Title: "For the Moonlight Splinters..." Author: Ki Slash. Series: yes. Pairing: C/P. Categories: angst, violence, a/u, crossover (Star Trek/Werewolf: The Apocalypse), dark imagery, horror, POV. Summary: Follows after the first two stories. This one deals with betrayal, anger, rage and sorrow.  Rating: NC-17 (for violent content and language). Disclaimers: All the characters belong to Paramount Pictures and White Wolf, Inc respectively.  Words/Terms (taken from the Werewolf: The Apocalypse (Second Edition). All rights to White Wolf, Inc)  Anthro: Teacher, Mentor. Black Spiral Dancers: Garou perverted and twisted by the Wyrm.  Charach: A Garou who sleeps with another Garou or has done so in the past. Often used as a word of anger. Cliath: A young Garou, not yet of any standing rank. Fomori: Humans who have turned to the Wyrm and draw their power from it. They are the enemies of the Garou. (Ki says: For this story (and the series), Starfleet itself is infested by the Wyrm. To recap, the Wyrm is the manifestation and symbol of evil. Toxic pollution, waste and degradation of the Earth are manifestations of the Wyrm).  Pentex: A corporation used and manipulated by the Wyrm. (Ki says: For this story, Pentex is pretty much linked with Starfleet. Starfleet Academy’s immaculate lawns and pristine buildings provide a facade for the evil and madness. For all the technology and advancement, Starfleet becomes an instrument for the Wyrm and its minions). Urrah: Garou who live in the city; also, the tainted ones. Wyrmhole: A place that has been spiritually defiled by the Wyrm; invariably a location of great corruption.      "For the Moonlight Splinters..."     We have been called the Maquis. Terrorists. Destroyers of order. We have been described as a band of ruffians, guerillas mocking justice and the law.  True. We are a band of ruffians. But we are bound with honor. We save civilization from the terror that is slowly consuming it alive, corrupting its insides. Guerillas? We prefer to hunt and stalk with precision. We are Garou, werewolves after all. Wolves hunt with purpose.  They might call us names, brand us as criminals. Take an innocent word and they twist it, pervert it for their own needs. The Wyrm takes many forms and it creeps, entwines itself around a living lifeform and constricts its soul...like a parasitic plant. Its modus operandi is always very subtle; it sneaks, sinks its claws into your arteries and before you even know it, you are dying inside. It is scary, yes. It is happening right now. What can the Maquis do in the face of this danger? What can a single pack do? Many have died, sacrificed their lives for the cause. I howl for them, honoring them. For the ones who survive and live to see yet another day, we fight. We will use our phasers, our hand grenades, our wits. When these weapons fail, we will use our Gaia-given gifts: our fangs and claws. We are born to be warriors, hunters of the night. We will move with the swiftness of the wind and we will strike at where it will hurt most.  Maquis. Terrorists. Guerillas. Names. Just names. We are weighed down by names. Our own race is weighed down by names. Loup-Garou. Werwulf. Renlang. Garwulf. Werewolf. The names do not matter.  If you ask me, names do matter. I grew up, bombarded with names. "Admiral’s son". "Tommy boy". "Spoilt brat". "Mr Casanova". "Dreamer". I grew up with these names and they defined my existence, became part of my identity. These names angered and saddened me. Were they really me? I grew up, unaware at first (when I was a child) and slowly realizing how they hurt when I became a teenager. That was when the pains started. The physical pain. The soul pain. It seemed as if someone had pierced my heart with razor-sharp claws. I hurt inwardly.  These names made me mad. I raged deep inside me. I pushed the rage down, bottling it with a grim determination. I did not want to let Mom see. I did not want to let my sisters see. I did not want to let Dad see. It was painful. Too painful.  Then, the dreams started. They came, silently, in the darkness of my bedroom. The first one came when I was only twelve. I saw wolves running with me and I ran with them in wolf form. I told Dad about the dream and he merely shrugged. Instead, he pushed me towards academic excellence. As the dreams became more and more persistent, I poured my concentration into flying and the mechanics of flying. When I was fifteen, one single dream stuck with me. It was a dream where I physically turned into a wolf. As I lay on my bed, I felt my face stretching, tightening. The next thing I knew, I was running on the soft grass of my mom’s garden. My paws stirred up clods of earth. I howled and I hunted the whole night with my dream wolf brethren.  I woke up, my hands stained with green grass and...blood. I had cuts on my body, cuts I didn’t know existed until that day. I spent a hour trying to wash away the blood and I soaked myself under the hot shower, shivering with reaction. I thought I was going mad. If they wanted to give me another name, it would be ‘mad’. Insane. The Admiral’s son was going insane.  Then, one night, my life as I knew it disappeared.  It was the night I experienced my First Change.  No, it wasn’t a joyous occasion. I hid the truth from Mom and Dad. Especially Dad. He saw the damage in my room. He called me "barking mad". I could see his face: half-angry, half-sad. His Paris dream going up in smoke. His legacy going down into the gutter. It wasn’t nice watching someone else’s dream being blown to bits. I witnessed it first hand.  It sucked.  I entered Starfleet Academy three years after my Change. Already, I could sense things changing...revealing themselves around me. Things were not what they seemed. As I walked on the nicely manicured lawns of the Academy, I could sense things. Bad things. Things that made me cry and run to my parents’ bedroom when I was a kid.  It was then I met Boothby. Groundskeeper Boothby.  "Glad to see another Garou in this Wyrmhole," he said to me that fateful day. Fateful day it was. He began to teach me. He was my Anthro, my teacher. Truthfully, without him, I thought I would go mad with this...thing inside me. Boothby began to push me. Crash course, he snapped at me once. I literally dropped everything. Beliefs. Ideas. My life. The Tom who came back from the camping trip with the irascible old man was a different Tom altogether. I walked with confidence, an arrogance. People would find me cocky and devil-may-care. I didn’t care. * * * * * * The Maquis are my pack. My new family. Nah, it wasn’t easy joining the Maquis. They are werewolves after all and they don’t take fools lightly.  You, Chakotay. You saved me. When I was lying in the ditch badly wounded by the bloody Dancers, you rescued me. I knew I fought bravely. But around that time, I was a bloody sodden drunk. I fought with pure instinct and nothing else. Boothby would have gladly throttled me. The state I was in then... Not a good place for any self-respecting Garou. They called my condition ‘harano’. Depression. Longing turned really bad.  Initiation into the Maquis was not a piece of cake. It was hard. You, Chakotay. You pushed me hard too, like Boothby had done. You made sure I felt the combined fury of the entire pack.I had to show my fangs at times. I was an untested Cliath, an Urrah... and everyone in the pack knew it. Some made use of my weakness and I suffered a few scratches. Some gave me grudging admiration.  B’Elanna. She was one of a kind. Fierce, living purely on her Rage. A terrifying warrior, for those who tasted her wrath. She had a short fuse, blamed on her part Klingon heritage. Klingon and Garou. A hot tamale indeed. She won quite a number of confrontations, beating the shit out of me and rubbing it in for days after. She was quite a difficult woman, one bad bad bitch. But she had her ‘off’ days too. She could be gentle, almost kind. When we stumbled in, torn and bleeding from our war with Starfleet, she would be there with bandages and exhortations. She was surprisingly compassionate when it came to the Maquis children-cubs. B’Elanna. B’Elanna. She was also the one who most vehemently opposed my relationship with Chakotay. At first, she showed her disapproval but it wasn’t overt. I remember her dark face wrinkling with displeasure when I emerged from Chakotay’s room. I must have been reeking with sex and perspiration. She certainly smelled in the sandalwood scent of our mingled sperm and she snarled, showing her right canine teeth. "You smell of sex," she had growled at me and stalked away, her body evidently bristling with suppressed emotion.  I quickly forgot about her remark. We were fighting Federation. Condition orange. She didn’t display any sign of anger when we fought side by side later in the week. She had ripped into the fomori and Black Spiral Dancers, her claws tearing into their putrid flesh. She fought with gusto. Then again, she always fought with gusto. Sometimes, I believed that B’Elanna existed solely for the fight, the singing of the blood in the veins.  Her disapproval became more and more obvious as my love for Chakotay grew. Her bottled-up rage increased together with my lust for the man. Sometimes, she would snap at me during meal times. Sometimes, the pack had to separate us from coming into blows.  I didn’t care much about B’Elanna. I slept with Chakotay frequently. We found ourselves tumbling into bed often. Even then, our love-making resembled a wrestling match, a battle for dominance. He might be the alpha for our pack. But I took immense pleasure in taking the upper hand in sex. We bit and licked each other, growling and snapping. It was a fantastic period for me; I started to flesh out, become more muscular. I didn’t care much about the pack’s feelings. Most of them kept quiet and a wide berth around me. Galliards are rumored to be ‘weird’ and my pack mates are Garou who have evidently listened to the old-wives stories. So, I was given my space and I cherished it. Except B’Elanna. One day, when I was fixing a malfunctioning phaser rifle, she barged right in. I looked up, lifting my lips slightly so that my canines could be seen. She emanated anger and she began pacing up and down, a caged animal. "What’s up, B’El?" I said, keeping my tone light. I began tinkling at the rifle again. She snorted violently and growled. "You better stop monopolizing Chakotay’s time," her words were snarled out. B’Elanna’s eyes blazed. An angered Black Fury is not to be trifled with.  Gaia was protecting my ass that day. "I am not monopolizing his time..." I said lazily. Her face twisted into a feral growl. "Don’t mess with me, Cliath..." "For your information, I have earned my place in the pack." I felt my own anger rising inside me. The hairs on my arms stood up on end. I forcibly turned my attention to the rifle, breathing slowly.  "Charach..." The word had a horrifying effect on me. For every Garou who was taught the Litany, this word was an insult. It impacted right into my psyche and I stood up, growling, flexing my fingers.  "You are living in the old times, B’Elanna..." I stated slowly. "You are charach," she said, her eyes flashing menacingly. "And you know that. The whole pack knows it. Chakotay knows it. I know it. Charach." This time, she had pushed my limits. I launched myself at her, going for her soft throat. She slammed right into me, her claws digging right into my chest. The fury roared in my ears, the blood searing in my veins. I was mad. Very mad.  B’Elanna’s teeth flashed right in front of me, her black wolf face terrible with jagged fangs. She meant to hurt me. She wanted to hurt me. I roared and pushed her away. Belatedly, I realized that I had unconsciously slipped into my Crinos form.  "Stop it." The words were growled out. It was the steady growl of a hunting wolf. The face of a large wolf swam in the red haze. As I pulled back, the haze dissipating, the large wolf had brownish fur. Muscular. The scent that hit my nose... Chakotay. "You two stop it. Right here. Right now." I forced myself back to my human shape, panting hard. B’Elanna was holding her left arm. A large bruise was spreading across it. She was breathing hard too. She glared at me, all bloody murder.  The brown wolf advanced. I could see Chakotay’s arms bulging with muscles. Coiled power all ready to be unleashed. He was a Philodox and he hated violence. His people hated violence. But I had seen him fighting. A wise Garou would have gladly let him pass.  "B’Elanna, you have gone too far!" Chakotay snarled and he grabbed her by the lapels of her jacket. She snarled softly but she didn’t fight back. He stared right into her eyes and she turned away, her battle lost. With a disparaging growl, he released her and she backed out of the door. She showed him her throat, flung another poisonous look at me and stormed away. "Tom?" I was surprised at the sound of his voice. Gentle. Tender.  "It’s okay," I assured him, flexing my hand gingerly. "Only a few bruises. It’s okay with me. Just words." "Just words? I have heard what she’d said." Chakotay’s beautiful face had a slight smile. Rueful smile. "B’Elanna has a bad temper. She is Ahroun but sometimes, I worry about her." He shook himself. He was still angry and it showed on his body.  "Charach..." He continued, softly now. "Now, that’s a word I haven’t heard for a while now." "It’s quite an ancient word," I said truthfully. But I was shaken. I had been called a name.  "Tom," Chakotay whispered to me. "I will always look after you." I smiled, squeezing his arm.  But the word stuck. A thorn in my flesh.     *** *** The Maquis move with precision. Of course, wolves operate with a certain finess, with a certain sense of organization. Everyone has a role. Everyone has a part to play. Every Garou has given his or her position when they are born under the different moon phases. I am a Galliard so therefore I am a Moon dancer. I lead the pack in singing. I rouse them into battle. Boothby has taught me the different kinds of songs and I have now in me a people’s oral traditions. B’Elanna is an Ahroun, a Garou born under the full moon. She is a born warrior, a fighter. Chakotay is a Philodox, a Garou born to lead. Every Garou has a part to play in the scheme of things.  But the Garou race is also dwindling. The Maquis are the last werewolves left to defend Gaia. Everything is being eaten up by the Wyrm. Everywhere I turn, forests die. Water is being poisoned. Even the beautiful Starfleet Academy is a veritable cess-pit, a Wyrmhole. Everywhere, the Wyrm sinks its tendrils and sucks out life. Bajor. The Demilitarized Zone. Vulcan. Trill. Cardassia. Earth.  So, for us Garou, we have other roles to play. I was given the assignment as a gun-runner.  To cut a story short, I was betrayed. The humans I dealt with were fomori in disguise, demons doing the Wyrm’s work. I spent weeks evading, killing the monsters. I was running on ragged. My fangs and my claws throbbed with exhaustion. In the day, I pretended to be Tom Paris, handsome, blonde and debonair. In the night, I fought with the creatures of the night. In the process, I became isolated from the pack. It was a terrifying thing, to be isolated. I was operating alone.  As I huddled in the squalid back streets, I missed Chakotay. The feeling of loss was a physical thing. I began to tremble. I longed for his hands on my body. His voice, at once soothing and commanding. Where was he? Where was the pack? I longed to howl so that the pack might know. But if I did so, the Black Spiral Dancers would pinpoint my whereabouts. My sense of isolation grew and I moaned, as if in pain.  At the lowest point of my present life, I was ambushed. The Black Spiral Dancers cornered me one night. Five versus one. Two females. Three males. All of them were dressed in the crisp immaculate uniforms of Starfleet. I sensed them when they came into the bar I was hiding in. Their stench, to a Garou, was overpowering. At first, I pretended to drink my whisky, ignoring them. But they were evidently on a hunt.  For one lost Garou.  One of the females approached me. Her manner was coy. The scent coming from her reminded me of garbage. It was terrible.  "Hello stranger..." She drawled. Her breath stung. From the corner of my mind, I could see her. Brunette. Quite pretty. But her eyes had a hint of insanity. A nervous tic could be seen jumping spasmodically along her jawline. "Hello, I am a lonely ensign here..." Her friend joined her. A blonde woman. The combined stench threatened to overwhelm me. I almost gagged. I could feel my Rage rising.  "Wanna fuck?" The blonde bitch said. Her lips were moist red. The vulgarity coming from her was quite shocking.  "No," I said firmly.  "You bastard!" The brunette shrieked suddenly, the insane light in her eyes growing...growing. "You bastard! You touched my breast! Bastard!" Everyone in the bar turned to face us. The pure humans in the chamber showed disgust. It was supposed to be a society free with discrimination. Well, theoretically speaking, in the 24th century. Bullshit.  "If you want to fight," I stated calmly. "Do it outside." I made a move to go. The brunette grabbed my arm and I bristled. She leaned forward, her garbage breath puffing right into my face. She began to lisp. "Sssssilverfang. Alll alone in thissss ssshithole. You cannot wiiiin..." Something in me snapped. I hit her with the back of my hand and she flew back, screaming.  The rest of the customers quickly emptied out of the bar, even the bartender. I was left alone. With the five Dancers. They burst into their natural forms, all muscles rippling and bubbling out. Saliva dripped from their mouths. They were black-furred, ugly as hell and stinking. I suddenly thought about B’Elanna, about her black-furred warrior self...and I missed her. Oh for the purity of her Garou blood and her fierce dignity. Not these...perverted souls writhing before me.  "Ssssssilverfang. Why doooo you fiiiight with usssss?" One of the males giggled maniacally. His fur was matted with gore. Instead of the beautiful wolf head of the pure Garou, he bore a bat’s face. His limbs were webbed.  I flowed into my Crinos form, growling. At the sound of my growling, the two females began to flap their sagging breasts at me, in a grotesque parody of flirtation. They were horrible too: all sores on their bodies and sea-urchin-like growths on their abdomens. As I watched, disgusted and angered, these growths moved on their own volition, writhing and glistening.  I had enough. I growled, howled a challenge and swiped my right claw at the females. My attack ripped out flesh and one of the females shrieked. It was piercing. The males howled and jumped right at me. I ducked, kicking out with my hind legs. A crash confirmed that I had taken out at least one of the bastards. Suddenly, a searing pain flamed down my left side of my body. I snarled, pulling back in alarm. The injured female, white skull glimmering through the huge gash on my face, leered at me and giggled insanely. Her claws had strips of my flesh. This time, I really longed for my pack. My Maquis pack.  I was growing exhausted as the minutes ticked past. I took out at least two of the Dancers. Their limp forms lay at my feet, their entrails spilling down. I snarled at the rest of the group. They gibbered back like hyaenas. The next thing I knew, something hit me. It felt like... Pain. Faces swam before me. Chakotay. B’Elanna. Mom. Dad. Gaia, I hurt! I felt as if my insides were being ripped out. Chakotay... As the darkness surrounded me, I heard faint voices. "...Assaulting a Starfleet officer..." "...Molestation..." "...Maquis..." I tried to fight the darkness. Damn it, I am not going to die! Then, I fell, right into nothing. Oblivion.     *** *** When I came to, I was already in the penal colony. It shocked me to the core and I was thrown into a spiraling pit of darkness. When they administered the numbing drug into me, I groaned. I had failed the Maquis. I had failed my parents. I had failed myself. I, Thomas Eugene Paris, Galliard, Garou... I had failed.  I couldn’t run away. I was tagged; my ankle acquired a bracelet, of sorts. Escape was unthinkable. They informed me, during one of those early psychological sessions, that had a bad childhood. This counted for my innate ‘aggression’. It was a load of rubbish. They fed me tranquilizing drugs. They told me that it wasn’t that bad. New Zealand had beautiful green slopes and clean clean air. It was "perfect" for me. Hunting ground, they said in their condescending voices. They also contacted Dad. They made sure the news of his indifference reached my ears. It hurt, of course. Especially at my state of mind. Such were the ways of the Wyrm. Psychological warfare indeed.  Initially, I howled every night. The sight of the moon drove me crazy. I wanted to be free. I longed to be free. I finally understood how the wolves in the zoo might have felt. I was trapped. Made dulled by the surrounding concrete and medication. On the outside, I looked like a perfectly healthy twenty-five year old. Inside, I was simply crumbling away.  Now, as I gaze out into the greenery, I feel a sense of failure. The beautiful landscape of the penal colony is a lie. It is an illusion, cultivated by the Wyrm’s minions, Starfleet and Pentex. At times, I pity the human employees in the colony. The mess-hall lady. The janitor. They are nice folk, cheerful and rosy-cheeked. But they have all been corrupted by the Wyrm. The Wyrm’s ways are always subtle. Too subtle.  I miss Chakotay terribly. Laying on the bed, my loins ache painfully. I want to feel his mouth on me, his smell of sandalwood whispering all over me. I know that he is fighting somewhere in the galaxy. Fighting for the cause. Will he hate me for what I have done? Shit, everyone would have known about my crime. Starfleet would have passed it through the ‘Net... Gaia, I miss Chakotay. It will be a full moon tonight. The young kid in C Block. Joseph. He will be telling us about wolf-men and howling at the moon. Poor kid. Somewhere, I know, Garou will be singing and regaling each other with stories of triumph. There will be camaraderie, of friendships forged.  It will hurt for me. When the moonlight splinters into my cell, I will close my eyes and wish for peace of mind. For salvation.    -finis-