Chapter 36: Mandukar
December 2413
This is Okhala. We will accept your prisoner immediately. Engage transporters.
Very well, drop shields and prepare for transport.
“Vance. Engage Transporters.”
In a swirl of red light, Kirina found herself transplanted from one dimly lit bridge to another. The brownish red hue of the Klingon lights was replaced by the eerie green glow of borg technology melded with what must once have been a proud Romulan vessel. She barely had a moment to contemplate her situation before she felt a blinding pain to her head and toppled over onto her side.
After striking Kirina with the butt of his rile, the Lieutenant roughly dragged the redheaded Romulan to her feet and led her off the bridge into the Commander’s office. The room had been prepared. Kirina was deposited into a restraint chair in the center of the room, and before long, her wrists and ankles were immobilized.
Show time, Kirina thought to herself. She would need to do more than simply stay alive. She had to keep D’Kera close, so that when Aurelia and her team arrived, they’d be able to kill her. She had to sell it, for as long as possible. She took in a breath, and then began struggling against the restraints.
“Ah, Doctor t’Nalah, back with the Tal Shiar where you belong,” Mandukar’s voice was unmistakable. “Tell me, you didn’t think you could hide forever, did you?”
D’Kera liked to talk, and Kirina needed her to continue talking. Defiance, she realized, was her best chance. The Commander would have to try to break her of it. Kirina snarled like a cornered targ – a sound she’d become all too familiar with – and shouted uncharacteristically at her captor, “Khoi-udt, susse’thrai!”
D’Kera just smirked, unperturbed, “Or maybe you thought you could get the better of us, lead your friends here? Well, just know, we’ve jammed that little tracker of yours.”
Tracker. Singular. She hasn’t detected the backups. Need to move on, can’t let her get suspicious. Kirina forced a grin in response, displaying a measure of composure, “No matter. When I’m done with you, you’ll regret surviving Jouret.” It was a bold statement, from the prisoner in the room. But it seemed to hit the mark.
“You know in a way the… Jouret incident…” D’Kera’s expression sours, “Well, I suppose it saved me from your horrors, didn’t it?” She moved about the room slightly, “Unleashing the assimilated colonists on your fellow Rihan? My my doctor, that is low. Those people could have been saved.”
Good. Keep her going. “Their sacrifice saved an entire planet from the likes of you and your alien allies.” Kirina’s voice was full of contempt, “And what of that, Commander? Since when do rihannsu rely on the help of yikh like the Elachi?”
“Times change, dear doctor,” D’Kera mused, “You should know that better than I. After all, you spent how long working with Borg technology?”
“Look around you! At what’s become of your ship!” Kirina struggled pointlessly against her restraints, “You’re the scourge of the quadrant. What good is your superior technology if you’re using it against your own people?”
“Scourge of the Quadrant,” D’Kera repeated, turning to the side, “…I like that. It reminds me of the Empire, when we wielded power effortlessly…” She stepped back in front of Kirina, looking down at her helpless prisoner. “Don’t you miss that?”
“The Empire didn’t murder its own!” Despite her efforts, this outburst was real, and full of emotion. “It didn’t experiment on innocent colonists!”
D’Kera stepped back to her previous position, still keeping out of mauling distance. “Idealistic. An admirable trait, but… misguided.” She paused, “I assume you haven’t come to retake your old job?”
Kirina was surprised into a sarcastic sort of chuckle, “Are you offering it?”
“Something like that.” D’Kera snapped her fingers. An underling emerged from the shadows, holding a small device. A device Kirina knew very well.
A neural implant, she recognized. Based on her own design from all those years ago. If it was implanted, she’d lose control of her body, and everything she knew, D’Kera would know. “Veruul!” she shouted at the minion, lashing out violently in his direction, only to be stopped yet again by her restraints. “You probably don’t even know how that works!”
D’Kera wrapped her self-satisfaction and pure, focused, rage around a vicious little smile. “Oh, he doesn’t,” she replied in an almost singsongy tone, “But that’s half the fun…”
In all she’d been through, somehow this was the most terrifying prospect Kirina had yet encountered. It was a fate worse than death. When the underling approached with the implant, she continued to lash out, kicking, headbutting, and biting any extremity that comes within range.
D’Kera motioned her underling back, her smile fading. “No? Well, then, suit yourself.” She drew her disruptor, clearly modified from Imperial standard.
Kirina stilled. All the flailing-in-place in the sector wouldn’t protect against a close range disruptor blast. As the modified weapon’s blue energy struck her the pain was severe, but she clamped her jaw and waited for the worst to subside. “Kllhe!” she growled as the underling approached again with the implant. Kirina resumed her thrashing, albeit with less strength.
“Please, doctor,” D’Kera said as she grinned and raised the disruptor again, “DO speak up!”
This time, Kirina cried out as the blast hit her. She slouched in the chair, leaning listlessly to one side without the strength to keep herself upright. She found herself barely able to keep her eyes open, her peripheries filled with blackness. She managed to speak, but only barely, her voice shaky and quiet. “You’ll die in this room today, susse’thrai.”
D’Kera stared at the little doctor for a long moment. Kirina thought she saw a hint of sadness in her face, but the pause was too good to last. Only as the searing, unbearable pain returned, did she hear D’Kera’s flat reply.
“I died a long time ago.”