Wesley pondered Cissy's question only briefly, before he answered, "Well, to start with, why did your family leave Vulcan?"
Wesley felt a certain amount of trepidation. He might be young and somewhat naive, but he had a pretty good idea why Cissy's grandparents had left their homeworld. The time Cissy had mentioned for their departure coincided with the finally achievement of absolute power by the Vulcan Communist Party and the suppression of the last vestiges of bourgeois lifestyles there.
A flicker of what might have been anger crossed Cissy's face, but it faded quickly.
"I can see by your face that you think you're stepping on a landmine," she said lightly, and normally you'd be right." Cissy gave him a frank look, then went on, "But in the interest of civil discourse, I promise not to vent."
"Fair enough," Wesley agreed, assuming a pleasant but attentive expression.
"My grandfather is a priest of the sun goddess V'ranni," Cissy began. "You've probably never heard of her," she added, and Wesley nodded, "because she never had many worshippers, even back in the old days."
"As the Surakites gained more prominence in Vulcan society, other belief systems started to decline." There was a touch of bitterness in Cissy's voice, and Wesley opened his mouth to protest, but she stopped him with a raised hand.
"I'll admit," she said, "that that can happen without malice on anyone's part. And I'll admit that at first the Surakites didn't actively oppose other religions."
"At first," she repeated after a pregnant pause. She looked Wesley right in the eye and said, "I know what you believe happened, and why, and I know what I believe happened and why, so I won't get into how religion died out on Vulcan. Suffice it to say that about seventy years ago it came down to leaving, or converting to Surakism whether you wanted to or not. My grandparents left."
Wesley knew that there was a lot Cissy was leaving unsaid, and in a way he was grateful for it. She was too interesting for him to get into a shouting match with her over things they would probably never change each others minds about, especially in light of the fact that he'd almost certainly never see her again.
"They came to Selenker originally intending to move on to some other world, but they never did. My grandpa says he didn't think much of Humans and expected things to be, well, not bad, but...difficult. He changed his mind, though, and ended up staying. They rest, as they say, is history."
"What does your grandfather do these days?" Wesley asked, able to keep from his voice but not his mind the thought that it would have been hard for a priest to get by with no superstitious yahoos to prey on.
"Oh, he's still a priest," Cissy said, surprising Wesley. "There were a lot more Vulcans in Selenker than he expected, though most were second and even third generation and had fully acculturated. And, as it turned out, there were communities of The Faithful (that's what we call ourselves) and a need for priests. So he found a temple and settled right in."
"So that would make you a second generation Selenker?" Wesley asked speculatively. Cissy shook her head.
"My father was in his twenties when they left Vulcan, but he met my mother here, and she's second generation, so I'm first and third generation," Cissy answered, finishing with a hint of pride in her voice.
Wesley asked about her family, and learned that her father was the youngest of four children, two of whom had stayed behind when the others left Vulcan, and like his father before him a priest of V'ranni. He learned that Cissy herself was the middle child of three, that her older brother was employed by an interstellar shipping concern, while her younger brother was currently serving in the Selenker Navy and torn between making a career of it, or going to college.
"Did you ever serve?' Wesley probed.
"Army artillery, baby!" Cissy boasted, puffing up proudly.
"Army?" Wesley repeated. The Federation Army was Star Fleet's poor cousin, and widely viewed by the Fleet (Wesley included) as ignorant bumpkins, officers and all. Oh, there were surely some good people in the army, and the army played an important role in the Federation, but Wesley had a tendency to look down his nose at 'ground pounders' as his fellow officers referred to them.
"Four years," Cissy nodded, either ignoring or not noticing the slight tone of condescension in Wesley's voice.
"Did you ever go anywhere or do anything especially interesting?"
"Well, it was all interesting, in a way, but yeah," Cissy grinned. "After Basic I went to ordinance school and then to one of our proving grounds, where I spent half my term of service proofing weapons and ammunition."
"Proofing?" Wesley asked, unfamiliar with the term.
"Testing," Cissy clarified. "Every new gun has to be 'proof fired' to make sure it works like it's supposed to. We'd test samples of fuses and shells, too. The best part, though, was testing prototypes."
"How so?"
Cissy smirked. "Because we got to fire them until they broke and otherwise beat the stuffing out of them."
"I get it," Wesley chuckled. "You had to find out which bits were likely to break first and under what conditions."
"Exactly," Cissy confirmed with a smile. "Maneuvers on Cornwall could be fun too, though I didn't like having to wear an environment suit all the time when we were outside."
Wesley nodded. When the Enterprise had received the order for the Selenker mission Wesley had done some research. Cornwall was the next planet out from Selenker itself. It was about three quarters as large, with a fairly dense but mostly unbreathable atmosphere, brackish seas, and few life forms more advanced than plants. The Selenkers had never bothered to terraform it, and it had few permanent inhabitants aside from miners and military personnel.
"Cornwall was where one of the two highlights of my army career took place,' Cissy confided.
"And that was..?"
"We got to watch the Navy fire a live torpedo against a surface target."
"A live torpedo? As in 'with a real warhead'?" Cissy nodded, and Wesley blinked. That would certainly have been a sight, he had to agree. Depending on who you asked, Selenker torpedoes were either slightly less, or slightly more powerful than their Federation equivalents. In keeping with Selenker practice, fusion bombs were used as warheads, and as a result Selenker torpedoes were quite a bit bigger. The effect of an atmospheric detonation would be exactly the same, though.
"How far away were you?" Wesley demanded.
"Ninety kilometers," Cissy supplied. "We parked our equipment and got into some trenches the Combat Engineers had dug. We were told to hunker down at t-minus sixty seconds, and then the bomb went off."
Cissy got a faraway look in her eyes. "It was brighter than the sun, of course," she recalled, "And it got hot. Really hot. I remember the plants were smoldering when we stood up. The fireball had cooled by then, and there was this enormous mushroom cloud rising into the sky. The weird part was that this was all happening in total silence. We didn't hear anything for almost five minutes, though it was louder than I expected when it finally showed up."
Wesley felt a bit awed. He'd seen Federation torpedoes explode, but only in space, where they resulted in a brief, albeit bright, flash of light. He had no desire to see one go off in an atmosphere, nor to be in the vicinity of such a thing. Cissy, on the other hand, seemed to recall the experience fondly.
"Talk about different outlooks on life," he muttered.
"I'm sorry, what?" Cissy asked, shaking herself out of her reverie.
"I was just wondering what the other milestone was," Wesley lied. "You mentioned that there were two."
"Oh," Cissy shrugged. "I made a combat drop once, but it was pretty tame in comparison."
"You were in a battle, and that was less intense than a weapon test?" Wesley asked skeptically.
Cissy smiled thinly. "It wasn't much of a battle, Wesley, just an anti-piracy op." At Wesley's quizzical look she elaborated. "Normally, when the Navy finds a pirate base they just nuke it from orbit. Sometimes, though, there are hostages to be rescued, or information to be gathered, so ground forces go down. My unit was assigned to one once. We landed a dozen or so kilometers away, fired a few rounds in support of the infantry, and that was it. We never even came under fire ourselves. Granted, at the time I was all keyed up, especially during the drop to the surface, but looking back it wasn't all that exciting."
Varan was in a state of near panic. For a Vulcan, anyway. He knew the widely held, if erroneous, belief of many beings (including some Vulcans) that Vulcans lacked emotions, and found himself wishing that were so. Unfortunately, Vulcans did have emotions. As a follower of the teachings of the great Surak, Varan didn't allow his feelings to show on his face, or in his behavior (in theory), but he definitely had them. And frankly, keeping his emotions off his face was easy compared to keeping them from influencing his behavior.
One of the crewmen he had been detailed to look after while they were on the surface, an engine room tech named Garibaldi, had disappeared. Just when and where, Varan didn't know, and neither did the other enlisted personnel who were with him. That was bad.
Very bad.
Of course, people sometimes did get lost, and groups did sometimes get separated, and if Garibaldi turned up somewhere claiming to have gotten lost there would be no serious consequences.
For him.
For Varan, on the other hand, the consequences could be quite serious indeed. If Garibaldi had gotten lost, Varan would catch a reprimand. If he was lucky, and Captain Picard was in a good mood, it would be verbal. That would be embarrassing, but have no long term effects. If he was unlucky, it would be a written reprimand, one that would go into his permanent record. As such, it would essentially end Varan's career. He wouldn't be drummed out of Star Fleet, but he would likely never be promoted again, nor given greater responsibilities.
If, on the other hand, Garibaldi had done the unthinkable and defected, Varan might as well cut his own throat right there. A quick death would be preferable to what would happen to him in the wake of a defection. He would be court-martialed and sentenced to be re-educated. At the re-education center his memories and personality would be all but erased, his intelligence would be reduced, and he would spend the rest of his life laboring for the glory of the Revolution in a factory or on a collective farm somewhere.
Varan prided himself on being smarter than most, and the prospect of being turned into a mental vegetable was the most terrifying thing he could imagine.
Varan had been retracting his party's steps, hoping to find that Garibaldi had lingered at some place of interest, then had had the good sense to stay there when he realized he was alone. Varan was honest enough with himself to admit that perhaps, in spite of the Surakian admonition against allowing one's emotions to influence one's actions, he was breaking that rule. Sure, if asked, he would say he was acting so out of concern Garibaldi, rather than himself, and it wouldn't even be a lie. It wouldn't be the whole truth, either.
As such, they had yet to find any sign of Garibaldi, and had reached the last place Varan knew for sure that he had still been with them. It was getting on toward night, his other charges were beginning to complain of hunger and weariness, and he was due at the housing arranged for them in less than an hour. There would be no concealing the fact that he'd lost one of his people, and that fact would soon be known aboard the Enterprise, with its inevitable consequences. Varan wanted to sigh in resignation and defeat, but didn't allow himself to. He was a follower of Surak. As such, he would face the resulting tempest with as much outward calm dispassion as he could muster. Schooling his face into an emotionless mask, he addressed the other crewmembers.
"It is clear that Technician Garibaldi has gone off on his own," Varan said, coldly adding, "despite orders to stay with the group at all times." The others shifted uncomfortably. "Whatever his motive for doing so might have been, it is clear we will not find him before our scheduled arrival at the Center for Social Justice," the CSJ being a communal education and living facility maintained by the Selenker Communist Party, where Varan, his charges, and most of the other people of leave from the Federation fleet would spend their nights while dirtside. "We will have to hurry to get there at the appointed time," he added, and set them off at a brisk pace. As he drove them, a glimmer of an idea took shape in Varan's mind. Maybe, somehow, he could cast Garibaldi's actions in a sinister light, and shift the blame to him. Such a plan had little chance of success, and was little more than a desperate gamble on Varan's part, but a little chance was better than no chance.
It was almost six o'clock, and Geordi was standing outside the hotel he, Wesley and Data were staying at, scanning on coming pedestrians for a glimpse of his friend. Geordi wasn't too worried. Wesley was a good kid, and wouldn't be late on purpose. Perhaps by accident, as he could be a bit absent minded at times. Geordi grinned to himself. 'Or in this case, easily distracted.' Cissy was certainly attractive, and while she hadn't struck Geordi as the type who would go for casual sex, you never could tell. If Wesley was getting lucky, he might well lose track of time. Geordi could hardly blame him if that were the case, and would probably forgive him for being late...after he got the details of the encounter, of course. He was musing on that notion when a warning chime sounded, followed by an air car settling at curbside. A young man in a Star Fleet uniform climbed out, and Geordi immediately recognized his friend. Geordi caught a glimpse of the Vulcan girl in the driver's seat as she leaned over to wave goodbye to Wesley. As Wesley waved back the air car's turbine engines surged and the car rose to join the flow of aerial traffic around the hotel. Wesley stared after it until it was lost from sight, then turned and headed for the front door. He paused when he saw Geordi waiting for him
"How'd it go, Wes?" Geordi asked, a bit slyly.
"It was an interesting experience, let me tell you," Wesley replied.
"In a good or bad way?" Geordi inquired, puzzled by Wesley's expression and tone of voice. The boy seemed a bit shaken, if Geordi was reading him right.
"Oh, it was fun," Wesley confirmed. "Cissy's a nice girl and all, but..." his voice trailed off thoughtfully.
"But what?"
"Well, it's just... We were talking, and I kept going on about all the traffic. Finally, Cissy asked if I wanted to go for a ride, and I said yes. She took me to her apartment so we could get her car, and it turned to be, well, an air car."
"So?" Geordi asked.
"Well, it's just that she's supposed to be one of the working class, and here she is with a materialistic luxury reserved for the economic elite," Wesley said, a bit plaintively.
Geordi folded his arms and gave Wesley a firm look. "Wes, you know, or ought to know, that those same elites sometimes allow the masses to have access to older or cheaper versions of those luxuries in order to preserve an illusion of upward economic mobility."
"Yeah," Wesley nodded, "I remember that, Geordi. But she said her brother gave it to her as a birthday present."
Geordi nodded absently. He could see why Wesley might be concerned, in so far as Cissy might not be what Wesley had first taken her for.
"Well," he suggested, "I've heard that the elites sometimes like to pass themselves of as members of the working classes, usually to keep up the pretense that the elites consider the masses to be their equals."
"She did say she was going to university," Wesley agreed. "She said she worked part-time as a waitress for spending money, because she had scholarships to pay for college."
Geordi snorted. "That should have told you everything right there, Wes. Obviously, she's an elitist who likes to slum."
"But she's so nice..!" Wesley protested.
"Just because she's a ruthless exploiter of the proletariat doesn't mean she can't be a nice person in private. They don't act like they do in holodramas all the time, Wes."
"I suppose you're right," Wesley admitted. Then he gave a little snort of his own and grinned. "And that air car of hers was awesome!"
"How so?" Geordi asked, relieved that Wesley was putting the encounter into proper perspective.
"Well," Wesley began, "It turns out that, once you're outside the city, there are free flight zones for air cars. No rules, do anything you want. And Cissy is a daredevil."
As Wesley began to ramble on about Cissy and her penchant for speed and stunt piloting, including killing both engine and counter-grav at ten thousand meters and free falling for as long as she dared before restarting them, Geordi relaxed. Putting up with a moping Ensign Crusher would have put a damper on their leave. Now, instead of wasting time cheering Wes up, they could concentrate on having fun.
The orbital cargo facility to which the Federation convoy had been directed was mammoth affair that rivaled the largest space stations in the UFP in sheer size, if not mass. Unlike its Federation counterparts, it was in the hands of a private concern, and was one of dozens surrounding Selenker. Ensign Lanar Kasta, assigned to the Star Fleet heavy lift transport Jupiter, found her gaze continually returning to the vast station. It filled the viewports on the side of Jupiter that faced it, if only because Jupiter was fast alongside, anchored to the station by mechanical grapples that held her steady as the one point five megatons of cargo she was scheduled to load streamed aboard. The loading was proceeding smoothly, which pleased Ens. Kasta to no end. She was the officer in charge of Jupiter's cargo spaces, responsible for both loading and unloading cargo, and for its safe stowage under way. She was, though, more than a little impressed and surprised by the sheer speed at which things were progressing. Of course the Jupiter had a modern automated cargo handling system, and the fact that the Selenkers used the same cargo module design as everyone else in this part of the galaxy (Star Fleet and the UFP included) didn't hurt. It was just that there was so much cargo.
Back home the Jupiter was considered a big ship. One of the biggest in the fleet, to be exact, and so rather rare. Loading a ship that big never went smoothly, because few if any Federation docks had the necessary experience, or room, to handle some much at once. Things were crowded, at least initially, and the crowding caused difficulties. Not here, though, and Kasta knew exactly why. The crew of this station were used to handling megatons of cargo, and probably did so on a regular, if not daily basis. Certainly all twelve of the docking points the station sported were occupied, and by the look of them could accommodate ships even larger than the Jupiter.
Kasta glanced at the displays that surrounded her in the Jupiter's Cargo Control Room. They showed the flow of containers within the ship as well as the continually updating manifest, as the containers were scanned and their contents noted against the list of what had been ordered. Some had attached special storage or routing instructions, mostly the former, and the vast majority of those only required refrigeration.
A lot of the containers held 'Textured Vegetable Protein', 'Processed Complex Carbohydrates' and 'Vegetable Oil', staples of diets across the Federation, and substances (especially the textured protein) that Kasta, like many others, loathed. A smaller but still significant number contained real meat, dairy products, eggs, vegetables, flour, sugar, fish and what not. A few openly listed treats and delicacies like fruit, candy, caviar and truffles. A tiny minority had their contents listed as 'Classified' and were routed into the Jupiter's High Security Storage Area.
Kasta's lips twisted in a bitter grimace. It was just barely possible, she supposed, that the mysterious containers held something vital to the well being of the starving masses on Centarus and Andor, or to the people of the Federation at large, but somehow she doubted it. She watched one of the cryptically labeled containers thread its way through the ship, and wondered what it might contain. Enough real food to feed a corrupt government or Fleet official and their family for a year? Drugs (medicinal or otherwise)? Personal electronics? Clothes? Kasta had heard the oft repeated legend of the Party boss who had audaciously smuggled in a fancy air car, which he drove in plain sight of everyone in the district he managed, because he knew he was untouchable because of his party connections.
Kasta snickered. Someone that arrogant would have been made an example, no matter what their connections, with the same prominent (but not too prominent) coverage in the media that such individuals always received. No, whatever it was, it would be small and easily concealed. Some people would know if its existence, but only a few, and they wouldn't care, since they would get to enjoy it as well.
Shrugging, Kasta put the matter out of her mind. She would never learn what was in those containers anyway, since she wasn't allowed into that part of the ship. More to the point, she cared far less about the glory of the Revolution than she did about the glory of Lanar Kasta. If this operation went well, she might get a commendation out of it, maybe even a promotion. Advancing from Ensign to Lieutenant (junior grade) would be reward enough for the time being. She'd remember those anonymous containers, though, and went so far as to download a copy of the manifest to her personal tricorder. Maybe someday she'd be in a position to do something about them. The thought brought a realization to her mind, and a dark smile to her lips.
Always assuming she wasn't the one ordering them.