Disclaimer: Ba'el is a character from Star Trek: The Next Generation. She appears in the episodes "Birthright Part I" and "Birthright Part II".
Ba'el played idly with her glass as she listened to the music. She was not looking at the band, obviously amateur, that played their instruments as loudly as they could, silencing the conversations of the locals. Wearing a plain dress, her long hair loose and wild, she looked very much as a Klingon merchant, and nobody would notice the hilt of her very Romulan Honor Blade slightly sticking out of her right boot. It was her father's and she liked having it by her side whenever she could, to remember him. Both her parents had given her some of their posesions when she had left Carraya IV, but her mother's d'k tahg knife had rusted with disuse and so she had given her bat'leth instead, not a weapon you could carry without being inmediately spotted out.
She always liked to go to places like that one, away from the bases where most of her fellow Starfleet officers partied. She liked to go down to the planets, walk their streets and find pubs and cafes where she could drink along the natives. Most of them always gave her a wide berth. They saw a Klingon, even if only a young Klingon woman without any armor, and decided it was better to leave her alone. And she really wanted to be left alone.
Maybe she actually liked to be singled out, to be marked as the outcast. Because she was really an outcast, even if in her daily life nobody reminded her of that. Half-Klingon, half-Romulan, she was rejected by both her cultures. But in the Federation she had always felt accepted and welcomed. Both Spock and Saavik had warned her about possible bigotry due to her hybrid nature, but she had hardly found it. And she had lived a happy childhood where her parents and the other adults in the community of Carraya IV had never hinted there was a problem with her nature. Until Worf came.
She guessed Worf was another of the reasons why she liked places like that one, so she could abandon herself and think about him and feel the pain his rejection still caused her as the same time she tried to numble it with alcohol. She suffered so much still and if she was going to let her emotions run free, it was better done in a place where no one would know her, where no one would stop her and frown upon her if grief turned into rage. She had fell so much in love with him, she still loved him, but he had never truly loved her, for he would not love anyone with Romulan blood. He had kissed her goodbye, saying he could, when he thought he was going to die, but at the end he had left her behind without a second glance. And then, later, she had married a full alien, a Trill. But he would never consider her. And it stung.
Sometimes she even wondered if she did need a therapy that would free her of her deep emotions that would never be returned and only hurt her. Sometimes she wished she were like Saavik, so calm, so controled. She even was tempted sometimes to ask her to teach her mental disciplines. But would they have any use in her? She doubted it.
And there she was. In the furthest place she had found, trying to forget the unforgettable, trying to easy her pain, and still, with the alien music playing, and the alien voices surrounding her, there was only one image in her head, and it was that of Worf.
Another gulp to her drink. She had asked the same a rough local had ordered beside her; the bartender, pleased and a bit wary of her exotic presence, had given it to her for free. The drink was strong, and she did not really like it; its taste was awful, but still she drank it, it was not the worst she had tried. Ba'el counted the weird-looking glasses where the different drinks were kept, traced the engraved patterns with her mind, and memorized their colors. The time went by.
And then he came. She did not see him enter. She had still her gaze fixed on the vases, and the door was behind her. She did not even notice his approach, her intent focused at the bottles and nothing else. He was almost touching her when she realized a new incomer and turned sharply to face it.
He wore plain civilian clothes too, and in the tavern's dim light he did not look very impressive. A hood covered most of his face, but his tall slim form and his slightly greenish skin could not be hidden between the small rounded bodies of the planet's inhabitants, and their fairly bright purple faces. Then even in the dark she made out his features, and Ba'el realized inmediately she was facing a Romulan.
Inwardly, she took her hand away from her drink and caressed her hidden pointy ear instead. But she did not have time to do anything more. The moment recognition came, the man had already reached out his hand and something was pushing her own free hand.
"A message from my commander," he whispered in rough Federation Standard, and before she could react, he turned away.
As his hand retreated, Ba'el instinctually grasped the unknown object. He was already disappearing between the people when she looked down at it. A Romulan padd, with a symbol on its screen. She had seen it before, even if probably she should not have. It was the odd scar Saavik had on her left shoulder, a family mark. A message from a mysterious Romulan commander to her revered admiral. Inwardly, Ba'el shuddered.