Forwarded by the ASC-VSO 
Posted: 03 Mar 2004 06:58:02 GMT  
In: alt.startrek.creative 
From: sisko2374@aol.com (Sisko2374) 
 
Title: Lies
Author: Sisko2374
Series: DS9
Rating: PG

REP DS9  ""Lies" [PG]

by Sisko2374@aol.com

Summary: A Cardassian soldier who returns home from the occupation of Bajor
"The first casualty of war is truth." — Samuel Johnson

"Feron! Welcome home!"

His face twitched when Marisiya kissed him on his left cheek, the same place
where the phaser burns had left him a half grinning skull before the doctors
had replaced his hanging charred flesh with a bio-plasticine implant. Sometimes
it still felt as if his face wasn't really there at all.  He hugged his best
friend's sister, all the while feeling a certain desperation in her return of
his embrace, as if she was really  welcoming her dead brother home from the
war.

"Thank you, its so good to be back."

A shrunken, decrepit, old grey riding hound skulked around the corner of the
door and began licking his boots. Marisiya laughed, tears beginning to roll
down her cheeks.

"Oh, look, Caldo still remembers you after all these years!"

He reached down and gently petted the old hound. 

Marisiya crossed her arms and shook her head.  "Hirik and that hound were
inseparable, even after he long outgrew him. Remember the morning you two left
for the induction center? You were both up all night, drunk on kanar, and as
you staggered toward the door Caldo tripped you both and sent you sprawling!" 

Feron nodded, grinning at the memory.

Her voice faltered. "It was almost as though he was trying to tell you  ..."

"Feron!" Professor Crinik's voice boomed as he strode quickly out of the
kitchen, his hand outstretched. "Welcome home my boy! Welcome home!"

Feron firmly grasped the pudgy old scholar's hand. "Thank you sir! You haven't
changed a bit."

Crinik slapped him on the back. "Still the flatterer! Have you eaten? I've
prepared a first class dinner. Arctorian eel worms sauteed in Spring wine with
just a hint of yamuk sauce."

Feron briefly glanced at Marisiya. "You always were the gourmet. I remember
eating meals here so rich  that I thought I'd turn into butter."
A slight tone of condescension crept into Marisiya's voice.  "Yes, and now that
father is teaching  history at the Central Command's Military Academy, we're
just swimming in off world foods and spirits. Every night is a feast fit for
Guls!"

Crinik grinned nervously. "And now that Marisiya's working an office job for
the Obsidian Order, she has to take careful note of what subversions we're
digesting. Goes in the report every night."

There was a long uncomfortable silence.

Feron broke it. "Well, everyone knows what I've been eating....nutritious and
satisfying army rations.  Now, how about some of those eels professor? Extra
yamuk sauce for me!"

Crinik laughed. "You certainly haven't changed! Still drowning everything in
yamuk sauce!"

Marisiya followed them into the dining room, a wisp of a  smile upon her face.



"Would you like a little more eel with your yamuk sauce my boy?"

Feron shook his head, his hands holding his stomach.  "No, really, I'm full.
But the eels were delicious."

The professor harrumphed. "Liar! You couldn't even taste them." He reached for
the carafe and refilled Feron's glass.  Feron drained it in one long, slow
swallow.  Crinik cocked one eye ridge and poured for his guest once more.

"A man who drinks most of my Spring wine should have his tongue good and loose
by now, but you've been as silent as a razor cat.  Speak up, its been a long
time. Don't be afraid, you're among friends here." The professor overtly
glanced at his daughter.

Feron held his wine glass up to the light. Shimmering bubbles in a pink
luminescent sea.  "Sorry, I guess I'm just not used to being among ...
friends...or family."

Marisiya leaned forward, elbows on the table.  "Have you seen your sister since
you've been back? What is she doing these days?  How is she? We lost track of
her after you left."

"Elitza? Oh, she's done quite well for herself. Got married two years ago, to a
rich man."

Marisiya's face lit up. "Really! What does he do? What sort of man is he?"

Feron smirked. The wine was having some effect. He was almost comfortable with
himself.  "He's a pleasant enough fellow.  Lives on a big estate in a mountain
valley of the Tanata range.  As to what he does, he's an import-export
industrialist."
She frowned in puzzlement.  "I never heard of that before. What sort of
profession is that?"	

Feron put down his glass and folded his hands across his stomach.  "He buys the
refined ore that the government produces with Bajoran labor on Terok Nor, which
is transported to him in his own ships leased by the government. He then
manufactures weapons with that ore which he sells back to the government which
exports the weapons back to the Cardassian army on Bajor, again in his ships,
so that they can hunt down more Bajorans to replace the ones that died working
in the ore processing center that exports ore to him, which he then turns into
weapons, and so on and so forth. Beautiful system really."

Crinik smiled wryly.  Marisiya stiffened. "Well ... I think that your sister
ought to be very proud of her husband.  He sounds like a patriot."

"Oh, he is!" Feron declaimed, raising his glass in a toast. "And she is! And so
am I!  And so are you! So are we all! Here's to patriots ... everywhere."

"To patriots!" Three glasses clinked together.

Setting his empty glass upon the table, Feron turned toward Crinik, his voice
beginning to slur from the wine.  "So what are you teaching at the Academy
these days? Anything interesting?"

"History of the First Cardassian Republic.  Mostly to the sleepy eyed sons of
Guls in the morning."

"Really! First Republic." Feron reached for the carafe. "Sounds radical."

"Oh, its not as bad as it sounds," Marisiya interjected. "The course is
restricted to purely military history. They keep him on a pretty short leash
over there."

Feron watched the old man's face turn from a healthy ashen grey to nearly the
same pink shade as the Spring wine.

"No, its not as bad as it sounds Marisiya. Its allowed me to maintain our
family comfortably since your mother died and ..."

She cut him off. "Oh, come on father! You're not ‘maintaining' anyone. I have
my own job. If anything, I'm taking care of you."  She turned to Feron. "He
likes to think of himself as some sort of secret dissident.  But the worst he
can manage is to bait me about the Obsidian Order."

Despite her cruel berating of  her father, Feron found Marisiya attractive when
she was spiteful. He wished some of that spite was directed at him, possibly
signaling the beginning of a courtship. Perhaps it was time to test the waters.


"The Obsidian Order.  You know, Marisiya, women in the Obsidian Order have
always entertained a certain fascination for me. Perhaps it's the pretentious
airs and their sadistic attitudes that I find so alluring. You didn't used to
be that way when we were growing up. Pity. Just what is it that you do for them
anyway?"
		
"Its classified." she intoned icily. Feron's heart skipped a beat. Was that
genuine hostility or just  being flippant on her part?

"Oh yes, its very secretive and vital what she does," her father interjected,
seizing the opportunity to counter-attack.  "She files molars."

Feron's face lit up.  "The Obsidian tooth fairy!" 

She lifted her nose almost level with her eyes, her lovely long neck ridges
fully extended, staring directly at Feron .  "If there was no one to record
molar and DNA identities, order would be impossible to maintain. People like
you would run amok."

Feron felt a flush of sexual excitement.  She was sparring directly with him! 
With just a hint of submissiveness in her mild reply.  He was about to say
something when her father brought an abrupt end to their flirtation.

"You two lovebirds should go out and rent a room for the night. Leave the old
man alone with the rest of the food. I can make better conversation talking to
myself. " He turned to Feron. "So tell me my boy, what's the situation on Bajor
like these days? How goes our glorious liberation, annexation and occupation?"

Feron looked down, not hiding his disappointment at the interruption of
Marisiya's flirtation.

"Well, the kill ratio is really quite good. About forty Bajorans die for every
Cardassian killed. But there's still quite a bit of the planet left that we
haven't strip mined yet, although I expect we'll be able to clean them out in
the next few decades or so.  And since we've managed to evict most of the
Bajoran farmers off their land and turn agricultural production over to export
to Cardassia rather than local subsistence, huge segments of the population now
constantly live on the brink of famine, with millions of children growing up
malnourished and deformed.  Those Bajorans that manage to escape the famine in
the countryside and make it to the cities either are conscripted into the mines
or the army brothels.  But the terrorist  resistance is weakening. Its only a
matter of time before they come to truly love and accept us."  Feron refilled
his glass and quickly downed it.

There was a long silence.  Finally, Crinik spoke, his voice dripping with
sarcasm.  "Splendid! Splendid! I'm so glad to see that Central Command is
winning Bajoran hearts and minds for Cardassia. ... At least my son didn't die
in vain."

Marisiya rose from the table, lashing out. "No, he didn't die in vain father!
Hirik was a hero. He saved his entire squad, including Feron, from a Bajoran
terrorist sniper. He sacrificed his life for others. That's what sort of man my
brother was.  That's why Central Command posthumously awarded him the Medal of
Gallantry." She walked to the little shrine on the wall behind her where her
brother's portrait and medal were hung. "Ask Feron. He was there. He knows what
happened that day." Tears were beginning to form in her eyes. She looked at
Feron. "Tell us how it happened. Tell us how Hirik died a hero."

Feron looked down and shrugged.  "He just died. That's all. He just died. He
was no hero. I'm sorry."

Marisiya stood beside her brother's portrait, trembling in disbelief and anger.
The old man's eyes narrowed. Softly he asked, "What do you mean, my boy? Tell
me how my son died."

Feron sighed and leaned back in his chair, staring at the picture of his
childhood friend on the wall. "We were on patrol in this little village,
Enamin, I think the name was.  We'd passed through there three days before
without incident. There was no sign of any Bajoran resistance activity.  But
when we got to the center of town, a sniper killed our NCO. Took his head right
off with a single shot."

Crinik nodded. "Yes, Gul Maro mentioned this in his letter."

"I threw myself up against a wall and tried to get off a shot where I thought
the sniper was but the sniper hit my body armor when I popped around the
corner.  Command of the squad had fallen to Hirik and I told him that I thought
the sniper was in this warehouse. No one could be sure because all of our
weapons detectors were scrambled. He ordered a phaser grenade attack and we
destroyed the warehouse, including about a dozen Bajoran workers inside."

Crinik closed his eyes and whispered, "We didn't know this."

"We ran across the street to investigate. I told Hirik that I didn't think we
got the sniper. There were too many bodies.  Bajoran snipers like to work
alone. We argued over who was responsible for the destruction of the warehouse.
The prefect had a policy of minimizing civilian casualties so as to avoid
fueling the Bajoran resistance, you see. While we were standing up arguing, the
sniper shot Hirik.  He was killed instantly.  We all dove for cover and waited.
The sniper wounded one more man in the squad, then broke cover. That's when I
killed the sniper and ended it."

"Liar!" Marisiya shouted. "We have Gul Maro's letter right here and it clearly
says Hirik was killed in a simultaneous exchange of fire that killed both the
sniper and himself but saved the squad."

The old man opened his eyes, looking directly at Feron. "Why didn't you tell
this to Gul Maro?"

Feron slumped forward. "I did, most of it, but not the part about me killing
the sniper. I said Hirik did it."

"But why?" the old man pleaded. "You should have had the medal, not Hirik."


"I didn't want it. When I went to check out the sniper's body...."  Feron began
to shake, his voice breaking, coughing repeatedly.  "The sniper was a thirteen
year old Bajoran orphan girl.  To me, she looked just like my little sister. 
Her name was Rajalya."

Feron turned his head, staring out the window.  Outside it was twilight, a
light rain beginning to fall. Rivulets of water ran down the glass.  He
shuddered. His head throbbing with the beating of his heart.  His voice sounded
small, hollow and  remote, as if he was speaking from a grave.

"Three days before, when we had passed through the village, I gave her my food
rations.  She was starving. No one else was feeding her, not even the
Bajorans.... and then ... on the day she killed Hirik and the commander ... I
killed her." 

Somewhere beyond the city, thunder rolled across the sky.

Professor Crinik's voice whispered, "I'm sorry, my boy... I'm so sorry."

Marisiya just stood there, trembling with indignation.  "I don't believe it,
it's a lie.  Maybe you could kill a child but not Hirik."

Something exploded deep inside Feron.  Rage surged to the surface, devouring
his sorrow, curling his lips into a snarl.

"Really?  How well do you think you knew your own brother, Marisiya?  What if I
told you that one day, when we were on patrol, we saw a Bajoran farmer tending
his field.  And do you know what Hirik said?  ‘There's a terrorist.' Then he
turned his phaser on the man and incinerated him, for no reason at all.  That's
the kind of man your brother was.  That's the kind of man that the central
command turned hin into... a .killer and a sadist ... and not only him."

"Liar! Get out! Get out!" Marisiya screamed.  Her wine glass sailed across the
table, cutting a gash in Feron's left eye ridge, blood and wine washing over
him and the floor. 

"Marisiya!" Professor Crinik shouted.  He rose quickly, dipping a clean napkin
in ice water and holding it against Feron's wound.  "My dear boy! Are you all
right, can you see?"  Crinik tried to examine Feron's eye, but Feron pushed hin
away,  nodding in mute acknowledgment that he was not seriously injured.  The
professor glared at his daughter then whispered,  "You better get that attended
to.  Perhaps you should leave now."  

Taking the napkin from the professor's hand Feron daubed blood  and wine from
his face as he rose from the table.  "I suppose its true what that great
Cardassian philosopher Volpik once said: ‘The truth is too dangerous, it
should be outlawed for our mutual protection and peace of mind'."

Crinik glared at Marisiya then turned to Feron.  "I'll see you out."

Outside the door the old man embraced Feron.

"My boy, I'm glad it was you who came back, not Hirik," the professor whispered
in Feron's ear.  Then, sobbing inconsolably, the old man slunk back inside, the
door sliding behind him with a quiet finality. 

For a long time, Feron stared at the flat surface of the door.  His own son? 
The professor was glad that Feron, not Hirik, had returned from the war? Did
that mean that he was glad that Hirik was dead? His own son?

Feron shook his head and walked slowly down the hallway, his mind reeling from
the wine and the confrontation with Marisiya.  The evening was not exactly a
success.  A reunion with what had been the closest thing he had to a family was
over.  Maybe for good.  He took the lift at the end of the apartment complex
down to street level and walked outside.  It was still raining.  A light, warm
spring rain that left the streets glistening with reflections in the night.

A couple passed him, giggling, the woman sheltering under the man's coat.  He
let his gaze follow them till the man turned back and stared resentfully.  Then
Feron turned and walked the other way. If things had been different, if there
had been no war and occupation of Bajor, perhaps that would be him and Marisiya
walking home in the rain right now.  When he and Hirik were ungainly
adolescents, Hirik had teased Feron about his crush on Marisiya.  Feron had
shot back that Hirik would wind up marrying Elitza when she grew up.  But now
Hirik was dead, Marisiya was working for the Obsidian Order and his sister
Elitza was married to a war profiteer.

Marisiya would probably never speak to him again.  It didn't matter.  Since
he'd come back from Bajor he wasn't really attracted to Cardassian women
anymore.  He'd heard of other soldiers who had been on Bajor who could no
longer have relations with Cardassian women.  They reenlisted  for seven year
tours of duty back on Bajor, just for the Bajoran women.

On occasions Feron had taken some comfort in the darkened side streets of the
Bajoran capitol.  There, one could find thousands of Bajoran women supporting
themselves and their families by selling their bodies to the Cardassian
occupiers.  He had been surprised at first to find that many of them had once
been artists, doctors, lawyers, teachers, even scientists before the
occupation.  Now they were reduced to the most abject form of servitude.  It
was then that it gradually dawned upon him that despite its caste system, the
old Bajoran society had possessed certain progressive features and that the
Cardassian occupation was slowly but surely destroying Bajoran society and 
civilization itself. 

The clearest expressions of that were the Cardassian army brothels stocked by
female refugees from the countryside who were rounded up and conscripted to
serve Cardassia.  It was a slow death sentence from abuse and neglect.  The
luckier ones, the prettiest women and girls, went to the officers as "comfort
women".

He shuddered.  At least he had never been reduced to patronizing the army
brothels, although he knew men who did so on a regular basis.  But every so
often the army would round up the independent prostitutes and force them too
into the brothels.  Bajoran women he had met on the streets had probably died
there. 

Nausea began to overwhelm him.  Bajoran women were so exotic, so beautiful. 
But he could never have a real relationship with a Bajoran woman.  The war and
occupation made that impossible.  Bajorans could only be slaves ... or
terrorists.  He thought of the Bajoran girl sniper.  "Well, at least you died a
clean death."

The eels and the wine came up, he fell to the sidewalk, retching violently.  A
well dressed Cardassian veered around him.  "Drunken bum!"

Feron stopped puking and shot back a terse reply.  "I was in the 51st Long
Range Recon Battalion on Bajor for seven years! Where were you?"

Startled, the man turned and walked back, apologizing profusely, helping Feron
up, telling him that he would never have said that if he'd only known that
Feron was a veteran.  He said that the brave Cardassian soldiers on Bajor made
him proud to be a Cardassian.

"Really?" Feron inquired.  "What if I told you that I was never on Bajor? That
I'm just another drunken bum?"

The man looked for a long time into Feron's sneering face, then released
Feron's arm, letting him fall to the pavement.  Feron's echoing laughter
followed the man as he stalked off down the street.  "Wait!" Feron called. 
"Come back!  I'm not a bum, I'm a Bajoran!  I'm a Bajoran terrorist! Does that
make you proud to be a Cardassian?" 

He laughed for a long time, sitting on his haunches, leaning against a wall. 
Looking up into the night sky he searched the heavens for the constellation of
"the Flame".  Yes, there it was.  And right at the tip of the flame was Bajor's
sun, B'havel.  So near, yet so far.  If he had a big enough telescope to catch
the light from Bajor he could look back in time seven years and see himself on
patrol with Hirik.  But he didn't need a telescope to see himself back on
Bajor.  All he had to do was close his eyes every night.  The same dream over
and over again that awoke him suddenly in a cold sweat in the middle of the
night.  Sleep was the only thing he feared these days.  

He had heard that Federation Starfleet personnel who had been in combat were
offered something called "therapy" to help them adjust to civilian life
afterwards.  Yes, "therapy" was just what he needed.  He fantasized about
"therapy" more and more these days.  A dozen grenades, a Mark IV phaser rifle
and a way into Central Command.  That would let him sleep at night.  But even
if it were possible to get into Central Command, he'd never survive.  At least
the dreams would stop though.  Then, maybe, just maybe, all those dead Bajorans
in his head would go away.

But what if they didn't?  What if the Bajorans were right about their Prophets
and an existence after death?  Then he would spend eternity with all the
Bajorans he had killed.  No, he couldn't rationally accept that.  If the
Bajoran's Prophets existed, they were no friends of Bajor, to let Cardassia
commit genocide and rape their planet. 

Yet belief in their Prophets helped the Bajorans cope with the horrors of the
occupation.  More than that, it helped them kill Cardassians.  Sometimes 
Bajorans threw their lives away with such wild abandon.


"Go on, Bajorans, believe in your Prophets if it helps you to kill us.  And you
must kill us, if you want to be free, if you want to live.  Kill us all!  Kill
all Cardassians!"

He was startled to find his voice echoing down the street.  Few people were
about, but maybe the monitors had heard him, the omnipresent audio/visual
recording devices on every street corner monitored by the Obsidian Order.  He
shrugged, got up and started staggering home once more.  It didn't matter. 
What could they do?  Put him on a list of subversives?  Put him on public
trial?  In jail?  Torture him?  Send him back to the Army?  That thought sent
him on a fit of laughter so intense it disturbed his full bladder..

He stumbled over to an alley, relieving himself against the wall among the
shadows.

When he was almost through, a  voice from behind called out, "Enough of that,
stay where you are!"

Two Cardassian policemen, clubs ready, approached him from the street.  Closing
his trousers, he turned to face them. Lights flashed in his eyes as the cops
ran a standard retinal scan I.D.  The taller cop on the left snorted
derisively.

"Central says he's a veteran, just back from Bajor. No record."

The cop on the right laid his club gently but firmly across Feron's right neck
ridge.  "All right soldier, we're letting you go ... this time, because you're
a veteran.  But remember, public intoxication and  urination is a serious
offense.  Next time we won't be so lenient.  Now get along home."

Feron nodded, murmuring his thanks.  The two cops watched him stagger down the
street, then turned and walked the other way.  Public intoxication and
urination?  Serious offense?  As serious as killing people?  Nobody was
arresting him for that.  After all, the victims were only Bajorans and it was
sanctioned by the Cardassian state.  That made it not only not a crime, but a
glorious duty. 

That was Cardassian justice for you, putting you on trial, making an example
out of you for public intoxication and urination while rewarding you for mass
murder ... of Bajorans.   It made you proud to be a Cardassian.

He was nearing home now.  The streets were darker, more  littered, the
buildings shabbier.  A subtle fragrance of slightly aged garbage filled the
damp air.  He glanced up at the second moon in its last quarter.

Justice.  If there were any justice in the universe a fleet of Bajoran battle
cruisers would be filling the sky above Cardassia right now, reigning death and
destruction on every city, every happily contented man, woman and child.  But
there was no justice.  The universe was only a void populated by atoms and gas
clouds.   Some of the atoms bonded together, became intelligent and used other
bunches of atoms, inflicting pain and suffering.  That was all.  No gods, no
justice.  Just pain.  No ships would appear in the sky to annihilate Cardassia,
to cleanse the galaxy of this parasitical pox.  Not in his time.

He slammed his palm against the door to his building. Nothing.  He slammed it
again.  Damn cheap landlord wouldn't fix the recognizer. After several more
poundings the door parted for him. Weaving up the stairs, his apartment door
whooshed aside for him.

He collapsed on the bed, wishing he were dead.  Was he the only Cardassian who
had a death wish?  No, Professor Crinik had it too.  He could see it in his
eyes.  Despite the good professor's personal comfort and standard of living,
Crinik was not proud to be a Cardassian either.  Just the opposite.  Because of
his intellect and his position, like Feron, he knew too much.  Too much about
how Cardassians were maintained in their "luxury".  Cardassian "happiness" was
a product of the pain and suffering they inflicted on countless other species
of the galaxy through rapine and  plunder.  Bajorans were only the latest
addition to the menu.

He glanced about his little room, bought with a government stipend, his reward
for inflicting pain and suffering on other bunches of sentient atoms so that
their lives could be consumed by the industrial war machine of Cardassia.  A
shiny black case on the dresser caught his eye.  Hirik's old target pistol.  He
had brought it back from Bajor to give to Professor Crinik, but he had
forgotten to bring it along to the dinner tonight.

Sitting up on the edge of the bed, he opened the case and pulled out the old
phaser. Hirik had won several competitions with this in his teens, before he
went to Bajor.  Did this help prepare you to  kill Bajorans better old friend? 
A red indicator showed a charge remaining in it. Was it enough to penetrate a
thick Cardassian skull?  Enough to end it all?  Putting the pistol to his
temple, he closed his eyes.  

Switching off the safety, he let his index finger caress the trigger.  One good
squeeze and it would all be over.  No more dead Bajorans, no more nightmares,
no more universe.  Just sweet oblivion.  The flashback came again.  He was back
on Bajor in that wretched little village, huddling behind the rubble of the
destroyed warehouse, waiting with his rifle for the sniper to break cover.

She appeared in the doorway, rifle in hand.  This time though, he stands up,
rifle still hoisted but exposed to enemy fire.  She sees him, hoisting her
rifle, beginning to turn toward him.  But this time, he does not fire.  He lets
his own rifle clatter to the ground, waiting to receive her fire.

She aims, her finger on the trigger.  Go on, he urges, one shot will finish me.
 Go on, pull the trigger.  His own finger slides along the trigger of the
pistol pressed against his temple.

Go on! Pull! But the Bajoran girl only laughs at him, a lilting mocking laugh
that he knows will haunt him the rest of his days.  With a great cry Feron
throws the pistol across the room.  He can still hear her mocking laughter...
and more voices, some laughing, some crying, some angry.  Dead Bajoran voices.

"Bajorans get out of my head!"

He stands up and begins ransacking his room.  There is a way to get to sleep
tonight... if he drinks enough kanar.  He feels a slight twinge of regret at
his own cowardice, for not being able to pull the trigger of the pistol against
his head.  It was a feeling that would grow and fester inside him.  In the
years to come he would regret many times over that hesitation, that indecision
on his part.  For never again would he be able to summon the courage to take
his own life.

END  

--
Stephen Ratliff
ASC Stories Only Forwarding

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