CH3
Ro walked into her office, the light on her console was
blinking, telling her
someone was waiting, Admiral Nechayav, she knew. She didn't
want to speak to
her, the last time Ro saw the woman she had betrayed her.
She didn't want to
face that now; but she knew she had to so she took a deep
breath, telling herself
to get over it and hit the button to accept the call.
"Ro Lauren of Deep Space Nine speaking." She said, the
Admirals face
appeared on the view screen.
"You had something on the Orion Syndicate."
"Yes. I'm transmitting it to you now." She said and took
out the pad.
"Ro, I just wanted you to know..." Nechvac said. "I often
regret decisions
I've made but rarely show it, for the most part it does
little good. When I sent
you to infiltrate the Marquis I thought your history with the
Cardassians would be
convincing cover. I never stopped to think about why, I
didn't think about you
and it was my error for putting you in that position as much
as the error was
yours. After what you'd been through; it wasn't fair for me
to assume or expect
that of you. You deserved some compassion and respect; even
if you had came
through for us I should have considered what it would do to
you emotionally and
I didn't. That was my mistake not yours. Working in matters
concerning the
Cardassians undercover is a dangerous, difficult and painful
game. I can't
concern myself with how every one under me deals with it,
I'll leave that to the
counselors, but as a leader I should know when someone is too
close their limit
and take them out for a while. If I fail at this as I did in
your case the
responsibility is mine. I've seen people betray everything
they believe in, commit
suicide, get so bitter and twisted they can't tell the
difference between right and
wrong. The lucky ones end up in a mental hospital, the
unlucky end up dead, but
I need my best people on the job; it no good to have a new
operative for every
mission. The hardest part of this job is knowing how far
someone can be pushed
without permanently damaging them. I didn't pay enough
attention, and I
messed up with you. I'm willing to see if I can help get you
a commission in
Starfleet if you want that. In fact you may do well for your
self in command
school. You may be surprised to hear this, but Starfleet was
ready to put you in
command of Deep Space Nine once you returned from you uncover
mission with
the Marquis."
"I don't believe it. Last I saw you, you were ready to have
me killed. Why
the change of heart?"
"Do you think I wanted to? It's not as if you were giving me
much of
choice. As I said it's a dangerous difficult and painful
game. After you defected, I
asked myself why; you had always been loyal despite some
incidents in your past,
why; what was your reason? When I looked at your file in
greater detail and
spoke to some people what realized was that you had every
reason for it."
"Who did you speak to?"
"Dr. Lenanna, Commander Yeltivits, Dr. Vetins, Counselor
Trio, and a few
others. The conclusion I came too is that you make a hell of
an officer, and I
don't think your mind was you own while you were working with
the Marquis.
Starfleet wants you, and they're willing to accommodate you,
as long they know
for sure that they have your loyalty. I'm serious about
sending you to command
school; I think it's where you belong, you're independent,
smart, and calm under
pressure, you have impressive tactical skills, and you're
determined and strong
willed. I think that we all may have learned a lesson about
your limits. None of us
are perfect and after some of the things you've been through
I'd have been
surprised if you acted any differently; yet you have suspired
many with your
strength. The only thing you really lack is emotional
stability and that you'll gain
in time with professional help. I think all you really need
to be ready for it is a
good counselor."
"Download complete." The computer reported.
"In a funny way you remind me of a woman I knew when I was
much
younger. Then I had no choice but to play their game. She
was the opposite of
you, and probably saved my life as well as my sanity. It was
my blessing to know
her."
"I'm glad someone was there for you." She said, wishing she
had that
touch, that she could do her job with the kind of compassion
that let her feel
others pain. She couldn't; she knew she'd go insane if she
tried. She had to keep
an emotional distance to do her job well, and in the end
protect others. For that
was what she really wanted; to prevent death and suffering of
innocent civilians,
even if that meant more suffering by herself or others in
Starfleet, like Ro Lauren.
A part of her envied and respected those people who had the
kind compassion to
truly let the pains of others burden their hearts and the
courage not to let this
debilitate them. Those rare few who had compassion to guide
them and courage
to follow it, for that and that alone was wisdom in her eyes.
She only wished she
had the gift. No one was perfect, they all had limits. What
it took to achieve
wisdom was beyond hers; similar to the way infiltrating the
Marquis was beyond
Ro's.
"Do you honestly think they'll let me in?"
"If I pull some stings for you? Who does over half the
admissions
committee answer to?"
"Good point."
"On another note, how's Kira? I heard she was hurt? What
happened?"
"You know she was evacuating Eropa Nova."
"The plant where the gateway was dumping theta radiation,
yes."
"She went through the gateway with Taran'atar to attempt to
solve the
problem at the source, and they managed to get some type of
shielding in place.
The runabout didn't return and both of them were critically
injured but returned
to Deep Space Nine. We found Taran'atar in an escape pod
with sever knife
wounds and according to the ops crew the Colonel just
appeared with severe
radiation poisoning and an arthrizen overdose, only seconds
away from death.
The doctor managed to revive her, but she's still rather ill;
he warned her to keep
off her feet for a day or so, but she didn't listen."
"Will she be OK?"
"I'll bet she'll be fine in about a week, sooner if she'll
let herself rest. The
doctor said he recommended she took about three days off, but
I highly doubt
she will. So I'm betting on a week."
"Ro, I have to go but Jun-Luc wants to talk to you. He told
me to ask you
to call him." Looking through what had just been transmitted
to her she said,
"This is some excellent work. How did you get this exactly?"
"It's in my report. Tell him I will contact him when I have
the time."
* * *
"Commander Dax, President Silvero is on subspace."
"Put her on." Silvoro's face appeared on the view screen.
She was an
older woman with gray hair and soft face, Dax could tell a
deal of wisdom had
come to her with age. From what she had heard she had
insisted she was the last
person to get off the planet. That was both honorable of
her, something both
rare and valuable in a politician.
"President, I am commander Dax, currently in charge of the
ops. I can get
you commander Vagan if necessary."
"No thank you. I would like to speak to Colonel Kira, but
first do you have
a causality report?"
"Yes. One person who tried to administer atherinze to them
self
overdosed and died, although some of their friends thought
they may have been
suicidal. There were nearly a million cases of radiation
poisoning. It was very
wise of you to evacuate the children and those who where for
any other reason
more sensitive to radiation first, that probably saved
hundreds of thousands of
lives. For the most part the radiation poisoning was easily
treated and everyone
is fine now. The worst causality was Kira Nerys."
"What? Kira? Was she killed?"
"We weren't sure for a while but she's alive. She had severe
theta radiation
poisoning. It appears she was even exposed to lethal levels
of the radiation for a
very short time before she stepped thorough a gateway
bringing her directly
here. She's still extremely ill."
"We never meant to drag her into this so she would suffer
more than the
rest of us. We will never forget the sacrifice she made for
us. We are forever in
her debt."
"You didn't drag her into this, she is obligated to help
whomever is need.
As station commander here that is her job."
"Never the less it was a very noble thing she did."
* * *
Kira awoke with a start, relived to find herself on Deep
Space Nine out of
the nightmare she had been pulled into in her sleep. She
felt worse than she had
before she had gone to sleep; the nightmare had almost
completely drained her.
She was sick to her stomach, her head hurt but not as sharply
as it had before,
and she felt nauseous feverish dizzy and weak. "Kira, you're
awake?" her doctor
asked in a soft voice, she nodded slightly. "How are you
doing?"
She told him how she felt, then asked, "Did you increase the
brightness of
the lights while I was out?"
"I don't think it's the lights. I'm going to give you some
medication that
will make you more comfortable, OK?" She nodded again, and
he gave her the
medication.
"Can you tell if I have a fever?" she asked.
He pulled out his tricorder to check. "That's odd. I don't
know why but
you do." Then, picking up a hypospray he said "Here this
will make you more
comfortable. I need to run a complete bioscan on you to make
sure that's not the
result of some type of virus that wouldn't have been affected
by the anti-
pathogen I gave you earlier; maybe you picked something up on
the planet." He
gave her a hypospray and she immediately felt better, expect
that she was still
exhausted.
"I haven't felt like this since I was thirteen and had the
ballakan fever. And
the fact that I had never had proper nutrition and none of us
had decent medical
supplies didn't do any good."
"Nerys why isn't that in your medical file?"
"I didn't put every time I caught a cold in the file."
"That's not a cold. How long were you sick?"
"It was at lest three months but I didn't get my strength
back for over a
year. If it hadn't been for Istani I would have died; Shaker
and the others left me
with her until I was well enough care for myself again."
"It's amazing you survived without proper medical care, from
what I know
during the occupation ninety-five percent of those who became
ill with the
Ballakan fever died, fifty before."
"It was all Istani, she saved my life. She was so caring and
gentle; she
always knew exactly what I needed, and she held my hand every
step of the way.
I wouldn't have made it if it wasn't for her."
"The woman who was killed?"
"Yes."
"I never knew how much she meant to you. Get some rest, you
need it to
recover."
* * *
"Gul Macet, I all ready told you that Colonel Kira is ill and
can not speak to
you now." Commander Vaughn stated. "If you would like to
give me a message
for her, or if there is any other way I can be of assistance
to you."
"What I need only she can help me with."
"What is it exactly? Considering she is incapacitated and I
am second in
command of this station I am now in command. I may be of
help you."
"What I need only she can do for me. And I have a feeling
that if you do it
with out her permission you won't be second in command for
much longer."
"Unless you're asking for asylum with the Bajoran Government
or
something equally ridicules then I don't think it will be
that bad."
"Commander that is basically what I need. You see some
people in my
family see me as a disgrace and are willing to use any means
necessary to get me
killed."
"You're quite right then. You need to talk to her." Then he
muttered
under his breath, "This will be interesting."
"Is their any way I could get through to her?"
"Not now."
"What happened to her anyway?"
"Severe theta radiation poisoning."
"How bad?"
"It's surprising she survived."
"What happened to the Jem'Hadar?"
"He survived as well."
"What a shame." Macet said. Taran'atar happened to be
standing at ops
during the conversation be he was not willing to let the
trader Gul talk about him
in such a fashion.
"Now I know why your family wants you dead. If I was in you
family I'd kill
you too."
"Taran'atar; Stop it!" Commander Vaughn yelled. "Gul Macet
your
comment was uncalled for as well. I demand you both
apologize at once." For a
moment neither reacted; they just stared at each other with
hateful loathing
wishing there was no view screen between them so they could
deal with there
anger in the most primitive way possible. "If you two don't
apologize I'll have
you Macet evicted; and Taran'atar you'll be thrown in the
brig."
"I regret my unnecessary and impolite comment." Gul Macet
said.
"Sorry, Commander." Taran'atar muttered.
"I don't want you two fighting or arguing again. I don't
want you
disrupting the smooth running of this station with your
personal problems. I
don't care about whether or not you like each other; you will
act like civilized
people."
"Yes sir." Taran'atar answered.
"Commander," Ro said with urgency in her voice. "There is a
Dominion
war ship coming through the wormhole."
"Damn, I thought they closed their borders."
"The Cardassian ship is raising shields and powering
weapons." Ro
reported.
"Do the same here." Vaughn ordered. "End communication with
the
Cardassian ship and hail the Dominion."
"Commander they are hailing us."
"On Screen." Odo's face appeared on the view screen in front
of a Jem-
Hader ship he seemed to be commanding.
Dax was the first to speak; she was the highest ranking
person on the
bridge who knew Odo. "Odo?"
"Yes it's me, I have a lot of business on station, but first
can I speak to
Kira?" The third request for her in the last three hours
Vaughan thought, how does she
do it?
Vaughn answered that "She's not available right now."
Taran'atar couldn't
believe that this human was treating a living God with the
same respect he treated
the Cardassian who had betrayed the Dominion.
"Is she alright?"
Dax answered. "She recovering from sever radiation
poisoning. If it's
really important I could get her for you."
"If she's injured she needs to rest. I won't bother her.
May I have
permission to beam abroad the station?"
"You may." Vaughn answered. Then he turned to Dax, "Do you
know
something important that I don't know or are you just
injecting yourself in a
diplomatic conversation between a foreign ambassador and the
commanding
officer without a good reason? Frankly I'm not convinced
it's wise to share news
of Kira's condition..."
"I know that Kira and Odo are in love, and he wouldn't do
anything to hurt
her. And he knows that she would have to be in very bad
shape to let someone
talk her into taking some time off. That's why I explained
to him that she was
injured and recovering, he would have been worried to death
about her if I
hadn't."
