youngest child would die as well, at the scarce age of 7.
No, Chelsi would have been their second-youngest. The day before the rangers brought their news, a light scan by a carefully trained healer had confirmed Kat's suspicions: there was to soon be another member of the Steele family who would hear the music of their home. She was pregnant, a welcome final addition who barely made it under the menopausal wire to be conceived. Kat would be the one to go, so that she could receive the innoculations required to help ensure a strong, healthy baby. The choice to leave, even for a short while, was not easy for Kat, who was a citizen by family instead of by ability, the same as Levi. This was a small factor in her favor - a sweep by bloodhounds might miss her, if she was lucky, as she was neither active nor latent.
"I love all of you," she whispered to them. "You all behave for your dad, ok? I don't want any tales about you, I'll be too close to my 9th month by the time I get back to have a lot of patience. And YOU," she kissed Levi yet again, "are going to behave for Shannon. God willing, Noi'soea will not happen for a great many years, but should I not return then you *will* follow my wishes, husband. And I expect that addition to be fully walled and chinked for Chelsi. She will be delighted to have her own room, especially after a long month shipside. No slacking off, my dear man!" She kissed him again, and with eyes dripping with tears, she kissed all her other children, and her best friend, receiving from each a kiss, and then a second one by each on her slightly swollen belly.
"Be safe, Kat," Shannon had the last words to her before Katarina had stepped back into the antiquated old shuttle that would carry her and the rest of the mismatched crew back into orbit, then with steady maintenance and good luck, the waiting ship would carry them to Alliance space for the pickup. The three children who had made the trip safely all waved like their goodbyes would be enough to power their mother into the interference vortex and beyond, and kept waving, even though the shuttle had no windows for it's passengers, even until it was far past being seen. The three young ones joined their minds as the speck faded in the sky, bringing their father in to listen with them. "See, dad? This is what will welcome Chelsi, and mom! With four, we could bring both of you in at the same time."
Arms wrapped around them all, Shannon also listened, with her own weak abilities, and she smiled. "It will be a good gift, Caley. It will be a good gift."
Shannon cried as she remembered, and as she remembered the way the nervous anticipation wound up to the time when Kat and Chelsi might start to arrive. It was a long trip, and the smuggling of refugees on board was never easy, but they continued to hope even as the months began to add up, as the Watcher watched in silence. Hope has an incredible tenacity to survive, and it had lived up to the point where Levi had to send Jaycee to climb the stone fence between their gardens to get her before dawn one morning, because Tim had fallen ill.
~~~~
He was in bed, nightclothes soaked with more than sweat, and too weak from crying to rise. "Mama's dead, Shannon, mama's dead. She isn't coming back, the notches are too many. Mama's dead. Mama's dead . . ." and he kept crying even as she rocked him in her arms, trying to ease the anguish he felt enough to learn why he had broken suddenly.~~~~On the wooden staff he had been given as a running-day gift, he had been carefully nicking a line of tiny grooves, one each evening, to mark the days. He and Kat had begun to do it privately, as soon as the baby's presence was confirmed, because Timothy was born unable to do numbers. Katarina could not get to a doctor in time before her pregnancy for a fresh innoculation against defective ova, and Levi missed his booster against the same thing, and when Timothy was born it was suddenly known that he had too many genes in him. An extra chromosome had snuck in, and hindered his mental state and abilities. But they loved him, and he grew strong and healthy, if not very smart. Shannon helped Timothy to remember with her, remember why he was so upset. ["One a day, my little man, close together like this, and when this knot here is reached, I will be close enough to birth safely. You see? My belly will grow as the line does . . . and then, after the baby comes out, if you want to you can mark the days and see if your little sib grows as fast as the notches on your staff."]
The others had known of the passage of months, but did not speak of it. It was past the time for the delivery, and Kat had promised to return before then. There had been other convoys which arrived in the meantime, and they had the news that Kat and the others had taken the refugees safely, and had fled without a word for or against their survival. Tim's abilities were too weak to pull this from them, and it was not spoken of out loud, to keep his spirits high. But the safeguarding hadn't worked, because there he was, aware at last that his mother would not be returning. Ever. The line of notches had reached to the bottom of the staff, ending as it did.
~~~~
Even when they still wandered, separated from family members, from children, from hope, still unaware of a truly safe place, Shannon Ramsey and Katarina Steele did what they could to help each other. Under a minbari priest, they each swore the oath of Noi'soea to the other, a pledge to protect the other's family, in all levels of commitment, should the other not be there, and to keep the pledge intact until then. Few oaths were more serious, and few oaths were more binding. It included that should one friend die, or be very ill for a long time, or be far away, the other would agree to keep her spouse free from betrayal with another woman. Often this meant taking to his bed herself, to fix any 'urges'. It was a harsh way, but it meant that neither woman's spouse would sleep with a woman she did not approve of, and it ensured that the 'new' lover would be pledged to take care of any children left orphaned. Levi had agreed after some convincing, and Shannon had no husband, and only dead children at that time. This adopting of Kat's kids was considered a blessing by all concerned, as Shannon was already loved as a friend. The next year, safe in their new home, when Shannon birthed Min, Timothy and Caley - because Jaycee was still not found by then - called her their sister, and brought flowers to the grave of her father, and then they mourned with Shannon when Min died of fever 3 months later, and planted seeds to grow flowers in the fresh grave soil. The man who conceived Min had died in a flood before Shannon's pregnancy was confirmed, but Levi - never having met him - still called him friend, and also put flowers at Min's grave. The Steele's were close to family, and Shannon was family.
Timothy could not be consoled by her that time, however. "Mama's dead, mama's dead," he had cried through that day, and he would not get up to eat, or to work. At sunset, his sisters carried him in their arms to the crossroads, for the ceremonies. Shannon, as Kat's chosen guardian for her family, stood in for her during the End-of-blood ceremony, then stood aside with Kat's - soon hers - children for the setting of the marker which showed Katarina's name to those still living, then with a heavy heart Shannon knelt at the center of the crossroads with all the neighbors and family to witness, and she spoke the old, old minbari words that bonded her to the man who knelt to face her, and he, through tears, did the same.
"I will take no other lover, for it was decided by our Katarina that I will protect this one's heart as long as I and he both live. I call her children my own, I call his children my own, he calls my children his own. So I take his hand, and make it so."
"I will take no other lover, for it was decided by our Katarina that I will protect this one's heart as long as I and she both live. I call her children my own, she calls my children her own. So I take her hand, and make it so."
It was almost another year before Levi admitted to Shannon that he needed her physically, and he always found a fresh flower to lay in front of Kat's marker beside the crossroads when the last one wilted or blew away. He never broke the vow, knowing he would catch it from Kat if he did. Levi did not know if there was an afterlife, but he took no chances to upset his love, hoping they would be reunited. Gradually, he had started to love Shannon as he had Kat, and gradually, she loved him in return.
But Kat had still been her friend, and she still curled up to weep, alone, on the couch on Proxima, many lightyears from Kat's marker and their children. [No one deserved what had happened to Kat. . . no one. I call her children my own. I call his children my own. I will call her children my own. I will call his children my own.] Grief warped through her in waves, then rage flashed over her.
[I will hunt down those bastards and kill them in their prison cells!!!!]
[No. I cannot. I can not break my vow to Kat. I have to protect the children that remain. I must make sure they are safe, that all the children back home are safe. I will never allow anything like what has happened to ever happen again!]
[ . . . gods above . . . they called it the Christmas Ship . . . like it was some kind of GIFT!] She collapsed again, sobbing at what she had witnessed on the computer screen.
Past a pair of closed doors, rage had not yet come. Grief had not yet come, either, as Levi could not quite believe what he watched before him. The search had first come up with news footage, shot by the crew of the 'Jonathan Brisby' as they moved through the ravaged ghost ship, and over the past hour his search had filtered its way down to the reactions of media rebounding off each other. Levi didn't quite see the people recorded, didn't quite hear their words. But what he did hear, and what he had seen before, would haunt his nightmares until the moment he died.
The people on the screen argued back and forth incessantly. Over what had 'really' happened. They would not even know, if not for the blood. Some of the samples had turned up telepath genetic markers, but there was more blood than bodies - some of the samples were not from bodies left behind. A trace back through a forced opening into Corps records showed that the DNA matched with several different Psi Cops and bloodhounds, and a further search had found the data entries. The ship had been hunted down, yes, by the Corps. But since blowing the rogues ships up wasn't stopping - or even slowing down much - the outward flow of excapees, the mission commander decided on a different idea. He went through the ship, killing those who fought back, taking the rest prisoner . . . then a glance into a side corner, a space that had been kept mostly clear of the piles of humanity and clothing and scraps of food and desperation, a glance made him decide that the ship would be a good messenger to the others. He ordered the prisoners killed, in a certain way, and that he would take care of one of them personally. Hold her down, he said (as he later wrote in his report). An excellent message about those who think there is life outside the Corps, he said.
It was less than two earth-weeks before the human holiday 'Christmas'. The corner had so carefully been kept clear, and kept clean. Then, painted onto the bulkhead, and assembled out of whatever scraps they could find, the refugees had assembled a small, and very humble nativity scene. A bit of religious light in the darkness of their situation. A few letters to 'Santa' were even found near the majority of the children's corpses, asking for food and clothes and maybe a toy, so they could play when they got to their new home.
Levi did not see the people arguing on the screen through his hands which covered his eyes, but he could not block the sound as he was too upset to speak, and thereby turn off the audio.
" . . . and I don't care! Any chance the Corps had of protecting it's reputation would have disappeared the instant ANYONE saw the extent of the mutilations-"
"That's a bit extreme, Paul, most of the bodies had obviously died fighting, yes, but I wouldn't call-"
"No! I stand by him on this. There is no way the head Psi Cop can be put on a legitimate trail! He is so obviously insane, look at what he did to the Mary woman! There is no way I'd ever-"
"He *will* stand trail! Anyone who would do that to an 8 month old fetus, deliberately cutting it out just to hack it apart! Would you be able to consider what he must have wanted? My gods! He made Mary WATCH! Her made her *watch*! And *bleed* to death from the cesarean cut as he dismembered the baby while it was *alive*! How can any of you argue he was sane? How can you argue that a man who probably *smiled* as an infant struggled to breathe just so it could scream in agony? How can you say that man was sane when he piled the dismembered parts in that damned manger while the baby's body still bled in his hands! How can you say that? Did you think it was merciful to Mary? Did you think she passed from the blood loss before or after he split her belly open? You saw her injuries! Would she have been aware of what was going on, as that - that *monster* began to sever the infant's hands, then his feet, then his arms and legs and then laid the head on top all the other parts, piled there all red and still dripping? You saw! You SAW!"
"I still say-"
~~~~
Levi Steele sat in a chair and wept, two years later, completely alone and miserable.
(the end.)