Cerulean Stars - Chapter 126

Chapter 126 - Kidnapped Part 2

Stardate 48513.14 - July 7, 2371 - 07:06:23

Sisko had called an emergency senior staff meeting almost immediately after Raine had informed him about their surprise guest. Something which had run into a bit of a problem in that everyone outside of Kira and Odo had arranged to take today off to recover from the party.

Which was why it had taken nearly an hour for all seven members of the station's senior  to gather in the conference room.

“So what are we looking at for tracking the Orions?” Sisko began the moment the last cup of Raktajino finished being replicated.

“There were three Orion ships in a holding orbit last night.” Odo began, bringing up sensor recordings of the three ships on the rooms primary display. “A freighter called the Erinel, a Raider called the Serenix, and a Frigate called the Castelion.”

He tapped a command into his padd and the display changed to show a pair of departure vectors.

“The Erinel is still in orbit of the station, but the Serenix and Castelion departed within an hour of each other last night.” 

“While Serenix wasn't her ship's registration, the class at least matches.” Raine put forward, fully aware of how easy it was for a criminal to alter a ship's registration. “And as far as I know the Tendi family doesn't have any frigates in their service.”

“The Serenix's vector would put it on a direct course for Orion.” Odo added in with a slight frown. “Given the trouble this Jellaa went through to cover up her actions though, I think it's safe to assume that isn't her final destination.”

Raine began to drum her fingers on the conference table, only to stop herself upon catching the slight wince of pain from the clearly hungover Jadzia. “An Orion Raider can outrun anything in Starfleet short of an Intrepid or Sovereign. Jellaa might think she doesn't need to obscure her course so long as she can get a big enough head start.”

Odo pursed his lips and glanced over to O'Brien who gave a reluctant nod.

“Even maxing out the Defiants warp drive we'd only be able to keep up for maybe twelve hours before we'd have to throttle it back to warp nine point six to avoid burning out the engines.”

“We might still be able to catch up if their navigator isn’t that familiar with the Bajoran and Trill sectors.” Jadzia put forward consideringly.

Sisko nodded and then stood up. “O'Brien, I want the Defiant ready to go in two hours. Dax, you have that long to put together an optimized intercept course. Bashir, you have the same for prepping the Defiants med bay. Major, Constable, I'm going to leave you two in charge of the station.”

He leaned forward and slapped his hands down onto the table. “Dismissed.”

There was a distinct lack of argument as everyone got to their feet and began filing out. Though a distinct lack of any personal orders had Raine suspecting she knew what the man was about to say.

“Brooks, I need you to stay back for a minute.” Sisko said.

She nodded, and they waited silently for the others to finish filing out. The moment the door closed Cisco collapsed back into his chair with an almost defeated sigh.

“Do you think they'll be safe?” He asked quietly.

“I don't know.” Raine admitted, sure the man would be able to pick up the undertone of worry in her voice. “But kidnapping is enough of an Orion cultural tradition that they have an etiquette about it. And part of that is that you're supposed to avoid killing the people you've kidnapped.”

Getting anything about Orion culture out of Jellaa had been like pulling teeth out of a particularly angry Targ. And Raine was pretty sure the only reason she'd been able to put together the limited dossier that she had was because Jellaa had wanted Saya to know certain things about how the Orion families worked.

Which in current hindsight might have been a red flag that the Orion woman was planning to someday try something with their daughter.

“And you still have no idea why she would do this?” Sisko pressed, clasping his hands together to stare pleadingly at her.

Raine shook her head. “I regularly go over the logs of Saya's conversations with Jellaa just to be on the safe side. And there wasn't even a hint that she was in the sector, let alone planning something like this.”

Sisko slumped in on himself. “I'm going to contact Starfleet after this. And while there's a chance there might be a ship in position to intercept the Serenix before it reaches Orion space, if there's not…”

He didn't need to say it, because they both knew how it would go. Starfleet would attempt to use diplomatic channels to get the two returned. But that had almost no chance of working given the general disdain most Orions held for the Federation.

“I’ll contact my mom.” Raine offered, knowing with absolute certainty that that wasn’t going to be a fun conversation. “At a minimum I can probably get us permission to enter Orion space after them.”

Technically speaking the Orion’s didn’t demand anyone stay out of their space, practically however, if you weren’t at least aligned with the Syndicate it was very much an ‘at your own risk’ type of choice. So for practicality reasons Starfleet treated Orion space the same way they did any generally unwelcoming polity.

“Do you have any connections on Orion that might be able to help?” Sisko inquired as he slipped back into command mode.

Raine mentally went over the handful of other Orions she knew before shaking her head. “Not really. The best I could probably do is get us through their equivalent of customs by knowing the right girls to bribe.”

She tilted her head slightly as a thought hit. “Actually, give me a bit. I might be able to convince the Romulans to let us use the Defiant’s cloaking device for this.”

The Romulan Star Empire got along with the Syndicate about as well as everyone else, which was to say not very well. But she knew from things T’Rel had mentioned that they were distinctly interested in anything that could be provided about the Syndicates high level inner workings. And that meant they might be willing to allow the use of the cloak on this trip for the same reason they allowed it in the Gamma Quadrant, an offer to share any information they might gather.

Sisko gave a thankful nod. “You have two hours, good luck Commander.”

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Stardate 48513.25 - July 7, 2371 - 08:04:11

It had been nearly three hours before Jellaa had shown up to drag Saya off to her personal quarters. A rather impressive looking room whose walls were covered with an eclectic collection of dangerous weapons and fancy art that had left the young Asari somewhat impressed by her dads decorating sense.

Unfortunately that wasn't able to distract from the shock of hearing her dad explain just why she had decided to kidnap her.

“You want me to what!?” Saya squeaked, trying and failing to process just how her dad’s words could possibly make any sense.

“Help me overthrow my cousin and seize control of the family.” Jellaa repeated with a roguish grin

“I know that sounds like a lot, kiddo.” She continued, holding up a hand before Saya could object. “But I already got most of it covered, I just need you to challenge the new Mistress of the Winter Constellations for her title and beat her into the ground.”

“That’s it!?” Saya shrieked, unable to believe what she’d heard her dad say. “You snuck onto the station!”

“Secrutiy was focused on the big Ferengi thing, so it was more walking then sneaking.” Jellaa shrugged.

“Drugged me!” 

Jellaa hung her head in embarrassment. “Yeah, I know that was a bit unOrion, but I couldn’t do it the traditional way cause of your powers.”

“Somehow snuck me out of the station!” 

“Really wasn’t that hard.” Jellaa admitted. “Stuck you two in a shielded cargo container and had Sen distract the officer they had on scanning duty with her boobs.”

“All so you could have me fight some old woman I’ve never heard of!?” Saya finished, her tone having escalated to full on yell.

“Na, D’Vana’s your age.”Jellaa corrected, grinning down at her in a way that made Saya’s eyeridge twitch. “Only reason it’ll work really.”

Jellaa leaned over and poked Saya on the forehead. “See, fourteens the age you kids officially graduate from your apprenticeships. And since you’re family, that means you can challenge her for her title.

She straightened up and grinned, leaving Saya to blink owlishly as she worked to process everything the Orion had just dropped on her. “Supposed to be so the new Mistress can show off to the rest of the family by beating down her generational peers. But well, I'm betting your glowy bullshit will let you kick her ass even with all the training.”

Saya let out a groan as the suspicion hit that this was her own fault for exaggerating her capabilities when they talked. “I can't do anything with my bullshit, dad. It takes me seconds to put together enough of a biotic field to effect someone, and I can barely hit a stationary target let alone a moving one.

Jellaa rolled her eyes before walking over to grab a decorative gold pyramid from her desk and, after testing its weight, threw it at Saya fast enough that the Asari didn’t even have time to react before it smacked into the instinctually raised barrier over her shoulder.

“It’s a melee fight kiddo. Swords, daggers, you know the fun stuff that you and your mom don’t have to worry about.”

“I’m not mom you know.” Saya groused. “I can barely keep my barrier going past a couple dozen hits from mom’s saber.”

Letting out a sigh Jellaa walked over to lay a comforting hand on Saya’s shoulder. “You’ll catch up eventually, kiddo. And hey, a couple dozen hits is a lot more than D’Vana will have going for her. So don’t worry about it.”

As oddly comforting as that was, it still ignored the fact that Saya didn’t want to fight some random family member she had never met. For a title she didn’t care about. All because her dad wanted to be in charge of a pirate family that meant absolutely nothing to her.

“What if I don’t want to fight D”Vana?”

“That’s up to you, kiddo.” Jellaa said, letting her hand drop before turning around and walking over to stare at the one of the many weapon displays covering the walls. “Everything's set to kick off even if you choose to sit it out. But with those afraid of the title still on Shona's side, chances are slim that we'll come out the winners.”

Saya flinched at the resigned finality in her dad's tone as she said that.

“I already handed the genetic records showing you’re family off to the Queen's record keepers. So as long as you sit the whole thing out, you should be fine for long enough for your mom to find some way to pick you up.” Jellaa continued as she grabbed a decorative dagger from one of the shelves and began idly playing with it. “That human friend of yours on the other hand…”

A sudden spike of worry shot through Saya as Jellaa let the silence hang for a moment before continuing.

“Well, Shona’ll probably sell him off to the highest bidder to make up some of the cost for all the trouble this is gonna cause.”

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Author's Notes: Yeah… Jellaa's not exactly a good person… To the point where it’s her mirror universe counterpart who would be considered the “good” version.