Return to Azaadi

The desert felt heavy underfoot as Jasmine Moonshade staggered towards the structures before her. They rippled in the haziness of the air adding to the sense of unbalance she felt. Her head pounded and her lips had cracked. How long had she gone without water? Her canteen was empty, the last of the water used and she felt her mind wandering. Her arms were reddened and raw where the suns had blistered and burnt at her skin. She was ill-prepared for the journey she had undertaken  her survival suit stripped from her and she now wore her original clothes she had worn when her memory of life on Araxes began - a grey vest and brown trousers with heavy boots.

The world seemed too bright, as though the universe had lost contrast  Her head pounded and she fought the creeping blindness that permeated her peripheral vision. Still, she recognised the scents of Azaadi, a strange mixture of the desert, off-worlders and something familiar that lay beyond her limited memory. She leant up against the wall of an alleyway, grazing her arm against the rough texture. Then, she heard a voice she knew. She peered up and realised where she was - the Bleeding Reaver Saloon.

Jasmine staggered into the saloon, swayed from side to side and fell to the floor, her strength had finally left her. She looked up and saw hazy figures at a table.

"Adherent!"

The voice of the Yiazzis!

Jasmine thought she may have said the words but realised she could no longer tell whether she was speaking or thinking. A figure knelt before her and she felt a canteen offered. She thought she heard a female voice from elsewhere in the room but she focused her eyes on the figure before her.

"All is undone!", Jasmine spat the words out through a dry mouth, "All is undone!"

"You are without a shirt? You will blister." She felt the canteen offered again and this time Jasmine took it and drank thirstily.

"Slowly, slowly, not too fast. You will throw up."

Jasmine took the canteen away from her mouth, nodded and let some of the water spill down her face before drinking again.

"Come, sit down....I will make something for your shoulders.....and your chest." Several lacerations marked the Adherent's torso, long and repeated lashings.

She climbed to her feet and staggered across to a chair. The water had the desired effect and she felt a modicum of clarity return to her thinking. She realised that her delirium had blocked out the pain from her wounds she had sustained and that that pain was swiftly returning.

"Captain", the Yiazzis gestured to a figure across the room, "keep watch, with weapon drawn, if you please."

Another figure, clouded by the red haze around her vision, asked with concern "Is there anything I can do? Should do?"

"Yes, XenoAnthropologist, examine those wounds if you please."

As the Yiazzis voice pulled away to a space behind, she heard a  pulsing, occasionally irregular but somehow melodic beeping came from a device the other figure held at close quarters. Jasmine rested her head in her hands and felt bloody tears fall from her eyes. As the female analysed her readings, Jasmine eased the backpack from her shoulders and let if fall gently besides the chair. Her hands were bloodened. The Albino Stigmata. Blood tears from the eyes had led to blood to fall upon the palms of her hands.

"There are some deep wounds", the female said, "some bleeding....don't appear to be immediately life threatening...that's odd...."

Jasmine sensed that the device had revealed something about her but her thinking was interrupted by the Yiazzis return with a paste.

"She is not exactly normal human...", the Yiazzis spoke and began to pour water over the wounds.

A voice from overhead, a familiar voice, presumably the captain issued an update over the security situation - they now had cannon support from overhead. The Yiazzis, as careful as always.

"Ivy seems to take to weapons well", the nearby female spoke again, "If I may ask, what is going on?"

The Yiazzis poured more water upon the wounds with little care to the mess. "Ask", she said, "I will listen also."

"You honour me with water I do not deserve Yiazzis.", Jasmine grimaced as the cooling water ran into her wounds upon her back making her move awkwardly.

"I'm Bobbi, a Starfleet researcher, what's going on?"

Jasmine turned to face the female, Bobbi, as the Yiazzis slathered the prepared paste into her wounds, holding the edges together and using what resembled beetle heads from her pouch to clamp the cuts together.

"My name is Jasmine Moonshade, although I am known by many names. My people call me their Adherent, but in truth they were never my people..."

"What do they mean by 'adherent'?"

Before she could answer, the Yiazzis had pushed Jasmine back into her chair and was treating the wounds to her shoulders and abdomen in the same manner as her back.

"The desert born....", Jasmine nodded towards the Morloch with a knowing look, "...not known for their gentle nature. As I was saying, an Adherent is a title given to the religious leader of our tribe...they saw in me an echo of their messiah...but I was the architect of their destruction...the tribe......they lived secretly, in hiding for many years. They found me, lost and near death in the desert, nursed me back to health in the belief I was a holy figure. In my arrogance, I unveiled us to the world and brought death to the people...."

Jasmine stared into nothingness, not realising that the Yiazzis had left the saloon to scour for more beetle heads until she returned through the open door and returned to treating the wounds.

"You revealed the desert born to the corporations?" asked the Starfleet researcher, as another figure entered the saloon and sat down at an adjacent table.

"We are not desert born", Jasmine lifted a finger to stress the point, a point amplified by the voice of the Yiazzis. "They are Jadites."

"Jadites?"

"There are people who fled Al Raqis and sought refuge in the desert. They are not all 'native' to this world although some are. I, myself, am known as a Moon-baby, native to a world called Xibilu."

"Moon-babys are used for organ replacement. Slaves.", the Yiazzis interjected.

"Oh no. From where?"

"They call it the Alliance." Jasmine spoke with a venom that surprised even herself.

"Alliance? And the corporations? How do they all relate?"

The Yiazzis spoke as she watered down the remnants of the prepared paste and began spreading it over exposed skin. "Blue Sun is from the Alliance."

Jasmine felt a sudden emotion overcome her and she clasped at the garment the Yiazzis wore. Feeling the bloody tears upon her cheeks again, she spoke solemnly "I come for my judgment Yiazzis. I come for what I deserve! Judgement!"

The Yiazzis stopped what she was doing and looked down as Jasmine looked up. "Your choices, your consequences, Adherent. I did not make your choices, I cannot give you consequences."

The Adherent returned her head to her hands "So many times I have tried to drive the guilt from myself. In pain, I sought refuge."

"Your own pain?", the realisation came to Bobbi now, "You did this to yourself?"

"I will voice an opinion", the Yiazzis sounded stern, "You fail them and yourself by this choice. Jade lives. She will have need of you."

Jasmine shook her head in desperation "What will she make of my decisions? So much blood spilit. May Jade have mercy on my soul!"

"Do not decide what her decisions will be", the Yiazzis spoke with authority, "Talk with her. You cannot choose for another. They must all make their own choices." She stopped, clearly in thought, "They made their choices. Their consequences are their own. You chose life for them, not death. But death came anyway."

"The savages that struck us.....I had not seen their like before.", Jasmine stood wearily as she spoke, perhaps seeking to reaffirm her position after a display of weakness, "their skin was red.....by nature or by artificial colouration I cannot tell you. They were savage powerful warriors, dark armour that seemed to absorb the light, it did not reflect the sun"

"Stealth armor, old technology but useful"

"They slaughtered without discrimination. They took the water of the young as freely as the water of our warriors."

"It covered only part of them...so that you saw their skin? Any other noticeable marks?"

"An odour....how can I describe it...clinical but somehow musky and animal like."

"That does not match any Starborn we have observed...."

"Or" said Bobbi, the Starfleet researcher, "if I may interject, any I recognise"

"And yet..." continued the Yiazzis, "they attacked only the Sanctuary, nothing else on Araxes. That argues for a mercenary attack. And that means money..."

Jasmine nodded "Logical reasoning. There are many with money upon this world....and those who have recently left.."

"So not the moon-babies seeking vengeance against the Jadites for the missing children..."

"What was the Sanctuary?", Bobbi asked.

"A refuge for those who rebelled and wished to live in peace" came the reply from the Yiazzis, "Sanctuaries here are.....places of learning, but that one was abandoned hundreds of years ago. We allowed the Jadeites to live there. They did not seek to destroy Mother Araxes. Unlike some others..."

"Someone trying to destroy the Council of Ghosts" interjected the captain from the roof. Jasmine became alert at the mention of the Council and tried to place the voice.

"I fear the Council are lost", Jasmine spoke sombrely, "there were but three moonbabies within our tribe - I have not seen nor heard of them since the attack", she turned to the Yiazzis with narrowed eyes, "Then we were mistaken in the belief we were hidden from the Desert Born. Our hubris betrays us once again. No matter. What is done is done. The Sanctuary has fallen."

"Another rises, to the north and west....." The Yiazzis cut off mid-sentence as the captain from the roof, Ivy, walked through the door, "...Captain, it seems we do not seek another destroyer, just yet. Thank you for your service, we are in your debt."

After a customary bow, the Yiazzis addressed the group again. "Have any of you seen a redskinned species, here or elsewhere?"

The cloaked figure that sat at the adjacent table spoke, "I know exposure to radiation and strong and sharp gusts of wind can flay the flesh and leave a red appearance."

As the group spoke, the captain from the roof who the others had called Ivy, took the opportunity to whisper something in Jasmine's direction. She read the captain's lips and gave the hand signal that she understood what she had been said.


[Edited for brevity]