Armistice Part 2

Captain's Log, Stardate 42615.7

Chaos

I was standing witness to the ceremony signifying the end of the rebel resistance on the surface of Psellus III along with Lieutenant Commander Hazor Dyan, Lieutenant Commander Akoval th'Idrani lorTheel'zhiin, Lieutenant Joran Maniersi, Lieutenant Silon, Corporal Gral, and Captain Ian Frazier. When the ambush happened, several rebels from within the crowd fired off disruptor shots. Unfortunately, they stunned half my crew and the only ones left standing were Hazor, Maniersi, Gral, and me. Gral sprinted toward the pile of weapons set down by the rebels during the ceremony, and a Romulan shuttle crested over the hill. Maniersi informed me that there were eight Romulans aboard the ship.

A Pselliad stepped out from the crowd and spoke with a bit of a strange accent. He stated that there was no need for panic and if we surrendered peacefully, things would be far less painful. Gral abandoned the weapons, went after the rebel leader standing by Taigu Taroo, grabbed a hold of her, and shielded himself from the speaker with her. He was shot by a rebel in the crowd in the process, but still remained standing. While the confusion was elevated, I took the opportunity to run towards Ambassador Cal West and Taroo, pick up a fallen weapon from the Taigu's color guard, and stand ground. The speaker threatened that his weapon was now set to wide beam kill, pointed it at the crowd, and demanded again that we come quietly.

I saw out of the corner of my eye that the shuttlecraft had landed and four Romulans had disembarked, making their way toward us. Gral threw the woman he was holding down on the ground and fired off a shot at the speaker which brought him down to a knee. This caused the rebels to shoot Gral down. I shot toward the oncoming Romulans, though I missed by a wide margin, and yelled for the rebels to drop their weapons. One of them, who had panicked and regrettably had his weapon's setting set higher, ended up executing four citizens. Some of the others began wiping out large groups of bystanders with a wide beam heavy stun. The woman ran to the fallen speaker and we heard her cry out "Onar!" but was pushed away by him.

A Familiar Face

The second round of Romulans disembarked from the shuttle and began making their way over to us. One of them wore a knowing smirk that I wanted to claw off her face, for it was the Tal Shiar agent, Rovek. I kept a stoic expression and commanded my crew to stand down for the sake of saving innocent lives.

The Romulans went over to the Pselliad speaker, presumably named Onar, and he gave the command to round us up to take us back to Sayounus. It was strange that Romulans, especially a Tal Shiar, would take orders from a local. They searched us thoroughly and took away our communicators. Hazor had tried to keep a phaser concealed, but it was soon discovered. Under armed guards, and the shuttle escort, we began the march back to the capital.

Onar smugly strode up to me and mocked that the Niven was not doing so well in their battle. Hazor, hearing this, made an aggressive move as it to hit him, but Onar reacted faster and laid him out on the ground. Maniersi helped him up and gestured to me that Onar was likely a surgically altered Romulan. I calmly retorted that my crew has been through far worse and that I was certain they were fine.

Imprisoned

When we arrived in Sayounus we were taken to a large police station and locked away in individual cells. A Romulan was posted as a guard into the cell block and a young Pselliad was seated at a desk in the middle of the block. I could see that Akoval, Silon, and Frazier were standing near the entrances to their cells quietly, Maniersi and Hazor were chatting up the Pselliad guard, but I could not see Gral from my vantage point. I assumed he was just further back in his cell.

The Pselliad seemed to be under the impression that the Federation was here to oppress his people and take away their freedoms. We would let their people starve and bring ruin upon the planet by stealing all of their resources. I snapped back for him to ask what the villagers Hazor made contact with thought of the Federation and their greedy ways.

Suddenly, the lights began to flicker and before I knew it, Gral came thundering out of his cell and tackled the Pselliad to the ground. Two more Pselliads came running into the cell block, and they knocked the Romulan guard out with the gardening tools they were armed with. One of them was the leader of the stricken village, Severius. He went to the desk, punched a few buttons, and the force fields holding us captive went down. He looked at Hazor and me and said, "Thank you, for all you've done for us." I nodded and said that we were just doing our jobs. "What is your job… is our life." I can only hope that there were others on this planet who thought the way he did.

Severius pointed us in the general direction of the exit and said he could not be found here so we parted ways. Frazier said that the Romulans were likely to have a hold on the palace so we should make our way there. We only had two weapons between us so we decided to split the group up in order to have a better chance of reaching the palace. He took Akoval, Silon, and Ambassador West. Hazor found a multimedia broadcast building a few blocks away, so the rest of us decided to go there to try to establish contact with the Niven.

Lovers' Quarrel

When we exited the building without incident, we saw that there were a couple Romulans patrolling the streets along with some of the Pselliad police force, and a crowd was causing a ruckus. When some members of the crowd caught sight of us, they began pelting things at the Romulan, causing a riot. We took advantage of the distraction and snuck around the crowd. Gral took an aimed shot at the Romulan to bring him down and the crowd swarmed him and the police, but a cop broke free to attack Hazor. Maniersi dove in to help him so I made a run for the broadcast station.

Inside the lobby, there was shattered glass everywhere and the staff were strewn about the floor, stunned at close range. I found my way to the booth and saw Onar and the female rebel leader arguing amidst a pile of broken storage discs and isolinear chips. Onar caught sight of me and gloated, "It's too late! We have chased your ship away from our system, and even now, the Romulan fleet is within hours of reoccupying what is rightfully ours!" The woman, who I later learned was named Ruissi, cried out that she loved him, but he only said, "A part of me also loves you." With a cruel smile he said, "Don't be so shocked. You have served your purpose well," and laughed heartily.

"How can you say that being under Romulan rule is retaking your freedom," I said to both of them. My message was pointed more toward Ruissi, knowing that Onar was a Romulan in disguise. "Though you may be a Federation protectorate, in no way are we ruling over your people. Psellus has been under a cultural quarantine for the past several years because of people like you, resisting and causing strife, thus giving us no choice but to delay until all of your people are united. The poverty and hunger that plagues your people is due to your actions. YOU are oppressing your own people. If the agreement were signed today as it was planned, the monopoly that the Ferengi and Orions have over your economy will be dissolved and your planet will flourish and prosper. You must allow us to demonstrate this before resorting to return to a government that will surely lead you to your doom."

Ruissi, finally recovering from her shock of being cast aside by her lover, went for a gun, and simultaneously, Onar made a reach for his communicator. Ruissi was just a second faster, however, and in a fit of passion, she shot him on the highest setting of the weapon, causing Onar to get vaporized. With trembling hands, she dropped the gun and cried, "It was a noble cause. Our ancestors told us about the better times and how the Federation was only interested in stealing our identity. But now I know that the Romulans have done nothing but lie and perpetuate a skewed image of the Federation in our minds."

Games, Beagles, and Hens

Maniersi, who had arrived with Hazor and Gral just moments before, leaned in to say that there was a large Romulan fleet on its way here. According to some logs found at the station, the path they were taking in order to get here quickly would involve crossing the neutral zone and flying through Federation space, thus being an act of war. There was also a mention of someone named Krassus, who was an unpopular senator on Romulus. It was inferred that this was a political maneuver to boost his popularity for the upcoming election. With Ruissi's help, we hatched a plan to send a message to the Romulan fleet stating that after an interrogation, it was revealed that everything was a Federation trick. A fleet of ships, including the Enterprise-D, were hidden in Stevens Nebula to ambush them. To make the ruse even more convincing, we decided to send a message to Starbase 27, using what equipment was still functional at this station, thus without the use of our usual security measures, in hopes that it would get intercepted. Gral and Hazor were set to cause an EMP to purposefully interrupt and cut transmission.

I asked for Rear Admiral Sextus Slate, but because he was not there, Fleet Captain Conrad Bain would take my message. I told him, "Fleet Captain Bain, the game is afoot. Release the beagles! The hens are approaching the henhouse! The Niven's retreat has seduced Senator Krassus to make his move and we are a go on Operation Revenge. Set for pick up on rendezvous point beta 24—" and transmission was cut. I had to burst out the laughter I had to hold back in order to keep a straight face during transmission.

Ruissi took us through some back routes out of the station and we reached the surface a few buildings away. As soon as we stepped outside, however, we found ourselves in transporter room three aboard the Niven. I asked Chief Warrant Officer Harald Lysander to also beam up the life signature who was with us so that we did not abandon Ruissi.

Debrief

My poor ship was in sorry state. She must have been through quite the firefight against the Romulans. Commander Devin West gave me a debrief, where I learned that my clever crew had made a maneuver as if we were retreating and left a warp signature so that the Romulans would think the same. In reality, the ship had hidden behind the uninhabited Psellus IV, waiting for a ripe time to attack again or to find us on the surface. The War Bird inexplicably left the area so when the coast was clear, they resumed orbit around Psellus III and beamed us aboard as soon as we were visible.

We returned Ruissi to the surface and we were able to speak briefly with Taroo as well. Apparently the Romulans had kidnapped her and forced her to send a message to the Romulan fleet who just so happened to be patrolling the edge of Romulan space, pleading for help from the Federation oppression. They would come in to liberate the planet and because they were answering a cry for help, they had to violate the neutral zone in order to arrive in time.

Clever, Romulans, but not clever enough.