Posted by Lazol (Chief Science Officer) in Finding New Traditions (Tag Ch’otok, Closed Thread)

Posted by Lieutenant Casela Synthi-er (Counsellor / RTF) in Finding New Traditions (Tag Ch’otok, Closed Thread)
She was broken, tired, her body in constant pain these days. Add to it the shared mental pain and heartache of those around her and most days, Casela did not want to get out of bed. The light blue tin and matching thermos sat on the table beside her bed, Ch’otok’s quiet way of enticing her to respond. The massacre, the use of her telepathic abilities in such an extreme way had drained her. She brought the last little girl out of the mines and collapsed for two weeks afterwards. Now she just didn’t want to respond. The filth and horror she’d taken into herself weighing on her soul as if they were her own acts. Which she knew was not true, but the horror weighed heavily on her.

But through the haze were the sadness and heartbroken tragedy of the orphans. The ones that had no family to take them, that were totally abandoned. It tugged at memories, ones that she didn’t think on often. The children she’d saved, and the parents she could not, when the Dominion destroyed her home, her family, and her people. They had needed hope. And then a softer, bitter sweet memory. In the long days of inactivity of the only thing left to do was to focus and dwell on the loss and sadness. It was winter now on Delotha. Snow and ice and very little to do. She rose, wincing at the pain in her body and the throbbing sledge hammer and dizziness in her mind. She wandered aimlessly through the small hut, until she found Ch’otok. “They need a distraction, some joy. Maybe we can help them. The village lost so much this year. Before I have to leave again, we could give them a new tradition to look forward to?”
Operative Valkyrie

Ch’otok was working on repairing his small dwelling, it was out of the way and had missed plenty of the horrors of the mission taken place only 2 weeks ago however it was something that still weighed on the village and the surrounding area. Casela would find him with some simple hand tools as he repaired a bookshelf that he had thrashed two days ago he heard her voice and looked up, “It’s good to see you up and about. Now tell me, what kind of tradition can two angles of death bring?” He said, their reputations still raw to the people, even if they brought a greater good by removing the governor from power it was still a sea of crimson that lay in their wake.

Ch’otok

Casela watched quietly, the skill and care coming out of his hands as he built a bookshelf and reparied his home, so at odds with the blood thirsty demon that had stalked through the village and planet with her. But they were all more than the sum of one event. Her course work at the Academy, and her knowledge simply from being Betazoid, telling her the truth of that. Those times seemed so long and like the events of someone else. And maybe, now, they were. Casela was no longer that person. She was Valkyrie. She hated that name, it made her cringe, made her want to rage to the heavens, but it was futile. She sat down, the short walk making her dizzy and disoriented. Her father had been out for 2 weeks, her mother much longer, after the Jem’hadar had been defeated. Casela had never lost consciousness though she’d been kept in the hospital for a week just incase, and then she’d sat with her parents until they woke up.

She shook her head, “We can’t. But maybe…” she thought quietly for a moment. One thing she’d learned from her training for the S31 and with T’Jal was how to create a persona and make it real. “What about a traveling entertainer? After the resistance we had a lot of orphans on Betazed. After the work of finding homes, rebuilding, finding a new routine, our people were broken, lost, wallowing in depression, many unable to face what they had done to protect us all. People were trying to live without their Imzadi’s–the other half of their souls, the light to a darkness none of us were able to face. The idea, I don’t remember where it started, but with a world of telepaths, it spread instantly. To simply celebrate, to give gifts, to dance and sing, play games, to simply force ourselves to be happy. It was more for the children, the orphans, the ones who might walk away with a future. In our village, we hid gifts for the children to stumble upon. Sometimes it was a toy or keepsake that had been lost. Sometimes it was clothes that were desperately needed, or photos of happier times.” Of course the irony is that Casela was a child as well at the time, but, mentally, she wasn’t a child anymore either. “The village trusts you, you live here, you belong here, but I don’t.”

That night Casela snuck away to the governor’s house. There was a replicator there and she was able to make the things she needed. People were looting it fiercely and she felt like they deserved to. She had no trouble however getting in and out unseen. The problem was, it took her 3 times longer than it should have, if she’d been well. When she returned, she introduced Ch’otok to Zanya. A fun loving woman with curly bouncy pink hair and stunning purple eyes. She could sing, tell stories, and was overall a fun and pixie like creature. “Now we just have to give them something to enjoy.”
Casela Synthi-er