Path: csiph.com!aioe.org!mezdHqKmJcOOIRuLkBn68g.user.46.165.242.75.POSTED!not-for-mail From: Philippe de la Matraque Newsgroups: alt.startrek.creative Subject: ENT WIP: Finding Home 11a/? R/S [R] Date: Tue, 11 Oct 2022 22:34:30 -0500 Organization: Aioe.org NNTP Server Message-ID: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Injection-Info: gioia.aioe.org; logging-data="2503"; posting-host="mezdHqKmJcOOIRuLkBn68g.user.gioia.aioe.org"; mail-complaints-to="abuse@aioe.org"; User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:91.0) Gecko/20100101 Thunderbird/91.5.0 Content-Language: en-US X-Notice: Filtered by postfilter v. 0.9.2 Xref: csiph.com alt.startrek.creative:107 Title: Finding Home Author: Philippe de la Matraque Part: 11a/? Series: ENT Rating: R (for discussion of violence and torture) Pairing: R/S light Archive: Yes to Trekiverse.org, otherwise, please ask. Contact: pdelamatraque@gmail.com Web: http://gabrielle.sytes.net/Trek/stories/findinghome1.html Summary: Sequel to Alien Us. Malcolm Reed barely survived to see to be reunited with Hoshi Sato. But things have taken a downturn and now he needs a new heart and a way to heal. Author's note: I deliberately use italics like this *in text** just because it makes conversion to HTML so much easier. Star Trek: Enterprise Finding Home by Philippe de la Matraque Sequel to *Alien Us** Chapter Eleven They stayed in the park until evening. Malcolm now knew the older man was Trip's father. He and Miguel had asked about Madeline, but Malcolm hadn't felt up to talking further. They didn't pry. They talked more about their Lizzie and about Albert and Owen. Malcolm had dozed off before lunch. Then he and Trevon had separated again. The day was about Madeline though, and Trevon let Malcolm share whatever memories he wanted. Malcolm was exhausted as they wheeled him back to the house. It was the first time I'd really seen it. It was a one-story ranch style, with brick siding. The older woman he'd met before, Trip's mother, came out to greet them. And she said they had a surprise for him. Trevon must have known what it was, because he helped him back to his room and turned him toward the bathroom. Malcolm felt his chest tighten. He could be in there. But only so far. The toilet and the sink. He couldn't go any further. "Your friend, Trip, asked a favor of Starfleet Research and Development," Trevon said. "You have been chosen to beta test this new shower." Malcolm found it hard to breathe. "It's safe, Malcolm," Trevon assured him. "You won't drown. You won't even get wet." He gently pushed and Malcolm had no choice but to go in. "It works by sound waves." Malcolm couldn't see a shower head. There was a drain in the floor, though. There were bars all around and a lower set on each side at the back where there was a bench built into the wall. *No water,** he told himself. Trevon sat him on the bench. "No need to even disrobe, though you could get a deeper clean if you did. Just push this button." He pointed to a spot between the upper and lower bars on Malcolm's left. He stepped back and closed Malcolm inside. *No water, just sounds.** Malcom's hand shook as he reached for the button. At first, nothing happened. Then he heard something, a low, whooshing sound. As it grew louder, there was a vibration through the bench and a brush of air. The whooshing began to pulsate. He could feel it in his ear drums. But there was no water. "Arms up," Trevon said, from outside the shower. Malcolm put his hands on the bars. They were warm. If Father was waiting in the room past Trevon, Malcolm couldn't hear him. The pulsing sound waves drowned out any but the closest words. White noise. The wind then died down, the pulsing stopped, and the whooshing went away. Trevon opened the door. Malcolm didn't rise anyway. He needed Trevon to leave. There was another part of the bathroom he needed. "You can do this anytime," Trevon said. "Do you need assistance to get back to the bed?" Malcolm shook his head. Trevon nodded. "I'll leave your PADD on the bedside table. There are other entries you may like to watch. Reach out to me if you need anything. Otherwise, I'll see you tomorrow." With that, he was gone. Malcolm used the bars to stand and held the counter as he closed the bathroom door. He relieved himself, cleaned his hands, and returned to the bed. "So you're afraid of water now?" Father's voice dripped with disdain. "Thought it was just drowning. That my son should be such a coward. You're a disgrace." Malcolm just wanted to sleep. But he dreaded what awaited him in his dreams. T'Rex and Sauron had both visited as he dozed in the park. "They should have eaten you instead of sending you back in this wasted carcass." They didn't send him back. They tried to kill him. But if he argued, Father would only call him out for disrespect and insubordination. Still, exhaustion won out and he fell asleep even with his father still insulting him from the corner. As his mind lost its grip on consciousness, he heard his sister's voice pushing back, saying he was always worth her heart. "Mom, I think I made a new friend today." Lizzie had come bursting in the back door. "She's from England and has this great British accent. She's an architect, too, just like me." Elaine smiled at her daughter. "You should invite her over for dinner." "Oh, she's been here for a while now, visiting her brother." Elaine woke with a start and was surprised to find herself in bed. She'd just been doing the dishes when Lizzie--. No, that was a dream. But surely this new friend was Madeline. Charlie had told her Malcolm's sister was also an architect after he and Miguel had come back from the park. It was kind of disturbing. Was her dream just a dream? Or was Elizabeth really visiting? Was she a ghost that Elaine could only experience when she slept? If that was the case--and she wasn't convinced it was--then she'd said Madeline had been coming, too, to visit her brother. On the one hand, it would be nice to think her daughter was still around. But on the other, it was sad to think she was just around to haunt her mother's dreams. Elaine didn't believe in an afterlife as her ancestors had, but a dead person unable to rest was a sad thing. And she didn't want that for Lizzie. As she made her way to the kitchen, she continued to muse on the idea. It was a common belief about ghosts that they came from traumatic deaths and murders. Lizzie was certainly murdered, but Malcolm's sister had chosen euthanasia to end an illness and help her brother. That, to Elaine, was a loving and noble death, not something that would lead to a haunting. So, all in all, she believed it was just a dream. Her unconscious mind had taken her unrelieved grief and flavored it with a newly realized commonality between her daughter and Malcolm's sister. She tried to decide if she wanted warm milk to try and sleep again when she felt a hand in hers. Startled, she turned sharply to find Malcolm her sleepless companion once again. She squeezed his hand. "Are you hungry, dear? You slept right through supper. I can heat up some soup." Instead, he pulled her toward the alcove, and she realized he was holding something. A data PADD. He sat and she sat next to him. He released her hand to turn on the device. He placed it between them, and Elaine could see a pretty, blonde woman on the screen. She looked as if she'd been crying. He started the video and the woman began to speak. "Why me?" she asked the camera. She had a crisp British accent. "I'm sure many people have asked that over the centuries. But why? I'm young. I'm healthy. Or I thought I was." So this was Madeline. Elaine saw more commonalities to her Lizzie. The hair, of course, but also the way she moved her hands when she talked. "I can't just talk to a computer, so I'm going to talk to you, Malcolm." Beside her, Malcolm choked back a sob. He hadn't expected that. Elaine put her arm around his shoulders and pulled him to her. On the screen, his sister told how she found out she was ill. Mistakes in her plan for a new building. Her boss worried and sent her to a doctor. And then she said how she got sick: the Xindi. Hundreds of people, who, like her, had hoped to make the swath of destruction beautiful and useful again, now had inoperable, untreatable brain tumors. Madeline was quite distressed, understandably. Still, she hoped to see her building built--without the mistakes--and she hoped to see her brother. That was apparently the first of several videos, dated seven and half months earlier. In her next video, she was noticeably stuttering her words. Their mother visited often, to fuss over her. Elaine would have done the same, truth be told, but she recalled Trip saying his parents didn't even want to see Malcolm. Where was this mother's motherly concern for her son? Madeline complained that it made her feel like a child. Then she revealed that both her parents called her daily. Elaine held Malcolm tighter. There was a strange dichotomy in their treatment of their children. And then Madeline named it, showing she understood what was happening. Trip had been right. Malcolm's father was too rigid and saw his son's aquaphobia as a character flaw. That Malcolm had not joined the Navy had meant that his father would never give his approval or affection, despite Malcolm's hopes. But then Madeline turned it around beautifully. She was proud of Malcolm, approved of his choice of career, and had even bragged about him to her friends. He mattered to her, especially as she faced her coming death. She closed the entry when their mother came to the door. In her third entry, she bemoaned the lack of fairness, the things she never got to do, like see Prague. Oh, Lizzie had loved Prague. And she wished she'd gotten a kitten. Or fallen in love. She envied her brother his life of adventure, his heroism in saving the planet. She'd never seen saved one life. She had after all, Elaine realized. "She saved yours," she whispered to Malcolm, who was now fully crying as he watched his sister sink into depression. But her fourth video was different. She'd learned of her brother's ordeal, or at least that he'd been dying and her parents had ordered him off life support without even seeing him as it would be too troubling--for them. And she asked if they would even cry for him as their mother did at nearly every visit. Then she smiled. Because Malcolm didn't die. She extolled his ability to exceed expectations. She noted their father showed some concern with her but never broke decorum, while their mother fretted and fawned, hoping in miracles. Again, she hoped she could see her brother again, perhaps if he was sent home to heal. When the next video played, Elaine saw a marked difference in Madeline. She smiled more and it went all the way to her eyes. She'd recorded this one only a couple weeks before, knowing she'd be donating her heart to save her brother. She felt happy about it. She hid it from their parents, as they'd try to prevent it. And Elaine loved her when she told Malcolm not to grieve too hard, "so you don't break our heart." She exhorted her brother to heal, to live, and to love. Elaine found she had tears in her own eyes, but happy ones. Malcolm's sister had loved him deeply and had gotten a chance to say goodbye. Elaine never doubted Lizzie's love, but perhaps she'd sleep better if her daughter had had the same chance. Still, Malcolm was deprived of love from his parents, and that had deeply wounded him. Perhaps his sister's very obvious love would help him heal. Even though he wept, he seemed less confused. He pulled the PADD to his chest. "Whatever your father said at the hospital," Elaine whispered to him, "it wasn't true. She chose to save you. And you were worth it to her." "I see him," he whispered back. "He says it's my fault. Sometimes she argues with him." Elaine's chest hurt for him, but she was glad he'd admitted to seeing them. She had thought he was seeing other things last time. "That's your grief talking," she told him. "He's not here. We wouldn't let him in." "I see them sometimes, too." He started to shake. "Who?" "The orcs," he breathed. "Or T'Rex, Sauron." Orcs and Sauron. *The Lord of the Rings.** But T'Rex was a dinosaur. That didn't make sense, so who could they be? The reasons he needed a heart? "Are they the ones that studied you? That hurt you?" He nodded. "They can't be here. They can't be real." "It's trauma," she said, wishing Trevon was here to explain it. "When they hurt you, they caused that trauma. They're only flashbacks. They can't hurt you anymore." "Sometimes I get lost." "It's okay. I do, too," she admitted. "Sometimes I dream my daughter, right here in this room. Then I come here expecting to see her. Tonight I dreamt her telling me she had a new friend." She touched the PADD. "Then you helped me meet her. Thank you for sharing that with me." "I dream when I'm awake." "Oh Malcolm, I'm no therapist." She squeezed him again. "But I am a mother. Your parents were wrong to reject you. They may not want you, but we do. And I'm going to do my best to love as your mother should have. If you'll let me." "I was twelve," he sobbed. "They drowned me." Elaine was shocked. "Your parents?" "Bullies," he replied. "Couldn't swim after that." She was glad it wasn't his parents, but it still shocked her. That is why they withdrew their love. "So no Navy," she reasoned. "They were wrong to judge you for that. My Lizzie loved to snorkel. We taught all the kids. We were at the beach almost every day in the summer. Heck, it was Florida, it was nice most of the year. I can't snorkel anymore. I don't want to see a beach. She was in the water when it happened. "So, if that's a character flaw for you, then it is for me, too. But I don't believe it is. Neither did Madeline. And it sounds like she knew you better than your parents did, so I'd take her word for it." He didn't say anything more, even as her arm grew tired. So she stood him up and walked him back to his room. "You should try and sleep some more." She pulled back the covers and even tucked him in. "Is he here?" Malcolm pointed to the corner. Elaine turned to the corner. "This is my house," she said, addressing Malcolm's vision of his father, "and you're not welcome in it. You are a bad father and you do not deserve him. So he's my son now, and if you persist in tormenting him, I give him full permission to curse you out in every language he knows." She looked back. "He still there?" Malcom gave one shake of his head. "Good. I mean it," she told him. "If he comes back, you tell him off." She pulled the chair close. "I'll sit here 'til you fall asleep. And I wish you good dreams." Trevon felt positive about his upcoming session with Malcolm. He'd received a communique quite early in the morning, regarding another nighttime encounter between Elaine and Malcolm. This time, Malcolm had initiated the contact. He shared his sister's journal with Mrs. Tucker and even admitted seeing his father and the inhabitants of Zheiren. More than that, he'd told her, in brief, of his deepest hurt: the drowning. That was the inciting incident to losing his parents' affections. But Malcom had only shared inconclusive evidence of abuse thus far. Zheiren also needed addressing, but it seemed the denizens of that country were occasional visitors, while his father was near constant. Still, he'd only just begun to grieve his sister honestly, and that needed more than one day in a park. Charles let Trevon in and offered him some tea. Trevon declined and asked to Malcolm right away if he was awake. Trevon found him sitting on his bed with the open case containing his sister's will. "Good morning, Malcolm. I hope you had a decent night's sleep." He pulled the chair closer to the bed. "Has she left you something?" "Everything," he answered, audibly though quietly. He showed Trevon a list of bequests. "Ah, an address in London. Where is London?" "England, my home." Not audible, but Malcolm still wasn't up to saying more than a few words audibly at this stage. "England, part of Great Britain," Trevon recited. "I've been told your accent is British. But this wouldn't be your childhood home?" "A flat. She lived in an apartment." "And everything in the apartment. You'll have some sorting to do when you get there. But it will be good for you to have a home address that doesn't include your parents." Malcolm picked up a small, cylindrical container. He shook it. Trevon guessed what it was. Dr. MacCormack had let him know the hospital had cremated the right hand of Madeline Reed, at her request, so her brother could have something of her. Her parents had received the body. "Ashes," Trevon said. "Just one hand. Your parents had the rest for a funeral." Malcolm stared at the container before gently pressing it back into the case. "Would you prefer we talk of your sister?" Trevon asked. Malcolm nodded. "Yesterday, you were remembering her. What did you remember?" "Madeline always welcomed me home." Trevon nodded. "You were away at school." Malcolm closed the case then pushed it away from him on the bed. Trevon guessed. "School was not a haven from your family. And home was not a haven from school. Were you still bullied at school?" "No one would dare." That made sense. "Because you were too well known after the incident? Too many intrusive memories then? The lack of justice?" Malcolm nodded. "What was it about home, then?" The scene changed and Trevon felt himself sitting in a vehicle, moving through the streets of Evington Academy. Stuart Reed was at the controls. He cut a large figure as Malcolm was still rather small for twelve. Malcolm occasionally cast a glance at his father, but Stuart Reed never even looked over once. Nor did he say a word. Instead Trevon's only distraction was the territory going by outside the windows. It seemed an overcast day though it wasn't raining. The architecture there was very different to San Francisco or Louisiana. Many of the buildings and houses looked much older. "If this is to be a silent trip, can you speed it up?" There was a change in the location. A mix of modern buildings and technology with the ancient. The time on the control panel had moved forward more than an hour and twenty minutes. When Stuart began to talk, Trevon half expected him to ask about Malcolm's school term. But when he started telling tales of his own tour of duty on the *HMS Churchill**, Trevon wasn't really surprised. And he felt the younger Malcolm's queasiness and discomfort at the mention of the sea. Another skip, this time of 25 minutes, and Stuart was still talking and ignorant of his son's uneasiness. The vehicle stopped as did Stuart, who exited. Malcolm got out, too, and pulled his bag out from the back. "He's back!" a young girl exclaimed as she came running from the house. "Madeline Mary Reed!" Stuart bellowed. "We do not carry on so. Perhaps you should go away to school. Maybe you'd learn to act with dignity." Madeline glared at her father for a moment before sighing and turning to Malcolm. "Welcome home, Malcolm. We missed you. Shall I carry that for you?" Stuart grunted behind them. "He's not an invalid. He can carry it himself." She moved to his other side, pulling him away from Stuart. "Well, *I've** missed you," she whispered. That was the scene Trevon had seen on the way to the park. "Was it always like that? Only Madeline showing enthusiasm at your return?" Malcolm on the bed nodded. The scene faded. "She could be annoying sometime, but she didn't change, like Mother and Father did." "I was an only child, so I can only imagine," Trevon admitted. "I've had clients with younger siblings. They can be complex. But she became an ally for you, away from your parents." Malcolm nodded again. "She encouraged me about Starfleet." "Did you keep up communication after you joined?" Malcolm shook his head and his eyes looked moist. "Was that on your part, or hers?" "Both," he whispered. Trevon nodded. "Why on your part?" "She was home," he said, barely louder than his whisper. So home also meant parents. "You couldn't talk to her without going through your parents. After four years, she could also leave home and start her career. Why not then?" "What I was doing. Covert ops." Telepathic again. Malcolm's head was down, perhaps indicating shame. "You weren't proud of that. Okay, why on her part, do you think?" "They wouldn't allow it." "And after she left home?" He shrugged. "Habit? She didn't say." "Perhaps it was habit for you both. Do you regret it?" He nodded. "I only thought of Mother and Father." "Perhaps she regretted it as well. How did her journal make you feel?" "Sad. She was sad. Dying." "But in the last she was happy?" Malcolm had told him so in the park. "Saving me gave her a reason." "How did she find out you needed a heart if the hospital didn't contact her?" Dr. MacCormack had been insistent that she'd volunteered. "Trip. She called the ship coming home." Trevon smiled. She had finally broken habit. "She called to talk to you, but you were in a medically-induced coma. She talked to Trip instead. She reached out *before** her decision to donate her heart." "Her journal was to me." That was a surprise but a nice one. "She addressed it to you rather than just, 'Dear Journal?'" Malcolm nodded. "She loved me." Trevon smiled again. "It sounds like she loved you very much. We do need to get back to your father, but that can wait for a bit. You need time to grieve." "She was there," he said, audibly. Trevon wasn't sure how to process that statement. "I don't think I understand." Another scene began to play, though it was raining outside now. The family was at the dinner table. No one spoke until the plates were empty. Then Mary Reed reported Malcolm's excellent grades while looking at Stuart and not her son. "I got full marks, too!" Madeline stated. "I like geometry and art best. What are you favorites?" She was looking right at Malcolm. Malcolm tried to remember how old she was, but answered, "Maths and science." Madeline went on about being a brownie and working on an architecture badge. Then Stuart cleared his throat and Mary dismissed them from the table. So they couldn't even have a conversation. Had Stuart being stewing over Malcolm's aquaphobia the whole term? Malcolm gladly left the table and went upstairs--two flights. He closed his door and fell back across his bed. There was a knock, and Treven felt young Malcolm sigh even as he tensed. But when he opened the door, it wasn't Stuart, but Madeline, and she held a box. The scene shifted and it was clear they had been showing off their badges to each other for some time. Then Madeline spoke again. "What happened to make Father angry at you? Before you went way last time, you ran away from the lake and Father. Are you afraid of the water?" Children can be very perceptive. When Malcolm replied it was drowning, not water, she pointed out that he could swim. So Malcolm asked if she had bullies at her school. She did but she hoped they wouldn't notice her. Malcolm joked lightly but said they were hurting a younger boy. Trevon was pleasantly surprised that young Malcolm had shared that primal hurt with her, even as vaguely as he had. She pulled him into a hug. Their parents had only told her that he was ill. Malcolm promised he was fine now, and she let him go before admitting she hadn't wanted him to go away to school. It was boring without him. Then scene faded away. Trevon understood now. "She's in the stories about your father." Perhaps she had been his descant then.