Darkened Stars - Chapter 8 

Darkened Stars - Chapter 8 

Stardate 29218.4 - March 20, 2352 - 22:25:32

Rain stared dumbfounded at the honest to god black clad katana wielding ninja that had just broken into her bedroom through one of the somehow jimmied open metal shuttered windows before the feeling of cool wind on still wet skin reminded the Asari just what her current state of dress was.

“You know what.” She told the almost surprised looking ninja as it stood there seemingly trying to decide just what to do with the circumstance it had found itself in. “I don't care.”

“So just shoo.” She continued making a “go away” motion with her hands. “And we can pretend this whole thing never–”

A throwing knife shot towards her face, only to stop dead on her barrier before falling blade first down to lodge itself into the stone of the floor. She stared at the absurdly sharp blade for a moment trying to comprehend just why a ninja might want to kill her before deciding it didn’t really matter.

“Fuck this, I’m going to kill you now.” She told them, making a gesture with the hand that wasn’t holding up a towel.

The ninja garbed person, seemingly in possession of at least some sort of survival instinct, made a break for the window, getting all of a two steps before the crackling blue biotic energy slammed them into the metal wall with enough force that the Asari doubted even a Klingon could walk away without several broken bones.

“And now there’s ninja on my wall.” Rain muttered tiredly to herself, knowing she’d have to clean the blood and other fluids up before going to bed lest she regret it in the morning.

The door to her room flew open, an angry nightclothes clad Jel’ang standing there with a disruptor pistol at the ready.

“Quick! There has been a…” She trailed off seeing the dead body not far from Rain’s metal shuttered window.

“Security breach.” The Klingon woman finished lamely, lowering her disruptor and frowning at Rain. “You could not take them alive?”

“He threw a knife at my head!” Rain protested with a pout. “And it’s not like I take a phaser with me to the bath or anything.”

“Or have even been able to find someone willing to sell me a phaser.” She groused, well aware that it was likely her own fault for basically picking a side.

“I do not like your continued obsession with replacing your Terran pistol.” Jel'ang said, shooting Rain a disapproving glare as she clutched the weapon in her hand slightly tighter in her grip. “A disruptor is an all around better weapon.”

“Because phasers have more options.” Rain said, rolling her eyes at the old argument. Sure, disruptors were better at straight up killing things. But if you needed something that could also cut through a wall, do some emergency wielding, or clear a large amount of collapsed rubble, a phaser was the way to go.

“Anyways.” She continued with a frown. “What’s with the ninja?”

“Ninja?” Jel'ang repeated with a confused look on her face.

Rain let out and annoyed sigh, having forgotten for a moment that the term might not translate and pointed to the body. 

“That's what Terrans sometimes call people who dress up in black and break into places.”

“I see.” Jel'ang returned with a nod of understanding before giving a mild shrug. “It is just an assassin. Likely from one of the local crime lords that are upset with our crackdown on their operations.”

Rain vaguely recalled the Klingon woman mentioning something about that a couple months back, but she hadn't really been paying attention at the time given she'd been focused on making sure dinner was properly put together.

“So, do we need to contact someone?” Rain inquired, not really sure what the Klingon procedure for such things given 'dead assassin’ hadn't really been covered in the handbook.

“We are Klingons not Cardassians.” Jel'ang answered with an amused laugh. “We shall check the body for any sign of who sent them, seize weapons for our own, and disintegrate the corpse.”

“Can I have the Katana?” Rain asked hopefully, having always wanted one of her own back when she had been human.

“Of course.” Jel'ang agreed approvingly. “It is your kill after all.

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Stardate 29359.7 - May 11, 2352 - 15:36:17

Listening to the public information broadcasts, ironically known as the Cardassian News Network, one would think the Alliance was leading a generally successful campaign to retake the North American continent from the Terran Rebellion, Rain of course knew otherwise.

As she suspected, did most of the Alliance members who were actually stationed in and around the Sol system. Because the truth was, at least according to bits and pieces she'd learned from the occasional chat with Kogen, one planet just wasn't that important to politicians who figured the worst that might happen was a need to box the place up.

Which, well, Rain vaguely remembered something similar happening in a mirror universe comic that had been about Picard stealing a secretly constructed Enterprise and using it to take over or restart the Terran Empire.

Either way, metaknowledge told Rain that was almost surely the direction this was heading if things weren't nipped in the bud, not that she was really in any position to do anything about it. But well, she'd at least have an all expenses paid ticket off the world with the rest of the Klingon forces when it came time for it.

At which point she honestly wasn't sure what she would do, though ‘stick around till Jel'ang died and then escape to the prime universe’ was currently in the–

“Are you going to pick, or stare at the tank all day like a dull witted gha'cher?” The annoyed voice of the Klingon who's stall she was standing in front of interrupted.

“Perhaps if your shell squid were more lively, I wouldn't have such a hard time deciding which should have the honor to serve as my lady’s dinner.” Rain shot back, well used to the Klingon idea of negotiation at this point.

“You dare!” He yelled in heavily exaggerated affront as he slammed his palms down on the countertop. “Look at the opalescence on those shells! Any true Klingon would know that is how you determine a shell squid's quality!”

Any Klingon that didn't think to ask an actual Klingon chef, sure, Rain thought to herself. But she had, because Jel'ang's mother had once again come to voice her general disapproval of her daughter, and the Asari wanted to continue operation 'butter up the matriarch’ since it seemed to be working to at least somewhat soften the strict woman's opinion of them.

“I am sure D’eboca will be interested to hear that he is not a true Klingon then.” Rain said with a smirk, knowing the chef who had suggested this stall to her would be more likely to find the whole encounter hilarious than take offense.

“Ha!” The stall owner laughed, throwing back this head in mirth as he did. “As if I don't call that old saber bear worse to his face any time he comes by.”

“Then perhaps he was just wrong about your shell squid being the best in the city.” Rain tossed out before turning to leave.

“As if that would–” He began.

“Are you driving off more business!?” The angry looking Klingon woman who had just entered through the back portion of the stall exclaimed as she glared at the stall owner.

“Never my dearest par'mach’kai.” The stall owner attempted to reassure the woman as Rain turned back to watch with an amused grin.

“I wished to buy high quality shell squid for my lady's visiting mother.” Rain interjected innocently. “Unfortunately it seems your husband does not have any in stock.”

“And if we had better you would buy them?” The woman asked, turning to Rain with narrowed eyes.

“In a second.” Rain confirmed with a grin, not wanting to have to do this all over again with another seller when she had more important things to get done today.

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The open air Klingon market was a little over a kilometer from the small compound that belonged to House Pelkar,  a good ten minute walk that Rain could cut down to seven by cutting through a number of semi-shaded alleyways that in an odd juxtaposition were actually safer to travel down then the main streets.

Unfortunately it seemed some people hadn't gotten that message.

“Can we not?” Rain asked hopefully as she took in the pair of black garbed humanoids who had taken up position blocking the exit of the alley she had been passing through.

“If you don't want me using the alleys today I can just–” She continued, turning to head back the way she had come only to let out a sigh upon seeing a third black clad form standing at that end.

“You realize I have a gun, right?” Rain tried, reaching down with the hand not carrying a sack of shell squid to the disruptor pistol at her hip that Jel'ang had demanded she carry when out after the last ninja incident.

As if in response to that all three of the black clad humanoids reached into their outfits and pulled out devices which looked, at least to the Asari's eyes, like nothing more than stylized sword hilts.

“You can't be–” She started to mutter in disbelief before with an odd electricity-like sound three blades of blood red energy shot out from the devices.

“Fucking lightsaber katanas!”

Oh she vaguely remembered something similar from Star Trek Online, but she hadn’t thought they were actually a thing. Now wasn’t the time for regrets about missing out on years of owning a knockoff lightsaber however, and she dropped the bag, pulling out her pistol and releasing as many shots as she could get off at the closest of the three.

Four green bolts sped out from her weapon, one of which was intercepted by the glowing blade of the female ninja that had been behind Rain, confirming her fear that there was at least some sort of force-field technology involved with the weapon. Two of the other bolts went wide, while the third clipped the woman’s calm, a walking wound at best if the disruptor had been set to kill like most Klingon’s tended to keep theirs.

Rain of course didn’t, so she took a grim satisfaction in watching the female ninja tumble to the ground unconscious from the heavy stun effect. And then she was desperately dodging around the pair of weapons from the other two as they did their level best to try and cut her up with them.

She would fully admit her combat training was eclectic at best, basically being some unholy combination of Leck taught street fighting, Jel’ang taught Klingon combat forms, and whatever else she had picked up over the years. And even that likely wouldn’t have saved her from having her barrier tested if it wasn’t for the tight confines of the alley making it so her opponents had a highly limited number of attack vectors.

Jumping back, she narrowly avoided a swipe of one of the black clad attackers legs that would have spent her tumbling into the others blade, and she raised her disruptor to counter only to have one of the energy blades lodge itself halfway into the barrel.

A brief lull passed as the three of them stared at the pair of locked weapons in surprise, before Rain punched the one that had just destroyed her weapon in the stomach with a biotic clad fist whose energies spread out from the sight of impact and turned his insides to mush. 

As he fell, the Asari fell with him into a controlled roll that took her past the other before springing back to her feet with another energy clad punch to the remaining attackers kidney’s that had him suffering a similar fate to his compatriot. Which with the adrenaline fading was when a mild burning pain in her leg made the Asari look down and grimace at the partially melted patch of artificial leather substitute that made up her pants.

“You’re lucky dermal regenerators are a thing.” Rain muttered to the unconscious female as she rounded up the automatically deactivated energy-blades for her spoils. “And even more that you attacked me somewhere I couldn’t just instantly kill you all.”

Grabbing her bag of shell squid from where it had landed, Rain looked over at the still unconscious form, mentally debating just what she should do with the woman before grabbing a leg with a tired sigh.

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“I bring dinner and a gift!” Rain announced as she walked back in through the door of the compound, dragging the still unconscious girl behind her as she made her way to the living room.

“Think she’s one of those–”

She stopped dead at the sight that greeted her, the normally organized room was a mess, at least half a dozen black clad bodies lay scattered amongst pieces of overturned and broken furniture. 

And at the very center of those bodies, lay the still and unmoving form of two Klingon women.

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Author's Notes: Achievement unlocked, survive the prologue.