The fire continued coming, but it seemed to be dying down. Or, more accurately, the guards who were producing it were dying off. The security team seemed to have perfect aim. There was, however, one more person with good aim.
Garren.
A shot whizzed right next to Dani's head. She gasped, recoiling back to the corner, shielding the struggling doctor. "Uh," she managed, blinking.
Two more shots came dangerously close, and then all fire ceased. Dani breathed hard, her eyes big as saucers. She was still holding the struggling Doctor in her arms, still panicking. "We need to find a... an infirmary... a med kit... something... something to help him..."
As the fire died down, Rose had a moment to look back and check on Dani and the Doctor. Jolian continued to maintain cover fire, and Maureen turned to look at the same time Rose did.
"Doctor!" Maureen exclaimed, turning towards Dani and Ryan where they were tucked into the corner.
"Do you have–" Rose started ask, but Maureen's actions made it clear she at least had a little bit of an idea of what to do. Rose turned her attention back to Garren and... she suddenly realized it was just Garren now. His men had dropped like flies once she and Jolian had gotten a good idea where they'd spread themselves out. Rose laid her hand on Jolian's shoulder, and the security officer held his fire. "Andus, I am going to give you one chance to surrender yourself," Rose called, mindful to keep herself behind cover as she did so.
As she said this, before Garren could make any sort of reply, the whine of the transporter announced the incoming team from the Griffin. Rose held up her arm to stop them from advancing once the transporter released them, and the team dropped down into cover with hers. "Get the Doc beamed up to the ship, now," she directed. She didn't have to look behind her to see if the order was being followed, the whine of transporter wasn't long in coming.
"I think you have misjudged the situation," an answer came from the other side of the hallway. Garren's figure emerged just behind the corner. He was still taking cover, but allowed only his upper body to pop through. He was holding a large projectile weapon, aiming it steadily at the group. "None of you will get out of here. Not you, and not your ship." He gave Rose an angry focused look, his eyes cold. "Don't you know it, Whore? When your master finds out, he'll blow the ship out of the sky and flood this place with poison. None of us will live through this day," he called, staring her down.
Dani watched the doctor shimmer away, relieved, and turned her attention to the group. Her eyes grew larger suddenly, realization struck full-force.
"Rose," she called, picking herself up, shifting bits of stray hair from her forehead, smearing it with the Doctor's blood. "Rose, the lab... I have to get to the lab... I..." She looked around, spotting a vent above her head and positioned herself right below it.
"Considering the only competent people in this mine were you and me, until the bastard stirred up the hornet's nest that is the Griffin, I'm not worried for my safety. Are you surrendering, or do I have to kill you?" Rose carefully aimed her gun at Garren, and took a shot. He easily pulled himself back within cover to avoid being hit, but Rose didn't seem surprised by this.
Dani took the forced relief in bullet-exchange to jump up and pull herself into the vent. In seconds, she was gone, leaving no time for questions or remarks.
As she waited to see what Andus Garren would do with her challenge, Rose took a look over her shoulder. She knew the Doctor had been transported out of here, presumably up to the Griffin for the medical care he so badly needed, but Dani had been quiet for too long. Rose hadn't known the petite engineer long, but she knew her well enough to know when Dani got quiet, she was either up to something or there was something wrong. She looked past the two security officers from the original away team, through the new faces that had just beamed in, and found that Dani was nowhere to be found.
"Where's Dani?" Rose hissed at Maureen. Maureen June's eyes traveled over all the same faces Rose had just looked at, and she shook her head in confusion.
"She was there just a minute ago," Maureen admitted. "I swear, I'd only just turned away from her."
"She went into the vent, ma'am," one one of the officers from The Griffin spoke up.
"QI'yaH,1" Rose spit out. "I told her not to go to the lab by herself," she added in explanation as her outburst drew the attention of the rest of the team.
A shift at the end of the hall broke the silence. Garren was... laughing.
"Competent??" His laughter was full of anger. Disgust, even. He poked his head out and stared at her, his gun at his side. "A whore teaches me about competence? In what, really? Tricks of the tongue?" He amused himself, smirking maliciously. He was, however, retreating, and his direction seemed intentional. He was moving towards a closed door just to his left, careful to keep his body shielded by the debris in the hall, protected from any incoming fire.
"You've seen those tricks of the tongue," Rose shot back. "As I recall, it offended your delicate sensibilities, and it was such a waste on that bastard. Fuck, I could have got him off with my pinky finger in my sleep." Rose slung her gun over shoulder by its strap. "Lay down cover fire, then follow me," she hissed quietly at the officers around her. "Are you scared of a little whore? Come out and face me like a man!" she yelled at Garren, moving to the edge of cover and getting ready to run. She met eyes with Jolian Marcus, then nodded.
As he started firing, Rose made a dash towards Garren, trying to keep low and use his cover as much to her advantage as he was using it to his.
Garren flipped his gun and fired three shots. They hit the wall and ricocheted with sparks. The hallway turned dark as a pit save for the glow of the cover fire. He twisted and ducked, kicking a wheeled chair in Rose's direction, using it to strengthen the confusion.
Rose caught just enough of a look at the incoming chair to anticipate its arrival. One foot planted itself on the seat of it, the other hit the back of it and started it falling. She was another two strides down the dark corridor before it clattered to the floor. She knew she didn't have much time to close the space, if he got the door shut behind him, she'd likely lose him.
"A little girl? Ha," Garren shouted, reaching his target door. While the Starfleet officers were new to the mines, he knew them like the back of his hand. He didn't need light to know where he was going. Darkness was working in his favor.
"You are the one hiding behind a platoon of armed men like a–" he smiled to himself through cold eyes, his level of respect for the woman rising slightly, "–a bIHnuch2," he spat in Klingon, smirking, shooting his own cover fire towards Rose's direction.
"Your accent is rubbish, you bloody wanker," Rose returned with a giggle. She dove over the debris that littered the corridor, tucking herself into a roll as she came down. She sprung up right on his heels, too close for him to get an affective shot off at her with the big gun he was currently using, but she expected he'd pull something better suited if she didn't close the space soon.
He shot his gun in her direction, not really anticipating a hit, watching the rounds light up the walls. He opened the door and ran inside, not bothering to close it.
Rose didn't hesitate following him in. As she crossed the threshold, she drew the smaller gun from the waistband of her pants. She shot off a couple rounds in the direction he'd been headed in, in hopes of at least getting a better view of the current state of the room, then dropped to a crouch behind a nearby table.
The room was quiet, dark and large, filled with neat rows of tables and chairs. A row of metal counters stood at the end, featuring an array of food inside clean metal trays.
The mess hall.
The door slammed shut, but for the moment Garren was nowhere to be found. It was quiet. Eerily quiet and deserted, the smell of food was the only sign this room was ever occupied.
Then a plate fell at the far end, clanging loudly on the metal grating floor. Garren cursed and ducked, pulling his side arm and checking the ammo. It was full, as always. He held his breath, ducked behind the counters and peeked from the side, looking at the woman he clearly underestimated. This was a mistake he was not going to repeat.
Rose zeroed in on the crashing plate and spotted Garren behind the edge of the counter. Keeping low, staying behind chairs and tables as much as she could, she crept towards his hiding place. She kept her gun trained on his location, but held off firing until she could get a little closer.
He crawled backwards, aiming his pistol in her general direction, and inched towards the double doors of the kitchen. He looked around him, his mind calculating, then smiled to himself and aimed just above the counter, at the glass sneeze guard. He waited for her to get closer, then released three shots at the three panes; the glass exploded outwards, raining shards on the floor.
Garren took the distraction and ran through the double doors into the large kitchen.
Rose's first instinct was to duck behind a table. Quick though she was, she felt some of the glass shards bite into what little flesh she had exposed. She didn't have long to notice this though, as the dull thwacking of the double hinges on the kitchen door drew her attention to Garren's escape route. A curse in Andorian crossed her lips, and she sprinted after him, turning the lack of traction she was able to get on the glass shards into a bit of a controlled skid. As she approached the counter, she jumped up and over the remains. She landed in a crouch on the other side, and shot up to run through the door after him.
The second she walked in, the dark space lit up, turning it into a blazingly bright white kitchen. Though he did make sure the lights were turned on at her entry, Garren was not at the entrance. He was crouched behind a counter, waiting for his chance to keep going.
He had to admit, though. The whore was good.
She skidded to a halt as the whiteness of the kitchen blinded her. Only frozen but a moment, she quickly ducked and rolled for the nearest thing she could find: a rolling prep cart. Staying still, listening carefully, she slowly let her eyes adjust to the brightness of the room in the relative shadow in the storage cubby of the cart.
Sparks exploded above her as Garren emptied half his clip on the food cart. The bullets blew through two milk cartons, covering her with the contents, as one bullet grazed her neck. Garren stopped firing and leaned against the wall, breathing deep in concentration.
"So you were an agent all along," he muttered, no longer needing to yell, and checked his ammo. "Quite a cover you had there." He looked at the brushed metal sidewalls of the counters, using them to spot any movement from her direction.
"I thought you suspected from the start," she returned, and hissed softly as she reached up to touch the graze on her neck. "Why the fuck do you work for such a stupid bastard anyways?" She settled into a kneeling position, pulling her head out of the cart now that she'd finally started to adjust to the light. She waited for his reply, in hopes that it might give her a better idea of where he was by the direction of it, and checked her gun as she waited.
"I knew there was something wrong with you," he replied, crawling to the other side, right under the ovens. They were still working and hot, one of the gas burners lit. He considered this as he scanned the room, looking for options.
Rose's eyes slid over the contents of the prep cart that hadn't been hit in Garren's firing. Potato peeler, egg slicer, mixing bowls, a box of kitchen matches... and an egg timer. One of those big clunky ones that you twisted the dial and it silently rotated its way down until it rang a bell obnoxious enough to wake even a hardened soldier in the middle of an air raid. She slid the matches into one of her pockets, and picked up the timer. A quick peek out from either side of the cart left her without a visual on Garren, so she twisted the timer forward about thirty seconds before rolling it across the floor towards the end of the island the gun fire had come from.
"You're ashamed to admit why you're working for Big Jim, aren't you? That's why you won't answer me," she accused, though she didn't expect him to respond. She was more concerned about him not hearing the timer as it rolled across the floor. She leaned over to watch it, and grinned as it stopped just shy of passing the back edge of the island.
"At least I didn't fuck him," came the angry reply, and the man jumped up, his gun dispensing rapid-fire in her general direction. He was getting angry, and angry was never a good place for a professional. He took a breath and cursed quietly. He was also out of ammo.
Rose stayed tucked down as far as she could behind the prep cart as he fired, but when he ran out of bullets, and she heard the tell tale noise of an empty clip, she was up and out from behind the cart in a flash. She leveled her gun at him with a shit eater grin on her face. Until the damn thing misfired and jammed. The string of Klingon that issued from her lips, as she threw the gun aside and reached to flip out the large one that was still slung across her back, spoke of damnation for whatever waste of skin petaQ3 couldn't maintain the piece of shit she'd appropriated from the mine's weapon locker.
Garren's first response was to jump to his feet from out of the far isle and recoil back into the food-covered cabinets. He stared at her, but there wasn't fear in his eyes, only anger and a sort of resolve. He was outmaneuvered, and now he was going to die. He looked at the barrel of the gun calmly, and then at Rose's eyes, and waited for her to fire. He was going to die. He was quite aware that his luck was—
RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNNNNNNNGGGGGGG
Having forgotten about the timer in the excitement, Rose's finger twitched on the trigger when the damned thing went off, letting off an unexpected shot. One that flew right past Garren's head, maybe an inch off. Another curse, this time in Orion, escaped her lips as she corrected her aim and pulled the trigger again. She found an empty clip, and her hand dipped to the cargo pocket on her left thigh, only to find the pocket actually was as empty as it looked.
Garren didn't need any encouragement. He jumped to the side and ducked, throwing himself on the floor and rolling. He got up at the other side of the isle and grabbed a butcher's knife, holding it firmly, as he watched Rose's movements from the other side of the bulky counter.
"Maybe you should stick to whoring, bitch." He smiled at her viciously, and twisted the knife expertly in his palm in an ‘infinity' shape. His close encounter with death shook his senses, focused his anger. The professional mercenary was back, full on and ready.
"Odd time to ask for a pity fuck," Rose shot, grinning as she drew her throwing knives. One she launched at Garren's hand that was holding the knife. "Disarm yourself, and hell, honey, I'll indulge you. You gotta be a better lay than your boss."
Garren shifted his weight quickly, but not quickly enough. The knife grazed his arm and changed angle, sticking itself nicely in the tip of his shoulder. He growled angrily and pulled it out, throwing it to the floor. His eyes glared at her angrily, but his demeanor changed. Something else was underneath these cruel dark eyes. Something strong and powerful despite the rage.
"I'm better in many things than that stupid fool," he muttered at her. Respect. That was what it is. Through his anger, it shone in his eyes, focusing his actions. This will be a battle worth fighting. Worth winning.
He pulled the knife up again and threw it in the air once, catching it expertly, moving across the isle towards her. A pot on the stove hissed as water poured onto the flames.
"Oh, I don't doubt that. Fuck knows he sets the bar low," she returned, watching carefully as he moved. She waited as he advanced, there was no need for her to continue to bring the fight to him. Out of the corner of her eye, she took a half-inventory of the items surrounding her. The knife block that was just out of reach, the stove between them, metal mixing bowls and baking sheets in a counter top storage rack.
He stopped right at the corner of the isle, looking at her carefully, the knife still in his hand. He could kill her, he was sure of it, but he wouldn't make the mistake of underestimating her. She was obviously no simple whore, but she was in the middle of his escape route, and he was not going to let her take him.
"You should know how low he sets bar," he smiled at her — smiled! — and shifted his weight, moving closer. The dumbwaiter was behind her. The dumbwaiter that went all the way up to the surface, to the storage shed. His grip on the knife tightened.
"So why the fuck were you working for him?" Rose grabbed one of the baking sheets out of the rack, and swung it at him. She aimed for the hand holding the knife.
He dodged it, huffing laugh. "You keep saying I was working for him. Was I?" he came closer to her but paused, as if intended on finishing this point. "I was paid handsomely by him, and by some of his employers," he smirked at her. "Surprised? You didn't think they'd let this idiot rule here without someone keeping an eye on him, did you?" He moved to his right towards the ovens, then lunged at her once quickly, his knife tearing the fabric of her shirt.
She twisted aside to avoid the knife doing much more than leaving a shallow gash across her chest, and grabbed Garren's wrist. She yanked hard, turning her back to him, and drove an elbow back into his gut as she drove her heel into his instep.
Ironically, the Chief's trick was the same one she had used when attacked by the Captain only a few days before. He hardened his abdomen muscles and pushed himself backwards, avoiding the bulk of the hit. "I always knew there was something wrong with you," he hissed and pushed his hand to her head. He twisted and pushed her down onto the stove top, pushing her face to the burning metal.
"I should have killed you earlier," he said and pushed down with his entire body weight, pinning her cheek to the scalding hot metal. The sickening hissing sound made him smile, despite the smell of burnt flesh. "Better late than never, bitch."
Rose bit her lip, she refused to give him the satisfaction of hearing her cry out. As she drew blood from biting so hard, her hands flailed around, searching for anything to defend herself with. She found the handle of the pot that he'd knocked out of the way to get at the burner, the one that still had some of the boiling water left in it. She swung it around behind her as hard as she could manage, catching him in the side, spilling the boiling water up his torso, some of it splashing on herself.
"AAARGH!!" he yelled in anger, recoiling. It wasn't water, not all of it, at least, bits of half cooked beef stuck to his shirt. His pants were heavy-duty uniform fabric, which (he spent half a second thinking this through) meant his lower organs were relatively safe. His stomach, however, was boiling. Literally.
He threw a punch and moved to his left, holding his chest lightly, his eyes piercing through her. "You even fight like a scared little woman," he hissed, "would you be more comfortable with an apron?" The dumbwaiter was behind him now, to his left, and was no longer blocked by her form. He pressed the button, calling the small elevator, then stretched his neck and stood crouching, ready to fight her back, ignoring the protests of his broiled chest.
Rose took a moment, eyes not leaving Garren, as she tried to focus despite the pain. It took a long minute, but she finally realized what he was crouched in front of, and glanced around for something to stop him. She let the pot fall to the floor as she noticed the container of grease, smelled like bacon she realized with a small smile.
"I fight like what I am," she dismissed, taking the grease bucket into her hand. "It's been working well enough for me," she added as she splashed the contents across his body.
He recoiled, expecting a hot substance again, and then blinked, his face and chest soaking in disgusting pig's grease. He looked at her under his dripping brows. The dumbwaiter was still humming, the small box elevator still descending from the surface. It will take a few more seconds, he assessed. He needed a diversion. Hell, he needed to kill the bitch.
"Very slick of you." He smirked cruelly and pulled a long knife from the table next to him. "Now why won't you just DIE," he hissed, and raised his hand, lunging.
Rose couldn't help snorting at the pun, as she flicked open the box of matches from her pocket. The hiss of the strike was soft, but it made her grin as she flicked the match at Garren before taking a step back and to the side.
His eyes grew wide as he finally understood what was about to happen. He tried to dodge but, ironically, his foot slipped on a patch of grease on the floor. He twisted his foot, huffing, watching as the match touched his wet shirt, like in slow motion. His eyes, for a moment, looked into Rose's. There it was, in all its glory. Respect.
And then he burned, yelling. The fire spread on his chest quickly and lit his hair. He screamed, flailing his arms, slipping on the greasy floor. The dumbwaiter's hatch loomed behind him, empty, as he blindly grabbed the air, slipping backwards.
For a moment, he managed to grab the opening, but his face was by now completely hidden behind a wall of flames. His screams continued, high pitched and agonizing, and he slipped backwards, into the opening, flipped inside and dropped, like a bag of potatoes, all the way down.
A second later, the light turned green. The dumbwaiter's clean empty box appeared, silencing the man's yells.
Rose stood there, staring blankly at the dumbwaiter, and finally she collapsed to the floor. Sitting there looking at a small flame in a puddle of grease in front of her, that's where she was when Maureen June lead her crew mates into the kitchen and found her.
"Did you find Dani?" Rose asked, looking up at the woman.
"We need to get you to sickbay," Maureen insisted, helping Rose to her feet.
"Did you find Dani?" Rose repeated, taking another look at the dumbwaiter.
"I'll get her and Marcus back to the ship, you keep on assignment down here," she directed to the rescue team. Rose was silent as they set up signal enhancers and Maureen stood next to her, looking at her face. "What happened? Where's Garren?"
"Dead." There was almost a tone of regret in her voice, and a certain degree of respect too. Maureen elected not to push the subject further, though she did look at the burns on Rose's face.
"June to Griffin," she said, tapping her combadge once the signal enhancers were in place. "Three to beam up." The last of the kidnapped away team disappeared in the blue whine of the transporter beam.