Taken

Posted on Tue Jan 23rd, 2018 @ 5:09pm by

1,023 words; about a 5 minute read

Mission: The Emerald Road
Location: Starbase

Vash walked along the promenade on Utopia Planitia Fleet Yards. The Dreadnought was undergoing heavy repairs due to the sacrifice of one of the nacelles and most of the crew had gone to Earth on shore leave.

Being an Orion, she had opted out of beaming down to the planet and despite the Admiralty's handler nagging her to take Security, Vash had dodged them easily enough. The Security at the massive fleet shipyard was more than enough to deter would be criminals and only the most daring would attack it or anyone on it.

Now the woman who once ruled the Orion Syndicate strolled from store to store, picking up a knick knack here or ordering some decorations there for the new club. She browsed at her leisure, but worried about Will; he had been called to Starfleet Command due to the alien organism's attack on his ship and the subsequent damage which had been inflicted on the ship itself.

She remembered the previous night that she and Will had spent at dinner and the very enjoyable evening in the massive suite. Vash had to hand it to him; he had gone out of his way to make it a very romantic evening and he had upped his game in other areas which still made her shiver.

Vash turned the gold civilian combadge that Will had given her over and over in her hand. It was a direct link to him, but until he contacted her on it to let her know everything, she wasn't to contact him. She wondered how her presence on the ship would affect the Admiralty's decisions regarding Will and hoped that she didn't have to apply some pressure of her own.

As she approached the food court, dozens of aliens of over a hundred worlds came and went. The smells, despite being so radically different from the vendor next to it, were complementary instead of clashing. She did note with a bit of irony that the Ferengi vendor was as far away from the Klingon vendor as possible and both of them were a bit further away from the other vendors.

She decided to get a bite to eat before she headed back to the ship they had been assigned to during quarantine and hope that she heard from him soon. After she got her order, a decadent ice cream stuffed in a cinnamon donut cone and covered in caramel and whipped cream on top of it.

Vash idly walked back to the transporter room that was reserved for the Dreadnought crew's usage while they waited for a new ship, the cone slowly being devoured by the tiny woman.

She rounded a corner and suddenly came to a stop. Two women were standing side by side in front of the transporter room and she immediately knew they were Orion despite cosmetics which had been used to dye their green skin. It was the way they carried themselves and the look in their eyes and the smirks which crossed their lips the moment they saw her.

The taller one smiled and began to walk casually towards her as if heading for the promenade while the other one casually checked a data PADD by the transporter room door so she couldn't escape that way. Vash grunted. Two from the front meant there was at least one coming up behind her and she had no idea who it was as she hadn't seen anyone else looking at her more than once.

Vash stepped back and half turned as she evaluated her options. There was a Security station about fifty yards away, a couple Starfleet officers chatting with a group of civilians about thirty yards away, several rooms that were marked Personnel Only, and the way back she had came. She slipped a hand in her bag and wished she had her Cardassian laser scalpel or the Romulan disruptors she favored, but this was a Starfleet base and Will had instructed her to carry nothing with her.

Her hand closed around a candlestick holder which she planned on having replicated for the new club and felt the solid silver shaft. It wasn't much of a weapon but she reasoned that they were also without weapons. She casually turned and started to make her back the way she had came and heard the footsteps of the taller woman quicken behind her.

"You're going the wrong way, Melani," the woman behind her said and Vash knew she had been made. She had had the option of reconstructive surgery and facial alteration, but she wasn't going to hide as someone else her entire life. Now she broke into a run for the nearest corner, the donut cone in her other hand discarded with a tiny bit of regret.

She rounded the corner and felt someone bump into her before her hearing registered the sound of a hypospray. She stumbled as the fast acting anesthetic entered her system and she fought to activate the combadge in her free hand. "Will, help!" she slurred as she felt strong hands support her. "Mothers....Without...Mercy." Was the last words she said before she slipped into unconsciousness.

The taller woman propped one of Vash's arms over her shoulder while the third women did the same for her other arm as if supporting a drunk comrade. The shorter woman came up with a smile and collected the bag that Vash had dropped. "It looks like our lucky day, Mothers," she said to the other two. "One bitch down without a fight and a bag of goodies we can split among ourselves. Let's get moving before whoever she contacted realizes she's gone."

With Vash between them, the three disguised Orion women headed for the nearest docking bay where a merchant ship waited to take them to a rendezvous point where their Orion Corvette waited. Once they were aboard that, no one would be able to catch up to them and then they could make the former Emerald Empress pay for her betrayal of the Syndicate. She would learn, one way or another...and then she would die.

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