Archive of Our Own

Personal Log, Stardate 58113.9

The Cerritos is currently in orbit around Argelius II, out in the Beta Quadrant, to resupply and help the local Praetor out with some diplomatic issue. It's supposed to be nice! There's a port here just for Federation ships. Apparently, the famous Captain Kirk took the USS Enterprise here for shore leave. I wonder if we'll get a chance to explore the planet too?

It's been pretty quiet, after that whole thing with the murderous crystalline entity and the time loop last week, so it's a good time to show Dr T'Ana just how dedicated I can be in little things too. After all, trust in little things leads to trust in big things, right?

D'Vana Tendi watched the sickbay doors open to mark the start of her shift -- and then let out a gasp of shock.

Two of the biobeds were full of disgusting, slimy... things. She walked closer to see that they looked like giant salamanders, with antennae and spotty skin covered in a fine layer of mucus.

"Uh, hi there?" Tendi said to the giant salamander.

"Brrrrrr," it replied, rolling a bulbous golden eye over to stare her.

"Hideous, aren't they?" she heard a voice say, and turned to see Dr T'Ana sitting at her office desk. "A couple of morons from engineering got drunk on Romulan ale, decided to go joyriding at warp 10, and mutated into amphibians. Hate when that happens."

"Does... does this kind of stuff happened a lot?" Tendi asked.

Dr T'Ana snorted. "More often than you'd think."

She motioned Tendi into her office, and Tendi quickly grabbed a seat. Dr T'Ana tossed a padd on the desk between them.

"Anyway, I need you to pick me up a couple of antiproton burst emitter fields, to stop these two from messing up my sickbay anymore." She raised her voice at the end of the sentence, and one of the giant salamanders let out an apologetic-sounding gurgle. "There's a bio-medical supply centre in the planetary capital; they should have some in stock."

"I... don't know what those look like," Tendi said.

"Eh, grab someone from Engineering to go with you. It's their fault this happened in the first place, and they should know what you're looking for." She quickly pulled up the on-shift duty roster. "Take what's-his-face, with the implant."

"Rutherford?"

"Sure. Whatever. I don't care enough to actually remember ensigns' names." She opened up a locked drawer in her desk and placed two bars of latinum on the table. "This should cover a couple emitters."

Tendi reached for the latinum, but before she could pick them up, Dr T'Ana's paw dropped on top of her hand. She looked up, and Dr T'Ana narrowed her golden eyes.

"Bring me back the change," she said forcefully.

"Y-Yes, sir," Tendi said. Dr T'Ana released her hand and waved her off.

"Now get out of my sight. Gonna take a 15 with the scratching post to work out the stress of dealing with these nimrods."

One of the salamanders let out a questioning gurgle from sickbay.

"You're on thin enough ice as it is already, Kevin, I'm not getting you a snack," Dr T'Ana yelled back.

The salamander sighed pitifully.

Tendi grabbed the padd, and headed out towards the closest turbolift.

She found Rutherford on the ground in Engineering, elbows deep in a console.

"Rutherford!" she called out.

He looked up and grinned. "Tendi! What brings you down here?"

She waved the padd in her hands. "Dr T'Ana needs me to get some medical tech from the planet below, and suggested I bring an engineer with me. Like you!"

Rutherford disentangled himself from the wires, brushed off his uniform, and stood up. He took the padd from Tendi and scanned over it. "Oh, antiproton burst emitter fields! I know what those are. Lemme show this to Billups; he should be cool with me heading out."

Tendi handed him the padd, and Rutherford headed over to where Lieutenant Commander Billups was doing maintenance on the engine core. Tendi leaned back against the console Rutherford was working on, when her foot hit something.

She reached down to discover a padd Rutherford had left on the floor. She tapped it, and the screen lit up.

Dear Mom,

Happy Mother's Day! It's been a while since my last message to you. Life on the Cerritos continues to be exciting. Just last Thursday, we were attacked by--

Tendi dropped the padd like a hot potato and let it clatter back to the floor. So Rutherford was working on a personal letter? It felt rude to read someone else's mail.

"Tendi!"

Tendi let out a yelp of surprise at Rutherford's voice. "I didn't mean to!" she said nervously.

Rutherford's eyebrows drew together in confusion. "But didn't you invite me on the away mission? Billups cleared me to go."

"Right, yes, the away mission! That's good, that's good," Tendi said, nudging the padd with the letter back under Rutherford's diagnostic gear. "Let's grab a shuttle and head on down."

The shuttle ride down gave Tendi time to think, so she decided to bring up the thing she'd been wondering about since seeing the letter.

"Hey, Rutherford?"

"Yeah?"

"Um, what's... Mother's Day?"

"Oh!" Rutherford brightened. "It's an Earth holiday that comes around about this time every year. It's a day where you show your mom how much you care about them. I mean, I try to tell my Mom I care about her all the time, but it's the time of year where I make things extra special for her. I'm off in Starfleet and she lives on Titan, so I like to send my Mom letters and pictures of all the crazy things I've seen." He quirked his head. "Do Orions have a day like that?"

"Ah, no," Tendi said. "A bunch of days celebrating famous raids and stuff, but not really anything celebrating parents."

"You could celebrate for the first time this year. Do something nice for your mom! What do you like to do for her?"

Tendi slumped a bit in her seat. "I... don't really talk to my Mom much."

Rutherford blanched. "Oh man, I'm so sorry, Tendi. I didn't know."

Tendi shook her head. "It's okay, really. You know how I keep saying that not all Orions are evil pirates?"

"Yeah?"

"Uh, well, my Mom... is a pretty big pirate warlord, and kind of a big deal. They call her the Queen of the Winter Skies, and she's the head of the Jade Syndicate. She wants me to be her heir, but I really wanted to go into medicine and help people. She thinks that Starfleet are all a bunch of boring goodie-goodies. So, y'know."

There was a pause before Rutherford replied. "I'm real sorry, Tendi. I didn't know. I shouldn't have brought it up."

"No, it's fine," Tendi said. "I brought it up first. Maybe someday I'll try to reach out to her again. I'm glad you're doing something nice for your Mom."

They sank into an comfortable silence as Rutherford navigated around a Pakled ship orbiting the planet. Flames popped up as the shuttle entered the atmosphere, and they turned their attention to landing the ship.

They parked the shuttle on a public landing pad between a store called Ronin's Candle Emporium and a travel agency advertising exotic vacations to the sunny beaches of Romulus.

The shuttle door opened, and Tendi took in a deep breath of air, appreciating the whirl of scents that came with the atmosphere of a planet. She helped Rutherford wheel out the hovercart from Engineering, and enjoyed the feel of warm sunshine on her green skin.

"So, where are we headed?" Rutherford asked.

Tendi checked the padd Dr T'Ana had given here. "The Harmon Medical Technology Institute. It should be... a little south of here? I don't think it's that far."

The headed off down one of the main streets of the capital. The city hub of Argelius II was a beautiful place, full of trees and lively painted stores. People passed by, going in and out of shops, and carrying on their daily lives. Everything had a wonderfully peaceful atmosphere. Tendi could see why it was a popular shore leave planet for Federation ships.

The front of a local store had a holo news broadcast running in its front window. Tendi peaked at the feed. It looked like Captain Freeman and Commander Ransom were holding a conference, along with the Betazoid Praetor of Argelius II and a pair of Pakled officers in very large hats. Was this what the Cerritos was here to help out with? She hoped things went well; the Pakleds had been very unpredictable lately.

The two Starfleet officers carried on with their trek. The bridge crew was always busy with matters of life and death; it was just as important to make Dr T'Ana happy.

The Harmon Medical Technology Institute was a squat, beige-coloured building on one of the major roads. The doors whooshed open for Tendi and Rutherford, revealing a cheery lobby area full of plants and cloth wall hangings. The receptionist -- a tall Kelpien woman -- rose from behind a desk at the other end of the room as they parked the hovercart off to one side.

"Welcome to the Harmon Medical Technology Institute," she said cheerfully. "How can I help you?"

"We're from the USS Cerritos," Tendi said, placing her padd on the counter. "We've been sent to get a couple of devices to help our crewmates."

The Kelpien picked up the padd, and traced her way down the list with her long fingers. "Ah, antiproton burst emitters." She chuckled. "Someone decide to go a little too fast?"

"Yeah, we got salamanders," Tendi said.

"Ah yes, that will happen." The Kelpien set the padd back down. "We have those in stock. Now, as Argelius II isn't a Federation world, they will cost 150 strips of latinum."

Tendi fished the bars out of her pocket and set them on the counter next to the padd. "Can you make change?"

Before the Kelpien could answer, the door whooshed open behind them again. "Well well, looks like we gotta couple a new rubes to hit up in this dive," a woman's voice said.

The Kelpien woman's threat ganglia popped out and started twitching wildly.

Tendi and Rutherford turned around.

There was a trio of human-looking people at the door. The woman in the middle wore a knee-length dark green dress, covered with black beading and long black fringe at the hem. Her black hair was cut into a short bob, held in place with a pearl beaded headband. The men on either side of her were tall walls of muscles, impeccably dressed in pinstriped three-piece suits with matching fedoras.

All three of them carried large mechanical guns.

"Looks like a couple a Feds wandered right into our turf, Boss Zolyx," the man on the right said.

The woman grinned. "Lucky us."

"What's with the retro look?" Rutherford asked.

"Iotians," the Kelpien whispered.

Tendi wasn't super well-versed in ancient Earth history, but every Starfleet crewmember handling Second Contact missions was taught about Sigma Iotia II, as a warning of what could go wrong if you messed it up.

The USS Horizon had had the best intentions when they'd given books to help the warlike Iotian people build a better society. But one single history book -- Chicago Mobs of the Twenties -- had caused the Iotians to reshape their entire society into a copy of 1920s human mobster culture. A single communicator forgotten by a USS Enterprise crewman a hundred years later had taught them how to recreate modern technology, and inspired them to spread their turf wars to the stars.

Iotians might have been stuck in the past, but they were clever, and dangerous, and real angry at Captain Kirk and his "Feds" for tricking them.

Zolyx sauntered up to the counter. "Soriya," she said to the Kelpien woman, who flinched, "so good to see you again."

"Hello," Soriya said nervously, avoiding eye contact.

"I'm here for your weekly protection fee. Be a shame if anything happened to you croakers here." She eyed up the counter. "Or maybe your Fed friends have been kind enough to pay for you?"

Zolyx grabbed the latinum bars from the counter and held them up. Tendi let out a cry and tried to grab them back, but in an instant both of the heavies had their guns pointed straight at her.

"Uh-uh-uh," Zolyx tutted. "My trigger men Tiny and Bruno got itchy fingers. Why don't you fellas grab a little air before they fill you with daylight?"

"What?" Rutherford asked.

"Put your hands up or they'll shoot," Soriya quietly translated.

Tendi and Rutherford did as they were told. They'd come unarmed, and Tendi suspected that a metal bullet -- even one from a gun 400 years out of date -- could move faster than she ever could.

Zolyx bit the edge of one of the bars to make sure it was real, then slipped it into a pocket on her flapper dress. "Always nice to take a cut of the Feds' 40%."

She and the other Iotians backed up until they reached the door, guns still drawn. "Been a slice, ya chumps," she said as they disappeared out the doors.

Tendi and Rutherford dropped their hands, as Soriya massaged her temples to get her threat ganglia back under control.

"Well, that was a shock," Rutherford said. "If I'd known we were going to get robbed I would have brought a phaser."

"I thought Argelius II was a peaceful world," Tendi said.

"Oh, it was," Soriya said. "Argelians are pacifists, and aside from some... issues a hundred years ago, it's been quite quiet. After all the troubles with the Dominion War in the Federation and the Ba'ul reunification movement on Kaminar, I moved here specifically to help get my blood pressure down. It's been lovely the past couple years."

She looked up towards the doors. "The Iotian trio showed up about a month ago, I think as a way to branch out and start their own 'turf'. They've been threatening and shaking down most of us shopkeepers in the area. I've tried sending appeals to the Praetor, but with the current major diplomatic crisis, she's been too distracted to help us." Soriya sighed. "I had to download a copy of their precious Book just to figure out what they were talking about so they'd stop smashing up my plants."

"Wait, you can just download a copy of Chicago Mobs of the Twenties?" Rutherford asked.

"Oh yes," Soriya said. "I think the Enterprise sent a copy back to Starfleet or something for archiving. It's available to download from their public records."

"Oh man, I should check that out," Rutherford said, grabbing Dr T'Ana's padd from the counter and loading up an archive site.

Tendi thought Soriya's words over. This Iotian gang was causing trouble for shopkeepers here. People were in need. Maybe... maybe this was a job for Starfleet.

Plus, Dr T'Ana would probably flush her out the airlock if she came back without the money and without the emitters.

"Maybe, we can help get rid of them?" Tendi offered.

Soriya's eyes brightened. "Would you? Can you use your Orion pheromones to seduce them into going away?"

Tendi let out a growl of frustration. "Captain Archer meets one group of Orions with pheromones on his first trip out of the Sol system, and now everyone thinks we're all like that."

Wait.

Everyone did think that all Orions were violent pirates, or sexy tempters. Or like, both at once. It was a stereotype Tendi had been fighting against since her first days at the Academy.

But if everyone thought that... maybe the Iotians did too.

"Rutherford," she said intensely, grabbing his shoulder.

"What?"

"I have an idea." She grinned. "Something that can get Dr T'Ana's latinum back. And also save the locals from shakedowns."

She grabbed his head, and Rutherford let himself be dragged out of the Harmon lobby back onto the streets of the capital.

"Can you tell where they are?" Tendi asked.

Rutherford unclipped the tricorder from his belt and ran a scan. "Scanning for Iotian signatures. It looks like they headed north to--" He squinted down the street. "--a café, or something?"

"Perfect," Tendi said. They followed the signal down the street towards a sign that read the Brikar Rock & Roll Bar, and peaked around the swinging doors of the entrance.

It was a small place, with a handful of tables, and a couple different holo news feeds playing over the bar. The Iotian trio sat at a rickety table near the middle of the room.

One of the gunmen set down a hand of cards. "Double fizzbin!" he announced proudly.

The other dropped his cards in disgust. "That's not a double fizzbin! Eights ain't wild on even-numbered days, and jacks are reversed on full moons!"

The first gunman slammed his hands on the table. "Are you calling me a dirty chiseler?"

"And what if I am?"

Zolyx rolled her eyes and sipped something from a martini glass.

Tendi and Rutherford ducked back out of sight. "Looks like we found 'em," he said.

Tendi took a deep breath. "We're here, we're unarmed, they robbed us, they don't respect Starfleet diplomacy, and the local authorities are busy dealing with whatever's going on downtown. I think the only way to deal with this might be... Orion-style diplomacy." She smiled sheepishly. "Just, roll with whatever I do?"

He gave her a thumbs up. "You got it."

Tendi stood, took a deep breath, and thought back to everything she'd learned over her childhood. Here goes nothing.

She kicked the sliding doors open. One of them hit the jukebox with a loud thump, causing the classical Beastie Boys song to skip and die. Everyone in the café turned to look at her, including the Iotians.

"Well, well, if it ain't the Feds," said Zolyx. "Come to give us more of your flimflam?" She laughed. "Without your fancy bean-shooters, the lot of you saps are just some weak sisters."

Tendi strode in and slammed her hands on the Iotians' table, causing their cards to go flying. "You!" she said, channeling as much force of her Orion piracy roots as she could. "You think I'm with the Feds? Oh no; I'm an agent of the Orion Jade Syndicate. And we're claiming this planet as our turf."

She gestured to the muted holo news feed playing over the bar, where Commander Ransom and the Pakleds were engaged in a full on fist-fight, while Captain Freeman and the Praetor yelled things at them.

"The Jade Syndicate has full control over these Feds and their ship. Even now, my agents are taking out the government as part of our conquest. Right, Starfleet scum?"

"Yep, totally true!" Rutherford said cheerfully.

Tendi leaned in close to Zolyx. "You all are going to clear out of my turf, and if you want to get out unharmed, I have three demands."

"Finally, some real negotiation," Zolyx said. "Waddaya want?"

"Firstly, you're going to give me back my funds."

Zolyx looked confused at the word. Rutherford whipped out the padd, and quickly scanned through something. "Try 'scratch'," he called.

"Firstly, you're going to give back my scratch," Tendi tried.

Zolyx seemed to register that. "And?"

"Number two, you're going to give back anything you stole--"

"Nicked!" Rutherford called.

"--anything you nicked from the shopkeepers around here. This is Jade Syndicate territory, and we claim all the spoils here."

"You want us to give up all our hard-earned kale?" one of the thugs said. "Lady, you gotta be goofy."

Tendi slapped the grunt across his face, stunning him. "I didn't say you could talk, worm!"

Rutherford let out a short gasp. The thug blinked in surprise. Zolyx looked downright impressed.

"I had my doubts, Greenie," she said, "but now I see I'm dealing with an actual Boss. And thirdly?"

"Thirdly, I need you and your whole crew to leave--"

"Dangle!" Rutherford called.

Tendi looked back at him. "Dangle?"

He shrugged. "The Book's glossary says it's a synonym for leave."

She turned back to Zolyx. "Thirdly, I need you and your whole crew to uh, dangle out of here? Within the next hour. As long as you leave this turf alone, you can escape the wrath of the Jade Syndicate."

Zolyx leaned back in her seat. "And why should we?"

Tendi leaned in close enough to see the beadwork on the Iotian's pearl headband. "Because if there's one thing we Orions know, it's how to inflict pain. And with the 'Feds' under our control..."

She back moved out and gestured over to the holo feed. The meeting had completely devolved into chaos. Someone seemed to have hit the Praetor in the face, as she was cradling her noise with one hand. Commander Ransom had lost his shirt at some point and was wrestling with one of the Pakleds. Captain Freeman was yelling intently at the other.

"I see," Zolyx said, nodding. "I can concede to the tougher mob operation."

She pulled both bars of latinum out of a pocket in her flapper dress and tossed them on the table. Tendi quickly snatched them up.

"Fine," Zolyx said, standing, "we'll beat feet. Find ourselves an even better piece of turf to work."

She motioned to her goons, who stood up to follow her. The one rubbing his cheek gave Tendi a submissive look as they left the cafe.

Someone smacked the jukebox, and the Beastie Boys resumed their centuries-old song about sabotage. The other patrons in the bar went back to their own drinks and conversations.

Tendi let out a huge sigh. "Aaaah, that was so nerve-wracking. I didn't think they'd believe me."

"You were great!" Rutherford said. "And honestly, you even scared me a little bit."

"Really?"

"Oh yeah, you'd make a terrifying pirate." He nudged her shoulder. "So I'm glad you're my friend and crewmate instead."

"Aww, thanks," she said, nudging him back. "Now let's go get those emitters!"

A hum filled the Cerritos' sick bay as Tendi turned on the second emitter. Kevin the salamander let out a thankful croak, then went back to sipping his juice box.

"Well, kid," Dr T'Ana said. "I gotta say, you did pretty good."

"You really think so?" Tendi said, her cheeks blushing an emerald green.

"Yeah. It's pretty simple to go pick these up, but you saved me the trip. Thanks."

Tendi felt her heart swell at the praise. "Th, thank you so much, Dr T'Ana."

"Yeah, yeah. Now go keep an eye on those antiproton burst levels and get out of my fur," Dr T'Ana said, heading into her office.

Tendi settled into a chair on the far side of sickbay, and pulled up a file on the padd she was using.

Dear Mom,
Humans have a holiday called Mother's Day. I know we haven't talked in a while, but I wanted to tell you--

"Hey!" Dr T'Ana yelled from her office. "Did you download a copy of Chicago Mobs of the Twenties onto my padd?!"

"Um, nope!" Tendi called back. It wasn't technically a lie. "Maybe it was there before?"

Dr T'Ana angrily mumbled to herself about data thieves, and Tendi hoped she wouldn't find out where it really came from.

She looked down at the letter on her padd, and then sent it back to her personal folder. Maybe she'd get up the courage to reach out to her Mom later. For now, she was happy enough to be here on the Cerritos, making a difference.