[[BACKSIM]] MSNPC Administrator Soldu tr’Kharis - Burning Heart

[Teayl Thorn]

((Corridor, outside Transporter Room, Deck 06, USS Ronin))

Soldu regarded the Major as though she had asked why gravity existed.

tr’Kharis: ::calm, unblinking:: Because I have already demonstrated that my survival is now… tied with yours. ::gaze shifting deliberately to Solana:: Had I wished for your destruction, I would have left you on the moon and allowed the Tholian to finish you. I require this vessel intact to take me and my people to safety. You require information I possess and information I can extract. We need each other, you don’t have to trust me…I don’t trust you! Mutual necessity is sufficient.

The woman with the tritanium stare held up a hand.  

Singh:  Or you're desperate and grasping at straws because you realize that you left whatever sliver of authority you had down on that moon along with the remainder of your face.  

Singh’s retort landed with the precision of slap across the previously mentioned translucent face.

Solana: Ouch. ::she clicked her tongue against her teeth at the barb:: Spoken like an Imperial Romulan. 

Winters: ::turning back to Singh:: Your call Major but I still say we put the Tholian in a transport buffer. Worse case, the buffer loses power and the problem is off our hands.

Soldu allowed his head to settle back against the grav-sled, his single clear eye fixed on Singh.

tr’Kharis: If you destroy it, you learn nothing. If you suspend it, you risk losing it. If you question it through conventional means, it will endure. ::shallow breath:: Allow me to speak with it. Under guard. Under restraint...whatever. You lose nothing by trying.

Singh:  Enough.  Senior Chief, Captain, I want that Tholian beamed to a holding cell and under heavy guard.  The ex-Administrator here...::She let her voice hang on the 'ex' for an extra moment::...was right about one small thing Captain.  We can't risk losing a potential source of intelligence about what the Alliance is doing to a power failure and we've already had several of those today.  We need to give Captain Kel some options...for example, perhaps the Lattice Alliance would be interested in recovering their soldier.  Perhaps they'd be even more interested in an ex-Administrator who hasn't offered us much beyond vague promises and green bloodstains on our deck.

The woman's implication sucked the air from Soldu's lungs like a hull breach and his jaw creaked. After all he had worked for, the sacrifices to keep his people safe, to get them out from under the Lattice web and away from this moon. The realisation that Starfleet would throw him back into his captor's clutches was a bitter consequence.

Singh:  Ultimately it's the Captain's decision.  If you would prefer to remain aboard this vessel then I strongly suggest you start providing information yourself.  Specifically what you people were doing here and how we can stop the damage you've done.  If you can't help with that then I cannot imagine the Captain will have much use for you.

Winters: Understood Major.

Solana: Yes, ma’am. 

The injured Romulan inhaled slowly, pain lancing through his chest, a faint tremor reaching his voice.

tr’Kharis: My people…::straing with anger, but controlled:: I assure you, Major… for the safe passage and medical treatment of my people… my usefulness will become apparent long before my bloodstains dry on your deck. 

A med-tech stepped forward, padd trembling slightly in his hands.

Maro:  Major...we've stabilized him but he's in pretty rough shape...we need to get him to sickbay or a little blood loss will be the least of his worries.  I've also let engineering know they'll need to decontaminate the transporter room...this guy brought a lot of radiation aboard with him.  You should get checked out Senior Chief, with your suit breached you were probably exposed as well.
Singh nodded once and strode out of his range of vision. 

The stretcher began gliding along the corridor, the lighting of the ceiling flicking across his range of vision.

Singh:  You heard the man.  Senior Chief, accompany our guest to Sickbay and don't take your eyes off him until he's sedated or dead then get yourself checked over.  Captain Winters, you're on prisoner transport...get them into a holding cell and setup a guard rotation.  I want redundant force fields and the environmental controls on a dead mans switch...if someone doesn't push a button every thirty seconds it's going to get real cold in the security center real fast.  Make sure the Tholian understands that.  Clear?  

Winters: On it.

Solana: Aye, ma’am. 

Soldu sensed the powerplay between them with quiet fascination and some familiarity as the sled began to move. Singh followed the sled briefly, her gaze settling on him.

tr’Kharis: ::dryly:: Your hospitality certainly is… memorable.

Singh:  It is not my custom to threaten an injured prisoner so instead I will make you a promise.  Help us undo the mess you have created and you will be protected.  Fail to do so and I promise to spend the rest of my life making you regret the rest of yours.  The choice is yours.
Winters: ::smirking:: I'll make sure the cell has two bunks just in case.

Solana: I would believe her, Soldu. The Major makes good on her promises. 

Soldu studied Singh’s face carefully before replying.

tr’Kharis: The Project's top scientists, Aduko, Rurat’dari and even Kanga Ro will freely give you what information they can. I will ensure it. The Reactor project should never have been accelerated as it was. ::regret in his tone:: What we did. The door we opened and the power that we took was wrong.  

Singh:  I'm going to report what has transpired to the Captain...if he chooses to speak with you do not waste his time.  Until then...cause no trouble. 
Winters: ::with a beaten tone:: Understood Major.

Solana: I’ve had enough trouble for one day. 

At this point, Soldu was strapped down to a drifting medical stretcher, but he doubted he could do anything even if he was free. Something was bubbling slightly in the wound across his sternum every time he breathed deeply. 

tr’Kharis: ::coughing:: I will comply for my people. But…trouble seems to follow me through this life. 

Winters: Watch your back with that Romulan Senior Chief.

Solana: And you with that Tholian, Captain. He’s wounded but that one is no slouch in a fight. 

The two human warriors left, leaving the old injured Romulan with the Orion as they took him…somewhere in a turbolift. An infirmary he hoped.

Perhaps he had to fall, to hit the bottom of the pit, to touch the gates of Erebus itself. There was only really two paths to go from here. Dead or somewhere else.

Despite his low situation, a grin spread across his ghostly face, green staining his teeth. 

((Turbo lift, heading to Deck 10, USS Ronin))

The turbolift doors slid open with a hiss and the grav-sled drifted inside. Solana entered beside it, rifle slung but ready and Soldu drifted, horizontal beside her. For several seconds the lift hummed downward in silence and then she spoke first.

Solana: While I don’t care for your methods, it would be dishonorable of me to not thank you for helping me with the Tholian. 

Soldu’s eye flicked toward her.

tr’Kharis: ::mildly:: As you should! I expected your gratitude would be forthcoming when the battle rage faded and you returned to your senses. ::rattling his restraints:: You have an unusual way to show your gratitude. Is this an Orion thing? Joakim never offered to tie me up.

Solana: We have good reason to. After all, since we met you you’ve shown that you’re Imperial Romulan through and through. I’d bet ten strips of latinum that the only reason you did what you did was to protect your honor after you made the choice to help me instead of shooting me in the back with my own weapon earlier. 

He studied her for a moment. A thread of honesty floating to the surface.

tr’Kharis: ::rasping laugh:: I’ll take that bet, though I know not how to prove it. You overestimate me if you think I have any honor left, Senior Chief. 

She smirked slightly. 

Solana: I was fully prepared to show you how good my knife throwing skills were should you have tried. But you have more honor than you pretend you have. If only you could free yourself of the prison of your old Empire’s way of thinking. 

Soldu’s mouth twitched faintly.

tr’Kharis: ::dry about the knife throwing:: I noticed. ::more quietly:: You are wrong there. 

He stubbornly didn’t elaborate what he thought she was wrong about. She leaned back against the wall of the lift, the picture of relaxed, but he could hear her heartbeat was anything but, and her grip on her weapon was steady. 

Solana: I saw how Aduko and you were together. That’s speaks of friendship or if nothing else, mutual respect. It’s why you didn’t shoot me in the back and why you even put yourself in harm’ way with the Tholian in the transporter room. You knew your best shot at helping your people, the ones with whom you served with down there, who were your responsibility, was to help us help you. Was it opportunistic? Of course, you’re a Romulan old enough to have lived through the peak of your Empire and seen it fall in an instant. Splinter and half of your kin move on to try and better themselves, while the other half cling to their old doctrine like a dehydrated man scrambling for a mirage. You may not want to admit it, Soldu but I think your time on this moon made you more like us than you’d like to admit. 

His lips moved in a word that he only released as a breath, a curse. 

tr’Kharis: ::mouthed:: Tal Shiar1!

Though the word had a common meaning in modern context as an order of Romulan secret enforcement, he had meant something more archaic with the exclamation. Something closer to calling her a “weaver or decider of fates”. 

His dark blue eye and his milky one settled steadily on her green ones. He refused to look away at that moment. It was his acknowledgement to her. She was not just his equal, but his master. This Orion Witch, Warrior…WOMAN! She had seen past all his disguises, his walls and layers, to his cold shriveled calculating heart and laid bare his fears and motivations. 

He was silent for a long moment, dizzy, spell bound, then the lift doors opened and the med-tech who had been awkwardly silent during their exchange hurried the grav-sled toward Sickbay. 

He licked his translucent lips, staining them with dark green ichor and took a deep breath. The pain increasing in his chest brought him back to himself and out of the witches beguiling influence. 

tr’Kharis: ::softly warning:: I assure you, Senior Chief… I remain very much a Romulan. oO No matter how much you think I’m like you. Oo

Solana: Well don’t worry. I don’t expect you to swear any oaths on a Dathe'anofv-sen2.

His slanted brows rose.

tr’Kharis: ::curious:: You know that term?

Solana: I told you. I used to serve with a half Romulan. ::She winked:: 

His mind spun with calculation for a moment and he tried for a self deprecating smile.

tr’Kharis: Then you…you do understand… how complicated being Romulan can be. Perhaps after all this, we could get a—

Her com badge chirped, and he was interrupted for the second time as he tried to ask her out for a drink. 

Winters: =/\= Winters to Senior Chief Solana. The Tholian is in the brig. I am headed there to personally babysit this thing. =/\=

Solana:  = /\= Good. Make sure you tuck it in. Can’t have it staying up past curfew. =/\=

((Sickbay, Deck 10, USS Ronin))

The doors to this starship’s infirmary opened and the sled rolled inside. Soldu glanced at the medical staff already preparing a biobed. He switched gears, ever trying to gain even a small measure of control in his situation. He rattled the restraints again even as something popped in his chest, it pained him and an alert screeched from the medical stretcher.

tr’Kharis: ::over the medical alert:: Am I to remain restrained? ::cough:: Surely I am no threat to you or your people in this state.

Solana: I’m going to suggest we keep a restraining field on your biobed so you don’t hurt yourself trying to be cunning. ::her tone softened:: But I’ll let Aduko know you’re here and assuming he’s been cleared by medical, there shouldn’t be any issues letting him visit you. ::she quickly added:: I’ll have one of the nurses come by and give you an update on the state of your people. Given the amount of radiation down there I’m sure some didn’t make it, but I know you want to know either way. 

She had disarmed him, and seen through his defences again, right to the heart of him. He bored a hole with his cyclops stare into her, unsure if what he felt now was burning hatred or some other emotion, equally as stong…something he hadn’t felt in a very long time. 

tr’Kharis: ::quietly:: Thank you, Senior Chief.

As his stretcher emitted a cacophony of beeps and the medical personnel descended upon him, Soldu's last thought before darkness consumed him, was that if he was ever able to escape confinement aboard this vessel, there was one thing he felt sure was necessary. He would need to kill Senior Chief Jenta Solana. Before she could destroy him with another one of her sensible comments!

[End of scene tr'Kharis]

((OOC: I think he likes her! ))

Tal Shiar1 - Romulan - Ruthless, highly secretive intelligence agency of the Romulan Star Empire, Alt. archaic meaning -  sourcerer, a fate weaver of great power.

Dathe'anofv-sen2 - Romulan - honor blade

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Soldu tr’Kharis (he/him)

Station Administrator, The Lid Prisoner, Starfleet vessel 

As simmed by

Writer for Lt. JG T'Fearne  

Security Officer   

USS Ronin - NCC-34523

R240107T14