Know Thyself
Fandom: Star Trek XI
Pairing: Gen
Series: Becomes, a Woman
In San Francisco, identity is fluid. This is the first thing she notices when she arrives. Perhaps this is a characteristic applicable to all humans, she hypothesizes.
She enrolls in Starfleet Academy as Madeline. There is no transliteration of her name; it is unpronounceable by the human larynx. She is not bitter about this. It is not humans' fault, after all. It is a question of biology, and that is immutable, at least for human beings. Their evolution is slow, unconscious.
Perhaps, then, this is why humans have such a peculiar relationship with identity.
Madeline's people have their identity written into their skin. The story of their people, their evolution, from before birth it etched into her body. Madeline's identity is clearly visible to those who understand the language of its ridges and valleys.
Here, the people have no memory. They are slippery, holding nothing and incapable of being grasped.
Humanity is fleeting.
Madeline is a xenobiologist. Evolution unfolds before her, spectacular and brilliant like a star in nova. Art, music, dance-all this is superfluous. Nothing is so beautiful as life. All else is a facsimile, a cruel illusion of truth.
Humans revel in their illusions, lovers of aesthetics without knowledge of true beauty. They have no idea what they are. So they become transient, they search, and Madeline pities them. She knows the comfort of understanding herself in all that she is, but, perhaps, the appeal is in the discovery. And this Madeline envies them for. She will never feel that sensation.
She is a fourth-year cadet when Vulcan is destroyed. They assign her to the Enterprise as a junior science officer.
On the shuttle, she sits next to Nyota Uhura, a grad student and linguist. Madeline likes her. She is not like many other humans. She is reserved, always purely herself, but she does not impose, does not dismiss that which she does not understand. They talk, and though she is incapable of speaking the language of Madeline's homeworld, she knows enough of the languages of the surrounding systems to follow if Madeline speaks slowly. She appreciates this, that she even tries.
Uhura does not ask about her skin. It is a strange sort of relief. Madeline is proud of the story she carries, but she is glad, sometimes, not to be asked.
Still, nothing is better than the feeling of being on the bridge. Here, she is simply Lieutenant Madeline, and none of the humans see her as any different. It isn't as if she has even been mistreated by them-had she been, she would never have stood for it. However, there is a lingering sense of other that she does not feel with her people. It is not a conscious reaction, she knows. Merely a residual fear of predators that causes this recoil against that which is different. Still, it is nice to be seen completely as an officer, without questioning eyes.
She is a scientist, not an experiment.
She is on the bridge when Vulcan collapses in on itself, swallows itself into an empty, gaping maw of a black hole. They only barely escape.
But Madeline cannot forget. Months later, she is still haunted by the destruction she witnessed. Six billion Vulcans, millions of species of flora and fauna, many only found on that planet, all wiped out in the space of a few minutes. It makes Madeline feel sick to think of it.
So much beauty, gone. Because of one man's hurt.
Madeline sees nothing in black and white. Her eyes do not perceive light as humans' do. For her, everything blends, a synthesis of light and color and movement. Shapes are less well defined, but oh, the things she sees. It is not precise, but she sees life. This is more than enough.
And because of this, she is certain that Nero's identity has somehow changed. He must have had another life, before this madness. She cannot guess what it was, but she hurts for him, for what he lost that broke him so.
Madeline's identity is in her skin. She is incapable of forgetting it. And this is her strength.
Pairing: Gen
Series: Becomes, a Woman
In San Francisco, identity is fluid. This is the first thing she notices when she arrives. Perhaps this is a characteristic applicable to all humans, she hypothesizes.
She enrolls in Starfleet Academy as Madeline. There is no transliteration of her name; it is unpronounceable by the human larynx. She is not bitter about this. It is not humans' fault, after all. It is a question of biology, and that is immutable, at least for human beings. Their evolution is slow, unconscious.
Perhaps, then, this is why humans have such a peculiar relationship with identity.
Madeline's people have their identity written into their skin. The story of their people, their evolution, from before birth it etched into her body. Madeline's identity is clearly visible to those who understand the language of its ridges and valleys.
Here, the people have no memory. They are slippery, holding nothing and incapable of being grasped.
Humanity is fleeting.
Madeline is a xenobiologist. Evolution unfolds before her, spectacular and brilliant like a star in nova. Art, music, dance-all this is superfluous. Nothing is so beautiful as life. All else is a facsimile, a cruel illusion of truth.
Humans revel in their illusions, lovers of aesthetics without knowledge of true beauty. They have no idea what they are. So they become transient, they search, and Madeline pities them. She knows the comfort of understanding herself in all that she is, but, perhaps, the appeal is in the discovery. And this Madeline envies them for. She will never feel that sensation.
She is a fourth-year cadet when Vulcan is destroyed. They assign her to the Enterprise as a junior science officer.
On the shuttle, she sits next to Nyota Uhura, a grad student and linguist. Madeline likes her. She is not like many other humans. She is reserved, always purely herself, but she does not impose, does not dismiss that which she does not understand. They talk, and though she is incapable of speaking the language of Madeline's homeworld, she knows enough of the languages of the surrounding systems to follow if Madeline speaks slowly. She appreciates this, that she even tries.
Uhura does not ask about her skin. It is a strange sort of relief. Madeline is proud of the story she carries, but she is glad, sometimes, not to be asked.
Still, nothing is better than the feeling of being on the bridge. Here, she is simply Lieutenant Madeline, and none of the humans see her as any different. It isn't as if she has even been mistreated by them-had she been, she would never have stood for it. However, there is a lingering sense of other that she does not feel with her people. It is not a conscious reaction, she knows. Merely a residual fear of predators that causes this recoil against that which is different. Still, it is nice to be seen completely as an officer, without questioning eyes.
She is a scientist, not an experiment.
She is on the bridge when Vulcan collapses in on itself, swallows itself into an empty, gaping maw of a black hole. They only barely escape.
But Madeline cannot forget. Months later, she is still haunted by the destruction she witnessed. Six billion Vulcans, millions of species of flora and fauna, many only found on that planet, all wiped out in the space of a few minutes. It makes Madeline feel sick to think of it.
So much beauty, gone. Because of one man's hurt.
Madeline sees nothing in black and white. Her eyes do not perceive light as humans' do. For her, everything blends, a synthesis of light and color and movement. Shapes are less well defined, but oh, the things she sees. It is not precise, but she sees life. This is more than enough.
And because of this, she is certain that Nero's identity has somehow changed. He must have had another life, before this madness. She cannot guess what it was, but she hurts for him, for what he lost that broke him so.
Madeline's identity is in her skin. She is incapable of forgetting it. And this is her strength.