Author's Note:
1. Sorry it's been more than a month since the last update. Life is crazy right now.
2. Sorry if I never replied to your review to the last chapter. I'm going to try and get caught up and answer any questions or address any concerns you may have by the end of the weekend. :)
3. There are only three more chapters left to this story after this so we're in the home stretch. Yay?
4. Perhaps most importantly, this chapter deals with several uncomfortable themes, most uncomfortable among them is probably the topic of genocide. I don't know that there's anything overtly graphic but I know this can be a tough thing to encounter, especially if you're not expecting it.
Stardate 2261.40
Dagny bounced Christopher up and down and inched toward Khel. "When was the last time he ate? When was the last time you ate, for that matter?"
Khel grunted, not even bothering to lift her head from the pillow. The light was gone from her dark eyes and apparently not even her son could rouse her from her sorrow. When Dagny had arrived ten minutes earlier, she'd found Christopher shrieking in his crib. It was impossible to tell whether he was protesting his vicious rash, the result of sitting too long in a soiled diaper, hunger, or sudden maternal abandonment.
Part of Dagny wanted to slap Khel, to violently shake her and call her every foul name she knew for neglecting her son, but grief was an insidious and unpredictable thing. Her own mother had taken to her bed in the wake of Aksel and Benjamin's deaths, and had it not been for the help of her older children and some family friends, the younger ones, the twins and Henrick and Tilde, would have been little better off than poor Christopher was now.
So while Dagny was angry at Khel's grief-stricken catatonia, she also understood it in a way. She decided she was being a bit unfair. Khel didn't have a large support network to lean on, but she did have Dagny and maybe it would be better to support and encourage than judge and berate, especially considering Jake hadn't even been dead a week.
"Khel?"
No answer. Dagny sat down at the foot of Khel's bed, trying to hold her breath against the smell of stale linens and body odor.
"Khel, won't you at least just look at your son?" she pleaded.
"The sheets don't smell like him anymore," Khel mumbled, her voice splitting into a sob.
Dagny allowed the empathy to wash over her. What would it be like if she lost Voris? Would she lie in bed with crippling depression while Safi cried for her mother's attention? She had done that in the days following the loss of her family, but no one had been counting on her then. The thought of her daughter crying for her caused her breasts to begin leaking. She gritted her teeth, hating to waste a single precious drop of milk that could go toward feeding her baby.
She wasn't entirely sure if Khel had fully weaned Christopher yet, but it occurred to her that if she was going to sit here and have milk soaking her shirt, she might as well feed one baby in need if she couldn't feed her own at the moment.
"Will you let me feed him?"
Khel nodded in between her sobs. Dagny adjusted her hold on Christopher and after a brief moment of acknowledging that it would be weird to breastfeed a child that wasn't hers, she began unbuttoning her blouse with her left hand. Christopher needed no prompting. He latched on hungrily and Dagny almost dropped him in shock. His top teeth scraped the top of her nipple, which was uncomfortable but didn't hurt nearly as badly as she thought it might.
His dark eyes stared up at her as he suckled and for the first time, it occurred to her how much he looked like his father. The ears, black hair, and complexion were all Khel's, but his round face and wideset eyes reminded her of Jake. She stole a glance at Khel, who gazed listlessly at the wall while another woman breastfed her child.
"Khel, when was the last time you ate?"
"I'm not hungry."
"I didn't ask that."
"It doesn't matter, there's no food anyway."
Dagny bit her lip. There was some leftover stew from the night before in her preserver and she badly wanted to offer it to Khel but a small, selfish part of her wanted to keep her mouth shut.
"What day do you pick up rations?"
"Third day, fourth day? I don't know anymore."
"I know this is a very difficult time, but this little boy needs you."
"I can't look at him," Khel sighed, fresh tears brewing in her eyes. "Every time I look at him I see Jacob staring back at me."
"Jake is gone, Khel," Dagny began, fully intending to finish her sentence by saying something to the effect of "but if he were here, he would want you and Christopher to be taken care of." She never got the chance.
Khel began to sob and though she badly wanted to hug her, Christopher was too busy sucking the nipple of her right breast raw. She patted Khel's leg and once she was done feeding the baby, she set him back in his crib and managed to coax Khel to her feet just long enough to change the bedlinens. Despite numerous attempts to get her to acknowledge her son or take a shower or change her clothes, Khel refused to participate in anything that would provide her any comfort.
Dagny put the dirty sheets in the wash and told Khel she intended to go back to the clinic and get the remains last night's stew, but Khel shook her head.
"Keep your stew."
"Khel, refusing to eat isn't good for you or Christopher-"
"Will you take him?"
"What?" Dagny blurted. "You want me to take your son?"
"Not forever," Khel mumbled. "Just for now."
"I can watch him for you for a few days if that's really what you want, but-"
"It is what I want," she interrupted, closing her eyes.
"I don't want to leave you alone like this."
"I didn't ask you to come here. I only want to be left alone so I can sleep. I see him in my dreams and it's the only way I can be with him."
Dagny tried protesting several more times but it was clear Khel had made up her mind. She was still uneasy about leaving Khel by herself, mostly out of fear that she would try to hurt herself, but she thought back to her time on Valder Station when people kept butting into her life when all she wanted was to sleep and cry. If they were anywhere but a remote colony world she would call a psychiatrist, but they had nothing like that here. She decided she would check in on her again tomorrow and possibly stop by Aisla's home on her way back to the clinic and see if she could pop in on the grieving widow every so often.
As she stepped into the side tunnel, she couldn't help notice how quiet it was. She had no idea how long she'd been at Khel's, but it couldn't be later than 2100 hours and usually there were at least some people still out and about at this time of night. She adjusted her grip on Christopher, who was fast asleep in her arms, and wondered what Voris would say about their new temporary charge.
If he protested, she would just put her foot down and that would be that. She knew him well enough to know he wouldn't just throw Christopher out into the tunnel. But did she have the courage to stand up to Voris at all? Once upon a time she did, but now all she could do in his presence was mumble, blush, and try to avoid thinking about how much she thought about him.
She was no psychologist, but she almost wondered if her sudden infatuation had anything to do with the dire situation on the colony. Maybe subconsciously she was seeking someone who could keep her and Safi safe, but hadn't Voris always made them feel safe? Would her feelings disappear once they were free from the colony and on Earth? She wasn't sure. Would Voris ever feel the same way about her? She wasn't sure. Did he even know how she felt about him? How could he not, with the way she was always so flustered around him anymore? Then again, he'd never shown any indication that he understood how humans showed affection.
The past few days he'd been asking her if she felt ill, frequently commenting on her flushed skin and absentmindedness. Yesterday she'd caught him secretly taking her vitals with a tricorder and when she confronted him about it, he indicated that aside from an increased heart rate, she appeared to be in perfect health. But how could he not know, when they'd spent so much time mind melding? Was he really that oblivious or just a master of ignoring the obvious. It was maddening and she knew if she ever wanted any peace of mind, she'd need to talk to him about it. But what if he rejected her? She didn't think she could bear it.
She looked down at the baby in her arms, half-forgetting she was holding Christopher rather than Safi. Her mind became so preoccupied with thoughts of her current awkward situation with Voris that she didn't immediately register the shouting in the distance up ahead. Just as it began to dawn on her that something was wrong, someone slid their hand across her mouth and began dragging her into a nearby residential tunnel.
Instinct made her struggle, but with a baby in her arms she was no match for the strength of this much larger person. Soon she was concealed in the shadows. Her senses were all on high alert and she was shaking. She was certain the person clamping their hand firmly around her mouth was speaking to her, but the blood pulsing through her ears was deafening. There were bursts of faint, flashing green light coming from further down in the main tunnel.
Her mind burned with possibilities. Phasers? Another riot?
"I'm gonna take me hand off yer mouth now, alrite?"
Cillian Kilpatrick? She nodded dumbly and tried to turn around.
"And ye won't scream?"
She shook her head and tried to tell him to let her go. When he did, she took a staggering breath and asked, "What's going on?"
He looked at the baby in her arms and said, "We've gotta hide that little one o' yers. Mike went to the clinic to fetch you lot. What are ye doin' out here?"
"What are you talking about? I was visiting Khel. This is Christopher, Khel's baby."
"All the same," he said, grabbing her arm and pulling her closer to the wall, "He can't stay out in the open. They'll kill him."
"Who would want to kill a baby?"
"The Gorn. They're here."
"What?"
"The Gorn are invading the colony. Three weeks ago the Romulans attacked a Gorn starbase and I expect there're here to exact some revenge."
The blood in her veins turned to ice. "I have to get back to the clinic. I have-"
"And do what?" he snapped, grabbing her shoulder. "Fight the Gorn by yerself? I told you, Mike already went to the clinic. If Voris was there, Mike's got him safe."
"Safe from what? Voris isn't Romulan," she started to protest.
"Do ye think the Gorn'll do careful DNA scans before killin' people?"
Her tongue suddenly felt too big for her mouth. A surge of adrenaline rushed through her and the remains of her afternoon meal threatened to come back up. "Safi's was with him, she-"
"Ye think they'd leave 'er there to fend for 'erself?"
The phaser fire was growing brighter and the screams were getting louder. The constable swore under his breath and looked around. "Ye can't stay out in the open like this. Ye know anyone who lives in this tunnel?"
She looked around but her mind was too full of images of her baby and Voris lying dead on the clinic floor to form a coherent answer. "I don't know. Where are we?"
She could see people running out in the main tunnel now and some people were starting to come out of their homes to see what was going on. The man at the far end was Jon Svendsen, Ann's husband. Constable Kilpatrick pulled a phaser from his hip and said, "I think they're only lookin' for Romulans. Maybe Klingons—Gorn have always hated Klingons. But I doubt they're lookin' to pick a fight with the Federation. If ye do what they tell ye and don't cause any fuss, I think ye'll be alrite. And fer heaven's sake, cover that boy's ears."
He darted into the main tunnel and was gone. Dagny turned and ran toward the Svendsen's, fighting back the urge to race back to the clinic.
"Dagny, what's going on?"
"The Gorn are invading."
"What?" cried several of his neighbors. Several others slammed their doors, apparently not requiring any further explanation.
Jon looked at her seriously and asked, "You're certain?"
"No, not really but there's phaser fire at the tunnel entrance and people are running. Cillian thinks they're looking for Romulans and Klingons and if we do as they say, they won't hurt us. I don't know." She fought back tears. "Can I come inside?"
He swore under his breath and motioned her into his home. Ann, Nicolas, Britta, Frøya, and Jørn were sitting around a tiny table sharing a meal of broth, looking utterly confused when she appeared in the doorway.
"What's going on, dad?" Britta asked.
"Dagny, is anything the matter?" Ann asked.
Before she could reply Jon said, "The Gorn are here, but Constable Kilpatrick thinks we'll be ok as long as we comply with their orders. They're not here for us."
Dagny glanced at Frøya, and Jørn, who were only twelve and ten. He was obviously trying to keep from frightening them but it wasn't working.
"Why don't you kids go upstairs and finish your supper there?" Ann said, rising to her feet.
"Why?" Frøya asked.
"Because I said so, that's why," Ann barked. Her stern tone reminded her so much of her own mother.
Britta, Frøya, and Jørn got up from the table with their soup bowls in hand without another word, but Nicolas stayed put. Ann swatted him with a dishrag and said, "I'm not in the mood for this right now."
"I'm almost eighteen!" he yelled. "I'm not a little kid anymore."
"Nicolas!" she shouted at her son.
"Let him stay," Jon said darkly. "But I would prefer if you went upstairs with the children. Dagny too."
He was staring at Christopher, seemingly unaware that the baby in her arms wasn't Safi. It was obvious what he was thinking and it made her sick to her stomach, realizing that this baby's presence was putting his entire family at risk. Maybe it wasn't fair to ask him to shelter her; she had no idea what she might do if the roles were reversed. Jon Svendsen seemed to be a mind-reader, because before anyone could utter another word he said, "You're staying, Dagny. You and the baby. Please go upstairs."
"Thank you," she whispered, wandering up a steep set of narrow stairs that led to a single room partitioned off by blankets hanging from a network of strings and cords. The setup reminded her a lot of the clinic and her own home, only the downstairs area was much smaller.
Ann's younger children were sitting in a tight circle on the floor in the corner, holding soup spoons but barely eating. When she saw Ann, she tried to offer a reassuring smile but it felt like a lie.
"How are you doing, Dagny?" Ann asked, her voice falsely cheerful.
She couldn't bring herself to say she was fine. She nodded and asked, "Do you still have any baby clothes?"
Ann shrugged. "I think I gave most of them to you and whatever I had left, I gave to other people with babies."
"I just need a hat."
"Is she cold?" Ann asked, coming over to see the baby. "She sure has gotten big."
"He. This is Christopher, Khel's baby."
"Why do you have Khel's baby?"
"Khel hasn't been handling Jake's death very well and asked me to look after him for a few days. I was on my way back to the clinic when-" She stole a glance at the children and lowered her voice. "When I realized the tunnels weren't safe."
Ann frowned and asked in a whisper," The Gorn are really here? Like, they're invading the colony?"
"The constable thinks they're here to take revenge on the Romulans, which is why I need a hat. I don't know if they'll have scanners, but I don't want to draw attention to the fact that Christopher is half-Romulan."
It was Ann's turn to look positively sick. "Frøya, will you get me the hat off your doll?"
"What do you want with it?"
"Dagny needs it for her baby," Ann replied through clenched teeth.
"She doesn't have any other hats?" Frøya complained. "I just finished knitting it and I've been working on it for weeks."
"Just give me the damn hat," Ann snapped.
"I'll give it back to you, I promise," Dagny added. "I just need to borrow it."
Frøya made an ugly face but got up and grabbed a puffy rag doll that had been sewn together from scraps and presented Dagny with a knitted hat with purple and orange flowers on it.
"Thank you so much," Dagny said, pulling it down over Christopher's ears and the edges of his brow. If anyone had assumed he was her daughter before, they almost certainly would now.
When Frøya sat down to finish the rest of her soup, Ann turned to Dagny and asked, "Are Voris and Safi ok?"
Her chin began to quiver and she was about to admit she didn't know when the sound of the door bursting open downstairs interrupted her. The Gorn were here.
Three hours in a dark, cramped, and hot tunnel were taking a toll on everyone. The hungry infant in his lap was nearly inconsolable and it was greatly amplifying the tension. He had attempted all pacifying techniques, but Safi had been wailing inconsolably for the past twenty minutes and the weary glares were turning into threats.
"Shut that baby up or I'll shut it up," one of the Romulan men snarled.
"I am doing my best to quiet her," Voris insisted.
"She's going to get us all killed," someone else hissed.
Voris put a forefinger in her mouth, which she attempted to suckle, but upon realizing it would not provide her with any nourishment, she spit it out and continued crying.
"Will you let me hold her?" the Rigelian woman asked. "I raised four children and I have a knack for getting them to settle down."
Voris very much disliked allowing strangers to handle his daughter, but he had no other ideas for calming her so he agreed. Unfortunately, it only made her cry harder. The touch of an experienced mother was no substitute for food or a clean sanitary garment.
"The baby needs to leave," the Romulan man said. "It is putting us all at risk."
The other residents of the tunnel were silent. He could not deny the man spoke truly, but he also could not deny he would not allow his daughter to be expelled from this place of safety. He would kill anyone who tried it, if necessary.
In truth, he had not tried every possible means of calming her. What he was on the verge of attempting was truly was a last resort—if he'd had sedatives available to him, he'd have used those first. He collected Safi from the Rigelian woman, angled his legs in front of him, and propped his daughter up on his thighs. He had hoped to let her become her own person, but it was logical, necessary even, to do this if it would preserve her life. Rather than allow himself to dwell on it further, he touched the fingertips of his hands to both sides of her face to initiate a paternal bond with her.
Despite the relative darkness, their eyes locked. Safi fell silent, evidently shocked at the intrusion into her young soul. He found her mind much as he had expected to find it: immature, unformed, and mostly fearful and agitated. Her emotions were understandable. Though she was still too young to comprehend the gravity of their current situation or that her father was not intentionally withholding food from her, he tried to express to her in the most basic and fundamental terms that he intended to keep her safe.
"Finally," someone muttered.
His focus wavered and Safi began to whimper again so he turned back to her and concentrated on making her feel secure. She didn't have fully formed thoughts, but he got the distinct impression that she wanted Dagny, not only because she associated Dagny with food, but because she felt safer in her mother's arms. The longer he kept their minds joined together, the more intense his love for her became.
Soon she was asleep and he cautiously released his hold on her face, grateful he was near the back of the tunnel and mostly in the shadows so that no one would see the faint line of tears silently falling down his face. Rather than wipe them away, he allowed himself to experience their wetness and realized for the first time just how lax his adherence to logic had become since meeting Dagny. He had a sense that he ought to be ashamed: how could he casually abandon the teachings of his father, forefather, and all predecessors dating back to Surak?
He loved his daughter. He loved Dagny. He was afraid for them both, more than he was for himself. Was it truly wrong to feel such things? He had become so many things in the past year, so perhaps it wasn't surprising that he would also become a heretic. It was almost amusing, but apparently he hadn't strayed so far from Surak's teachings that he could allow himself to laugh. What would Dagny say, if she saw him fighting off bitter laughter?
Voris finally permitted himself to think of Dagny. Mike Yates had not returned and no one had come to give them any news of the colony's fate. He did not know for certain, but he sensed Dagny was still alive. An idea began to form. Dagny was not his mate in any formal sense, but they had bonded often and regularly enough that it was possible a sufficient portion of his katra had transferred to her to make non-psionic telepathic contact possible between them. He had never managed to make such contact with anyone, but he had also never tried. Before he could decide against it, he closed his eyes and stretched his mind as far as it would go, probing for any shred of Dagny in the colony beyond the tunnel.
Were the Gorn really this big, or was the room just really this small? Dagny was on the verge of fainting when the Gorn soldier lifted his phaser rifle to her chest and told her, Ann, and the children to go downstairs. Unlike the Gorn who lived in Bergeron colony, he had a universal translator that made his speech smooth and flawless. Ann went down first, calling her children after her and Dagny and the Gorn soldier brought up the rear.
There were two other soldiers waiting for them on the ground floor, tossing the sparse furniture over in a way that suggested they found it more amusing than necessary.
When one of them opened the preserver and extracted an onion and sniffed it, Nicolas said, "Hey!" His protest earned him the butt of a phaser rifle in his cheek. Ann tensed and Frøya yelped, but the soldier didn't strike Nicolas again. Dagny exhaled sharply, suddenly conscious of the fact that she was dizzy and had been holding her breath ever since she'd begun walking down the stairs.
"Is there anyone here besides you and these people?" one of the soldiers asked Jon, pointing in their direction.
"No," Jon replied.
"And these people are your family?"
"Everyone who lives in this house is standing right here."
It wasn't exactly untrue. Everyone who lived in these quarters was present, plus Dagny and Christopher. It didn't hurt that Dagny had the benefit of looking an awful lot like Ann and her children.
"You are not hiding any Romulans or Klingons?"
The children were certainly old enough to keep their mouths shut, but were they brave enough? Dagny was almost certain she was going to pass out and leaned her back against the wall to steady herself. It took enormous effort not to grip Christopher too tightly and wake him.
Jon looked directly at his family and Dagny and replied coolly, "We are not hiding anyone."
Jon didn't know the baby wasn't Safi, but it still wasn't technically a lie. If any of the soldiers wanted to, they could investigate the infant in Dagny's arms more closely, but he wasn't being hidden: he was out in the open and wearing a very silly doll's hat.
"You will remain in your quarters until further notice."
"And you should teach your pups to be more respectful," added the soldier who'd struck Nicolas.
Jon gave a small nod of his head and opened the door for the Gorn soldiers to leave. The moment the door closed behind them, Ann ran to Nicolas and cupped his cheeks in her hands. "What were you thinking, talking back like that?"
"Are we just supposed to let them take our food?" Nicloas protested. "Hurt our Romulan and Klingon neighbors?"
"They had phasers, Nicolas," Jon said angrily, pointing at his son with his entire hand. "Were we supposed to fight them off with our bare hands while your sisters and brother watch? Even if we did manage to win, what would you do about the dozens of other Gorn troops currently swarming the tunnels?"
Nicolas winced as his mother touched his rapidly swelling cheek and said, "We can't just let this happen."
"No, but we can't put this family and Dagny and that baby at risk either. Use your head, son."
Nicolas looked at Dagny with a look both stern and apologetic. Suddenly everyone in the room was carefully watching her. It seemed a miracle her legs didn't buckle beneath her where she stood. When she spoke, her voice came out as a haggard whisper. "Thank you so much."
"Did you really think we were going to let anyone hurt your baby?" Jon asked.
"He isn't my baby," she said, tears finally falling down her face. "I don't know where my baby is."
Jon gave her a strange look which prompted Ann to explain. "Dagny was visiting Khel and agreed to watch Christopher for a few days."
His face went pale. "So I really am hiding a Romulan in my house?"
"I'm so sorry," she said, trying to choke back tears. "I didn't mean to endanger your family."
His expression suddenly hardened and he replied, "Vulcan, Romulan, it doesn't matter. He's a baby and no one's murdering any babies if I can do anything to stop it. He's welcome here, do you understand?"
"What about Khel though?" she gasped. "I just left her lying in bed. What will the soldiers do when they get to her house?"
She didn't know why she was asking a question she already knew the answer to. It was impossible to say if they would actually kill Khel, but there was no doubt nothing good was waiting for her in the near future if the Gorn had their way. Nicolas suddenly pulled away from his mother and headed toward the door.
Jon grabbed him angrily, but Nicolas twisted around and freed himself from his grip. "I'm not going to sit here while they kill her."
"And I'm not going to stand by while my son tries to commit suicide," Jon shouted.
Nicolas turned again and took a swing at his father, causing Ann to scream and rush to break up a fight between her husband and oldest son. Dagny was finally coming to her senses and ferried the other children back upstairs. A minute later, Ann came up the stairs wearing a blank look.
"Did Nicolas leave, mama?" Britta asked.
Though she tried mightily to fight it, Ann finally burst into tears, which caused Britta to start crying and soon there wasn't a dry eye in the house, including Christopher, who was now awake and howling along with his saviors.
An hour passed by, then two, but Nicolas didn't return. She couldn't decide whether his efforts to save Khel, a woman he barely knew, were heroic or stupid or some combination of both. When Ann and the children were asleep, she wandered downstairs with Christopher and sat down at the kitchen table with Jon.
"I want to be proud of him," Jon said, not looking over at her. He was sporting a black eye and a busted lip that had likely come from a physical altercation with his son. "But I'm angry at him for risking his life."
Dagny nodded, blinking away tears. "You risked your life and possibly your entire family's lives for Christopher. You didn't have to."
"It was the right thing to do."
"Someone going to help Khel is the right thing to do too," she insisted. "I only wish I were brave enough to have done it myself."
"Maybe that's why I'm angry: because my seventeen year-old son did what I couldn't bring myself to do."
"Your seventeen year-old son doesn't have children of his own to protect like you do."
"And like you," he added. "You're a parent too, crazy as that sounds. I look at you and still see a little girl. You're not that much older than Nicolas."
"I don't know where my little girl is," she said, her voice shaking. "But I can only hope that someone risked their life to save her and Voris, just like Nicolas is doing for Khel right now."
Jon replied with a solemn nod.
"I don't know what good it will do," she said, confessing the fears she'd kept internalized all evening long. "I mean, the constable said Mike went to the clinic to get us. I can only hope he found somewhere to hide them, but where can anyone hide for very long?"
"There are lots of pockets of gallicite all over this colony and I don't think anyone's invented a scanner that can penetrate it," Jon said thoughtfully. "I don't see why they couldn't be hiding somewhere."
"They still can't hide forever. Even if the Gorn don't find them, eventually they'll starve."
"I know things seem hopeless right now," he said, reaching for her shoulder. "But never stop hoping. We saw some tough times back on the Albret, but we're still here."
"We are," she agreed. "But a lot of other people aren't. Not everyone gets a happy ending."
Before he could argue further, they were interrupted by three bold raps on the door. They exchanged wary looks. Jon rose to his feet to answer the door and found Anja, Aisla's aunt, flanked by two enormous Gorn soldiers.
"I heard Dagny was here," Anja said calmly.
Even if Jon wanted to lie, Dagny was sitting directly in their line of sight. Why had she brought Christopher downstairs? She wanted to kick herself for exposing him unnecessarily. She stood and looked at Anja, too afraid to make eye contact with the soldiers behind her.
"I'm afraid you're needed at the clinic," Anja said.
"You should be flogged for abandoning your post," one of the soldiers said.
"I'm sure there's no need for that," Anja replied, her voice steady and dispassionate. "After all, was is not your soldiers who instituted the strict curfew?"
Not wanting to cause any more trouble for the Svendsens, Dagny quickly said, "I'll come to the clinic. It's my job."
She didn't want to take Christopher, but she didn't want to burden the Svendsens with caring for a Romulan fugitive, even if he was just an infant. Thankfully Jon said, "You're not thinking of taking the baby with you? It's so late."
"Yes, you should leave her here," Anja added.
"This is your child?" asked the soldier to Anja's right.
Dagny swallowed hard and nodded. She was already hiding a Romulan baby from people who wanted to kill him, so surely the penalty for lying about it couldn't be worse than the actual crime.
"Bring it with you," the soldier said, his face twisting into what she guessed was a smile. "It is not right to take a child away from its mother."
Why was he looking at her like that? This was the stuff nightmares were made out of. Jon clearly looked like he wanted to argue, but Dagny numbly stepped forward. Making too big of a fuss about it would only arouse suspicion and she unwilling to put his family in any more danger. "We'll be just fine." If only she could convince herself that was actually true.
She followed Anja out into the narrow tunnel and began what could only be described as a forced march back to the clinic. Anja snuck a glance at Christopher and Dagny could tell from the resulting expression on her face that she knew it wasn't Safi she was holding. Christopher was almost nine months old and nearly twice Safi's size, but if she knew the true identity of the baby in Dagny's arms, she didn't reveal it in her face.
As they approached the entrance to the main tunnel from the residential tunnel, Anja gripped Dagny's bicep and said, "No matter what, just look down and don't stop walking."
The hairs on the back of her neck stood up. "Is something wrong?"
"No talking," one of the soldiers barked, shoving Dagny so hard she nearly face-planted on the ground.
They turned into the main tunnel, which was completely empty except for several people standing by the main stairwell. As they got closer, she began to get the impression they weren't standing at all and when they were within sight of the clinic, she understood what Anja had been warning her about. Why hadn't she listened and kept her eyes down? A horrified scream caught in her throat at the grisly display and her knees started to buckle.
Anja tightened her grip on her arm and muttered, "There's nothing we can do for them now. Keep walking."
The Gorn shoved her hard again and Dagny only barely managed to maintain her balance and keep hold of Christopher. Bile crawled up the back of her throat and every instinct in her begged her to run, to fight, to do anything other than allow herself to be shepherded by these monsters.
She closed her eyes and kept walking but the image was already permanently burned into her mind. She would never forget it for the rest of her life and would go on to have nightmares about it for decades. The people she had imagined were standing near the stairwell were not standing at all, but hanging. The Gorn had erected a beam across the entrance at the bottom of the stairs and from it hung the bloodied and broken bodies of three Klingons, a Romulan man she was almost certain was Rhaev, and Khel.