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DAY 06: First Circle of Hell [1535 hrs.]

[Sar-unga Neleo | Hallway | USS Theurgy | Day 06] Attn. Lucan

The doors to Miles's quarters shut behind her with all the calmness that Sar-unga did not have. As soon as they were closed, she turned right around and gave the doors a good, rage-filled kick.
"And a solid FUCK YOU too!" She screamed, "Fuck you!"

This was not her mother's heartbreak. Hell, this wasn't even Sar-unga's normal heartbreak. She'd dumped and been dumped many times in her long life, but none of them felt like this. Her shoulders heaved, her spine tingled, she felt her tail between her legs, her whole body almost shaking. There was no sadness, no rage. She wasn't even capable of feeling right now. She heard her blood rush through her ears and she heard her own intrusive thoughts becoming louder and louder.

This was not planned. She and Miles were going to stick around as fuckbuddies for the rest of their lives. Maybe even more. He wasn't supposed to tell her that he was 'concerned about her' and he wasn't supposed to say that he 'thought we needed a break'. Bullshit, bullshit, all of it. She was fine. She wasn't a broken victim. She wasn't broken. She wasn't.

She realized she had been walking, though she didn't know where she was going. His voice was in her head, mocking her. She was irrational. Emotional. Impulsive. She wasn't quite right. She needed help. Was this his voice or hers? Was she thinking all this?

She stopped, right in the middle of the hallway. A crewman had to walk around her to get where he was going. She knew, but the force of her realization meant she could not move until she absorbed it all in. Miles wasn't the one to blame here. He was just responding to what he saw, and all he saw was a rape victim. She was not a victim though. Not at all.

No, this wasn't Miles's fault. She knew whose fault this really was.

Just as pure, shaking rage overtook her, she finally, finally heard her little voice, the voice of sanity override her thoughts. She needed to cool off. She needed to let off steam. This was dangerous. She should head to the gym, like she always does in times of stress.

She hoped it would work this time.
[Security Office]

The path to the gym was so familiar to her that her legs went on autopilot while her mind spun. Her intrusive thoughts were so loud she thought they resembled voices, the voices of the dead. You're worthless. You're nothing. You don't exist. To anyone else, this would be an indication of mental illness. To the Asurian, this was just a part of life. These voices, the images of Zaraq suffering, in agony, the idea that she could hurt him, she could make his life hell. Beyond hell.
He doesn't deserve death. Make him suffer. Make him beg. The thoughts chanted to the wild beat of her heart, the roaring rush of her lungs taking in and forcing out air. What are you thinking, you're going mad! You can't do that!

She had already entered the office and passed the aide station. She was aware she must look quite pissed off. She hoped she made the on-duty officers afraid. Fear was control. Control was power. This is insane, this is absolutely insane! You just need to calm down, calm down! Stop thinking about him, stop thinking about torture! You're better than this!

Violent images flashed in her vision, the day Zaraq ruined everything. She wanted so bad to do something. If she came in and worked out and left like she usually did, Miles would still have dumped her. She'd still have nightmares. She'd still have more emotions than a hyperactive betazoid. She'd still be unlovable. Filthy. Tainted. All his fault, all his fault. Your fault, your fault! This will all go away when I'm done working out. Then my mind will be clear again. Please let my mind be clear again.

She had gone through the motions of  travel so automatically that it startled her to realize she had no memory of what happened between the aide's desk and here. She was in workout clothes. It clung to her body and let her skin breathe. That was alright, she could accept that. She clenched her fists, her white hands going even whiter with the force, and stepped into the gym. Her eyes scanned the gym for other people. She hoped she was alone.

Re: DAY 06: First Circle of Hell [1535 hrs.]

Reply #1 –
[ Zaraq | Security Centre | Gym ] Attn: FollowTomorrow

At the end of his shift, seeking the opportunity to be alone, Zaraq had decided to forego using the Upper Gymnasium in favour of the smaller one inside the Theurgy's security area. it had lockers and everything he needed, the privacy included because of the time of the day. He had not donned Starfleet issue exercise wear, the blue shorts and shirt not available in his size - the largest kind ripping across his back and arms when he had tried to use them years ago. Instead, he wore black training gear, trousers and a tank top, and he had begun his gym session with lifting weights.

It was when he did the bench press that the sliding doors opened, and he turned his bald head to see whom had entered - the promise of actually being alone ruined.

He paused in his repetitions when he saw whom it was, and the way she looked at him. As a Klingon warrior, his upper lip twitched in impulse to fight the threat. Yet he after a moment of consideration, and resignation to the fact that Cardamone had every reason to be angry with him - having defiled her honour in the fashion he had during the mutiny. He still had sessions with Hayden O'Connor regarding his actions under T'Rena's influence, and one of the worst things was how he had betrayed his fellow security officer from the Harbinger. The white-haired human who had turned out to be no more human than he was, and whom his eyes had feasted upon for many months without him saying anything.

Had she come to reclaim her honour? He had no right to deny it from her. Slowly, he rose from the bench with the heavy dumbbells in his massive hands - turning against her. His brow was beaded in sweat, but the stare from underneath his thick eyebrows was steady. It seemed that while she had ignored his very presence on the day they raided the Black Opal, she was acknowledging him now, so he spoke to her  - breath still laboured after the sets he had finished.

"So, you are not ignoring me now?" he rasped in his deep voice. Then he dropped the dumbbells, one hundred kilogram each hitting the floor. No longer could he throw them at her. A sign of surrender. "Do you have words for me?"

Re: DAY 06: First Circle of Hell [1535 hrs.]

Reply #2 –
The whole breakup thing with Miles, that wasn't supposed to happen. She's established this with the universe. Now this, finding Zaraq, getting close enough to him to see the beads of sweat shine off his ugly little bald head---this was really not supposed to happen. She could almost let herself believe in fate or divine intervention at this string of unhappy circumstances.

She stood ramrod straight, her face losing the last of its color. She was aware she probably looked like she wanted to punch him in the face, which might explain why he seemed stand-offish. It didn't excuse anything. Her stomach roiled, she felt hot bile rise into her chest. Her tight clothing made her feel naked and vulnerable and angry, but she made no move to cover herself. That would be showing weakness.

He got up. She felt apprehension rise until it reached a boiling point. If he came any closer, she had the skills to defend herself. God what she wouldn't do for her Sindt right now. Or her rifle. Her tail was straight up in the air, so were the hairs on her neck.

He dropped his weights. She acknowledged it was supposed to be a sign of surrender, but the loud sound they made as they hit the floor only reminded her that he was stronger than her. Her tail twitched at the heavy sound.

"Yeah, I have words. Get out of the gym, it's mine. And get off the ship too, while you're at it, there's an airlock down the hall from here." Her voice wavered. She hated it. She hated everything. It was all this man's fault, everything in her life that had gone wrong from that day on happened because of him. And here he was standing around, breathing, as if he deserved those luxuries.

Re: DAY 06: First Circle of Hell [1535 hrs.]

Reply #3 –
Zaraq heard Dyan speak, and at first he believed she would just lay a claim to the gym at the given hour, and as much he could have granted her willingly - swallowing his Klingon pride for sake of her honour.

Yet when she asked him to take his own life, he was reminded about what he had almost done after the mutiny. Of sitting there in his quarters with a hand phaser on the side table. He had put the muzzle to his own head, and then... Hayden O'Connor had come, and she had convinced him to fight yet another battle. A battle to restore his own honour, or at least doing so for his own sake. She claimed he had no guilt, that his mind had been compromised so there was no honour lost from the moment T'Rena laid her hand on his face.

Yet as he faced the fierce Asurian in the gym, it was quite plain that the facts did not mend everything broken. The facts were mere excuses for him, because Dyan's wounds would not mend so easily.

"I made a promise not to kill myself," he grated, turning away from her, breathing through his nostrils. His thick, dark eyebrows were drawn down over his eyes, searching for words that would somehow help Dyan. There were none, of course, but some things were better said than others. "I was about to kill myself in shame after my mind was set right again, but Counsellor O'Connor forbade me that act. She said I would forfeit the battle, surrender my Klingon honour as if it meant naught. She has even said that if I would take my own life... the truth about my actions would gradually come to eat at my victims and their families. She said that since I am innocent, you and the rest would come to realise I was too, and regret my fate... however remote in time such might be."

He looked around, not meaning any disrespect by looking upon her physique, since that would be quite ill timed. "I will gladly leave, if that brings you comfort... Yet I have sworn to remain alive, for better or worse."

Re: DAY 06: First Circle of Hell [1535 hrs.]

Reply #4 –
She found it hard to control herself. Federation decorum did not look very kindly upon fighting out all your personal matters the way Asurian culture did. If only she were back home. She'd get her family together and jump the poor Klingon like a discount mafia. Or maybe she could get the whole family here, borrow a few rifles and jump the poor Klingon like a real mafia. Her voice shook, not with fear, but with tightly controlled rage.

"You never had honor. You turned too easy. You didn't even put up a fight. It's--It's like you wanted this. And you wanted this for a long time before it ever happened. The fact that you fell so easily to some traitor shows me you never had the mettle of honor in you in the first place." She stepped forward, pointing at Zaraq, but her eyes didn't focus on him. They seemed to be on a point very far behind him. It felt like she was speaking to a concept, not a person.

"You may have the counselor fooled, but don't take me for the sort of idiot she is. You don't deserve to be here right now. You don't even really deserve death." Her hand shook, so she stopped pointing and made a wide flourish. She realized she was contradicting herself, having just told him to go kill himself and now saying he doesn't deserve that. She didn't think about it too hard. "You don't even deserve hell. You deserve something much worse."

That said, though Dyan was very convinced that her thoughts were correct, she had no way of knowing, and until she lets herself think about what happened, she may never know. All she wanted to think about was feeling better, and the only way she could see to do that is through vengeance.

Re: DAY 06: First Circle of Hell [1535 hrs.]

Reply #5 –
Zaraq stood there, forbidding his Klingon temper to take over. He had regrets, shame prevalent in his duties, rage for being a victim to the puny Vulcan woman lingering with every thought about what he had done.

"Just because I fancied you did not mean I would ravage you," he barked, because that was the truth and he stood by it. "I am the same as I was before, and if you challenge the honour I hold as a Klingon, then you speak ill of the untainted. Whether or not I turned easy is not for you to say, because you - if anyone - know what the touch of our late First Officer could do."

Once he had begun to counter her arguments, he could not stop there. It was defensive, and perhaps offensive towards Cadamone, but it was the truth as he knew it. "The Vulcan warped your mind on the bridge, and when you were thrown into the Brig, you were not fully there. You saw images of your past, thought Riptor and I were some disgraced Asurian family, and you did not even recognise that Vulpinian. That Miles Renard, someone whom you had spread your legs for. You almost killed him in that holding cell, so dare not come with accusations towards me when you know the power T'Rena held over our minds!"

Zaraq did not enjoy the spreading of hearsay, but that did not mean he hadn't heard of the tryst between the Asuiran and the squad leader of the Lone Wolves. He was breathing hard through his nose, upper lip curled, and his large hands massive fists by his sides. "I deeply regret what I did to you, despite how it was not truly me!"

Re: DAY 06: First Circle of Hell [1535 hrs.]

Reply #6 –
At some point during Zaraq's counter-argument, she was no longer thinking very hard about what she was saying. She had emotions and that was about it. If she were a little more lucid, she'd recognize that as a giant red flag. What a shame.

"You never had honor! You fancied me, whatever the hell that's supposed to mean, and all it took was a little nudge from some weak-ass Vulcan and boom. That was it! At least I had the strength to fight back at what she wanted me to do, that's why I was hallucinating in the first place--and don't remind me about Miles. If I had my way I'd still kill him today."

She was not actually about to kill Miles. As far ass he knew, everything terrible that happened today was Zaraq's fault, not Miles's. Sure, the Vulpinian was not on her metaphorical friend list anymore, but he didn't deserve death. However the tone of her voice suggested it was serious, because in this very instant it felt serious. If Miles walked in, she wasn't too sure she could stop herself from giving him a swift, sterilizing kick to the reproductive organs.

"To compare what I did to you three was nothing. Scars heal--we have dermal regenerators for a reason. But you--" She snarled, her voice going low, "You don't know what it's like. Every time I go to sleep, I find a quiet moment, every time I smell sweat, walk near that cell, every time I even so much as think about loving a man, life stops. Everything has changed and it'll never, ever go back. You think you can just fix all this because you have regret?! Like the most useless emotion in your repertoire is something to be proud of?! Oh, so great, you regret what you did. I guess you're a good person now, huh?! Is that what they convinced you? Your soul's all clean and you won't do it again.

Look at you right now." Her voice raised again, it had been over the past few sentences. She gestured at Zaraq. "You want to kick my ass, all because I'm upset I got raped."

"Go on then, do it!" She crossed her arms and took a wider stance. She challenged him and fully intended to fight back if he took her up on it. "Beat the shit out of me. Show everyone on this ship. Show them you're a violent, unstable brute. Maybe it'll take another 'incident' for our higher ups to learn what I already know and what you already said. You haven't changed a damn bit."

Re: DAY 06: First Circle of Hell [1535 hrs.]

Reply #7 –
Zaraq knew violence was not the answer, neither to restore his own honour in Cardamone's eyes, nor cast of the shame he felt for his defeat against the Vulcan's mind-tricks. Still, it was compelling, this invitation that the Asurian gave him. To have him fight for recognition was one thing, triggered as he was by her lack of understanding, but fighting Cardamone would not regain his honour in any sense. He would merely make it worse. So, in lack of an adequate solution, he was left with his building rage. He wanted to howl, roar from the very depth of his soul into her face, yet little good would it do him. Sense, it seemed, stayed with him like a decease, muddling the waters and making things more difficult than they had a right to be.

"So what will you have me do then?" he snapped, and paced the gym like a predator bereft of opening for lounging the prey - the solution eluding him. "I am not the rapist you accuse me to be, despite how the shame still lingers because of my memories of the event. Imagine yourself committing atrocious acts, but knowing you were not the same as you are! Of course I regret it. Of course I seek to ask your forgiveness, even if it is not in your heart to give it. Whether or not you wish to hear it, only a spineless Targ would not say it nonetheless!"

With those memories in mind, he could tell her he remembered how wet her sex was - how aroused she was and ready for his ridged girth to press into her - but he would not. In part, he believed that she might hold some shame herself in that particular regard, but bringing it up would just add to the idea that he was a monster. An idea she seemed bent on making true, perhaps - in part - because she had enjoyed it so. "If you will have me leave, I will, yet do not think I will yield my life to you. Nor will I yield the areas here in the Security Center to you, for the simple reason that we share duties. Remember, if you will, that I decided to step down as Master-at-Arms because of what T'Rena made me do, but I will not step away from my duties completely. Abandoning the mission would not benefit anyone, not even you."

Again, he repeated his question. "What will you have me do to make those memories of yours fade? Is it truly a fight you want, for your own sake and not to prove me something I am not?"

Re: DAY 06: First Circle of Hell [1535 hrs.]

Reply #8 –
Zaraq, for all his flaws, was really terribly intelligent. He was correct, there was nothing he could have done to fight the mind meld, untrained as he was, and the only reason the Asurian was able to resist was because Asurian neurology was Fucked Up, to say the least. There was nothing anyone could have done to prevent this, and though Zaraq was innocent, his guilt was a mark of true character on his part, and both he and Sar-unga deserved to move on from such trauma.

None of these thoughts were present in Sar-unga's mind, sadly. They may have, but all she thought about was how Baldy over there was stubborn, clinging to what she thought were lies. But, she thought, he had a point. He could not relieve her memories. He could not fix her. She stood where she was, without reply. She couldn't be fixed.

But she could feel better.

"Fine." She spoke, her voice was low and could be considered a growl if it wasn't so feminine. "You wont' fight then. Have it your way. Stay on the Theurgy. Keep living your life, like nothing ever happened." She straightened herself out, and decided that for now, she would allow the battle to be lost and find someplace else to work out. It was only the beginning of a war, after all.

"But don't think for a moment things are going to be all rainbows and sunshine just because you go to therapy now and everyone else thinks you're just some poor, manipulated fool to be pitied. Because I know what you are, and I won't let you live it down."  She started to step towards the door, then span around and sped up the pace. If Zaraq had any more to say she didn't want to hear it. She had things to think about. Plans to cook up.

Re: DAY 06: First Circle of Hell [1535 hrs.]

Reply #9 –
In the lingering silence after Zaraq spoke, they glared at each other - as if they had locked bat'leths in battle.

In the end, it was Dyan who acquiesced his point, at least to a degree. She did not force the issue of him leaving and ceding the training facility to her, or the other demands she'd made. Still, she made her threats, and continued with her accusations - claiming still that he was of no honour. She said she knew what he was, which made him snarl. The hypocrisy of the rankling statement making him bare his teeth as she sought to flee the battle. To her retreating back, he growled, fists cracking loudly as he closed them into fists.

"That's rich coming from you, 'Cardamone'," he barked towards the back of her head. "Stop right there, Petty Officer, that's an order!"

Outranking the Asurian, he hoped that the serrated lash of his voice would cut to her bone - making her stop in her tracks. He might have defiled her whilst under the influence of a Vulcan, but the white-haired alien would have to think twice about her words. "You persist in questioning my honour. You, who made us all think you were human. You claim you know 'what I am', while you have lied to us all since you entered Starfleet. Disgracing yourself with falsehood about who you are!"

His upper lip curled, and he stepped up beside her - his deep voice filling the room with its reverberation. "Do you think it would pass by unnoticed, how you lied and deceived everyone - secretly reporting everything you've learned about us to your Asurian superiors? Do you really think it is me some of the guards think are a liability? PetaQ! You should take a look in the mirror, Petty Officer Cardamone - or 'Neleo' - before you judge the people around you. Your mind was your own when you betrayed your comrades-in-arms... I fail to see why a spy would be released from the Brig at all. I wonder, what did you offer the Captain in exchange for your freedom?"

He forcibly had to stop himself there, wanting to drive the Daqtagh's edge of his words into her heart further by reminding her how wet she had been when he pushed inside her, but he knew that it was the border he mustn't cross - the mercy he had to show lest he would dishonour himself as well. It sufficed, he reckoned, that he insinuated something along those lines when it came to the captain's odd sense of mercy.

Re: DAY 06: First Circle of Hell [1535 hrs.]

Reply #10 –
Quick movements, the looming figure, displays of aggression, all these things that switched on her basic instincts came from Zaraq. A sweaty, musky, smelly Zaraq. The smell alone was all it took, and she was no longer in the gym. Her mind forced her to re-watch, re-feel the entire ordeal. To an outsider, it looked as if she had stopped at the exact moment Zaraq ordered her to. The only sign that she was not necessarily paying attention was the thousand yard stare.

She only began to fade back into the situation mid-way into the Klingon's speech. Something about her, her Asurian nature, she lied--which lie is he upset about again? She'd told many. All of them were justified, of course, or else she wouldn't have told them. Her look finally settled into one of hatred, disgust, a smug sense of superiority that one would find absolutely detestable.
"And yet I'm still more honorable than you'll ever be."

Yes, he was attacking her. He hated her guts. He was starting to feel about her the way she felt about him. And he'd hate him even more when her own people came to save the day.

She began to move again. Though she had some control over the situation, she could feel her flashbacks raring up in the back of her mind again. She was not going to stick around to suffer in front of Zaraq.

Re: DAY 06: First Circle of Hell [1535 hrs.]

Reply #11 –
Oh, how close at hand the ire was, so easy to grasp. Treacherously so, since Zaraq knew he couldn't allow himself the satisfaction of striking down the Asurian. He had been forced into exile, and adapted to the Federation rules and regulations. He knew what it meant to throw the regulations aside, so while Cardamone - again - said he had less honour than her, it was all he could do not to strike her down. He quelled the impulse at great difficulty, chastising himself for not holding to her perspective;the perspective of the plight she'd suffered. The defilement caused her because of what their former First Officer had done to him.

Was it a plight, though, when she had been so wet and ready when he thrust himself inside her? Impulse begot recklessness, and since she was leaving, he had only one window of opportunity to challenge her claim. He did not wish to voice his defence by means of shaming her, yet he was Klingon, and for his species, mating was violent. He might have erred in killing Winterbourne, and many other things, but the circumstances in the interrogation room had been much akin to normal Klingon mating - subduing Cardamone not such a henious act. Then again, perhaps he was just making excuses for his ire to have an outlet.

"You bleated as a chemvaH, and you were as wet as a drowned boqrat," he said in a low voice behind her back before the sliding doors opened to the corridor, "That is what shames you, and makes you push that shame unto me. T'Rena is dead, so I am all you have left. Fear not, jajlo' Qa', for I will not tell a soul how you enjoyed me."

Saying this, Zaraq spared her his stare, and turned his back on her - about to return to his training.

chemvaH = Klingon animal. Saying goes that Klingon women make noises like a chemvaH when they want to show their interest for a man.
boqrat = Klingon animal. it's liver can be eaten.
jajlo' Qa' = A very loud animal, though not a bird, crows mornings like a rooster

Re: DAY 06: First Circle of Hell [1535 hrs.]

Reply #12 –
Zaraq's words hurt. They hurt deep, on a level that her native language did not have the vocabulary to express, and so she did not fully understand how deeply it hurt. She didn't remember any of those parts. All she remembers was pain, her own screaming, a disgusting smell, the interrogation room that she can no longer go into. He could've been right for all she knew. Zaraq is not the one to lie.

But, as in war, she had to lose a battle to win. She would allow Zaraq the fleeting sense of victory, just this once. She knew he was returning to his training. He might feel smug a while. "That'll teach her to defy me," sort of emotion. He'll enjoy himself a while, while Sar-unga makes her next move.

She'll find someone, maybe even many people, someone to confide in. All those hurts, she'll pour them on other people. From crewmembers she's had lunch with before, to any sympathetic superior. Maybe even Zaraq's counselor. They'll all learn how evil, twisted he is. She'll turn them all against him, until he has no one...

Yes, she thought, the pain subsiding. Hell would be a nice vacation compared to what she's going to make Zaraq go through.
 
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