For All The Right Reasons Pt. VII

[Veloras Itana 0]

For All The Right Reasons

Pt. VII

"Hints, Allegations & Things Left Unsaid"

 

For the two weeks that followed, Itana did not utter a word. The time that she was conscious was spent staring blankly at nothing or transfixed on whatever ghosts she held clenched in her fists. She hardly ate and, when she did it was nearly forced on her by her father who almost never left her side. At night she would murmur to herself in her sleep which remained fitful and unsettled. Nothing could calm her and, it began to seem as if nothing could stir her from the prison she'd constructed for herself within her own mind.

Ranik and Mila Jenaras had become friends during this time. She would check in on Itana whenever she could. They would share their concerns that, whatever had happened in Itana's mind had been more than she could deal with. Worried that the damage may be lasting, if not permanent. She had simply shut down. They were sure this catatonia was now being aggravated by the prolonged separation from the rest of her family.

There was nothing that could be done about that though. They'd been cut off, here in the mountains, since the attack, with no way for Ranik to take his daughter home. Patrols by the Cardassians had been tripled following rumors that Shakaar himself had come down to survey the devastation at the Kendra Valley encampment. Shakaar was long gone now though. They had moved on to the next potential hot spot of resistance activity to stem civillian retaliations for the massacre before more innocent lives were lost. They had offered to take Ranik and Itana with them but, at the time, she was still too unstable and prone to fits of terror induced screaming. He didn't dare expose her, or the others to the danger of being discovered so, they'd remained behind with the most seriously wounded.

Many had died since the departure of the Shakaar cell. The constant dampness of the caves, lack of proper medical equipment, diminishing food supplies and the approaching cold of winter in the mountains was now beginning to take its toll on the healthy as well as the infirm. It was becoming clear they couldn't remain here much longer. To do so would mean either death from exposure or discovery by the encroaching patrols. It would soon come to a choice between risking discovery and certain death. They had little time left to decide which it was going to be.

Ranik felt now, more than ever, that it seemed they were chasing their own tails more than they were chasing the Cardassians from their home. Looking down at his daughter's tormented face, he found himself once again second guessing his choices both about bringing her to the Valley and involving his family in the fight to free Bajor. He was once again forced to consider whether or not it was worth his child's suffering to continue a fight that so often seemed futile.

 

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Inside Itana's mind, the acts of a tragedy being written by her subconscious ran to the end, rewound and played again as she tried to understand the images and intents of her own thoughts. Mists of half remembered moments and a torrent of past events swirled in a maelstrom of thought and emotion through her mind's eye as the dream began again. Always the same beginning. Always the same ending. Always the same feeling of loss. Lack of completion. As if she had been cut in half and the part that made her happy to be who she was was gone leaving only an empty and uncertain hole where it had been. Feelings of loss and of being lost so profound that words could not possibly contain the emotion these feelings generated, so all that was left was the silence behind the screams. Nothingness.

In the dream she was standing at the edge of the Kendra Valley settlement, staring into the eyes of a young man. He was dead. She knew this by the charred skin and fabric surrounding the half meter hole in his abdomen that nearly severed the top of his body from his legs. She was repulsed by the sight and the smell of it but, she could not look away. As she stared at him, his lips began to move, then his eyes, his hair, his whole face. It swirled and contorted into obscurity. She blinked, backing away and, as she looked back, the young man was gone. In his place was her own reflection. She stepped nearer to the body again and watched as Itara's face paled to an ashy, slate-like color. There was a horizontal slice that cut through the features on her face. Her hair was burned away and her body appeared swollen and discolored. Itana felt her stomach churn as her sister's one eye opened. The other had been obliterated by the cuts. Itana's lips moved and a strange burbling sound emerged from them. Two words assailed her ears as a scream burst from her sister's grey-blue lips. "HE KNEW."

The image of her sister and the Kendra Valley faded away and in its place was the tatters of what was once the tent she shared with her family in the Rakantha relocation camps outside Rakantha proper. Smoke still rose from its center carrying pieces of it on the breeze. In a place that had been home to over seventy families, nothing remained. Itana looked at the ground and saw the burned bits of a baby's shoe beside fabric from her mother's dress and, she knew. They were all dead. No one needed to tell her, she knew. The scene faded to blackness as she once again heard the voice of her sister Itara carried on the breeze that brought her back to consciousness...."He Knew...."

"Daddy?" A weak voice came from behind him and Ranik turned from the entrance to see Itana sitting up, looking at him slightly confused.

 

"Itana?" He cried with relief. "Thank the Prophets!" He ran to her, sweeping her up in his arms.

"Where are we?" She whispered in a dry, croaky voice. Her head felt funny. Her neck was stiff and her arms and legs felt heavy. She wondered for a moment if she'd been sick and that was why she couldn't remember where she was or why her mom and sister weren't here with her. Then she remembered. The dreams, her sister's pleas for help, then her attempts to say goodbye, all of it came flooding back and, she knew. They were dead. All three of them had been killed by the Cardassians at the Kendra Valley... No...wait....not at the valley. That was other people. Where had they died? Why was it all so jumbled in her mind?

"Daddy?" She whispered again, hearing the haunting tones of her sister's voice echoing in her mind ~he knew~. Her eyes flew wide and she looked at her father angrily. "You knew didn't you?" She spat in frustration and confusion. "You knew people would die. You knew momma would die. Why Daddy?"

Itana began to cry again with images of burned baby shoes and the haunted eyes of the dead swirling in her mind. She wavered a moment as she fought to maintain her grip on the conscious world. She had to know. Mila Jenaras had been standing in the entryway behind Ranik as Itana began to speak. Shaking her head subtly, she shrugged at Ranik not sure what to make of the girl's insitance. Ranik himself look from Jenaras back to his daughter with a mixture of hurt, concern and confusion. There was literally no way Itana could have known the details that prompted their trip. There had been no contact with the outside world since their arrival, including word from Rakantha Province. There was no way Itana could know whether Ebret and the other two children had been harmed. Could she? No, of course she couldn't. This was all the result of trauma. Her mind's attempt to deal with what she'd seen at the settlement.

"It's all right, Itana." He began, carressing her face. "Your mother and sister and brother are fine. You've been having bad dreams, sweetheart."

 

"No, I haven't. Itara told me." Itana looked at him flatly, using years of experience with controlling her fears and emotions to steady her voice and keep her mind in the here and now. "She came here and told me. They're dead. The Cardassians came the morning after we left. They took everyone except Momma, Aomar and Itara away." Her voice faultered and her body began to shake again. "She told me, Daddy. She did. She said the Cardassians hurt her to get momma to say where you were. She said you knew it would happen. All of it."

Ranik stared at his daughter dumfounded. "Itana," He lowered his voice trying to calm himself now as much as his daughter. "Don't you think that if I had known your mother and sister and brother were in danger, I would have done all I could to protect them?"

It was the best, and only, response he could think of that didn't involve divulging everything to her. How could he tell her that he and his wife had discussed everything prior to the trip. That Ebret knew the danger? That she had refused to leave the children with friends and be the one that came with him. That she had insisted he save at least one of the children in case something went wrong. How could he tell his daughter that a drawing of straws had saved her life and, had quite probably cost the lives of her siblings. No, that guilt he would bear alone. He sighed, looking into his daughter's eyes, desparate for her to believe him when he told her that he had done all he could, even if he no longer believed that himself.

Mila Jenaras watched the exchange between father and daughter, unsure what to make of it. Her own first impressions were rarely wrong. She prided herself on her ability to see a person's pagh and, had considered the life of a Vedek up until it became neccessary for her to learn to be a healer. She believed Veloras Ranik to be a good man. Why then was his own daughter questioning his actions and the intentions behind them?

Itana continued to improve over the next several days. She stopped questioning her father about the trip and what had prompted it and, slowly she began to rebuild her strength. She knew she was right. She also knew Itara was gone. Her father was all she had left now and, she was all he had as well. There would come a time for answers but, now wasn't that time.

It would be two years before Itana would ask those questions again. Her father would be arrested and dragged away from her, accused of being a collaborator before she would ask him once again why she had lived and the others had been left behind to die.

...To Be Continued

 

 

Today she dresses

For the change she's facing now

And the storm that's raging

A safe haven she has found

She doesn't care

What the prophets say anymore

For the love she had

She has no more

So she gathers rain

She gathers rain

To rinse away all her guilt and pain

She gathers rain

She gathers rain

To wash and cleanse and make

her whole again

~Collective Soul