We'll Always Have Tokyo

Posted on Tue Sep 14th, 2021 @ 1:06pm by Lieutenant Mila Lynn & Sublieutenant Miles Lynn & Major Ashley Rogers

3,026 words; about a 15 minute read

Mission: Chapter V: The Calm Before The Storm
Location: Tokyo, Earth
Timeline: 238703.02

After visiting the twins and being threatened with starting a diplomatic incident, Sara went back to Ash's cell and waved a PADD at her. "Did you know you're a suspect in crimes across 8 sectors and 12 planets? And there's actually 2 active warrants out for you." Sara asked.

Ash looked the PADD and smiled wistfully at each line on in it before chuckling and sitting back down, "I guess the Chancellor on Wakal 3 was bluffing, he didn't actually report what I did to him."

"You think this is a joke? You can go back to prison. And those kids in the other cell seem to not really know who they're associating with. They tried to call the Ambassador to Cera... I talked them out of it because I don’t want to be the one to lock you up again," Sara said.

Now Ash actually laughed as she looked around dramatically, "What do you think this is? I know it's not a joke, but I had to make a living. Besides, I'm not particularly concerned about those two warrants, there were no witnesses and the alleged victims are.... no longer... around."

Sara's eyes narrowed, "You're unbelievable."

"I am who I am. So clearly you have no intention of actually reporting up the chain of command that you have me in custody. Why am I even still here?" Ash asked.

"So no one else picks you up," Sara practically growled. "Mom took your first stint in prison pretty hard and it took her such a long time to get over it when they released you. She was actually starting to be proud of you when you decided to just up and disappear. She doesn't know about any of this," Sara waved the PADD in front of Ash. "I don't want to break her heart again... That while her daughter might not be a traitor, she's just a killer for hire."

"No one asked you to do that. I can't stop being what I am. Because what I am can actually do some good in this galaxy," Ash pointed out

"By recruiting children to be your accomplices?" Sara accused.

"That's not what happened!" Ash said, suddenly very defensive. "They needed help. They were abandoned and alone on Drozana. We gave them a home, even brought them back to her home world to reunite with their family. Let them go... if you want to make sure I'm not going to go on a killing spree on the streets of Tokyo, let them do what they need to do."

"No. Because I'm fairly certain the girl will probably break you out at the first opportunity," Sara pointed out.

Ash smirked and then fiddled with something on the wall inside her cell and the forcefield dropped. She walked out and leaned into her sister, "Wrong. I could break myself out at anytime. I'm here because I'm trying to do what's right for them. Now.... your move."

Sara looked at her sister speechless and knew there was only one option.

---

"I'm going to regret this, but I'm going to let the 3 of you spend the night here. Just let me do what I need to do and you can do what you need to do in the morning, okay?" Sara said as she brought Ash to the twins.

Mila laughed when she saw Ash. "Let me guess, you broke yourself out? I have to say, Lieutenant Commander, you really need to improve the locks on these cells." To illustrate her point, she clipped off the control unit for her aural implant and held it to the force field, which immediately shut down. "They are far too easy to break out once you figure them out. All it needs is a signal resonating at the right frequency. Or some very basic engineering."

Sara rubbed her head more thoroughly, "For that, I'm just going to have to spend the rest of my night here with you."

Ash looked at the twins and her sister, "We aren't going to escape." Then looking at Mila directly, [We aren't.] "We will do this your way and then we will get out of your hair."

Sara rolled her eyes, [I can sign too, idiot.]

"Why do you think I didn't sign [Let's escape]?" Ash said.

The twins burst out laughing, relieved to finally see the Rogers sisters acting like sisters and not like enemies. "Well then," Miles said when he finally managed to catch a breath. "There's one thing that irks me, though. I'm hungry."

Mila punched him in the shoulder. "Always thinking with your stomach. Remember Valos? How your stomach nearly drove us into the arms of those slavers if I hadn't noticed something was off about it all?"

"I highly doubt that the Federation would mix drugs into our food to make us obey them without second thought," Miles replied indignantly. "And they didn't get us, so everything's good, right?"

His sister groaned. "As long as you promise you will never again accept an invitation to a free buffet by three naked Orion girls on a shady space station. Next time, I'll just let them take you and scrap you for parts."

"So if we get four naked Orion girls, we'll be okay?" Ash asked with a smirk.

Sara shook her head, "I never did understand what Renee saw in you.." She then paused, not intending to antagonize her sister.

"It's okay. We've somewhat come to a mutual understanding..." Ash said. "Now can we get the kids some food?" Then she winked at Miles, [Orion girls later...]

Sara looked at Mila for help before sighing, "All we can offer are rations. You're still prisoners, after all. But.... I might be able to replicate you something for dessert."

Mila shrugged. "Food is food, as far as I am concerned. We've had rations on the shuttle, we'll be fine for another day." She turned at Ash and smirked. "Careful, or I'll have to tell Sari you're trying to get Miles to cheat on her. Hell hath no fury as an Orion woman scorned."

"Who said the Orions were for him?" Ash retorted with a laugh.

Sara furrowed her brow at the kids and the banter they shared with Ash, who was equally as open to returning it. If she really tried, she could remember this side of her sister before everything went south in Ash's life... the one she grew up with. "There will be no Orion girls here tonight," Sara spoke up. "I'll have some rations delivered here soon," she said as she typed a few commands into the console.

Ash looked at Sara, "Oh, you're no fun..."

"Mmmhmmm, how many times did I cover for you growing up?" Sara asked with a raised eyebrow. Seeing Ash not respond made her nod, "That's right." Looking over to the twins, "If we are going to spend some quality time here together, anyone want to hear Ash stories?"

The twins looked at each other and giggled. "Sure," Miles said. "I mean, it's not as if she'd ever tell any embarrassing stories about herself, herself. We could always use some blackmail material."

"Oh no. No no no. No Ash story times," Ash protested.

Sara smirked at the trio in front of her, "I'll tell some if you tell some... considering I haven't seen Ash in a couple of years, it'd be nice to hear what she's been up to that doesn't involve seeing warrants for her arrest."

"The charges are overblown and you know it," Ash said.

"Maybe I'll start with the day I realized who you really were....and what you were really capable of," Sara looked at the twins, "Ash, really was the best older sister I could ask for. I was pretty young when she went off to Starfleet Academy, but all of my memories back then were of a protective sister that always fought the boogeymen under my bed and the bullys at school for me. By the time I went to the Academy, the Rogers name was pretty sullied by Ash. We didn't know it then, but she was arrested for treason and sent to prison after the war for doing what she was ordered to do by Section 31. So you could only imagine what it was like to be the sister of a security officer that betrayed her own ship and defected in a time of war. And not just that, but destroying her own ship and killing her best friend. Now we know that was also a setup by the Section, but at the time, everyone wanted to see her dead. Including mom. I still believed in her though. It wasn't easy. But she did get exonerated and released but the truth wasn't much better. Ash was still a killer. Her body count probably dwarfed the crew manifest of the Wrangler. I saw it first hand when we were fighting for our lives against a Sindareen that she pissed off. He kidnapped us and we were stranded on a planet waiting for rescue. Ash kept us alive but what she did to him... the brutality... I can't ever forget that. That knife she carries around? That was his knife. He tried to kill us with it. Did you tell the kids that, Ash?"

Ash pursed her lips and took a breath, "I've stopped hiding who I am..."

Sara looked at the twins, "I'm not sure how you met or what you think she is... but you probably need to know that before you get too close."

Mila shook her head. "Why do you want to scare us away from her so badly? Because you think we are helpless? We are crew members of a mercenary vessel. And before Ash found us, we had to make our own way in the galaxy. Believe me, we've seen and done things you can't even imagine in that innocent cuddled Starfleet head of yours. You have no idea what it's like out there, in the independent systems run by pirates, slavers, and worse."

Her brother put his hand on her shoulder. "Mila..."

She shook her head again. "It's true, isn't it. Remember your little artist girlfriend back on Mandar? How she ended up being captured by those slavers? How we got her out?"

"Yes, I remember Sabine." Miles sighed. "It was not a pretty story, that much is for certain."

Mila laughed, but it was a hollow, deriding laugh. "Tell me about it." She looked Sara directly in the eyes. "They had captured her to sell as a sex slave. Only way for us to get her out was to get in. So I told Miles to sell me to them. He wasn't happy with the idea, but ultimately went with it when he realised it was the only way. So while their leader was busy 'inspecting the merchandise', Miles broke his girlfriend out. And then came to get me. You should have seen the look on his face when he came into the room and saw me, standing there naked, covered in blood, and with a dead Orion in front of me. Managed to distract him, grab his disruptor from his belt, and blow up his head at point blank range. So never, ever think that I am a vulnerable little girl."

Ash looked over at Mila with a knowing but supportive nod before looking over at Sara who was stunned silent, "Things like that are more common than Starfleet and the Federation would like to think... or even truly realize, Sara. Once you know the truth in how the galaxy operates outside of the jurisdiction of Starfleet, you can't unknow it. You start to see that the sanctimony of that uniform and that badge means nothing to the people that needs it the most."

"You could have reported them to the nearest Federation outpost," Sara pointed out.

"And they'll do what? Log it? Send security officers? The slavers would be gone by the time the report processed itself through the system," Ash said. "Out there, no one will take care of you but yourself. Starfleet can't even take care of itself without people like me. Did you know that Sara? Did you know the Section reached out to me before Mars happened? I never followed up with why after I told them no. I decided to buy in and commit to being the Starfleet officer you all wanted me to be. We all saw how that went. I couldn't put on that uniform again knowing that it wasn't a symbol of hope but it was a vise around my neck. Never again will I play by the rules and see innocent people hurt. Starfleet didn't help Miles and Mila. I did. Starfleet won't help us help the Romulans when their star goes nova... we will."

Sara started to understand more about her sister and the two kids sitting inside their detention cell, "I'm sorry... I didn't know...."

Ash looked at her sister, "You wouldn't. And I wish more people didn't have to. But that's not the way the galaxy works. People like me have to do the dirty work so that people like you can live the way you live. People like me deal with slavers and pirates the only way they understand. And people like me are put into detention by people like you because of it." Ash put a supportive arm around both of the twins, [We're only playing by the rules now because she's my sister, anyone else.... we would have Perez by now.]

Miles sighed. "Lieutenant Commander, your sister is right. You know the worst part about this whole episode? The nearest Starfleet outpost was about 20 minutes away at low warp. They could have stopped this happening long ago, but they didn't. So spare us the stories about what a great ideal the Federation is. It's nothing more than that. An ideal. It's far from reality."

"Now that you're free from that life, why take on a position on a mercenary ship? Why not give Starfleet Academy a try? Clearly you're more than qualified with the skills I've seen so far?" Sara asked, genuinely curious.

Ash looked on silently, also curious about the answer. It definitely would be safer for them to nurture their abilities from the safety of the Federation bubble. That part she had to admit was true.

Mila laughed again. "We are genetically engineered. Not by choice, but we are. Your precious Federation would have us locked in a lab for hell knows what. Or treat us as some kind of charity case. Or maybe lock us up for all the stuff we had to do to survive out there."

"What my sister is trying to say," Miles added, trying to calm the situation down. "We don't have the highest opinion of the Vidraysh, as it's called on Cera."

"Tell them what it means," Mila said, smirking. "Tell them how what started as simply our local dialect word for Federation came to mean 'virtue-signalling with no intent to follow through'. Because that is how you are seen from the outside. A lot of fancy talk of equality and freedom for all, but when it comes down to it, you just let the scum get away with it, just like the Klingons and the Romulans. But at least they don't pretend to have the moral high ground."

"And there was no Starfleet or Federation, there would be even more of that," Sara pointed out. "We may not be perfect but we are trying."

Ash chortled. "Trying? You can't possibly believe that. Maybe there was once a time where we did, but the realities of the universe has proven time and time again that moral high ground means nothing. If the galaxy is as true as the Federation and Starfleet thinks it is, people like me wouldn't exist. Sorry for bursting your bubble, sis."

"What other choice do I have, Ash? Resign my commission like you did? Give up on everything? That's not the kind of person I am," Sara said accusatorily. "Someone still had to try..."

Miles decided to step in. "You know that she didn't give up on anything when she left Starfleet. After all they put her through, anyone would have. It's rough out there, and we need people like Ash to make sure it doesn't get worse. Your belief in the Federation's ideals is admirable, but reality is a lot harsher than you would like it to be."

Sara shook her head, "You think I don't know reality isn't harsh? Jean Luc Picard gave up on the Federation and Starfleet. If someone like Ash and someone like Picard both came to the same conclusion about what this uniform and symbol represents, you think I didn't really ponder what the hell I'm still doing here?"

Ash looked at Miles and Mila, "You guys don't have to defend me. I'm not a great person and I'd like to think I'm moderately better than the person my sister thinks I am. So, you're all right about me,, in your own ways. And quite frankly, if we were to be thrown into a cell by anyone in Starfleet... I'm glad it was Sara."

Ration bars then materialized in the cell. Ash looked at one and picked it up, "Mmmm, standard issue, my favorite flavor. Look, we all make choices and for the first time in my life I'm making my own. I don't answer to Starfleet. I don't answer to the Section and I'd like to think I'm not doing too bad." She pulled the twins into a hug as she handed them their ration bars.

Sara looked at the scene in front of her in confusion, "It does seem like I've missed a lot..." She shook her head, "If everyone that has any semblance of right and wrong all left Starfleet, we will leave it to those that treated you like shit, Ash. I
can't, in good conscience, let that happen. You may think I'm gullible or a hopeless optimist, but that's all we have now."

 

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