Dark, green circles marred the undersides of V’alura’s once bright blue eyes. Her cheeks and temples slightly sunken, marking the weight she’s lost. Auburn hair, once kept perfectly curled and coiled, lay limp and dull. V’alura frowned at every imperfection captured by her little hand mirror. In her mind she cataloged everything left to do before she boarded the USS Owaga, her weariness expanding with each new listed item. Come now V’alura, she thought, You can’t meet your half-brother looking like death itself. They were finally going to meet in person and she could not, would not give him any less then her very best.

The show must go on and you are a professional. V’alura sucked in a deep steadying breath, that collapsed into a coughing fit. The nurse sitting beside her jumped into action and injected V’alura with a hypo while pressing a bronchodilator into her hands. V’alura breathed in, rough and unsteady until the coughing fit subsided. Her shoulders trembled. Weakness seeped into her muscles. V’alura gritted through the haze and picked up her hair curler sitting beside her travel bag of make-up. There was work to do.

It took hours battling her weakness, coughing fits and fatigue. Until finally the woman who looked back from the mirror resembled the woman that she was before. A proud woman who always looked her best and poured her heart into her work and her team. V’alura flashed her mirror a smile, not the dazzler she used to pull from her pocket like a stick of gum. But it would be enough. And just in time. Not twenty minutes later a page came over sickbay’s intercom. =^=Helm to Sickbay. Five minutes till we reach transporter distance to the Owaga.=^=

V’alura stood on shaky legs with her nurse’s assistance and the two walked arm in arm to the transport pads. She refused transport directly from sickbay to the Owaga and she was not shy to claim pride for that choice. It was that pride that pushed her to focus and take each step with confidence and grace. Dressed in a pale pink cropped blazer knotted together in the front, matching pink slacks, and a thick gold chain draped across her collar bone to make an impression. Between the hair, make-up and clothes V’alura looked like she walked off a photo shoot than out of a sickbay. Last but not least, she reminded herself as she stepped onto the transport pad, remember to smile for the camera.

White enveloped her vision and in a flash she materialized aboard the Owaga alongside her nurse and an NE helping to tote her personal luggage. On top of which were two seemingly empty terrariums. V’alura took a quiet, shallow breath (least she trigger another coughing fit) and closed her eyes. In her mind’s eye she prepared the expression she will wear, choreographed her movements and prepared her lines. She will give Solal the true V’alura the friend and sister experience. There was no illness in the world that could stop her.

V’alura Belmont