Chapter Text
Olam kept her phaser rifle steady, pointed in front of her into the clouds of dust and darkness beyond. Half destroyed buildings loomed out of the gloom either side of her. Some of them were still burning, filling the air with smoke and ash and a flickering orange glow.
The settlement certainly seemed to have been abandoned, but it would be just like the Cardassians to leave some kind of nasty surprise behind. Years of living through the occupation had taught her to never trust appearances. And so she had set her rifle to kill, and she clung onto it tightly.
Still, the place was undeniably a wreck. Most of the buildings had been reduced to concrete skeletons and smoking hunks of debris, and the only evidence that any Cardassians had been here at all were the dead bodies they kept finding… Olam held no love for the spoonheads, but she'd decided to come back here later with a group of friends and bury the bodies. They deserved that, if nothing else. And besides, she knew from personal experience how much unburied corpses could stink. The last thing any of them needed were hoards of flies and carrion beasts settling in.
"See anything, Olam?" Torrel, the dark-haired man she'd been assigned to sweep the area with, called out.
Olam winced. "Keep quiet!" She hissed through her teeth. "If the spoonheads left any troops behind, the last thing we wanna do is advertise our position, OK?"
Torrel scoffed, but dropped the volume of his voice a little. "C'mon, Olam. They're gone! The occupation is over. I know the past few years have taught us to be paranoid, but there's n-"
Rustle rustle
"Shh." Olam held up a hand. "Do you hear that?"
"Hear what?"
Olam held a finger to her lips and silently gestured for him to follow her.
The noise was so quiet she could barely hear it, but something was moving around in the rubble to their left. She crept over, keeping her rifle trained on it. Torrel, blissfully silent for once, tiptoed after her.
They approached the rubble pile. The noise had stopped, and Olam was beginning to wonder if she'd imagined it… When a streak of grey shot through her vision and something collided with her at high speed.
The thing proceeded to sink its teeth into Olam's leg.
She shouted, gripping the back of the creature's neck with one hand and yanking it away. The thing came unstuck with a great ripping and tearing, taking chunks of her trousers with it in its claws and teeth. It lashed out wildly in her grasp, snarling, its big purple eyes shimmering with rage. Above those eyes sat a spoon-shaped ridge, with a dip in the middle. Olam snorted, and relaxed just a little.
"Olam, what's going on, what is it?" Torrel approached nervously, his rifle still raised and ready.
"It's OK. I think we can deal with this one without phasers." Olam dropped her rifle to the ground to prove her point, and noticed that immediately the creature stopped squirming as violently. "It's a Cardassian, all right, but it's a little one. Not more than 5 years old."
The Cardassian tried to snap at her wrist, hissing in frustration. They hadn't spoken yet, at least not in any language Olam knew of. Certainly not Bajoran or Cardassian. They looked old enough to speak, but evidently either didn't know how, or was refusing to. Not entirely surprising, given the circumstances… Olam raised her free hand, attempting a reassuring smile. "Hey, kid. We aren't gonna hurt you."
The child seemed unconvinced, if they could even understand her, glowering at her with angry tears rolling down their cheeks. Olam sighed. "I thought we gave the Cardassians more than enough notice before they evacuated. There's no reason why a kid should get left behind."
"Haven't you heard?" Torrel muttered. "Cardassian orphans are usually treated as outcasts. If their parents and family are dead, nobody cares enough to try and care for 'em. Kids like this have been popping up everywhere. Seems like they got ditched when the occupation ended."
Olam's heart dropped. "They just… Left them? So this one's parents are dead?"
Torrel shrugged, kicking at pebbles on the ground. "... I mean, yeah, probably."
Olam looked back at the child. Their struggles were less violent now, and they were panting through their sobs. They were dirty, and skinny, and covered in bruises. For a moment, Olam remembered her own childhood, remembered the hunger, the pain, the burning hollowness of loss. She cursed softly under her breath. "... Prophets save us. Poor bloody thing."
Torrel sighed. "Olam… The orphanages are full of kids already. It'll take us years to rebuild, to make a good place for a child to grow up in… It's clearly some kind of mute or mentally impaired or something, and… Nobody's ever gonna accept a spoonhead, anyways. Maybe…"
"Maybe what?" Olam looked up sharply.
Torrel weighed his phaser rifle in his hands. "Maybe it'd be kinder to just… Put it out of its misery?" When he saw the look on Olam's face he continued, stammering. "I-I mean, it's not gonna be any kind of life for it here, is it?"
Olam narrowed her eyes. "Would you be saying this to me if this was a Bajoran child?"
"Well, no, but this is different, isn't it? It's a spoonhead."
"Spoonhead it may be, but it's also just a little kid, Torrel!"
"I know, I just-" Torrel threw his hands up in frustration. "OK, say we don't kill it. Who's gonna take care of it? Look after it? Teach it to read, take it to school, there's nobody who wo-"
"I will." The words had left Olam's mouth before she had even thought to say them. She waited for the regret to set in. It never came.
"I'll take care of them."
Torrel stood struck silent.
Olam turned back to the child. They were quiet now, too, watching her with those big wet purple eyes. Olam wondered if they could really understand her, after all. A strange feeling of certainty washed over her, even as she wondered what on Bajor she was getting herself into.
"I'll take care of you, little one."