Cerulean Stars - Chapter 104

Chapter 104

Stardate 48424.4 - June 4, 2371 - 21:44:38

“And that's when he took me for a walk in the garden.” Jadzia all but gushed as she sat cross legged on the small bed of her cabin. “And we spent the entire time talking about our respective quantum field fluctuations.”

“Respective quantum field fluctuations.” Raine repeated in a teasing tone as she leaned over the back of the desk chair. “How daring.”

“Oh hush!” Jadzia scolded with a pout as she grabbed a pillow and tossed it at Raine. “It wasn't like that.”

Resisting the urge to return the past couple months teasing about her own dating choices all at once, Raine let a slightly bemused smile graced the corner of her lips. 

“Jadzia, you just spent the past ten minutes waxing eloquently about Deral's conversational ability and capped that off by describing how he took you for a romantic walk through the garden.”

“It wasn't a romantic walk.” Jadzia protested again. “We just talked, about multi-dimensional physics.“

Raine stared at Jadzia for a moment, waiting for the Trill to say more before rolling her eyes when it became clear that for all Dax's accumulated wisdom Jadzia could in fact be amusingly blind about certain things.

“I'm going to point out here that a good twenty percent of Starfleet would consider that a romantic conversation. Add in the newly discovered friendly alien species and the walk through a garden filled with alien plant life, and you'd probably be bordering on a good forty to fifty percent at least.”

She wasn't even exaggerating there, it took a certain kind of person to want to do what they did, and that led to some odd standards when it came to romantic ideas.

“I'm three hundred and fifty years old, Raine.” Jadzia put forward with a scowl as she shot an almost offended glare at the Asari. “I'm not going to turn into a blushing ensign at the first handsome face I see.”

“You're twenty-nine.” Raine corrected, knowing from personal experience how weakly the wisdom of years stood up to the realities of a body's biological age. “And went from bookish shut in to experienced party girl without personally experiencing the various steps between.”

“I was not a shut-in!” Jadzia objected in a defensive tone. “I was just really focused on my studies.”

Letting out an annoyed sigh Raine took a moment to just stare at Jadzia. “You were so focused on your studies your first romantic relationship was the post joining memories of other peoples romantic relationships.”

A fact the Asari knew because Jadzia herself had told her about it.

“And since then you've been going the shallow hookup route because your taste in actual romantic partners is contradictorily someone who is both young and mature.”

Something Raine had only figured out because she knew the type of men the Trill woman had ended up marrying across various timelines.

“Which matters because Deral is biologically in his thirties, and given how Meridian works, has likely lived longer than Dax. Meaning he fulfills both of those criteria, on top of being generally intelligent and charming.”

Jadzia narrowed her eyes accusingly. “Why does it suddenly feel like you're trying to play matchmaker?”

“Because I am.” Raine said innocently. “That doing so means I can finally return the favor for all the relationship advice you have given me in the past is just a bonus.”

“Uh huh.” Jadzia returned, shooting Raine a skeptical look that made the Asari’s lips twitch in amusement. 

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Stardate 48425.7 - June 5, 2371 - 09:07:55

With the majority of the Defiant's crew dealing with the scientific mystery that was Meridian, that left Raine, after getting Commander Sisko's permission, free to try her luck with what she considered the bigger mystery, the people who lived there.

“I have to admit.” She stared, looking out over the small colony's central square with Seltin, the colony's leader watching the children at play there with a small smile on her face. “This is certainly a lot calmer than the last itinerant world I spent time on.”

She'd had to fight dinosaurs there, and as fun as that had been the fact that she had been the only one of the runabout crew capable of doing so had quickly soured her on experience.

“It's still hard to believe there are more planets like Meridian out there.” Seltin confessed in a tone filled with equal parts wonder and skepticism.

“Meridian is the fourth that we know of.” Raine offered, holding back a laugh as one of the kids tripped and fell into the fountain. “Ullon Four pops in and out of a subspace pocket dimension every eleven months like clockwork. Ockmenic Nine spends all but two hours a year in a transmaterial energy plane. And Trellec Three, well, we don't really know because it hasn't returned since we found it two decades ago.”

Letting out a sigh, Seltin shook her head almost pityingly. “I suppose even the wondrous must get boring once it becomes common.”

“Maybe for certain rare beings.” Raine admitted, her thoughts going to Q and those like him. “But I've met beings millions of years old who get just as excited at seeing their ten thousandth Cosmozoan as twenty year olds seeing their first.”

“Is that way your people stay here?” She carefully probed. “The wonder of it?”

“Meridian is our home.” Seltin returned simply as she turned and began walking towards the outer edge of the colony, Raine quickly falling in step behind her as she did. “Very likely the only home our people have left.” She all but whispered at the end.

Given the sixty year blocks of time the planet spent in the other dimension Raine had suspected as much. But now that she had confirmation she could follow it up with one of the questions she’d been hoping to have an opportunity to ask.

“How long ago did you lose contact with the rest of your people?” 

Pausing in her step, Seltin glanced over her shoulder with an odd look on her face. “Does it matter?”

Yes.” Raine admitted, getting the distinct feeling from the way Seltin was looking at her now that anything other than the truth would end up with the other woman waving the issue off. “Because I was kind of hoping we might be able to find out what happened to them so we can tell you about it the next time Meridian returns. At least, assuming you don’t want Starfleet’s help relocating to a more stable world.”

“I was wondering how long it would take.” Seltin mused softly as she turned back to face Raine directly. “Your Commander Sisko danced around the question quite skillfully last night after learning the acceleration cycles of our world was nearing its destructive end point.” 

“And?” Raine floated, because she hadn’t heard anything about that from him.

“We have accepted that our end will come with Meridian.” Seltin returned simply. “So while such an offer is appreciated for the compassion with which it was made, we will not be availing ourselves of it.”

Putting on a faux smile to hide her true feelings, Raine gave a nod of understanding before motioning for the other woman to continue on.

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Stardate 48426.2 - June 5, 2371 - 13:30:43

Stalking into the Defiant’s small ready room with a frown on her face, Raine waited a moment for Commander Sisko to look up from his computer and take in her obviously agitated state before informing him of what she’d figured out.

“They’re a cult.”

“A cult?” Sisko repeated, his voice rife with skepticism at her words.

“All the signs are there.” Raine told him. “A charismatic leader, a small population, an extremely isolated location, and an almost religious reverence for the planet.”

“I didn't want to believe it at first.” She continued as she began to pace. “But too much didn't add up. And then Seltin told me straight up that they're planning to die with the world.”

Turning back to Sisko, she slammed her hands onto the edge of his desk and let out a strangled sound of barely restrained rage. “They have children Benjamin! No sane parent would doom their child like that when an option to save them is sitting right in front of them!”

Letting out a sigh as the look on his face softened, Sisko closed his computer before clasping his hands and leaning back in this chair. “Even assuming you're right Raine, with the Prime Directive at play there's nothing we can do beyond provide what help they ask for.”

“That's… We could…” She desperately wracked her mind for anything other than her knee jerk reaction to just grab the kids with the transporter and bring them back to the Federation.

“The most we can do is try to find a way to stop their world from destroying itself and maybe convince some of them to accept our offer of relocation.” Sisko put forward, all but radiating a general sense of melancholia at this point. “Both of which we're already attempting.”

Raine hung her head, the energy all but draining out of her at those words. “There has to be more we can do.”

She'd always had a love-hate relationship with the Prime Directive, oh it had its place in preventing an extraordinarily large number of abuses, but when coming face to face with a group of innocents you knew you could otherwise save, that tended to be a very cold comfort.

“It never gets easier, does it?” Sisko offered as he gave her a knowing look. “That thin line of having to respect the decisions of others when you know it will result in their deaths.”

Staring Sisko in the eye for a moment Raine shook her head. “If someone wants to meet the Koala early, that's up to them. My problem is when they decide to drag others who are unable to make that same choice along with them.”

Well, that was somewhat of a lie, because she disapproved of suicide on principle given the endless possibilities the universe offered. But she could at least accept that it was an issue with no simple answer to it.

However she also knew herself well enough to know she probably wouldn't be able to let the issue sit without saying something that would very likely make everything worse. 

“Sir, permission to delegate security duties on the planet to Lieutenant Sera?”

Sisko nodded. “Granted.”

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Author’s Notes: Sometimes you really want to punch the planet of the week idiots.