Forwarded by the ASC-VSO Posted: Sat, 31 Jan 2004 07:06:14 GMT In: alt.startrek.creative From: Gabrielle Lawson inheildi@earthlink.net Title: Faith, Part III: Peace Author: Gabrielle Lawson (inheildi@earthlink.net) Series: DS9 Part: NEW 9/17 Rating: [PG-13] Codes: Chapter Fourteen Continued Rations were eaten on the way to roll call, and the walk, therefore was usually quiet. Also, the knowledge of what they'd witness again that morning kept the chatter to a minimum. Two Jem'Hadar, including the Third, met Bashir as he entered the roll call grounds and escorted him to the front where another prisoner stood with Deyos. "Commander?" Bormann whispered, and Jordan looked again. Yes, it was Riker underneath the bloody, striped uniform and mussed hair. When everyone was lined up, the counting began. Jordan concentrated on the sunrise, watching the hues of the sky change from dark blue to brilliant white. And he prayed and sang songs in his head. Two hours passed and he hardly noticed. The Jem'Hadar stopped buzzing around the prisoners, and he knew that counting was over. The lottery would begin. It was no surprise whose numbers would be called. They were chosen the night before. But Deyos did like to mix the order, keeping the condemned in suspense and on edge. In front of him, two people to the right, Jordan spotted one of them. His shoulders shook in little movements, and a trickle of urine made a puddle at his feet. Jordan looked away. The first three were called, and the man one row up and two over didn't move. *You have a few minutes yet,* Jordan thought to him. He had seen more of these lotteries than he could count, but he'd never been able to decide if it was better, once chosen, to die first and not suffer the waiting, or to have that one last hour of life, agonizing as it may be. The screams of the victims beat against him more than any Jem'Hadar fist had ever done. They wore on his spirit and nearly drowned his hope in despair. *I have Jesus*, he told himself. *I am and will be redeemed.* Over an over he repeated those two phrases and the last of the screams died out. A stifling silence seized the gathered prisoners, as if they were all afraid to breathe. Deyos's voice rang out against the morning sky, and none of the numbers he read were Jordan's. But at least one of them was familiar, and Jafhe moved foward. As he passed, Jordan heard him whisper, "The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want." Jordan add his own whisper. "He maketh me to lie down in green pastures." Another voice joined, soft and low. "He leadeth me beside the still waters." And it became a soft sea, a wave of whispers, carrying the Psalm as other believers joined in. "He restoreth my soul: He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for His name's sake." Jordan felt a chill slide up his legs into his spine, right up to the top of his head. Then a tide. The voices rose, loud and full of faith. "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for Thou art with me; Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: Thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over." Jafhe stopped in front of Deyos and finished the Psalm with just his own voice, unwavering and strong. "Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the LORD for ever." Deyos looked on with disinterest. "Why do you pray to a god you cannot see or hear?" he asked. "I feel Him," Jafhe replied. "I hear His voice. I feel His love, and I see Him in the eyes of my brothers and sisters." "You will feel the hook soon enough," Deyos replied. "No amount of chanting will change that." "It needn't change," Jafhe said. "There is life beyond the hook. A better life than you can even imagine." Deyos's face hardened. "To work!" he shouted, ending the confrontation, the roll call, and the day's lottery. Jordan only hoped he could be so strong when his own number was called. Jafhe knelt to lift one of the dead ones, and he joined the convoy that led away to the crematoria. Oddly, Riker stayed behind with Deyos, and only now did Jordan realize that the walls had been clean before the morning's lottery began. The siren woke her. That and the light. And the cold air streaming through the ventilation duct high on the wall. Formenos yawned and sat up, stretching her arms high above her head. Then she shook as a chill reached up her spine to the top of her head. Her clothes lay over a lone chair that sat next to a nearly bare white table. She quickly threw off the striped camp dress she'd used as a nightgown and put on the pants and jacket she'd been given by Pfenner. She heard a knock at her door as she splashed her face with water from a basin on the table. She grabbed the striped dress again to dry her face and keyed the door open. Dr. Pfenner stood on the other side. "Good morning, Eline," he said. "May I call you Eline? I wanted to invite you to breakfast." Formenos felt a twinge of self-consciousness. She touched her head, feeling the short bristles of her hair. Why had Pfenner singled her out anyway? Simmons would have understood the project better. But regardless of Pfenner's motives, she was hungry. "Thank you. And what shall I call you?" "Wilhelm is my given name," he answered, smiling. "If you're ready then, follow me." He led her just one door down, and when the door opened, she was even more suspicious. Where her room was infinitely better than the dirt-floored barracks, it was Spartan in comparison to this. She had a bed, the chair and table with its basin of water, and little else. "They think the bigger quarters and comforts will entice me to work on their project," Pfenner explained, blushing, and for a moment Formenos wondered if it had worked. Where her walls were stark white, Pfenner's walls were a comforting blue. They stood in the entry room which opened into a dining room, and she could see the table set with fruits and bread through the doorway. There were two other doors and Formenos guessed they led to a bedroom and a lavatory. His rooms also didn't seem to be as cold as hers. Compared to every other non-Dominion person in this camp, Pfenner lived in the lap of luxury. "This way, please," Pfenner said when she didn't respond. He put a hand on her back and gently encouraged her in the direction of the dining room. He even pulled a chair out for her and pushed it in when she had sat. "It's not exactly like home," he said, taking a slice of bread from one of the platters on the table, "but it's better than those pasty ration bars." Formenos chose a fruit that at least resembled an apple, though the orange color was a bit odd. It turned out to be much sweeter than an apple, too. "What is it?" she asked. "I'm really not sure," he replied. "They leave the platters here every morning. It's nothing from Earth or any of the other planets I'm familiar with. It might be indigenous to this moon, I suppose." "It's a moon?" Formenos forced her mind off the fruit. "Do you know where we are?" "The Quarron System." Pfenner chose an oblong blue fruit. "The third moon of the fourth planet, Quaray. Not far from the D'Nexi Lines, which has the Dominion on edge. They are getting impatient." "Let them," Formenos said, testing him. Pfenner put the fruit down and dropped his head. "I wish I could," he said. "I'd give up my life to keep this technology from the Dominion." He looked up again, and met her gaze. "But it's not my life the failures take." There was pain in his eyes and in his voice, and she knew he was sincere. "The pilots?" she asked. "There used to be so many of them," Pfenner said, snatching up the fruit again. "Now there's hardly a handful. Gone. Lost to oblivion. Either destroyed or left to starve to death in some other layer of subspace with no way to contact our layer or return." He shuddered. "I can't stop imagining it. Their cold, blank stare facing me from within their EV suit, unmoving and ghostly pale. Every day we deliver one or more of them to oblivion." The siren sounded again, but there was no blast of cold air. "Back to work," Pfenner said with a distinct lack of enthusiasm. As he stood, he pocketed a few pieces of fruit and bread. He didn't look to be starving, and they had received two meals the day before, so Formenos was unsure why he'd be stashing food away. Nevertheless, she followed his example,wrapped a napkin around a piece of bread and stuffed it into one of her pockets. They left Pfenner's quarters and took a turbolift to the lowest level of the habitat. They went down another corridor to a barred door, which Pfenner opened by keying in a code. Formenos had not seen this area before. When they'd returned to the habitat at the end of the day, they'd gone right to quarters. The next corridor was lined with cells. These had no furniture beyond a waste reclamator, and even their walls were transparent, so that the inhabitants could not expect any privacy. Pfenner walked in front of her, with his head down and his finger pointing to each cell on the left as if he were counting. The guant-faced prisoners in the cells moved forward as they passed, watching Pfenner hopefully. Many of the cells were empty, and Formenos now knew who the prisoners were. The pilots. They'd walked half the corridor when Pfenner stopped, and Formenos could now see a small gap in the security field near the floor of each cell. Pfenner stopped and passed the fruit to the three prisoners who occupied the cell on his right, and the bread to those on the left. The prisoners in those cells, squatted to snatch up the food, which they hungrily ate. Pfenner looked into the next cells down on either side. "Four for tomorrow," he whispered. Formenos only had one piece of bread, not enough for even one cell, so she didn't even take it from her pocket. Formenos looked up and saw that there was another level with yet more cells, and she wondered how many other blocks there were in the habitat. And how many were empty now. Pfenner turned and once again touched her back, guiding her back toward the door. "Wilhelm?" she said as they stepped into the turbolift again. "Yes?" he asked. "Stop the lift." He regarded her with confusion but did as she had requested. She touched his arm. "You have to let them go." Pfenner shook his head. "I don't understand." "The pilots," Formenos explained, looking deep into his eyes. "You have to let the pilots go. The Dominion can't have K-Layer Subspace Concealment. The project must never succeed." "What?" he whispered, trying to look away. She touched his face, bringing his eyes back to hers. "They will win the war, Wilhelm. Think for a moment. Imagine it. Do you want them to win, to dominate the Alpha Quadrant? And what do you think they will do to their enemies, who dared to stand in their way. How many will die, Wilhelm, if you succeed?" "I have thought of all that," he breathed, and he brought his hands up to grip her shoulders firmly. "I tried. I sabotaged the code in the navigational system. One of the ships--" He took a deep breath. "We could see it. Like a ghost image. But the sensors showed it had intersected with a chroniton wave. The ship kept appearing and dissappearing for days. I could see her, the pilot, burning, but the ship never blew up. Over and over it happened. The Vorta finally ordered that the base be turned forty-five degrees so it wouldn't be visible from the launch bay. That pilot is still out there somewhere. Mtingwa. That was her name." Formenos knew the name. She'd read the report. But when Doctor Bashir wrote the report, he didn't know what actually happened to her when she reverted back to the time of her ship's explosion. Formenos closed her eyes and hoped that Mtingwa wasn't conscious of the temporal loop she was stuck in. Pfenner released her and moved away. The turbolift began to move again. "I can't get that image out of my head," Pfenner admitted softly. "She haunts my dreams. I can't try that again. I can't keep sending them out there to die. Or worse. If the project succeeds, they will come back." "But what will they come back to?" Formenos asked. "You have to look beyond Mtingwa to what she was fighting for." "I can't," he breathed as the door opened onto the lab. They were all dead this time. And fairly fresh. Gore and filth and blood didn't smell good, but rotting flesh smelled infinitely worse. And part of Doctor JuIian Bashir was shocked that he could be so cynical. Each of the bodies he incinerated had been a person. A real, whole person. Somewhere they had families who missed them, families who would grieve their deaths if they ever recieved the news. They had hobbies and careers, dreams and personalities. And only his escape from Camp 371 kept him from being eligible for such a death as each of them had received. But he found himself wondering if these bodies weren't the lucky ones. Their deaths had been long and brutal, but in the end, the torture was over. They were gone. They felt no fear, no pain, no betrayal, and he wondered why, time and time again, fate had intervened to make sure his own life continued, even if he could no longer find anything to live for. *There is life beyond the hook,* that one prisoner had said, and Bashir wondered what he meant. He was aware that there were still some believers among the human population of the present, but that prisoner wasn't human and he hadn't been alone. Dozens of voices had joined him in his recitation. Did they really believe in the heaven of Judeo-Christian religion? Did he? He wasn't sure. He would have said he didn't believe in ghosts, but Riker had heard Vlád'a speak. And, with that acknowledgment, he realized none had come to him in this place. He saw images and people from the past, but none of them spoke to him, not like his hallucinations usually did. Well, either way, that one prisoner would find out if there was life after death this evening when he took his turn at the hook. The Jem'Hadar kapos didn't care about philosophical ruminations, so he worked as he pondered that morning's lottery, carrying the victims to the table and dumping them into the crematorium. Each body seemed heavier than the one before, and, by the tenth, his arms were shaking from the strain. He told himself that next time he'd save the women for last. They generally weighed less. He opened the crematorium door, dumped the ashes, and went to get the next body. By the last, he could no longer lift it, even though it was thin and frail. He hooked his arms under the man's shouders and dragged him into the small room. He practically had to climb onto the table himself in order to get the corpse up there. A thought danced in his head for a moment. He could roll himself into the incinerator. But of course, he'd have no way to lift the table to seal it. He got down and lifted the table, sealing the corpse inside the incinerator. In thirty seconds that man who had a family and dreams and hope was reduced to ash, and Bashir was allowed, in small ways, to be a doctor again. Commander William Thomas Riker was finding himself jealous of Doctor Bashir's insomnia. He hadn't slept a wink all night and he felt it. Bashir, on the other hand, he was sure, had not so much as closed his eyes all night, but his only apparent symptoms were mental. Physically, Bashir looked no different than the day he left *Enterprise*. Riker's body was bruised and sore from the beatings he received during the night. He hadn't eaten since the runabout, so he was very hungry. But his bout with elements the day before and all night long, made him feel clammy and feverish. And his present assignment was pushing his stomach right over the edge. He'd dry heaved at least a dozen times. After the heinous "lottery" Bashir was sent to deal with the bodies, and Riker was, once again, left to clean up what they left behind. Only now the blood was fresh and he'd been on hand to watch the victims die. Of course, he'd already seen it with V'dara, so the surprise was gone. But that didn't lessen the horror of watching it happen over and over again. After the last, fifteen new numbers were called, and Riker watched each face as they came forward. Some were pale and shocked, realizing only then that this would be their last day of life. Some faced the Vorta with stoic defiance. Two cried openly. And one came forward reciting a psalm and his expression was peaceful. It was almost enough to calm Riker's roiling stomach. But then they had left with Bashir, and Deyos ordered him to clean the building. All of it. The wall was left in its raised position, open to the roll call plaza. Because of that, Riker could find little shade, and the burning sunlight cooked the blood and debris onto the walls and floor. He'd gone through three buckets of soapy water already, and his hands were stained red from wringing out the brush and mop. Sweat damped his striped uniform and dripped into his eyes. He was allowed a short break when the temperature was at its highest. He was given two ration bars that tasted like clay. He hadn't eaten since well before their capture, but the stench of the building and the filth on his hands kept him from eating more than a bite. He was hungry but he didn't feel his stomach could handle it. What he really wanted was a drink of water. The only water available, however, was that in his bucket, and even when it was fresh, it was soapy. As he scrubbed he thought of the *Enterprise* and Deanna. And he thought of his crew. None of them had come forward in the lottery at least. Simmons worried him, as did Formenos. He knew nothing of her fate since they had been separated. In fact, the only one of his crew he'd seen since that first morning was Bashir, who wasn't even officially part of his crew. He tried thinking about Pfenner and the mission, but he also hadn't slept in more than a day. His mind swam from one thought to the next, from rational to irrational. He dreamed even while he worked, eyes open and body moving. But always his mind came back around to the nightmare of having a hook buried in his back. Formenos found that her new status as a willing scientist gave her an added benefit beyond the retention of her tongue: freedom of movement. It wasn't complete freedom. There were still Jem'Hadar keeping watch, but they didn't try to stop her from leaving one room to get to another. Apparently being a scientist on the K-Layer project carried a high status. Pfenner knew she wasn't really a scientist, and he didn't assign her any tasks beyond what she might have learned in her flight training. Nominally, she was put in charge of ship design. In reality, she made very few suggesions to the present design. It seemed that Pfenner had taken an interest in her even before they'd met. Once, when they were alone in the lab, she had asked him how he knew her name and he showed her. He went to a computer terminal and logged in. Once he was in the system, he showed her how he'd hacked into more restricted areas, including the Dominion's list of prisoners of war. Formenos watched him very carefully, memorizing everything and asking questions anywhere she was confused. In the end he showed her her own file and she wasn't surprised to see a list of degrees she had never earned. Pfenner had not only viewed her records, he had changed them. And that had given her an idea. Pfenner left to relieve himself and Formenos followed his actions to hack into the system. Besides prisoner records, Pfenner had access to nearly everything in the plant: power relays, ventilation systems, matter resequencers, transporter controls, scrap inventory, etc. She thought about simply deleting every record about the K-Layer project, but decided there were probably backups on the orbital base. She could change the code in some small way to ensure continued failure, but she didn't want a result like Mtingwa's purgatory. She needed something that would stop the experiments altogether. She needed to destroy the plant, its computers and the orbital base. It was a tall order and she wasn't sure how to fill it. She heard footsteps and quickly logged out. Pfenner returned and, as she pretended to work, she pondered the problem. She had freedom of movement, but she couldn't just stroll through the plant setting explosives here and there. "Would you do me the honor," Pfenner asked, coming up behind her, "of joining me for dinner?" Was it that time already? Her stomach rumbled in answer. In spite of what he was doing, she liked Pfenner. Still, the war--the Federation--mattered more. She turned and looked him right in the eyes. "I have a friend here. I want to talk to him." Pfenner's eyes dropped, but he didn't seem angry or jealous. "He can't talk to you, Eline. They took his tongue." "I know," she said, "but they didn't take mine." She smiled. "Thanks to you." Pfenner took in a big breath. "Twenty minutes. And be discreet. They may trust me to a certain extent, but they are only taking you on my word." Formenos nodded. "He's a crewmate. I just want to check on him, ask if he's seen Commander Riker or the others." Pfenner nodded. "Hurry back." Formenos didn't wait for a second invitation. She moved past him and out the door. She found Simmons where she'd seen him before, and, though the Jem'Hadar watched her closely, they did not stop her from approaching him. He looked up with wide, questioning eyes. "Are you alright?" she asked, not bothering to raise her voice. "I mean besides. . . ." She touched her throat. Simmons shrugged, but offered her a slight smile. His eyes brightened when she took his hand and he felt the bread between their palms. "You go back to the camp in the evenings?" she asked, careful to stick to 'yes or no' questions. He nodded his reply. "Then you've seen the commander?" He shook his head and then nodded and ended with a shrug. He put one finger to his eye and nodded then touched his mouth while shaking his head. Formenos guessed what that might mean. "You've only seen him, not talked with him? So he's not in the same barracks." Simmons shrugged again. "What about the others?" Simmons nodded and Formenos sighed. Maybe she could get some help. Four minds were better than one. She couldn't count Riker if he had no interaction with Simmons, and she wasn't at all sure of Bashir's mind. She leaned against the ship Simmons was working on, putting it and her back to the Jem'Hadar. "The target is here," she whispered. "You saw him yesterday. This is where the project is. We need to stop it. I have access to the computer. You have access to the others. I need to know how to destroy the plant and the orbital platform where they launch." Simmons had realized she was revealing a confidence and ducked back to work as he listened. He gave the shortest of nods to show he understood. "I'll see you tomorrow," she said, speaking up again so the Jem'Hadar could hear. She touched his shoulder lightly and then left him to his work. Jafhe went in silence. He did not scream or protest. His serene expression never left his face. Jordan considered himself a man of faith, but he couldn't fathom how Jafhe had pulled that off with a hook in his back. Despite the usual horror of the lottery, the surviving prisoners might have gone back to their barracks with some hope because of Jafhe's manner of passing. But Jafhe's death was overshadowed and they left with dread instead. Unfortunately, Jordan had found himself in the front line of the evening's lottery and so he'd had a perfect vantage point for up-close viewing. Except for the triggering incident. One man farther back decided he didn't want to die in the morning. As illogical as it was, he tried to run. Not that he had anywhere to run to. The camp was vast and the fences electrified. No one had yet escaped and it was very unlikely a single prisoner, with nothing but the clothes on his back would do any better. Of course, he was caught. Just in case it wasn't bad enough that the punishment for resistance was a week without rations for the entire camp, Deyos gave them a choice. Actually, he gave the choice to Bashir, who stood alone now that Riker had been put with the rest of the camp. One week without rations for the entire camp, or the man would be stoned to death. "A historical form of capital punishment from your Earth, I believe," Deyos had said. "One stone for each man and woman in this camp, and if even one person doesn't throw it, you will forfeit our agreement. Which shall it be, Doctor?" And so once again, Bashir had to choose to kill someone. If a man could die and yet keep breathing, Deyos had accomplished it with Bashir. To make matters worse, the Jem'Hadar brought the whimpering escapee to stand in front of him so that Bashir could get a good look. He pleaded, and Bashir froze. From back in the gathered camp, the chant began, "Stone, stone, stone." Jordan understood that, and he chanted along, because he knew Bashir didn't understand. He'd need the help. One man for two hundred. Julian Bashir stood in front of the quivering prisoner. Tears ran down the man's face; he'd lost control of his bladder in his fear. "Please," he begged. "I'm sorry. I'll go." Deyos raised a hand to dismiss him and stepped between them. "The choice is no longer yours. That privilege is for our reknowned Doctor Bashir. One week without rations, or stoning. Yours will, of course, be the first stone." *Noch nicht,* Bashir heard, once again seeing Scharfuhrer Heiler before him. "*Und du nicht.*" "Stone, stone, stone," the crowd droned. A week without rations. Bashir looked at their faces: gaunt, pale, starving. They'd starve. "Oh, it's not that easy, Herr Engländer." Heiler had a gun and she turned it from his temple to face the crowd. "I will shoot one of them." "Choose," ordered Heiler. Or was it Deyos. "How many will die in one week, do you think?" She pulled the trigger and Piotr collapsed to the ground. Bashir collapsed, too, and fell to his knees. "Stone," he breathed. "I'm sorry," Heiler said, above him. "I didn't hear you." Another shot rang out and another man fell. "Stone!" Bashir choked out. "Stone him." -- --Gabrielle I'd much rather be writing! http://www.stormpages.com/gabrielle/trek/ The Edge of the Frontier http://www.stormpages.com/gabrielle/doyle/ This Side of the Nether Blog: http://www.gabriellewrites.blogspot.com -- Stephen Ratliff ASC Stories Only Forwarding In the Pattern Buffer at: http//trekiverse.crosswinds.net/feed/ Yahoo! Groups Links To visit your group on the web, go to:http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ASCL/ To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:ASCL-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service. From ???@??? 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