Starship Mine missing scene/reaction
The Enterprise leaves Deep space Nine a week after she arrives, with all crew accounted for and young Klingon passengers in crowds besides. Commander Data has a story to tell at mission's end, Lieutenant Worf doesn't, and Sariel's too junior to hear the details of either regardless of what's said. That doesn't bother her. It's none of her business what her superiors do in their off hours and anyhow, she has her own memories from their time at the edge of the world. As for those memories -- she's keeping them quiet, holding them close, treating a pair of giggly engineers and a red-headed outlaw just the same inside her head. Treasuring them.
They make the Remmler Array and Arkaria Base in good time. They've been preparing for the impending baryon sweep for half the journey, maybe more, and they're as ready as they can be. Sariel's as glad as the next junior officer that only the senior staff have a reception to attend when they arrive; those sorts of things are awkward when you're shy and from what she's heard Em Tyler say, commander Hutchinson has all of Sonya's talkative nature and none of her cheerful adaptability. She goes her own way once she's planetside, losing herself in the dispersing crowd as officers and civilians alike scatter to Arkaria's far corners.
Arkaria proper has forests, paths and trails marked by the footfalls of a hundred hundred horses and riders, but it's a lake beach rather than a woodland clearing that Sariel aims for. She's not alone; tourists and locals trickle in, trickle out, vanish and linger, and she's not terribly surprised when midway through the afternoon a friend settles cross-legged in the sand beside her. It's Selar.
The lake's water is clean, green-tinged and saltless and too cold for a tropical daughter to swim in. The sand is the brown of the inland, shaded with the colors of the surrounding soil. Selar is her matter-of-fact self, stark facts and plain speech; she's cool, frank, honest to a fault. Sariel doesn't mind - just the opposite, really. Selar's many things, but she's not loud, and her usual blunt truthfulness extends to calling Sariel friend. That's alright, and then some. It's mutual.
Green. The bindings are copper.
Of course, neither woman gets the details of what happened at the reception until later. Stories circulate back in fits and fragments; Sonya calls Em, who's worried about Geordi; she immediately calls Selar, and never mind that the Vulcan doctor's nowhere near Arkaria base itself and can't help. Sariel's right there when the lieutenant's communicator chimes, and--well. She hears.
In the end, it's disaster averted. Narrowly averted, but averted nonetheless. The fine details of the situation don't ever become entirely clear; an infiltration, a hostage situation - Sariel shudders at the phrase - and something about... Captain Picard, a barber and a saddle? Sariel, frankly, isn't in a hurry to ask what any of that last actually means.
The facts are plain as they break orbit. The captain is safe. Commander La Forge is fine. The rest of the senior staff are all accounted for.
Commander Hutchinson is not fine. Commander Hutchinson was dead on the floor.
Sariel didn't know him. That doesn't mean she doesn't still feel a twinge of guilt for disliking the idea of the man. She's not sure what she thinks of Arkaria in the end, pleasant afternoon by the lake aside. Part of her is, and she admits this freely to herself, rather glad to see the back of the place when the Enterprise leaves.
They make the Remmler Array and Arkaria Base in good time. They've been preparing for the impending baryon sweep for half the journey, maybe more, and they're as ready as they can be. Sariel's as glad as the next junior officer that only the senior staff have a reception to attend when they arrive; those sorts of things are awkward when you're shy and from what she's heard Em Tyler say, commander Hutchinson has all of Sonya's talkative nature and none of her cheerful adaptability. She goes her own way once she's planetside, losing herself in the dispersing crowd as officers and civilians alike scatter to Arkaria's far corners.
Arkaria proper has forests, paths and trails marked by the footfalls of a hundred hundred horses and riders, but it's a lake beach rather than a woodland clearing that Sariel aims for. She's not alone; tourists and locals trickle in, trickle out, vanish and linger, and she's not terribly surprised when midway through the afternoon a friend settles cross-legged in the sand beside her. It's Selar.
The lake's water is clean, green-tinged and saltless and too cold for a tropical daughter to swim in. The sand is the brown of the inland, shaded with the colors of the surrounding soil. Selar is her matter-of-fact self, stark facts and plain speech; she's cool, frank, honest to a fault. Sariel doesn't mind - just the opposite, really. Selar's many things, but she's not loud, and her usual blunt truthfulness extends to calling Sariel friend. That's alright, and then some. It's mutual.
Green. The bindings are copper.
Of course, neither woman gets the details of what happened at the reception until later. Stories circulate back in fits and fragments; Sonya calls Em, who's worried about Geordi; she immediately calls Selar, and never mind that the Vulcan doctor's nowhere near Arkaria base itself and can't help. Sariel's right there when the lieutenant's communicator chimes, and--well. She hears.
In the end, it's disaster averted. Narrowly averted, but averted nonetheless. The fine details of the situation don't ever become entirely clear; an infiltration, a hostage situation - Sariel shudders at the phrase - and something about... Captain Picard, a barber and a saddle? Sariel, frankly, isn't in a hurry to ask what any of that last actually means.
The facts are plain as they break orbit. The captain is safe. Commander La Forge is fine. The rest of the senior staff are all accounted for.
Commander Hutchinson is not fine. Commander Hutchinson was dead on the floor.
Sariel didn't know him. That doesn't mean she doesn't still feel a twinge of guilt for disliking the idea of the man. She's not sure what she thinks of Arkaria in the end, pleasant afternoon by the lake aside. Part of her is, and she admits this freely to herself, rather glad to see the back of the place when the Enterprise leaves.