From: Nick <nick@freakmagnet.demon.co.uk>
Subject: 'Stranger With This Face' Part Nine
Date: Mon, 21 Jun 1999 21:18:19 +0100

Right, here we are again. For all (and any) interested parties, I've
just uploaded this *monster* to fanfiction.net. I'll post part ten next
week (when it's written)! and update the website at the same time.
Disclaimer's in some previous part, all comments welcome, blah blah
blah.
*
*
*
'STRANGER WITH THIS FACE'
*
PART NINE
*
Where did all this red stuff come from? Frantically wiping her sticky
hands off on her clothing, she stared around her at her new
surroundings. The walls were a kind of once-white grey and almost greasy
to the touch and the hard bench she sat upon felt cold through her
pyjamas. This room was silent but for her panting breath which almost
echoed in the small space. 
*
She didn't know how she had ended up there; at least she didn't think
she did. The odd, violent flashes that came to her in waves like nausea
must be a dream, she reasoned. Afterall, how could images so terrible
belong in her waking world?
*
She remembered a cold, wet surface- tarmac beneath her bare feet; cold,
hard rain hitting her scalp through the parting of her hair; the cool,
whispering brush of net curtain, disturbed by a breeze and rubbing at
her bare ankles... The sight of her reflection in the silver surface of
a clean knife...
*
*
Loud, piercing screams startled Stephen into wakefulness; slouched in
the chair he'd sat in four hours ago. Still half asleep the doctor
hurried back into Marianne's darkened bedroom to find the young woman
sitting upright in bed, one fist rammed into her mouth to stifle her own
sobs. With movements as automatic and caring as those of a father,
Franklin pulled her into a tight hug, one hand rising of it's own
volition to pet her sweat-soaked hair.
*
"It's okay, it's okay- You had a bad dream but you're safe now-" His
voice soothing her, he gently rocked her from side to side until finally
she calmed a little. As her sobs ebbed away he held her away from him,
cupping her face in his hands, "It's all okay-"
*
"What happened?" her voice sounded alien to them both and Franklin
noticed that she seemed to be looking through him,
*
"You had some sort of- I don't know- 'episode'- In the monastery- Grare
had to sedate you. That was about five hours ago- You've been sleeping
ever since. Do you remember?" Numbly she shook her head and he reached
over to the bedside cabinet to retrieve a roll of toilet tissue. Tearing
some off he handed it to her and watched as she used it to mop savagely
at her tear-reddened eyes. "I don't suppose you remember what you were
dreaming about?" She hesitated, her attention fixing itself firmly on
the tissue that disintegrated in her wet palm, then shook her head.
Franklin noticed her hesitation but decided not to pursue it- yet.
Instead he tucked one limp lock of hair behind her ear and rubbed one of
her arms encouragingly.
*
"Thanks for staying with me." She mumbled before using a clean piece of
tissue to noisily blow her nose. In reply he shrugged and was about to
speak when a soft sound from the commlink still attached to the back of
his hand, alerted them both to an incoming message.
*
"This is Franklin."
*
//Doctor, we've a stellarcom transmission from Earth. You need to see
it- There's a problem-//
*
"I'll be right there. Franklin out." Raising one eyebrow at the woman
beside him, Stephen rose to his feet, ignoring the creak of his
protesting knee joints, "That was a little vague..." he muttered half to
himself before looking at Marianne intently, "Will you be okay for a
while?" She nodded again,
*
"I'll probably not sleep again for a while anyway-" she managed a smile
and a shrug, fake bravado more for her own benefit than his.
*
"Okay- I'll be as quick as I can."
*
When a few minutes later, she was at last alone, Marianne slowly kicked
back the bedcovers and slid out of it.  Under the cruel blue-toned light
of the washroom, she stared at her reflection in the mirror. There were
the usual dark circles under her eyes and her skin had grown
progressively paler and more wax-like since she had arrived on the
Lumati homeworld, this she knew already. But now it seemed almost as if
she were seeing this face for the first time. There was a furtive look
to the watery grey eyes and a slackness to the jaw. 
*
On a sudden impulse, Marianne held up her hands for inspection: the
nails were jagged and bitten, the fingers long and bony, the skin so
white as to be almost translucent.
*
In a sudden flash, those hands were covered in hot, sticky blood... Then
in less than a blink, they were naked white again. Marianne blinked once
more and peered back into the strange mirror-girl's eyes. Who the hell
was she? 
*
Hurrying back into the bedroom, Marianne tugged a pair of slacks from
their crumpled state hanging over a chair and forced uncooperative legs
into their confines. She pulled a well-worn cardigan, which usually
doubled as a dressing gown; over the T-shirt she had slept in and found
a pair of trainers under the bed. Without a moment's thought, Marianne
all but ran out of the room.
*
*
The rooms Lennier shared with Grare were even warmer and stuffier than
usual and the Minbari kicked off his boots to feel the smooth floor
beneath the bare soles of his feet. The floor wasn't cool but it felt
good to stretch toes that had spent fourteen hours trapped inside shoes.
Pallor had died tonight. With little more than a rasping gasp for a
breath that would not come, she had let her head fall back into her
pillow and sank into death like a stone, utterly transformed from the
strong and proud Drazi female who had arrived with him several months
ago.
*
He had stayed with her, watching, waiting, aware that he was doing so
and ashamed of himself for hoping her time would come soon. Walking
slowly through the temple afterward he'd noticed distantly how little
everything had changed, how the day to day continued. Outside the sky
had been the same wistful grey as it had been when he had gone in and
the journey from the temple to his rooms had been as long and uneventful
as had been his earlier one in the opposite direction.
*
Now, as he concentrated on the task of spreading out the triangular mat
he used for his meditation, he realised that he felt only one thing:
guilt. He felt no sadness- he had mourned Pallor long ago when there was
still a life inside the ulcerated shell that fought for life and that
spoke with dignity. He felt no peace, he had long since given up on ever
feeling *that*. But he felt guilt, an emotion he was all too familiar
with. 
*
Guilt. Because when he had received the news that Pallor was taking her
final breaths and asking for him, he had been more concerned by the
worry in his friend Grare's eyes, by the news that *he* brought, that
Marianne had collapsed, that Marianne *hurt*. As far as he could be
concerned, Pallor could wait. And so when Grare had insisted that as
always, 'the patient' should come first he had impatiently and
resentfully hurried to Pallor's deathbed, his thoughts centred wholly on
someone else.
*
Folding his hands into a simulation of composure he did not feel Lennier
knelt facing the open door, closed his eyes against the guilt he still
felt and pretended to meditate.
*
Barely an hour later, the sound of a heavy tread on the stairs leading
to his rooms, Lennier's eyes snapped open.
*
*
Knelt upon his prayer mat and staring unblinking through the open
doorway, Lennier took in the sight before him. Marianne was hovering at
the top of the stairs catching her breath and smoothing clammy hands
over her creased and mucky pants. Her hair, straggly and damp with
perspiration was escaping from the rubber band it had been scraped into
earlier and what might once have been a coffee stain several washes ago
adorned the front of her T-shirt. She was nervously chewing on her lower
lip, bringing a flash of colour to an otherwise pale and waxy
complexion. He thought that she looked the most like Deborah that he'd
ever known her to.
*
"Lennier, help me- I don't want to know anymore... I know all I need to
but the- pictures- images- they won't leave me alone..." On shaky legs,
Marianne advanced toward him, the dim light etching it's way over her
features as she left the darkness of the stairway behind her. Still
silent, Lennier rose smoothly to his feet and took her hands hesitantly
into his own.
*
"I cannot help you-" She thought that he sounded as fearful of her
memories as she and for a moment Marianne forgot that it was *she* who
had approached *him* for help and not the other way around.
*
"It's alright, I know-" Her voice dropping to an inaudible whisper, she
pulled him into a strong embrace, one hand cupping the back of his neck
to press him closer to her. For Lennier it seemed as if she were not
only holding him upright, but that she was also holding him *together*.
*
A few feet away and in all directions, the candles he'd lit earlier to
pray by, flickered, casting their shadows across the walls, ceiling and
floor.
*
*
Most of the candles that lit the small space had burned down to nearly
half their length. Lennier barely noticed. Lying quietly in the circle
of his arms, her back to him, Marianne pulled absently on the silver
cross around her neck. At some point in the evening, Lennier had
suddenly remembered that it was *he* who should be supporting her and to
that end, he had turned her in his arms and pulled her down the floor
with him. She'd kicked off her shoes at some point and they now sat
beside his own boots. Surprisingly, there was little difference in size
between the two pairs and that strange fact had led the minbari to reach
for and hold up her hand for inspection. Pressed flat against his own
palm, Marianne's hand was almost the same size and held similar cuts and
calluses to that of his own but to a lesser extent. This woman was *not*
a former member of the Anla'shok. But these hands *had* known the
harshness of *prison* life and that fact alone served to remind him, yet
again that they used to belong to Deborah.
*
"I don't know who I used to be. But I know that I don't want to be her
again." Marianne's voice was stronger now, "It was the 'death of
personality', wasn't it? I thought about it, narrowed down the
options... It's the only thing that's left..."
*
"Yes."
*
"How do you know me?"
*
"I knew... your... 'alter-ego'- I made a promise to her that I would not
stand in the way of her leading a life apart from her past."
*
"Well... You tried..." She'd let go of the cross around her neck and now
brought her free hand down to cover his, sandwiching it between her
palms. "How close were you? Were you... lovers?"
*
"No. At least not 'physically'."
*
"I suppose in a prison that would have been difficult... You still miss
her?"
*
"Of course."
*
"It must have been terrible- me showing up here..."
*
"It is not your fault-"
*
"I never said it was." She stared up at him now, craning her neck to do
so. "Was she *very* different to me?"
*
"No. Not 'very'. She was more- fragile."
*
"And she committed a crime. For a mind-wipe it must have been murder...
Did she *want* to undergo the wipe?"
*
"Yes. In the end she did- She wanted to forget the event leading up
until that day. It was not a full wipe- a medical condition prevented
such action from being possible"
*
"The epilepsy.... Of course... I think she's still inside my head. You
know, some nights I think that there's someone with me- Tonight I *saw*
her in the mirror...  It's not a good feeling and I usually wake up
feeling panicked- violated even- Did she go through anything like that?"
*
"She never discussed anything of that nature with me. But I think that
she experienced nightmares..."
*
"Was she a bad person?"
*
"No!"
*
"I didn't think so."
*
*
When Franklin arrived at the hospice, Hobbs was already there,
frantically pacing the small space of the office, tugging at a hangnail
until she drew blood. 
*
"Okay- what's the problem?" Storming into the room, he barely noticed
his colleague's nervous movements, throwing his jacket on a chair and
fixing fists to hips in a defiant stance.
*
"Hello Stephen..." When Lillian looked up to meet his stare, he noticed
how distracted she looked. "We just got a transmission from the support
centre- Um..." Suddenly deciding not to relay the transmission's content
to him, Lillian backed away toward the monitor in the corner of the tiny
room, Stephen followed, folding his arms across his chest as he settled
back to watch.
*
Five minutes later, the transmission ended and Stephen turned to face
her, his expression now matching hers,
*
"They can't do this- Patch me through to them-"
*
"They just did. And it won't do any good- I already tried... In three
days time the biohazard team will arrive to evacuate all uninfected non-
Lumati- The planet will remain quarantined from then onwards."
*
"Oh god-" Rubbing frantically at his jaw as he began paced, Franklin
started muttering under his breath, "They're going to leave these people
to *die*... Without medical equipment... staff... research... The Lumati
haven't a hope in *hell*!"
*
*
End of part nine.
Part ten will follow soon.

-- 
Nick


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