JDL | Lt Cmdr. Rinehart, Arrain tr'Verelan, Lt sh'Thrass - "The So-Called Walk of Shame"

Posted on 241502.23 @ 4:48am by Commander Tierney Rinehart & Lieutenant Zhyalla sh'Thrass & Arrain Maec tr'Verelan

Mission: Holy Cow

Birds.

She could hear birds. Chirping, singing, trilling, hooting... She could hear them over the dullest of residual ringing. Tierney lay there for some time and simply listening to her surroundings. A quick buzz of sonar told her that the Romulan was close by, alive, and their general position hadn't changed. Somewhere in the tree line a herd of small deer-like creatures grazed, birds played in the branches and grasses, and they were relatively safe. Most importantly, the sun was warming her cold, sore body as it brazenly caressed her curled up curves. Resting, however, wasn't an option. The Starling's eyes slowly opened, squinting to adjust their sensitive depths to the brilliant light of day, and she carefully pushed herself up into a sitting position. "Any idea what time it is?" She tentatively asked, trying to peer over the grasses in the Arrain's direction. Convincing her body that it really did want to get to its feet would be her next trick of the morning, and it would take a fair bit of bribery with how badly it ached.

About fifteen yards across the flowing grassland Maec crouched atop a slab of limestone and slowly scanned the landscape while using his right hand to shield weary eyes from the burning sun. Nothing. At least nothing beyond the abundant chattering wildlife that inhabited this vibrant world. No sign of any locals or any lloann'na (feddies). Were they still embroiled in the incident from the night before? The grinding whisper of grasses being crushed beneath a rousing animal caused his ears to twitch and his eyes to stray. He was already glaring at the disheveled squinting form of Tierney when she managed to speak. “Three and a half hours since daybreak.” He said tersely and frowned deeply at the woman “you are quite the sleeper. A seemingly dangerous trait for someone of your trade? No?” Without listening to her answer he pushed himself and carefully slid off the rock disappearing into the wavering grasses. A short moment later he appeared next to Tierney “get up, let’s go.”

She could feel, more than hear, his approach. The soft acoustic vibrations gave him away to the highly tuned and highly sensitive little Starling. She slept when she was ill, and now she sat fending off the gnarled fingers of hypothermia, but explaining that to the Romulan would have fallen on deaf ears. A quick look up at him told her he didn't care and that showing him yet another so called 'weakness' probably wouldn't have been the brightest idea she'd had to date. The point remained, however, that he hadn't killed her when she'd given him the chance, nor had he stolen her breath as she fitfully slept in her little nest of grass and woolen throw. What she did know was that she itched. Insect bites dotted the landscape of her delicate hide, some large enough to represent ping pong balls as they all too happily announced her susceptibility and allergy to their venom. A joint popped as she moved to bring her legs under herself, it was either her knee or hip and she couldn't tell which. "Hold your horses." She grumbled softly and rose to unsteady feet. Home was needed. Medical was needed. A heated blanket or a hot bath was doubly needed.

And then there was a loud snap from something in the treeline. The Starling's head rapidly jerked in its direction, her ears honing in on the location as she instinctively brought a shivering hand towards her phaser. The fingers, however, came to a subtle rest on the holster's soft leather casing and the sound of sonar zipping to get a quick feed was quickly replaced with a sigh and the shaking of her pounding skull. "We're about to have company." Tierney said, looking to the stoic Arrain.

When the security officer had stepped on the dry twig, Zhyalla had winced as if she'd been slapped across the face. They couldn't see well for the tall grass, and didn't know who or what was out in front of them. They'd been slowly following a search pattern extending out from the site of the explosion through the night and into the morning. She was wide awake — Andorians didn't need much sleep — but the security officers were clearly starting to reach the end of their usefulness. They needed sleep, but she'd promised Commander Dhej she'd find Tierney and the Romulan; she'd have sent the security officers back to the base camp and kept up the search on her own, but going it alone on a strange planet that had just thrown an attack at them was probably the worst idea she could follow. So here she was, following search pattern theta, with two rapidly drooping security officers.

Maec’s eyes turned towards the tree line which visually hovered just above the tall wavering grass heads. He frowned and reached for his own phaser but cursed aloud in Rihannsu remembering he had dropped the damned thing during the encounter with Tierney. Giving the woman a vexing look he reached out and grabbed her wrist twisting it backward- albeit a bit gently but no less painful before removing her phaser from its holster and releasing her hand. “You are injured. I will deal with this matter- wait here.” Her rank may have outweighed his relatively speaking but Maec’s tone carried the weight of a command and his expression was now starkly different. His eyes narrowed giving him the appearance of a raptor searching out a threat or potential prey. Another breaking twig echoed through the sweeping wind and Maec sprinted into the tall grasses. Violently pushing through the greenery he finally melted out of the grasses at the base of the treeline. Apparently his sudden appearance startled one of the security officers who drew his weapon and pointed it at Maec. For his part, after finding a weapon being drawn at him, Maec instinctively fired sending the yellow shirted man vaulting backwards into a tree. Realizing his mistake he frowned and straightened his posture while picking a few stray blades of green out of his hair “forgiveness- you startled me.” He apologized nonchalantly and then bowed slightly at the unconscious security officer before turning his attention to the blue skinned female “is the Commander well?”

Zhyalla's eyes darted to the downed security officer, then to the Romulan officer. "Commander Dhej was well enough to still be giving orders, and he was in the care of the Doctor when I headed out to find you and Tierney," she answered, her eyes meeting those of the other security officer. He quickly moved to check on his unconscious companion. "Speaking of Tierney, is she nearby?" Zhyalla looked around, but the tall grass kept her friend obscured if she was near. She couldn't help a quick glance at the security officers, but she had little sympathy for the unconscious one — he had been clumsy enough to step on twigs twice, and it was lucky for him to have only drawn the attention of a Romulan with an antsy trigger finger on a phaser set to stun.

“She is…” Maec paused, glanced at the wall of fluttering grasses, and then let out a parched sigh “alive- but a bit unwell after being shot.” He indifferently turned his back to the antennae’d woman and walked over to the downed security officer who had been propped against the tree he had slammed into for support. Kneeling down he held up his fingers and asked the man to count them. After a long minute he stood back up and returned to Zhyalla “have you discovered the cause and culprit of the explosion?”

"The commander didn't really say. He's just having everyone regroup at the Lovelace, so we can set up a command post at the landing site. We've been searching for the two of you since the explosion, the rest of our people were accounted for. No fatalities that I was aware of," Zhyalla explained, glancing in the direction that the Romulan had looked into the grass. "Where's Tierney?"

At that very moment, the Starling was back on the cold, grassy loam, her legs arched and bent in front of her with her feet flat on the ground and her entire torso draped over her thighs. Pain radiated through her belly to lower back before shooting straight up her spine to join the lancing of her shoulder and finally settled in her skull. The cold of morning combined with the shade of the grass was doing little else to raise her core temperature as she sat there slumped and trembling. Part of Tierney had told her to ignore the Romulan's bravado and simply follow him towards the source of the snapping twigs. Any soldier worth their merit wouldn't have stepped on one piece of deadwood, let alone two in such rapid succession -- she'd wanted to call after him, but the radiating pain in her wrist where he'd needlessly manhandled her and the rapidly rising tide of fatigue and pain left her an unwilling party to play the role of nagging pain in the ass. The alternative wasn't pretty, nor was it inviting. It was filled with shallow puffs of breath and a tightened, shivering jaw. Deep in her heart she knew what was going on and all Nanee could do would be to verify it and medically mediate to end the physical pain she felt. If they ever made it back to camp.

“Fortunate.” Maec noted dryly as his eyes studied the groggy security office who was slowly being helped to his feet. Turning to face the ocean of grass he looked out over the flowing field dejectedly recalling the previous night “she is in the field- about forty five degrees and half a kilometer from this position.”

Zhyalla didn't wait for Maec to finish speaking. He clearly was more concerned about his security officer, and that meant it relieved her of the duty of having to do so. She also was pretty sure that Tierney would have been on his heels if she was capable of doing so, so she clearly wasn't capable of following. Hopefully it wasn't anything more serious that her being asleep and the Romulan being convinced it was safe to leave her without a lookout, but even if it was only that, Zhyalla was less than impressed with the Romulan's choice and she was concerned for her friend.

She made her way through the tall grass, moving only as slow as she had to due to visibility and a desire to remain stealthy in case there was anything else out there. She followed the directions provided by the irritating green blooded chief of security, and as she approached the area that Tierney was supposed to be, Zhyalla came to a stop.

"Tierney?" She called her friend's name at a normal volume at first, hoping that the little woman would be the only pair of ears within hearing distance.

"He..." The Starling's voice cracked mid-shiver and she swallowed hard, hugging her knees as she drew another breath for a better attempt at responding. "Here!" Her eyes closed as she mustered a yell.

Zhyalla quickly moved to where she heard the weak call come from, and found her friend folded up in the tall grass, clearly in pain. She knelt down beside the tiny woman, quickly looking for obvious signs of injury.

"Dhej?" Tierney asked, looking up as best she could. The throw hid the plasma burn pattern across her shoulder, and everything else... No one could see of explain the level of hurt and cold that seemed to have grabbed onto and continued to hold the little creature hostage.

"The commander's okay, though the Doc looked like she was going to have to patch him up a bit. He wants you and that green blooded jackass back at the landing site," Zhyalla stated, frowning at the look of pain that painted Tierney's face. "Can you walk?"

"No." The ruby maned one huffed in response, her jaw tight.

"Okay, up you go then." Zhyalla slid her arms under the tiny woman, and with a quick half jump, she was back on her feet with Tierney in her arms. "Keep your arms around my neck, and lean into me best you can. We'll try to make this quick."

Tierney didn't respond beyond a nod, and leaned her head onto the Andorian's shoulder, quietly willing the entire experience away.

"You'll be okay. We'll get you back to the Doc quick as a Jack hammer," Zhyalla insisted, heading in the direction of where she'd left the Romulan and his security minions. At the very least she needed to let them know that she had Tierney and was headed back to the landing site, and they could follow when the oaf who couldn't avoid spooking the green blooded hob goblin with a twig finished recovering from being stunned.

=/\= End Log =/\=

Lt Commander Tierney Rinehart
Chief of Intelligence
USS ENTERPRISE, NCC-1701-F

Arrain Maec tr'Verelan
Chief of Security
USS ENTERPRISE, NCC-1701-F

Lieutenant Zhyalla sh'Thrass
Chief Helm Officer
USS Enterprise, NCC-1701-F