I Was Only Nineteen
Summary: During the episode Hunters two crewmen receive news from home, and not all of it is good. At 70,000 light years away from home will a growing friendship help them through it all?
Author's Note: The characters of Lieutenants Emily Hadley and Hiram Mcleich are my creation. I also used the calculator for Stardates here.
USS Voyager (NCC-74656)
The Mess Hall
Stardate 51505.1
04 July 2374, 0840
In the Mess Hall, a late breakfast was far from everyone's minds as a transmission had come in around midnight yesterday. Letters home.
Lieutenants Emily Hadley and Hiram Mcleich sat at a small table closest to the viewport. Each of them had a steaming mug of tea in front of them.
"I have to say that it was worth the replicator ration for the licorice tea," Hiram began as he lifted the cup to his lips and took a sip.
"Hiram, we're getting letters from home…" Emily smiled as she brushed a stray strand of her blonde hair over her left ear and adjusted the messy bun she kept it in.
"I know." Hiram replied stiffly.
"We're gonna get to hear from our families. Our friends…" Emily replied.
"Honestly I'm not quite looking forward to mine," Hiram replied.
"Your parents?" Emily asked, concern on her face.
"Yeah, I've not spoken to them since I joined the Maquis…four years ago." Mcleich absently tapped the provisional Starfleet officer insignia on the right side of his gray mock turtleneck.
"Hiram, I'm sure they still love you." Emily hunched over her cup.
"That's not the issue. I know my parents love me. But I know the Starfleet in both of them will want to have a few words with me over that decision." Hiram took a deep breath and let it out with a sigh.
"Take it from me, as a Mom myself, if my son had joined the Maquis and was reported missing and presumably dead only to be found again recriminations would be the last thing on my mind." Emily replied, putting a hand on his left forearm.
"Always good to get a Mum's perspective on these things." Hiram took another sip of tea with his right hand.
"I noticed you use the word Mum and not Mom." Emily gave him a small smirk.
"I'm Aussie, love, comes with the territory." Hiram smiled at her.
"Same as calling me or most women you know "love" in casual settings?" Emily asked.
"I'm not likely to call Seven of Nine or Captain Janeway 'love' in casual conversation." Hiram raised both hands, palms facing Emily.
"I can imagine Janeway would have a few words with you if you did that," Emily replied with a small laugh.
Hiram shrugged and after a pause. "I do want to wish you a happy Fourth of July. Lovely we're about to be getting letters home on a national holiday you celebrate."
"Will is probably shooting fireworks with the kids over the backyard." Emily mused.
"I can imagine scientists at the Corgal Institute can come up with all manner of interesting pyrotechnics," Hiram smirked.
"I just hope it won't result in an epic noise complaint. Like the year before I joined Voyager . Will and his colleagues are banned from even mentioning the Improved Roman Candle at the Corgal Institute." Emily sighed.
"I'm sure Will's gonna have stories for days about the ankle biters." Hiram quipped.
The two sipped tea in companionable silence as the door to the Mess Hall hissed open, as Commander Chakotay walked into the room with purposeful strides toward their table.
Chakotay beelined straight for Mcleich, a PADD held in his left hand. Something about his body language gave off a downbeat vibe.
"Mcleich, I'd like a word. Privately ." Chakotay gave Emily a sideways look. Emily nodded politely and stood up from her chair and picked up her tray to carry it off for disposal.
Hiram picked up his cup of tea and followed Voyager's First Officer into the corridor.
"What's going on, sir?" Hiram asked.
"I got a letter from Sveta." Chakotay continued his slow yet purposeful stride towards the Bridge.
"What did she have to say?" Hiram asked.
"She's lucky. She's sitting in the New Zealand Penal Colony." Chakotay headed for the turbolift.
'There's more to this story…' Hiram thought.
"I read her letter, and then had to pause to re-read it an hour later." Chakotay took a deep breath. "There is no more Maquis movement. Everyone is either dead or imprisoned…"
"How? What?" Hiram stopped dead in his tracks.
"The Cardassians got a new ally from the Gamma Quadrant called the Dominion. They rearmed the Cardassian military and reinforced them with their genetically engineered super soldiers…and they went after us." Chakotay paused in his own stride as well.
"Those scale faced cunts!" Hiram exclaimed.
"I've been delivering this message to each and every Maquis crewmember on this ship, so I ask you to let me do my job and tell each of them this in person." Chakotay put a hand on Hiram's shoulder.
"Yes sir." Hiram nodded before Chakotay continued on his grim duty and he headed for the Bridge…
USS Voyager (NCC-74656)
Bridge
Stardate 51505.2
04 July 2374, 0925
As Emily Hadley walked out of the turbolift she saw Hiram Mcleich finish his discussion with Commander Tuvok before taking the tactical station.
She conferred with Ensign Samantha Wildman, taking in the gravimetric eddies and other details the science station monitored the last watch. Then after Samantha left, she stole a glance over her other shoulder.
Hiram was busy at his own station, but she could see a slight stoop to his shoulders like he was hunching inward. 'Chakotay must have had some bad news…'
She continued to look over at the science station, checking the readings on the gravitational eddies. Voyager was downloading the messages with Lieutenant Torres and Seven-of-Nine working as best they could to salvage each letter in the really garbled data stream.
'Now I'm starting to worry. He hasn't made one Dad joke in hours.' Emily thought as she did another scan of some gravitational eddies close to Voyager .
Hours passed. A batch of letters was delivered by Neelix, the crew's unofficial and self-declared morale officer.
Finally, watch ended, their reliefs arrived, and after turning her station over she caught up to Hiram just as he was about to enter the turbolift…
'Dead or imprisoned.' Three words had hung over Hiram Mcleich for the whole eight hours since he'd talked to Chakotay. He saw Emily heading his way and held the turbolift to let her enter.
As soon as the doors closed he saw the worry in her eyes. "Hiram, what's wrong? You've been down since Chakotay talked to you…"
"Aside from us or the handful of blokes in Federation custody, there's no more Maquis…" Hiram glumly replied.
"What happened?" Emily stepped closer to him.
"The bloody Cardies…ran to some superpower from the Gamma Quadrant called the Dominion. They ran roughshod over the lot of us." Hiram said with a sigh.
"Mess Hall," Hiram ordered the turbolift and it moved to the right deck.
"Going for dinner?" Emily asked.
"Nah yeah…" Hiram replied.
"Which arrangement means yes in Aussie?" Emily asked.
Hiram faintly grinned. "Pay attention to the second word, love."
"Oh." Emily put her palm to her forehead.
"I'll teach you Aussie yet," Hiram managed the ghost of a smile.
They walked into the Mess Hall. "What's on the menu?" Hiram asked from behind Emily.
"Looks like a mystery dish." Emily wrinkled her nose.
They got their trays and Hiram headed for the replicator. Emily gave him a quizzical look.
"Having a drink to me mates," Hiram explained as he headed to the replicator and inserted one of his replicator rations.
"What are you drinking?" Emily asked.
"Lark. Australian Whisky, neat," Hiram replied before getting the glass from the replicator.
"Is it okay if I join you?" Emily asked.
Hiram nodded. Emily walked over the replicator and made her own order. "Make that two."
"I hadn't had you pegged for a whisky drinker." Hiram raised an eyebrow.
"I'm more of a red wine kind of girl. I'll drink some liquors provided they aren't vodka…" Emily winced.
"That's right, you told me a couple stories from your Academy days." Hiram slid Emily's seat out then he seated himself.
"Ugh, don't remind me. I'm not touching a drop of vodka for the rest of my life." Emily took her seat as she spoke.
"Similar feels about Jäegermeister, mate."
A silence hung in the air. 'Having her close by helps a lot.' Hiram thought as he tucked into his meal.
Emily broke the silence. "How are you holding up?"
"Honestly? Having you near helps," Hiram replied, with an audible gulp at the end.
"Again, I'm so sorry about what happened to the Maquis."
"You might be one of the handful of people in Starfleet who feel that way," Hiram glumly replied.
"Hiram, a lot of us might not have agreed with the Maquis taking up arms against the Cardassians after the treaty, but at the end of the day you were Federation citizens. And many of you were ex-Starfleet."
"There are the Starfleet zealots who brand us as terrorists," Hiram observed.
"I'm not one of them." Emily put a hand on his forearm.
"I never said you were, mate."
"Hiram, even if I were part of that group I'm just as appalled as you are at the wholesale destruction the Cardassians and Dominion pulled," Emily replied. She swallowed the lump in her throat at the bitter pill she was reminded of.
Now Hiram put a hand on her forearm, and he tried to flash a grin though his heart wasn't it. Her smile back and small squeeze to his arm was the reassurance he needed.
"One of Neelix's more interesting creations. Crunchy consistency," Emily remarked after swallowing a bite.
"Tastes like chicken. But at least it isn't a bloody leola root," Hiram shrugged.
Presently the meal concluded and all that remained were the two whiskys.
Hiram reached for his glass. He raised it in the air. Emily touched her own glass to his.
"May you cheat death. But if you can't, may all your wounds be in front." Hiram's voice had a slight quiver to it.
"To the Maquis we left behind." Hiram held his glass against Emily's as he spoke.
Emily solemnly added. "To the Maquis."
They both sipped their drinks and Hiram felt the fiery warmth from the whisky travel down his gullet and into his stomach.
"Waltzing Matilda. Waltzing Matilda. Who'll come a Waltzing Matilda with me?" Hiram began as Emily joined him.
Two voices. One American and one Australian carried the tune despite newly drunk whisky. "And their ghosts may be heard as you pass by that Billabong. Who'll come a Waltzing Matilda with me?"
For a moment the tune and the drink carried Hiram away. To yet another war, his time in Starfleet during the Cardassian War…
"Hiram?"
Emily's voice and the concern in her eyes brought him back into the present.
"Sorry, love, was miles away…"
"Well, I'm here right now if you want to talk," Emily replied.
"Appreciate it, love," Hiram replied. He shut his eyes after taking the last dregs of his drink.
At Emily's gentle clasp to his forearm, he opened them again. For several moments nothing was said.
"I was only nineteen…" Hiram broke the silence. 'My God that was seventeen years ago…'
"Oh?" Emily asked.
"On Sulaco the Cardies dug their heels into the jungle muck and dared us to come after them. So we did. Only to be met with month after month of tropical diseases, shrieking nocturnal predators and other sights that will haunt me for the rest of my days…" Hiram's right hand shook as he spoke.
"You never told me you were there…I mean I know you served in the 3rd Commando Regiment, but you never told me you fought at Sulaco." Emily leaned forward as the conversational noise from a nearby table rose.
"It's not something I've talked about in many years," Hiram replied. 'Yet I feel comfortable doing so with you.'
Emily was taken aback by Hiram's candor. She knew the Australian tended to be very guarded about parts of his past.
"I-I don't know what to say…the fact that you're willing to share that with me…" Emily gulped.
"It's because I can trust you. And that's not something I do easily, love," Hiram replied.
"Hiram, I promise you'll always have a friend in me. If you ever need to talk, I'm there for you." Emily stood from her seat.
"And I promise you the same, Em." Hiram did the same.
Both officers walked towards the exit, Hiram stepping back to let Emily out first. After exiting the Mess Hall Emily turned left to head for her quarters and Hiram made the right turn towards his own.
USS Voyager (NCC-74656)
Lieutenant Mcleich's Quarters
Stardate 51506.4
04 July 2374, 2039
"Personal log, Stardate 51506.8. Today was one Hell of a day. We got news from home and not all of it was good." Hiram paced through his living room as he spoke.
His eyes scanned the gray sofa, single brown easy chair, the coffee table with a couple of PADDs, and a pocket-sized brown leather notebook with some graph paper filler with a pen to one side of it. On his wall was a boomerang with five initials engraved on it, an Australian state flag, and a framed photograph of Hiram and four of his old mates from 3 Commando aboard the USS Canberra (NCC-671923).
He walked over to the kitchen area, took some boiling water from an electric kettle and poured it into a mug with another bag of licorice tea. He took in the aroma and closed his eyes.
"Our mates back in the Alpha Quadrant are all gone. The bloody Cardies ran right to some right cunts in the Gamma Quadrant called the Dominion. Bar a handful of us in Federation custody, we're all that remains…" Hiram took the teacup and took another whiff of the tea.
"Emily really came through for me today. I'm grateful that she's in my life. Her friendship means the Galaxy to me." Hiram sipped his cup of tea as he reached over for one of the two PADDs on his coffee table.
The text of A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway appeared on the screen, and he took another sip of his tea.
"Computer finish recording personal log." Hiram turned his body so his legs stretched across the sofa.
He sipped his tea and continued to read. Presently he yawned. Putting the empty mug in the sink he went into his bathroom to brush his teeth and got ready for bed. Sleep wouldn't bring him any peace.
"I was not angry since I came to France until this instant!" - Henry V, Act 4, Scene 7
Sulaco, 2357
"Bastards!" Hiram Mcleich glowered as he passed a water-filled drainage ditch. The dry mouth and his sweat drenched uniform and the five kilometers under his 22 kilogram backpack were all forgotten.
In the ditch lay a dozen dead Federation civilians floating. Men. Women. Not a single one wore a Starfleet uniform. His eyes watered from the stench of decay.
'That's a fucking kid among the bodies! The brutes!' Hiram thought as he clutched the grips of his phaser rifle as the unit marched along the road.
He glanced behind him, seeing Kahega walking behind him. The tall and muscular East African's face might as well have been carved out of stone.
"If I catch the cunts who did this I'm shooting them in the stomach," Hiram grumbled.
"We'll take it to these bastards soon enough," Kahega nodded as the lieutenant called a short halt from the front of the column.
As he crouched behind a fallen tree, Hiram felt a hand on his shoulder, slim and feminine.
"You okay, Mcleich?"
Hiram looked over one shoulder to see Petty Officer Third Class Eleanor Dietrich crouched to his left. The red-haired noncom's hand slid off his shoulder.
"Bloody Cardies…" Hiram glowered.
He saw the medic's eyes widen briefly before she composed herself.
"You're not alone feeling the way you do," Dietrich replied as she glanced towards the ditch.
"I hate the bastards already," Hiram hissed through clenched teeth.
Dietrich sighed. "I hate to say this, but that's war…"
"Killed the poys and the luggage. 'Tis expressly against the law of arms. 'Tis as arrant a piece of knavery mark you now, as can be offert, in your conscience now, is it not?" Hiram began.
" Henry V. You read that well," Dietrich quipped.
"Thanks, mate."
"Also, you're doing great here too. You really came through helping me yesterday when the 1-44 guys found that Cardassian booby trap."
"You trained us well." Hiram blushed at the compliment.
"I'm glad you were paying attention. We saved four lives that day," Dietrich replied.
The command came to move again. Dietrich managed to get to her feet first, her red ponytail swinging side to side over the top of her backpack.
Hiram followed behind her and the patrol took another turn into the jungle. Up until then the platoon from 3 Commando seemed to be part of a larger dismounted patrol. Until they weren't.
A movement to contact. A fancy term for walking in the general direction of supposed enemy forces until one actually stumbles into them.
"Contact!"
Fire erupted around the jungle. Cardassian and Federation phaser beams flew about. The occasional grenade explosion.
Kahega fired his weapon and Hiram ran forward, finding a tree trunk, and ducked behind it. He fired his weapon from his covered position as Kahega advanced to another position. He also saw Dietrich to his left, advancing to a tree stump.
Almost as soon as the firefight kicked off it ended. The jungle hung silent. The sound of his breathing together with his pounding heart was all he could hear at the moment. Scanning the ground in front of him. Smelling smoke. O-zone from phaser impacts.
His eyes watered from the smoke of a shrub smoldering nearby. Crackling leaves. And a moan. From somewhere up front.
"Did you hear that?" Hiram asked.
"That moaning sound?" Dietrich replied.
"It's real faint…" Hiram aimed his phaser rifle at a cluster of bushes.
"Careful, could be Cardassian." Kahega approached, aiming his rifle.
Dietrich held up a hand as she approached the bush. "I'm a medic! I won't hurt you…" Dietrich said in halting Cardassian.
She dragged a wounded Cardassian from the bushes. The man lay in a fetal position, moaning and clutching at his stomach.
"I'm going to lay you on your back so I can see what's wrong with your…" Dietrich began.
The Cardassian released his hands, revealing a fist sized photon grenade that exploded in a flash…
USS Voyager (NCC-74656)
05 July 2374, 0238
Hiram sat bolt upright in bed. He looked at the clock and blinked his eyes—another sodding nightmare.
He slid out of bed, brushed the covers aside, and walked towards the bathroom. Turning the sink on he splashed his face with cold water.
His hand shook as he remembered Sulaco once again. 'Cardassians would feign wounds and then produce grenades to kill those who'd aid them! That's how the fuckers got Dietrich!'
Looking around his quarters once again he headed back into the bedroom, grabbing a bag containing a heavy blue cotton top, wrestling shoes, training gloves, a belt and shorts. Perhaps a bit of sambo was in order…
TBC