1. CHIEF O'BRIENS WAR
THIS bloody war with the Dominion and their alpha quadrant allies was the second major protracted conflict he had endured in his lifetime, and already it was two conflicts too many.
It had been said that some men discovered their true sense of destiny and purpose in war, but not Miles Edward O'Brien. He hated the whole affair and all the foul works it entailed. He had neither the temperament nor blood-lust to relish such appalling conflict, and had detested the evils that flowed from such affairs, what they forced him to do in the course of "duty".
He'd learned that with such brutal first hand experience when he had accidentally watched that Cardassian soldier disintegrate in a lethal blast of fire from a phaser he thought was on stun, but was at its highest setting, vaporizing the man from existence; a phaser fired by his own hand. How right there, he had joined that most exclusive of clubs, of men who had taken another's life with their own hands.
In the midst of the horrors that had taken place during the Cardassian sneak attack on Setlik three during the border wars, O'Brien felt that his life would never again be quite the same. He'd prided himself on going out of his way to inflict even unwilling harm on the smallest and most significant creatures. But on the battlefield of Setlick, he had prematurely terminated the existence of a living; breathing sentient.
It had haunted him ever since, and he knew that some of the lingering resentment he harbored towards the Cardassians was in part due to what he felt he had become because of that trauma. How they had violated some of his earlier innocence in order to continue their grasping aggression towards their neighbors.
O'Brien felt a keen contempt for the people who had allowed this terrible war to rage on as it did. Unscrupulous warlords like Gul Dukat, and the Pya'Chl hive generals who satiated their greed and ruthless ambition, by aligning their preople in hock to the Dominion, so they could pursue their brutal thirst for conquering other peoples stuff, using other peoples sons and daughters to fight their battles.
How many young lives on the battlefield had their lives ended, or their minds and spirit crushed by being caught up in the slaughter on the front lines. Did the likes of Dukat ever take time to think about privations of the ordinary men and women who made the progress of their wars possible? O'Brien doubted that Dukat ever lost sleep over it. Anyone who had been head of the enslavement and occupation of an entire planet probably had little in the way of conscience.
O'Brien watched as the icy planet of Zalod grew in size on the viewscreen of the Sabre assault craft he and Jadzia were now travelling in. There was no sign of actual fighting going on as they approached, but the scars of war were there to see though. As they approached orbit they saw the wrecked remnants of Pya'Chl battlecruisers and the planets orbital defense network littered about in orbit, huge chunks of phaser and disrupter scarred flotsom scattered about the face of the world. O'Brien even saw hunks of hull plating that looked horribly like those found on Starfleet and Klingon vessels.
Although the skeleton Pya'Chl fleet protecting their colony had been comprehensively outgunned, their soldiers had upheld their reputation for ferocity and not retreating in the face of superior firepower. Dax had her work cut out navigating the debris field so they could land safely on the surface outpost without smashing into a lump of wreckage.
O'brien glumly surveyed the fall out of the battle and said "God what a mess. Obviously, discretion being the better part of valour mustn't translate well to the Pya'Chl". They must have hung in there to the bitter end. Even more casualties piling up on the front lines again. I just hope we didn't lose too many on our side in seizing the outpost."
Dax didn't take her eyes off the ships helm consoles, but she responded. "Pya'Chl starship personnel can give the most tenacious of Klingon crews stiff competition for fighting to the last. The powers that be may consider this theater of operations peripheral to the outcome of the overall war, but there is nothing peripheral about the destruction that's gone on here. I only hope any information about enemy plans we can salvage from that base turn out to be worth it."
Chief O'Brien agreed with Dax's sentiments , the fighting had been a lot fiercer than should have been expected at a world that wasn't on the major battlefronts. Zalod was a colony of the Pya'Chl, whose militant leaders had decided to join the Dominion just like Cardassia had. They were less powerful and had far less ships and Jem'Hadar legions in their territory that was a little offset from the main combat theatres, but the Dominion was launching joint attacks on the allies with them from Pya'Chl territory.
However for all the Pya'Chl seemed to be getting from an alliance with the Dominion, the fact remained that in the greater scheme of things; they were still a lesser ally, and with the Romulans recently joining the war on the Federations side; they found themselves increasing sidelined as the Dominion pulled their forces away from their worlds and diverted them to fight on the new battle lines opening up on the Romulan fronts.
It was for this reason that Dax and O'Brien found themselves at Zalod, the planet contained several bases and outposts used by the Pya'Chl and the Dominion to fight the war, but with the planets coastal defences so comprehensively breached, the world was all but undefended and ripe for a counter attack by the Federation alliance forces, and that was where the two of them came in, they were to sneak into the largest of the military outposts and gather whatever data and information about enemy forces they could find in the bases surviving computer terminals and sensors, and once they had obtained that information, they were to pepper the base with explosive charges and blow it to high heaven depriving the enemy forces of one more stronghold to attack from.
The planet may not have been strategically important enough to warrant a standing invasion, but being given this one off chance to destroy the military capabilities of this world was not one to decline when it presented itself.
The assault craft was in low orbit now and Zalod's globe filled the viewscreen, which had to compensate and reduce the inherent brightness of the world due to the powerful albedo given off by the icy planets surface. The surface ice which had an orange pink hue due to Zalod's star being a red dwarf star, covered most of the the planet, and was hugely reflective.
Zalod was a cold and inhospitable class M planet locked in a frigid ice age. It's mountainous surface was battered by fierce gale force winds and snow storm systems that were generated by the craggy surface topography of the planet. The seas on the planet were almost all coated with fast moving and unpredictable ice floes, and the atmosphere contained quite high concentrations of volcanic gasses from the numerous volcanoes on the geologically active surface that had the additional side effect of producing near constant tremours all over the planets many faultlines.
O'Brien thought it must be one of the most dismal and depressing Class M planets the Alpha quadrant possessed. O'Brien broke the silence that had descended in the cockpit. He stared out glumly at the hostile world, and said "I'll have to make sure Zalod isn't on my holiday list next year. Keiko and Molly would never speak to me again if I booked a fortnight stay."
Dax laughed "I'd have the opposite problem Chief! Worf would probably wan't us to have our honeymoon here. He'd say it was a character building sort of place." O'Brien laughed back as well continuing the patter that at least broke some of the gloom of being in a place such as this. "I must lack character then Lieutenant, because it just strikes me as a cold and uncomfortable place where we're best to leave as soon as is humanly possible! Starfleet really does send us to some rum destinations to fight this war don't they?"
"Come on now chief. I thought you of all people would appreciate a soldier has to make sacrifices in this war." Dax said, mockingly chastising him for his complaint. "Oh I do Lieutenant. I just wish we could make sacrifices on a planet like, say Risa for once!" Dax pulled a face at this and turned back to her console, checking the sensors and reporting her findings. "Coast is clear Chief. Have you got all the explosives and equipment prepped, because we're ready to go."
O'Brien reported that they had all that they needed stowed in their combat rucksacks and went to the stowing area to give Dax and himself their respective kit. Dax however was still scrutinizing the consoles despite having given the all clear, and it was clear from her expression that she'd picked up something unexpected and unwelcome at that.
"Chief, I don't believe it, there is a Romulan battle corvette landed on the surface about fifty four kilometres due west from the surface base. It looks like they are docked near the surface disrupter cannons around a small sensor monitoring post. I knew that Starfleet and the Romulan navy had co-ordinated attacks in this region, a gesture of solidarity and mutual cooperation toward our new allies. But I wasn't aware that they were here."
O'Brien was alarmed at this turn of events. They didn't need this sort of thing on a delicate operation. "Neither was I lieutenant. I think we had better contact Fleet captain Rodd. If we haven't been notified of Romulan activity on Zalod, then it looks like the Romulans have held back that they had forces deployed here."
Dax nodded in agreement and went to activate the com panel, as she was senior officer for the mission and it fell to her to contact the fleet captain who was coordinating attacks in this region, and to whom they would report to during this mission.
O'Brien was unsettled about the presence of a Romulan ship. Officially the Romulans were their allies and it was in theory at least, a friendly ship. However, O'Brein knew from past encounters that the Romulans weren't exactly known to be the galaxies most reliable or steadfast of allies. They may not take kindly to being caught with their pants down on some clandestine exercise on that world.
Dax was ready to open up comms and O'Brien could only hope that Captian Rodd knew more that they did about why that Romulan ship was there, and perhaps more importantly, what it was actually up to on Zalod.