Shadow Operations: Resurrection
Season 1 Episode 6
The Investigation
Dec. 8, 2018

As Daryl walked along the corridor with Cody on their way to the holodeck, he thought of something. I am sorry, but I have to excuse myself for now Daryl said to Cody. I need to attend to a few things. Good luck with the sims, Let me know how it went, ok? Yeah...uh...ok.. Cody said, a little baffled by Daryl’s sudden change of mind. Daryl stepped into the first turbolift he found and made his way to his quarters. Through it all he had forgotten to send Darva a message.

Moments later, he sat down behind the screen. He tapped his commbadge, Lt. Thompson to Admiral MacLeod A short silence fell.

A female voice came in. This is Commander Alantris. The Admiral is in conference. How can I help you?

I would like to open a commlink to Earth, to Darva MacGuire. She is...my partner. I didn’t get a chance to send her a message earlier. Is that allowed?

Again a short silence. Agreed. Use SO encryption level 5. And keep it short and discrete Lieutenant. Alantris out.

Daryl opened a secured comm channel and activated a few of his own security and tunneling protocols on his screen and contacted his apartment. It took a while, then the face of Darva appeared on screen.

Hey...how are you doing? she asked. she smiled.

Hey there. Doing good here Daryl replied.

It’s good to see you. he continued. I couldn’t call in earlier and can’t call for long now. Security protocols and stuff. But I wanted to say that... he hesitated. ...That I won’t be coming back for a while. I got an assignment from Admiral MacLeod. Shadow Operations has been reopened. He wants me on the team. I said yes.

Darva nodded and judging the look on her face, she wasn’t too happy with it. I see. I understand. You’re not the desk-job kind of type. But what about us ? she looked at him intensely.

I don’t know, Darva. I guess we won’t see each other a lot. But we talked about is the day I left. Like you said...I’m not spending my life behind a desk.

A silence fell. I accept your choice Daryl. It only feels...odd...A few weeks ago I learned you were still alive. Then we met. We had a few beautiful days together. And now it feels again like I lost you.

Daryl didn’t know what to say and looked at the wall behind the screen, as if it would give him the words he needed. I am sorry, but this is what I want to do. he said eventually. I’ll promise you I’ll call in as often as possible. Daryl said.

I certainly hope so Darva whispered. Take care of yourself Daryl. She blew him a kiss.

Daryl smiled Promised he said. Then he closed the channel and sat back in his chair.

Cody was exhausted. All muscles hurt and it felt like ages before he had caught his breath again. Jahkar had put him and the smaller Carnora through a series of holosims. Endurance, Stealth and bucketload of melee and hand-to-hand combat had been on the menu for the past hours.

Jahkar seemed satisfied as he praised Cody’s fighting style. Cody had gone through some martial arts schools, and he did learn some stuff along the way, but he was surprised that he had impressed Jahkar. Maybe he should put in some more effort and become better in it. It couldn’t hurt, in the light of events. Any questions? Jahkar asked in the end.

I have one Cody said. I want to sharpen my skills. Both melee as the hand-to-hand combat. Can you help me with that, sir?

Jahkar nodded. I’d be more than glad to. Though your techniques are working, they are a little rough on the edges. But we can work on that.

Cody nodded. Thanks, Colonel

Beckett went back to his quarter for a quick shower and a clean uniform. 15 minutes later, he walked out of his quarters again. His commbadge chirped. It was Vree who requested the whole team to the holodeck.

He arrived a few minutes later at the holodeck and listened to what Vree told. Good, their first training together. He wondered how things would go. The big Carnora jumped forward and sniffed the air over the corpses. Cody walked passed him, after the others, and entered the facility. . He took his tricorder and started scanning the area.

He carefully looked around in the cave like corridor. Further on, the cave changed into a man-made corridor. It became bigger and bigger. It reminded him of the pyramid tombs of the Maya’s on Earth, some 3,000 years ago. As they moved on further into the compound, the trail of dead Klingons became larger. Cody wondered if they would find anything that could help them further...

The team separated when they got inside and Mayla walked straight to the chambers where Echo Team’s target was. Striding into the room, she went straight to the mobile computer terminal stood.

Her team had already pulled out the memory and data modules to take back with them for Starfleet Intelligence to analyze, as was the proper procedure on all their missions. She checked it over to be sure nothing was amiss before turning to the holographic representation of the dead body on the ground she had impaled with two bat’leths.

Mayla stood there for a minute, her eyes scanning over the area first before focusing on the ornate table he had been standing at when he was killed. She was looking for any clues that were outside Klingon communiques. She began to search all around the table, and then she started on the body.

Ra’yral walked in, studying the surroundings and giving the ornate style of the room a disgusted huff. He saw Mayla and walked over to her who was studying the impaled Klingon.

Commander, I didn’t want to say anything in front of the others, he started, and waited until she looked up at him. But I recognize the wounds and kill style in the dining hall where over 40 brutally killed Klingons currently reside.

Mayla turned her attention back to the Klingon and turned the body onto its side to check his armor for any family markings that may tell her what house he was from. And where did you recognize them from, Lieutenant?

Ra’yral knelt down and prodded the bat’leth entry location with his finger. From your father’s holosims where we were pitted against you and your sibko during the Linea campaign.

Mayla didn’t show any indication she knew what he was talking about. But what he said was the truth. Kyril would have done exactly that to prepare Bravo Squad to combat her sibko and those like her.

Those were just holosims, Roar, using the name she knew him as when she was little. Let’s keep them fiction. And I really do appreciate you keeping your deductions on what really killed these Klingons to yourself. Everything that occurred on that campaign is still highly classified. You made the right decision not to discuss it with everyone else.

Ra’yral gave her a gruff harumph and patted her on the shoulder. Aye, aye, sir. Then he changed the subject. Did you find any markings on the armor? I’m assuming that’s what you’re looking for.

There are, Jahkar said from the doorway, stepping through a pool of Klingon blood. But not one I recognize.

Mayla motioned him to come over and look at the dead Klingon leader. He was the leader, and the markings on his ceremonial armor is slightly different from the guards.

He strode over to the dead Klingon leader and saw the stylized crest on the chest plate. He had to do a double take, because it was not a crest he would have expected to see here — or anywhere. He knelt beside the dead Klingon and examined the crest more closely.

Kahless’ Beard! This cannot be. This is the crest of the House of K’hmal. It should not be here...are you certain this is an accurate representation?

Before Mayla could answer, the half-Klingon, half-Romulan moved to another body and looked at the slightly different crest on that warrior’s armor, now recognizing it for what it was. This is a dead house. The House of K’hmal fell more than 20 years ago, during the Federation-Klingon War that preceded the Dominion War. The leader of the house at that time was General Krang...the war criminal. He led an attack on several colonies in the Arcanus Sector and butchered everyone there. He was hunted down by Captain LaVictorie of the USS Forrestal and was captured.

When word of his surrender and imprisonment by the Federation reached Qo’noS, Gowron and High Council stripped him of his title, his holdings and house. He was disavowed by the Klingon government and to this day remains in a Federation prison.

Jahkar looked up at his commanding officer, These Klingons are ghosts, Commander. There is no other way to describe them.

Mayla studied the mek’leth still in its sheath. On the pommel was the same crest as the one on the armor. The Klingon High Council knew this splinter group existed. They were the ones who sanctioned all this. She waved a hand to encompass the entire facility. It would be interesting to know if the High Council knew who these Klingons really were. She looked over at the computer terminal where her team had taken the memory quads. Starfleet Intelligence has the data from that computer terminal, maybe there might be something else there too.

Vala wasn’t a crime scene investigator, but she knew immediately where her skills would be useful. She brushed past the Carnora who were sniffing and rifling through the dead bodies. Beckett had taken off through one of the sets of tunnels, and Jahkar had gone the other way. Everyone seemed to be breaking up. Divide and conquer seemed to be the way to go.

She asked Vree for directions to the hangar bay before proceeding through the maze of tunnels. Once there, she took stock of a small fleet of vehicles residing inside. There were a half dozen or so fighters. Each one was armed to the gills. Quantum torpedoes, multiple phaser banks, sub-warp engines. They were maneuverable, quick vehicles, but they weren’t one thing. They weren’t Klingon made.

Vala scanned her tricorder over the nearest ship. The markings on the hull may provide some clues as to where these fighters had come from. They were an amalgam of parts from different cultures. The engines were Federation prototypes that she recognized from a few years ago. The hull was Andorian. She wandered over to one that had an open door and looked inside. It had been set up for Klingon usage, but was obviously Romulan in origin. It was like a perfect union of parts made up into an ultimate fighter. The Black Market sale value on these had to be through the roof. Who had enough knowledge...No, who had enough ability to puzzle these parts together to build these ships?

Her tricorder beeped. She’d need to go to astrometrics to finalize the micro-particle analysis. Maybe something that was adhered to hulls of these ships could clue the team into where they had been before coming to the Klingon base.

Reepchip moved with the group and, like Ryramorl, sniffed the air from time to time. His large ears kept moving as he tried to hear what was around him. As they headed down the corridor, he raised his muzzle—then Ryramorl tapped him on the shoulder, then made some gestures. Reepchip saluted, then turned to Mayla Vree and saluted her.

Commander, he said softly. Asking permission to use echolocation, sir.

The Andorian officer roamed the floor of the Klingon structure they were currently on and she scanned the dead Klingons to determine how they were killed. Consistently tricorder readings determined death was either caused by disruptor fire, bladed weapons or sheer blunt force trauma.

Tiri would have liked to have known more, but that would have required an autopsy of these Klingons. From these holographic representations she could not tell if any poisons or toxins were used.

She knelt over one of the slain Klingons and viewed his injuries up close. This victim appeared to have died from a bat’leth wound to the chest. The point of the weapon had pierced his armor and ribs, impaling his heart.

Seeing nothing special about the corpse, Tiri moved on to the next. She investigated four dead bodies in all before she came across something of interest. She found a tattoo on the face on one of the Klingons who had attacked this place and it was unique, as far as she could tell.

Commander, she called to Mayla Vree. Nothing unusual about the ways in which these Klingons died. But I did find something on this Klingon. A tattoo. None of the others are wearing one like it. It appears to be...unique.