MSNPC Taradar - It was going to be a long day

[Teal]

I loved this snapshot story of the action through the eyes of a civilian on DS33 as a young Kelpian shopkeeper strives to save his plants amongst the growing chaos. Can we keep him? @Sirok, I think that's the right tag??

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((Taradar's, Promenade, Commercial Sector, Beta Module))

Taradar's plants, it was his shop and his life for the last few years.
Taradar was a young Kelpian and had thought it was a great idea to provide
some calm to people living in an unnatural place like a pile of metal
floating in the middle of space. It was more than proven that watching plants grow in such a space helped the psychological state of
several sentient species.

The shop was somewhat narrow, because he tried to make the most of the
space.  The shop was illuminated by a not very bright and warm ambient
light, but the main lights came from the alcoves in which each of the
plants were placed, adapted to the needs of each one of them. To prevent
trouble for the customers, the plants were arranged according to the
frequency of light they needed, to avoid sudden changes. Perhaps not
everyone noticed, but for someone with eyes as sensitive as a Kelpian's,
that kind of detail was important. The place was spotless, with a faint
musty smell and a slight electrical hum from the various lights and
humidifiers.

He had not yet passed through his Vahar'ai and the DS33 situation was
making him more than nervous. A huge part of him was telling him to run, to
leave as soon as possible. But the Kelpians had been teaching their young
to control their pre-Vahar'ai impulses for over a century. Starfleet
officers had strongly encouraged civilians like him to evacuate the
station. And that's what he wanted to do, but unlike others, his
merchandise couldn't be stored easily. He was dealing with living beings,
some of them delicate and needing more care than automated systems could
perform. Of course he wanted to leave, and he tried to prepare the more
delicate plants to take with him so that he could leave others with the
automated system. But it was a slow and painstaking process, so he had
chosen to take one of the last transports.

Taradar was finishing setting up the alcove for the denobulan orchids,
normally well suited to artificial environments, but he didn't know how
long he would be gone. He began to hear noise on the Promenade, he was
surprised, as the evacuation continued he heard less noise and people, not
more. He stepped out of the small room for a moment, leaving the smells and
dampness of his space behind. Outside he saw a large group of Starfleet
officers going to Warrior Sports and setting up barricades around it like
at the nearest docking port. He figured they'd be doing it at the others.
He didn't quite understand why they would set up barricades if a storm
troop could beam down basically anywhere. Stranger still, though, was that
he could have sworn he'd seen a couple of commanders go into the sports
tent. Weren't senior officers supposed to be in OPS to prevent assault?

The slender Kelpian stood watching for a moment as all these people moved
about. His was not the only shop that was open or staffed, but it was true
that they were a huge minority. On the other hand, something was gleaning
at him, making the back of his head tighten. The same officers who were
supposed to protect him and the rest of the civilians, who were beginning
to position themselves all over the commercial sector, smelled strange.
They were of different species, so he couldn't quite put his finger on what
but it was there, it was a smell that indicated something was going on that
wasn't the usual one. He even heard more noise and smells coming from the
jeffreys tubes, everything was going wrong.

He went back into the shop to continue packing up, he still had a lot of
work to do to make sure everything was secure. Furthermore, he had a
feeling it was going to be a long day.

OCC: I wanted to give a different view of the situation to that of
Starfleet officers, and even if the Khitomer is more concerned with
civilians, it doesn't mean that there aren't some on the loose.

-- 
Taradar
Owner of Taradar's plants
Deep Space 33
E239702S10

https://sims.starbase118.net/single/Ronin/-O3TIqmR56zG_JNYf-Ah

Edited August 9 by Teal