Backdated - Monster Mash Day 5

[daughterofthefifth]

Lwaxana Troi made her way toward the turbolift in a state of some agitation. Five days! Five days of uncertainty, chaos, monsters (how ridiculous!), exuding Calm, tending to the mortally and mentally wounded, and that poor girl--

She shuddered and shook off that particular thought as quickly as it had come. There was something to be said for vampires, anyway.

--well, and now: This! The Taj Mahal chamber, looking as if small starships had been firing phasers at each other and missed. Repeatedly! Oh, and not to mention the slime that covered everything!

She reached the turbolift and pressed the call button. At least that was still working! Bulkheads torn apart, easy as tissue paper on a child's birthday. Blinking panels and half-functioning doors. Outrageous.

The doors slid open and she stepped inside. There was all ready another occupant--that dour young man of Caroline's.

"Evening," Lwaxana said, though for all she knew, it could have been any time of day at all.

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[daughterofthefifth]

She couldn't get a perfect read on him--something to do with his age, since Caroline was nearly as transparent as any mortal human--but detecting his simmering anger was not difficult.

And it didn't take a trained diplomat to see that this wasn't the sort of anger you just casually defused with small talk. So, she ignored it.

"You live up on Level 5, don't you? I'm thinking of moving into a suite."

[wholeworldoutthere]

"Only three are open," Klaus confirmed, and leaned back against the opposite wall of the lift. "One's ours, one's Mystique's," and she might actually want it now that Level One had been flooded, "and one's burned. Not by us," he adds, or maybe by Mystique, when she was up there by herself. He doesn't know, and doesn't care.

[daughterofthefifth]

Lwaxana threw up her hands. "Everything is ruined!" she exclaimed. "My Taj Mahal--a smoking wreck! Level 1 is flooded! I might as well move into my shuttle!"

As she said it, the idea began to take shape and gain traction in her imagination. Actually, she wasn't sure why she hadn't done it all ready--except there really had been something very grand about sleeping next to that perfect miniature.

She sighed. "No use in going all the way up there now. Computer--shuttle bay."

[wholeworldoutthere]

That was fine with Klaus. He'd gotten in the lift in an effort to escape Level Five, where he'd taken so many walks and runs with Star. Anywhere would work just as well, as long as it wasn't there. Or maybe he ought to stop by where he died.

"Computer, stop by Level Two first," he bypassed Lwaxana's command. She could go on on her way to Level One afterwards.

[daughterofthefifth]

"What's on Level Two?"

Rooms, of course, but Lwaxana wondered what the significance was in this particular case. It clearly troubled him.

[wholeworldoutthere]

"A lot of rubble," Klaus replies, too exhausted to say anything else. Too angry to think of something wittier to reply.

When the door opens, he steps out without a look back at her.

[daughterofthefifth]

For half a second, Lwaxana deliberated, but her mothering instincts took over and overrode common sense. She stepped out behind him.

"Better you have someone with you--what if something's lurking in that rubble? Who will get help if you're alone?"

[wholeworldoutthere]

"Haven't you been listening to our good doctor?" Klaus asks without pausing, on his way to the spot. "I'm the big bad wolf in these parts."

There's not even a trace of humour in him.

[daughterofthefifth]

"Of course," she agreed. "The kind of man who's always in control of the situation? Used to it, anyway, that kind of control." Lwaxana glanced sharply at the square of his shoulders, but in that moment, he was just as difficult to read as in every other moment.

"I've known many men like you in my capacity as an intergalactic diplomat! I was once kidnapped by a horrid little Ferengi captain just for advantages in trade negotiations."

She was talking to distract him from the imposition of her presence. If she hadn't been talking, she may have heard the rustling on the wall above them.

[wholeworldoutthere]

Oh, would she just shut up and leave him alone. "Was that little Ferengi captain capable of tearing your tongue out because you spoke when you weren't wanted," he asked, almost nonchalantly, but missing the mark on account of the anger audibly hidden right under the surface.

He had no idea what a Ferengi was, so the answer might as well be yes. It wasn't his point.

[daughterofthefifth]

"What a joke! Ferengi are barely taller than a child--he wouldn't have been able to reach..."

She trailed off as something moved in the periphery of her vision. And then, as she turned to look, it flew toward her.

[wholeworldoutthere]

Klaus moved in a heartbeat, a few feet ahead of her one second, right in front of her the next, and he punched right through the thing flying at her face.

And immediately cursed up a blue streak, and shook the dying corpse off of his arm, which was now being eaten up by acidic blood. He bloody well hated the Alien movies, by then.

[daughterofthefifth]

Lwaxana screamed, for two reasons: first, of all, because By the Deities, what is that thing?!. She recognized its remains as Klaus shook them off as being another of those things that had attached itself to Santana--she remembered vividly how that had ended.

And she screamed also, because as the pain of the acid distracted Klaus, his mental walls dropped and she was suddenly rushed with a wave of jumbled images and thoughts, impossible to process in a moment.

She stood, shaking, watching him shake off its remains without really seeing.

[wholeworldoutthere]

This was more acid than Klaus had gotten sprayed with when encountering the seven foot tall counterpart of this little bastard, and the pain wasn't dying down any time soon as the acid kept eating at his arm. He zoomed away at top speed, towards the nearest bathroom, and ran his forearm under the tap until all the acid was gone. His arm looked like shit, raw and bloody, bone showing in places.

In short, he needed blood, and zoomed away to the nearest replicator, leaning heavily against the wall beside it as he requested blood. The first three were barely drinkable, but fourth time was, apparently, the charm, and he downed it greedily, then asked the replicator for more.

[daughterofthefifth]

Lwaxana drew herself up, pulling the threads of her sanity back together and knitting them back into place. As she took stock of herself and her surroundings, her trained mind was all ready sorting the information she'd received telepathically. It was not a great deal of thought and feeling, but what she had gotten was intense, bloody, full of great highs and lows of emotion.

One thing was clear: this was a young man with significant family issues. It was amazing he was able to trust Caroline with his wounded heart as much as he had.

Her own heart had slowed finally, as she dithered for a moment in the hall. To follow him, or to return to the safety of the turbolift? Obviously, no area of the station was really safe!

[wholeworldoutthere]

Eventually, Klaus had drunk enough blood that he knew the healing would happen. By the time he headed back into the hall, his arm was still a bloody mess, and he was still in pain, but it was well on its way to healed, even if it hung useless by his side.

"Now," he told the woman, pain audible in his voice, his mental shields back up, if somewhat wobbly, and having no idea that she had caught anything at all from his mind, "the kind of man I actually am might not want to save your life a second time."

[daughterofthefifth]

Lwaxana had recovered enough to smile graciously. "No, I see that. But perhaps you are just the kind of man to make sure I get back to the lift safely?"

She thought, especially now, perhaps he was. "It wouldn't be polite to follow you any further anyway."

[wholeworldoutthere]

"Didn't stop you before," Klaus pointed out, and turned to head in the opposite direction from the lift. He was absolutely not that kind of man, although he might as well keep an ear out for her.

Killing things was a perfect way to let off some steam, whether you almost lost your arm to it or not.

[daughterofthefifth]

"Well, it will impress Caroline enough that you punched a flying egg creature for me," Lwaxana said, sounding more put out than she really was. And she turned as well, back toward the turbolift.