ONE
Nigel Bane was thrown roughly against the hard bulkhead but he didn’t mind.
Mostly because the half-naked and beautiful Trill woman pressed her lips greedily against his not a second later and rubbed her body sensually against the young Australian.
They didn’t speak – words were really not required in this instance – and after the long passionate kiss the red-head steered Bane towards her bed, pushed him onto it and straddled him almost like a snake trying to squeeze the life out of another victim.
She had of course an entirely different motive and Nigel Bane never once fought her on it.
Some two hours later they both lay exhausted and entangled in the sheets. Nigel Bane watched with great admiration the mesmerizing leopard like spots trailing down the sides of Tazla Star’s soft feminine curves. Her fire red hair and piercing green eyes not only enhanced her beauty but also left little doubt to her strength and resolve.
He softly touched her lower right arm and she flinched noticeably and quickly drew it away.
“Sorry,” he whispered, surprised by the reaction.
“Don’t touch me there,” she said with sudden anger flaring in her voice.
Bane had no idea what had just happened.
And she took pity in his confused eyes. “I just don’t like to be touched there,” she tried to explain. “It’s a long story.”
He nodded slowly. He was sure it was. No one would have doubted that Commander – formerly Captain – Tazla Star did not have a number of long stories to tell. She kept them mostly to herself however and so Bane didn’t know exactly what bothered her about her right arm. It wasn’t as if she had made any complaints before when his hands had roamed her body in much more sensitive areas.
Nigel Bane didn’t know Tazla Star all that well and that was probably a good thing considering her reputation. He knew that she had been court marshaled, lost her rank and had spend some time in the Starfleet stockade. In fact he had seen first-hand the results of her betrayal to Starfleet.
His ship, the border cutter
Bluefin had been there when she had violated orders which subsequently had led to the near destruction of a Starfleet ship and the death of numerous crewmembers including his captains’ nephew.
To say it mildly she was not popular among his crew or all of Starfleet for that matter. He had heard a few conversations filled with outrage that she had been released from the stockade so early and assigned to the Border Service after she had probably been unsuccessful in securing another assignment in the regular fleet.
Tazla moved in closer to Bane and softly kissed him on the lips to make up for her earlier harshness. She stroked his blonde hair softly. “You know I like you, don’t you?” she said.
“I bet you say that to all the boys,” he replied with a grin.
She frowned. “I’m serious, Nigel. You are the only person I can look in the eye without seeing despise hidden there.”
“I’m sure it’s not that bad.”
She laughed sarcastically. “Your right, it’s worse. I’m Tazla Star, the traitor, the one who sold out Starfleet for her own personal gain and led to dozens of casualties in the process. If it was up to them they would have kept me rotting in that prison for the rest of my life. Thank the heavens for the Dominion, eh?”
At that Bane turned away. “You know I like you much better when you don’t talk like that.”
“I’m sorry,” she said and kissed him again. “It gets to you after a while.” She stood up and headed for the washroom. “I better get ready, I’ve got a busy day ahead of me.”
Nigel Bane looked upwards where a window allowed him a good view of the sandy-brown planet they were orbiting. He also caught a glimpse of a number of Starfleet freighters similar to the one he was on a the moment. He felt a sting of pride when he discovered the USS
Bluefin among the fleet.
“Things appear to be on the upswing for you,” he said as he watched the idle convoy. “After all they decided to place you in charge of this operation. That’s something, isn’t it? Or are you still bitter about having to join us unsophisticated Border Dogs.”
Bane heard her laugh from the washroom unit. This time it sounded a tad more joyful. “Trust me I take the Border Dogs over the stockade any day. But you greatly overestimate my role. I’m a glorified administrator and that’s all there’s to it. Just have a look at my schedule for the day and you’ll weep,” she said just before the gentle hum of the sonic shower replaced her voice.
“My shift starts in a few minutes,” replied Bane but reached for the padd next to the bed anyway. It didn’t contain Star’s schedule. Instead he found a detailed report on Tiaita, the planet they were orbiting.
He was about to leave it and search for the schedule when the first line grabbed his undivided attention.
The planet Tiaita has been deeply engulfed in the throes of civil war for decades.
This was complete news to Nigel Bane who admittedly did not know the full scope of their mission to this planet. What he did know was that Starfleet had recently signed a treaty with the Tiaitan after they had developed warp drive technology and joined the intergalactic community. He knew that the system was rich of resources and that Starfleet had dispatched the Border Service along with a small fleet of freighters in order to begin mining operations and construction on a starship yard in the system.
The admiral in charge of the undertaking was hoping to be able to use the system as a staging platform against the Dominion and the Cardassians whose territory was just a few short light-years away. Two powerful pulsars – nicknamed the Twin Pulsars – made long range sensors ineffective and in turn making the system a perfect hidden base for Starfleet’s languished war effort.
But nobody had mentioned a civil war. Bane was no idealist and he perfectly understood that the war with the Dominion which had raged on for over a year now with no end in sight would require many sacrifices by those who served in Starfleet, possibly by all the citizens of the Federation.
His interested piqued he read on, soon his face twisting into a frown.
According to the report the planet was decisively divided between a fundamentalist government and a rebel fraction which had turned against their religious masters and was being relentlessly persecuted for their refusal to adhere to the established religious believes.
The government had started a scheme of systematic cleansing, leaving a large portion of their society’s underclass starved or even worse, executed them if they refused to convert.
Bane had been so engulfed in the document he hardly noticed Star reappear from the washroom, now fully dressed.
“This can’t be right,” he mumbled.
Star simply watched on patiently as he read on.
When Bane was done he looked at her with a blank expression on his face. “Is this true? Are we helping these people fight their civil war?”
The Trill walked over to him and swiftly snatched the padd out of his hands. “You weren’t suppose to read that,” she said with a frown.
Bane jumped out of bed, feeling a sudden anger boiling within. “Never mind that,” he said. “I want to know if that’s true.”
She slowly turned to him. “We are here to honor our treaty with the Tiaitan and begin construction of mining facilities and a shipyard. You know that.”
“I’ve read the mission brief, Taz,” he shot back. “But there was no mention of any of that. If this report is correct we should never have signed a treaty with this people in the first place. My god, are we helping them to eradicate their own people?”
“Even if we were, what could we do about it?” Star asked. “This has all been decided way over our heads by desk pushers in San Francisco. We are expected to follow orders, that’s all.”
But Bane shook his head. “No, I can’t believe this.”
She placed the padd into a drawer and out of sight. “I think it be for the best if you pretend you never saw this,” she said. “Now, didn’t you say your shift is about to start?”
The Australian glanced at the chronometer and with a ping of panic realized he was already going to be late. Star smirked when she watched him pull on his clothes in a hurry, almost stumbling while pulling up his trousers.
“I want to find out more about this,” he said after he had zipped up. “I’m serious Taz, I don’t care about the orders I need to see this for myself. I can’t just sit quietly at my station knowing that I might be an accessory to genocide.”
Star thought for a moment, or at least looked as if she did. “I tell you what, I’m scheduled for another supply run to the surface at 23:00 hours. Why don’t you come with me and I can show you firsthand what we are dealing with.”
“I’ll be there,” he said resolutely.
“Good. Now you better get out of here, Lieutenant. I refuse to take responsibility for your tardiness.”
Bane nodded sharply, not catching the sarcasm in the Trill’s voice. His mind was too preoccupied. He rushed out of her quarters.
Star stood there a moment longer. She felt a sickness in her stomach which to her was the equivalent of her conscience acting up. Once again her symbiont was letting her know that it did not agree with the way she was leading her life. Or more precisely of the means she was employing to accomplish her agenda. It was by no means a new sensation.
But Star didn’t feel regret this time. At least not too much. Nigel Bane was a genuinely nice guy and she hadn’t lied when she had admitted she liked him a great deal. But she also needed him for reasons which weren’t quite so straight forward. She didn’t take pleasure in manipulating good people but this time perhaps it was worth it.
She stroked her lower right arm which even though impossible to tell was no longer hers. The faint sensation of the alien object served as a reminder of the mistakes she had made in the past. She couldn’t quite shake the feeling that this could very well end up as another one.
She recovered the box from under her bed, sat on the floor and self-administered the hypo spray. The drug quickly took effect and for the next hour or so her mind would not have to contemplate the questionable things that she still needed to do.
* * * *
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