NEW: DS9 Oswiecim 40/42 [PG-13 Violence]
Gabrielle Lawson
Title: Oswiecim
Author: Gabrielle Lawson (gla...@gwu.edu)
Series: DS9
Part: NEW 40/42
Rating: [PG-13] (Violence)
Codes:
See part 0/42 for disclaimer
Chapter Seventeen -- Continued
He felt again the blackness slipping away, but this time
there was no voice and no screaming. It was still quiet. He
could hear the air rushing in and rushing out, and he knew it
was his own breath. He could feel the pain again and
remember why it was there. He heard familiar sounds, clicks
and beeps. One, he knew, was his pulse.
He opened his eyes, expecting to see light that would
hurt them. But the light was dim and his vision blurred. He
turned his head, or at least he tried. The muscles on the right
side of his neck protested painfully. But now he could see
there was a form beside him, sleeping in a chair. He looked
uncomfortable.
Sisko. That was not the voice he had heard. But it was
right that he was there. He heard his words again in his head.
*Don't give up on us yet.* He closed his eyes again in shame.
He had done just that.
He tried to move his arm, to touch him and see if he
was real, but his left arm wouldn't move past the elbow. Sharp
pain emanated from his shoulder. He remembered his
shoulders hurting, that one being dislocated. He reached then
with his right arm, across his chest. That hurt, too, but he had
to try. "Captain," he attempted to say, but his voice wouldn't
work. His throat hurt when he tried.
"Captain?"
Sisko jerked awake and saw, first, Amsha Bashir's
form lying on the next bed over. She had asked him to come
while she slept. He was grateful to her for that. He looked up
at the doctor who stood just behind him. She was smiling.
She tilted her head toward the biobed. Sisko followed her gaze
to find Julian Bashir looking back at him, reaching out his
hand to him.
"Captain," Bashir said softly, but gravelly. His eyes
looked hopeful. "Are you real?"
Sisko forgot his weariness and pulled his chair closer to
the biobed. He took Bashir's hand and listened for his
whisper. "Yes," he replied happily, "I'm real."
"Good." Bashir's mouth turned up ever so slightly in a
smile. "I was . . . ," he took a breath, ". . . worried about you."
Now that didn't make any sense. "Me?" he asked. But
when Bashir didn't offer an explanation he didn't push the
issue. "Do you know where you are?"
The smile disappeared as Bashir looked around the
room as best he could. His mother, now awake, was at his
other side, smiling down at him. He smiled back, for just a
moment. "A hospital," he answered. "Modern."
Sisko nodded. "Starfleet Medical."
"Why does it still hurt?" Bashir asked, still in a
whisper.
Sisko didn't know how to respond. He didn't want to
provoke any bad memories. "It was cyanide," he finally said.
He was about to explain that the doctors couldn't give him
anything for the pain because it might interfere, but Bashir
nodded that he understood already. *Of course, he does,*
Sisko admonished himself.
"How long?"
Sisko wasn't quite sure what he was asking but
assumed he meant how much time since he'd been gassed.
"Twenty-three hours."
Bashir smiled again. "That's more than four."
Sisko grinned, too. "Yes, it is."
The smile disappeared and Sisko saw there was
genuine worry in the younger man's eyes. "I'm sorry," he
said.
Sisko didn't understand. What had Bashir done to be
sorry for? "For what?"
"I gave up on you." Sisko could see Bashir's eyelids
trying to close again. But they didn't and he continued, "In the
gas . . . ," he breathed. "I tried to hold my breath . . . but--"
He
broke off then and looked away to the ceiling. His breath
came faster, but in uneven spurts.
"You couldn't hold your breath that long, Julian,"
Sisko said, trying to console him. "No one could."
Bashir's brown eyes, so tired, turned back to him. "I
took . . . a deep breath," he said, "of the gas . . . to die."
Thoughts ran through Sisko's mind of what it must
have been like in there and shook his head. No one would
blame him for giving up, not in there. "Julian," he began, but
he didn't quite know what else to say. "It's alright," was all he
could think of. "Don't be sorry."
Bashir was losing the battle with his eyelids. He
nodded weakly. "I had a dream," he said, "that Kira was . . .
coming to save me." He blinked, trying to stay awake.
"She did," Sisko told him and watched him fall asleep
again.
******
Bashir awoke, and this time, there was no light at all
and no pain. He could turn his head and even move his
shoulder. He lifted his hands. The left was identical to the
right, unbroken. He did not even feel hungry. He felt fine.
For the first time in weeks he was warm and felt at peace. He
was safe.
"Jules!" his mother exclaimed as she entered the room.
"You're awake. Your father and I were so worried." She
came to his bed and hugged him. Her touch was soft, not
painful. She kissed his forehead and pulled back to sit beside
his legs at the foot of the bed.
Julian looked around the room, but did not see his
father. "Where's Dad?" he asked.
"In prison," his mother answered. She seemed
untroubled by that fact.
"They didn't let him out,?" Bashir complained. "Even
for this?"
"It's really not important, Jules," she told him.
"You're well , and we have you back again."
Julian looked at her. It was an odd thing to say, and a
strange choice of words. She smiled at him and her smile sent
a wave of dread though his body. It was an evil smile. She
blinked and when her eyes opened they were black, no iris, no
pupil. She laughed. When she spoke, her voice was no longer
that of his mother. It was Whaley and it was Heiler at the
same time. "And we won't make the same mistakes this
time."
She reached her hand toward him, to touch his chest .
A small strand of her fluid self, like a short, thick needle,
protruded from her opened palm. Bashir was frozen to the
bed. He couldn't move or call for help. He couldn't even
scream. Her hand touched him, stabbed through his skin.
Julian gasped and his eyes flew open. The room was
dark and quiet, but he couldn't turn his head, and his shoulder
wouldn't move. He felt soreness and fatigue. And his
stomach was empty. A long tube ran from his left arm to a
unit on the wall. His mother was beside him, sitting in the
chair where he thought he'd seen Sisko. She was sleeping, and
he was afraid to wake her. He barely blinked the rest of the
night.
******
Kira left the conference room and blew out a breath.
She hadn't had to deal with the temporal investigators last
time. This time, she had faced a roomful of them. They'd
already been through nearly everyone else who had been on
the planet. Though she had really spent less time than any of
them on the surface, with the exception of Sisko and his short
visit, she was the highest ranking officer who'd gone down.
So they spent the greatest amount of time grilling her on
everything that she had done and seen. Who had she talked to?
What did she say? Did she think that she, in any way, changed
the timeline?
They hadn't liked her story about the barracks. She
hadn't liked it either, but she told them the truth. And the truth
was that, while she didn't think her actions altered the
timeline, she couldn't be sure. Maybe the block elder was
angered by her visit and punished one of the others. Maybe he
hadn't the first time around. She didn't know. Still, she
wasn't sorry. She would have done the same again if it meant
saving Bashir.
Besides, she reminded them, if anyone had changed the
timeline it was the changeling herself. She had killed at least
one man that probably wasn't meant to die in the original
timeline. In her capacity as an SS officer in a concentration
camp, she might have killed more. They wouldn't know for
sure until Bashir had his debriefing. Kira was looking forward
to that even less than she had her own. While she was,
admittedly, curious about his seven and a half weeks off the
ship, she knew it would be difficult at best for the doctor to
recount those weeks to a group of strangers. Bureaucrats, no
less.
He was sitting up when she entered his room. He
smiled as his mother excused herself. "I don't mean to
interrupt," Kira told her. "I can come another time."
"No, no," Amsha said, touching her shoulder, "I need a
break."
"She's hungry," Bashir said, "but she doesn't want to
admit it in front of me." His voice was soft, but getting
stronger. Two days of lying in bed had done a lot for him.
"They still won't let him eat real food," Amsha
explained. "I think it must be terrible."
"It might be more terrible," he argued, "if after all
those weeks starving, I died because I ate something." He
sighed. "But you're right. It is terrible. So eat for both of us,
and tell me all about it when you get back."
Kira couldn't help but smile at him. How could he
make jokes, after all that? Amsha squeezed her arm and
pushed her gently into the room. Kira just watched him for a
moment, standing at the foot of his bed. He was still thin, but
the tube that led into his arm was feeding him nutrients at a
level his body could withstand. He wasn't bruised anymore.
They had taken care of that. But he still leaned his head back
on pillows, and his left arm was still restrained against the bed.
A display over his head monitored his heartbeat.
"Please sit down," he told her finally. "It makes me
tired watching you stand."
Kira obeyed, though she really didn't mind standing.
She'd just spent six hours with the bureaucrats, sitting when
she wanted to get up and, at the very least, pace the room.
"How are you, Julian?"
"Better than I look, I hope," he answered. He was still
smiling, but he looked sad. "At least two more surgeries." He
glanced down at his hand. It was still twisted and ugly, though
it had regained more of its natural coloring. "It's knit together
already," he explained. "They're going to try something new.
Osteogenic replacements. All new bones, patterned after my
other hand, so they'll match. Did you kill her?"
The question was so blunt; it took Kira by surprise.
"Yes," she answered plainly.
"Are you sure?" he asked, fear growing in his eyes. "I
mean, because I keep thinking . . . or--or dreaming that--"
"She's dead, Julian," Kira promised him. She lifted her
hand. "Hold out your hand."
She could tell he was afraid, but slowly, his right hand
lifted from the bed, palm up. Kira held a small vial and she
poured the contents of it into his hand. "That's all that's left of
her."
Bashir stared at the gray-black powder in his hand as if
he was waiting for it to change and move. His hand shook.
She had scooped up a handful of the powder just before she
transported. Once the ship was docked, she had dumped it
from her pocket into the little vial. Now she helped him dump
it back. "It's for you," she said, putting the vial in his hand,
"to do with as you please. If you want to destroy it, there's a
phaser waiting for you as soon as they let you out of here."
He held the vial up and gazed into it. But she could see
that he was seeing more than the powder. He drew in a shaky
breath. "I can't tell my mother this," he said, speaking softly,
"but sometimes, I don't know what is real. I keep thinking this
is the dream, and when I'm awake is when I'm asleep. I'm
back there. And she's back there. Or I dream it and I wake up
and see her here where you're sitting. And she leaned toward
me and--" He couldn't finish. His mouth just wouldn't make
the words come out.
"That's not really awake," Kira told him. She took the
vial back and placed it on a table, and then she took his hand.
"This is real, Julian. It's over. I promise."
He shook his head. "But you can't," he said. "They
can be anything, Nerys, anywhere. They can be the wall or the
bed. Or you. Or me. You can't promise anything."
Kira didn't know what to say. He was right. It was a
terrifying thought. She had been having thoughts like that
since Ambassador Krajensky turned out to be a changeling.
And then when the Dominion had invaded, she had had
nightmares. She still did sometimes. But she could always tell
the dreams from something real. For him, the nightmare had
been real.
She knew what it was like, to a certain extent. She had
fought most of her life to rid her planet of Cardassians. And
when it finally happened, and they were gone, that felt more
like a dream to her than reality. Life was different, too easy
maybe, without the constant threat, the constant fear. Which
was more real?
He surprised her again. "I lied, Kira," he said.
She shook her head. She didn't know what he was
talking about. *Lied about what?*
"On the ship," he explained, "when I had to go back. I
lied about why."
She still didn't understand. "You mean they wouldn't
have killed those other people?"
This time he shook his head. He winced a little when
he did. "They would have killed them. I didn't lie about that.
But I wasn't so concerned about the timeline as I let on. I
don't think I cared about the timeline at all. I was more
concerned about Max and Leo and maybe Vlada, but I hadn't
seen him for so long."
Kira thought for a moment before answering. Would
she have cared, in his situation, or would the people have
meant more to her? She knew they would. She had made a
similar decision about Gaia, offering to give her life to protect
the lives of the *Defiant*'s descendants. But for Bashir, it had
been even more personal. "They were your friends," Kira
stated. "They would have killed them first."
"Can you find them for me, Kira," he asked, his eyes
filling with urgency. "I need to know."
Bashir was still holding her hand, but he held it tighter
now. "I'll try," she promised. "What were their names?"
"Max Zeidl," he told her. She found a PADD and
handed it to him. But he didn't write it. "I don't know Leo's
last name. I just know that he was Max's brother-in-law, his
wife's brother. And I don't know how to spell Zeidl. I haven't
got a clue about Vlada." He laid the PADD down.
"V-l-a, with an accent mark, d, with a haczek, a."
Bashir was startled by the interruption. Kira had been
too, but she recognized the doctor's voice and accent.
"It's Czech, yes?" the doctor asked, stepping farther
into the room.
"Yes," Bashir answered. "Can you write it?" He held
the PADD to her. His hand still shook. Kira wasn't sure if it
was fear or weakness. She remembered what he had said.
They could be anyone.
"Of course,"she took the PADD. "What was his last
name?"
"Sczerbak," Bashir said the name slowly. Kira didn't
blame him. It sounded difficult.
"Definitely Czech," the doctor said brightly. "Any
others?" Bashir repeated Max's name, which she wrote down.
She handed the PADD back to him, but he handed it to Kira.
"Major," the doctor continued, "I'm afraid I'm going to have
to ask you to leave. We have a surgery to prepare for."
Kira stood quickly, but Bashir stopped her from going.
"Thank you," he said. His face was so serious. "You're my
hero now."
"You should talk to Jordan," she told him. "He found
you the first time."
"I'd like to."
Kira gave him another smile, though she felt worse
now than when she had come in. He was right. There was no
certain way to tell if someone was a changeling. The doctor
could be one. And she was about to leave him alone with her.
*Don't be ridiculous,* she told herself. *She hasn't hurt him
yet.* She excused herself and took the list of names with her.
Three days later, it was Bashir's turn in the conference
room. He'd only been walking since the day before, but he
insisted on walking to the debriefing himself. Captain Sisko
was there, still in dress uniform. He helped Bashir to
straighten his. It was a little too big. Bashir stared at himself
in the mirror. He almost did not recognize himself.
"It was a nice service," the captain was saying. "I'm
sorry you couldn't be there."
Bashir shook his head. "I saw her kill people," he said,
"beat them to death in front of me. But I didn't know about
the others. She only said she killed you. I should have caught
it. I knew there was something wrong with the blood."
"Julian," Sisko said, sounding a bit frustrated. "It
wasn't your fault. None of it was your fault. Do you
remember when the Klingons attacked the station? Martok
stood right in front of me and cut his hand open. He bled right
there on my desk. But he wasn't Martok. I couldn't tell. And
you, you walked around for a month performing surgery and
we couldn't tell it wasn't you." He softened his voice again.
"She fooled all of us, Julian."
Julian knew he was right. He was just so used to
blaming himself. But he remembered things she had said,
about how all the crew was supposed to go to Auschwitz.
They would have all been killed. But he had delayed her and
Sisko had destroyed the ship. Fourteen crewmembers had
died. It was unfortunate, but it was better than all of them
dying. "How did Salerno die?" he asked. He had read the
report naming the survivors and the report of the funeral that
took place just an hour ago. His name had been on both lists.
Sisko sighed. "She killed him that last night. He was
looking for you in the main camp, near Block 11. Kira found
his body on the other side of the wall. He'd been stabbed.
And it looked like some animal had torn his face."
"Lion," Bashir whispered, remembering. He sat down
on the edge of the biobed. "I was hanging there. I thought I
was hallucinating. I did that a lot. I saw a lion dragging a
uniform. It became an elephant. I thought it was a dream."
"Hanging?" Sisko asked.
"Not by my neck," Julian assured him. "By my wrists.
Not something I'd recommend."
Sisko apparently wanted to change the subject. "You
hallucinated a lot? Always animals?"
Bashir chuckled and shook his head. "No, usually it
was you, or the Chief, even Garak. You helped me get through
. . . things. Usually when I didn't want to get through things.
You made me set my arm the first time. And O'Brien, he told
me it didn't hurt as much the second time. He was lying."
Sisko laughed too. "Glad we could help." He took a
deep breath again. "Julian, I've got to get back to the station.
I'm taking most of the remaining crew with me."
Julian turned to him sharply, feeling a panic rise up in
him. They were leaving him. *No,* he argued with himself,
*just leaving before you.* "When?" he asked, trying to calm
himself.
Sisko shrugged. "Now," he said. "But Major Kira will
be staying. The *Defiant*'s not ready to leave yet either.
She'll stay and bring you and the replacement crew back with
the ship. A few of the others volunteered to stay as well. They
want to see you. They helped to save you."
Julian nodded. The hospital had rules about how many
visitors a patient could have at one time. Only his parents and
the senior staff had been to visit him so far.
"Kira's already there," Sisko continued. "You may
want someone in there with you. Someone you know."
Bashir nodded, but he couldn't really think. He was
finally becoming a Muselman, he thought. *A little late now,*
he chided.
Sisko shook him out of it. "Oh, I have something for
you." He held his fist out, palm down.
Bashir put his own hand out, and Sisko dropped
something in it. It had a familiar feel to it, a weight that
wasn't heavy, but meant something. A communicator badge.
Brand new. It was such a small thing, but he hadn't worn one
for almost two months. It felt right to have one in his hand
again. He remembered the hope he'd had in his last one, there
in the train, if only the *Defiant* had answered. "Is that how
you found me?" Julian asked. "My comm badge?"
Sisko nodded. "The Nazis were trying to repair it. We
traced it back to Bialystok and from there to Treblinka and
Auschwitz. We weren't sure which. We had to search both of
them."
Bashir buffed the badge on the sleeve of his uniform
and then held it up to the light. It was so shiny. He saw a
reflection of his own eye as he looked at it. It was real. It had
to be.
The door opened and Dax entered. "It's time," she
said. O'Brien was behind her. Worf stayed out in the corridor.
"I'm sorry we can't stay, Julian."
Bashir knew they had to go. The Dominion was still
out there. "I'll be there soon," he told her, putting on a smile
he didn't really feel. If it was time for them to go, it was also
time for him. "You won't even have time to miss me."
"Who said anything about missing you?" O'Brien
quipped. "Don't let them go too hard on you, Julian."
"Can't be as bad as my last interrogation," Julian joked
back. It was easier that way.
"It's not an interrogation," Sisko contended, missing
the humor entirely. "It's a debriefing. And you're going to be
late for it."
He helped Bashir stand up and held onto his arm until
the dizziness left him. Dax gave him a hug and O'Brien shook
his hand. "I've told my father to expect you," Sisko told him.
"New Orleans. Don't forget." He walked Bashir to the door.
Sisko had already told him about the restaurant. He
was supposed to go with Kira. The captain had even cleared a
special menu with Julian's nutritionist. "How could I forget?"
Julian asked him. He couldn't wait. The hospital was keeping
him on a rather bland diet. It would be good to have
something substantial, even if he couldn't have very much of
it.
A nurse was waiting in the hall and she walked with
him the rest of the way. Sisko and the others had to go the
opposite direction. As soon as they parted ways, Julian felt
alone again, and no matter what he had told them about the
debriefing, it scared him nearly as much as the interrogation
had. Though this time he knew they wouldn't rip out his
fingernails. They would just make him remember it all. And
there was some of it that he prayed to forget.
To Be Continued.... (mid-scene again.)
--
--Gabrielle
I'd much rather be writing!
http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Shire/2460