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Twixt Scylla and Charybdis IV: To There and Back Again

Posted on Wed Nov 13th, 2019 @ 10:51am by Lieutenant Commander Mnhei'sahe Dox & Commander Rita Paris

Mission: Family Detention
Location: Earth, Scotland, MacGregor Manse guest house
Timeline: 2396



"Now that I had the Starfleet records, all I needed were the Tal'Shiar's records. Which proved to be a far more challenging task, as Victory needed repairs and parts, and there were not exactly starbase repairs waiting for us. If we were captured by Starfleet, then much like your friend Paris, they would not allow us to return back to our own time. Starfleet hadn't created the temporal Prime Directive as yet, but they were definitely on their way there, and that was a rule they were rather adamant about. I wouldn't have it- to never to see my family again, and to fail in my mission was unacceptable. So instead, I did the unthinkable."

"We snuck back to Earth, under cover of cloak, and stole the parts we needed from the Enterprise Museum."

As Char spoke, dropping a fairly big-deal detail, there was a quiet moment between the two women, and in that moment, in spite of the undercurrent of tension that Mnhei’sahe was holding onto as the revelation had a slightly unexpected reaction.

“Ha!!” The almost perpetually anxious young pilot let out a throaty, deep laugh and her somber face broke into a smile. The raw audacity and insanity of Char’s story was enough to crack Dox’s nervousness as she let out a small string of chuckles for a few seconds before eventually containing herself. “Usae… Sorry, I’m sorry. That’s just…”

As Mnhei’sahe replied, she had a smile on her face as she nodded. “Of course. I know I shouldn’t laugh… It’s serious, I know. I just… somehow… that’s the kind of thing that almost has to happen. No matter how well we plan these things, there’s always something that… requires something that just seems impossible on the face of it that you have to do anyway.”

A tear ran down her cheek as she slowly shook her head. “Or maybe I just needed that, in spite of myself. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to… I shouldn’t have done that.”

"Laughed at us stealing parts from the second starship they named Enterprise for Jim Kirk to gallivant about space?" Charybdis asked with a twinkle in her eye. "Laugh, woman. It IS funny, because you're right- it IS always something in plans like that which go wrong, that makes you scramble for options, that makes you pull off audacious improvisations, and those often don't work so well. One minute I'm burglarizing an ex-lover's starship... oh yes I did, only once, and it was so-so, truth be told," Charybdis admitted with no shame.

Smirking slightly at that last bit, Dox took a sip of tea with a knowing expression as she thought to herself, I’ll have to tell Rita she probably made the right call shooting Kirk down at the academy.

"The next minute I'm the star attraction at what people think is a publicity stunt, and trying to outwit a computer mind far more advanced than my own, to convince him that the only way to save the ship is to get her back in time.”



“As it turns out, slingshot maneuver by tractor beam is not nearly as exact as one might hope, and we overshot our mark by a wide margin. I wanted to go back a week earlier- I could avoid the other Victory easily and it would put us ahead of schedule. Instead... well... let's just say that a chroniton charged hull and too many trips around the sun produced a string of encounters that were fortunately wiped away by the machinations of one of those ancient beings with more power and pride than brains... or self-control."



Raising her eyebrows at that, Dox sighed a bit as she replied, “I’ve… met more than my share of those kinds of beings. For things that are still talked about in the academy like abstract concepts, sometimes it feels like they’re everywhere. Or maybe what my grandmother said about names has merit.”

Taking another sip of her tea, Dox thought about what she was saying, “That old Rihannsu belief that what you name something partly dictates that thing’s destiny. Our ship’s named after an ancient Earth Goddess. Now that Goddess actually lives on the ship and we’ve had more encounters with beings that call themselves gods than any ten other starships.” As she thought, she let out a chuckle. “I have lunch with one every week and one of my shipmates is engaged to another... and apparently I’m going to have to wear something extremely bizarre to be in the bridal party.”

"That does top anything I did... while I had a few cosmic beings pop up from time to time, I never had one living aboard the ship. The crew had become gods in one reality I briefly visited because of the Bulikaya Particle, but that was one of those Great Barrier things, and one of the reasons it's not recommended starships try penetrating it," Char shook her head. "As for naming, that was definitely something I considered... I was named for the original 'rock and a hard place', and that was where I spent my career, on a cosmic stage. But we did eventually manage to arrive at ch'Rihan, and I enacted my great plan. The real reason I had left most of the crew behind. Because you can fool some of the people some of the time, but you can't use cloaking technology to sneak up on Homeworld."

"I got there by surrendering, and turning myself over. As a wayward asset of the Tal'Shiar, in a starship a hundred years out of date, as a traitor to the Star Empire. You can imagine how that went," the old starship captain said casually, knowing full well that Dox had a very good idea just exactly what such a surrender would entail, and what a personal cost it would take.

Across the table, the young woman shuddered slightly at the thought as the old woman spun her tale. "I bargained for the lives of my crew to be held on the ship until they were through 'debriefing' me, to keep them alive and on the ship. The warp cores were gutted from her and they kept her as an amusement. They connected Victory to generators to maintain life support and the food processors, as Liviana maneuvered the occupying troops to keep the crew alive and intact while they turned me over to a few curious scientists."

"It was there that I met Dr. Zaheel, who realized I had an alien symbiote possessed considerable psionic strength living in my sinuses. He forcibly removed the Kolari windserpent from me, and dissected Sning. That trauma cost me my psionic might, which had grown considerably by that point, and left me psychically deadened. All that was left was the memory of torment the original Tal'Shiar scientists had installed within me to make me dangerous to meld with, in a direct link. Otherwise, I showed as a null zone, and I still do to this day." The old woman tried to speak casually of having a part of her mind and soul ripped away and her third eye burnt out of her mind But her hands still shook as she moved them under the table to hold one another, distrusting them on the table before her.

But she wasn’t fooling Dox. The young lieutenant remembered all too well how it felt to have the doors of her own mind forcibly shut by the Titan Gaia because of how it disconnected her from her telepathic bond with Mona. It took months of intense training to re-establish that bond, but having gone from sharing each other's deepest thoughts and emotions to nothing was a horrible feeling. Or lack of feeling. The red-headed Rihannsu wanted to reach over to try and comfort her friend, but also didn’t want to make what she was feeling any worse.

"But… my gamble paid off, and I was able to manipulate my guards and effect my escape with the data I had come so far and sacrificed so much for," the retired Admiral set the stage for her tale's climax. "I gleaned the history of Tal'Shiar movements for thirty years- not a full database as I'd accomplished with the Federation, but enough to foil their current plot and set them back decades, while making me aware of all the other petty little plots they would be trying for the next few decades. All I had to do was escape the planet then escape the system, in a starship with no power, save my crew in the process and make it back to a past that was a distant and seemingly unreachable land to me, adrift as I had become in the seas of time."

Looking across at the woman and her wall of memories, Dox thought of her family in the manor across the lawn. She also thought about the implications of everything else. Of the plots the Tal’Shiar were planning only nine years ago that would likely be still in play possibly in this timeline. Of this Dr. Zaheel, who likely still existed on ch’Rihan now. But she pushed aside the smaller questions as she replied, “Not exactly an easy proposition. But you’re here, now. How did you do it?”

The question wasn’t entirely academic. It had only been a couple of weeks since Dox stood on ch’Rihan, and her mind had raced with fear over what she would have done had the Captain and Rita not come to rescue her. So, insight into how someone else escaped ch’Rihan was extremely useful information to the young officer that knew all too well that the threat of being re-captured was an ever-present one. While Dox's grandmother had given Dox her blessing to leave on the promise that she would one day return of her own free will to try and help her people, Riov Rendal still thought of Dox as her apprentice and wanted the young Rihannsu noble back.

"When I was still telepathic I planted post-hypnotic commands in the minds of the guards and even my doctor, to move small pieces of the puzzle that was my escape plan about so that I could make good my departure on my own terms. I was also aided by Zaheel's nurse T'lara, who was a rebel against the regime. And of course, I had Liviana waiting for my signal, on a starship they believed was nothing but a hunk of outdated Federation junk with no power." The old woman drew herself up a bit, swelling with pride.

"What they didn't realize was that Victory packed a cloak, which of course had its own power supply- a singularity drive, of course. Which we had turned to shielding itself, with false walls in Engineering as the device cloaked itself and its power outputs. When I gave the signal, Liviana beamed me up, we dealt with the guards who had grown lax thinking that they guarded helpless primitives, and we completed the linkages to get Victory back online, to give her the chance to run to Eisn. But in my pride, I had one more stop to make." The old woman smiled wryly at the memory, and she chuckled.

"I was so headstrong and foolish, perhaps because I knew that the Hobus supernova was coming for them. My granddaughter had made me aware of the fact, of the day and time, even, to the precise second. Thus I felt I had become the harbinger of the end of ch'Rihan, and I was determined to be heard," Charybdis' voice gained strength as she rallied at the memory. “My granddaughter, the rebel of space and time, had swum the length and breadth of the ages, and there was very little she didn't know if she cared to. After all, what is a secret today is history in a hundred years' time. So the shield harmonics of the Senate were child's play to beam through if you knew their frequencies... which, of course, she did."

"I beamed into the Senate, and I'll spare you my speech. Suffice to say, I shamed them. I shamed them for what they had done in my era, what they had done to me and my family. But most of all I shamed them for letting petty, venal little people like Sela and Rikal turn the great Star Empire of noble and proud Rihannsu into the petty, backstabbing liars and cheats of the galaxy. I shamed them and warned them that Al'thindor came for them, his fiery wings already spread, prepared to devour Homeworld in his fiery embrace, washing clean our home, our world, our culture."

Staring off as she recalled the moment, Chary refocused on Dox once more. "I told them that it was likely better this way, and perhaps we would rise anew once more from the ashes, to be reborn as a better society than the decadent, selfish cowards we had become."

Listening, Dox was transfixed. The story had become a virtual mirror for the events that lead to Char’s great aunt becoming Empress over a century ago. She had heard whispered tales of Ael t’Rllaillieu as a child and learned so much more of the noble woman’s reign under her grandmother’s aegis. But to sit opposite a woman that was so like those tales filled the young Rihannsu with hope. Her people could be so much better… and there sat the proof, telling her tales. As Dox hung spellbound, Charybdis continued.

"It took my leave as the Centurions closed in, and we made our getaway. My sister, Freddie Carlow, born of my mother's tryst with the ancient astronaut from my crew, swore a blood oath to capture me, but my mother and the crew of the Feathers of Al'thindor aided our escape... at the cost of their lives. She... believed in me, in my mission... enough to sacrifice her own life. Though she died... well." The tears filled the old woman's eyes at the memory of her mother's sacrifice, to die at the hands of her own daughter in combat amongst the stars with her other daughter. Steeling herself, Charybdis raised her chin defiantly once more and nodded.



Across the table, Dox’s eyes went wide with horror at the turn of the tale. But she continued to listen, not wanting to miss a word.

"We slingshotted around Eisn, with Carlow in pursuit. But she didn't know the calculations, had not harmonized her shields, and she didn't have McCray at tactical manipulating the shield shape and harmonics as only a seasoned chrononaut and mistress of helioseismology could... one who had performed such feats hundreds of times. My sister claimed my mother and her crew's lives, but she burnt to ash trying to kill me as well... the feathers of Al'thindor indeed, eh?"

There was no mirth in the joke she tried to make, nor did it raise spirits in the room.

"Back in our own time we limped back to Federation space, the journey taking months. While Liviana McCray's calculations had held, we had not enough power for precision, or to even try again. We arrived five years after we'd left... just as Praxis exploded and the Khitomer summit was coming to pass." Reliving it in her mind, it was clear this was something which pained the old woman- her failure after having endured so much in her efforts to save the Federation. "Time travel is so often an imprecise art, after all. But Siivas had always told me that the Firebird would be when and where she was needed. That was the Deltans name for me- they called me the Firebird, because of the destiny they believed the universe held for me, and for our people."

"By the time we reached Earth, I was prepared for the battle. I routed the Puppeteer on Earth, and proved that Admiral Cartwright had been the victim of a Romulan plot, controlled by them for years. The few of my people who remained were... no." The old woman in the faded blue dress shook her head sadly.

"They chose death over failure, and I... killed them," Charybdis admitted. "I killed them all, my own people, to save Starfleet and the Federation. I dared to imagine that I might someday find a way back into the good graces of my people, but... there is no coming back from some betrayals. Thus I was an exile, forever, from Homeworld, even as I planned and worked toward finding a way to get as many offworld before the catastrophe that was destined to come about." At that, the old woman's face curled in a wry smile. "But I had my life here on Earth, with my Earthman husband and his boisterous clan, Qurka Qurg caring for my children who had grown so much in my absence. I had hope, that if I worked hard enough from this side of the Neutral Zone that perhaps I could make things better for our people in the future."

Watching, Dox’s eyes were swelled with tears that she managed to keep contained as she listened to each pained word, hanging on them and doing her best to absorb it all. “But… there was no supernova. No catastrophe. Ch’Rihan is still there, and it still needs…

“...you...”

Then the young Rihannsu thought of Char’s words some more as a phrase range through her head as her words froze in her throat, ‘If I worked hard enough from this side of the Neutral Zone that perhaps I could make things better for our people in the future.’ But in her heart, Dox knew what Char's cryptic statements from earlier meant, and that there were very few conclusions one could make, knowing that.

Everything about Char’s stories came back to the idea that these patterns were repeating. The patterns of her amazing life were happening in their own, unique ways, in Dox’s own. The parallels kept cropping up in ways that bordered on the uncanny as Dox’s mind raced over everything she had been told. After the story hung in the air between the two for a time, the Rihannsu Starfleet Lieutenant raised her head again, and her eyes met those of the woman across from her. Violet eyes that shone with all the steely resolve of the starship captain in the stories she had been telling. Eyes that looked at Mnhei'sahe Dox with purpose.

“Char… I’m not just here to learn that I’m not alone, am I?” Dox asked in a serious tone, her face quite set and purposeful.

The smile that spread across the old woman's face was a joyous one, and for a moment Dox could see that beautiful, vivacious creature of ambition, talent, and braggadocio she had once been. "No. Not entirely. And I didn't have to tell you that... a very good sign."

Rising stiffly and slowly from the chair, the aged Rihannsu levered herself up using the table, then waved for the young pilot to accompany her. "I've something for you. Something a bit unbelievable and of dubious value, but... well, I should explain."

Shuffling across the living room covered in mementos of a career spent amongst the stars, most of them dusty and cobwebbed, the old woman made her way into her simple bedchamber. A twin bed with a white woolen blanket was in the center of the room, with a chest of drawers across from the foot of the bed. Above it on the wall facing the bed was a holo of Char in her youth, standing beside a strapping, bearded dark-haired man with silvered sidewalls, with an easy grin on his face.

Standing beside them were a studious-looking young vulcanoid boy of perhaps six or seven, and a girl with a wide and bright smile, perhaps close to the same age. It was clear that it was placed there so that Char would see it as she drifted off to sleep, and again when she woke- her family, together and happy.

Making her way to the bed, Char knelt, slowly and carefully, until she could grasp the case she kept beneath the bed. Tugging at it, she waved off Dox's silent offer of help, to slide the unremarkable rectangular metallic case out from under the bed. Using the bed to steady herself, Charybdis rose back to stand on her feet again, and with a grunt, she got the case onto the bed. As she unsnapped the latches, she explained.

"In the history that I knew, ch'Rihan was to be destroyed, and our people scattered to the stars. Everything on Homeworld that day would be reduced to ash by the fury of Al'thindor, and I knew it. So I thought that I would return this to them, to give our people hope... a symbol to rally around, were I to live long enough." Unsnapping the last latch, she stared at the case.

"Liviana warned me that time is neither linear nor is it predictable, and events- even events as significant as that- are subject to change without notice. My home is chronally shielded, you see," Charybdis admitted with a sly old woman's smirk. "So I remember the death of 'Romulus' and 'Remus', and the chaos that followed it for our people as the Star Empire fractured into warlords and rebellious outposts. I was waiting for someone to rise who might light the way.”

“I was still waiting when it all changed, and our world was not destroyed. Time changed course, and we were none the poorer for it. Ch'Rihan still turns, and Eisn still shines upon her. But that just means that it's business as usual for the Tal'Shiar, and our people still lack mnhei'sahe," Charybdis shook her head, then opened the case.

"This is a relic of never was, Mnhei'sahe Dox. When I spoke those words in the Senate, and when I took my leave, I knew nothing of that place would survive. So I sought to cheat fate, and save a piece of our honor for the future, as my great aunt had done before me." Reaching into the case, the old woman reverently picked up the contents, placing it flat on her palms then holding it out reverently for the young pilot to see.

A sword.

A sword of lightly curved metal in a black, maithe wood sheath with a Sardonyx-wood inlay and a rough, black kahs-hir steel hilt crafted to accommodate both hands. A sword whose legendary craftsmanship was clear, even to Dox, who was no expert.

A sword that looked somehow very familiar from those lessons her grandmother had taught her, and near-identical to the replica blade that Riov Renal wore on her hip.

"Forged by the Vulcan swordsmith S'harien in the ways of the old Vulcan smiths before the time of the sundering, it was the only one of the three that S'task still possessed when we arrived on Homeworld. My great aunt stole it, to show the cowards of my day that they lacked honor, and to eventually return it to the Empty Chair. I thought..." the old woman shook her head.

"I thought I was saving it for our people. To reunite them, someday... stolen from the future and hidden in the past, to one day be returned to our people to light their darkest hour. But that day never was, and now, never will be. This is not the Sword of S'task... it is just a mockery of my failure, of my hubris, and of a timeline that is simply fiction, now." Tears ran freely down the old woman's face as she looked from the sword to the young woman with whom she had shared her life's tale.

"I want you to have it... as a keepsake. It is not the symbol that it should have been, and in the end, all I managed was to reduce it to a copy- a replica, an analogous possibility of the original. But I think you understand what it was supposed to represent, and you... you are the future, Mnhei'sahe Dox." There was a pleading note in the old woman's voice as she stepped forward slightly, the sword across her palms. "My days are done. I am old, and my plan to save our people from themselves... failed. But you... you are only at the beginning of your time, and you still have a chance to make a difference. So... take it." Still weeping, the old woman offered the blade that should not exist, yet did, to the woman before her who had cheated fate.

While Char insisted that the sword was but a temporal copy, Dox’s eyes went wide as she looked at it in the old admiral’s hands.

"This is your time, so please... I beg of you... take the sword- a gift, from one generation to the next. It doesn't obligate you to become the savior of our people, and I don't expect you to lead a rebellion. If I gave it to my granddaughter, it would be just another artifact in her collection, and she already has plenty of trinkets and curiosities," the old captain chuckled.

Hands at her side, clammy and trembling, Dox couldn’t believe what she was being shown. What she was being offered.

"Just go where the universe takes you, do what needs to be done... but I ask that you carry this in your heart. Let this be a reminder to you of what could be, and what might yet be... yet never forget that arrogance may be your downfall, as it was mine. Because all of your plans and schemes may come to naught." Smiling, the wizened old pioneer lifted the sword a bit higher, offering it hopefully to the next generation of young diplomats.

Looking into the pleading, hopeful eyes of the elder Rihannsu Admiral, Mnhei’sahe’s own eyes were shining and wet with tears of her own. Tears of disbelief, and fear, and compassion. Slowly, she reached for the sword. Her hand shook as she did and her mind raced with every reason she could think of as to why this all seemed insane to the young woman.

Despite what Char had said, Mnhei’sahe knew better. This was the sword of S’task. The Honor blade of the Rihannsu Star Empire. A symbol that sat in S’task’s empty chair in the senate for over twenty-three hundred years. And while a temporal duplicate sat there still, that fact didn’t make this sword any less real to the young woman any more than Rita Paris, Sonak or Az’Prel were to her for their own convoluted origins.

Hovering above the rough black handle, Mnhei’sahe’s hand seemed frozen in space and time. She didn’t know how to do what was being asked of her. So many fates had been laid before the young woman in the span of but a couple of months. So many paths chosen for her that she had to choose from. But this was a burden, somehow, far greater than the rest. And the weight of it hit her hard in her side as she felt her heart grow heavy. With weakness in her voice, she stuttered. “Why? Why me? I… I... don't... I don't deserve…

But even as the weak words fell from her trembling lips, Mnhei'sahe knew she was lying to herself. She knew exactly why she was being offered this weighty boon. It was at the very heart of everything Char had been trying to say with her amazing stories, and as she spoke again, her voice grew just a bit stronger.

"It's... because I'm afraid of it, isn't it? Because I don't want it. I don't want the responsibility or the burden. But you already know that, don't you? You knew when you start talking to me, that I'll take it because it has to be done. Because it's the choice between doing nothing and something. And that's not a choice at all. Go where the universe takes me, do what needs to be done."

There was a sadness in the young pilot's eyes as she brought her hand down over the handle and felt it's cold stone grip. A reservation to a fate she had not sought. A fate she did not believe she deserved, yet knew she had to accept, in spite of herself.

"Because you are a hero, Mnhei'sahe Dox. All the best heroes are hesitant because those who rush in are fools, and those who refuse to answer are cowards, and you are neither. But you weep when your heart is touched... and we are all the sum of our tears. Too little and the ground is not fertile, and nothing can grow there. Too much, the best of us is washed away. This does not destin you to be the savior of the Rihannsu. It will just serve as a reminder to you too, I hope, do as I said. Be noble, be true, but be not too proud, lest it all come to naught." The old starfarer sat down on the edge of the bed, as if a great weight had been lifted from her, and she found herself a bit lightheaded at the sensation. In doing so, her hands dropped away from the sword, leaving the choice to Dox to support the artifact, or to drop it.

Gripping the sheathed blade quickly with both hands, any concerns Char might have of the young woman being too proud were momentarily swept aside as, without another thought of the sword’s importance, Dox simply placed it gently on the end of the bed to move quickly to her elder’s aid. At that moment, it stopped being ‘THE’ sword and just became a sword. And a sword that needed to be set aside for a more important reason, as the nervous pilot leaned over with an anxious expression of concern for her friend. “Char? Are you okay?”

Resting a hand on Char’s own, Mnhei’sahe leaned over and spoke softly though her heart was feeling crushed under the weight of what she knew was coming. “Can… can I get you anything?”

Any answer the elderly adventurer might have expressed was lost, as a bar of white light shone from the base of the doorway, then slid upward to create a rectangular hole in reality- out of which stepped a rather buxom and brazen bronzed bombshell. Copper hair gathered back and away revealed long, tapering, pointy ears not dissimilar to the ones sported by Charybdis. But this was clearly a woman in her prime, who had just stepped out of a doorway in reality. Which promptly slid shut, top to bottom, behind her.

"You can't, no. But I can," she offered, silvery eyes looking Dox over critically; taking in the scene, the sword, and the visitor. Stepping over, she held out her hand, which the old matron took in both her own with a weary smile.

Turning in surprise, Dox's hand immediately went to the hilt of the sword, unsure of what was happening for but a split second, before the pieces began falling into place, as she recognized the woman from Char's stories. The granddaughter she had spoken of- Liviana McCray, the rebel chrononaut.

"It's time, isn't it, Liviana?" Chary asked, and the alien beauty nodded.

"I promised you one more trip, Grandmama. I've never broken a promise to you, have I?" the woman smiled, one of those smiles that could light up a room. But it was clear that was a sadness in her eyes, and that the smile was a bit forced.

Watching, Dox moved her hand away from the sword again and noticed the slightly forced smile along with the woman's somewhat prickly posture towards her. But she was too curious to challenge it in the moment, and let the family speak uninterrupted.

"No... in all of space and time, you've never broken a single promise to me, Livi. Is Rain coming?" the old woman asked, shifting her weight and rising slowly to her feet.

There was only a slight pause, and a downward cast to the eyes of the menace to space and time known as Liviana McCray. "No, Grandmama. Not this trip, she... she couldn't. I'm sorry."

"Then let us bring your Lieutenant Dox, shall we?" Charybdis asked, seemingly ignoring the reaction. "I think she might appreciate it."

Raising an eyebrow, Dox caught the unusual wording Char had used of 'your' and, filing it away, she turned towards the new arrival with a questioning stare.

As the granddaughter of the Rihannsu elder made eye contact with Dox, there was a flash of anger in her eyes, or perhaps resentment- it was hard to tell. But the smile slid into place easily, one that a used shuttle salesman would use, and she shrugged, making the low-cut bodysuit she wore threatened to spill her overabundant bosom out into the universe. But somehow the garment held on, and she returned her gaze back to the progenitor of her line.

"If she'd like to come along on an illegal time travel jaunt using forbidden technology to perform a task that would get her court-martialed... then sure, she's welcome to come along. If that's what you want, Grandmama," Liviana finished, her odd, silvery pale blue eyes seeking those of her grand dam. As for the wizened old woman herself, she turned to Dox, a smile on her lips and a twinkle of mischief in her eye.

"What do you say, Mnhei'sahe? One little expedition together?" She said the words casually, but there was hope in the old woman's nebulous violet eyes, and it was clear she wanted the young pilot to accompany them, wherever they were going.

In the moment Dox couldn't be sure which she was feeling more: relief that this expected visitor wasn't yet Death herself, as she feared. Or concern over already knowing what her reaction was going to be.

As she looked into Char's hopeful eyes, the young pilot who didn't know how to say no if she felt she was needed, thought hard for a moment. She thought of Captain Telvan's words of warning, that she should hope to never have to encounter the DTI- and she realized that she was about to give such a meeting a very real cause to come to pass. She thought of Char’s own misadventures in time. But she also thought that whatever this was, it was likely a big part of why the elder Rihannsu wanted to meet her. Char knew this was going to happen, and so wanted Dox here, today, to go with her. And the need in Char’s eyes emphasized that Dox knew what she had to do. "Why do I suspect that you already know that I'm not going to turn you down, Admiral?"

"Because someone along the way taught you to never resist the call of adventure?" the old woman chuckled, releasing one hand from her granddaughter's and taking Mnhe'sahe's hand in her own. "Don't worry- with a little luck, no one will find out. We'll be unobserved, Liviana?"

"Aye, Gran. I'll keep us slightly out of phase with the local timestream, and we'll just be observers, " Liviana replied, a holographic screen springing into existence in this air before her. Tapping at it with one hand, she ran through a menu or two quicker than Dox could grasp the alien symbols onscreen, although she noticed that it looked like a form of LCARS. In the corner where the registry that tended to be present on ship's display screens, she could make out the reversed word Constellation 7. "The ghosts might notice us, but the locals will not. Little trick from the Time Corps we used to use to observe history without disrupting it..."

Ghosts?’ Dox thought to herself as she raised an eyebrow.

At that, a meter wide band of light appeared on the ground before them, which then rose to two meters tall, creating a rectangular hole in space and time, through which Liviana stepped halfway through, helping her aged ancestor to follow her, even as the old woman's hand gripped Dox's with a surprising strength, even if the hand was shaking. Looking into the light of the displacement portal, the old woman's eyes shone with tears and anticipation as she shuffled into it, tugging the next generation of heroine behind her.

Stepping through right behind Char, her hand still in the Elder hero’s own, Mnhei’sahe blinked a moment as the blinding light of the portal disoriented her. But the disorientation passed quickly enough for the pilot, who had begun to become used to being in odd places doing inexplicable things found herself somewhere beyond the norm to be sure.

As they emerged on the other side, they were no longer in Char's small country cottage, but on a stonework bridge, leading to an ancient castle. The lights were bright inside it, and the flickering light of bonfires could be seen from here, as they had arrived just inside the castle entry. Ahead was music and laughter, the sounds of revelry- clearly a party of some sort, as people bustled by and through them, a rather unusual sensation. Pennants hung from the ramparts, snapping in the cold evening breeze. The gates to the castle stood open as did every door. Music was audible the moment that they stepped through. The hillsides were awash with rich coppers and golds as well as deeper purples and greens, there was a fine edge of frost around the dark waters of the loch. The crisp autumn air carried the aroma of wood smoke and cooking food.

"Eilean Donnan, seat of Clan McCray... the party... this was our last night on Earth, before we launched Victory," the old woman's eyes went wide at the realization. Apparently, the destination had been a surprise to her, but clearly not an unwelcome one.



To Be Continued...

 

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