An Entangled Getaway - Part II

Posted on Sat Apr 16th, 2016 @ 1:20pm by Indra Nyyar & Kaeli & Isaura Panossian & Eldren Tohr

Mission: Further Challenges
Location: Cardassia

* Cardassia *

Kaeli hitched up her skirt and ran through the trees, moving in Isa’s direction. Moments later, she broke free of the treeline and continued across the wide expanse of lawn .She wanted to call out, but that might be suicidal. She had no idea what was happening in the house and didn’t want to risk exposing Eldren. Finally, she could see the outbuilding and picked up her pace even more. The alarm had to have reached the guard there and Isa could be in danger.

As Kaeli approached the out building, Isa could be heard growling, “Stay down!” and the sound of the taser buzzed quietly. Isa sighed heavily then looked up and nearly yelped when she saw Kaeli. “Oh, prophets, Kaeli!” She didn’t state the obvious: that she’d scared her. “Damned Cardie took three taser hits to stay down. And I shared his first one!”, she whined.

“Are you alright?” Kaeli gripped Isa’s shoulders and looked her over. Finally, she leaned in close to check her pupils. Her heart rate began to settle. “When this is over, remind me to kick this one in the nuts for that.”

“Eh, I’m fine, though I owe Drekkar a good thrashing. He called just as I was about to pounce on this guy and gave him a head’s up,” Isa said. “We’d better get inside and help Eldren. That alarm probably sounded in there, too.”

“Alright, let’s get inside. If there’s two out this far, it’s likely there are some inside too.” Kaeli looked at the throwing knife she still held and wiped it clean on her skirt. She shifted it to her right hand and pulled a disruptor from the thigh holster. “I hate being out in the open that long. It’s a big lawn.”

“We’ll just run very fast,” Isa said, flashing a grin. “Ready?” She rolled her shoulders and worked her legs, trying to make sure that her neurons were firing as they should and shaking off the taser’s effect. She looked across the lawn then cursed. “Look - one just came out the side door.”

“Dammit!” Kaeli pulled back into the building and out of sight, watching as the Cardassian turned and hurried around to the front. “I wonder why he’s suddenly in such a hurry?”

“The alarm? They’re likely doing a perimeter sweep. Come on, let’s get across this lawn. We know that this doorway is clear,” Isa said and started off at a run.

Kaeli took off after her, both running as fast as they could towards the house. Up ahead, she saw Nyyar and Eldren as the door opened. Several yards shy of the house, a figure stepped around the far corner of the house. Kaeli skidded to a stop, her mind racing. Run Isa! It was Boroca.

“Shit...!” Isa nearly barreled into Kaeli (Kaeli was a faster runner and had passed her). “Boroca... Can we kill him?”

“Sure if we want to start a war,” Kaeli answered. She motioned to Nyyar, who stepped in front of Eldren, backing him into the house and out of sight. “He can’t get in the house.” Kaeli despised being exposed. She agreed with Isa, she’d prefer to kill Boroca but it causing a war was very likely. “What if I pretend to surrender long enough for him to get close? Can you get to the house?”

“Surrender? Are you nuts?”, Isa hissed. “Wait... will Jarad get you out of it?” They didn’t really have time to debate this - Boroca would notice them in another moment.

“If I play this right, I’ll be ready to transport out of here in a few minutes. You and El can deal with those other two.”

“Right... Don’t get hurt - Jarad will kill me if you do,” Isa said, dropping to the grass. “Go on draw his attention.”

That wasn’t hard to do. Boroca cleared the columns at the corner of the house and and stopped, surprised at seeing a woman standing on the grass. It took a split-second for recognition to set in and in an instant both he and Kaeli had raised weapons. She slowly edged away from where Isa lay in the tall grass, thankful that with the house empty, no one had bothered mowing the lawn in the back.

“Drop it Kaeli!” he shouted.

Like that would work, she sent to Isa.

Just get him to look somewhere else, Isa thought back. She readied herself for that moment.

“Or what?” Kaeli shot back. She continued to move slowly away from Isa and towards Boroca.

“I’ll be sending you home in a bag again,” he countered and a nasty smile spread over his face.

He certainly knew the chink in her armour. His words threw her and it was clear he’d scored. Slowly, she lowered the disruptor. “Let’s talk,” Kaeli called out.

Boroca motioned her forward and she began to walk, leaving Isa. As she reached Boroca, he pulled her back towards the columns, his own disruptor pressed to her chest.

“Oh... so not good,” Isa breathed as she hopped to her feet and dashed for the door where she’d seen Nyyar. Before she could reach it, a Cardassian came around from the back of the house. He shouted and charged at Isaura; she, in turn, pulled a knife and stopped running. Letting him get close, she dodged his charge and drove the knife into his back. He twisted away, taking the knife with him, and Isa hurried backwards the rest of the way to the door.

She opened it and found Nyyar and Eldren there. “Time to go. The alarm’s been raised, so no need for stealth now.” She tapped her commbadge and hailed Tindam. “Beam Kaeli up, Tinman, then get us.” An affirmative response came over her comm.

“Any minute now...,” she said then yelped and grabbed at Nyyar, pulling her away as a Cardassian’s disruptor split the air.

In a heartbeat Eldren stepped to cover the two women and raised his disruptor and discharging two bolts in rapid succession. Part of the doorframe exploded sending burning splinters all around while the Cardassian went down in a heap with a bad wound to his abdomen.

Damn I’m getting old… Eldren thought as the smell of burnt flesh rapidly filled the air while the soldier on the ground writhed in agony. He stepped forward leveling the weapon on the wounded man when he heard Nyyar’s soft gasp behind him.

His finger hesitated on the trigger for an instant, long enough for the man on the ground to get off one last shot. It hit Eldren squarely in the thigh.

“You won’t get her off this planet --”

“The hell we won’t,” Isa grumbled and fired on the Cardassian with the disruptor Eldren had given her earlier, killing him. In the next moment, as Nyyar screamed and reached for the wounded Eldren, an eerie orange shimmer engulfed them all as Tindam executed Isa’s request.

Outside, Boroca had slammed Kaeli against the wall of the house as Isa took off running. “Does Jarad know you’re here?” he hissed.

Kaeli shook her head. “No! He’d kill me if he did. I’m here for my own reasons.”

“Like my wife?” he asked. “She’s well-guarded inside.”

Kaeli smiled at that, despite the weapon pointed at her face. “Are you sure?” Before he could reply, the orange glow of the transporter swept her out of his grasp.

* * *

The group materialized on Eldren’s ship and Nyyar dropped to the deck, holding Eldren close, trying to reassure him. Her mind raced as she glanced at the wound, realizing how serious it was. “Any of you a medic?” Her tone made it clear she was close to panic.

Isaura glanced at Kaeli and thought: There’s a reason we have Jarad on the Ning’Tao. My skills are... rudimentary, at best. Yours?

The same. I’m usually the one putting others in this situation, not patching them up. Kaeli frowned. Do what you can and we’ll go to Bajor.

“And better doing that quickly,” Eldren blurted through gritted teeth, “this one looks really bad.”

Nyyar would agree with that. She turned her worried gaze on the two women. “There’s a village there, the elder will see that he’s taken care of. I can give you the coordinates.”

“Kaeli, get forward with Tindam and get us out of the Cardie system. I’ll deal with Eldren. I’m not sure heading for Bajor is the best idea though - it’s the obvious place for us to go,” Isa said, taking charge. She opened several cabinets before finding the first aid kit then knelt beside Eldren to begin tending his wound.

Kaeli slid into the seat beside Tindam. She gave him a set of coordinates. “Give it all we have. That path will get us past the DMZ in about an hour and back in Federation space.”

“What the hell did you do?” Tindam complained, looking back at the blood on Eldren’s leg and soaking into the padded flooring of the small ship. When Kaeli hit his thigh, he turned back and entered the coordinates before gunning the engines and going to warp. “Leaving Cardassian space as quickly as possible,” he muttered.

“I thought you’d see it my way,” Kaeli said. “And we didn’t do it. A Cardassian did. Isa, what do you think about a brief pitstop at DS9? I can kidnap a doctor and bring him along?”

“We’re tight on space already, Kaeli. DS9 is a Fleet station; we can stop there and get him patched up,” Isa glanced up at Kaeli. With certain credentials that shouldn’t be a problem, she said, meaning her own as a quasi-Fleet agent.

“Good enough. Once we clear this area, Tinman, get us to DS9,” Kaeli ordered.

Nyyar watched as Isa began to work on Eldren. Noting Isa’s concerned expression, and picking up on the fact that parts of the conversation between the two women seemed to be unspoken, she had to ask. “Will he make it to DS9?”

“Sure,” Isa nodded, not entirely telling the truth as she saw it. “Tohr, you’re not going to like what I’m about to do. Nyyar, hold his shoulders. Don’t let him hit me,” she flashed a distracted smile at the two. “This is going to hurt.” She had ripped his pants’ leg open and now injected a gel into the wound then put a cauterizing patch over it; the patch would heat the gel, sealing the man’s wound. It was a dirty fix, but it’d keep him alive for now.

When the patch warmed the gel inside the wound seemed to burn Eldren winced with pain and cried out as his hands tried to clutch at the medication to rip it off. Nyyar held him by the shoulders as best as she could while Isa got hold of his wrists to stop him from removing the patch. A difficult operation for the both of them but in the end the pain subsided and Eldren quieted down.

“Butcherer.” He managed to stammer before reclining his head in Nyyar’s lap “But thanks.” His voice trailed off with the last words.

“It will be a few days till we reach the station,” Nyyar murmured to Isa. “Unless you know someone there who can start coming this way to meet us, we might have a serious problem.”

“Ah...,” Isa stalled, “We’ll... ah... Kaeli? Anyone we know on DS9?”

Kaeli considered the question, her brow furrowed in thought. “Possibly. I’ll call Ro and put him to work.” The panel in front of her began to beep - the sensors. “Shit. There’s two Cardassian ships moving out this way. We’re still cloaked so I think they’re just doing a sweep. If they get too close they will pick up our warp trail.”

“If we drop the cloak, can we shift the power to the engines and outrun them?” Isa, wiping Eldren’s blood from her hands, moved forward to stand just behind Tindam and Kaeli.

“This is a small ship, Isa. Those Cardie ships are... much larger. But... I discovered while you were goofing around on the planet, that this ship is meant to confuse anyone chasing it. We have mimic torpedoes: fire off two of those, and the ships will chase they, not us,” Tindam told the two women. He didn’t ask for permission; he simply programmed the torpedoes and prepared to send them off.

Kaeli opened her mouth to reply but the voice that came was Nyyar’s. “If it keeps them away, do it.” Her tone left no room for argument, all signs of panic gone. “Kaeli, there is a man on DS9 I want you to contact. This Ro you mentioned should talk to him.”

“Got it.” When Nyyar gave her the name, she got busy on the comm.

At the same time, Tindam fired the two torpedoes. Each flew for some distance before triggering a burst of static and noise. If scanned, they’d transmit a Bajoran ship’s registry. The bursts were enough to catch the attention of the two ships; they went after the torpedoes, leaving Eldren’s ship to speed toward the DMZ.

*************
Capt’n Isaura Panossian
Kaeli
Eldren Tohr
Indra Nyyar
Tindam
Boroca