Refugee
by Kathy P.
Part 15
Chief O'Brien stepped off the turbolift into Deep Space Nine's Ops center and moved over to the main diagnostic computer station to preform a check of the stations' computers. The curly haired man only paid minimal attention to his routine duties, the larger part of his concentration turned inward to his turbulent thoughts.
The Chief was a deeply trouble man. Over the past several days he had been forced to confront his deep feelings of anger and resentment toward the Cardassian race. The Hebitians seemed to be taking a perverse delight in proving to everyone on the station that the residents' preconceived notions on how Cardassians would act were totally wrong. Most of the station's inhabitants had no idea how to treat the eclectic group of people that had descended on the station.
Trying to make sense of what was going on, he had sat down with Keiko last night to discuss the confusing situation. Talking to his wife made him see that his anger over the war with Cardassia was clouding his judgement on all things' Cardassians. She had pointed out some of the old cultures on Earth that had been vilified in the past for the way their government and military had acted, and how all the people had been stereotyped for being evil, or ruthless.
Keiko had even brought up the situation of his estrangement to Julian since his marriage to Garak. Reluctantly he admitted to his wife that he had been wrong to cut Julian out of his life. He knew that his emotions were flammable in regards to Garak and he had come very close to destroying his friendship with Julian.
With a tender smile, Keiko had looked at her husband and suggested that he work things out with the doctor.
"I married a smart woman," Chief O'Brien muttered to himself as he started the systems check.
Tapping a few commands into the computer, he frowned when an alarm started to beep at him. Digging deeper into the system, trying to locate the problem, his eyes narrowed when he found that some security systems had been breached.
Hitting his combadge he called for the Captain. "O'Brien to Captain Sisko. I'm in Ops and there's something that you should take a look at, Captain."
"I'll be right out," the Captain replied.
The door to his office opened and Benjamin Sisko headed over to where the Chief was working.
"What's going on, Chief?"
"I was running a systems check, when I ran across this. See, here and here?" he said as he pointed out some symbols on the computer consol. "There has been some unauthorized access to the computers, sir. You can see where they tried to get past these lockouts."
"What systems were they trying to access?"
Punching in a few more commands, O'Brien followed the path that the intruder had taken in the station's computer systems. "Let's see here. The only system that they went after was Star Fleet intelligence."
"Sisko to Odo. Constable, we need you up in Ops." Sisko stated forcefully.
"On my way, Captain," came the Changeling's reply.
"I want to know when this happened, Chief, and who's responsible," Sisko growled as his gaze roamed over the computer consol.
"Yes, sir."
Running his fingers over the touch screen, O'Brien punched in a few more commands, bringing up more details.
With a sinking feeling in his stomach, he stared at the screen for a moment. "Well, I know how they managed to get so deep into the system," he said as he turned toward the Captain.
Captain Sisko raised an inquiring eyebrow as he waited for O'Brien to continue.
"The codes that were used were Cardassian, sir."
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With a wave of her hand, Kai Winn dismissed the last of her acolytes from her presence. She ignored the confused glance from her senior vedek, refusing to explain herself to her underlings.
Pacing around her quarters, she mulled over the problems running through her mind. First and foremost was her dislike of the man chosen as the Bajoran Emissary. To have an unbeliever given such a distinguished position in Bajoran religion was an insult to every Bajoran.
Now the Emissary was allowing their hated occupiers onto Deep Space Nine.
Insult upon insult.
Her gold robes swirled around her ankle as she turned to pace across the room again. There had to be more she could do to stop these events.
The doors to her quarters slid open and a figure wearing the purple robes of one of her acolytes stepped inside.
Kai Winn stiffened with anger at the intrusion. "I thought I told you all that I wished to be alone to meditate."
The robed figure responded by taking another step forward.
Narrowing her eyes, the Kai stared at the unwanted intruder. "Who are you," she demanded, indignant that her orders where not being followed.
Raising his arms, the silent figure pushed the hood back, reveling a smirking visage. "Eminence, I am but your humble servant," the man said reverently, with only a hint of mocking in his voice.
"Tran," she said icily, annoyed by the man's attempt at power games. "I wondered when you would bother to contact me." Turning her back on him, she moved to sit behind the desk that was place to one side of the room.
Without turning, she could hear the younger man following behind her. Sitting down in her chair, she motioned for the Bajoran man to take a seat as well. "Tell me about your progress."
With a chuckle, Tran leaned back in his chair. "Everything is going as planned, Eminence. My time in the Bajoran underground has taught me well. The stations' computers are relatively easy to break into when compared to Cardassian security measures. Those scaly bastards were fanatical about protecting their systems. These Star Fleet types are too naive if they think that they have anything resembling a secure system."
The Kai took this in silently. She had her doubts about Tran's reliability, but her associate, Heb Krat has assured her it was worth the risk to smuggle the banished man onto Deep Space Nine.
After being kicked off the station, Tran had stirred up unrest down on the planet, protesting the fact that Cardassians were being given asylum by the Federation. The bitter man had pointed out how long the Federation had taken to come to Bajor's aid and how Star Fleet showed its true colors once they were offered something they wanted, like the information the Cardassian's had on the Dominion.
Tran has managed to convince quite a few, that the Federation was making a huge tactical error in helping out the so-called Hebitians. The Dominion has promised to leave Bajor out of the war with the Federation and the peace was being threatened by the fact the Dominion citizens were seeking assistance on a Bajoran space station.
Many had turned away from the man in disgust, seeing through his ranting to the fanatic behind the carefully cultivated patriotic mask. Others had agreed with him though, and brought him to the attention of Heb Krat, the chief aide to the Minister in charge of the Hebitian talks.
Heb had tried everything in his power to hamper the negotiations with the Hebitians. Being the aide to the Bajoran Minister negotiation the talks with the Hebitians was a perfect cover for the dissenter. While seeming to work toward the goal of assisting the Hebitians, Heb passed along the knowledge he gathered to help put an end to the farce.
When the Kai had voiced her disapproval of the talks, she was quickly approached to join the growing conspiracy. Heb had secretly contacted her to confer about what they could do to stop these discussions. They quickly came up with a plan on how to discredit the Hebitians on the station.
Some research into Tran's past had revealed that the man was a computer expert. There didn't seem to be a system that the man could not crack into.
Tran had eagerly agreed to help when he was approach by some of the Kai's sympathizers. It had been no problem to hide the man aboard the Kai's ship to bring him onto Deep Space Nine. The majority of the docking crews were Bajoran, and they didn't pay close attention to security since it was their religious leader's party that was docking. Tran was slipped off the ship with ease.
"What were you thinking when you attacked the Cardassian boy? You've brought us unwanted attention," The Kai said, more concerned with Tran's uncertain temper than the attack on the small boy. "Security has been increased and this will make it more difficult to achieve our goals."
With a sneer, Tran replied, "He's lucky he is still breathing. The little brat was where he didn't belong. Don't worry about it Eminence. I'm sure that most of the people on the station would love to see the Cardassian's pushed out an airlock."
"Be that as it may, you need to be more cautious," the Kai warned, not liking the man's instability. Tran could be a problem to them in the future if he continued to believe he was untouchable. She was going to have to talk to Heb about the problem and what they could do if they needed to get rid of the man.
"Now, about the next part of the plan. Are we ready to go ahead with it?"
Tran grinned ferally. "Everything is in place, Eminence. By the time I'm done, there won't be a Cardassian supporter left on the station."
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In the dim light, Larin sat on the edge of Marin's bed, gently stroking his son's soft hair. The young boy had quickly fallen asleep after being brought home for the infirmary after being check out by both Dr. Bashir and Mirell, the Hebitian's doctor, after suffering a concussion at the hand of an unknown assailant.
When Larin had laid the small boy down in his bed, he had asked his father to stay with him until he was sleeping.
Gazing down at his motionless son, Larin felt the fear and anger come flooding back. He stove to compose himself when Marin started to fidget as he picked up some of his father's turbulent emotions.
Taking some deep breaths, Larin shoved the feelings down again, not wanting to upset Marin any further today.
With one last caress, Larin stood up and moved over to the door. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw that Marin was still deep in sleep. Dimming the lights some more he closed the door, leaving it open a crack.
"How is he?" Marrett asked from the couch where he was sitting feeding Megwyn. Looking over at his haggard husband, he freed one hand and patted the cushion beside him on the couch.
Taking him up on his offer, Larin sat down close to his husband, leaning again his strong frame. Laying his head on his shoulder, the younger man watched as his daughter sucked on the teat of the bottle Marrett held.
"He fell asleep right away," Larin said with a sigh as he reached over and stroked his daughter's cheek. Megwyn smiled around the bottle's teat at her father's touch, before latching on to drink some more.
With a sad smile, Larin gently took the small baby from his husband's arm.
Marrett's arm encircled his shoulder, pulling the slighter man even closer to him. They sat in silence for a moment, watching their daughter feed.
"Nothing was supposed to happen to the children, Marrett," Larin said softly.
"I know, Larin, I know," was his husband equally soft reply.
"I feel like packing up, getting on the Daerle, and getting the hell out of here."
"We can, you know," Marrett said, looking down at his husband. "If you really wanted to, we could leave today."
Larin turned in Marrett's embrace to look up at him. "Part of me is screaming to get off the station," he said fiercely. "But we're too dependent on these damn talks to leave."
Levering himself off of the couch, Larin walked over to Megwyn's bassinet, placing the baby in it, along with her bottle and few soft toys to occupy her. He watched as she settled in, ignoring the bottle to pat one of her soft, plush vole stuffed animals with her small hands.
Seeing that his daughter was happily occupied he walked over to the room he shared with his husband. He quickly returned with his brush and moved over to sit beside his husband again.
Without a word, Marrett reached up to unwind his lover's long braid of hair. Taking the brush from the smaller man, Marrett started to brush out the soft black hair. This routine never failed to relax the younger man. Marrett smiled to himself when he felt Larin's muscles start to loosen.
His next words though proved that his mind was still brooding over the events of the past few days.
"Sometimes I think that I'm not making any progress here," Larin said pensively as he leaned into the brush strokes.
"How do you mean, love?"
"At the meeting today Minister Garrett told me that the offer to settle on Golana was under dispute. It seems that Governor Pelor is being pressured to change his mind."
Setting the brush down, Marrett clasped his hands together, resting his elbows on his knees. "No other offer has been put forth right?"
"Just the space station," Larin replied as he turned to face his husband again. He watched as the older man mulled the possibilities over in his sharp mind.
"Which isn't really an option?"
"Can you picture us all crammed into a decrepit space station?"
"No, and we shouldn't have to settle for it. We carry information that the Federation needs if they want to accomplish anything in the war against the Dominion in the Cardassian sector."
"I've pointed that out to them," Larin said.
"Yes, but we haven't started to withhold pertinent information yet."
Larin nodded in agreement. " So far I've been quite free with the information we have. I wanted to show the conference that we had something worthy to contribute."
"Which was a good idea, Larin, but its time to start keeping back some intelligence if we are not making any progress," the older man said as he straightened up on the couch. Throwing an arm around his lover, he pulled the younger man close.
"Think you can start being stubborn, Larin?" he said with a wide grin.
Smiling sweetly the younger man replied, "I think I might be able to pull of a convincing act, love."
Chuckling together, the two men leaned toward each other, sharing a slow kiss.
They parted reluctantly when the chimes to their door rang, asking for admittance.
"Come in," Larin said as he rose from the couch. He stepped over to Megwyn's bassinet to check on the happily playing baby as the door slid open.
Glancing over his shoulder his stomach fluttered nervously when saw Captain Sisko and the station's constable enter the room. The younger man didn't like the feelings emanating from the two figures.
Steeling himself for whatever news they brought, he moved back over to Marrett. "Captain, Odo, can I help you with anything?" he asked.
"Gul'en, Marrett," the Captain said with a nod at the two men. "A situation has arisen that I need to talk to you about."
Larin raised one eye ridge. "A situation? I don't like the sound of that."
Clearing his throat, Odo took over from the Captain. "Chief O'Brien came across an attempt to break into the station's computer systems today."
Larin tilted his head, curious, "That can't be a common occurrence on this station."
"It's not," Odo replied in his gruff monotone. "What brought us here, however, is the fact that old Cardassian codes that were used in the attempt."
Folding his arms over his chest, Larin's lips curved up into an ironic smile, "So of course you had to investigate the only Cardassians on board, see if we're involved. Let me guess, some kind of security files were breached."
Marrett stood up from the couch and moved over to his husband's side. Standing close to the younger man, he laid a supportive hand on his shoulder. "Are you here to ask for our help, Captain?" he said as he studied the two men.
Odo returned the Hebitian's steady gaze. "I was hoping you could take a look at the codes used and if you could let me know the whereabouts of your people during the incident."
Larin stiffened at his husband's side. "I trust my people implicitly, Constable. I can vouch for each and every one of them."
"I'm sure you can, Gul'en, but it's routine to ask for the whereabouts of any..."
"Suspects," Larin grounded out as he stepped closer to the two men, ignoring the tightening grip on his shoulder. "How dare you imply that any of my people had anything to do with this!"
Captain Sisko raised a hand to deflect Larin's accusations, "No one is accusing anyone at this point in time," he said, trying to calm the irate Hebitian.
"Not from my point of view, Captain. The two of you come here, asking for explanations and then say that you're not accusing anyone? What about the attack on my son! Tell me, what are you're doing about that," Larin yelled, his blue eyes crackling with anger.
Two simultaneous cries split the air in the tension filled room.
"Papa!!" came the frightened cry from the bedroom, echoed by Megwyn's distressed wail.
Larin froze, his face going pale as he listened to his children's cries. He shook off his paralysis when he saw Marrett pick their crying daughter out of her bassinet to comfort her. Whirling around the younger man rushed toward Marin's room.
He emerged from the room seconds later with a softly sobbing boy wrapped tightly around him, his tear stained face pressing into his father's neck.
"Captain," Larin said woodenly as he stroked his son's hair, "You'll have the location of all my people on your desk in the morning."
Captain Sisko nodded his head once, then motioned for the constable to proceed him out the door. "Thank you for your cooperation, Gu'len. It wasn't my attention to cause you any trouble tonight."
Larin hugged his son tighter, averting his eyes from the Star Fleet captain. "Well it happened though, didn't it. I thought that we had established a foundation of trust amongst us. Now I'm not that sure."
The tall man stiffened momentarily. "I like to think that we have, Gu'len. Let's not have this incident damage our relationship any further." With a final nod, he followed Odo out of the room.
Rocking his son back and forth, the Hebitian could not help but wonder if anything would go right again. Closing his eyes, he sent a prayer to the spirits that his father would have more luck with Garak that he was having with the negotiation talks.
To be Continued...
Liked it? Hated it? E-Mail comments to Kathy at [email protected]
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