I, Elizabeth

“Clipping Clue-Pons” POV CHALLENGE

I, Elizabeth

By Linda

Disclaimer: Once again, I do not own these characters; I only try to breath life into them.
Rating: G
Genre: POV challenge, wild speculation, spiritual
Summary: The point of view of a character we have only seen through Trip’s eyes: his sister.

A/N: This story might be stretching the disbelief of many people. But then we are all used to suspending disbelief by reading science fiction where we have warp drive and time travel! I am not sure how much of this story is great deep longing for the universe to be this way, or how much is really true. But I hope that I am open to all ways of seeing and respect all ways of believing. Do we bring something into reality just by just thinking it? If what is in the human mind, the human soul, is real – then every thought is reality. This POV was purging to write, I just let my imagination go. Life is about discovery, loss, rediscovery -- so anyone who has lost someone probably understands where this is coming from. Whether it is coherent and worth reading, is up to the reader.

So you don’t believe in an afterlife? Then skip this story, for a ghost, a katra, a being from another dimension of life, is speaking to you.

You are still here? Well, then, this is my point of view. I, Elizabeth Tucker, see through the veil that separates me from my beloved brother.

So I am not big on memorials Trip? That is what you told Malcolm. Stop beating up verbally on Malcolm. He speaks from the heart in his brusque way. But it is not true, in a sense, that I am not big on memorials. Sure, I do not approve of cold words on stone, except for the cornerstones of the buildings I designed. But like the young engineer you were mentoring, Taylor, I do not want to be forgotten by you during the reminder of your physical existence. That wonderful corporeal adventure – do not waste it in painful memories, but in joyful ones of those who have left it behind. Live it to the fullest before we are joined once again in another reality.

And when Taylor asked you to remember her, you were honest in saying that was too much for you to do, in that moment. I know you; remember how hard we cried as children when ‘Everybody’s Gramps’, our dear old next-door neighbor, died? But with that admission to Taylor, there began the healing, admitting what a hard thing it was to accept that she…that we…had died. But a memorial? Let the memories of me that make you smile be my memorial! When you can again think of me without pain, when you can celebrate my existence in memory: then I will have my memorial. For I am part of you as much as you are part of me…forever. Our childhood is logged in the very essence of time, in many universes. You and I are the right and left hemispheres of one soul, closer than our other siblings, closer than our parents. But not in a sexual way, because as I said, we are two halves of one being and sex requires two beings. But I see another who is almost as close to you. One who IS a separate being, one so separate that she is from another world.

Since I am not anywhere, as I am everywhere, I sought your spirit in the seconds following my physical death - which by the way, I did not even feel. All those nightmares you had of me in pain are for naught. Stop beating up on yourself. I was confused. I ‘flew’ to you in the seconds after the weapon hit me. I came to you as I always had when I was frightened. You were in your engine room, and it would be awhile before you would know I had died. I reached out to touch you as if I still had arms, as if I could still curl up against you and have you pull me close within a brotherly arm. As if you could still pull sticky long blond hairs off a tear stained face and make whatever was making me cry, go away.

You startled and did not know why. You took your hand off the intermix control. But that small acknowledgment of my presence was what I needed to begin my own healing and adjustment to this new form of existence. The loss of my earthly existence was a shock. My family – no more physical touching, no more sensations of speech and emotional effects on the body. All my preparation for my career and all the buildings I would never design now – for naught. The children I would never give birth to...

But especially, I could not touch you, not like before. I was new at this sort of existence, and didn’t know how. But she did. She-who-could-speak-to-katras though she did not know that yet. I reached out to her and felt her accept me. But you could not accept me because you put up barriers against me when you saw the black smoldering ruin where once stood our childhood home. All you could feel then was pain, so you shut me out. You would not let me touch you in dreams and so the nightmares came instead. You came to her for help in making you sleep and I was there. She could touch you physically, and I felt the echo of that touch through her. I knew before you did, before she did, what you would become to each other. In this dimension of existence, that is something we can know. I took comfort in that ability to touch you again, through the Vulcan gift.

When you finally were open to me because she was there to listen and you finally called me “baby sister” again, I cried great silent tears and so did she. She knew, but didn’t know, that I was there.

The baby. You held her like you did me when I was first born. Do you remember telling me over ice cream bars while sitting on the front porch, how dad put me in your arms wide-eyed and still wet? “Son, here is your brand new baby sister, Elizabeth. Always take care of her.” You were such a small boy then.

Baby Elizabeth. I held her too. I still do. And I will hold her until you join us in our plane of existence. Until then, I will share the holding of Baby Elizabeth with another mother as we walk the great hot sandy planes of Vulcan and the cooler but still warm sand of beaches on earth.

And we draw up the sands of a Vulcan garden and walk them, we women: Sarah, who immigrated from Ireland to America and bore our grandmother, T’Mir who bore the grandmother of your true love, and her child, and her child’s child: mother of your true love who walks beside me gently rocking the baby in her arms. Your first child, my brother, is in good hands as we walk the sands of Vulcan or the sands of the Florida beaches that we call up. Yes, call up, for the physical can still be brought into being by us for brief periods, a great comfort and fully accessible from our memories.

Time is not a barrier here. You are living linearly in corporeal form, but I see you in your past and in your future. The now of your pain I cannot stop, but I do share.

I was in shock with the abrupt ending of my physical existence. I had so many plans. I was enjoying life so much. But from the prospective I have now, I do not dwell on what is lost because I see from the unity of life which is the One: all the sentience that ever existed, exists at any moment, and that will always exist. Yes, I was just one of seven million as you say, and were I still in human form would have resented your trying to push my memory out of your life. My only hurt now is your hurt, that you think you cannot enjoy a piece of pecan pie because I no longer can. But I can! I am with you every time you enjoy anything, and every time you suffer mentally or physically. I am more with you now than I could ever have been when bounded and limited by my physical form.

We are not all of one mind here, though we are all part of the One and can merge into it, into the essence of life that crosses all universes and all existence. There are sentiences here who have never incarnated, but respect as heroes, those that do. There are those that believe it is right to only incarnate once. There are those who have many times incarnated as physical beings of diverse levels of knowing: beetle to eagle. I know I have lived the physical life before and will again - after you have joined us here and we merge in total understanding once more. Some of us here have been reborn only within one genetic line, one family. Others have been many races, many species on a single planet. Then there are those who have been Klingon, then Human, then Vulcan, then Trill. I touch the spirit of Gandhi and of Surak, and all that it is possible to be or has been.

Yes, we too take comfort in our memories, our memorials of you. So take joy in life, for every bite of pecan pie, every touch of your lover, we live along with you. And one day, very soon in the vastness of time and space, we will again be together on the same plane of existence. It never ends you know, dear brother. Life…just always is.

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A whole mess of folks have made comments

Wow. What a mystical offering, Linda. I can hear the shaman in you, dear! Although I don't share your beliefs, I do respect them. Thank you for sharing them with us.

What a wonderful point of view! Very hopeful and touching.

i love how managed to tie in a number of people views on the after-life to make this story universal and even more touching. wow!!

Really interesting idea and played out nicely.

I'm no longer religious, but that was very moving.

That was very touching and sweet. I enjoyed it fully. Nice piece. T

I've never been a religious person, but I still liked this story very much. Very sad and moving.

Very nice, touching, peaceful and hopeful.

I enjoyed that muchly. Great original POV! Thank you for writing this.

I agree, original and moving! Thank you very much! :)

Having just gotten back from Vulkon where I was able to put faces with names that I have been seeing on this site, and have now met some of you who left comments here. Life is indeed a great adventure and I appreciate very much being able to touch the lives of others and have them touch mine. For all your comments - thank you!

That was beautiful. I loved the merging of Vulcan and human existence to carry the memory of Trip and T'Pol's love. Sniff..