Ensign T'Reyna - The Battle of Harlow-III

[Gogigobo Fairhug]

Really enjoyed this engrossing sim from @Mister_Wake, particularly the way it shows the difference in what was actually happening/being said and what was happening/being said in T’Reyna’s mind. 👏🏻

((Distribution Station, Biodome 2B, Miri IVa))

Having a scanner buzzing by her head was not pleasant, yet a lesser annoyance compared to the fury rising in her scorching veins.

Myran:  If she is indeed infected, Commander, she needs to be moved to a medical facility quickly.

Fairhug: Ensign, how do you f…

Foolish, foolish...

T'Reyna: Shut up!  ::She outburst::   My.. Head! So ... Full of ... Hatred! Commander, Adjunct, I am... unfit for ... Duty, please ... stun me before--...

This could be career ending. Telling an officer to quiet. He understands, however. This is not herself. Any fool could deduce that.

oO I need to control myself Oo

Myran: Commander?  

A soft feeling. Touch, hands, sensation. It caused her eyes to widen, in surprise, in anxiety, in happiness and anger all at once. Relief and stress, how dare she touch you, she is here to help, please do not touch me...

Irrational, illogical, irritable..

Myran: Let me take your pain, Ensign.  ::Turning to Fairhug, her eyes full of compassion.:: I can only dull her pain, Commander.  I cannot work against the effects of the plant; however.

Ah... Solace...

All that pain through her neurons ceased. No longer did the fire spread through her with agony to kick her blooming chaos into motion. Her breaths would become more steady, practiced and focused as she attempted to endure through the emotions.

This was like Pon Farr all over again.

Fairhug: How do you feel, Ensign?

T'Reyna: I am not... Fit... For duty...

Myran?: No, you are not.  Commander, we should really move her to a medical facility, but we also need to deal with this uprising and the plant that has once again morphed into something other than what it was.

Containment is logical. Containment is best. Containment is encasement, wrong, you can help them, they need you, this is not what you deserve! Serve them, prove yourself! The pain may be dulled, but the flames are out of control, like a bonfire rising smoke, filling the lungs with choking ambition! 

Fairhug: Do you have anyone who can help nearby?

Myran pulled out her communicator and typed something into it one handed. 

Myran?: I have let security know that we have several affected by the plant.  They are sending reinforcements and medical personnel.  

Fairhug: Ensign, why do you feel you are unfit for duty?

The Commander! Calming, soothing, official!

Answer him, you fool! He asked you a question, soldier!

T’Reyna: Symptoms... Blood on fire... Emotions- forced... And... And... Difficult to think... Fighting oneself, to... suppress... An attack from within... it is... in my blood...

 

Even without the pain, the new war within raged on. Sweat dripped down from her forehead as her body fought the flu-like symptoms, her body trying to heat out the pathogens within. 

 

Cold fusion, soldier. You feel that flowing through your veins, the energy? That is not an illness, that is you! What you are without that pathetic Vulcan teachings, who you are supposed to be! If you destroy the working parts, you get a broken machine! A beacon of light from a burning screen! Light it all up, Subaltern! Let this city burn, root out the infection, bring these miserable people the monster they believe you to be!

oO I am not a Subaltern any longer... I am an Ensign! My duty is to these people, not destruction.. Oo

 

Cut the source of the problem out, you cannot cure cancer without radiation! Fight the fire within with a fire of your own! Burn it all down! Light up the void!

 

Hands firm.

Her eyes snapped to the Adjunct as she was grasped like a common criminal. No matter how much T'Reyna knew why, her body insisted on fighting back. Every ounce of her being fought against the infection, the illogical conceptions of hostility...

Myran?: Please don’t fight against me, Ensign.  This is for your safety.  We’re going to get you some help.

Fairhug?: Perhaps we should take a step back, Adjunct. T’Reyna is a friend and a Starfleet Officer. I’m sure she means us no harm.

Yes, Officer, I am Subaltern T'Reyna, ally, friend, you are not my target...

T’Reyna: Commander, it is... ok...--

That is all she managed to say.

It was not the flash of phaser fire she sensed first. It was the sound she first heard.

Phaser. Fire. Energy. Flame.

Fairhug?: Get down up!

Shoved away by a force she could not even register of the Commanders, she was now free of the soothing grasp of Myran. The pain returned, flooding her being. Yet it was not the same agony she felt before. No, this was not pain. It was something different. Something familiar. Something worse. Something older.

Myran: ?

Another shot. Another firefight. Another time.

Fairhug?: It’s the Tellarite Jem'Hadar. Looks like he found T’Reyna’s phaser!

Myran: ?

T’Reyna: Contact!

 

This wasn't an alleyway.

It was the Badlands.

Harlow-III. A barely inhabited piece of rock in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by abnormal storms in space that made any chance of reinforcements a petty dream. Yet even here, across these scorched barren rocks filled with craters, the flames swirled in vortex firestorms, rushing in hazes across the battlefield. Smoke rose from the pits nearby, where ships had been shot down and homes had been laid to waste. The only safety were canyons; natural rock formations where once the rivers of life flowed, only to dry after thousands of years of heat.

 

Walls either side, bricks upon Miri-IV, the canyon stretched only a small passage. No cover, no escape, only a way forward. To fight. The pain of the heat rose from within, a uniform ripped and torn as blood oozed from her chin, scarred from the protest, shrapnel from artillery. This was war. This was Hell.

 

Before her, the enemy came into sight as her two crewmates fell. The Jem'Hadar, armoured and rifled, his pale scales as clear in this red rock as a target like a star in space. His rifle raised and she knew his aim was perfected through Dominion training. Yet he missed, anyway. The phaser hitting a wall above Commander Fairhug. Perhaps it was the storms that toyed his senses, or a lack of ketracel-white. Both sides had lacked supplies for weeks.

 

There was only moments before they deaths. She acted fast, as was her instinct, a good soldier that she is. She dived down, gripping Adjunct Myran's Sublieutenant Voltok's phaser from her his holster. In a snap-like motion, muscle memory and trained focus, she fired upon the TellariteJem'Hadar soldier.

 

Myran/Fairhug: ?

 

It is fortunate Myran had set it to stun.

 

The enemy fell, heavily with a thud.

Another foe defeated, of little relief for their vast infinite numbers. Harlow-III, she swore, would not be their grave, no matter how much they must suffer to fulfill their role in this endless war.

 

Wasn't this war twenty-six years ago?

 

T'Reyna blinked.

 

The Tellarite was on the floor, stunned from Adjunct's phaser. Slowly, as she came back to reality, she dropped the phaser with a shaken hand once more. To her, the body was still. She knew not if she had just killed him or not.

 

She did not know if she had just killed an innocent man. In that momentary panic, she felt her body freeze in place as the fires cooled. For even a soldier, burning in the embers of battle, would defeat themselves in the cold depths of guilt.

 

Myran/Fairhug: ?

 

Ensign T'Reyna
Security
Starbase 118 Ops
O240102T11