Forgotten Past (Pt. 4)

Posted on Sun Oct 18th, 2020 @ 8:46am by Lieutenant Colonel Azhul Naxea & Lieutenant Commander S'hib

Mission: Season 3: Episode 5: Shoreleave
Location: Ferengi Freighter Latinum
3234 words - 6.5 OF Standard Post Measure

Inside the small shuttlebay of the Ferengi freight Latinum, Naxea tossed a duffel bag into the small shuttle that Vedek Toral had purchased. She was now dressed in dark tan pants and a red V-neck bajoran shirt, and boots with a dulled Starfleet commbadge. She watched S'hib approach. "Are you ready?"

“Always,” S’hib smiled as he clicked up the small ramp carrying the last few bags on his back, his StarFleet uniform replaced with the long flowing garb on the Sequella planetary defence force, its muted colours and tight fitting hood covered the majority of his body. “Are you?” he asked curiously, glancing out of the enlarged circular slit that sat around each eye, his ears pivoting around in tiny triangular pockets atop his hood.

"If I wasn't I wouldn't be here," she replied, grinning. She slapped the panel, closing the hatch behind S'hib. She took her position in the Co-pilot's seat, as S'hib was a qualified pilot and she was not. Piloting was something she never cared for as a ground combat officer. "Getting to the planet without being detected will be the hard part. I believe if we jump to warp the minute the latinum does, then cut our engines and go to low power in low polar orbit, we can enter the atmosphere and fly at low level to avoid detection. Are you up for that?"

"Oh sure," S'hib snorted sarcastically as he sat down, taking a minute to frown and shuffle about in the relatively tiny seat, the rough leather chair clearly designed for the stature of the Ferengi. "Just remember, life jackets under the seat and we have little bags in case you need to be sick." He grinned before glancing over the controls, trying to familiarise himself with its layout.

"Well, it's either that or we can try to do a warp bubble jump and power down after reaching orbit and do a HALO Orbital Jump from the shuttle," she shrugged with a grin. "Which most Fleeters aren't qualified to perform."

“Mock us all you like, but you’re still dating one.” S’hib said as he continued to look at the controls, his tongue stuck between his lips as he returned the grin.

"So, did you find the go button yet?" she teased, crossing her arms as she looked at S'hib.

"I can either take us off correctly, or I can do it quickly... but I can't do both." S'hib huffed back as adjusted his long legs and moved his hips slightly, wondering how anyone could sit in it comfortably.

"I'd expect you'd be able to do both," she teased him.

"Yes well," S'hib continued, taking the obvious bait without missing a beat. "Rent us a shuttle from this century and I might be able to." He snorted, trying to hide the fact she had wound him up as he stubbornly moved his hands to the controls and began to engage the thrusters.

"I didn't rent the shuttle. Vedek Toral did," she reminded him as she turned in her seat and monitored the systems and plotted the jump coordinates into S'hib's console. "Everything looks good. The latinum is going to warp in three...two...one....now."

"Coordinates locked, engaging warp drive..." S'hib confirmed as he moved two fingers up the impulse slider and into the warp threshold.

The shuttle and the latinum engaged their warp engines at the same time as Naxea kept her eyes on her console. "Ok, shut down the warp engines, going to low power mode," Naxea said as her fingers danced over the controls.

"Powering down warp drive... Now." S'hib said as the shuttle lurched back into real space directly above the planet, it's vast surface filling their view in the blink of an eye and causing a small panicked noise to leave his nostrils. "That's..." He said before swallowing, feeling his heart beating rapidly. "Closer than I thought it would be."

Naxea went over the data in her console before shutting the shuttle's power level to minimum, taking the warp core and impulse engines offline and going to minimal life support. "Nice job...now, can you get us to tree top level?

"Maybe..." He quipped, falling silent for a brief moment before sniffing and glancing over to Naxea. "If you say please." S'hib teased while idly manoeuvring the shuttle into the atmosphere.

"Never...besides if you don't, it's likely our funeral," she shrugged.

"I suppose that's as close to a please as I'm going to get." S'hib hummed as he tilted the nose of the shuttle down, attempting to build more forward momentum as the ventral hull burned brightly, giving the shuttle a brief appearance of a shooting star.

Equipment rattled in the back of the shuttle as the air became denser, buffering the Ferengi shuttle with strong winds that made the Sequellians bones ache.

"Five thousand meters..." S'hib noted as the first dark and angry clouds raced towards them, engulfing their view of the surface like a dense nebula and splattering the viewscreen with rain. "These thrusters aren't cutting it Naxea, this thing wasn't designed for unaided atmospheric flight."

The shuttle rocked harder as they barreled towards the surface, the clouds vanishing above them as quickly as they had appeared, only to be replaced by a darkened landscape caught in the midst of a storm

"Can you give me Impulse for a fraction of a second, we may just end up looking like another lightning strike on sensors..." S'hib asked as the trees and rough terrain approached them.

Naxea nodded, trusting in S'hib's abilities as she allocated just enough power for the engines. "There you go."

The shuttle lurched as soon as the impulse engines flared, a faint red glow flickering on either side of the beige shuttle as it slowed, pulling S'hib and Naxea forward in their seats.

"Maybe we should have done the orbital jump..." He said somewhere between sarcasm and sincerity, trying to ignore the thumping of treetops hitting the bottom of the shuttle.

"And miss seeing your flying in person? Never," she teased before drawing up the coordinates of the supposed Cardassian base.

=====

Five kilometers from the base, the shuttle set down in a small secluded area of forest. "We hike from here," Naxea said as she was already up, grabbing her back pack.

"I should have brought my guitar..." S'hib quipped as he got out of his chair, almost hitting his head on the low roof as he watched Naxea exit, his eyes firmly fixed on her rear.

Hefting a Bajoran Phaser rifle out of the weapons compartment on her way out, Naxea turned, catching S'hib staring at her. "Stop staring at my ass," she said, shaking her head. 'Men,' she thought. She turned and stepped out of the shuttle. From the position of the sun overhead, Naxea guessed it to be near mid-day. The temperature was warm on the Class O planet. The small continent they had landed on was the only one on the planet.

"Bit presumptuous thinking it's yours..." S'hib shot back before snorting loudly, his upper lip peeling back as he grinned while moving through the shuttle, grabbing the other rifle.

Naxea grinned and shook her head. "You forget I know you."

He approached her in silence for a moment, stopping and resting the rifle on his shoulder before inclining his head to one side and looking at her, admiring her for a brief moment. "I forget a lot of things, that's why I keep you around." S'hib said softly before slapping the rifle into his other hand and slowly meandering off.

She only shook her head as she followed.

======

After an hour of moving over hills and forests, Naxea came to a halt as she crouched down behind a tree as they were nearing their destination, signaling for S'hib to stop and get down. She removed her backpack and dug through it for a minute before producing binoculars. Looking over the grey structure with imposing walls, Naxea didn't see any guards at several spots where they should be. 'Odd,' she thought as she continued to scan the building that was devoid of activity.

"You're being too quiet..." S'hib said in a hushed tone as he crouched down. "What is it?" He asked as he got lower, moving onto his front on the other side of the tree.

"I don't see a single guard, soldier or prisoner," she replied, bringing the binoculars from her face. "Something isn't right. We should keep watch for awhile to see if we can see any movement."

“Maybe nobody’s at home.” he said as he sat up somewhat on his arms, his long neck extending his head forward with his tall diamond shaped ears fixed onto the complex, trying to at the very least hear something.

"I don't know," Naxea replied honestly as she shifted and got comfortable as she prepared to wait.

"Well, best get comfy then..." S'hib sighed as he shifted his weight onto his side.

========

Several hours later, the sun was beginning to set beyond the horizon, setting the sky ablaze with it's colors of orange. Naxea peered through her binoculars, still not seeing any movement or signs of activity. "Alright, let's check this place out," she said getting to her feet. Stuffing the binoculars away, she readied her rifle and began to step towards the base. "I can't believe that the Cardassians would simply abandon a base."

"You know...what if they knew we were coming," S'hib blurted out as he followed, ducking under a low hanging branch as his hooves crunched along the forest floor.

"Abandoned the place, moved everything damning to a different location..." He continued, shrugging somewhat as he openly thought aloud. "That way they wouldn't have to deal with us, since capturing us would cause more issues for them... then once we leave having found nothing they move right back in."

Naxea hated to admit it but S'hib could be right...she hoped not but it was still a possibility. She looked at the towering walls and then to the entrance. "Hmmm...are you any good at bypassing Cardassian doors?" she asked, keeping her eyes moving and still not seeing anything out of the ordinary--other than the lack of soldiers.

“Well,” He said as he slowly approached the entrance, a towering gateway with a side door built into the main gate. “The first thing you do before you try and unlock a door, is see if its actually... locked,” He said as his words slowed into cautious confusion as the door simply creaked open on its hinge.

“You know that normally doesn't work...” S’hib added as he poked the barrel of his rifle through the gap and continued opening it.

"What is going on here?" she asked herself more than S'hib. After walking several feet, they came to a large courtyard with several smaller buildings. Her eyes went to the dirt, spotting several foot prints--some belonging to cardassian military boots and others that appeared to belong to civilian shoes but they didn't appear recent. She withdrew her tricorder and after a moment, she shook her head in frustration. "Something in these walls are scrambling the tricorder. I can't get a reading." She shoved the tricorder back into her cargo pocket as she continued to move through the courtyard, devoid of any activity or life.

"I don't see any evidence of a weapon discharge, nor blood... or fighting..." He said as a chill went down his mane, careful not to walk over any footprints with his own hooves. "But there is an odd smell, can't quite describe it..." He said as his large nostrils twitched as though studying the air.

"A smell?" Naxea questioned as she approached a building and peered in. Inside there were several small rooms. Entering to inspect the rooms closer, she saw that each was filled with a bed. She spotted a Bajoran ear ring on the floor of the third room. She entered, kneeling down and picked up the ear ring as she studied the family symbol that every Bajoran Ear ring held. Not recognizing the family symbol, she pocketed the ear ring and turned to leave the building when she spotted a several rows of mounds of dirt through an opposite window. "No...." she whispered. "S'hib!" she called loudly, rushing out of the building and to the rows of dirt located behind it.

“Naxea wait!” He shouted with a neigh like panicked cry. “Don’t go near them!” He continued as he hurried out of the complex after her, hooves thumping quickly to catch up and stop her.

"What do you mean wait?" she turned back to S'hib as he caught up with her. "Those look like mass graves," she stated, anger apparent in her voice. "If those sons of bitches..."

“Yes but if they are, we don’t know how they died, they might have abandoned the place because its contaminated, the smell... Naxea we shouldn’t just start digging up mass graves without taking precautions!” He pleaded, clutching her arm as gently as he could to stop her moving forward. “It might work now we are outside...” He said gesturing his tricorder towards the mounds of dirt.

"Fine," she said, annoyed. "Scan them but if not, we need to find out who or what is buried here and how they died."

"Naxea..." He said softly as he stepped around in front of her, head low and back arched to be on her level. "You know I'll never understand the pain your people went through, but what I do know... is that pain runs deep, and it burns brightly in that passionate heart of yours," S'hib continued, moving his free hand to her shoulder. "But right now it's burning too bright, so I need you to take a step back." He said as stepped back himself, his tricorder already running a sweep as he turned towards the mounds.

S'hib sighed silently to himself as he walked towards the hastily pilled dirt, slowly waving his tricorder from side to side as he stopped and knelt down, his face contorting with confusion as the scans came back. "I'm detecting bodies at different stages of decomposition," He said as he pivoted on his hooves and looked at Naxea. "Some are Bajoran..." He said lowly as he gestured the tricorder to the mound he was near.

"The others are Cardassian," S'hib nodded to the mounds of dirt further ahead. "They've all been shot... though I can't discern by what weapon."

Rage was soon replaced by confusion. "What the hell happened here? Who killed the Cardassians?" she asked.

"Very good questions, my dear Major," came a voice from approaching behind them.

She turned to see a recognizable face--one she recalled from her time aboard Deep Space Nine. He had been a tailor there and after the rest she knew through intel and military briefs. He had become the leader of the Cardassian Union not long after the end of the Dominion war. Though now sporting greying hair, Naxea still recognized the man who had once offered her a Jumja Stick on Deep Space Nine. Behind him were four Cardassian Soldiers. "Mr. Garak? Why are you here?"

S'hib stayed quiet but had quickly moved to stand somewhat ahead of Naxea, finger at the ready as his rifle teetered somewhere between the ground and the boots of the Cardassians.

"I could ask you the same question but I believe I already know the answer to that one," Garak replied, still approaching with a casual demeanor. "It seems my friend Vedek Toral did indeed manage to get someone to believe in his idea of a lost Bajoran Colony. It is indeed a shame about those Bajorans...so when I heard, I came here to make sure those responsible were punished," he indicated with a nod to the mound that had contained Cardassians.

"Why didn't you report this to Starfleet, those men you punished should have stood trial on Bajor," He snorted, shouldering his rifle somewhat more. "Which makes it sound to me like you were here covering things up."

"My my, a Sequus. Rarely are those of your species seen away from your homeworld," Garak commented, studying S'hib for a moment. "Do lower your weapon. My personal guard aren't as forgiving as I am about weapons pointed in my direction. If I wanted you dead, you would be already."

"It's ok, S'hib," Naxea comforted, raising a hand. She knew enough about Elim Garak to know that his statement was true.

"Besides, if I had taken the time to inform the Bajoran Government, they could possibly have escaped or worse, been held in some soft Federation prison," Garak explained. "It is true I recently learned of this mining outpost and used my contact to leak the information out without alerting any in the Cardassian Military...it seems however, I was not successful as the guards killed the Bajoran Prisoners after learning that their secret was out and were planning to escape."

Naxea shook her head. "So in essence, you killed these Bajorans," she accused bitterly.

"They were already dead. Perhaps they did not know it yet," Garak replied with a shrug of his shoulders.

Naxea fought back tears as she looked at the mound that contained the Bajorans. "The bodies deserve a proper burial on Bajor. Give them that much at least."

"Of course. I will have a medical team dig up and prepare the bodies for transport to Bajor," Garak replied.

"There will be a full investigation once Starfleet learns of this," S'hib snorted loudly. "And I will expect your full cooperation in this matter." He growled, pointy a stubby hoofed digit at Garak.

"I would expect nothing less from Starfleet," Garak replied. "I assure you. I am many things but I distaste the murder of innocent men women and children. However, I must insist that you leave Cardassian Space and this planet immediately. I will personally see to it that all Bajorans are returned to Bajor and this distasteful base be dismantled. I will personally escort you safely out of Cardassian Space."

Naxea was torn. She wanted to look after her people and see them home but she also knew they were trespassing in Cardassian Territory and she didn't want to push their luck. "Tell me one thing...did you know of this base all along?"

"No. This base was classified and it's records sealed by a former...associate, of mine, Gul Dukat," Garak explained. "I had just uncovered the files recently."

Naxea shook her head as anger and frustration built up within her. "Come on, S'hib. Let's leave this place."

He could see the pain in her eyes, the way she carried her shoulders and balled her fists tight, leaving was the best thing for everyone, especially Naxea. "Leave the base intact, it would be far better if you swallowed this bitter pill instead of hiding everything you find distasteful..." S'hib snorted as he moved towards Naxea, wrapping an arm around her back in an attempt to comfort her.

Naxea only wanted to return to the Elysium. She estimated they would arrive back at Earth just in time for it's departure as she and S'hib headed back to the shuttle. At least she had finally gotten closure, but at what cost? she wondered as she leaned against S'hib.