Chapter Text
Part Three (Cont'd)
Thud-dunk.
Denella reached out and grabbed the little rubber ball out of the air as it bounced off the wall in front of her, trying to remember why she had the ball in the pocket of her overalls in the first place.
She was getting somewhat concerned about it, given that as far as she could tell, it looked like a key component of the damping system used inside the Bounty’s main landing struts. As far as she could remember, she hadn’t done any work in that particular area for some time. In fact, they were one of the few parts of the ship not currently in need of major repair. It was also possible that she’d misidentified the little rubber ball completely.
Still, the idea that she might have an important part of the ship’s landing gear in her pocket was mildly troubling. Though at least it gave her something to pass the time.
Thud-dunk.
She threw the ball against the floor, bounced it up onto the wall of the brig, and caught it as it arced back over to her again.
She was sitting on the floor of the small holding cell she had been placed in. Aside from her and the ball, all there was inside was a simple single bed and a small table on which was the canteen of water she had been provided. Since she had been marched in here, she had barely seen anyone else, aside from at mealtimes. She certainly hadn’t seen any sign of her crewmates, despite Starfleet visiting hours being as open and friendly as you might expect.
So, she had little to do but worry. About what was to become of her, about whatever Klath had gotten himself into, and about what this little rubber ball was actually supposed to be.
She sat and worried. And threw the ball.
Thud-dunk.
“Stop that,” a voice piped up from the entrance to the cell.
She caught the ball and looked over. Standing on the other side of the Starfleet-issue forcefield was the short-haired blonde security officer who had been in charge of bringing her here. “The ball,” she gestured, “Stop that. Some of us are working on the other side of that wall.”
“Oh,” Denella said, mustering a weak smile, “Sorry.”
The officer didn’t match her smile. She instead gestured to someone standing around the corner from the holding cell’s entrance, currently out of Denella’s line of sight. “You’ve got a visitor.”
The Orion woman stood and approached the forcefield, hoping to see Klath, safely back from his misadventure. Or possibly Jirel, having wrangled some way of getting her out of here. In fact, right now, she’d even have been glad to see Sunek. Though she made a mental note not to say as much if it was him.
Instead of any of her crewmates, however, Lieutenant Kapadia stepped into view, awkwardly toying with a padd in his hand. “Erm, hi,” he offered, “I’ve got some questions about your, um, repair schedule? And I can’t find anyone else from your ship?”
Denella looked back through the gently shimmering forcefield, not entirely sure how to answer. “I’ve been arrested, Lieutenant,” she eventually went with.
Kapadia nodded and gestured to the confines of the cell. “Yes, I’d rather gathered that. But, still, I don’t know who else to ask.”
He looked over at the security officer, who was stifling a yawn as she kept one eye on their conversation.
“I mean, you know how it is,” he continued, “Based on what I’ve seen, the entire secondary antimatter injection assembly is going to need to be completely realigned—”
“Hey!” Denella snapped, taking great offence to that comment, “The secondary antimatter injection assembly doesn’t need realigning! I built that whole assembly myself from scratch, and—”
“Ugh,” the security officer called out, stifling an even bigger yawn, “It’s been too long a shift for me to stand here listening to you two nerds. I’ll be in the office if you need me.”
She patted Kapadia on the shoulder and walked off. As she left, he turned back to the still angry Denella and smiled. “Thanks for playing along,” he said, eliciting a confused look from the Orion woman, “I thought that might get rid of her. And your secondary antimatter injection assembly is perfectly aligned.”
“Damn right it’s perfectly aligned,” she muttered.
Kapadia merely nodded at this, as the two of them took a moment to appreciate their shared love of a perfectly aligned secondary antimatter injection assembly. It was an engineer thing.
“So, I guess we should address the whole ‘being arrested’ issue?” Denella said eventually.
“It might help,” he nodded, “And may I say that you’re taking your impending trip to a Federation penal colony very well indeed.”
“Believe it or not,” she replied, without a trace of humour, “I’ve been in much, much worse situations than this.”
Kapadia looked back at the defiant look on the Orion woman’s face, and instantly realised that he didn’t doubt that statement for a second. “Th—They’ve, um, explained what you did,” he said, “The evidence points back to your ship pretty strongly. Why on earth were you trying to hack into a starbase computer system?”
“I didn’t try to,” she pointed out, “I did.”
He acknowledged the technicality with a curt nod, but patiently waited for a better explanation.
“And it’s not like I was trying to hack the base’s prefix codes or anything. I just gained access to the transit history. Check the logs on the Bounty if you don’t believe me.”
“Transit history? Why?”
“I’m a shuttlecraft spotter,” she offered with a wry look, “Heard a big rumour there was a genuine 23rd century Deltan speeder in orbit.”
Kapadia’s face creased into a smile, but he maintained his curious look at her, not settling for that sort of an answer. Eventually, she sighed and shrugged. “Because my friend needed me to. Ok?”
The Starfleet engineer stared back at her for a moment, weighing this up. “Hmm,” he said eventually, gesturing at the detention cell again, “Whoever they are, must be a really good friend.”
“Yeah. He is,” she nodded with complete sincerity, “Remember how you reacted when you first met me? That’s how most people do. But Klath...he didn’t do that.”
Kapadia nodded back in understanding, awkwardly shifting the padd between his hands with a slight feeling of shame at the reminder of his slack-jawed conduct the day before. “I should, um, I should go,” he managed, “Get...back to work.”
“Hey,” she replied, “Next time you see any of my shipmates, please let them know where I am. Ok?”
He nodded and walked away, lost in thought. Denella heard the doors to the room open and close, and she was alone again. She considered her options, and realised with frustration that there was still nothing she could do except to sit around and wait for some sort of miracle. Everything else was completely out of her control.
Although she was feeling hungry. And to solve that issue, she just needed to get the security officer’s attention. And that was something that was very much in her control.
She sat back down against the wall and picked up the rubber ball again.
Thud-dunk.
* * * * *
Klath sat and waited, trying to ignore the irritating chittering noises all around him.
Having sent the mysterious woman on her way with his message and rested up on the hill, he had elected to return to the township to eat. He already knew that wherever his adversary was, he was more than capable of tracking his movements. If anything, the more conspicuous he made himself, the less likely it was that he would end up being taken by surprise.
He had stopped in a small eating establishment, supposing that after his earlier antics it might be a bit rude to return to the other Kraterite bar. But this one seemed to be just as popular with the locals. Boisterous clicks and chirps came from all corners as various Kraterites socialised together, serving as an irritating distraction to the hulking Klingon.
Still, he tried to focus on his surroundings. He sat, and he waited. And tried as much as possible not to think about the Sons of Marlek. Because he hadn’t thought about them for a very long time. They were connected to a part of his past that he had never told anyone willingly, and that he knew the details of weren’t easy for most people to find. Which meant that whoever was stalking him was personally connected in some way.
And that meant he had to be alert.
He had positioned himself at one of the rear tables of the venue, making sure that he had a clear view of all available entry points, with only the solid rear wall of the building behind him and no blind spots to either side. He knew that there was no way they could fight in here. But he wanted to make sure there was no possibility of him being surprised.
A half-eaten meal sat in front of him. He had no idea what it had been, some sort of cooked meat served with mostly raw pieces of the local vegetation, but it had been edible. Enough to keep him going for as long as he needed.
Knowing that his quarry was a fellow Klingon, he paid the hunched, nervous Kraterite bartender no real attention as it tentatively approached his table, clutching a small padd. Eventually, after a few nervy clicks in his direction, Klath looked over. The bartender flinches slightly, but handed Klath the padd, gesticulating at it with its other hand.
“What is this?” Klath asked with clear annoyance, eliciting a series of further clicks.
He reluctantly looked down at the padd and activated the screen. There was a simple message displayed on it. A message for him. It didn’t take him long to realise who it was from.
And his scowl deepened even further.
* * * * *
Sunek was beginning to get tired of waking up with a sore head. Although this time it didn’t take him long to realise that something was different. That this was no common or garden hangover.
Partly because he didn’t remember drinking anything. But mostly because he woke up to find himself shackled to a tree, on top of a hillside, in the middle of nowhere.
Night was starting to fall around him, but he could make out that he was in a clearing, surrounded by tall fronds of blue-green grass. A vague memory of walking through the township drifted to the forefront of his mind, along with the hissing sound of a hypospray. Which at least cleared part of the story up.
“Hey!” he called out, not even knowing if anyone was around to hear him, “I like a bit of kinky stuff as much as the next guy, but buy me a drink first at least?”
He managed to at least make his words sound confident, even if inside he felt no such emotion, as he worked in vain against his restraints.
The fist that slammed into his side seemed to come from nowhere. Certainly he hasn’t seen who it belonged to. But it struck with enough force to make his vision blur.
“Quiet!” the owner of the fist hissed into his ear.
Sunek coughed and hacked, trying desperately to suck vital air back into his lungs. As he gasped, his assailant moved into view, the scarred Klingon sizing up the curious Vulcan that he had taken as his captive. Frankly, Kolar couldn’t see what even Klath saw in the pathetic specimen in front of him. But he knew they were close, that they were shipmates. And he was sure that would be enough to bring the other Klingon to him. So that he could meet Klath on his turf.
“You talk a lot for a Vulcan,” he spat, with barely concealed disgust.
Sunek, still gasping for air, failed to give an immediate response. Kolar had no way of knowing how much of a galactic rarity he had just witnessed. Instead, he snorted and walked off, keeping his eyes primed on his surroundings and his senses heightened in the twilight.
He was sure that Klath had gotten the message by now, and he revelled in the fact that he was nearing the end of his journey. A journey that had already taken him all across the quadrant to track down and deal with eleven members of the Grontar’s crew so far.
He had already dealt with his accomplice a few hours earlier. She had returned with Klath’s message, and after she revealed that she had been kidnapped by him, Kolar had decided that she was becoming too much of a liability. Her body was still laid out somewhere in the undergrowth behind him. He didn’t care who discovered it after he was gone. All that was left for him to do was deal with the Grontar’s captain. He had saved the biggest prize for last.
“Hey,” Sunek gasped out eventually, “Whatever you think I owe you, that’s cool. Just let me get back to my ship, call in a couple of favours, and—”
“I require nothing from you, you pathetic k'pekt,” Kolar snapped, as he cautiously scanned the undergrowth around them, “You are merely bait for my prey.”
Sunek considered this. All told, it didn’t do a lot to settle his nerves. And when he was nervous, he talked even more than usual. “When you say ‘bait’...” he started, before looking worried, “Oh crap, tell me you’re not hunting some sort of weird Vulcan-eating monster that lives on this planet. Cos, honestly, I’m mostly gristle—”
“Quiet!” Kolar snapped again, as he continued his vigil.
Sunek suppressed a shiver as a cold wind blew in across the top of the hill. He was only wearing his short-sleeved tunic and trousers that he had left the Bounty with earlier in the day. “Wouldn’t have a spare jacket around here would you?” he grunted unhappily, “Kinda thought I was gonna be spending tonight indoors…”
Kolar brushed off his irritation at the Vulcan’s continued predilection for conversation, trying to keep himself primed for the fight. “The cold is good,” he muttered back, embracing the chill, “As we Klingons say: Revenge is a dish best served cold.”
“Psh, yeah. There’s a similar saying on Vulcan,” Sunek replied, gamely continuing the conversation with his captor, “Course, that one’s more to do with plomeek soup in the summertime. But I don’t care what temperature it is outside, I prefer my soup hot, y’know…?”
Kolar felt himself bristle in annoyance as the Vulcan babbled on from where he was shackled to the tree, seemingly having a lot to say on the subject of serving suggestions for plomeek soup.
He idly allowed his hand to drift down to the d'k tahg dagger on his belt. The one he had already used once today.
And as the Vulcan continued to talk, he began to wonder whether it was vital to his plan that his bait remained alive.