“He really needs the time away, sir,” Jeremy said carefully to Captain Kirk, “and I don’t dare leave him on his own. If you could see your way clear to allowing me to take some leave with him…”

Jim gazed up from his chair to Jade, who was perched on the edge of his desk. Jeremy Paget stood next to her, his proper bearing carrying no trace of the pleading that was in his brown eyes.

Jade returned his glance, then returned to studying Paget. “I can’t argue with that, James,” she said. “I think some time with Mr. Paget may be just what the doctor ordered.” If she expected a reaction from the Security man, Jim couldn’t see it. “And you did authorize Miss Gollub to accompany Chekov on his leave,” Jade concluded.

“And Spock is stubbornly refusing to admit he needs the time at all,” Jim scowled.

“Well, since he wouldn’t have enough time to get to San Francisco and back,” Jade rejoined, “at least not and spend more than a few hours with Ruth…”

“Which would only aggravate her…”

“Captain, my request, begging your pardon,” Paget put in respectfully.

Jim straightened. “Yes, I’m sorry, Commander. Two week’s leave is granted.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“Take care of him, Mr. Paget,” Jade said softly.

“I’ll do my untrained best, Dr. Han,” Jeremy replied, then turned and left the office. Again Jim noted Jade’s gaze following him. He cleared his throat.

“Something there I should know about?” he asked.

“I’m not certain yet,” Han replied with a mild frown. “I’ll be sure to let you know when I am.”

“And is there anything I should worry about?” Jim wondered, and realized he had spoken aloud when Jade turned to him, her dark eyes dancing.

“I’ll let you know that, too, James,” she said with a sweet smile “ – when I’m certain.”

The cabin was dark and Jeremy took a deep breath and said a quick prayer before ordering, “Lights, full.”

“Jesus God, sweet Mary, Mother o’Christ turn them fuckin’ t’ings off!!” DelMonde moaned. The engineer was in his bunk, on his back, one arm raised to shield his eyes.

“Sorry. N.C., I need it to pack.”

“Pack? Where the hell you goin’?”

“Not me, babe. We.”

Del pushed himself up onto his elbows. “Fuck you, Cobra,” he said coldly, and Jeremy could see that the Cajun’s eyes were already bloodshot. “There no place I wanna go an’ not’ing I wanna do ‘cept lie here an’ drink my damn self to death. So if you not mind…” He started to turn away and Paget crossed the cabin in three steps, grasping his arm.

“Oh no you don’t,” Jeremy scolded. “I just spent a week’s pay down at the bar on the station, and I called in a favor with Scotty and got us a warp shuttle – a real Chutzpah, not one of the Federation Fakes – and the navigation is all set for a test drive.”

“Have a fuckin’ wonderful time,” Del growled without looking at the TerAfrican.

“Come on, Del, it’ll be…”

“Fuck you.”

“I said I spent a week’s pay…”

“An’ I said fuck you.”

With a fair show of disinterest, Jeremy let go of Del’s arm and stepped away. He carefully removed his weapons’ belt and laid it on his bunk, stripping off the rest of his clothes to head for the shower. After turning on the water, he went back to the door of the head, manually slid the door about half an inch open, and waited.

He didn’t have to stand there long. As soon as the sound of the water leaked through to the cabin, DelMonde was sitting up, reaching for the phaser Paget had so carelessly left on the bed next to his. Paget slid the door the rest of the way open and charged forward, catching the engineer’s right arm, twisting it behind his back, throwing his own left arm around the Cajun’s neck in a neat headlock.

“You’ve really lost it, my man,” Jeremy murmured in Del’s ear. “I never thought I could sucker a world-class telepath like you that easily.” As DelMonde struggled, the Security man tightened his grip. “And I even telegraphed it to you,” he went on. “When’s the last, first or only time I ever called you ‘Del’?”

The engineer tried to answer, but Jeremy only pulled up on the choke-hold.

“No, babe, we’re doin’ this my way. I know what you’re feelin’ I know how bad it hurts, I know you wanna die but that ain’t gonna happen. Life’s a cruel bitch and she makes you keep on goin’ through the worst possible shit and expects you to love her for it. So what you do, you poor, lost, fucked-up, crazy soul, is suck it up and spit in her vicious face and live like you mean it – whether or not you do. Because, N.C., my second dearest friend in all the universe, that’s the only thing we’ve got left.”

When he felt the Cajun’s body trembling in the harsh embrace, Jeremy eased up. DelMonde sagged to his knees, and Paget let go. In a flash the engineer had grabbed the phaser – and the TerAfrican glanced down at him, folding his arms.

“How fuckin’ stupid do you think I am?” he asked with a twisted grin. “The damn thing’s not even charged.”

Of course, Del tried it anyway, and Jeremy couldn’t stop the chuckle. The Cajun looked up at him with weary anger.

“Fuck you, Paget,” he said, but there was no strength in it.

“Yeah, that’s for later,” the Security man returned. “For now, I got us two weeks leave, a fully stocked shuttle and hours and hours to get blind drunk and stoned…”

“An’ grounded?” Del muttered.

“No, with the five cases of bourbon I got stowed, I ain’t gonna be cleanin’ up your vomit every hour on the hour. Besides, you’re still full of the blue Loonie juice. That’s enough poison without adding Haven chemicals to it.”

“So says Dr. Paget,” the engineer grumbled.

“Five cases of bourbon, N.C. Two weeks. A warp shuttle. Get your sorry ass up, throw a couple changes of clothes into a duffle, grab your guitar and let’s get the fuck out of here.”

Jeremy had set the autopilot to take them in the usual round-about trip, though he’d set it for six hours rather than the usual three. That would be enough time, he thought, for DelMonde to get past the sullen part of his usual drunk stages, even given the particular difficulty he was facing. Not that Paget expected the engineer to get to the hilariously sarcastic phase any time in the next two weeks, but he hoped he could help the Cajun get back some of his equilibrium. Or at the very least, dull the excruciating pain to a level closer to the poor empath’s normal state of existence.

The first two bottles of bourbon disappeared in minutes, and as Del opened a third, Jeremy lit a huge cigar of Rigellian. They exchanged intoxicants for a while, then Jeremy noticed that the engineer was eyeing him suspiciously.

“How you know?” Del said at last.

“Know what?” Paget returned, exhaling a fragrant cloud of smoke.

“That I was fixin’ to…”

“Pull a dumb-ass stunt like tryin’ to get me to leave a phaser just lyin’ around?” the TerAfrican cut in.

He didn’t expect the Cajun to have the least amount of guilt, and he wasn’t disappointed.

“So how you know?” Del repeated belligerently.

“The cute little silver Romulan told me,” Paget said, and took the bottle from Del, handing him the Rigellian.

“You mean Wen?” Del asked, taking a large hit.

“Yeah. For what Romulans call a ‘non-gift’ he sure ain’t.”

Del grunted an agreement.

“So how’d he ever get classified like that?”

The engineer shrugged an ‘I don’t know.’ “Joron thought – “ His voice stopped as if choked off, his pain at the memory of his Romulan guest all too evident. “He thought,” he recovered, “that some rich sick-fuck mos’ likely paid off his mama to get him put as a slave so the poor t’ing be trained up to serve the bastard right.”

Jeremy shuddered. “For a race of telepaths, they’re a cold bunch.”

“No,” Del said, “they not.” But he didn’t elaborate.

Again they exchanged bottle and cigar.

“Did you notice how much Wen looks like…” Jeremy ventured.

“Yeah. Pretty damned scary, non?”

“And the situation he was in…”

“Yeah, that too. You s’posin it got somet’ing to do wit' th' looks?”

Jeremy shuddered. “God, I hope not. If it did, Kam would mutilate himself.”

“An’ have a hell of a good time doin’ it,” the engineer returned with grim humor. He finished the bottle, and reached for a fourth.

“It was a good choice for him, though,” Jeremy mused.

Del studied him for a moment. “He already look Indiian to you?” he asked, his unshielded telepathy automatically picking up on the TerAfrican’s chain of thought.

“Well, I did once meet an Indiian that looked like him,” Paget replied, not even questioning how Del knew he was again talking about Sulu rather than Wen.

“Yeah,” Del murmured, renewed pain in his dark, drunken eyes. “Her barracuda.”

Paget blinked. “Spill, N.C., I’m mind-blind, remember?”

“Terry. The racer… shit, Cobra, don’ make me say her name.” He focused just a little, sending the image of Ruth’s young lover directly to his friend’s brain.

“I didn’t know his name,” Jeremy responded immediately. “I only knew him as Katana.”

“Yeah.”

“But he was only half…” The words were out of Paget’s mouth before he thought, and he clamped his lips shut. Pelori MacEntyre, too, had been half-Indiian, half-Human.

Del squeezed his eyes shut and downed half the bottle in one go.

“I’m sorry, Cajun,” Jeremy said softly.

“Yeah, you were sweet on her too,” the engineer mumbled.

Jeremy grabbed a fifth bottle, opening it, then clinking it to the one in Del’s hand.

“To good memories only,” he offered.

“To fuckin’ oblivion,” Del returned.

When they reached the hotel room Jeremy had booked on one of the border planets, neither one of them could walk without the support of the other. It wasn’t the gaily inebriated inability of their former warp drive testing excursions, though they were twice as incapacitated. Paget arranged for a porter to bring up their duffels, DelMonde’s guitar, and the remaining alcohol, then flopped on the wide, king-size bed. He heard Del going into the bathroom, then the sound of vomiting. He made himself get up to go check on the engineer, and bumped into him on the way into the head.

“Jus’ makin’ more room,” Del said almost cheerfully, and he guided Paget back to the bed before taking another bottle from the large case of liquor.

“What we drink to now?” the Cajun asked. “Vulcans? Starfleet Intelligence? Warrior-Bonds? Blue Loonie Juice?”

“Warrior-Bonds,” Jeremy said, sitting up from where he’d collapsed. “Tell me about that, N.C.”

“Nothin’ much to tell,” the engineer replied, taking a long drink. “They was linked, part o’ each other, till death an’ beyond.”

“Did they love each other, or was there some other…?”

“Yeah, they in love, true, mushy, stupid, dangerous, everlastin’ love,” Del sneered.

“Both of them?”

“Yeah.” The Cajun squinted at his friend. “Why you wanna know fo’?”

“No reason…” Paget’s voice trailed off and he leaned over, almost falling off the bed, to grab the wooden box that contained numerous cigars of Rigellian.

“Anybody ever tell you you lie worth shit?” the engineer said.

“I don’t wanna talk about it,” Jeremy muttered.

“They why you ask, son?”

As Paget shrugged, Del focused his thoughts as well as he was able. “Wen say what?” he blurted out.

Jeremy stopped in the middle of lighting another cigar. “Don’t do that,” he growled.

“I a damn world-class telepath, remember?” the engineer scowled.

“Like I ever forget.”

“So?”

Jeremy sighed and finished lighting the Rigellian. He took a hit, then extended it to Del, taking the bottle of bourbon from his friend’s hand. He took a long drink before speaking again.

“Wen was freakin’ about you and your suicidal thoughts, and I wanted to calm him down, I just touched his shoulder and…”

“He felt it?” Del blinked. “He do that when he touch Joron… me… but… hell, Jer, you mind-blind!”

“That’s what I told him.”

Del narrowed his gaze. “Non, you still mentally deaf an’ dumb as a post,” he confirmed. He closed his eyes.

“Stop that!” Paget grunted.

“It Sulu,” the engineer said at last. “Mere de duin, it Sulu!”

“No,” the TerAfrican said, the syllable covered in pain and grief and desperate hope. “That’s not possible, he doesn’t love me.”

“Whatever you say, Cobra,” Del returned blithely, taking the bottle from Jeremy and downing a good measure of what was left in it.

The only time they weren’t drinking or smoking was when they passed out. They joked, argued, fought, which led to fucking, which led to more drinking. They ‘made more room’ separately and together, showered separately and together, ordered room service and ignored most of the food.

Nearly two weeks later, Del lazily lifted one of the last bottles from the last case. “Shee-it,” he said, “after this, we only got two more.”

“That’s all right, we’ve gotta check out in the morning and head back to the good old Enterprise,” Jeremy told him.

“How much Rigellian left?”

“Two cigars.”

“Shee-it.”

“We’ll need to sober up on the way home anyway.”

Del eyed him dourly. “What fo’? I not plannin’ on…”

“Yes, you are,” Paget replied firmly. “You’re an officer…”

“But nowhere near a gentleman.”

“… and unless you’re plannin’ to resign…”

“Hell, Cobra, where else I got to go?”

“You’re a galaxy-class Maker.”

“An’ wit’out you to set me up, I starve. Nobody wanna deal wit’ a foul-tempered sombitch like me.”

“So you’re gonna sober up and suck it up,” Jeremy affirmed.

“Not around that damned Vulcan,” Del snarled.

Jeremy had no answer for that – at least not until he pled Del’s case to Kirk one more time. He glanced at the guitar case that had sat unopened for the last two weeks. “Play something for me, N.C.,” he said.

“Fuck that,” the engineer replied, taking a drink from the bottle of bourbon.

“Why?” Jeremy wanted to know.

“You t’ink music gonna soothe my broken soul?”

“No, just get some of the shit out of your system.”

“I can puke fo’ that.”

"All right." Paget took in a deep breath.

DelMonde narrowed his eyes. "Don't be lookin’ at me that way, Jer."

"What way?"

"The 'we gonna have to rip the bandage off quick' way," the Cajun replied.

Jer leaned back in his chair. "Tell me about her," he ordered mercilessly.

"Fuck you," Del replied, lifting the bottle.

"You have." Jer crossed his arms. "I'm surprised the two of you hooked up. The lieutenant hated your guts the last time I saw her. You'd written that song for her..."

It seemed so long ago. Del remembered how green she'd gone while he played the "Telepathic Girls" song. She always did have a temper. He took another long sip of bourbon to wash the memory away. He hoped that seeing this technique was not going to work, Jer would move on to something else.

"I know it was quick," Paget said, bumping his attack up to the next level. "But did she have time to say anything to you at the end?"

Hot rage swept through the Cajun's veins. "It none o’ your fuckin’ business what she say."

"Fine." The security man/psychologist's face was remorseless. "Just tell me, though, whether or not she told you that she wanted you to curl up and do your damnedest to die after she was gone."

Del threw the half-empty bottle in his hand into the wall near Paget's head.

The Security man didn't even flinch as it burst messily. "Because she didn't strike me as a person who would want that from someone she cared about."

"I gonna fuckin’ kill you," Del seethed.

"Do it," Paget said calmly. "Do anything. Do something. At the very least have the guts to pick up that fucking guitar... Because you gotta release what's inside you. You need the release if you’re goin’ back to the ship.”

“What I need,” Del suddenly blazed, “what I need is that li’l gal who love me more than she ever love anyone else! What I need is her arms aroun’ me, her body aroun’ me! What I need is to tell her how much I love her, to feel her mind in mine, to form our own damned Bond! I need her, Jer, Cobra, sweet Mary, I need her, I need her…!”

His voice broke off and he started sobbing, his body wracked with his grieving, helpless cries of pain and loss.

Jeremy immediately went to him, pulling him into strong arms and shared emotion. There was little he could do other than let the agony work itself out, allow the empath to feel his surety and his affection and the depth of his understanding. There was sympathy in him, but no pity. The engineer would only throw that kind of support back in his face – and it was uncalled for anyway. Del was stronger than he knew – pity was for the weak.

You can survive this, Paget thought with steely sorrow. I know you don’t think you can, but you can use her love to ease you. There’s nothin’ stronger than love, babe, I swear it, even unrequited – and yours wasn’t. It’s never been, not with Pelori, not even with Ruth. The words of the Song of Solomon grew within him, and he focused all his emotion on them to send them to DelMonde’s anguished soul.

Set me as a seal upon thine heart, as a seal upon thine arm: for love is strong as death; and wrath bitter as the underworld: its coals are coals of fire; violent are its flames. Wear me as a signet ring on your heart, as a ring on your hand. Love is as overpowering as death. Devotion is as unyielding as the grave. Love's flames are flames of fire, flames that come from the Lord. Many waters cannot quench love, nor will rivers overflow it; If a man were to give all the riches of his house for love, it would be utterly despised.

He heard Del’s cry of despair and continued.

What shall we do for our sister on the day when she is spoken for? If she is a wall, we will build on her a battlement of silver; But if she is a door, we will barricade her with planks of cedar.

The words penetrated Del’s mind, permeating through the bitterness and grief. He wept harder, pouring his shattered being into the river of pain until it overflowed its banks, flooding the blue desert within him. Battlement of silver, doors barricaded with planks of cedar…

A lingering memory of wholeness and completion began to well up from the flood waters, the certainty of life after death, the song of the dead no longer dishonored. It floated above the desert, gathering like storm clouds, then with a flash of silver lightning, burst into a cooling, life-giving rain. Del thought he heard an echo of the angels in a voice as sweet and as calm as the rain itself.

I was a wall, and my breasts were like towers; Then I became in his eyes as one who finds peace.

It broke him and he let the water rush into him, cleansing the desert, feeding him with love that was as strong as death. He felt Jeremy’s strength, felt, too, a deep bond of friendship and the knowledge of what Del’s death would do to those who loved him.

Yes, there were still those who loved him.

It is not yet your time to journey on, came a whisper of three Romulan voices – and he was surprised to find that Lahs’ was one of them. Oh you who sits in the garden, our companion is listening for your voice. Let her hear it!

I will, he promised brokenly. I swear to god I surely will.

Jeremy didn’t know when he passed out, but he woke just before dawn, sure he was dreaming. There was a guitar playing softly, a low but strong voice singing in a slow cadence.

Click here to hear the song:

Once upon a time was a backbeat
Once upon a time all the chords came to life
And the angels had guitars even before they had wings
If you hold on to a chorus you can get through the night…