unfederated sanctuary

[warpfairy]

Davlia does not join the Federation. In fact, Davlia is quite collectively outraged that the Federation would refuse them entry until they received kindly donated technological insight, and only then ask them to participate in the government that wanted to condemn their would-be benefactor to life in prison. Davlia decides that it's doing all right by itself; it uses what Isabella and Lalita can dump into the nets from their stolen ship's library, and their new warp tech, to make contact with other civilizations, and are presently trading merrily with non-Federation civilizations and scouting a possible colony site a few stars to the galactic east.

Isabella catches up with Lalita on the language, and by the time they've been living among Davlians for a year they're both fluent. Lalita has an easier time making himself useful to their hosts than Isabella does, what with his vast arsenal of variously practical skills, but Isabella manages to make a few PADDs from the ship take Davlian electricity and pokes around on the nets, contributing useful ideas in appropriately modest pseudonymous fashion. (Not under "polarbear". That wouldn't make her inconspicuous, here. She goes by the less than concealing "priv_sky"; if anyone, under all the careful not-prying, is curious about her identity, they may have it, but she's trying to be polite.) Occasionally she gets a Davlia-approved thrill of warmth when something she's suggested anonymously is put into practice and nobody knows it's hers except Lalita.

The ship doesn't have very good bandwidth for subspace access to the Federation nets - it's warp-capable, but it was mostly not intended for long-distance runs, it didn't need to send large packets of information through subspace when it was generally within fine range for radio. Also, the Federation knows where they are, or at least has a very strong hunch - it just can't scoop them up without annoying the Davlians, who they're still trying to court. They can restrict information flow to the Potomac systems (because wherever they think it is, they know it was stolen) and to Davlia's own nets. News of home is not nonexistent, but it is infrequent and probably filtered.

They've been on Davlia for almost six years when Isabella learns that their neighbors have been unobtrusively considering her and Lalita what amounts to common-law married since they landed. She tells him so.

Comments

[warpfairy]

"It is. Do you think it's a trick?"

[dream_me_up]

"It might be. Hard to tell what the catch is, though. Do you want to go see?"

[warpfairy]

"I'd suggest that I could go alone and if I don't tell you in a timely manner that everything's clear you could rescue me again, but - based on the timing I don't want to be across the quadrant from you."

[dream_me_up]

"There is that," he says. "I'll go with you."

[warpfairy]

She leans on him. "I love you. I don't suppose you know how to use our teeny subspace bandwidth from the Potomac to hack into the necessary things to discover if the amnesty is legitimate?"

[dream_me_up]

"Not easily. I could do it, but it would take a while. Or I would have to go somewhere that had better bandwidth."

[warpfairy]

"We could stop - somewhere. I don't want to try paying Ferengi for subspace bandwidth, but someplace where it would be easier to pop back here, or where we couldn't be snapped up if it turned out that's what's waiting. Breen, maybe? I don't know much about the Breen except that they're not Federation and don't tend to shoot on sight."

[dream_me_up]

"Hmm," he says. "I don't know much about them either. What I can tell you for sure, though, is that if the amnesty isn't legitimate and the announcement reached us all the way out here anyway, there's going to be hell to pay, politically speaking. Want to risk it?"

[warpfairy]

"You suppose I could accomplish much by getting recaptured if that's what they have in mind?" she asks. "Concretely, I mean, not just inconveniencing someone's speechwriter."

[dream_me_up]

"Well, you can't know how the dice are going to come up before you throw them. But it'll be a push. Especially if you manage to put out some kind of public statement about it that uses words like 'betrayal'."

[warpfairy]

She smiles slightly.

"Looks like we should pack, then, and I should get repatriated." She laughs. "And if everything works out, in a few weeks we'll be on the books married in the Federation, instead of retroactively recognized at some time who knows when."

[dream_me_up]

"That'll be cute."

[warpfairy]

They pack.

They fly to New Vulcan; they are not interrupted on the way by any Starfleet vessels cackling "gotcha".

They dock; they shuttle down; their hotel room is comped; off goes Isabella to her repatriation ceremony.

It takes a little longer than expected. She's not back in the morning.

This morning is circled, in her calendar.

[dream_me_up]

...

Lalita goes looking. Early.

[warpfairy]

He can hear shouting, when he approaches the room.

One of the voices is Isabella's, and there is a familiar tension in her voice, if you happen to have an augmented memory and can remember that far back.

"- would have been betrothed regardless, if your father had -"

"I said no - I am - I am spoken for - I have a sa-kugalsu -"

"He is not a Vulcan, T'Mir -"

When he gets to the door, he can see Isabella backed into a corner, shaking, face drawn and pale, and she sees him, and she screams at the top of her lungs, "Kal-if-fee!"

[dream_me_up]

That is a word Lalita knows.

[warpfairy]

"T'Mir, be serious," says one of the Vulcans. He's probably not the one Lalita may be about to fight; that's probably the young man over there in the corner, who isn't in as bad shape as Isabella is but appears to be coming up on his own little problem. It's not entirely clear whether this was how he'd have chosen to resolve it. "V'Ler is -"

"It's my right, I am claiming it," Isabella hisses through gritted teeth, "if my sa-kugalsu will champion me against your - your breeding program."

[dream_me_up]

"Of course I will, darling."

[warpfairy]

Isabella sinks to the floor and hugs her knees and shakes.

"This backfired," murmurs one of the elder Vulcans to another, "V'Ler could wind up dead instead of married, I told the High Council -"

"There's nothing for it now, and if he lives it will break the fever, at least," the other mutters. They probably don't intend to be overheard, but no one counts on Lalita's ears.

V'Ler, the young man in the corner, is now visibly sizing up the challenger.

[dream_me_up]

Lalita smiles slightly.

"I'll try not to kill him. He is a member of an endangered species."

He doesn't look like much, all together - tall, lithe, human. But he is entirely too confident for a human who speaks Vulcan this well, who apparently understands exactly what is going on, who is betrothed to a half-Vulcan, and who is about to fulfill a combat challenge for her right to deny her Vulcan suitor.

[warpfairy]

V'Ler notices this, but he's - distracted; either his own conveniently timed hormonal issues are in full swing now or he finds something attractive about crying, life-threateningly desperate women who have been surprise-engaged to him as part of recovering said endangered species.

He shifts his weight, takes a step forward.

"T'Mir, your display is unseemly, even at this time," hisses one of the elders.

"I hate you so much," she hisses back at him through the tears.

[dream_me_up]

It is upsetting to watch Isabella cry. He doesn't like it.

"I'll just be a minute, darling," he says gently.

In the event, once the challenge has begun, it takes him forty seconds to put V'Ler on the floor. He is not fucking around. Not with this.

[warpfairy]

V'Ler makes some sort of noise. He's definitely not eying Isabella anymore.

The elders are - surprised - but they don't get between Lalita and Isabella, who uncurls from herself enough to hold out her arms towards him, trembling.

[dream_me_up]

He hugs her.

"C'mon back to the hotel, my love," he murmurs in English.

[warpfairy]

She can walk. It's a little hard to remember that particular use of her limbs at the moment, but if she can lean on him, head on his shoulder, tearstained face tucked against his neck, she can follow him.