Forwarded by the ASC-VSO 
Posted: Thu, 15 Apr 2004 05:02:13 GMT  
In: alt.startrek.creative 
From: Gabrielle Lawson  
 


Title: Oswiecim
Author: Gabrielle Lawson (inheildi@earthlink.net)
Series: DS9
Part: REP 27/42
Rating: [PG-13] (Violence)
Codes:

           Chapter Eleven -- Continued

      Early Friday morning, the train crossed the Czech border
and entered Germany.  A soldier, checking for contraband or
unauthorized persons or something, entered the train, waking up
each of the passengers.  The conductor brought him to Dax and
Novak's compartment.  Dax smiled at him as Novak said hello.
He had woken up quite confused the day before.  He was still
confused, wondering where the third passenger had gone and why
there was no longer any carpet in the compartment.

      The soldier with him paid no attention.  He saluted stiffly,
refusing to lower his arm until Novak responded in kind.  He
checked their papers, forged carefully by O'Brien and the mess
hall's replicator.  Satisfied, he saluted again, clicking his heels
together.  Then he turned sharply back toward the corridor to
bother the rest of the sleeping passengers.

      "How much farther is Berlin?" Dax asked after she was
sure their former visitors couldn't hear.

      "It shouldn't be too far," Novak answered, "but then, this
trip shouldn't have taken two days already.  It would have been a
lot shorter if we'd just headed due west instead of circling around
to the south."

      "Well, there's not much we can do about it now," Dax
admitted.  "The question is, what do we do once we get to Berlin?
What do we know about this Eichmann?"

      "Now that Thomas has more time on her hands, she was
kind enough to send us a summary while you were sleeping."  He
held out a PADD to her.

      Dax took it.  "How is she doing anyway?" she asked as she
activated the display.

      "She said she doesn't remember any of it," Novak relayed.
"They must have hit her pretty good.  Nurses say it's a concussion.
She still can't talk very well.  She wrote everything out and the
nurse passed it along."

      "At least she'll be alright."  Dax was relieved.  They still
needed her on this mission.  She started reading the notes Thomas
had sent.

      Eichmann was a lieutenant-colonel in the Gestapo and
head of the Jewish Division of that organization.  He was also a
member of the SS.  He was in charge of organizing the transports
of all the Jews of Europe to the gas chambers of the death camps.
Apparently, he fulfilled his duty efficiently.  In the next year, he
would manage to transport almost all of Hungary's Jews to their
deaths in Auschwitz.  Over 400,000 in only a few weeks.  He
almost got away with it, too.  After the war, he escaped to
Argentina where he hid for several years.  *A bit of poetic justice,
though,* Thomas wrote, *he was later kidnapped by the Israeli
secret service, and put on trial.  He was sentenced to death.*

      "Sounds like a lovely man," Dax noted wryly.  "We
probably won't have to see him though for the information.
Hopefully a clerk can help us."

      "I suppose we'll be staying in SS uniform for this," Novak
said.  "We can't exactly change back to Gestapo, can we?"

      "Not without the sensors working properly," Dax hinted.
Novak had been the last to speak with the ship.

      "Chief thinks we'll have it by nightfall," he offered.

      "Nightfall?" she asked.  "We have to stay in Berlin all
day?"

      "Looks that way.  Or," he suggested, "we could start out
for whatever camp it came from.  They could always transport us
later."

      Dax shook her head.  "I think we'll need to confer with
Thomas and the captain before we go to the camp.  It may take
more than two of us to find him in one of those.  Thomas said
some of them had thousands of prisoners."

      Novak yawned and Dax looked out the window.  It was
still quite dark out.  The train was moving faster now.  It would
still be early when they reached Berlin.


      Julian Bashir stared forward.  Max sat beside him, forcing
the bread into his hands.  Julian nibbled it absently.  He was intent
on watching the man across the courtyard.  The man was slowly
pacing from one end of his barracks to the other.  He had no shoes,
no pants.  But he didn't seem cold.  He didn't seem to care.  He
simply shuffled his feet before him, moving methodically, almost
like a robot.  Muselman.  That's what men like him were called.
Men like Bashir.

      He'd heard the others say it as they pointed to him or used
his new nickname, "*Herr Englander.*"  And they were right.  To
a point.  Muselmen had given up.  They were no longer living, just
moving around, waiting to die.  The man across the way wasn't
even eating as Max was forcing him to do.

      But there was one major difference between them, that
man across the courtyard and Bashir.  That man was no longer
thinking.  Bashir was.  Constantly.  His thoughts weren't always
clear and unclouded.  Mostly he just remembered.  He
remembered every detail of this place.  Every pain, every torment,
every face of a dying friend or stranger and those who did the
killing.  And he remembered other things, things from before.

      At first he had put them out of his mind.  They were little
things.  He had had bigger things to worry about.  But now, those
little things seemed precious to him, more so than the bread Max
prodded him with every morning and night.  He remembered
washing his hands with soap and warm water, sleeping on a
mattress, sitting on a chair, changing his clothes in the morning,
drinking a glass of cold water.  He remembered these things and
missed them.  They filled up the last few spaces that had been free
of sadness and despair.

      He remembered the *Defiant* and her crew.  They visited
him sometimes as they had his first night in the dark cell.  But they
offered him no help.  They only reminded him of what he couldn't
have.  He didn't want them to come.  He didn't want any of the
memories anymore.  He wanted to be like that man across the
courtyard.  He wanted to stop thinking.

      It was time for *Appell.*  Bashir rose, ignoring the pain.
All life was pain now.  More here or less there hardly mattered.
Nothing mattered if it didn't offer him a way out of this place or
an end to his thoughts, the constant reminders of what he didn't
have, what he couldn't have.

      *Appell* proved to be mercifully short that morning.  All
prisoners were accounted for.  The kommandos lined up and
headed for their various work sites within an hour.  Heiler was
waiting for him as usual, marching alongside the column so that
she could torment him as they went.  "There will be a selection
today," the man's voice taunted.  The other prisoners around
Bashir glanced over without turning their heads.  Seeing who it
was, and not understanding the language, they soon lost interest.
"In the hospital," Heiler continued.  She smiled one of her cold,
black smiles and then stopped, letting Bashir's row of the
kommando get ahead of her.


      Things seemed to be running much smoother this time.
The personnel of the Reich Security Main Office were much more
accommodating than those of the Economic Administration.
However, bureaucracy was still bureaucracy, and Dax found
herself fighting back yawns as she sat waiting for Novak to finish
talking with the Germans.  She missed Thomas's input even more.
It was much easier when she had Thomas's little notebook to read
telling her at least some of what was happening.  As it was she had
to wait until Novak had a chance to speak to her alone.

      It still took a few hours to find the appropriate department
in the huge building, even though it seemed to Novak and herself
to be a simple request.  They had transport numbers from
Bialystok, Poland.  They simply needed to know the destinations
for those transports.  Dax hoped they all went to the same place.  It
would make it much easier to find Bashir.  The *Defiant* simply
didn't have enough crew left to search more than one camp.  If the
camps were as big as Thomas said they were, Dax wasn't even
sure they would have enough people to search any of them.

      Dax's stomach growled, reminding her of the time.  She'd
had a roll for breakfast on the train with some juice to wash it
down.  What she needed now was a more substantial lunch.
Novak was speaking to a clerk.  He was nodding his head, and his
voice didn't sound agitated.  It seemed like a good sign.  He
nodded once more and turned away.  He took Dax by the arm and
gently led her back into the hallway.

      He released her arm, and after checking that they were
alone, he smiled.  "The clerk's going to take care of it.  He's going
to look up the information.  We can go to lunch and come back for
it in two hours."

      "Two hours?  Why so long?"  Dax was disappointed that
there was yet another delay.

      "No computers," Novak shrugged.  "He's got to actually
look through the records.  It could take awhile."

      Dax sighed, but nodded.  "To lunch then.  Do you think we
can find that little restaurant we were in before?"

      "It's possible," Novak replied.  "They did send us a map."
He tapped his pocket where the PADD was stashed.  "You know,
Commander," he said as they headed for the stairs, "I should teach
you a little German while we're here."


      Bashir could see that she was telling the truth.  Each day, it
seemed, the large can became heavier and its swill less appetizing.
He rarely made it into line in time to receive it anymore even
though the *kapo* regularly sent him to fetch it.  He didn't try.
He had forgotten how to hear the protests of his stomach.
Starvation was dulling his hearing anyway.  As he set the can
down again, much to the annoyance of his partner in this endeavor,
he looked over at the hospital.  The scene was much as it had been
the day Henri was selected.

      It was snowing, or sleeting really.  The rain came down in
frozen sheets adding to the misery of the muddy road.  Bashir's
partner cursed at him in some language, Dutch perhaps, probably
for being too slow or for stopping so often.  Bashir didn't care.
There was little he could do about it.  He hadn't the strength to
carry the can for more than a few steps before he had to set it
down again.  It was the other voice that caught his attention.

      "You'll get to the middle of the line today," she ordered.
"And you will eat the soup.  I'll dish it out myself.  You'll eat all
of it or I'll kill someone else."

      Bashir turned his head, but saw only the other prisoner on
the other side of the can.  The changeling was still at the work site.

      "Did you think I couldn't do a prisoner?"  Whaley's voice
emitted from the prisoner's mouth.  "Really you should pay better
attention.  This one died during roll call.  It was rather a trick to
get his uniform.  I couldn't just replace it.  We changelings don't
give off odors, you know.  I'd need to smell like one of you,
which, I understand, is pretty bad."

      Bashir froze, lowering his eyes to the can and watched the
steam slipping out from underneath the lid.

      "You're not much for conversation anymore, are you?" she
asked.  "I've been watching you.  You don't eat anymore, not
much anyway.  Only what they make you eat.  You don't speak to
anyone.  You walk around like you're in a daze.  You work, but
that's all you do."  She gestured that he should pick up the can
again.  This time she managed to lift most of the weight herself,
freeing Bashir from his part of the burden.  How she did it from
the one handle, he didn't know.  He was more curious about why
she did it.  "I've seen you staring at the fence," she continued.
"Thinking of ending it all, are we?"

      Bashir stared straight ahead as they walked.  He wouldn't
answer her.  He had given up speaking.  It only made things worse.

      "Well," the changeling went on, ignoring his silence, "I
won't have it.  Have you seen what they do when someone
escapes?  They kill ten others at random, slowly in Block 11.  If
you kill yourself, I'll see that as escape.  And I'll kill twenty.  Do
you understand me?"  She waited for a reply that Bashir wouldn't
give.  He did understand what she was saying.  But he didn't
understand her.  "Answer!"

      Bashir nodded.  The can stopped moving again.  Some of
the soup sloshed over the side when she set it down.  It sank down
a few centimeters into the mud.

      "Let me see your hand," she said.  Her voice had a
different quality to it.  Where she had been cold before, she almost
sounded sympathetic.  Still, he knew which hand she was referring
to, and he didn't want to let her see it.

      But she was a changeling, and she was not limited by the
length of the dead prisoner's arms.  Her left arm stretched
outward, taking hold of his right and spinning him around until he
faced her.  Her other hand took hold of his wrist.  He stiffened as
she touched him and closed his eyes, expecting the pain.  But her
grasp was gentle and she lifted the hand carefully.

      She unwrapped the worn and filthy bandage that covered it,
the same one that had come from Vlada's extra shirt so many
weeks before.  She looked at it for a few moments.  "It's becoming
infected," she pointed out.  Bashir already knew that.  "Go to the
hospital after roll call tonight."

      Bashir thought about what he had just seen at the hospital
and what it had been like the night they'd taken Henri there.  He
would likely never get through the lines, and even if he did, there
was nothing the doctors could do for him.  The bones in his hand
were crushed.  They couldn't be set any more than they already
were.  The best they could do, given their equipment and the
century, was amputate it.  And, of course, a one-armed man
couldn't work.

      "I'll take you there myself," the changeling said, releasing
his hand.  She wadded up the bandage and placed it in his other
hand.  "You wrap it.  I'll carry the soup."

      Bashir obeyed, carefully wrapping his hand as they walked,
at the same time, he tried not to slip and fall in the mud.  He was
watching his hand now, rather than the road.  Nothing was clear to
him as they walked.  One minute, she was threatening, tormenting,
another she was almost kind.  But she wasn't the only one he
didn't understand.  He also didn't understand himself, despite the
hours of thinking he'd done on the subject in the three days since
the incident.  He had thought of the fence.  It would be a quick
end, so quick that he wouldn't even feel the pain of the thousands
of volts of electricity coursing through his body.  He'd even stood
not ten feet from it when the guards weren't looking.  But he
hadn't stepped closer. His legs had refused the movement.  He felt
life was no longer possible, but he couldn't bring himself to end it.


      It was nearly 1600 hours before the sensors came back
online.  O'Brien had been working non-stop to get them fixed,
stopping only to sleep when he was too exhausted to see.  The
damage had been worse than he had thought.  A whole power
relay had been blown out and had to be replaced.  It was a slow
process.  He would have rerouted power from other areas, but all
non-essential systems were already shut down.  The remaining
crewmembers had been consolidated in the middle of the ship so
they could shut down life support in the unused quarters.

      But now the relay was replaced, the sensors were online,
and O'Brien could finally go to sleep.  He called the captain to
give him the news and then signed himself out for the next eight
hours.  It almost seemed unfair that his work hadn't earned him at
least a day off, but no one was getting a day off on this trip.
Besides, they were closer now to finding Julian, and he wanted to
know how the search was progressing.


      The call came in almost instantly.   Sisko sighed when he
heard it.  He had been worried that the signal he'd sent might have
been heard by some of the Germans.  But Dax answered without
even whispering, though she did keep her voice quiet.  "It's good
to hear from you, Benjamin.  At least I hope it's good."

      "It is, Old Man," Sisko reported happily.  "We can beam
you back up whenever you're ready.  Have you made any
progress?"

      "Progress is a relative term, Benjamin."  He could hear the
smile in her voice.  "We're having lunch.  We're supposed to
return to the Security Headquarters in half an hour to retrieve the
information.  This should tell us what we need to know though."

      "Good, glad to hear it."

      "Benjamin, how is Ensign Thomas doing?"

      "She'll be fine, Dax," Sisko assured his friend.  "Her voice
is a little raspy, but she's anxious to get back down there."

      "Novak said she doesn't remember."

      "No, she doesn't.  And I didn't see it as necessary to
remind her."  Thomas didn't remember the attack.  But she also
didn't remember the events directly leading up to it.  She didn't
seem to remember the promise she had made to the councilman.
She had been deeply depressed when she had last left the ship.
Sisko had worried at first, once she was beamed back up, that Dax
had been wrong, that Thomas had hung herself.

      She was too important to the team.  Now, more than ever,
they'd need her knowledge of the time period.  Once they got the
information from the Security Headquarters, each destination
would have to be searched.  The destinations were concentration
camps.  Sisko couldn't just send his people into them blindly.
They'd need to be briefed on what they would experience and how
to find Bashir without drawing attention to themselves.  Sisko
needed her to do that.  He didn't know enough about the camps,
and he wagered that Bashir didn't have the time for him to
research it through the computer.

      Dax interrupted his thoughts.  "Well, I'm really glad you
called, Benjamin.  Lunch was not in our budget."

      Sisko smiled.  "You owe me one, Old Man."  He called
over to the nearest crewmember with orders to replicate fifty
marks to transport to Dax's location.  "Send another comm badge,
too.  I want to keep a lock on both of them."


      Novak was relieved about the sensors.  The transporters
could find them now.  He was also relieved about the money.  The
waitress had already served their food before they realized they
didn't have enough marks to pay for the meal.  Thomas had had
the rest of the money with her.  The money and a new comm
badge appeared on the chair beside them where no one else would
see.  Novak pocketed the badge and paid the waitress.  He and Dax
headed back to the RSHA building to get the information the clerk
would have ready for them.

      Novak decided he preferred the RSHA to the Economics
Administration, if only for the level of cooperation they received.
No one had feared them when they walked in the door.  No one
had tried to hide or run away.  It had still taken the better part of
the day to find the correct clerk to help them, but no one had
intentionally obstructed them along the way.  But in a way, all that
also made him sick.  They weren't scared of him or his uniform.
He was wearing the uniform of a monster, and they found it
commonplace.

      They knew just where to go this time, and he and Dax
arrived at the clerk's desk exactly two hours after they had left.
The man looked busy, he didn't even notice that two SS officers
were standing over his desk.  Novak had to clear his throat to get
his attention.  The man jumped out his chair, tossing his right arm
out in the Nazi salute, just as he had before lunch.  "*Heil
Hitler!*" he said by way of greeting.

      He hated to repeated it, but Novak knew he had to keep up
appearances.  "*Heil Hitler!*" he returned, executing the salute
with a click of his jack-booted heels.  "We've returned for the
information on the Bialystok transports."

      The man stared at him, his mouth hanging open.  He didn't
say anything at first, but looked back and forth between Novak
and Dax.  He stopped on Dax and closed his mouth abruptly.
"You're back?"

      "Yes," Novak confirmed, trying to remain patient.  "Were
you able to find the information?"

      "Yes, yes, oh yes," the man assured him.  "That was no
problem, really, it was only a few weeks ago, maybe a month.  But
I thought you wanted it sent to you."

      "Sent?"  Novak realized now that he had been hasty in his
judgment.  This had every potential to be just as frustrating as the
Economic Administration or the *Judenrat* back in the ghetto.
"We didn't even leave an address."

      "I know," the clerk said, "I wondered why you had me
send it without telling me where."

      "I didn't tell you where," Novak recounted slowly,
"because I didn't tell you to send it at all.  You told me to return
for it in two hours.  So I've returned."

      "But--"

      Novak gave up trying to keep the condescension from his
voice.  "But you sent it."

      "Yes."

      "Just where did you send it?"

      "To your office," the clerk answered timidly.

      "I don't have an office," Novak countered.

      The clerk looked at him quizzically.  "The SS office."

      The headquarters.  The man had sent the information to the
SS headquarters.  Novak imagined the runaround he and Dax
would get there, just trying to get the package from the mailroom.
They didn't even know where the SS headquarters was.  "I assume
you still have a copy here."

      "Of course," replied the clerk.

      Deciding he'd had enough of the game altogether, Novak
ordered, "Then find it again."

      "That could take time," the man protested.  "I get off work
in two hours."

      "Don't whine," Novak told him.  "It's really rather
pathetic.  Find the information now."

      "Okay, okay," the man resigned, "if you'll come back
around four, I--"

      Novak was shaking his head.  "We'll wait, thank you.  Go
now.  We'll be right here."  He even helped the man out of his
seat.  The man graciously offered the chair to Dax and then rushed
off with as much charm as he could muster.

      "What just happened?" Dax whispered when the clerk had
rounded the corner.

      "He sent the information to our office at the SS
headquarters," he explained.

      "Oh, that helps," she remarked, rolling her eyes.

      "I thought so."

      The clerk returned an hour later with several file folders
under his arm.  "Here is the information you requested."

      Dax rose to return his seat, but the man waved for her to
stay and put the folders down in front of her.  "I have an errand to
run anyway.  Just leave the files on my desk when you are
finished.  I'll put them away when I get back."  He bowed to Dax
and then saluted both of them before leaving the room again.

      "You'd think their arms would get tired," Dax commented
wryly.  Then she pointed to the files.  "We can replicate these."

      Novak nodded.  They could just look at them now and
copy the relevant information, but there might be a chance
that they'd overlook something that might be important later.  If
they replicated them, they would have the whole file for later use.
"I'll stay."

      Dax smiled.  "See you in a few minutes, Lieutenant."  She
tapped her comm badge and disappeared in a curtain of
shimmering light.




      "We've got the information," she announced as she
stepped off the transporter pad.  "We've got time to replicate it."
She looked well enough if a bit haggard. *Probably from sleeping
on the train,* Sisko told himself.  Her spots, though very dim,
were beginning to show.

      Sisko turned to the transporter officer.  "Take these to the
mess hall and replicate them."  The woman nodded and Sisko
added, "These files have priority over anyone's dinner."

      "Aye, sir."  She took the files and headed for the door,
stopping only long enough for it to open halfway.

      "It's good to see you again, Old Man," Sisko said, turning
his attention back to Dax.  "I was beginning to worry."

      "We ran into a glitch," she explained.  "An inept clerk.  He
sent the information to our office."

      "What office?"

      "Exactly."

      Sisko smirked.  He was glad to see her sense of humor
returning.

      But then she became serious again and sat on the edge of
the pad.  "You know," she began, "they all seem like normal
people.  To look at most of them, you wouldn't think they were
capable of what they're doing down there.  But we saw signs,
Benjamin, out the window of the train.  Little towns with signs
that said 'Judenrein'.  Novak told me what it meant.  Free of Jews.
They'd killed or transported all their Jews."

      There was no time for a reply.  The door opened and the
transporter officer returned carrying two short stacks of file folders.
"These are the originals," she said, handing the top stack to Dax.
"And these are the copies."  She gave the copies to Sisko.

      Dax was already back on the transporter pad.  "This
shouldn't take but a couple of minutes," she said.  She tapped her
comm badge twice, opening and closing the signal.

      Novak's reply was quick.  "All clear, Commander."

      Sisko gave the order and she disappeared again.  She
reappeared with Novak almost as quickly.  "Welcome back,"
Sisko offered.  "If you're up to it, we'll take a look at those files
now."

      Dax spoke for both of them.  "After all it took to get it, I
don't think we can wait even another hour.  But I would like to
change clothes."  Novak nodded his agreement.

      "Of course," Sisko said.  "But you'll probably have to put
those uniforms right back on."

      "That's fine, Captain," Novak replied, "but we'd rather not
wear them any longer than necessary."

      "Good."  Sisko meant that.  He hated the uniforms, too,
with their death's head emblems and swastikas.  "We'll meet in
sickbay in twenty minutes.  We'll want Ensign Thomas's input as
well.  I would think," he added, "that all of this just got more
difficult, not less."


      The changeling kept her word.  As soon as roll call had
ended, well into the night, Heiler had come for him.  She walked
quickly and Bashir was unable to keep up with her pace.  She took
his arm, pulling him forward through the mush and past the other
prisoners.  She bypassed the lines leading up to the hospital
buildings, pushing anyone who got in the way.  For Bashir, it was
too much.  Every time she moved, his back was jostled or jolted.
When she brushed past someone, they invariably brushed into him.
His left arm, which he had nearly learned to ignore in the last few
weeks, began to flare with a bright white pain that got in the way
of his eyes.  As a result, he stumbled more, she pulled him harder
and everything became worse.  He would have fallen on the steps
leading into the building if she hadn't had such a strong grip on his
arm.

      He was vaguely aware of the other doctors.  The fatigue
and hunger combined with the reintensified pain blocked out the
interior of the building.  His knees buckled.  This time he fell.  The
changeling had released his right arm.  A dull shadow of pain
lingered there where her hand had been.

      He heard Heiler speaking, as if from a distance.  "*Saubere
die Wunde.  Ich werde in zwei Tagen wieder nach ihm sehen.*"
He didn't hear the doctor try and protest.


To Be Continued....



-- 
--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
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