2: You Don't Bring A Disruptor To A Bar Fight
,,We're heading in opposite direction to the Federation border.", Katrina examined the map once more.
,,I know. It should be like this.", L'Rell pointed at the hologram of the planet once more, ,,Hw'Sjaros lies on House Mogh territory. They are not very big and stay out of the fights between the houses for most parts. I never heard of this planet before, but this shows only more that it has neither military nor cultural importance. That means that Kol won't have his armies there, at least not if we land in an rather small town. A whole planet is just too big."
,,But you are not exactly unobtrusive with the scar on your face."
She smiled, and it looked just as dangerous as her usual expression, ,,I want to lay a false trail for Kol."
Of course. It had been so obvious. Now Katrina felt very foolish.
They were silent for some time, and L'Rell got up and emptied the duffle bag at the floor. Only a battered book, two big metal bottles, something that looked just like an Starfleet mess kit, just a lot more dented, and an flashlight clanked down.
Something at Katrinas console flashed.
,,Incoming Transmission."
,,,Put it trough!"
From the little Katrina understand, it was the flight control of the planet, and L'Rell had a brief dialogue with them, and then piloted the fast mover trough the atmosphere.
It was a beauty Katrina hasn't expected on this flight, and one she wasn't prepared for.
Clouds hung over the greenish and brown landscapes, looking like a white liquid half-mingled in water and lying on a invisible surface. They looked soft and mystical, as if there could truly be higher beings living here like in the old earth religions. She could see it all trough the transparent walls of the fast mover, it was almost as if she would fly herself, standing directly in the sky.
It looked so much like earth that Katrina could hardly held back an pain filled sigh.
White mist against the glass as they flow trough the first layer of clouds, now hovering between the blurred higher clouds and the much more material looking lower ones.
L'Rell flow after what the sensors told her, holding onto a small town somewhere in the temperate zone.
The patchwork-blanket like ground became fields and flat agricultural buildings and then turned to single plants grouped to fields. Over something that looked quite like maize, L'Rell throttled the engines of the fast mover and lowered it slowly to the ground, steamrolling several of the plants.
She touched a panel on her consol, and one of the Shuttle walls opened. Katrina huddled outside, and couldn't help but smile at being finally outside a spacecraft again. Cold, clear air hit her face. The pale light of a winters sun hidden behind clouds shone in her eyes, so that she had to look in another direction. From where she was standing half-out of the shuttles ramp, she could see over plants and plants and the beginning of another field, and another, up to the horizon. It seemed almost surreal to her, that there wasn't a wall between her and this distances. How long had it been since she have had so much space that wasn't the vacuum between stars?
The cold air sent a chill down her arms, but it was a good feeling, finally some distinct temperature again after the always same slightly-to-warm-but-okay on Klingon ships.
L'Rell left the shuttle, too, and even if she chased away that expression fairly fast, Katrina didn't miss how she cherished the free air, too. Then she forced her eyes away from the wideness and to the next plant. She walked to it and grabbed one of the fruits. It was a long, pointy pod covered in fibrous, brownish blue leaves.
,,One can eat them uncooked when they are young. They taste quite good, probably even for you, human, and they won't rott for several months."
She poded the leaves of and devoured the vegetable. Remineded at how empty her stomach felt like, Katrina grabbed the next pod and did the same.
,,You have to take the ones that are still blue, otherwise they are too old."
Katrina stared at the leaves of hers, then bit in it. And it tasted indeed not that bad, like walnut and spelt with an slightly irritating earthy taste in the aftermath.
,,Pick as much as you can. We don't know when or if we are able to get good food for the next time.", said L'Rell and carried several other pods in the ship. Katrina did the same.
Only as there was a pile of alien-maize, L'Rell grabbed the bottles, threw them in the duffle bag, took her metal bar and paced towards the end of the field.
By now, the coolness felt no longer refreshing, but painful, and Katrina was torn between longing for a warm shop and fear of walking into a Klingon village.
,,You have to cover your ears and forehead.", said L'Rell, ,,We conquered enough human-looking species to that it won't make them suspicious."
Katrina shrugged, and then ripped an long stripe of her jacket away and bound it around her head. And as much as her fingernails hurt from scratching off the little Starfleet-deltas, she still felt like her clothes resembled an uniform to much.
,,The shirt you wear underneath your armor. Can you take it of and give it to me?"
L'Rells expression was just as weirded out as she would have looked had she asked her something like this, and with a smirk and an light growl she mumbled: ,,Want to see me undress, human?"
Katrina had to do her best not to gulp and stay just as dangerously close to her as she had before.
,,The hell, noooh?! My clothes look too much like Starfleet. You can have my jacket if it fits.", she hissed.
She forced herself to go back into the shuttle with her, but some minutes later she actually did wear the rough shirt. It was too wide for her, and the fabric felt soft from being used to much. It was even more cold than her jacket, but at least she didn't looked like a shield screaming ,,HUMAN" anymore.
The town consisted only of some storehouses and cattle sheds, and some scattered houses.
It was an fascinating experience to actually see where Klingons lived, not just their war cruisers and ground battlements. Their architecture struck her as something in between Italian and traditional Burkina Faso houses; simple, relatively low buildings in earthy colors with flat roofs and small, long windows, pragmatic and stable. They looked surprisingly low-tech for an civilization this advanced, but then, maybe it was wiser to built your houses so that they still worked even when your enemy destroyed the energy hubs.
They walked trough the whole village, but there didn't seemed to be any supermarket or the klingon equivalent to one anywhere. Finally, they stopped in front of the only pub, and with a shrug, L'Rell went inside. Whoa, good to be finally out of this painful coldness.
It looked like an absolutely ordinary pub one would expect in a small village, just with Klingons instead of Federation-species sitting in the battered wooden chairs and battle paintings instead of ones of happy feasts hanging at the rough walls. The people seemed just as ordinary, too. They seemed like figures of the same playground, well knowing each of their moves and possible actions so that everything they did became just everyday life for the others. Two older women sitting in a corner, just drinking along each other. Several men laughing at something. A guy leaning over a table with two others. A drunken woman very obviously trying to flirt with a man who was just as obviously for everybody but her repulsed by it.
She and L'Rell were obviously an not fitting element in this, and there were two ways the others could react. The could completely ignore them because they were not part of their strange well practiced world, or they could see them as invaders, and be hostile to them, watching everything they did closely to decide when to attack.
However, nothing of this happened. They stared and whispered for a moment, but then they looked away again markedly not caring. Only an young man found the courage to approach them, obviously nervous but equally curious.
He said something Katrina did not understand. Only now Katrina painfully realized that her Klingonese was far too bad to be even remotely close to ,,able to have a conversation", and that she couldn't talk English with L'Rell because she would have showed herself as a human then.
L'Rell hissed something in her mother tongue and the guy took a step backwards and disappeared fastly.
,,Idiots.", L'Rell said in what Katrina first thought to be Vulcan with an terrible accent, ,,Most of them probably never saw an alien before."
,,Is that ordinary?", she asked back in Vulcan.
,,For non-warriors, oh yes. Is it for Federation-people?"
,,Not really.", it felt as if she would loudly say ,,Look, I'm human and from your enemies!" to talk about such things in the middle of a bar.
L'Rell sat down on a jagged chair in front of the bar and belted something that seemed to be the name of a drink.
The bartender handed her something red in an not exactly clean mug. Then he asked Katrina something.
,,Huh?"
,,He asks you what you want to drink."
,,Water.", her knowledge was just enough to say that.
The man replied something.
,,What?"
L'Rell grinned slightly: ,,He says that water is for the Targs. They have bloodwine and Rihannsu ale."
,,Rihannsu ale"
The bartender disappeared and came back with a glass full of a blue liqid.
Feeling the liquid bathed her mouth was just wonderful after haven't drunken for over an day, and she cherished the sensation. The glass was empty far to fast.
As they ate what L'Rell had ordered, Katrina continued to survile the guests. The women were still talking. An absolutely unobtrusive man except for the disruptor his hands calmingly fiddled with entered the bar and sat down in a corner. How much a live must have been shaped by violence that people had to carry weapons with them?
She heard L'Rell ask the bartender something, a short dialogue begun. Finally, the bartender muttered something that sounded like an rejection, and L'Rell signed.
,,So far to ,we'll find another way easily', huh?"
L'Rell just stared at her annoyed.
,,Are there any specific cultural peculiarities concerning buying something?"
,,What are you planning? You are not able to speak our language."
,,Why did he let you down?"
,,He said that they can't just give strangers their stock, especially not if they don't even have money, but just valuables."
,,Is it appropriate here to bargain?"
,,For something like this, yes."
,,Say him that we don't need to buy our supplies here. We can just as well fly to another town, but then he would loose the chance to make a lot of profit today."
,,He asked how much I am willing to pay, otherwise he wouldn't do such a strange deal."
,,Hmm. How much would be just enough to make it profitable?"
L'Rell said the number, and the innkeeper let out an annoyed groan, but continued to listen.
,,Now slowly deal your way up to what is acceptable to you."
Harsh words in Klingon, mumble mumble. Then the innkeeper left. As he came back, he smacked an bag full of not exactly eatable looking stuff and an water canister on the bar, his expression showing that just one more ask and he would attack them.
L'Rell took the supplies and stuffed them into her duffle bag. Then she continued drinking.
,,Do you want something, too?", L'Rell handed her the mug with the thick red alcohol. ,,Tastes absolutely disgusting. But I need to get drunk."
She finished already the forth mug.
Katrina didn't asked why she needed this, and she didn't asked if it was an intelligent decision to get drunk while they were fleeing. She knew this world better than her, and if she thought it was safe…
She was starting her fifth mug and Katrina was studying the interesting show of alien everyday life as an harsh growl and the dull sound of a fist hitting flesh made her flinch.
,,Just ignore them.", L'Rell mumbled and turned to her drink again.
Katrina turned a last look at the woman who just tried to hit her opponent with an bottle, who stumbled dangerously close to another desk surrounded by people. She couldn't help but listen and stiffen her back at every small sound of the fight, though.
Then suddenly, a sound dangerously close to her, and she jumped off her bar chair just soon enough to see an man smack very closely beside it. His opponent was directly behind him.
Her legs almost got limp from the sudden thrust of hitting the floor, but she managed to stumble out of the way.
The attacker missed, bringing him dangerously close to Katrina. Instinctively, she kicked the bar chair against him. Her knees screamed.
Damn. Bad idea. The Klingons eyes found her, fury in his features. She dodged from the first blow, stumbled backwards. Just rarely enough.
She had to escape every attack. She couldn't allow them to come in her range. Not in her condition. Another attack. Rushing to the right. A step back. Shit, she needed a weapon, but there weren't any nearby. Her back hit the wall. She flinched.
He winded up. Katrina jumped forwards, throwing her full weight at him, managing to rim her elbow in his stomach, trying to push her fingers in his eyes. Then he grabbed for her shoulders, hit her upper arm, dull pain. Panicked, she kicked for his shin, twisting herself out of his grip, somehow managing to.
Gasping for air, she realized that she had stumbled in the middle of the brawl.
Screams. Something hitting her back, making her almost fall. The innkeepers tries to calm everybody, lost in the noise. L'Rell, taking a blow but only using the now close distance to her opponent to smack the end of her metal bar right into his face.
A sway to her neck, she just barely blocked it with her lower arm, but the power behind it shot pain trough the whole muscle. A woman kicked for her belly. She jumped left, but the motion made her loose her balance, her foot grazed her flank, a trace of pain. She panted. Her vision already started to blurry.
Finally, she saw a gap between the fighters, and fought her way trough with elbows and arms.
As she was out of the most dangerous area, she finally had time to oversee the whole brawl.
L'Rell was stuck somewhere near the back wall, just a few meters beside her, holding the attackers on distance with her staff, never letting them close enough to reach her, gracefully dancing out of the line of their attacks, winding and sliding to the sides. A second attacker ran towards her.
,,Watch out! He's got a knife!"
Just at the last moment, L'Rell managed to block his stab with both hands on the staff, pushing his arm away and bashing the end against his neck in one single motion.
Then the brawl was close to her again, and she blocked, dodged, stumbled away. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw something slide over the floor. She ducked from another attack, then she was finally free to actually see what was going on around her, and she saw the disruptor lying on the floor. She let herself fall, grabbed after it, between stamping feet. Somebody almost tramped her hand, but then her fingers closed around the reassuringly solid metal. Aiming in front of her, she stood up, backed out towards the door. L'Rell appeared beside her, exhaustion in her face, panting, blood dripping down a scratch over her right temple.
,,I know I can't win against all of you!", Katrina growled, ,,But if you are trying to kill me, I will take at least one of you with me! Who volunteers, huh?"
Nobody moved, everybody just stared.
,,Run", L'Rell said. And they did.
,,Do you have the supplies?", Katrina asked as they were finally standing in safety at the street, twenty meters away from the pub.
,,I have." , she pointed at the duffle back she was already wearing.
Only now, in the quietness and fresh, cold air outside, the realized how much she enjoyed L'Rells presence. Is was not just her function as the obviously stronger fighter who could protect her and knew the area. There was something really pleasant about her calm, decent way. You could talk every time if you wanted to. But if you not, this wasn't in any way bad.
And then harsh, fast footsteps behind them, and as Katrina wheeled around she saw the muzzle of the Disruptor at the last moment.
She ducked, shot behind her without aiming, ran, L'Rell too, hissing something.
Within a second she was meters before Katrina. Her vision blurred. It became harder and harder to lift her legs.
L'Rell sprinted in a small allay, Katrina followed, but by now, her legs felt as if they wouldn't obey the will of her mind, but as if they were just numb masses of wood she was teetering on. Just run. Don't stop. Don't think about that they will get you. That you are already finished.
But then her legs failed beneath her, and she sprawled. Dull pain as she hit the stone floor. She had to get up again. Afsaneh, Terral, the others at the central command, Gabriel, all this Captains and people needed her.
But as much as she tried to lift herself up, her legs just slid away. She heard their persecutors. Just a moment and they would be in a alley to shot again. Shit. She raised her disruptor.
And then L'Rell shouted some swear, turned, and sprinted back to her.
As she pulled her up, the pursuers turned around the corner. Katrina shot. She missed, but at least they couldn't aim goodly if they had to duck from her shoots.
L'Rell yanked her with her, running, half carrying her. Katrina had no choice than just blindly move the numb foreign objects, stumble to not be dragged over the floor.
An resident jumped back in his house. Blasts bursting in the buildings beside them, in the street, just centimeters away from their feet, closely past her head. Heavy footsteps. Screamed commands. L'Rell fast breathing and her own raspy gasping.
,,In which direction is our shuttle?", L'Rells head turned panicked. Only now Katrina realized that they were in a part of the village they didn't knew.
,,There!"
Just as L'Rell threw herself to the left to escape an blast very close to her shoulder, the maize field came in sight.
They rushed into the tall plants, hard leaves scratched Katrinas hands and face.
,,What if they find our shuttle before we do?"
,,Shit.", L'Rell said. And then she was suddenly gone.
Katrina tried to sit up, listend. She could hear their persecutors pushing away plants, but they were slow now. They too didn't knew how to orientate in here.
This time, she actually managed to stand, pulling herself up with holding several maize plants. Far too slowly she stumbled through the field. From time to time, she could hear their persecutors shoot blindly in the plants.
Then she saw one of the fast movers solar sail-like wings towering over the plants. But the enemies seemed to have seen it, too, because now she heard running people.
As fast as she could, she stumbled in wide jumps towards the spaceship. As she was almost there, she realized in horror that the fast mover started to hover, door still open. Steps behind her.
She ran, as fast as she was able to, jumped. But due her shacky legs, it wasn't high enough and she slammed against the edge with her torso, grabbing for something to pull herself fully in. And then L'Rell grabbed her, and threw her inside.
,,Go to the helm!", she ordered, taking the disruptor.
Quickly, she drove the fast mover up. Burst of energy shot against the hull. They were trying to hit them trough the still open and only slowly closing door.
L'Rell leaned beside it, absolutely unafraid shooting back.
As Katrina just wanted to turn her head back, L'Rell flinched back. A bolt missed her chest just for a few centimeters.
They were getting higher and higher but their persecutors still shot, Katrina could see them trough the all transparent walls. They were shooting like madpeople, screaming.
And then, something spluttered behind her, and an energy bolt exploded at her console. Sparks sprayed. She shrieked, flinching invultairily.
,,What was that?", she sounded hysterical.
,,An ricochet. I was reflected by the wall."
And then they were finally to high for being shot, and the door closed completely.
For a moment, she saw L'Rell still holding up the disruptor, still alert. There was something surreal to it, as if she would be the modernized version of the painting of an antic war goddess. Everything about her, her focused eyes, the sharp lines of her profile, her armor and her heavy, strong frame, looked oddly scenic. Katrina followed up the form of her angular nose and past those unsettling almondy eyes and then how the ridges and scales swept up her forehead to her crown.
And then the tension left her, and she let herself fall on the back, panting. From one moment to another, all the mightyness was gone. With the pain and exhaustion showing in her face, she seemed so vulnerable suddenly. She hardly perceived that she was Klingon anymore, she was just an exhausted and tired woman. Only now Katrina realized how much younger than her she must have been.
Only a moment, then L'Rell had chased this vulnerability away already. She examined the slight cut at her temple, then she came over to Katrina. Only now Katrina realized that one of the shots must have grazed her lower leg.
,,It is not severe.", L'Rell announced.
Katrina must have looked skeptical, or maybe L'Rell had just interpreted her expression as that, because she said: ,,I know a thing or two about medicine."
She seemed really creepy as Katrina realized what her job exactly was and why she would have medicial knowledge, and she had to do her best not to flinch.
,,Is our hull damaged? I want to know if it can still withstand the vacuum of space before we fly higher, I'm not up for dying because of decompression after this damn flight."
L'Rell typed something in her console. ,,It still works, as long as we are not hit by higher energetic energy blasts. Anyway, why did they have a disruptor at the bar, and how did these people find us so fast?"
,,Huh?", between all that action, stuff like this hadn't come to her mind, ,,Is it atypical for your people to carry disruptors in a bar?"
After she saw L'Rells expression, she added: ,,I didn't wanted to insult you, I simply don't know how the etiquette about this is in your culture. In an former national state named USA on earth everybody was allowed to carry a pistol – a projectile weapon – and at some places, it was actually normal to carry yours with you in a pub."
L'Rell looked at her as if she found that piece of earth history interesting. ,,It isn't for us. You don't bring a disruptor to a bar fight. It is dishonorable to kill somebody in a simple private brawl, not in a war. They must have looked out for somebody – us, or at least see the possibility that we would have to be killed. I don't like this."
A/N: I am not sure how medicinally accurate it is that Katrina healed so fastly, just as I don't know if House Mogh truly had so less power during that period, and I was afraid to fact check if Romulan and Vulcan languages are truly so closely resembling, but for the sake of my story working, I just assumed it.
This chapter is a bit more action filled than the last one, I hope its quality does not suffer from that.
I would very much like your opinion on it.