Disclaimer: I do not own Star Trek or any of its related properties. All such rights belong to CBS/Paramount.
This is the sixth installment of the Special Investigations Division. I hope you enjoy. More is on the way.
Brin Macen lay on his stomach, peering at the Tzenkethi base stretched out before him. He slid back into the wet grass crowning the hillock overseeing the western portion of the encampment. The members of his Special Investigations Division team were lined up across the ridge facing the weapons depot. Tapping the boots of Rab Daggit and T'Kir, he summoned them for a brief conference.
"The base appears to match the layouts we obtained." Macen informed them, "What's your assessment on security and infiltration?"
T'Kir tapped a few commands into her tricorder then closed it, "I've got the electronic security systems wired. We can walk in and out as we please."
Macen indulged himself in feeling a moment of pride for his Vulcan paramour, "And physical obstacles?"
"The operational specs we were given outline a guard detail of ten troopers. Radil and I have come up with a plan that should shut them down."
"Should?" Macen asked with some amusement, and a little worry; "You are aware of the fact that they do outnumber us. You've forgotten to account for the scientists and technicians in your little estimate."
"I considered them a non-factor." Daggit admitted.
"Anybody that can pick up a disrupter is a factor."
"Let me consult with Radil for a moment." Daggit requested and crawled away.
Macen let out a sigh and set in to wait for Daggit's return. Besides himself, Daggit and T'Kir, the mission team consisted of Radil and Kort. Hannah Grace, Lisea Danan and Hal Dracas were aboard the cloaked Solstice in orbit above them. The starship crew hated being left behind but someone had to be in position to rescue the away team if disaster struck.
"You okay?" T'Kir asked in a hushed whisper. As an extremely powerful telepath that shared a permanent rapport with Macen, she needn't have used words but she knew he was more comfortable conversing than thought casting.
"When does it end?" he asked bleakly.
"This mission?"
"All of these missions." He replied bitterly, "When will we finally make a difference?"
"This is because we're after trilithium, isn't it?"
Tolian Soran, another El-Aurian and Macen's distant uncle, had been the first to isolate trilithium and used it to destroy a star. Now it seemed his secrets had not died with him. It was the second time in recent history that Macen had been called upon to mitigate the damage a destructive El-Aurian discovery could do. For a pacifistic race, his people tended to uncover highly volatile scientific secrets that could easily be used for brutal ends. Macen supposed that was true of every race. .
"Get over it!" T'Kir hissed, "Quit moping, we have a job t'do."
Macen shook his head as if to clear literal cobwebs, "You're right. It just gets to me sometimes."
"I know." T'Kir squeezed his hand, "I've been there longer than anyone else. I'm not going anywhere."
T'Kir could see the effect her words had upon Macen. As an El-Aurian, Macen was considered a highly skilled Listener. He also suffered from survivor's guilt for avoiding the assimilation of his homeworld by the Borg. His decades of serving on the front lines of the Federation's conflicts, the Border wars, the Cardassian War, fighting alongside the Maquis following the signing of the DMZ accords, and behind the lines throughout the duration of the Dominion War had left Macen suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. This left him virtually unable to truly confide in anyone else and fearful of their eventual loss. To voice his doubts so readily indicated how troubled he truly was. It was a psych profile that would normally have excluded Macen from Starfleet service but Macen was a valuable weapon who served as a reservist and as a special "consultant".
Macen studied T'Kir in the pale moonlight and the faint glow of the base's lights coming over the ridge they occupied. Physically, they presented themselves as total opposites. Macen was fair skinned with red hair streaked with blonde. T'Kir's hair was the darkest black, worn all tousled and carefree.
Both possessed round faces. Macen's was dominated by the moustache and goatee he habitually wore. T'Kir's crystal blue eyes captured all attention given her face. Her large, sensual lips also drew the attention of those that studied her features. Her delicately upswept Vulcan ears also drew their share of looks.
Macen was tall for the average humanoid. He was born with a trim frame and lithe muscles that conveyed some sense of musculature but not that of bulk. He was also starting to carry a few extra pounds on his gut. In other words, he resembled the analyst and researcher he was by nature rather than the field agent he'd become.
T'Kir also violated the physical stereotypes of her people. Besides the rarity of her blue eyes and her abandonment of logic, she was also far more voluptuous than the average ascetic Vulcan. Her body type closely matched that of now-Admiral Saavik's. Whereas Saavik's body type was a result of her dual Romulan-Vulcan heritage, T'Kir's was a result of being raised by Romulan defectors to the Federation and Vulcan dissidents. Her diet and lifestyle had allowed her genetic predispositions to blossom.
Daggit chose that moment to slide back alongside them, "Radil and I worked things out. Luckily Hal made extra stun grenades for just an eventuality. Kort will assist Radil in clearing out the scientists' barracks."
Only Daggit referred to Dracas by his first name. Most others used his last name or referred to him as "Chief", his reserve rank with Starfleet,
"Which leaves us one short for taking the primary guard station." Macen pointed out.
"I can handle that task alone."
For all their experiences together, Macen tended to forget how adept at dealing out death and destruction Daggit truly was. Daggit had been born on Angosia and come to adulthood during the height of the Tarsus Wars. Selected and volunteered for a radical new weapons program, Daggit underwent psychological conditioning and received physiological enhancements. Recrafted into a humanoid "super soldier", Daggit, and those like him, were sent to the front lines. It was because of the efforts of these altered souls that victory was achieved and peace secured.
After the war, the soldiers received a far cooler welcome at home. Having no treatment in place to reverse the conditioning done to the afflicted men and women, there was no counter to their programmed, violent responses to situational stimuli. The authorities' solution was to lock them away on the lunar prison complex. This situation remained unchanged for a decade until a prison break occurred during a visit by the Federation starship Enterprise. The Enterprise was tasked with a final cultural inspection of Angosia for their bid for Federation membership. The revelation of the existence of Angosian super soldiers and their government's treatment of them put that application on hold until such time as a cure or an accommodation could be found for the afflicted commandos.
That decision was revisited during the Dominion War. The Federation approached Angosia and offered a trade: immediate membership in exchange for the use of the super soldiers. The soldiers were accepted on a voluntary basis, with most choosing to serve. They were placed in commando units specialising in behind the lines operations. This is where Daggit met Macen. Macen served as the intelligence officer and guide to one such unit attached to a fighting force comprised of Maquis survivors.
After the war, Daggit went on to serve aboard the Enterprise-E herself. The Enterprise encountered Macen while the Gulag mission was underway. During an encounter between them, harsh words were exchanged, which Daggit came to regret. After the Gulag crisis was resolved, Daggit requested a transfer to Macen's command. It was granted and Daggit had been a member of the SID's Special Unit ever since.
Unlike Macen, Daggit was a bear of a man. His limbs were tree trunks but without sacrificing speed or agility. His age was indeterminate but flecks of grey were appearing in his dark brown hair. His features were rather craggy and haunted but a spark of mischief glowed in his eyes.
"You're certain?" Macen asked.
Daggit nodded once, "I've done harder before."
Macen sombrely nodded, "All right then, that leaves the weapons lab for us."
The teaming up of Macen and T'Kir had occurred years before and had persisted ever since. Shortly after his arrival in the Alpha Quadrant, Macen had joined Starfleet. His skills as a sociologist and historian made him a perfect candidate for a Starfleet Intelligence analyst. After several decades slowly rising through the ranks, Macen made his mark with his insightful analyses of the newly discovered Cardassians.
Macen was sent to the front lines of the ever fluid Border Wars dispute. His time there enabled Starfleet to gain further insights into a hostile mindset. Macen was first initiated into the world of covert operations during this period. Macen was kept in place at the onset of the Cardassian War and once again provided his unique blend of intuitive analysis and special ops.
Macen's methods had drawn the attention of Vice Admiral Alynna Nechayev. She appreciated his ability to think outside the Starfleet mould. His indifference to procedure occasionally proved problematic but she quickly took him under her wing. It was at this time that he was groomed for his next assignment.
The treaty ending the Cardassian War had ceded territory to the Cardassians in the form of a Demilitarised Zone. Many of the affected systems had been colonised by Federation citizens. These same citizens had now formed a militia group dedicated to liberating the newly created DMZ from Cardassian control. The militia group was named the Maquis after the French resistance organisation of Earth's Second World War.
Macen was assigned to infiltrate the Maquis and assume a deep cover within their ranks. As it turned out, Macen's role was perfectly suited to him. He deeply empathised with the Maquis' struggle and threw himself wholeheartedly into the Resistance. His skills as an analyst provided a much needed service to the Ronaran Maquis cell that he'd joined.
The cell was headed by the former Starfleet officer, Ro Laren. Both personally and professionally, Ro and Macen got on famously. Ro became one of the few people that Macen trusted. T'Kir was the other member of the cell to be so honoured.
T'Kir heralded from Shial. This was a frontier world that was later ceded by the Federation. Shial was a colony populated by Romulan defectors and Vulcan dissidents. It was a world devoted to honour, passion, and even logic. Shial had been among the first worlds "cleansed" by the Cardassians after they took possession of the planet.
T'Kir had been off planet attending school. The news of events had brought her back to the DMZ and into the arms of the Maquis. The elevated stress triggered an exponential increase in her telepathic abilities and they quickly spiralled out of control. This soon affected her mental and emotional stability and she teetered on the edge of madness.
Plunging headlong into the passions normally denied a Vulcan and even governed by a Romulan, T'Kir underwent massive mood swings. At wit's end of how to deal with her, Ro transferred T'Kir to Macen's intelligence unit. Macen proved to be a calming influence on the turbulent Vulcan. Although she was unstable, Macen saw a reflection of himself in her. Her loyalty to him proved infectious and he became her staunch, and oft, defender.
The turning point came at the end of the Maquis Resistance. The Jem'Hadar were overrunning the outmatched freedom fighters with no hope of stemming the tide in sight. Ro and Macen were leading their forces out of the Zone. Macen was headed for Federation space, then would meet up with Ro near Bajor. The tremendous losses and mounting stress finally overwhelmed T'Kir. She stabbed Macen with a Romulan Honour Blade that she habitually carried. Macen survived and negotiated the Maquis' surrender to a Starfleet cruiser.
Macen utilised his Starfleet Intelligence credentials to commandeer a shuttle and made his rendezvous with Ro. T'Kir was sent to the famous Andes Psychological Institute for treatment and care. Macen returned to the DMZ, this time with Starfleet commandos and eventually took his first glimpse of Cardassia Prime during the final battle of the Dominion War.
After the war ended and the treaties were signed, Macen was ordered to return to Earth. Once there he learned he was to lead a special team in a prototype ship on a mission to find an internment camp reserved for dissidents from across the Federation. Macen chose to fill the role of Chief Operations Officer with T'Kir. Lacking the time to officially process a possible release, Macen broke her out of the Andes Institute. The rest could be counted on as history.
In addition to their longstanding friendship, the two recently forged ahead into a romantic relationship. They'd discovered, and admitted to, mutual feelings of attraction and desire. They'd also learned that their separate psychoses formed a greater whole when united. They balanced out one another's extremes.
"Ready?" Macen asked.
She grinned, "Are you?"
"Mission status?" Lisea Danan asked as she strode onto the Solstice's bridge. She moved directly from the turbolift to the command chair in the centre of the space. Unlike the rest of the bridge, closely modelled after the Battle Bridge of the Galaxy-class starships, the Solstice's command chair was taken from a Defiant-class warship. The only other occupant of the bridge was the ship's helmsman, Hannah Grace.
"The infiltration team has just begun their incursion. No reports on their progress yet. No sign of trouble on our end." Grace reported.
"No ships on the horizon?" Danan inquired of the younger woman.
"Nope." Grace grunted, "Not that it'd matter. The cloaking field is holding fine. A Tzenkethi cruiser could drop out of warp right on top of us and we'd still be invisible."
Danan silently shook her head at Grace's unbridled, and somewhat naive, faith in their technological gadgetry. As a scientist, Danan was used to seeing inexplicable phenomena and unplanned for technical snafus. As Macen's former partner, both in his infiltration of the Maquis and in the bedroom, Danan had seen firsthand how often things went wrong when it was the most important for it not to. Sadly, in time, Grace would also share a taste of this knowledge.
For her part, Grace sat at her console all athletically blonde and perky. Danan sighed. She had to alter her own hair from its natural chestnut colour to achieve the shade of blonde she wore. She knew, and had it reinforced by the previous seven lifetimes of her symbiot's hosts, that she shouldn't be jealous but there it was and she simply had to find a way to deal with it. The Trill had a long history of positive self imagery and Danan was determined to uphold this tradition.
Danan tapped the command chair's comm switch, "Bridge to Engineering. How's it going down there Chief?"
"Fine." Came Dracas' usual terse reply.
"Let me know if there's any problems." Danan killed the circuit. You kept things to a minimal with Dracas. It kept him happy.
"What happens if the infiltration team gets caught?" Grace asked suddenly.
Did you skip the briefing? Danan thought but replied with, "Then we beam the team back up and raze the base with photon torpedoes."
"Wouldn't that let them know we were here?"
Danan suddenly had an image of Grace chewing something Dax had referred to, something called bubblegum. This wasn't the usual Grace. She seemed distracted by something. Watching her fidget at her post, it was like some internal problem was gnawing at her. Danan hoped it could be resolved swiftly. A distracted pilot could get them all killed.
"Hannah." Danan said softly.
"Hmmm?" Grace continued chewing on her thumbnail.
"I know we haven't known each other long, but I hope you realise that I've sort of become the team's unofficial counsellor. If there's ever something bothering you, well I'd hope you'd feel free to discus it with me."
"S'kay." Grace mumbled as she studied her board.
Well, I tried. Danan sighed to herself; It's up to her to make the next move.
Danan studied Grace for a moment longer and amended that last thought, Maybe I'll see what T'Kir knows.
The beginning of the insertion had proceeded flawlessly. T'Kir's manipulations of the security system allowed them to freely penetrate the perimeter. Now they were inside the base, where Tzenkethi troops stood post and walked the fenceline. It was also the most delicate phase of the mission.
Daggit used a judo chop to stun a passing guard. Radil and Kort each separated from the group and disabled troops standing guard. The three reunited with Macen and T'Kir merely to confirm the completion of the individual tasks before splitting up again.
Daggit headed off alone for the base's main security centre. Radil and Kort aimed for the barracks. There was a guard shack where the guards "hotracked" or completed a shift to be relieved by a replacement who had vacated a bunk that was now open for his or her use. Another barracks building served as the scientists' quarters. Macen and T'Kir proceeded towards the laboratory where they were holding the prototype trilithium device.
Daggit crept up to the security tower. It stood twenty metres tall and had clear views of the entire complex. Luckily, the warren of walkways between the observed buildings created concealing shadows and blinds. Daggit reached the corner of the building he was using for cover and paused. There was a thirty metre "clear" perimeter around the tower's base. This was designed to allow the on duty personnel the opportunity to challenge any approaching bodies.
Daggit studied the guard facing him. The young Tzenkethi routinely surveyed his surroundings before returning his attention to some unknown form of entertainment, but he did it at regular intervals. Daggit was willing to bet he could make it to the base of the tower in the span of one of those intervals.
Daggit took a deep breath, and as the guard looked away, began sprinting. He ran flat out... ten metres... twenty metres... thirty... The alarms sounded and voices began shouting. Daggit cursed and pulled a small cylinder out of his backpack. Dracas had assured him that the device had enough explosive power to crack open a bunker. It should handle this tower. He strapped the bomb to a support strut, set the timer, and began running away.
Daggit ran a careening zigzag pattern while the alerted and angry Tzenkethi guards fired at him. He dove behind the building he'd started from and finished the silent count that had been ticking down in his head. The bomb detonated, shredding the support and throwing the guard station into the air. It all collapsed to the ground in a mangled heap. None of the guards were left alive to molest Daggit further.
Radil was doing a silent countdown with one hand and holding a stun grenade with the other. The alarms went of and she bit down several suggestions that her father had committed unnatural acts with domesticated animals. Waving frantically, she urged Kort to open the doors and throw the grenades anyway. They each lobbed their entire cache of grenades and retreated from the barracks's entrance.
"What in the name of Kahless is going on?" Kort demanded.
"I don't know." Radil admitted, "But one things for sure, we'd sure as hell find out in a hurry."
"Elements!" T'Kir hissed under her breath, "It's no use. The computer locks down the laboratories during a crisis then goes into stand-by."
"Can you restart the system?"
"It's a critical dump." T'Kir explained, "They scram the entire security system. You have to reload a new one in order to regain operational control of the classified areas."
"Damn it." Macen sighed then shrugged, "On to Plan B."
He tapped his comm badge, "Macen to Solstice."
"Danan here. Are you all right? A distress signal has been issued from the planet requesting immediate assistance."
"You wouldn't happen to have scrambled that signal would you?" Macen asked hopefully.
"No. Why?"
"No reason." Macen said in a forlorn tone, "We just need an immediate extraction."
"Easily done."
"We also need to decloak, target the base, and pound it into oblivion with photon torpedoes."
"That bad?"
"Yup, that bad."
"We'll beam you up in a minute."
"Looking forward to it."
Macen closed the circuit and glanced over to T'Kir, "Guess we can't win then all."
She hugged him.
"What's that for?"
"For being you."
He returned the hug and waited for the transporter beam to grab them.
Macen entered the bridge and immediately went to stand behind Grace, "What's our status?"
"I've bombarded the base with six photon torpedoes so far. Sensors indicate catastrophic damage."
"Lisea or T'Kir?"
T'Kir plopped down at her Ops station alongside Grace's helm, "Confirmed. All structures appeared to be down and gutted."
"Let's be sure." Macen ordered, "Fire four more torpedoes, then cloak us and plot us a course back across the Federation border."
"Aye, sir." Grace replied.
Atta girl, Danan thought happily, Just needed some focused activity and attention.
After the Solstice safely crossed the border into Federation space, Macen met with Daggit in his small office attached to his quarters. Daggit looked stiff and uncomfortable.
"Relax Rab." Macen urged, "Just tell me what went wrong?"
"I don't know." Daggit replied haltingly, "I thought I'd made it but then they'd spotted me. In the end it all came down to the simple fact that I wasn't fast enough."
"Thank God." Macen laughed, and seeing Daggit's bewildered expression laughed harder; "You've always been somewhat superhuman. It's reassuring to us mere mortals to discover that you really do have limitations too."
"You're not angry?"
"You tried." Macen told him, "That's all I can ask."
"But we failed!"
"We failed to make it appear to be the work of some unknown insurgent group or terrorists." Macen clarified, "What we did accomplish was our task of destroying the lab and equipment. We may have left some evidence behind that could link it to forces originating in the Federation but nothing that could be tied to Starfleet. We've maintained plausible deniability and that's what the special unit is all about."
"Thank you, sir." Daggit nodded, "I feel better."
"I'm glad." Macen grinned, "Now get back to your post."
"Yessir!" Daggit exited, leaving Macen alone.
Now, he mentally groaned, just how exactly am I going to explain this to Admiral Drake?