It's the Xana and Selyara Fun Hour!

Posted on Jul 28, 2014 @ 10:50pm by Selyara Chen

Mission: The Tangled Webs We Weave
Location: RISA

"It's the Xana and Selyara fun hour!"
(Con't "In Memoriam")
=/\=

Location: RISA
Stardate 2.14.0717.2222
Scene: Selyara Chen’s apartment

Leaving the The Quiet Waters at Temtibi Lagoon had been easy. In the
end, Xana didn’t know how Selyara had done it, nor did she ask. It
was better not to ask, she figured.


The Bolian/Human woman sat in her room with Angus and after half an
hour, Selyara came back. “Let’s go,” she said in a quiet voice that
did not brook argument.


That had been days ago; since then the two women had taken shifts in
Selyara’s apartment as a base of operations running down leads. From
time to time they’d leave, either to gather supplies or to run down a
lead, but for the most part they would lie low. One was a wanted
criminal and the other was one of the most recognizable women in the
galaxy who couldn’t risk being seen; suffice it to say the sunshine
was not their friend and the shadows of the evening did not hold as
much cover as promised. Their circles clearly overlapped, and perhaps
in another lifetime, they would have been fast friends; the kind of
friends that would relied on each other for moral support and comfort.
Actually at this point in each other’s lives, it was something they
both could have used, too. However, both had climbed too far, built
armor to thick, led lives of quiet desperation so they were not afford
the simple joys of being friends any longer.


“Strike the Tholians,” Selyara replied. Tapping her PADD she said,
“You’ve pissed them off plenty--”


“Thank you,” Xana said with a half bow from her spot on a wicker
chaise with its red cushions.


Selyara glared at her which the Bolian/Italian met head on. “But it’s
not their style, they were not going to EARTH to pick up your
children. They made threats against *you*. Everyone on this list
made threats against *you*, not yours and Daisy’s children. This
making it harder to find them.”


“A contracted kidnapper,” Xana sighed, “we’re back to that.”


“Still rules out the Tholians; they’re not going to contract it out to
anyone,” Selyara said definitely, neatly passing that PADD to the
side.


Digging through the PADDs Xana said, “I’m digging through the
communication trails again, we’re missing something there. I can feel
it.”


Angus, who had been sitting on the floor nibbling on a bone, got up
and started to look to the door. “Right, I’ll do it after I’ll take
him for a walk,” Xana said.


“Remember...,” Selyara warned.


The Venice-born woman glared at other woman. “Don’t worry, Angus and
I will be sure to wave at everyone on the way out and in. Maybe
invite them in for tea and biscotti.”

“You say that like it’s a joke. I know you,” Selyara said shaking her head.


Xana stood and had her mouth opened up to say something when she felt
an overwhelming sense of...warmth. Love. Relief. It flooded her
senses, causing her face to flush to a deep blue.


“You do not look like yourself. Do I need to take you to the mafia doctor?"


Well however good she felt maybe she didn’t look good.


“I need to sit,” Xana murmured. Collapsing into the chaise she just
vacated the Bolian/Human closed her eyes.


Selyara tilted her head to the side. “Are you going to be ill?”


“No - I um, that is, I’ll be fine,” Xana said quietly. “But may I
ask...can you take Angus out? I just need a moment…..”


Selyara nodded and strapped the black leash (hardly necessary given
the docile dog) and walked out of the apartment with the dog. Once
they left, Xana laid back. It had been so long since she did this;
she had tried several times after Jake left but she was felt rebuffed
that she stopped and now she wasn’t sure she could do it anymore.


She had to try again. Then again she was told he was MIA so maybe she
was trying with a missing - or worse a dead man. Maybe she was losing
her mind.


Still she reached out with mind to see if she could feel him.


Nothing.


Sagging against the cotton cushions, the azure woman inhaled and
counted to five. Then she tried again. She reached out with her
mind, trying to picture her husband….


Very, very faint but there it was; sure, strong and solid.


Tears formed in her eyes; she hadn’t felt Jake in her mind for so long
she had forgotten what it was like. And now he was alive and so
happy…


What was making him so happy?


She was afraid to find out, to be honest. Still she tried to reach
out again, fearful she’d lose this connection, fearful of what she’d
find…


Relief...love…


**The kids?**


“Oh gods, he has the kids,” Xana exhaled to an empty apartment as she
opened her eyes.


At that moment Selyara’s door opened up and Angus bounded in with
Selyara walking in behind him. “We’re leaving.”


“Agreed,” Xana smiled contentedly.


The Vulcan/Betazoid narrowed her eyes. “I doubt we want to leave for
the same reasons.”


“I know my kids are safe so I want to go home,” Xana smiled.


“How do you know that?”


Saying things like: “My husband and I have a psychic connection that
defies time and place” didn’t sound sane so instead Xana instead
stated “I have my connections that I can’t share.” Staring at Selyara
she said, “What’s your reason for wanting to leave?”


“Rawyvin Seth is on his way here and rumor has it that he has a new
sidekick,” Selyara replied. Seeing Xana’s face she glared, “Know
anything about that?”


Getting up the mother of the kidnapped victims smiled, “It’s a long
trip, we’ll talk.”


“Easy for you to say, your problems are momentarily over, and mine are
just beginning.” Selyara’s voice was tight, some emotion carefully
quashed running below the surface. “I have talked to some people,
called in a few favors, and I have a safe house we can go to until I
figure a way to sneak you out of here. But naturally, since this is a
stereotypical shady escape, it will have to wait until dark. In the
meantime, I will need to erase any trace of my presence here, and warn
some people to lay low for a while. Rawyvin has a nasty habit of…
Killing my informants to make a point, and I would prefer not to be in
that position again.”


“Killing your informants? Why?” From what she knew, Rawyvin was
focused psychopath, making wild stabs around Selyara seemed
uncharacteristic.


“Ever had a cat?” Selyara was busy manipulating the controls of her
computer. The screen was covered with hundreds of small video feeds.
She seemed to be running some sort of facial recognition software and
deleting any feeds she found herself caught in. “This is illegal by
the way, you might want to look away. Plausible deniability and all
that.”


“No, but one of my husbands did. Always been more of a dog person.”
Xana scratched behind Angus’ ears.


“Sensible woman. Well, you know how cats sometimes bring home dead
things and drop it on your doormat? Birds and mice- things like that-
as a present to show they care? Well I think it is something like
that, although who knows. He’s a sick bastard.” Selyara gave a minute
shudder. “The day I understand his psychology is the day I...”


“I thought he was in love with you. At least that’s the impression I
got when you mind melded with me.” Selyara’s body language was
beginning to become agitated as she talked about Rawyvin Seth, and
Xana was beginning to wonder if she hadn’t made an extreme tactical
error.


“Is that what you thought.” Selyara turned around, her eyes glinting
wildly in the light of her computer console. She grabbed Xana’s arm in
an iron grasp. “Would you like to see what he wants to do to me when
he finds me? Would you like to see what he did to one of my
informants?”


The images assailed Xana, along with an undercurrent of revulsion and
fear so overwhelming she couldn’t tell where Selyara’s feelings ended,
and hers began. She pushed the other woman away, hard.


“Puttana!” Xana was furious at the other woman, and furious at herself
for having jeopardized. “Didn’t I tell you not to do that the first
time you did that?”


“Actually I believe you told me not to go messing around in your
mind.” Selyara said evasively with all the guile of a child who has
been caught out and falls back on semantics to avoid punishment. “I
didn’t know how else to convey how serious him knowing where I am is.
But… I apologize? It has been a very long time since I was in…
civilized... company, and I’m afraid that I’ve forgotten much of the
pleasantries and niceties of social interactions.”


“And boundaries, apparently.” Xana was still shaking, wondering how
she was going to fix the mess she had made in her haste to get her
children back. Selyara didn’t respond, she was already looking raptly
at her computer screens, hands flying at breakneck speed working to a
pattern only she knew. She looked almost happy.


They sat like that for several hours before Selyara abruptly stood up
and folder her computer up and put it into a case.


“Time to go. Anything you want to keep make sure you’ve got it out of
here. This place is about to have a little accident. Poor Mizithra
Enaii must have forgotten to put out her candles before she went to
bed, it’s such a shame she disabled the fire suppressions system
because she’s such a lousy cook.” Selyara pushed Xana through the door
and down the hall as the first flames began to lick the curtains and
rugs.


=/\=

Location: RISA

Scene: Temporary safe house


“You aren’t really going to do house cleaning, are you? Really, what’s
the point?” Selyara frowned at the blue woman. She’d become so used to
taking what she wanted from people with little regard for their
desires that it was, frankly, intensely frustrating to try and have to
guess at Xana’s motivations, or try to analyze her behavior.


“It’s filthy. I’m not sleeping in filth.” Xana raised an eyebrow as
she cleaned off the sticky container that served as a table.


“It’s- oh forget it.” Selyara was tired, she was terrified of being
caught, and she was tired of trying to figure out a polite way to ask
the question which was eating her whole. “You told Rawyvin where I
was.”


Sharp. To the point. Maybe a bit too much to the point- Xana would be
a powerful tool if she played her cards right. A politician feeling
guilty was easy to extract promises from.


“I… Might have told him where you were, to lure him here to help find
my children. I swear I didn’t know how dangerous a situation I was
putting you in.” Confession, the first step to feeling better.


Selyara swore she could feel the anger swirling before her eyes, even
as she set her face in icy stone. She was so furious she saw little
spots of color dancing in front of her eyes and it took all of her
admittedly rusty Vulcan training to not act on the urge to jump
forward and beat the woman senseless against the crate. She tried to
rein in the anger and form a coherent response that would express what
she needed to, without descending into histrionics.


“You were going to use me.” Her voice was so cold she thought it would
freeze her lips. “I offered to help in good faith, and you were going
to use me like a pawn in your games, or a strip of latinum to be
traded. What would have happened to me after you got what you wanted,
if Rawyvin Seth didn’t happen to me first? Would you have turned me in
to the authorities to regain status? Or would you have tried to force
me to work for you? Don’t even bother trying to answer. You’ll be back
home with your children soon enough, I’ll be wherever the hell I can
run and if you know what’s good for you, you’ll forget you ever saw
me.”


She turned her back to the woman, a deliberate slight: You are so
insignificant that I’m not even scared of you.


Xana shook her head and returned back to cleaning the table off. She’d
wait for Selyara’s mercurial mood to take a turn for the better
before she tried to fix the situation. Selyara veered so quickly
between almost sweet and vulnerable, and something on the precipice of
madness that she had given up predicting when that might be.


"You don't have children, do you, Selyara?" Xana asked. The other
woman said nothing, so the mother continued on, "I believe in fairness
and justice...except I'm a mother first. A better woman wouldn't have
to reconcile that but I'm not a better woman."


There was another long silence before Xana said, "My daughter was born
9 years ago and someone told me that being a parent means learning to
live with your heart perpetually outside your body. My hearts were
missing and I didn't know you so yes I used you. Am I sorry now? Yes.
Was it worth it? No, because my children weren't here. But I didn't
know that so would I have done it again....you've been good to me,
Selyara, but don't ever ask a loving mother to make that decision
between a stranger and her children. You won't like it if you're the
stranger." Exhaling Xana said, "But I am sorry and I will do what I
can to make it up to you."


“I’m someone’s child too.” Selyara pointed out. It wasn’t the best
argument, but she said it with conviction. “You better get some sleep
now. You’ll sleep well since you know that your kids are safe.”


Selyara pulled out a pack of cards and began to assemble an elaborate
construction out of them. Xana recognized the start of Selyara’s
bizarre bedtime ritual; She would spend the next hour or more,
unspeaking, building a card house, then destroying it, then rebuilding
it, and nothing would distract her. Then, all of a sudden, and with no
discernable pattern, she’d stop, get up, and fall asleep almost
immediately.


Xana went to her cot and lay down. Selyara was right, the worry she’d
felt for the last few weeks gone, her head barely made it to the
pillow before she was out like a light.


=/\=


“Hey, you’ll have to get up if you don’t want to miss the shuttle off
of here.” A new voice shook Xana awake. The blue woman bolted upright,
and her gaze fell on a petite blonde Betazed who was standing holding
a small package.


“Who are you?”


“Mizzie didn’t tell you? Well, she said to give this to you.” The
blonde handed a padd over to Xana. The dead screen came to life when
she looked at it.


[[Xana: Her name is Anissa, and she knows the plan. Don’t let her fool
you, she’s a smart woman (and a telepath), so she may prove useful to
you when you get back. Easy to keep loyal, just let her rub elbows
with the gliterati and give her just enough work to occupy her. Also,
I promised her you’d make her an aide. Better follow through on that
one because I’m using her as a diversion for Rawyvin to go chasing
after. I suppose I owe you an apology about the using ME as bait. ]]


[[Also: I suspect, based on the information that you so kindly shared,
that Edgerton is somehow involved with my jailbreak. That means he’s
linked to Section 31. Watch your back; as I understand it, they are
not above assassinations. -Selyara]]


“Fantastico,” Xana sighed.


Anissa smiled brightly. “So are you ready? We have a shuttle to catch.”


The azure woman read through the message again and nodded. Then she
destroyed it, knowing that’s what Selyara would want (assuming she
hadn’t programmed a way for it to be destroyed on its own). “Lead
on...Anissa, is it?”

*********************************

NRPG: Alright, lets kick the intrigue up a notch. BAM!

Sarah Albertini-Bond
As
Xana Bonviva
Secretary of Starfleet

And

Alix Fowler
As
Selyara Chen
Section 31's most wanted