Cerulean Stars - Chapter 134

Chapter 134 - The Birthday Party - Part 1

Stardate 48535.2 - July 15, 2371 - 08:21:07

For all the Orions seemed to want a significant portion of their general aesthetic to look like it came out of a Pirates of the Caribbean holonovel. They didn't seem to extend that beyond the surface level of things, for while the bed Saya had slept in had certainly looked like it belonged in a period piece, it had been nearly as soft and comfy as the cloud foam mattresses her mother had bought from Morn.

Something the young Asari truly appreciated given the bunks on her fathers ship had been the least comfortable mattresses she had ever slept on.

“Time to get up kiddo.” Jellaa called out, causing Saya to pull back the covers so she could properly glare at the older Orion.

“Yeah.” Jellaa began in a fond tone as she walked over and settled onto a corner of the bed. “Your mom wasn't much of a morning person either.”

She held up a medium sized paper bag and jiggled it in a way that made it clear there were several things inside. “But hey, got some breakfast for you. Had Syraa pick it up from one of the Klingon restaurants in town.”

Saya scrunched her face. “Klingon?”

“Not a lot of you safe food on Orion, kiddo.” Jellaa returned in amusement. “And since dear old Shona's not letting me beam back up to my ship to hit up the replicators, it was a choice between either Klingon or Ferengi.”

Switching her gaze between her dad's grin and the bag a few times, Saya could only admit that in a choice between the two Klingon was eminently preferable.

“You don't have replicators here?” She grumbled, sitting up and grabbing the bag from the Orion's outstretched hand in annoyance.

“Ha!” Jellaa laughed, slapping her knee in mirth. “You think the great main line of the Tendi family would deign to eat anything not made by trained chefs?”

Peaking into the bag, Saya let out a silent sigh of relief upon seeing a large carton of batterbread sticks instead of any of the more disgusting examples of Klingon breakfast foods.

“I don't know.” She shrugged. “I mean, yeah, Shona seemed kind of full of herself with the men carrying her around on that chair thing and the way she talked down to you. But D'Vana was nice enough.”

Jellaa reached to grab one of the batterbread sticks from the bag only to pout when Saya yanked it further away.

“You don't wanna look at D'Vana as an example of the family. She's always been kind of… Odd. Which is why nobody’ll be too broken up if she loses the title.”

Chewing on a stick of batterbread, Saya considered that alongside the important questions yesterday's conversation with the Orion teen had left her with. “You're not going to expect me to stay here forever and go around flaying your enemies are you?”

An odd look briefly flashed across Jellaa's face before settling back into her normal rakish grin. “Heard some stories about Cousin D'Rana did you?”

“That easy to tell?” Saya asked in surprise.

“She's the only one in the family that's ever actually flayed someone.” Jellaa admitted with a shrug. “As to sticking around.” She grinned. “I promised I'd make sure you and your boytoy got back to the Federation after all this is over and I meant it.”

“Because mom'll put a photon torpedo up your ass if you don't.” Saya reminded her.

Jellaa's grin widened. “Wouldn't be the first thing she's tried to shove up there.” 

“Eww!” Saya scrunched up her face at the mental image that conjured.

“Teenages.” Jellaa muttered in exasperation. "Didn't Blue ever tell you about the first time we met up after you were born? She tried to shove that Starfleet boot of hers so far up my ass if I'd have been throwing up deltas.”

She gave a fond smile. “Fun times. Probably would have gotten both of us kicked off of Wrigleys if you hadn't crapped your pants and started crying.”

Moments ago Saya had thought she was as mortified as she could possibly be, she was apparently wrong however, because this was somehow worse.

“You know how everyone always jokes about baby crap being a toxic mess?” Jellaa continued, heedless of the way Saya was now trying to hide her head under the covers. “Yours was glowing and actually caused biohazard alarms to go off.”

“Please.” Saya whined pitifully. “Can I go fight to the death now?”

“Everyone has embarrassing baby stories kiddo.” Jellaa offered, patting Saya consolingly through the covers. “Don’t stress yourself out about em.”

“As to the fight.” The Orion continued in an odd tone. “That’ll be in a couple hours. Though that reminds me…”

The way Jellaa trailed off and distinct feeling of her getting off the bed had Saya peek back out from under the covers just in time to see her dad step out of the room only to return less than a minute later with a long box in hand.

Setting the box on the bed, Jellaa smiled. “Happy birthday, I’d have gotten you an outfit to go with it. But I’ve been told by multiple people I have shit taste when it comes to that sort of thing.”

Glancing over the stylish leather jacket, tight short, and high boot combination her father was wearing, Saya raised a skeptical eyebrow.

“I kidnapped a fashion guy from Casperia.” Jellaa shrugged. “He was so offended by the family standard I was wearing he insisted a new wardrobe be part of his ransom.”

“People can be weird.” Saya muttered in agreement as she pulled the package over.

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Stardate 48535.4 - July 15, 2371 - 10:06:14

When Saya had decided to go along with her dad’s plan to overthrow her family, the Asari had figured it would be a quick duel in a training hall or field somewhere with maybe a handful of people watching. 

Looking up at the stands of the large colosseum shaped arena that were rapidly filling up with what had to be at least a hundred rowdy looking Orions, she was willing to admit she might have been mistaken.

In hindsight that mistake was really on her for not considering that a species who went so all in on a theme that they would decorate the interior of their ships like ancient sailing vessels might extend that exuberance to every single facet of their lives.

The saber Jellaa had provided Saya with as a birthday present was overly fancy in a way that should have made it completely impractical as an actual weapon. Whoever had made it however had apparently taken that thought as a challenge, because it was as perfectly balanced as the practical blades her mom usually had her train with.

D'Vana's black and gold sword was similarly over the top, though in Saya's opinion a lot cooler looking than her own jewel encrusted blade.

“I like your sword.” She offered awkwardly to the Orion teen standing across from her.

“Thanks!” D'Vana chirped happily, turning the weapon to show the flat of its blade so Saya could see the golden pattern on it. “It's one of the Constellation blades. The first Pirate Queen gave them out to the families three hundred years ago. Legends say she had them forged from the metallic fangs of a giant cosmozoan.”

“That’s a really cool story.” Saya admitted with the tiniest bit of jealousy. “Has your family ever scanned the blade to try and find out what kind of cosmozoan it was?”

“No.” D’Vana pouted. “And they won’t let me do it either.” She shot a look to her mother up in the imperial box before leaning forward and whispering. ”I think they’re afraid of embarrassing the Queen’s descendants if the story turns out to be fake.”

A loud gong brought the low conversations in the stand to a halt, and Shona stood up from her overly fancy throne and walked to the edge of the arena’s inner wall. “All right everyone! That’s enough betting! It’s time for the girls to get the show started!”

The older Orion focused her gaze on Saya. “Do try to last longer than a minute dear.” Letting those words linger for a moment she raised a hand. “Begin!”

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Stardate 48535.4 - July 15, 2371 - 10:09:12

Two seemingly normal people to watch over instead of one trained Romulan agent meant Raine's original plan for dragging said agent along on the second half of their rescue mission had needed a significant bit of rewriting. So they’d had Sera take the pair back to the Defiant on their thankfully unstolen shuttle and switched to plan-E for getting the kids back.

Raine didn’t like plan-E for a number of reasons, not the least because splitting up only gave her a limited number of ways out if the Orion’s decided to push things and bring out guns. But when life gave you lemons sometimes your only option was to use them as an improvised weapon. Something that, by Starfleet standards, Raine was moderately good at.

So she deactivated her holoemitter, steeling herself for a moment as she stared at the slowly approaching gates before thumbing the van’s acceleration to its maximum.

A loud screech of distorting metal rang out as the van plowed through the ornate golden gates that were thankfully more decorative than defensive. And Raine winced as the vehicle’s cheap inertial dampeners failed to protect her from being slammed forward into the thankfully effective seatbelt.

“You'd really think the Orions of all people would have breast friendly seatbelts.” She muttered, rubbing her very likely bruised chest for a moment before releasing the restraints and grabbing her sword from the passenger seat.

“All right, tits up.”

With those words of self encouragement she kicked open the door and threw herself out of the van in a hopefully impressive dive.

“I’m here to get my daughter back assholes!” She yelled, brandishing her weapon towards the guard towers. “So come on out so I can stomp you into the ground!”

Seconds passed, and the Asari felt a drop of sweat trickle down her brow. Slowly the tension ramped up as she waited for the guards inevitable response, only to be left completely dumbfounded as her mental timer hit the minute mark with absolutely no response to her intrusion.

“I swear to Q.” She muttered under her breath as she looked around the still empty courtyard in confusion. “If this turns out to be their winter castle or some bullshit like that I'm going to stab someone.”

The sound of loud multi-person cheer from the somewhat distant arena drew her attention, and she felt her eye ridge twitch as a suspicion hit for just why nobody seemed to be around.

“Fucking crime families.” She muttered in annoyance as she broke out into a run.

On the up side, she supposed whatever sports event had dragged the guards away meant that Sisko and Bashir would have an easy time getting in. She would just have to make sure everyone’s attention stayed away from the castle till they could track down the kids and get them out.

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Author’s Notes: I feel kind of bad for Raine here, she was assuming a general level of competence much higher than it actually was. Though to be fair, there would have been at least one guy there if Jellaa wasn’t planning her coup.