Eriecho - Star Trek Kelvin Timeline fanfiction

Beats

They were there.

Every species but hers, it seemed. The shadows were dim and moved, sweeping along, upper left to lower right, in time with the rhythm of a circulating fan that brought a bit of slightly less stale air to the cells below.

The rhythm. Slow and steady, then faster, punctuated by breath, hard and heavy, catching as a small sound escaped at times. Not words. Just sounds. Animal sounds. Friction.

Then clanging, and it was a new rhythm, as metallic sounds thunk-thunk-thunked along bars, batons on steel, forks on plates.

The beat. Feet marching, feet going as fast as the whipping, as slow as the chains, all in one direction, the yard close by.

Another beat. Feet on a floor, then feet on the soil, air rushing in, briefly, oh so briefly, then beats of feet back onto a floor, as fast as whips, as slow as tethers.

Forks on bowls. Clangs of metal again. A beat of cups to table, cups to lips, back to table. Regimented and controlled. Forks on bowls. Bowls taken. Forks brought back. A small patch of belonging.

Clangs again. Batons on bars. Batons on hands. Her hands. A grunt. An exchange of what were barely words.

More friction. More rhythm. Faster and faster. A small sound of pleasure. A payment for a job well done. A privilege. A bit of better food. A bit of green cloth.

Feet silenced. Snores. Pushes and gropes in the night. More rhythm. Friction again. Payment stolen from her this time. No way to scream. Worse if she would scream.

A slap. Another. Taking punishment. Being punished for nothing in particular. Being punished as everyone was punished.

A view of a corpse, not of her own species, but of a Suliban woman, ancient and looking more ancient due to the conditions. A body dressed in the bit of green cloth. The body of the only one who had been mother. The body taken. Leaving her with only the one she called her father, who could not protect her, from the friction and the theft and the batons and the grunts and the pushes and the gropes.

A hand on her shoulder. A silent scream.

Blinding light.

"Eriecho, wake up!" Saddik called out. "Awaken, you were having a nightmare."

Eriecho gasped. "I was back in Canamar." She looked around the four walls of her tiny room on Mars. "It was awful. I saw them taking away H'Shema's body."

"We are home. We are safe. H'Shema is, she is in a better place, I am sure," Saddik said.

"A place," Eriecho opined, "a better place must be one like this one, like Mars, a place without beatings."