Hidden by the leaves... aka Samurai Messner

[messner 0]

Raolin Messner woke early, and with some time to spare, he sat in his quarters and read Hagakure, Book of the Samurai for quite a while.  He'd been reading a chunk here and there for some days, and was almost finished with it now.  Hagakure is essentially a collection of sayings and wisdoms.  Some passages Messner pondered for a while, and others he payed only small attention to.  Some he decided he would never understand, and of these some he came to this conclusion about after a long time and some of them after no time at all.  Eventually Messner realized his next duty shift was coming up and prepared to leave.  He'd heard that something was wrong with the Captain and Commander, but he didn't yet know what.  He was on his way out the door, when suddenly he found himself scrolling back through to a previous chapter until he stopped at a certain passage.  He read some if it out loud to himself..

 

"A man is a good retainer to the extent that he earnestly places importance in his master.  This is the highest sort of retainer....  It is further good fortune if.. one has wisdom and talent and can use them appropriately.  But even a person who is good at nothing and exceedingly clumsy will be a reliable retainer if only he has the determination to think earnestly of his master.  Having only wisdom and talent is the lowest tier of usefulness."

 

He paused for several seconds with a pondering, meaningful, cinematic look on his face, until finally he turned away and strode determinedly out the door.  He went about his routine fairly normally for a short time, but still had this passage in the back of his mind when he soon learned that the HoD and RawI' had both been infected with some desperate condition.  When he happened through the MRF on patrol and saw his commanding officers prostrate on biobeds, he stopped and looked on with increasing concern.  Just as he was going to force himself back out on patrol, though, they both vanished into thin air.  After several moments of utter anger and confusion, Messner determined he would be able to determine the best way to help from the meH, and rushed there.

 

Messner stalked around the meH anxiously, awaiting some instruction, but still managed to catch much of the conversation Ramjep was having with an alien on the viewscreen who seemed to be responsible for the dissappearances which Messner was so concerned about.  He took in much information from the exchange, but the most important parts that he understood were that these aliens did not have any concern for his commanders' lives, and that they would have to be forced into giving them back.

 

Messner just about jumped out of his skin when the idea was brought up of taking a shuttle in to rescue them, and very well could have viscerally popped right there on the meH if he had not a few moments later been assigned to the rescue party.  He got to the shuttle bay as fast as he could, and would have dashed into space by himself if they had not a few moments later departed with all accounted for.  At this point Messner's training and mental discipline kicked in finally, and as he realized he couldn't do anything further until they got through the shield barrier and to the right location, he calmed himself in favor of formulating a plan.  The only problem was that he had no information on the situation they were entering, and he was the only security officer on the team, and he had no idea how heavily guarded the facility might be that they were invading amidsts countless enemy reenforcements.  Messner was perplexed for half a moment, when the furthest passage he had read that morning came back to him suddenly and clearly.

 

"When one has made a decision to kill a person, even if it will be very difficult to succeed by advancing straight ahead, it will not do to think about doing it in a long, roundabout way. One's heart may slacken, he may miss his chance, and by and large there will be no success. The Way of the Samurai is one of immediacy, and it is best to dash in headlong."  This blended together in his thoughts with a bit he had read quite a while ago, but which was just as vivid in his mind, "A real man does not think of victory or defeat.  He plunges recklessly towards an irrational death."

 

"Dash in headlong...." Messner mumbled to himself, but noone heard him.  As Rhoz worked at punching through the planets force field, Messner punched the coordinates into the transporter system for the room that his commanding officers were in.  His mind became a sildent void; his anger was a flame licking at the edges; his concern was countless fists pounding at his concentration; his fear was ten thousand feet of water pressing his void from all sides, threatening to crush him to oblivion.  Not too long ago, one Ensign Messner, freshly promoted from cleaning duty, would have been crushed.  There would have been a warm puddle of liquid on the shuttle deck, at the very least, the alternative being a cold puddle of security officer.  But though he wouldn't believe it himself, Messner's trials with friends, enemies, beasts, and crewmates had hardened him.  His friends from the alpha quadrant would hardly recognize the resolute man who now stood as unswaying as an ancient statue as he drew his phaser.

 

Rhoz broke through the field.

 

"Dash in headlong...."  Messner pressed the panel next to him as he leveled his phaser at the future.. at whatever may come.

 

He barely made out the beginning of someone saying  "what are you..." as he dematerialized.  He rematerialized in a room which appeared to be a lab at first sight.  The only person immediately in his view had his back turned, but was apparently an alien like that on the viewscreen, and was apparently a guard judging by the sidearm strapped to his chest, and Messner was not going to try to take prisoners.  Just as the guard began to turn to see the source of a noise, he fell limp from a phaser stun in his back.  Messner stepped back and calmly swept his view and phaser in a circle around him in search of enemies and already searching for possible cover from counter-attack.  As he finished his complete circle he came back around to face the room's only door, just as another guard came onto the scene with his weapon already drawn.  Messner aimed.  The guard aimed.

 

Messner's fear was only playing before.  Now it clenched around him with all its might.  Of course, he had been in battle before.  He had faced great fear before.  And most of the time he had managed to act, or at least react, in spite of it.  But in this instance, it simply did not touch him.  His Captain and Commander were on the line, and Lieutenant Senior Grade Raolin Messner was simply beyond fear.

 

It was that one instant that made the difference.  Messner's mind was set.  The guard blinked.  Messner fired first, and the guard fell to the ground, dropping his weapon and releasing the trigger which had already been pressed half way down.

 

Messner remained perfectly still and poised for a few seconds.  Spiders sized him up for building webs on, and birds pondered good spots for nests.  Then he finally tapped his communicator and started to tell the rest of the shuttle that the room was clear, but even as he said it the others besides Rhoz transported in near him.  He checked Bch and K'Walus for pulses and breathed a heavy sigh of relief to find them both.  Then he positioned himself in the doorway and kept watch so as to keep out of the way of the rest of the team.  The coast looked clear, and he was starting to relax ever so slightly, when he spotted several (and I mean SEVERAL!) guards moving just beyond a transparent window of sorts down the hall.

 

As the first of them came around a corner, he was shot down, and Messner prepared for battle and death.  "No matter if the enemy has thousands of men, there is fulfillment in simply standing them off and being determined to cut them all down, starting from one end."  However, perhaps luckily for the guards, though more likely luckily for Messner, as the beam dissipated from that first shot, he and the rest of the team were beamed back to the shuttlecraft and to safety.

 

"If one were to say in a word what the condition of being a samurai is, its basis lies first in seriously devoting one's body and soul to his master."