Chapter Text
IV. Conspiracy
Commander Daina Reese looks up from the report that she is studying. She glances around her office with its slight view of the Golden Gate Bridge. Ostensibly, she is the Flag Lieutenant of Rear Admiral Lawrence Styles, the Chief of Staff to the Commander, Special Operations Command.
In reality, a Chief Yeoman handles all of that work. She has nothing to do with Styles or his boss, Samuel Harriman, except for the pressure that she exerts on both of them, one directly, the other indirectly. She cocks an ear, hearing a slight vibration. She gets up and pulls her jacket from the rack and pulls out the small black insignia from a hidden interior pocket. She punches a button on her computer console; the office darkens slightly and she feels the shimmer/hum of a compartmentalization field.
Unconsciously, she looks around, then shakes her head. She inserts the black delta into a custom-made slot in the computer console.
The Vulcan male stares at her expressionless. She manages to keep her own genetic expression of loathing off of her face.
“Captain Stivek,” she says, nodding her head slightly.
“Commander,” he replies. He wastes no time, as is his want. “One of the 17th’s ships stumbled onto something in the Triangle sector. The ship is now missing, presumed destroyed, but there is already a Federation presence there.”
“What did the ship stumble onto? What happened?”
“We are not sure. I do not think there are any of our operations there, but we cannot be sure.”
“Which ship of the 17th’s?”
“The Aerfen,” he replies. “Brevet Lieutenant, junior grade Decker Sinclair in temporary command.”
Daina exhales sharply. “She is the daughter of Rear Admiral Mary Decker. Superintendent of the Utopia Planitia dockyards.”
“I see,” Captain Stivek intones.
Do you? she thinks. “What do you want from my end?”
“Interference. I think it should be strongly suggested to Rear Admiral Styles that the 17th be recalled from the search. In fact I think that the search should reveal that the ship was lost with all hands. In a natural occurrence.”
“Admiral Decker has a great deal of influence. I don’t think we’ll be able to do that, especially since there is a Lancer already on scene.
“Deal with it, Commander,” he says imperiously. “I’ll have the Constitution travel to the area. That should get us the story that we want.”
He clicks off.
“Prick,” she says to the empty air, using an Earth euphemism she had picked up.
She pages through several screens on her computer, until she comes from her so-called superior’s schedule. She curses as she sees that he and the Chief of Starfleet Engineering Command have already left for Mars.
She closes her eyes, then gets up, hurriedly pulling on civilian clothing. She signs out of her calendar, taking leave for the few hours left in the day.
As she exits from the air tram in the Old City, she walks purposefully towards a tube station. She doesn’t see a young human woman of about thirty follow her at a discreet distance, her gray eyes locked on Daina’s back.
If she had seen the young woman, she would’ve recognized her as a bartender/stage performer at a certain Deltan Link-club she had attended to blow off some steam a couple of nights ago.
The young woman is wearing considerably more clothing than she had been, but still might be recognizable by the nose ring she wears, as well as a tattoo on her left forearm. One of many on her body that Commander Reese, or her alter ego might have noticed, while ‘blowing off steam.’
Special Agent II Greer Josephs of Federation Security’s Counterintelligence Division, in the Investigations Directorate, follows her quarry.
V. A Perfect Yarn
Emma Rosewarne narrows her eyes at James Blackthorne. Croft, she tells herself, thinking of that long ago misadventure that had given him that nickname. They sit in her cramped ready room off of the CIC, a bottle of Bushmill’s Single Malt Irish opened between them, two mismatched glasses with just a touch in the bottom of each in front of each.
Emma glances around the compartment; she was so new in command that she hadn’t had time to put her own personal touches on it.
Only a single picture of a small boy, his features marked by dark patches around his inquisitive blue eyes, his nose, and his mouth on pale gray skin. Bronze curls like hers halo his face.
Croft notices her looking at it; he draws his eyes towards the holo. “How is he?” he asks quietly.
She smiles. “He’s good. Growing like a weed. He’ll probably be taller than me.”
He smiles and nods. “With his father, no doubt. Any health issues?”
She looks at the picture for a moment. You mean any of the dozen or so health issues that a Rigelian h’vast and human hybrid could have, especially since his mother was injured severely by a madman nearly blowing up the ship she was on before she found out she was pregnant with him? A ship that his h’vast’er had died on? she thinks. “No,” she answers. “He’s healthy as a horse.”
Looking into Croft’s eyes, she sees that he knows her thoughts. Any of those other three women would have asked the same thing.
With equal care and sensitivity.
“Issa and Alexa are taking good care of him,” she finishes. “His grandparents on Rigel V are in his life, as well.” She reaches over and touches his cheek. “How are you doing, stud?” she asks, making her tone as light as possible. He leans into the touch, closing his eyes.
“I’m okay,” he says after a moment.
“Have you talked to Chandra?” she asks softly. “I haven’t had a chance since I joined her group.”
“No,” he says simply. His eyes snap open, revealing that he won’t speak any further. “What’s the latest on this?” he asks in an airy tone.
Emma grits her teeth at his peremptory manner. She jabs her finger at the rank title on his chest. “You may outrank me, Major,” she says, “but until I receive orders to the contrary, you’re not in my chain of command. So button up the attitude.”
He looks at her, then snorts. “Some things never change, Prickly,” he says. “Please,” he says almost sweetly.
She exhales and shakes her head at the sudden activation of the Croft charm. Charm that had in the past had dropped the pants on four other cadets at the Academy of at least two genders. None of them who had any trouble putting him in his place with word or deed, even as those pants were dropping.
“We’ve detected the Aerfen’s log buoy at the edge of the debris field. We’re getting some strange readings around it. We were about to grab it when you and your merry band showed up.”
“What’s keeping you?” he asks.
“Sitting here entertaining a jarhead, with my twenty-one year old single malt.”
He lifts his glass, then drains it. He holds it out for more. “Protestant whisky,” he says with an air of mock disdain.
“Me mother swears by it at the Orange lodge,” she retorts. He shakes the empty glass, gently. She sighs and pours more.
“Your turn,” she says, when she had downed and refilled hers. She deliberately puts the cap back on. “What the hell are you doing in what looks like a surplus Romulan dartship?”
He exhales.
“And don’t give me that classified ‘bullshit’,” she warns. “We go way back. And we’ve spent enough time picking up the pieces for each other that you know that I can be trusted.” She smirks. “Not to mention being without clothing and ‘up to something’ with you on a semi-regular basis.”
He gives that crooked grin at the southernism. A grin that at certain times had melted her and those others of that bond they had formed. He looks down and to the left, before bringing his eyes up to hers. She hides her smile at that particular movement and look.
“There are a lot of moving parts to this. At least two. One that I can give you some limited knowledge of. The other could impact your life and your career, so I’ll keep that to myself.”
She looks at him, then nods. She touches the intercom to the bridge.
“Haveka here,” comes the XO’s gruff voice.
“I’m going offwatch. Have Mork continue scanning that debris around the buoy.”
“Aye, Captain,” she replies. “By the way, the jarhead’s ride jumped away. We’re tracking it.”
“Understood,” she says, “Rosewarne out.”
“My ‘ride’s’ driver ain’t going to like that you’re tracking her.”
She rolls her eyes at the pronoun. “Oh, I’m sure that you’ll kiss the butthurt and make it better.”
She gets up. He raises his eyebrow at her. She manages to keep the eyeroll in check.
“Come on, pitiful,” she says. “You can rub my feet while you’re spilling about this gak-rope you’re leading us into.” She sees his reaction to her using the Rigelian word.
Later, the memories cascade as he gently enters her, along with the light that builds in her head. She can tell that the memories come over him as well.
Memories of a time when all of their loved ones were alive and well.
And happy.
VI. A Connection Made
Chandra looks at Siobhan, trying to keep her expression even. Kim releases Chandra, then moves over to Siobhan. “Oh, honey, I want her to be alive, as well. But the news from Chandra’s ship isn’t good.”
Siobhan looks at Chandra. “They’re still sifting through a lot of wreckage. But they’ve found the log buoy; they’re waiting to see if any other attackers might come in before pulling it in,” Chandra says.
She joins Kim in hugging Siobhan as well. She notices that Siobhan’s copper eyebrows are drawn together. She reaches out with the Link, to their connection that had been established on Vostus, when Chandra had taken it upon herself to help at least her two officers with their emotional health.
Chandra raises her left eyebrow then brings herself from Siobhan’s opposite shoulder where George is doing whatever George does. She gazes into Siobhan’s eyes. “Where did that come from?”
Siobhan smirks, then lets it fade, looking away. “When you were, uh, getting your broken ass fixed by Doctor McCoy, apparently you were spilling out the old horny. So much so that I actually saw Decker in my mind. After I got out of sickbay, we, uh, did some conversatin’ in our quarters.” She grins. “All in the interest of emotional health.”
Chandra sees Kim roll her eyes. Siobhan looks back at her, her face now serious. “Is it possible that I could pick her up?”
“I don’t know,” Chandra says. “It would usually happen if the two of you included me in your ‘conversatin’. But I didn’t—“
She stops. Siobhan grins broadly at Chandra’s discomfiture. She nods. “Let me guess. When y’all went to Earth,” she observes.
Kim looks at Chandra in mock anger. It fades when she remembers that Decker may be lost to all of them.
“What happened? Why do you think she’s alive?”
“I just got a feeling. She’s in my head. And it feels real, like when we were together.” She looks at Chandra. “What happened in the sickbay?”
Chandra shrugs after a moment. “I dunno. I’ve got a lot of issues, from this,” she says, lifting her hand to the nasty scar on the right side of her bald head. “I can’t control things, and I get weird sensations. I might’ve done something to connect the both of you.”
Kim is looking on her datapad, as well as scanning the both of them with her medical tricorder.
“Anything, Doc?” Siobhan asks.
“Nope. Nothing out of the ordinary. But I don’t think I’d be able to pick anything up.”
Chandra exhales. “Maybe I somehow inadvertently formed a prelanka-tere when I was giving Decker the screaming thigh sweats.”
“She wasn’t the only one,” Siobhan admits.
“Prelanka-tere?” Kim asks.
“A bond of the mind,” Siobhan replies, before Chandra can. “One of three parts of the Deltan soul. The mind, the heart, and the body.” She smiles and reaches over to kiss Chandra. “We formed the bond of the heart on Vostus.”
They all fall silent for a moment, when they absorb what has been said.
Of the possibilities.
Chandra feels the tickle of someone else in her mind about to weigh in.
VII. The Gold Rush
Greer watches as the woman boards yet another tube train. Between air trams, tube trains, and plain walking, Greer is sure that she has traversed the length and breadth of the city. There is a sneaking suspicion that the woman in the bright, flowered sundress was toying with her.
Leading her on a wild-goose chase.
The sundress was part of it. When she’d left Starfleet Headquarters, she’d been wearing trousers, a man’s shirt, and good walking shoes. Reese had ducked into a shop and come out with only the shoes the same.
Greer looks up. It had already started to get dark a couple of hours ago. She wonders when the hell the Romulan is going to make her move.
Whatever in the galaxy that is.
Greer realizes that they are moving once to the area around the docks, a place that they hadn’t been all afternoon. They are also moving away from well-lit, well traveled areas. She touches the phaser pistol concealed on her hip, under the flowing top that she’d chosen for this job. Flowing enough to conceal certain tools of her trade, but loose enough to move, with a tanktop underneath to change her appearance when needed. Neutral enough not to call attention to herself, which the little clothing that Greer wore in association with her cover job would definitely do.
She sees Reese duck into an alley. Greer looks around her. It has suddenly grown quiet; she realizes that she has followed Reese into a dead end alley Greer feels the hairs on the back of her neck prick up. She swings behind a small outcropping, drawing her weapon.
She curses under her breath as a large wharf rat stares at her from where she’d thought that the threat would come.
Her world lights up in pain, centered on the lower right side—the exposed side—as she twists. She feels the blade of whatever had entered her sliding out. She tries to bring her phaser up, but it is suddenly too heavy for her nerveless fingers. She hears it hit the ground.
Daina Reese stares down at her. Oddly, she concentrates on the exceptionally warm skin against her bare arm. The woman’s dark eyes gaze into hers; there is a hint of recognition.
“Ahh, the bartender,” she says. “A pity.” Greer sees the bright red of her own blood on the blade as the traitor pulls it up, then wipes it on Greer’s flowing top. As an afterthought, Reese reaches down and kisses Greer.
The warmth of those lips, centers Greer in her blinding pain. She gives into the kiss, but lets her own tongue move away from the woman’s. She finds what she was looking for with her tongue, then pushes it away from the back of her teeth. She bites down on it with her back teeth as Reese releases the kiss. She feels the comforting single pulse of the beacon activating as Reese pulls away.
Her left hand moves from her waist. Her hands closes on something that an ordinary Security officer, responsible for keeping order wouldn’t carry.
A counterintelligence cop would. She pulls it and thrusts upward.
Reese screams. The last thing that Greer sees when consciousness eludes her is bright green splashing on her top, melding with her scarlet.