First Ever Story – Extra Special thanks to Rosie-bec for beta-ing this story for me (I suggest you read her stories – Wicked!) Anyhow, Please read and review.

Disclaimer: I own neither the The Doctor, nor anyone from the Star Trek Universe!!

Polly

Mero Sesra was glad to be leaving. She'd never been happy aboard the station – too many ghosts. Too many memories. Sure, you could paint the walls, give it a brand spanking new name – a Starfleet name, no less – yet to Sesra, even after four years, it was still Terok Nor. The strange thing was, she'd never been aboard during the occupation.. Her family had lived in the mountains of the Hedrikspool province, sheltered from the Cardassian patrol ship's sensors by the Kelvinite deposits in the mountains. But life hadn't been easy. Her father had aided the resistance, harbouring those most sought by the Cardassians for interrogation and eventual execution. Endless nights, hiding in the caves, starting at the sound of the smallest rock fall – At every sound, a cold fist had wrapped itself around her stomach and squeezed, not letting go until the sun rose the following morning.

First, she'd heard the stories. Then she'd met the survivors. Those cell members who'd been to Terok Nor and lived to tell about it. The haunted looks in their eyes, their ragged bodies barely hiding their ribcages. The fear in their eyes. Fear and rage. The starvation pits. The random 'questioning' by Gul Dukat, the Ore Processor. Never having experienced the horrors of the station herself, her mind was allowed free rein, her imagination breathing darkness into that which reached for her in her dreams. When Sesra had been old enough to hold a phaser, barely entering her teens, she'd asked her father for the night watch. Always the night watch. Her father had praised her for her devotion to the resistance, but the truth had been much simpler. Her nightmares were of dark places and shadows. She'd believed that if she'd slept during the dark hours the nightmares would be stronger, the shadows given form, the grey Cardassian hand reaching, always reaching-

But then the Cardassians had left, and the provisional council had invited Starfleet here. To help rebuild Bajor. Funny she'd thought at the time, that the federation arrives with its shiny starships after the Cardassians leave. She'd viewed them as cowards and apologists. But then Kira Nerys had been installed as the Bajoran/Federation liaison officer. Within one week Kira had returned to Bajor asking for volunteers to stand alongside the Starfleet security teams. She'd given a rousing speech to those assembled, questioning whether the proud people of Bajor would allow themselves to be baby-sat, and spoon-fed, and nursed by Starfleet. Sesra had stood in the assembly hall of the shaktar province and cheered with the best of them.

She'd learned a lot about the federation in the four years since she'd enlisted. Their customs, their battles – that which they faced outside of this one small sector. The Borg. The Romulans. Omnipotent beings from another reality. To this day she still couldn't believe that Cpt Sisko had actually floored a member of the Q continuum. Now she was going home. Her tour had finished, and what with the new situation with the Klingons as well as the Dominion lurking on the other side of the celestial temple she felt she'd earned some peace. Real peace. She'd seen bloodshed to equal sunsets, and now felt it was time to consult with Vedeks – to find a new life for herself. If the federation had taught her anything, it was to aspire. To better one's self. It had taken over a decade of violence to teach her that what she really desired most was serenity. To tend a little garden, to sit on the porch drinking lemonade, to have children maybe…

She walked across the promenade for the last time, nodding and smiling occasionally at her now-former comrades. Never again. The thought struck her and she stifled a smile. The times she had walked past the Klingon Coffee shop and, just for a moment in her mind, it had disappeared to be replaced with a guard office – the gray-skinned Cardassians walking toward her, leering, the hands…

She stepped into the turbolift. "Habitat ring" she told the computer. The door closed and the car sped her to her destination.

The doors opened to reveal the gray walls of the corridor (military grey no doubt) just outside her quarters. The corridor was deserted, but being mid afternoon station time this was not unusual – the shift change occurring at sixteen-hundred hours. Sesra was just about to enter her quarters to grab her kit bag, her last artefacts, when-

"I'm cold" said a voice behind her. Turning on her heel and adopting a defensive stance she saw…a little girl. A Bajoran child, no more than six.

"Where are your quarters?" asked Sesra smiling, hoping not to intimidate the child.

The little girl shrugged.

"You're not supposed to talk strangers, right?" Sesra whispered and winked.

The little girl smiled.

"I'm lieutenant…I'm Sesra" she started again, remembering she'd just been discharged, "and now were not strangers…?" Sesra left thequestion hanging in the air, but the child was not forthcoming.

"Are you playing?" she asked.

The little girl smiled again.

"Can I play, too?"

The little girl smiled and reached a hand forward, when…

"Hey Sesra, don't think just cause your not an officer anymore I won't be cleaning you out at the poker table!!"

"Winters, you can barely clean your uniform without help" She laughed.

"Fancy a quick 'Risa Rainbow' before disembarking?" Winters asked. Sesra liked Winters. He'd always been kind. Flirtatious yes, but kind not overbearing.

"I'll just see this little…"But the child had vanished.

"She was just here. Right here! I think she was playing"

Winters looked first left, then right.

"Well then, if she can vanish like that, she's definitely gonna win. I wonder if Quark would take odds….".

Sesra punched his shoulder playfully.

"You can ask him when you go and order our 'rainbows' – one for the road and all that"

"Yes Sir. Lieutenant Sir" He Saluted floridly, grinned and almost skipped out of sight.

The doors to Sesra's quarters opened at her approach and she stepped inside.

"Lights level 2" – Unexpectedly, the lights didn't respond. Great, she thought.

"Okay come out guys, thanks for the party!!!" She darted to her drapes and pulled to reveal ……nothing.

A child's giggle.

"Alright this isn't funny this…" Out of the corner of her eye she spotted a pair of small feet behind the other drapes. Sesra crept up, yanked the drapes aside.

"Gotcha! You're in a lot of trouble, sneaking into an off…another persons quarters"

"Will you help me hide?" the child asked, "I'm so cold".

The child reached a hand toward Sesra, and Sesra instinctively reached for it. Her hand clasped the child's but something didn't feel right. Her hand went numb, the coldness spreading past her wrist, her elbow. She tried to let go but was almost bonded to the child. A dizziness, a buzzing spread through her conciousness and she felt herself slipping away, like her mind was being shutdown idea by idea yet ransacked at the same time.

She looked up from her hand to the childs face. And saw Hell itself………….