The gym was kept well-lit all times of day, the strips of lighting across the bulkhead casting the wide, largely empty space in a cold, exposing light. Kharth hit the bag in a steady rhythm, the sound of leather gloves on padding filling the silence, every blow echoing back at her.

Sweat darkened her vest and stung her eyes, but she didn’t stop to wipe it away. The bag swung. Came back. Met her fist again. Her shoulders ached by now, but her throat ached worse. The bruising there had started to turn yellow. Starik had suggested she come by Sickbay. She’d come here instead.

When the door opened, she didn’t stop, didn’t turn. It would be someone else doing late-night exercises, or it was someone trying to interrupt. Either way, she wanted to keep the world small, narrow – focused on the edge of her fists.

‘Saeihr.’

Even Airex’s voice was enough for her next thump of the bag to land with a vicious excess of force that made it swing wildly, and she had to step away, rounding on him.

‘No – what the hell do you want?’

He was still in uniform, rumpled and tired. She assumed he’d been in the lab, pulling long shifts, doing his reading. Like it would fix anything. But he stepped back at her outburst, eyes widening.

‘I came to check up on you,’ Airex stammered.

‘No, you didn’t.’ She reached to steady the swinging bag. ‘You came to try to tell me he’s dead.’

It was an uncharitable assumption. The beat of silence suggested it wasn’t wholly wrong. At length, Airex swallowed. ‘I understand your doubt surrounding the Enterprise files. This is one case study. But the autopsy of Ensign Gamble made it very clear he died on Vadia IX, before beaming back to Enterprise, likely at the moment of possession -’

‘Or was killed by the energy discharge of the Vezda breaking free in his hand. And even if not, that’s one incident!’ She stabbed an accusing finger at him. ‘You’re the Chief Science Officer of this ship. You need to find options, not slam doors shut.’

‘I have to follow the evidence -’

‘One case, a hundred and fifty years ago!’ She turned away, tried to set her feet, tried to get back into the rhythm of her boxing practice. ‘There’s not enough data. Find more.’

He didn’t say anything for a moment, and she thought he might get the picture. Then, ‘You shouldn’t be alone right now.’

‘What,’ Kharth growled, ‘you’re volunteering for a slumber party?’ Thump. Thump.

‘I don’t mean me – look, I haven’t told anyone…’ Airex hesitated, and she didn’t turn back. ‘You should meet with Carraway when we rendezvous with the squadron. And you should tell him.’

‘Yeah, Valance has made it super clear I’m going to need to talk to -’

‘Tell him what the Vezda said.’ She could almost hear his cringing, and it didn’t help. ‘What it called you.’

‘Stop it.’ She rounded on him anew, but he looked ready for it this time, braced and impassive. ‘Stop pretending you have special insights -’

‘You’re hurt, and you’re lashing out, and the Vezda wielded intimate knowledge as a weapon,’ Airex carried on, louder, talking over her. ‘And you need to be honest about that with Greg -’

‘Stop acting like you’re the only one who knows me!’ Kharth snarled. In the back of her mind, memories stirred – not just their ancient history, but the year before, clinging to each other for grief over Valance when stranded in the Delta Quadrant, her insistence he stay aboard Endeavour when he’d offered to leave, that she still needed him –

‘Like you’re the only one who understands how bad it was,’ she continued, as if she could shout over her own roiling vulnerability. ‘Yeah, that thing read my mind, stole my true name, used it against me; that doesn’t make you a genius to figure out that sucks!’

In the silence that followed her echoing shout, he finally looked startled. Then his expression fell. ‘I – I didn’t realise…’

‘Didn’t realise what?’

Airex’s face folded with grief and sympathy, enough to make her want to punch him. ‘That you never told Logan.’

‘Get out.’ It was an observation of how deep the Vezda’s invasion had been, she knew – and yet it stung like an accusation, like she’d failed Jack, held too much of herself back, and she pointed at the door. ‘Get the hell out -’

‘I’m going.’

The door slid shut behind him, leaving only the hum of the ship and her ragged breathing. Kharth stood there a moment, fists hanging as motionless at her side as the punching bag from the ceiling, heavy and worn.

The gym was too bright, too empty. She pulled the gloves off and dropped them, then headed to the wall panel and dimmed the lights, leaving only the pale glow from the viewports. Beyond it, the stars of the Expanse streamed as Endeavour made her steady way onward.

Kharth sat on the bench, elbows on her knees, head bowed. That was how Cortez found her, an unknowable time later, alone in the half-light.

‘You look like hell.’ Cortez sat on the bench beside her and handed over a water bottle.

Kharth made a noise that was almost a laugh. ‘Hey, you fix ships, not people. You’re not allowed to diagnose.’

‘I bet Starik would agree with me. It’s so bad he’d even say, “look like hell.”’

Kharth drank. The water was cold, but it hit what her body needed hard enough to make her feel alive again. Made of flesh and blood and not fire and rage. ‘Did Airex send you?’

Cortez scoffed. ‘I told him not to come down here.’

‘So you talked -’

‘We were in the lab. Going over details. He was trying to not fret. It was almost cute.’ At her glare, Cortez reeled back. ‘Okay, not cute. Weird. Creepy. Invasive?’

Kharth slumped, elbows on her knees again. ‘I bit his head off.’

‘You shock me.’

‘He’s just – I know he wants to make things right, but for him that means making things make sense. And they don’t. And they can’t, not yet.’

Cortez gave a slow nod. ‘We’re gonna find answers, you know? We’re decrypting the nav logs of the builders’ ship. We’re going to find where they came from.’

‘Then we get more about the fissure, the technology – that doesn’t find us him.’

‘One step at a time,’ said Cortez softly, but they could both hear the uselessness of the sentiment, however true it was. After a beat, Cortez slouched with a soft huff. ‘Do you blame me?’

Kharth frowned. ‘What?’

‘If what was happening in that containment room was a Vezda – a non-corporeal being made up of energy at that stage – waking up, getting ready to break out, not a power core overloading, then Torkath was right,’ she said softly. ‘Then I should have cracked the door open and got them out -’

‘How the hell were we to know it was an interdimensional monster?’ Kharth pointed out. ‘Torkath’s just looking for someone to blame so he doesn’t blame himself. He was the idiot, foolhardy and proud. So desperate to take control of the situation he couldn’t control that he got Brok’tan killed, and Jack…’ Her voice trailed off, and she looked away. Swallowed. ‘It’s his fault. Not yours.’

Cortez sucked her teeth. ‘Wow. I suck.’

‘I just said -’

‘I came down here to check up on you, an’ here you are, making me feel better.’

Kharth sighed, clasping her hands in front of her. ‘I got all my weird energy out nearly punching Airex. Shit.’ She lowered her head. ‘I can’t see him right now, he just makes me feel – raw, and exposed, and…’

‘Hey, you don’t have to do anything right now. And I know that’s the problem for you, you want to do something, but… look.’ Cortez swung her leg over the bench, straddling it to face her. ‘You want to punch his stupid face for having the audacity to know you, but you trust him. And you trust me. And we’re gonna get to the bottom of this. Okay?’

Kharth didn’t look up, knowing her nod seemed surly, like a teenager who’d done wrong. ‘Okay,’ she mumbled after a beat.

‘And you can keep lurking down here and beating the hell out of a punching bag, and Kar’s gonna reinstate you once you’ve done a round with Greg, and we’re gonna fix things.’

Fix things. Slowly, Kharth raised her head at last, searching Cortez’s gaze. ‘Do you think Dav’s right?’

‘I…’

‘Do you think Jack’s dead?’

Cortez bit her lip. ‘I think we don’t know anything. And that’s driving everyone nuts. Including Dav.’

Now Kharth looked away, sighing. ‘I should talk to him -’

‘Yeah, maybe. But you can do it in a few million years.’ Cortez looked from her to the abandoned gloves to the punching bag. ‘You done in here?’

‘I still had a run left in my routine.’

‘You can skip it once, girl -’

‘No,’ Kharth sighed, and stood up. ‘I’ll feel better if I finish it off. You can go. Seriously. I’m not going to rip anyone’s head off.’

‘Okay, good, because I’m spent,’ Cortez groaned, hopping to her feet. ‘I’m gonna hit the rack. We’ll talk, right? Coffee breaks. Round Table, your quarters, different lounge, whatever.’

Kharth gave a level nod, knowing the equilibrium she felt right now wouldn’t last – that soon she would rotate back to the gnawing terror, rage, vulnerability. ‘We’ll talk,’ she said quietly. It wasn’t that she was lying to make Cortez leave. It was that this was all she could do.

She hit the lights again and headed for the treadmill.

Thirty minutes later, she was in the locker room, finally feeling she’d drained every micron of energy from her muscles enough that she might sleep. After a workout in an empty gym, the sound of someone else rattling around in the locker room felt loud, intrusive.

When she saw Caede, she stopped short with a venomous glare. ‘What is this, a line of people come to check up on me?’

But surprise registered in his eyes as he turned to her. ‘Oh. Kharth. Didn’t know you were down here.’

‘Yeah, sure -’

‘I have a workout to fit in. You don’t factor into my schedule right now.’ He opened a locker and shrugged out of his uniform jacket. ‘You think I don’t know better than to fawn over how soft and sad you are?’

She paused, his words grating even if the sentiment was exactly what she’d expressed she wanted. She moved to her locker with a surly air. ‘Fine. Just, Starfleet types, right -’

‘You’re a Starfleet type,’ Caede grunted.

‘Okay, you don’t have to fawn, but could you shut up?’

‘No.’ He turned to her again, gaze level. ‘I get it. They’ve been fussing and soft. When what you want to do is rip and claw and tear at the universe.’

Kharth paused, staring into the locker where she’d stuffed her gym bag. ‘Not the universe,’ she muttered.

‘Okay. The thing that’s running around wearing Logan’s face. Dead, alive, in limbo, whatever. Let the scientists ponder that and get answers.’

‘I’m doing that, I’m being good, I’m waiting,’ Kharth said, ignoring that she’d verbally ripped the jugular out of one of the scientists.

‘That’s not what I mean. Hey. Look at me, Kharth.’ She turned to face him, gym bag in hand, and found his eyes dark, expression firm. ‘What happened to Logan is messed up. Whatever it is, it’s messed up. And it’s messed up for you.’

‘I know -’

‘And Starfleet says you sit and wait for orders and a plan and a mission, which means you’ll be on the sidelines. Screw that.’ Caede pulled his undershirt off and grabbed a workout vest, swapping for exercise even as he spoke of rebellion. ‘That’s not what you want. And when the time comes – with the Vezda, Klingons, the people who built that facility, whatever – just say the word. I’ll have your back.’

‘Have my back for what?’

He closed the locker. Shrugged. ‘Doing what you need to do: making them pay.’