Teaser: "Sheila & K'avir"

The first time K’avir Velimir laid eyes on Sheila Stephens was shortly after her unplanned arrival on board the starship Vega.  The starship had just left SPACEnter Arcturus-12 on the planet Canutus and Sheila was in the mess hall, picking at a plate of food.  The ship’s chief medical officer, Richard Keller, sat in front of her, eating and talking animatedly.  Sheila was clearly not interested in conversing with the doctor and she looked very sad.

            Prince Hasani was in the mess hall, wooing a willing lieutenant from Engineering.  K’avir stood about four feet away, his back against a bulkhead, ever vigilant but his eyes on the beautiful woman across the room.  Sheila’s emotions were powerful: hurt, anger, pain, disgust, and shock and they rolled off her in waves.  K’avir studied her, taking in every detail of her appearance.  She was tall and her skin was the color of the bronze sand beaches near his home on Alvelar.  She had large, deep-set brown eyes and a shapely mouth with a full lower lip.  Her hair was fascinating; she wore it secured against her head and the strands were thick and twisted.  K’avir wanted to see what her hair looked like when it was loose.  He thought Sheila was easily the most beautiful woman on board the Vega, and Captain Matheson was not a man who recruited unattractive females to serve on board his starship.

            K’avir never sought her out, but knew her schedule.  She worked twelve-hour days in Medical Bay as Dr. Keller’s second, but everyone knew that Dr. Stephens was a far superior surgeon to her drunken, careless supervisor.  She had a gift for healing and a wonderful bedside manner that the crew quickly came to appreciate to the point that the women on the starship dealt with her exclusively.

            They officially met one late night in the gym.  Sheila, furious at her circumstances, took her rage out on the punching bag in the exercise room.  She had no form or technique, just pummeled the heavy bag until her fists hurt and her knuckles ached.  It helped her to sleep, even if only for three hours a night.   She never allowed her sore hands to take away from her dedication to her craft, for she loved being a physician and welcomed the opportunity to work in a large, fully-equipped medical facility.  Arcturus-12 was a tiny buttfuck of an outpost on the pimple-like planet of Canutus and its medical wing was sorely lacking.   Such could not be said of the Vega, one of the Alliance’s prized stellar-class diplomatic starships.  Anything Sheila wanted or needed, she could get.

            She had heard of K’avir and saw him every now and then in the corridors, always with the flirtatious Prince Hasani, the ambassador from Alvelar.  K’avir was the prince’s personal guard and he was never sick, so she never saw him in Medical Bay.  He rarely ate, so she never saw him in the mess hall.  So when he showed up in the exercise room one late night, she was surprised.  She didn’t see him right off; she was so into her punching.  It was when he walked by her and uttered a simple tip, “Keep one fist up to block and the other cocked to swing,” that she realized she wasn’t alone.  He did not stay in the room; just walked through it.  Sheila unconsciously took his advice.

            A couple of days later, K’avir walked through the gym again and offered up another tip:  “Square your shoulders and stagger your feet.” Again, she incorporated the tip and found that the new stance gave her more leverage.  If he noticed her bruises, he never said anything about it.  Soon, she was looking forward to hearing his advice.  There were never any more words than what he offered in the way of fighting tips.   He told her the best way for her to crouch, how to stick and to move, how to bob and weave, and even recommended that she start using the speed bag in addition to the heavy bag.   K’avir told her to start learning how to kick and use her knees on the heavy bag and suggested she start studying appropriate boxing techniques.  Sheila, ever angry at her situation, absorbed his advice and it started paying off.   She was learning how to fight back.  She was not going to let that bastard kill her.