Title: More Questions Than Answers: The Call to
Mourn, Part One
Location: Sandokhan Alpha Base
Setting: The Holy Catacombs
Captain Kematsopoulos peered in cautiously. The room
in this part of the tunnel was polished white stone. The Sandokhan dead
were neatly entombed in some elaborate pattern. There were statues and all
manner of adornment for the tombs. The immense room was minimally illumined
with burning torches. The light danced eerily on the walls, tombs and statues
giving the illusion of movement.
The Captain, who was shivering and still carrying the
ill Empress, could not help but glance further at the surroundings as he
entered. He was impressed. The Sandokhans were a remarkable people and perhaps
the saddest casualty of the hatred between the Galadons and Tureth.
The others followed behind him. Dr. Sarie carried Lasara
and Dr. L carried Rolin, who was nearly her size as they searched for a place
to hide. A small recessed ledge off to the left side, met their needs. They
put the sleeping children in first and made them comfortable. Then it was
the adults turn. The Empress convinced the CO that he should enter sleep
next and then she'd join them in the second stage of the Ankhanahkstoi, the
trancelike restorative sleep.
The Captain ordered the AMO and CMO to go on without
them and escape the cave. The CMO reluctantly agreed, gave him a warning
and left.
"Captain, you are next," the Empress said.
He pulled himself up on the ledge and looked at her.
Her beautiful eyes looked distant and pained. "What is wrong?" he said not
being able to seek out the answer through the bond/link. She was shielding
him from something.
She hesitated for a moment as if lost in some other
thought. "The Sandokhans have started some part of their mourning ritual
named 'The Call to Mourn'. They ..." she said stopping mid-sentence.
Her eyes became glazed and she started to sway to some inaudible music (the
chanting from the ritual).
"Your Majesty, what is wrong?" he asked straining to
understand both her words and her thoughts.
"Hurry - enter the sleep now!" she said as if someone
else was talking though her.
"No. Not until I know what is going on. What is wrong?"
Nouri asked, very worried for her. Something was definitely wrong.
The Empress continued swaying and began chanting along
with the mourners in a guttural alien tongue. The universal translator had
a difficult time translating most of the words. Only a few words came out
intermittently.
Suddenly the Empress dropped the mental barrier she
erected to prevent the Captain from knowing what had happened to her as the
Sandokhans advanced on their position.
Then he felt it. Nouri felt it himself and through
the bond with the Empress. "The Call to Mourn". He shuddered. It was like
nothing he had ever felt before.
Title: More Questions Than Answers: The Call to Mourn, Part Two
Location: Sandokhan Alpha Base
Setting: A hidden upper ledge in the Holy Catacombs
"The Call to Mourn" called the CMO to join them and
she did. It called the Empress who had also fallen under its spell. Now it
called to Nouri to join them. It called him to share in their mourning and
to share his own grief.
The grief over the loss of his departed wife rose and
swelled with in him and joined that of the mourning party as did their grief
in him. He looked down at his wedding ring, which he still wore after being
widowered. He rubbed it wishfully. He missed T'Nar very much and always would.
He was surprised he could even love another, yet he loved (or so he believed)
the Empress.
His grief swirled and mixed together with the Sandokhans.
They became as one people who shared the same losses. Nouri felt compelled
to join them and help entomb their dead and to give T'Nar the burial he never
had the chance to give her. (Not much was left of her transport shuttle or
its passengers after the "accident" ripped the vessel apart. His wife's body
was never found.)
The Empress smiled oddly and read his thoughts. "Join
us and entomb our dead," she said as she tried to leave the ledge. The Empress
had lost people close the her in the Romulan terrorist attack on her palace
and from the capture by the Sandokhans. Nouri felt this too as a lure to
join the mourners.
"No! We cannot. We cannot reveal our location.
We cannot trust K'Arak to set us free. We must enter the second stage of
the Ankhanahkstoi, finish the ritual and escape to the surface!!" he said
adamantly. Nouri reached out with one hand to hold her and keep her from
leaving.
He reached with his other hand into the medical kit
the AMO left him.
Title: More Questions Than Answers: The Call to Mourn, Part Three
Location: Sandokhan Alpha Base
Setting: A hidden upper ledge in the Holy Catacombs
After careful but quick thought, the Captain gave the
woman he thought he loved a sedative. It was the only way he could think
of saving her. She struggled against it then fell limp in his arms. Nouri
changed his position to support her dead weight. The hypo fell out of his
hand and rolled forward to the beginning of the ledge. It was now visible
to any passerby who looked up.
As Zahrina became unconscious, Captain Kematsopoulos
sighed with relief. He had kept her and this location safe from the Sandokhans
and was now severed from the strongest link he had to the them.
Nouri did not know if the Empress would be able to
enter the second stage of the ritual with the sedative. He hoped she would.
He had no choice though. Being telepathically linked to her, he knew she
could not resist the strong compelling urge to join the aliens in their mourning
ritual. He could barely do so himself.
He ignored the hypospray for now, dragged his beloved
gently to the back of the recess and put her with the children. She was still
very cold as was he. Nouri put her near the two small blissfully snoring
Sandokhans. He covered her with one of the blankets that they brought from
the holding cell.
He smiled. The children seemed fine. Little Lasara
and her brother Rolin got to enter stage two on time. But for the adults,
he felt that something had gone wrong again with the healing ritual. Or perhaps
it was just different from the last time for unknown reasons? "Perhaps it
was because we (he and the Empress) had not entered the sleep?" he thought.
The last time he did at least get to begin the second stage on time.
Nouri sat down near the Empress. He could still feel
the pull but not so intensely. It was difficult but he could manage it.
Captain Kematsopoulos set up watch. He knew that he should join the others
in stage two but someone had to be on guard when the Sandokhans entered.
He hoped that they would not stay long. He put the second blanket over his
shivering body and tried to get warm. He put his makeshift weapon down near
him.
For a moment he regretted telling his medical team
to leave them but he knew that the chances of them making it out alive being
stuck with the four of them who would have to be hiding here for hours was
practically nonexistent. He tried to settle more comfortably into his hiding
spot with the other three.
Title: More Questions Than Answers: The Call to Mourn, Part Four
Location: Sandokhan Alpha Base
Setting: A hidden upper ledge in the Holy Catacombs
L'Asaha and her party arrived at the entrance of the
Holy Catacombs. She paused, drawing her will about her and the will of those
present. They hit a feverish pitch, sustained it and waited. More joined
them.
The Captain felt this. He began to show the same signs
that the Empress had before he sedated her. Nouri fought to hold on. The
drums. The chants. The gongs. The bells. The cantors. The unexplainable ritualistic
pull. All compelled him to join them. Join them now. Join them or perish.
L'Asaha, through her ritual and role as priestess,
felt someone alien getting caught up in "The Call". It was a male overwhelmed
with grief from losing his wife. She intensified her efforts to draw everyone
to funeral ceremony and focused on him. She could not tell who he was but
she could feel his grief. She stepped up "The Call to Mourn" to draw
him to her.
She chanted and went nearer to the Captain's location,
not knowing exactly where he was. As the mighty priestess drew closer and
closer, she tired to ensnare him as she did the CMO. The urge to join them
became overpowering for the Captain.
It became clear to Nouri that he could not hold on.
He had one way left to avoid joining them but was it too late?
Had he known the CMO was recaptured he would have tried
to save her and been surely swept away by "The Call to Mourn". Had he known
that the CMO revealed their location he would not have taken this last option
either. But he did not know. He thought the CMO had left with AMO and
was safely on her way to freedom. His emerging telepathic abilities from
the mutations were just not that strong and he had no idea what to do with
them or how to focus them.
The pull was intense. Nouri fought hard to concentrate
and not give in. The Captain reached for the hypospray that rolled away when
he moved the Empress. He had momentarily forgotten that it had rolled away
as he struggled to keep from joining he mourners. He needed to get it out
of view. If the ritual continued its stranglehold on him, he would have
to use it on himself. He could think of no other way to escape "The Call",
if nothing else worked.
He continued to execute his specialized training on
Vulcan and from his grandmother. He added to it T'Nar's memories from their
emafa suru (mind meld). Nouristao used all this to battle them and to struggle
to remain in control of his mind. Would all of this be enough? He began to
doubt it.
As soon as he did, Nouri's eyes glazed and he began
to sway back and forth to the chanting. He became lost to "The Call to Mourn".
His hand that had reached for the hypospray, went palm down instead to support
his weight so he could leave the ledge and join the mourners.
Title: More Questions Than Answers: The Call to Mourn, Part Five
Location: Sandokhan Alpha Base
Setting: A hidden upper ledge in the Holy Catacombs
Nouri was lost to "The Call to Mourn" and trying to
get off the ledge to join the Sandokhans. His eyes showed the tell tale signs
of being in the trance. However it was not the one he needed to be saved
(The Ankhanahkstoi) but one from the Sandokhans(The Call to Mourn). They
called to him to join them in their sorrow.
He tried to get off the ledge but the fatigue from
the last few days of not sleeping and eating enough overwhelmed him. His
hand slipped from supporting his weight. Fortunately for him at the same
time L'Asaha gave her deaconess control of the ritual so she could question
the CMO. "The Call to Mourn" momentarily lost its complete power over
him.
Nouristao looked down at his hand that slipped. Where
was he? What was he doing? He forgot. He looked around for a clue. He saw
the hypospray. That was an odd place for it he thought. He could not recall
that he had used it earlier. He went to pick the up the hypo. "Perhaps it
will provide some answer to what I am doing?" he thought. He stretched out
his arm to reach it.
His hand left the almost complete darkness of the recessed
ledge and came forward toward the main room top grab the hypospray. He concentrated
hard to try to remember what he was doing or hoping to do with it. SPARKLE!
The light from the torches reflected off his wedding ring. "T'Nar: Remember
me," it seemed to say. S'Tao remembered. He grabbed the hypospray and without
hesitation injected himself. He hoped it would be enough.
The Captain felt himself get drowsy. He hurried to
join the other three sleeping hidden recession the ledge. THUNK! He fell
unconscious before he could make it all the way back. His torso and hand
fell forward and his feet behind him toward the sleeping trio.
Guest
Alien Log: L'Asaha
Title: More Questions Than Answers: The Call to
Mourn, Part Six
Location: Sandokhan Alpha Base
Setting: At entrance the Holy Catacombs
L'Asaha, the mighty high priestess of the Sandokhans
continues the rites for their newly dead. The Sandokhan faithful carry their
dead in biers laden with exotic flowers and waving banners with images of
their dead and favorite saints. The chanting is reverential and the incense
inviting. The biers, banners and people sway back in forth to the music.
The smoke from the censor wafts lazily into the air making a series of interconnected
half circles. The candles flicker slowly.
They all process in a grand stately manner toward the
Holy Catacombs. L'Asaha motions to the others to begin a new part of the
funerary services called, "The Call to Mourn". They will gather up both believers
and non-believers to mourn and honor the dead as the dead join their ancestors
in entombment. The cantors change the chants and deaconess changes the incense.
The candles seem to respond to those changes and flicker faster in response
to the heightened pace.
The funeral procession winds along the tunnels until
the High Priestess feels something unusual ... something ... something ...
alien. She stops.
She looks around with her physical eyes and does not
see anything. Through her role as priestess she "sees" an alien somewhere
nearby, a female or maybe two. She steps up the ritual to draw her/them
out. (Note: She doesn't "see" a picture of someone, just feel their presence.)
Unknown to the Sandokhans, the CMO and AMO are hiding
just barely out of site in a crevice right behind them. Both of the doctors
are having a hard time not giving into "The Call " but the Moeban had the
hardest struggle as those with telepathic abilities and closest to the chanting
are the most vulnerable.
The CMO is not a strong telepath but the cantors are
practically standing on her feet. She tries hard to resist but finally succumbs,
leaving the AMO behind.
LCDR Laleia-Lii emerges from behind the sloping rock
and joins the mourners in the back. She sways and chants with them, fully
caught up in "The Call". They become as one people and one voice.
L'Asaha turns and sees "the alien child" appear. She
smiles. It was that the female child that those newly captured aliens brought
with them. She moves the procession along and tries not to dwell on how
sad a race these new aliens must be to bring children with them on their
evil missions.
The mourning party continues to call others to join
in their sorrow and to entomb the dead. Then those newly called get others
to join. The sphere of influence under control of "The Call" grows and grows
like ripples in a pond.
Suddenly, L'Asaha feels it again. Another alien!
Whoever this alien woman was she was not nearby and fought her attempts to
draw her to them. This one she could tell from prior experience was highly
telepathic and Galadonese. She smiles, that will make it easy to "Call" her.
The Priestess turns her focus to catch this alien also.
She increases the strength of "the Call". L'Asaha leans further herself into
the ritual to "see" this person. She tries to extend her sphere of influence
and get her to invite others near her if any.
There was something odd in the victim's reaction to
her. It is hard to pinpoint. Almost like a mother protecting a child. "How
odd," she thinks. She continues to draw her will about her and press the
woman with it and the will of everyone present. L'Asaha knows of no one who
could escape "The Call" once it was "heard". She increases its strength again.
The candles flicker wildly, casting dangerous looking
shapes on the walls. The smoke from the incense roils furiously out of the
censor into the air. The mourners reach a frenzied state. Success! The Empress
is unable to resist any longer.
Guest
Alien Log: L'Asaha
Title: More Questions Than Answers: The Call to Mourn, Part Seven
Location: Sandokhan Alpha Base
Setting: At entrance the Holy Catacombs
L'Asaha enters the Holy Catacombs first. Done! The
alien woman is broken. She now knows what she was protecting! There was
another alien!!! A man...
She leans in further to the ritual trying to differentiate
between the two aliens. The woman's spiritual wounds were very fresh. The
man's ran deep. "Good," she thinks. She could use those weaknesses to draw
them to her.
The rest of the mourning party enters with the CMO
in tow. Her tricorder, still dangling from her hand, is still recording
everything.
L'Asaha shivers and nods to her deaconess to take over.
"Could now be time of the Last Prophecy?" she wonders. She needed to get
some answers.
L'Asaha runs the ancient poem, "The Last Prophecy of
Tarrook", through her head.
She lingers on this part:
"In the darkness,
where the dead things grow,
Among the dead, the six trying go
Among the dead, the four dying go
Is taken the one who shines blue. "
"After I catch the man and woman
and compel them to join us, there will be three aliens who will be in the
Holy Catacombs," she thinks. (She does not know yet that the CO and Empress
are already there and who came with them.) L'Asaha tries to find out what
is happening and if there are three more people involved in this to give
a count of six. She turns to the alien child that they captured a few days
ago. "Tell me about yourself," she asks gently but firmly.
The CMO is strangely compelled to tell her everything.
"I am a Moeban... a doctor, the Chief Medical Officer of the USS Eagle..."
she hears herself say as if it was someone else was talking.
The Priestess reigns in her surprise and smiles. Now
she was going to get some more answers and figure this all out! She nods
to her deaconess to proceed without her. Then suddenly ... she feels
the woman she was trying to catch disappear and then the man. "What happened???"
she wonders. She could not feel them any longer. "Where did they go? How
could they get away?" she asks herself.
"Why are you here?" the high priestess demands from
the CMO hoping she might have some answers.
"I was fleeing the Sandokhans with two small, sick
Sandokhan children. I was trying to help them. They were both
ill. The youngest was very sick, nearly about to die. I was
trying to save his life...Your people are being poisoned. I couldn't
help him. His sister seemed to believe in a Lady In Blue who would 'save
us all,'" the doctor explains.
"Where is the Lady and what happened? " the priestess
asks eagerly.
"Hiding ... on a ledge ... with the Captain and the
children...The youngest was healed ... by the Lady... " the CMO still under
the spell of "The Call" continues to answer.
"Who are the four dying?" L'Asaha asks trying to make
sense of this in light of the Prophecy.
"The Captain ... and the children ... and the Empress..."
she lists.
L'Asaha is both surprised and vindicated. "So the Lady
is an Empress!" she thought. That could satisfy the part of the Prophecy
that said "product of ancient king and queen".
L'Asaha of course has no idea yet that the maid was
the Empress of all Galadon in disguise. (Zahrina had done this to both protect
herself and the peace proceedings. She had lied heavily about her true identity
when she was captured to keep her people from paying a ransom or wiping out
the Sandokhans. The Empress believed that if the Galadonese people knew what
the Sandokhans had done to her and those with her that they'd be out for
blood. Her people could easily transfer their hatred of the Tureth and their
wishes to eliminate that race on the Sandokhans.)
"Why are they dying? Take me to them!" L'Asaha both
asks and orders.
"They are dying because of a... a... ritual...that
they could not complete immediately. They could not rest as we were fleeing
and began to die. They had to rest then or die so we came here," she explains.
Then LCDR Laleia-Lii still in a trancelike state, begins walking toward the
CO, Empress, and children. L'Asaha follows her and thinks hard.
L'Asaha counted to herself, Lady in Blue, two children,
one captain, this doctor makes five". "I count only five where is the other
one that was with you?" L'Asaha asks.
"Other one?" the CMO replies distantly.
"The other who came to you to this place where our
honored dead are?" L'Asaha asks.
"The AMO?" the CMO says hesitating. There were others
on the Eagle that came to the tunnels but not to this place.
"Yes. Where is she and were their others who came here?"
the priestess asks.
"She was on the ledge where I was...She did not join..."
Dr. Laleia-Lii replies
"And who else was with you?" she asks, hoping to find
that there were only six.
"No one. There is no one else," the Moeban finishes.
L'Asaha smiles triumphantly. That was six with four
dying! The Prophecy will come true now! The Sandokhans will be saved. She
needed to speak with the Lady in Blue immediately. She would ask the doctor
about the poison along the way. The Prophecy took precedence over all.
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