[Star Trek 2009] Precious Things: Legacy
Title: Precious Things: Legacy
Setting: Star Trek 2009
Note: Many thanks to rexlapinii for catching a pretty big oops in there & elanya for the awesome beta-ing!
Summary: Every message finds it's way home, somehow.
"I wish I could help, somehow. Wish there was something I could do." Molly wraps her arms around her knees as she watches the small projector nestled in the grass, the reporter speaking in a voice fraught with emotion. Vulcan's destruction has been heard of even in her tiny, backwards corner of the universe. Molly doesn't think it's possible anyone could be unaware of something so tragic and sad.
"Oh please. You're just the local nature nut. And besides, what the hell could people like you or me do anyway?" Her cousin laughs mockingly - she's not mean, Molly knows, but sometimes she wishes the girl would stop dismissing her so easily all the time. After all, she works in the flower nursery three days a week as well, doesn't she? Molly's annoyance does not go unnoticed. "Geez girly, aiming a bit high, aren't you? You've never even been off planet before. Don't you think any of those new colonies or whatever out there are just a little bit far for the likes of us?"
Molly's overt scowl is greeted with a snicker. She sighs and lets her shoulders drop, the anger draining out of her in a single instant.
"I know. I just… wish there were something I could do. That's all."
Her cousin offers her a placating smile and a small wave - not quite a comforting pat, but it's more than what she usually gets from her, so Molly can't find it in herself to complain.
She stabs her trowel in dark, rich earth and takes another sample and idly notes the volunteer positions the reporter is describing, her thoughts literally galaxies away. She is just a first level, newly graduated botanist. She has no relevant expertise to speak of. She's good with plants, she's told. That's all.
That night she fills out an application form and sends it off. She forgets about it the very next day.
~*~
When the answer comes, Molly's younger brother races into the house, shrieking incoherently. It takes their parents ten minutes to calm down the boy and another five to pry the datapad he is holding out of his dirt smeared hands.
The thing is sleek and shiny and brand new - nothing they've ever seen on the farm, where everything is bought secondhand in order to spare any credit they can, and used until it comes apart before it is replaced. Their flowers always come first and foremost. They live comfortably, in this modern day and age, but they must still be thrifty and careful for the sake of their livelihood.
Molly's father reads the tag on the datapad and looks up gravely at her, something indefinable in his gaze that both scares and thrills Molly alike.
"Are you sure this is what you want to do, Mollygirl?"
It takes him handing her the datapad and nodding in confirmation when she looks up at him, all shock and surprise, before the realization finally sinks in. The logo on the datapad is that of Vulcan, along with another smaller one she can't identify until she looks it up later. It is the IDIC symbol. Later that night Molly reads the explanation that comes along with the picture and finds herself hoping. She's not sure for what, yet. She just knows that it's something bigger and better. And she has a chance at it.
It takes her three days to pack properly, acquire a new set of clothes and find the right things to bring with her. Her parents drive her to the nearest transit station, eyes tearful but proud. Two hours later Molly is finally on her way, a cheerful attendant kindly guiding her through all the steps she will be going through as she heads out into the vastness of space, her destination an alien world.
She has never felt so small, yet so very alive before. She even forgets to breathe as the shuttle breaches the barrier between atmosphere and space, until she is dizzy from lack of air and giddiness alike.
She's seen all the pictures of her planet before, floating in space like a precious jewel nestled in the darkest and richest of satins.
They are nothing next to actually being up there, looking down below.
Molly stares in wonder and thinks that she and every single other human being in the universe are very, very lucky to still have that sight.
~*~
The trip is long and tiring, and her arrival signals the first moment where she doubts her decision and fears she has somehow made the biggest mistake of her life. The heat is brutal, the air is harsh and everything smells wrong. The welcome interview is long and arduous and the Vulcan asking her questions turns her brain inside out while figuring out her qualifications. Many of her answers leave him unsatisfied; of this she has no doubt. ("You know when conditions for optimal growth are adequate because it 'feels right'?" she remembers him asking, each word carefully enunciated.) Finally though she is turned over to the administrator of the small settlement, another Vulcan male with whom, for some reason, she feels safe enough to ask the question that has plagued since she first set foot on the planet.
"Why did you hire me?" She speaks hurriedly, before he can ask her for more details. Molly's been asked to be more specific as to what she means more often in the past hour than she has her entire life. The interviewer may have even asked her that single question more often than all the others put together - she doesn’t have the exact number though, having lost count early on. "I mean - I'm just some average botanist from some hick town on Earth. My specialty isn't even in xenobotany, I just… make things grow. I'm nothing special." She can practically feel the uncharacteristic bemusement radiating from the Vulcan standing before her and curses herself for being insecure and stupid and a million other things she doesn't have the time to put into words. Solak moves slightly before she can apologize and retreat, so she remains silent, trying not to make things worse.
"You offered assistance." At her confused expression, Solak elaborates. "You are a botanist. You volunteered to help us. We have need of botanists. And of assistance. You were a logical selection from the pool of volunteers at our disposal."
"Oh." Molly stares at him for a moment. She doesn't ask him if there were many botanists who applied, and if her candidacy was the very last one down the list, which they accepted anyway because they needed everyone they could find. Even some silly farm girl from some village no one would ever hear about.
"Then if all is satisfactory, I shall accompany you to your new lodgings." They are being housed, fed and paid a salary. Molly understands why they are still called volunteers though. The work they will face will be hard and uncompromising. Not something most people would volunteer for, in normal conditions. Molly is watching him more than where they are going, until she reminds herself that staring is rude and shifts her gaze back towards their destination, a small building built to house some of the volunteers. She hopes her roommates will be people she can like. "I… I'm glad you did. Select me to help, I mean."
Her statement is answered by a polite nod. As they walk, Molly wishes she'd worn something lighter and misses the cool winds from home and the smell of the flowers her family cultivates, strewn across more fields than the eye can see. Here the dry earth crunches and crackles underfoot and as tired and worried as she is, Molly wonders if the seeds she brought form Earth will manage to thrive under such harsh conditions.
They will, she decides as they walk down the barren path, devoid of any vegetation or flowers. She'll figure out how to make it happen, and they will. If she achieves nothing else while she is here, Molly will make certain these people see life and color blooming in their new home.
A Vulcan woman is waiting for them at the compound. Solak introduces her as the one in charge of ensuring the volunteers have everything they need, and places Molly in the her care before returning to his office.
~*~
It takes her a month to settle in and two to start making friends among the volunteers, though Molly suspects that the Vulcan woman who has been greeting her every morning and who carefully inquires as to her physical well-being every evening is - in a distant, controlled sort of way - actually attempting to make her feel welcome and at home. As much a home as this place can be, for someone who has just lost a whole world, she thinks. It seems obvious to her why the volunteers have their own quarters, though she doesn't offer her thoughts on the matter to the others who eventually stop wondering and instead focus on working. It's not that the Vulcans feel they are better than them, she decides. It's just that everything is still too raw, and having to be even more polite and more controlled around anyone not Vulcan is just asking for too much. Molly makes a point of being calm and silent around the one assigned to ensure their well-being. After a while, some of the others start behaving the same way as Molly is. She feels better then, slightly. Her mother would approve of the balance that is being worked out - a harmony of the household Molly desperately missed and welcomes once she finds it again, as strange and different as this place is.
The homesickness that keeps her awake through the nights fades eventually as of that moment, just like her mother promised her it would. Molly decides that she would miss it were her otherwise quiet and solemn hostess not there to inquire after her, all gentle solicitousness and silent companionship. So she tends to the fields or the nurseries and carefully follows the instructions when running tests and otherwise is as pleasant and unobtrusive as she can be. Outside working with the plants or inside in the laboratory - those are the places where she and all the other volunteers live during the day, focusing on their labor in order to bring back at least a semblance of home for those who live in the settlement.
There are things replicators cannot account for, Molly knows only too well. She learns more every day about exactly how much they cannot replace. And though the Vulcans are making do with them as they must, everyone hopes that soon some of their destroyed world's own flora will settle in and take root, with the least possible genetic tweaking necessary for it to adapt to this new world. These plants they nurture contain many nutrients essential to the survival of their children and much of the fauna that was not wiped out when Vulcan was destroyed. It is imperative to ensure that they will be able to keep receiving these nutrients. All of them work, carefully and intently, knowing what hangs in the balance.
At night, Molly works on a secret project. She is careful not to change anything to the earth she is working with. It is important that the seeds can grow in this environment without any changes at all. That was how the creator of this strain of flower meant for them to be grown. The plant adapts to the environment. Not the other way around.
There are small and large successes for the team of botanists, over weeks and months. They rejoice at each and every one.
Seven months since she first set foot on alien soil and after many failed attempts, Molly is victorious in her own, private project.
~*~
"I did it! I did it!" She races into the compound and for the administrator's office, hands covered in reddish dirt, shouting excitedly and loudly for all to hear. Molly has always been quiet and unobtrusive around her hosts, easily intimidated their solemnity. But this time she is all brilliant smiles and exultant laughter as she rounds a corner and bursts into Solak's office.
"You have to come see! I did-" Molly stops in mid-word and claps a hand to her mouth, horrified. "Oh! I'm so sorry!" Something deep within is still dancing merrily and even though she is mortified at interrupting a visit from someone who is obviously a highly ranked official within Vulcan society, Molly can't help bouncing in place, just a little bit. The motion causes two sets of eyebrows to rise just a little bit higher in perfect tandem and the sight is enough to nearly tear a giggle from her. It comes out as a short sound instead: a sharp and triumphant squeak.
"I believe your young botanist has something important to show us, Solak." The older Vulcan's voice is just as calm and controlled as anyone else's in the settlement, but Molly can't help but like it somehow. She's not sure if it's in the way he immediately rises to his feet and then gestures towards the door courteously, allowing her to lead the way, or in how he obviously isn't bothered at all by her interruption or her dirt smeared hands - but this Vulcan has been around humans a lot. (And there is also dirt on her face, she realizes, blushing beet-red as she leads them on.)
She bursts outs of the office and trots alone the path as quickly as she thinks they'll follow, her pace increasing with every passing moment. She is running by the time they make it into the first of the nurseries and then races right by all the others, drawing startled exclamations from the ones who are non-Vulcan and a few raised eyebrows from those who are. The woman who has been taking care of the volunteers all this time smoothly rises to her feet and follows from a distance, calm and serene. Molly could swear there is an air of anticipation about the austere woman, as though she believes something incredibly important is about to occur. She is so thrilled about her achievement that she dismisses the thought, instead focusing on a patch of brambles and greenery not too far away behind the edge of the settlement. As they near, brilliant, piercing colors break through the ragged leaves of green and the dusty, carefully maintained earth.
"They bloomed! See? They're from an amateur botanist who lived on Vulcan. But she was human, I mean, not a Vulcan. And she was a genius with roses. Everyone in the professional community agrees to this, the woman worked miracles. She created this new strain there, before - that's why…" Molly pauses again then forges on. Somehow this is right and good, despite her blundering. It's all right to tell this to them both, but mostly to the one who is now leaning over the bloom. It's almost as though he were memorizing every petal, every curve and shade of red and gold. "She shipped them off to Earth about a month before..." Even though every Vulcan in the colony easily speaks the words, Molly still can't. They don't mind, she hopes, as she rushes along to make her point clear. "Every single botanist that leaves Earth always brings a packet of these seeds along now. Because they can grow anywhere. I... just can't say the name of this strain, I'm sorry." She shows the older Vulcan the seed container she's kept in her pockets the entire time she has lived on the planet, the faded Vulcan script elegantly embossed upon it gleaming softly in the sunlight. "It's in Vulcan. She never gave it a Terran version of the name. So most of us, we just call this particular variety Grayson's Rose."
Solak takes a step back, looking serious but not unhappy. After a moment the older Vulcan speaks.
"Na'k'diwa."
He moves forward slowly and then leans down, hands cupping yet not touching the bloom. The word is harsh and foreign, but the way he says it is not. His fingertips hover over the gilt edge of one petal, tracing its shape gently. Gold melts into the deepest of reds. There is something indefinable about him, which she can't decipher but that makes Molly want to smile and cry at the same time.
"It means, 'For my Beloved'."
Setting: Star Trek 2009
Note: Many thanks to rexlapinii for catching a pretty big oops in there & elanya for the awesome beta-ing!
Summary: Every message finds it's way home, somehow.
"I wish I could help, somehow. Wish there was something I could do." Molly wraps her arms around her knees as she watches the small projector nestled in the grass, the reporter speaking in a voice fraught with emotion. Vulcan's destruction has been heard of even in her tiny, backwards corner of the universe. Molly doesn't think it's possible anyone could be unaware of something so tragic and sad.
"Oh please. You're just the local nature nut. And besides, what the hell could people like you or me do anyway?" Her cousin laughs mockingly - she's not mean, Molly knows, but sometimes she wishes the girl would stop dismissing her so easily all the time. After all, she works in the flower nursery three days a week as well, doesn't she? Molly's annoyance does not go unnoticed. "Geez girly, aiming a bit high, aren't you? You've never even been off planet before. Don't you think any of those new colonies or whatever out there are just a little bit far for the likes of us?"
Molly's overt scowl is greeted with a snicker. She sighs and lets her shoulders drop, the anger draining out of her in a single instant.
"I know. I just… wish there were something I could do. That's all."
Her cousin offers her a placating smile and a small wave - not quite a comforting pat, but it's more than what she usually gets from her, so Molly can't find it in herself to complain.
She stabs her trowel in dark, rich earth and takes another sample and idly notes the volunteer positions the reporter is describing, her thoughts literally galaxies away. She is just a first level, newly graduated botanist. She has no relevant expertise to speak of. She's good with plants, she's told. That's all.
That night she fills out an application form and sends it off. She forgets about it the very next day.
~*~
When the answer comes, Molly's younger brother races into the house, shrieking incoherently. It takes their parents ten minutes to calm down the boy and another five to pry the datapad he is holding out of his dirt smeared hands.
The thing is sleek and shiny and brand new - nothing they've ever seen on the farm, where everything is bought secondhand in order to spare any credit they can, and used until it comes apart before it is replaced. Their flowers always come first and foremost. They live comfortably, in this modern day and age, but they must still be thrifty and careful for the sake of their livelihood.
Molly's father reads the tag on the datapad and looks up gravely at her, something indefinable in his gaze that both scares and thrills Molly alike.
"Are you sure this is what you want to do, Mollygirl?"
It takes him handing her the datapad and nodding in confirmation when she looks up at him, all shock and surprise, before the realization finally sinks in. The logo on the datapad is that of Vulcan, along with another smaller one she can't identify until she looks it up later. It is the IDIC symbol. Later that night Molly reads the explanation that comes along with the picture and finds herself hoping. She's not sure for what, yet. She just knows that it's something bigger and better. And she has a chance at it.
It takes her three days to pack properly, acquire a new set of clothes and find the right things to bring with her. Her parents drive her to the nearest transit station, eyes tearful but proud. Two hours later Molly is finally on her way, a cheerful attendant kindly guiding her through all the steps she will be going through as she heads out into the vastness of space, her destination an alien world.
She has never felt so small, yet so very alive before. She even forgets to breathe as the shuttle breaches the barrier between atmosphere and space, until she is dizzy from lack of air and giddiness alike.
She's seen all the pictures of her planet before, floating in space like a precious jewel nestled in the darkest and richest of satins.
They are nothing next to actually being up there, looking down below.
Molly stares in wonder and thinks that she and every single other human being in the universe are very, very lucky to still have that sight.
~*~
The trip is long and tiring, and her arrival signals the first moment where she doubts her decision and fears she has somehow made the biggest mistake of her life. The heat is brutal, the air is harsh and everything smells wrong. The welcome interview is long and arduous and the Vulcan asking her questions turns her brain inside out while figuring out her qualifications. Many of her answers leave him unsatisfied; of this she has no doubt. ("You know when conditions for optimal growth are adequate because it 'feels right'?" she remembers him asking, each word carefully enunciated.) Finally though she is turned over to the administrator of the small settlement, another Vulcan male with whom, for some reason, she feels safe enough to ask the question that has plagued since she first set foot on the planet.
"Why did you hire me?" She speaks hurriedly, before he can ask her for more details. Molly's been asked to be more specific as to what she means more often in the past hour than she has her entire life. The interviewer may have even asked her that single question more often than all the others put together - she doesn’t have the exact number though, having lost count early on. "I mean - I'm just some average botanist from some hick town on Earth. My specialty isn't even in xenobotany, I just… make things grow. I'm nothing special." She can practically feel the uncharacteristic bemusement radiating from the Vulcan standing before her and curses herself for being insecure and stupid and a million other things she doesn't have the time to put into words. Solak moves slightly before she can apologize and retreat, so she remains silent, trying not to make things worse.
"You offered assistance." At her confused expression, Solak elaborates. "You are a botanist. You volunteered to help us. We have need of botanists. And of assistance. You were a logical selection from the pool of volunteers at our disposal."
"Oh." Molly stares at him for a moment. She doesn't ask him if there were many botanists who applied, and if her candidacy was the very last one down the list, which they accepted anyway because they needed everyone they could find. Even some silly farm girl from some village no one would ever hear about.
"Then if all is satisfactory, I shall accompany you to your new lodgings." They are being housed, fed and paid a salary. Molly understands why they are still called volunteers though. The work they will face will be hard and uncompromising. Not something most people would volunteer for, in normal conditions. Molly is watching him more than where they are going, until she reminds herself that staring is rude and shifts her gaze back towards their destination, a small building built to house some of the volunteers. She hopes her roommates will be people she can like. "I… I'm glad you did. Select me to help, I mean."
Her statement is answered by a polite nod. As they walk, Molly wishes she'd worn something lighter and misses the cool winds from home and the smell of the flowers her family cultivates, strewn across more fields than the eye can see. Here the dry earth crunches and crackles underfoot and as tired and worried as she is, Molly wonders if the seeds she brought form Earth will manage to thrive under such harsh conditions.
They will, she decides as they walk down the barren path, devoid of any vegetation or flowers. She'll figure out how to make it happen, and they will. If she achieves nothing else while she is here, Molly will make certain these people see life and color blooming in their new home.
A Vulcan woman is waiting for them at the compound. Solak introduces her as the one in charge of ensuring the volunteers have everything they need, and places Molly in the her care before returning to his office.
~*~
It takes her a month to settle in and two to start making friends among the volunteers, though Molly suspects that the Vulcan woman who has been greeting her every morning and who carefully inquires as to her physical well-being every evening is - in a distant, controlled sort of way - actually attempting to make her feel welcome and at home. As much a home as this place can be, for someone who has just lost a whole world, she thinks. It seems obvious to her why the volunteers have their own quarters, though she doesn't offer her thoughts on the matter to the others who eventually stop wondering and instead focus on working. It's not that the Vulcans feel they are better than them, she decides. It's just that everything is still too raw, and having to be even more polite and more controlled around anyone not Vulcan is just asking for too much. Molly makes a point of being calm and silent around the one assigned to ensure their well-being. After a while, some of the others start behaving the same way as Molly is. She feels better then, slightly. Her mother would approve of the balance that is being worked out - a harmony of the household Molly desperately missed and welcomes once she finds it again, as strange and different as this place is.
The homesickness that keeps her awake through the nights fades eventually as of that moment, just like her mother promised her it would. Molly decides that she would miss it were her otherwise quiet and solemn hostess not there to inquire after her, all gentle solicitousness and silent companionship. So she tends to the fields or the nurseries and carefully follows the instructions when running tests and otherwise is as pleasant and unobtrusive as she can be. Outside working with the plants or inside in the laboratory - those are the places where she and all the other volunteers live during the day, focusing on their labor in order to bring back at least a semblance of home for those who live in the settlement.
There are things replicators cannot account for, Molly knows only too well. She learns more every day about exactly how much they cannot replace. And though the Vulcans are making do with them as they must, everyone hopes that soon some of their destroyed world's own flora will settle in and take root, with the least possible genetic tweaking necessary for it to adapt to this new world. These plants they nurture contain many nutrients essential to the survival of their children and much of the fauna that was not wiped out when Vulcan was destroyed. It is imperative to ensure that they will be able to keep receiving these nutrients. All of them work, carefully and intently, knowing what hangs in the balance.
At night, Molly works on a secret project. She is careful not to change anything to the earth she is working with. It is important that the seeds can grow in this environment without any changes at all. That was how the creator of this strain of flower meant for them to be grown. The plant adapts to the environment. Not the other way around.
There are small and large successes for the team of botanists, over weeks and months. They rejoice at each and every one.
Seven months since she first set foot on alien soil and after many failed attempts, Molly is victorious in her own, private project.
~*~
"I did it! I did it!" She races into the compound and for the administrator's office, hands covered in reddish dirt, shouting excitedly and loudly for all to hear. Molly has always been quiet and unobtrusive around her hosts, easily intimidated their solemnity. But this time she is all brilliant smiles and exultant laughter as she rounds a corner and bursts into Solak's office.
"You have to come see! I did-" Molly stops in mid-word and claps a hand to her mouth, horrified. "Oh! I'm so sorry!" Something deep within is still dancing merrily and even though she is mortified at interrupting a visit from someone who is obviously a highly ranked official within Vulcan society, Molly can't help bouncing in place, just a little bit. The motion causes two sets of eyebrows to rise just a little bit higher in perfect tandem and the sight is enough to nearly tear a giggle from her. It comes out as a short sound instead: a sharp and triumphant squeak.
"I believe your young botanist has something important to show us, Solak." The older Vulcan's voice is just as calm and controlled as anyone else's in the settlement, but Molly can't help but like it somehow. She's not sure if it's in the way he immediately rises to his feet and then gestures towards the door courteously, allowing her to lead the way, or in how he obviously isn't bothered at all by her interruption or her dirt smeared hands - but this Vulcan has been around humans a lot. (And there is also dirt on her face, she realizes, blushing beet-red as she leads them on.)
She bursts outs of the office and trots alone the path as quickly as she thinks they'll follow, her pace increasing with every passing moment. She is running by the time they make it into the first of the nurseries and then races right by all the others, drawing startled exclamations from the ones who are non-Vulcan and a few raised eyebrows from those who are. The woman who has been taking care of the volunteers all this time smoothly rises to her feet and follows from a distance, calm and serene. Molly could swear there is an air of anticipation about the austere woman, as though she believes something incredibly important is about to occur. She is so thrilled about her achievement that she dismisses the thought, instead focusing on a patch of brambles and greenery not too far away behind the edge of the settlement. As they near, brilliant, piercing colors break through the ragged leaves of green and the dusty, carefully maintained earth.
"They bloomed! See? They're from an amateur botanist who lived on Vulcan. But she was human, I mean, not a Vulcan. And she was a genius with roses. Everyone in the professional community agrees to this, the woman worked miracles. She created this new strain there, before - that's why…" Molly pauses again then forges on. Somehow this is right and good, despite her blundering. It's all right to tell this to them both, but mostly to the one who is now leaning over the bloom. It's almost as though he were memorizing every petal, every curve and shade of red and gold. "She shipped them off to Earth about a month before..." Even though every Vulcan in the colony easily speaks the words, Molly still can't. They don't mind, she hopes, as she rushes along to make her point clear. "Every single botanist that leaves Earth always brings a packet of these seeds along now. Because they can grow anywhere. I... just can't say the name of this strain, I'm sorry." She shows the older Vulcan the seed container she's kept in her pockets the entire time she has lived on the planet, the faded Vulcan script elegantly embossed upon it gleaming softly in the sunlight. "It's in Vulcan. She never gave it a Terran version of the name. So most of us, we just call this particular variety Grayson's Rose."
Solak takes a step back, looking serious but not unhappy. After a moment the older Vulcan speaks.
"Na'k'diwa."
He moves forward slowly and then leans down, hands cupping yet not touching the bloom. The word is harsh and foreign, but the way he says it is not. His fingertips hover over the gilt edge of one petal, tracing its shape gently. Gold melts into the deepest of reds. There is something indefinable about him, which she can't decipher but that makes Molly want to smile and cry at the same time.
"It means, 'For my Beloved'."