Forwarded by the ASC-VSO Posted: Thu, 15 Apr 2004 05:16:30 GMT In: alt.startrek.creative From: Gabrielle Lawson Title: Oswiecim Author: Gabrielle Lawson (inheildi@earthlink.net) Series: DS9 Part: REP 41/42 Rating: [PG-13] (Violence) Codes: Chapter Seventeen -- Continued The interrogation--*debriefing,* he reminded himself-- had been set up right in the hospital in deference to him. The nurse went inside the conference room with him. The whole medical staff had been very protective of him from the beginning. After reviewing his own chart, he could understand that. He didn't mind. He liked protective, though he knew he couldn't trust it. The room seemed to be full of people, though Bashir rationalized that it was only his imagination. There were four people present at the main table. They would be questioning him. One wore a uniform, an admiral. Two others wore drab suits, temporal investigators. The fourth was a Betazoid, probably a counselor, someone to guard his emotional state. But she was also someone who could pull out memories, things he wanted to forget. Kira was already there, sitting in a chair near the back wall. She nodded and smiled when he saw her. He felt better knowing she was there, but not much better. He was afraid they would ask him too many questions, questions that didn't involve the timeline. If even one of them was a changeling, then they would all know. They would know everything she did to him. The admiral stood. "Doctor," he said, bowing slightly, "please have a seat." Julian looked at the chair in the center of the room. It was no different from all of the other chairs, padded with red upholstery. But it had arms, and Julian stood for a few moments more seeing a different chair and his own blood spilled on the arms, turning them red. He closed his eyes. *It's just a chair,* he told himself. *Just a chair.* He felt dizzy and had to sit. "Please understand, Doctor," the Betazoid said. "We're not here to prosecute you. Just to assess any possible changes to the timeline. We'll make it as brief as possible. We don't want you to feel uncomfortable." They all introduced themselves, but Julian was only half listening. He could have sworn he heard a murmuring in Polish. He held his left hand, still gnarled and crooked, in his lap. The room felt hot to him, but he was starting to shiver. "You spent nearly two months on the surface," one of the investigators began, checking his notes. Bashir couldn't remember his name. "It would be difficult to recount every action undertaken in such a long time, so it would probably be easiest if you could start by telling us of any significant events that might have changed the timeline." *Significant events?* Bashir thought. Szymon's death was significant. And Henri's. They all were. But the man had spoken about the whole affair as if it was so sanitary, packaged and easily manageable if they just used all the right words. "Everything," Julian told him. "Everything was 'significant.' And everything might have changed the timeline. I was there. I took up a space that would have been filled by someone else. So maybe someone was saved because they weren't in my spot. Or maybe someone died because of it. The tiny rations that I ate would have fed a different man. The space I took on the bunk would have given another man a place to sleep. The men she killed might not have died. Not one of them was insignificant." The investigators looked at each other and then at the Betazoid. This was not going as smoothly as they would have liked. Bashir didn't care. He wanted to be done, to go along with them so that he could leave, but that word had hit him wrong. It had felt like a dishonor to the dead to talk about them so coldly. *Significant events.* "Doctor," the admiral asked. "What happened to your hand?" Julian's head snapped up. What had that to do with the timeline? "A hammer," he answered sharply. "During work?" The admiral was asking delicately, but he didn't seem to understand the reaction it provoked in Bashir. "Work?" he repeated. Again with those words. It wasn't work. It wasn't a day in an office and then home for dinner. It was slavery. They were two very different things. "No, not at work." "When?" Why was he asking that? Bashir felt the air go out of the room. "When they were questioning me." "What did they ask you?" the admiral continued. "And how did you answer?" Now Bashir understood. Had his words changed time? "I lied," Bashir tried to reassure him. "I couldn't tell them about the future. They'd think I was insane." "They tortured you," the admiral continued. "Wouldn't it have been better if they thought you insane?" "Do you want me to have told them the truth?" Julian asked in return. "They killed the insane. And they killed spies. I couldn't be either one. No matter what she did to me." The Betazoid was looking uncomfortable and Bashir realized she must be receiving a lot of emotions from him, thoughts too, memories she didn't really want any more than he did. "*She* did to you?" It appeared the admiral had taken over the questioning altogether. "I assume you mean the changeling. How did you know it was the changeling?" "She always let me know," Bashir told him, "when she wanted me to. She would change her eyes or her face." "You said she killed men. Why did she kill them?" "She didn't need a reason," Julian explained, losing his patience. He'd had little to start with. "She didn't need a reason. Not when they were Jews." "Who did she kill? Can you name them or the circumstances of their deaths?" Bashir shook his head. His chest was hurting, but he wasn't sure if it was panic or remembered pain. "Only four of them," he answered, but his voice was hardly working now. They might not have heard. "We know about Heiler. What were the others' names?" "One was . . . Henri," Julian said. His breath was coming in quickly in short gasps, but he felt he wasn't getting enough air. "Henri Bresalier. He had a sister in Missouri. He was going to live with her after the war. He wanted English lessons. I wanted off the floor." "Why was he killed?" "Because he was my friend," Julian breathed. "Because we killed forty-six of her people on that ship. She beat him nearly to death in front of me. He was selected in the hospital." The Betazoid drew her eyebrows together. "Selected?" *At least she's not reading my mind,* Julian thought. "For death. He couldn't work, so he was killed." "You worked in the hospital." The other investigator this time. Bashir shook his head. "She wouldn't have let me. My first kommando was building a crematorium. Number II. My second built barracks." The admiral tried to direct the conversation back around to the dead. "You said there were four. Heiler and Bresalier. Who were the other two?" Bashir stopped breathing. He tried to speak, but the words wouldn't come. The admiral didn't let that interrupt him. "What were their names?" Bashir was shaking his head. "I don't know," he said and finally drew in a breath. "He was. . . ." "He was what? Who? Did she beat him, too?" The room began to spin. "What about the fourth man? Did you know his name?" *Yes,* Bashir said, but only in his mind. How could he forget Piotr? He would never forget, as long as he lived. He nodded and a tear fell down his face. "She didn't," he whispered, "beat the other man." They were all silent now, finally sensing his discomfort. But he'd gone too far to stop. It was something he could no longer control. He had tried to push the memories away, but they refused to stay buried. They rushed back at him, and he could see it all again. He felt the cold air, the barrel of the gun at his temple. *"Oh, it's not that easy,* Herr Englander," he heard Heiler say. "*I will shoot one of them.*" *He tried to find a way out, an answer beyond the simple yes or no she gave him. He couldn't do it. He couldn't beat that man. But he knew she would shoot. He was frozen, lost in panic. And he couldn't decide.* "I was ready to die," he told them. His face was wet with tears now, tears he hadn't been able to shed for Piotr before, or the nameless man waiting to be flogged. "I," he stuttered, "I was . . . flogged. I knew . . . but she didn't shoot *me." *The gun fired, blocking all other sound from his ears. He could see Piotr fall, his blood spilling onto the snow and splattering his neighbors in the line. Heiler raised the gun again before Bashir could even rise. He took the whip in his shaking hand.* "I . . . beat him." He couldn't breathe. "I kept . . . waiting for them to say stop, that it was enough. I didn't want to," he pleaded with them. "But she would have killed them." He was nearly sobbing, hardly coherent. "She would have shot them all. Because of me." He doubled over, dropping his face into his hands. "That's enough," Kira said, but he didn't hear her. He was lost to himself. "Leave him alone." "Major," the admiral protested weakly. His voice nearly cracked. Kira didn't let him finish. "He couldn't help it. Anything he did there. He had no power, no choices!" She was indignant. "Get out and leave him alone!" She touched him. He hadn't even realized she had left her seat. She put her arm around him. Her other hand touched his face, lifted his head. "It wasn't your fault, Julian. You didn't beat that man. She did." He held out his hand as if to show her the truth. "But it was my hand. I felt it when it hit him. I heard him scream. He passed out and they made me start over from *eins.* We were at *zwanzig,* and he had to start over at *eins!* He was dead, Kira, before he reached twenty again. I don't even know what he did." "But it wasn't you, Julian," she insisted, taking both of his hands in hers. "She used your hand because she knew it would hurt you more than anything she could do to your body." The others must have obeyed her and left. Three hours later, Kira and he left, too. That night, Kira had nightmares. She dreamt of everything he told her in those three hours. ****** Kira found him in the garden. The hospital really did have a beautiful garden. Actually, she had to admit it was all the way around a beautiful planet, just as Sisko had said. Paradise. She could hardly imagine it as the same place she had seen before. The sky was a gorgeous blue and the temperature--it was spring there--was neither too hot nor too cold. Flowers of every color imaginable were blooming in the garden around Starfleet Medical. Bashir was sitting on a bench there all alone. "Julian," she said quietly, not wanting to startle him. He was jumpy these days. "It's almost time." Sisko's father was expecting them for dinner. The whole crew. Jordan was especially looking forward to it. He had stopped her three times on the *Defiant* just that afternoon, asking if Bashir would be going. They'd all put a lot into saving him. They wanted to see for themselves that he was alright. Kira wasn't one hundred percent convinced that he was alright. But then, neither was she. She'd lived with things, dealt with things, remembered things that needed forgetting. And she was still able to carry out her duties. She knew Bashir would be the same doctor he always was. The best, though she still didn't think she'd ever tell him that. "Did you find them, Kira?" he asked, still gazing at the flowers. His back was to her. "Anything at all?" Kira shook her head, though she knew he couldn't see. "No, but Thomas is helping to look. We'll be late, Julian. We have a reservation. Just think, real food." He lifted a hand to her without turning around. It was his left hand. His fingers were long and straight. The back of his hand was smooth. He turned his head and smiled. "I can't feel it yet. It will take a couple of days." "Well, you only need one to throw." Kira had a bag over her shoulder. The uniform she'd replicated was inside of it. The entire away team--except for Dax and Salamon--had volunteered to return with the *Defiant.* And they'd all be carrying bags to dinner. Joe Sisko had also offered to host their bonfire. He still didn't rise from the bench. "I've figured it out," he told her. His smile was gone. "Here or there. It makes no difference. They could take me on the station or steal me from my sleep on Meezan IV. The *Defiant,* Earth. Nothing is safe anymore." "So what will you do?" Kira asked him. "Just keep breathing, I guess." He stood and his smile returned. "And eat real food. Come on, we don't want to be late!" Two days later she was pacing the deck of the *Defiant*'s bridge. She knew she shouldn't. It might make the new crew nervous. Thomas, from the helm, turned around to look at her. Kira motioned her to the back of the room. "Run a scan of the planet's surface," she told her quietly. "See if you can find him." "Should be easier this time," Thomas quipped. "Let's hope so. We're supposed to be leaving in less than an hour." Thomas ran the scan, and the results came back quickly, thanks to the newly repaired sensors. Thomas seemed to freeze for a moment, and then the set of her shoulders softened. "He's gone back, Major," she reported gently. "What?" Kira stepped up beside her to look at the readout. Auschwitz. She thought for a moment. Like returning to Gallitep. She had done that once. It had looked so different, so empty, so silent, and yet so full of presence. She sighed. "I think we'll be a little late." She raised her voice. You have the bridge, Mr. Jordan." The transporter put her down only a few meters from him, but he barely stirred to note her presence. He was standing in a doorway. She was in the corridor behind him, almost around the corner. "Julian," she whispered, not wanting to startle him. "This was my cell," he answered softly. "My haven." *Haven?* Kira wondered at his choice of terms. She stepped closer, looking around his shoulder. It was a dark room, not even three meters square if she had to guess. There was no light source, not even a window. The door was solid and thick. "No one touched me when I was in there," he went on. "Except the doctor, but that doesn't count." Kira touched his arm. "Julian, we need to go back." He didn't look at her. He just sighed. "How could this happen?" he asked. Kira didn't know what to say in reply. She had a few ideas on why the changeling had sent him to this place, but the torture and torment were something else. Obsession, dementia perhaps. "Not just me," he added, seeming to know what she was thinking, "but to all of them. There were so many, Kira. What is in us, so black and vile, to make us do things like this? I don't think I'll ever understand." His words had torn something within her. "I understood once," she whispered, dropping her eyes to the floor. She thought maybe she saw a faint stain of long-eroded blood there. "I've been trying to forget." He raised his left hand to run it along the frame of the door. "I couldn't step inside," he told her. "I was afraid the door would close behind me." He sighed again. "I can't leave yet, Major. I have to say goodbye." Kira didn't ask to whom. She imagined she knew. His friends, and all the others that he met or didn't meet. He was like that. She was, too. He turned slowly, putting his back to the cell. "Then I guess we'll be a little late," Kira said, and she took his hand. "You're not alone this time." Epilogue Julian Bashir placed his communicator carefully on the table beside his bed. Then he picked it up and rubbed it against his sleeve until it shined. He set it back down again and changed into his night clothes. It had been a long day of answering the same question over and over. "How are you?" Still he couldn't say they didn't care. It felt good to have so many people care about how he was. But it was also tiresome to answer them, especially when they didn't really want to know. Some of them did, like Captain Sisko or O'Brien, but Julian wanted to spare them the details. Kira knew them all. Jordan had had a glimpse of them during his day there. He might tell O'Brien someday. O'Brien had memories, too. But for now, nightmares and all, he was ready to go to sleep. In his own bed, the bed he'd left only three and a half weeks before. *Temporal mechanics.* He had only slept for five hours though before he was awakened by the chime on his door. At first he couldn't move to answer it. His heart was pounding too hard. He had a phaser though, and he picked it up. He was better able to move then, and he made it to the door. He keyed it open and lowered the phaser. "Thought you might want a midnight snack," Captain Sisko said. He was smiling broadly and carrying a large casserole dish. "So I made you some beets. I know how you love them." He stepped into the room without being invited. But Julian didn't feel threatened. He sensed something more was to happen. "I'm not *that* hungry, sir." "Well, maybe you'll like hasperat," Kira suggested poking her head around the door frame. "Welcome home." "Fruits, Julian." Dax was next. "They're not only delicious, but they contain vitamins, to help you grow. You're much too thin." Bashir had run out of things to say. Each time one of them stepped into the room, someone else stepped into the door frame. O'Brien had a plate of cookies. Chocolate chip. Garak had something Cardassian. Odo even managed a tray of root beer. "Bubbles," he said. Jake, of course, had brought Idanian spice pudding. Jordan had a plate of matzoth. "Something Jewish," he explained, "I think." His hair was starting to grow in again, like Julian's fingernails. Novak had brought something German, a dark Bavarian bread. Julian sat down on the couch and watched them stream in and laughed. It felt good to laugh again. By the time they were all in, there was barely room for them to sit on the floor and every table he had was covered with plates and bowls and glasses. Sisko stood to make a toast. "As of today, according to Nurse Jabara . . . , " he waited for a nod from her, ". . . you're free to eat whatever you want, so we thought we'd bring you a treat or two. Of course, you have to stick with small portions, so we had to come and help you eat all this food." He raised his glass and became serious. "To the fallen!" They stayed for several hours, though Odo had to excuse himself to rest. Nurse Jabara kept a close eye on him despite her earlier affirmation, but she let him sample everything. It was wonderful. And at that moment, he would not have cared if it was only a dream. It was a good dream. Thomas was the last one to leave. She hung back when the others said their good-byes. "I didn't bring any food," she said, seeming to apologize. Her hands were behind her back. "But I did bring you something." She pulled one of her arms from behind her and produced a book. A real book, with paper and a leather cover. "I replicated it in book form. It's the English translation," she explained. "I'm glad one of ours survived." She kissed him on the cheek and then disappeared down the corridor. Julian looked at the cover of the book. "*To the Fallen,*" he read aloud, "by Max Zeidl." Bibliography *Historical Atlas of the Holocaust.* (Macmillan Publishing: New York) 1996. *Auschwitz 1940-1945: Guidebook Through the Museum. *(Oswiecim: Panstowowe Muzum w Oswiecimiu) 1993. Czech, Danuta. *Auschwitz Chronicle.* (H. Holt: New York) 1990. Hoss, Rudolf. *Death Dealer: The Memoirs of the SS Kommandant at Auschwitz.* (New York: De Capo Press) 1996. Levi, Primo. *Survival in Auschwitz.* (New York: Collier Books) 1961. Jackson, Livia E. Bitton. *Elli: coming of Age in the Holocaust.* (Times Books: New York) 1980. Page, David W., M.D. *Body Trauma: a writer's guide to wounds and injuries.* (Cincinnati: Writer's Digest Books) 1996. Sofsky, Wolfgang. *The Order of Terror: The Concentration Camp.* (Princeton: Princeton University Press) 1993. Stevens, Serita Deborah with Anne Klarner. *Deadly Doses: a writer's guide to poisons.* (Cincinnati: Writer's Digest Books) 1990. Wells, Leon W., *The Janowska Road.* (Macmillan) 1963. Qtd. in Friedlander, Albert H., ed. *Out of the Whirlwind: A Reader of Holocaust Literature.* (New York: Schocken Books) 1968. pp. 227-258. The End. So what's part 42/42? A "just for fun" X-Files Epilogue Feedback welcome: inheildi@earthlink.net -- --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 Awards Tech Support http://www.trekiverse.us/ASCAwards/commenting/ No Tribbles were harmed in the running of these Awards ASCL is a stories-only list, no discussion. Comments and feedback should be directed to alt.startrek .creative or directly to the author. 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: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ From ???@??? 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