Looking through the Ages

[Cptn Corizon 0]

Corizon took a deep breath as the shuttle craft, Joseph d’Arimathie, entered his range of vision escorted by two Miramo flyers. To be quiet truthful he wasn’t sure what annoyed him more – that he had to leave the volume of lore he was reading or that he had to leave it to meet with the Vorta Lexin who’d decided to grace the Archives with his presence.

 

How he’d become a diplomat was beyond him. This, after all, was a man who’d spent the better part of his career planning and teaching people to kill men like Lexin and now he was expected to liaison with them and help save their empire… oh it was a delicious irony if you were into that kind of thing – Corizon wasn’t.

 

The shuttle sat down with a gentle thud and hiss of the landing thrusters. A moment later the hatch door lifted and the pale, slender body of the Vorta emerged. For his part, Lexin couldn’t be happier about the situation, for all of the talk about how gruff the Dameon captain supposedly was, he’d been nothing but an amicable host and though his dislike for the mission at hand was… palatable, he carried it out professionally and dutiful.

 

The bright sun took a moment for his eyes to adjust too, he’d always wondered why the Vorta would have such keen hearing but such poor sight and taste, and perhaps someday he would get to ask a Founder that question, perhaps not.

 

“Captain,” Lexin said with the cool tone the Dameon had come to expect from the Vorta. “I didn’t expect you to meet me personally; I do hope I didn’t tear you away from anything too interesting.”

 

“Of course not,” Corizon said, a half-lie implanted. “Besides, I don’t think the Miramo would want you wandering around…”

 

“Yes,” Lexin replied. “From what the Satarimi have told me they do guard their secrets rather jealously and take their role very seriously.”

 

The two began walking down the pathway that lead to the archive area that they’d been granted access to and for a moment they both took in the scenery. For Corizon it seemed as something from his own world, where monuments to the glories of the Old Empire speckled the old cities and the mood often felt more like a morgue than a bustling world at the intersection of the Gorn, Klingon and Federation borders. For Lexin it was somewhat humbling reminder that even the mightiest of Empires could fade with time, something that he feared was happening with his own beloved Dominion.

 

“I was wondering,” Corizon said, breaking the long silence. “Why or rather how did the inhabitants of this planet end up guarding the collective history of the Satarimi…”

 

“The Satarimi are guarded about their past,” Lexin conceded, “but from what I’ve gathered they ruled this area some 15,000 years ago… in deed many of the ruins here pre-date the structures on their homeworld. Apparently the Miramo regard them as something as high-power and follow their word as law. ”

 

“Interesting,” Corizon said. “I am still curious about why… “

 

“From what I can tell,” he continued, “The Satarimi ruled mostly in absentia, returning to their client worlds every so often to check on their progress.”

 

“Seems to be a habit, you can’t deny that the Founder’s wouldn’t have been influenced by them or the Scorpiads.”

 

Lexin paused long enough to send a sidelong glance at Corizon, unsure if the response was meant to be a heretical as it sounded, but then Corizon wasn’t a subject of the Dominion. “The Founder’s are wise in all things.”

 

Corizon bit back a remark and smiled instead. “I suppose.”

 

“So,” Lexin said, noticeably changing the subject. “What have you been able to find so far…”

 

“Well I’ve been looking through the archives from the historical time frame that Taenix thinks the Founders were here… looks like the figured that the Scorpiads wouldn’t challenge the Satarimi…”

 

The Vorta nodded along as Corizon prattled. He didn’t mention that the very notion of the Founder’s having to “hide” was repulsive, even offensive, but it was clear that such notions weren’t the most… engendering to the Vorta male.

 

“And what of the device? Any mention of it?”

 

“Not yet… though…”

 

--

 

The Orion leaned back into the rather comfortable, despite its looks, wooden chair and considered the sheer number of files that were archived just in this building alone. It was astounding to imagine that she was one of few outsiders to ever glimpse into these files that held the collective history of an entire sector dating back to a time before the Dominion ruled. Great gods – she could spend possibly her entire life in the building and still be finding new pieces of history about the Satarimi.

 

Her delusions of spending the rest of her Starfleet career happily running through the archives were brought to an end when the patter of Ensign Karly Harrein footsteps turned into Karly’s normally mezzo voice rising to a full soprano.

 

“Commander,” the blond haired female said, almost giddily. “You’re not going to believe what Falo and I found!”

 

Pausing for a moment, the Orion considered a response, ruefully smiling over the possibilities. Finally she decided to go with her better nature and went with a simple, “Oh?”

 

“Well,” Karly said, catching her breath. “We were looking… on a hunch… at some of the exploratory records. We came across something really odd.”

 

Again with the possibilities. Imagining herself to be a cat listening kitten telling about catching the first mouse, she nodded patiently with a wide smile. “Yes?”

 

“Well this one system… it was showing up on star charts and exploration records for several years, then nothing. Absolutely nothing. Like it had never existed or something.”

“Well these are old records,” she offered. “It could have been forgotten about, or the system really doesn’t exist anymore.”

 

“Falo said the same thing,” she said, referencing the third member of the away team from science. “So we checked out some of our own records and looked through another set of star charts that referenced trade routes back when the Satarimi Empire stretched across the entire sector…”

 

Laarell had to admit she was slightly impressed by the detective work of her team thus far, but then again she’d picked the group for a reason. “Good, what did you find?”

 

“Well what we found only confused us more.”

 

“Oh?”

 

“The system is… nearest we can tell absolutely worthless.”

 

“Well that could explain a good deal.”

 

“I know what you’re thinking,” Karly said. “I said the same thing till Falo pulled up another record.”

 

“Keep talking,” Laarell said as she resumed looking through files.

 

“Other than a small mine on the fourth planet that was deserted when the Satarimi Explorative force came in. They placed a small base there and used it as listening post for a couple hundred years till it gradually became less and less on the frontiers of their space.”

 

“Mhmmm.”

 

Unphased by her superiors waning interest, the human female continued. “The odd thing is that the records of the place don’t end after they stopped using the base – even then they were apparently very through in keeping track of things – it’s not until a few years after the supposed destruction of the Founder’s homeworld and the time frame we have for them going into hiding that the place drops off the grid completely, even rerouted the trade convoys that passed near it away.”

 

“That’s nic… wait… what?”

 

Smiling, despite herself, Karly nodded. “Founders lose their homeworld, then poof. No more records.”

 

“Really? Now that is interesting. What else do we know about this system?”

 

“Well other than the abandoned mine/listening post, there’s not much else there. The mining world is a small dead world, the Founders likely wouldn’t operate there though, it would be really obvious to anyone passing by to look there first.”

 

“What’s the profile of the other worlds?”

 

“Two aren’t even habitable… even for changelings and the other is… barely class-M.”

 

“Barely?”

 

“The entire planet is one big marsh.”

 

“Life?”

 

“Oh, lots of life… according to the scans, but no one is entirely sure of what kind. The Satarimi sent a dozen or so expeditions to the planet, but only two returned… and they weren’t ever the same.”

 

The Orion looked dubiously at the science officer. “Explain.”

 

“Well apparently there is a possibly sentient race on the planet… reptilian… but the two teams who returned couldn’t really tell any much about them…”

 

“Oh?”

 

“They were emotionally scarred…”

 

“Oh. Lovely,” the Orion said. For a moment she considered how wonderful an assignment this was going to be before it clicked that this information was literally ten-thousand years old. “Well, maybe they’re all dead… or evolved into something friendlier.”

 

“Possibly.”

 

“It does sound like the perfect place for the Founders to hide at though.”

 

“Falo and I thought as much.”

 

“I’ll get ahold of the Captain… I think he’s with Lexin in the Ornery. “

 

Karly nodded and headed off to resume looking through files. Calling out after her, the Orion smiled widely. “And good work you two.”