The Intelligence Officer's sudden gasp caught in her throat. The yellow glass vial slipped right through her fingers, without hesitation, and careened in slow motion toward the shiny sink basin before she knew what was happening. With a clink, clink, and a ka-CHHH... it shattered loudly into several pieces. The shatter resonated off the metal basin, magnifying the sound into a shockingly loud crash. The medication drabbled down the drain as she stood watching, horrified.
"Kym," a voice met her ears from the bedroom. "You okay?"
Kym lifted her gaze to the round mirror, still holding the unloaded hypospray. With her long tangled brown hair pulled back in a loose ponytail shimmering in the dim light of her bathroom, she looked at her reflection with disbelief and wide eyes. Her white silk nightgown cascaded delicately over her shoulders. Thin fingers got to work picking up the slivers of glass, pinching each piece in her fingernails and angrily pitching each shard into the nearby trashcan.
"I'm fine," she voiced back to the bedroom, carefully picking the pieces out of the drain. She ran the faucet to rinse the medication down the drain and clean surrounding sink top.
Her last vial of drexamethasone - six doses over the course of 12 days - peacefully dripped down the drain as she felt a sting of panic welling in her stomach. The powerful glucocorticoid kept her body from rejecting the transplanted stem cells she received nearly a year ago to correct a devastating spinal cord injury. The drug could not be replicated, but rather had to be shipped from Starfleet Medical on Earth, three days away. She already knew that the Deep Space Nine pharmacy didn't routinely stock the drug and with a day to process the pharmaceutical order, Kym would now be without the essential medication for at least four days.
"What broke?" A voice from behind her drifted to the replicator in an early morning stupor. Kym didn't turn around even when she heard "red-leaf tea, please."
With a sigh, she finally admitted her clumsy mistake.
"My last vial of Drexa." she said with a shake of her head and a two-handed lean on the sink counter top. "I accidentally dropped it into the sink."
Still wiping up her mess with a soft gray towel, she spotted one piece of glass stuck in the overflow drain. As she pulled it out, she shook her head again at her own clumsiness. She threw it into the trash can with one last burst of anger.
"Oh." the voice behind her said. She quickly brushed her teeth and spit into the now-clean sink, running the water to wash the toothpaste away.
"What now?" she absently said as she combed through her tangled hair. Maybe I'll cut this disastrous mess off, she thought. It would be nice to not worry about all these tangles one day.
"Don't worry about it. I already have an order in with Starfleet Medical. Should arrive tomorrow. In the meantime, we can substitute with methylprednisone."
Relieved, Kym retreated back into the bedroom to get dressed. The evidence of the previous night's events surrounded her - the disheveled bed sheets, her Starfleet uniform still strewn carelessly across the floor, her phase pistol and its harness draped over the back of a tall black leather chair. The scene still surprised her as she debated on whether it was all a horrible mistake. She could hardly believe the past three days' events, let alone the culmination of events last night.
Before she could finish dressing in a clean uniform, she suddenly heard a station-wide alert:
"All senior staff report to the wardroom."
She quickly loaded her phase pistol into her concealed weapon shoulder harness and pulled on her tunic over it. As she slipped her other boot on, she heard the familiar voice again from her dining room.
"Want me to wait for you?"
Kym exited her bedroom in a rush, trying to quickly gather herself. She slung her hair into a silver clip and flashed a smile. Putting aside her desperate need for a cup of coffee, she brandished an aura of confidence and alertness.
"No need, I'm ready now." she said. Yup, this shouldn't be awkward at all... she thought to herself as they made their way out into the corridor and toward the wardroom together.
Two weeks prior...
"For sleep, riches and health to be truly enjoyed, they must be interrupted." -Jean Paul
Commander Kymberli Rzepka's ebony eyes flashed open in a startle. She lay frozen in her bed for a moment, taking in the view of her gray ceiling and praying she didn't hear what she thought she did.
Not now. Please, for the love of the Four Deities, just let me sleep...
"Kira to Commander Rzepka."
In a fury of movement, Kym scrambled to touch the comm badge on the table beside her bed. Her legs flailed against the sheets for leverage as she finally reached the silver and gold device.
"Rzepka here. Go ahead." she replied in a breathless but sleepy voice. Please be nothing... please...
"Commander, please report to my office," Kira's voice sounded worried through the comm link. Kym let her head fall back against her pillow in frustration, but she smiled to mask her exasperation.
"I'll be right there." she said back through the comm, touching the cold metal device again to break the link. She lay still for another few seconds, thinking she had to practically lock herself in a closet to get any sleep.
"Computer, time," she said as she threw aside the gray satin sheets and sat on the edge of the bed.
"The time is 0830 hours."
An hour. She slept a whole hour. Having worked third shift the previous night without sleeping the previous day, one hour felt like one minute. Her animosity toward the situation grew as she forced herself out of bed and pulled on her black uniform. Adjusting her concealed weapon holster around her shoulders, she wondered what could be so important that required attention now.
Someone important better be dead, she thought to herself.
Since receiving orders from Starfleet Intelligence two months ago for a permanent position aboard Deep Space Nine, Kym hadn't gotten much sleep at all. She usually worked overnight as the station's Senior Military Analyst; the late hours providing little interruption while working on sensitive matters. The trade-off was interruption to her sleeping patterns during the day. As a Betazoid, she functioned well on a minimum of eight hours of sleep a day, with 9 to 11 hours being optimal for peak telepathy. She had been averaging four per night. If she was lucky.
Within a few minutes, Kym gingerly stepped into Captain Kira Nerys' office, expecting either a celebration or a catastrophe. Inside the captain's office, she noticed Lieutenant Ro Laren, Dr. Julian Bashir, Commander Elias Vaughn and Lieutenant Nog sitting calmly on the soft gray sofa and chairs around the perimeter of Kira's office. The captain stood at the replicator when she noticed the sleep-deprived Commander walk in.
"….and a coffee. Hot with cream." Nerys said into the replicator. A whirr and a glow later, two mugs materialized in the replicator's interior. Nerys lifted both cups and handed one to Kym.
"You're gonna need this." Nerys said as Kym took the cup with both hands. The warmth of the glass mug promised an extra spark of energy she needed to get through the impromptu meeting.
"Thank you," Kym said with relief. She eyed the empty chair next to Commander Vaughn, inviting her to sit.
"You ok, kid?" Vaughn said with a speck of concern, shifting his weight and crossing his left ankle over his right knee, leaning back in his chair.
"Just came off third," she muttered with a small nod, gently sitting and gripping her coffee cup close to her face with both hands. The holy grail. Her lifeline for the next hour or so. She held the sacred cup to her lips and slowly breathed in the steam. It smelled delicious. She took a small satisfying sip and looked up at Nerys, waiting for the big news. Kym extended her psionic abilities out into the room of officers, detecting only excitement from the doctor and annoyance from Lieutenant Ro. Nothing from Vaughn or Nog.
"Commander, I'll catch you up quickly. I received this from Starfleet Command today," Nerys began, handing a small gray padd over to Kym. Kym wrapped her fingers securely around the padd, took it, and skimmed the text. An Order for Investigation.
"Captain Erika Tulane has been missing for seventeen days. Her runabout was discovered in orbit around Kurrill Prime in the Gamma quadrant with considerable damage but no sign of the captain. It was transmitting a rotating frequency distress signal. Enterprise picked it up and investigated, but found no further evidence of the Captain's whereabouts. They delivered the runabout and the information back to Starfleet Command, who then sent it here." Nerys explained. She leaned herself against her black desk, half-sitting and half-standing. The image on the desk's reflective surface distracted Kym from the perceived seriousness of the looming situation.
Kym quickly read the description of the missing captain while Nerys spoke, thinking her name sounded familiar. Her prior assignments included first officer aboard the Excelsior during the time Kym served aboard as a young engineer five years ago. Tulane... Tulane... now I remember. She's half-Betazoid, Kym concluded.
"Why us?" Kym finally asked, already knowing the answer.
"Not us... you." Nerys said, passing another padd to the Commander. Kym nearly choked on a mouthful of coffee when she saw the orders on the screen. She'd been ordered by Starfleet Intelligence to take command of the Defiant with a high clearance crew and investigate the whereabouts of the Captain. "You know more about Kurrill Prime than anyone here. Starfleet Intelligence is entrusting you to find the missing captain," Nerys continued. "To be honest, you also know more about Tulane than any of us."
Kurrill Prime was the homeworld of the Vorta, the former leaders of the Jem'Hadar army. Kym studied them extensively throughout her graduate studies in Interspatial Relations and during the Dominion War. The Vorta were generally gentle people, but their planet was very primitive, made up of mostly forests and caves. The Vorta were once believed to be ape-like creatures. According to various historical sources, the Vorta discovered a Founder many years prior to the Dominion War and protected it from persecution from the solids, and in return, the Founder promised them places of power within the Dominion during the war. The Founders genetically altered the Vorta to be sentient, humanoid beings and gave them the designation of commanders of the Jem'Hadar. The few Vorta left on the homeworld, however, remained in their original, pre-genetically engineered state. Truth was, Kym did know more about Kurrill than anyone else on the station, but only by default.
"Why didn't you call me sooner?" Kym snapped, feeling herself growing even more aggravated with the situation. She sighed and took another sip of coffee, calming her nerves down.
"I thought you would appreciate the hour of sleep. I apologize." Nerys curtly replied, her attitude projecting back at Kym. Kym looked Nerys in the eye with an apologetic glance and received a small smile, and understanding, in return.
"And let me guess... I'm sitting with my skeleton crew now." Kym suggested. Nerys nodded.
"With the rest up to you. You still need tactical, science, and one more security as well as shift relief." Nerys confirmed.
Out of the corner of her burning eye, Kym glanced at Commander Vaughn, still sitting cross-legged with his arm slung over the back of his chair. She finally sensed a small bit of satisfaction from him, with a twinge of excitement.
She knew he would be standing as her first officer.
She glanced back down at the orders in her hand. Seventeen pages described the situation in which the captain went missing, pictures of the runabout, and coordinates of the planet.
The silence in the captain's office was eerie and the tension was thick. Everyone waited to hear what Kym said next. She couldn't argue. She couldn't put this off on anyone else. She knew that Starfleet was counting on her, sleep deprived or not.
Placing her half-empty coffee cup down on the edge of the shiny black desk, Kym stood at attention in front of the captain. Having been under Nerys' official command for over two months, Kym still felt strange standing at attention in front of one of her best friends.
"Very well, then. Lieutenant Nog, how soon can Defiant be ready?" Kym asked, turning to face the Ferengi.
"The last of the upgrades will be finished in twenty minutes, sir." The young lieutenant was eager to get back out into space again. Betazoids were unable to sense emotions from Ferengi, but she could tell even without sensing his emotions.
"We will prepare to embark in thirty minutes, then, Captain," Kym said to Nerys. The captain nodded in acknowledgment and promptly dismissed the crewmen. All of them filed out of the office except for Commander Vaughn, who stood and approached his fellow officers.
"Do you need a crash course in the Defiant's tactical systems?" he said quietly to Kym. She merely shook her head and grinned. She knew he was going to constantly challenge her for the duration of the mission.
"Hasn't been that long, Commander. I'm sure I can manage," she said confidently. Vaughn smiled at Kym's brazen attitude, knowing even if she did need the lesson, she would never accept it.
"See you on the bridge, then." Vaughn said, turning and walking out into Operations.
Kym turned to Nerys and shook her head, picking up the half-empty coffee cup. A dirty, worn baseball rested on a small black stand in the middle of the desk. A twinge of sadness crept into Kym's heart a she thought about Captain Sisko and how much he was missed.
"I'm going to need more than this cup of coffee today." Kym admitted. Nerys pursed her lips in concern, finally forcing a small grin.
"Good luck and be careful. I hope you find her."