Hina grumbled to herself as she browsed through the market. She understood why she had been asked to come here, but that didn’t mean she had to like it. Federation tech had been stolen and they had been tased with recovering it. Other teams were out looking for the one piece they knew had been taken, and Saffiya had sent her to see if there was anything else that needed to be recovered. So an engineer made sense. What didn’t make sense was actually sending a person with no real undercover training undercover. This was what she had signed up for when joining Starfleet. Or when Saffiya had asked her to come to the Valkyrie either for that matter.

She squeezed her way through a group of people stopping at another stall browsing with disinterested eyes as the various things up for sale. Again she spotted nothing important and started to turn to move on before she attracted too much attention for not actually buying anything. Unfortunately for her, she wasn’t paying attention to where she was going and collided with another person heading in the opposite direction.

“Hey!” she said, stepping back.

“Apologies,” Nesta muttered before turning her head to make sure she didn’t see one of her brothers behind her. She didn’t spot them so she turned back to the woman she ran into.

Hina took a look at the woman. So much for not attracting attention.

“Should be more careful…” Hina began to comment, starting to step away before anyone else got involved. “Never know who could be watching.”

“You have no idea.” Nesta commented. She couldn’t help but continuously checking over her shoulder. “I have to keep moving. Please excuse me,” Nesta stated while attempting to step around the woman.

Hina was about to let the woman continue, seeing no point in causing a scene, but something seemed off. She was acting far too suspiciously, even for where they both happened to be. She glanced over the woman shoulder, where the woman herself had been looking moments ago, not seeing anything out of the ordinary. Then she saw a flash of an Orion man looking very determined, heading in their general direction. He didn’t seem to have noticed either of them yet however.

“Oh… I think I understand…” she commented. “Come on… this way…” she said, pointing deeper into the market.

Nesta didn’t move at first. She watched as the other lady turned and wondered to herself whether she could trust her or not. Maybe she was just being too paranoid right now.

“I can help you… just follow me…” she said, looking for the stall she had seen earlier. It had been filled with a large group of people, and would have been perfect to hide in.

“Oh….” Nesta made an impulse decision to trust this woman. What other choices did she have right now? She was not familiar with this place and she needed to get out of sight quick. “Thank you. No one besides my brother, Vigo, has ever tried to help me before,” Nesta declared as she started following behind her newfound acquaintance.

Hina glanced back and nodded.

“Sure… no problem…” she said, ducking through another stall. “Im going to guess the less than happy Orion guy I saw is someone you want to avoid?” she asked. She paused for a moment looking around.

“Definitely. He threatened to kill me,” Nesta said quietly while ensuring to follow as closely behind the woman as possible.

“Right… makes sense.” she said. She quickly pulled Nesta toward the packed stall she had seen before, squeezing through the group of people. The interior of the stall was selling mostly exotic clothing and such. It had drawn quite a crowd and would be easy to lose people in. She wished she had had more of a plan, but her engineer’s brain was doing the best it could with what she had.

Nesta was taken by surprise when she was suddenly pulled into the busy stall. She now understood what was happening. She was glad that she had chosen to follow along despite her apprehensions. She had no idea how she would repay the favor but she was grateful she ran into this woman when she did.

“Grab something to change how you look, then we can get out of here…” Hina said. She wasn’t truly worried about how to pay for it, figuring the black market wouldn’t miss it.

“Good idea,” Nesta spoke at an almost whisper. She realized it probably wasn’t necessary but she couldn’t help herself. She looked at the clothing for sale all around her. These clothes were most certainly not her style but that didn’t matter. She reached out and grabbed the closest thing to her which happened to be a very bright colored long dress. She giggled to herself because her brother would never expect to see her wearing something like this. She immediately pulled the dress on over her head. It was just big enough to go over her clothing. Thank the Gods, she thought to herself. After the dress was on, she caught a glimpse of herself in the reflection of a nearby mirror. My green skin, she thought in a panic. She quickly looked around her and spotted a huge hat. It was too big and too fancy for her but it would do the job. She took it and placed it on her head. Between the coverage of the dress and the hat, she should be able to escape the attention of her brother.

“Alright, this is the best I can do. Ready when you are,” Nesta declared turning back to face her rescuer.

Hina looked over at the woman. She didn’t know how successful her disguise would be, this was well outside of what she would have considered normal. But it seemed ok to her.

“Alright… come on…” she said, pointing toward the other exit. She looked back. “So why did this other guy threaten to kill you?” she asked.

“It’s kind of a long story. Shortest version is he is my brother and I disappointed him.” Nesta said quieter than she had intended.

“Oh… I see…” she replied. “Well we can definitely get away from him…” she said.

“Thank you! I don’t know what I would have done if I had not run into you.” Nesta spoke and looked directly into the woman’s eyes. She wanted to make sure she understood how grateful she was for the help.

Hina emerged into another section of the market looking around. She needed to get them to a safe place so she could contact the ship. She looked around, spying what looked like a nice out of the way spot. She calmly made her way toward it, keeping an eye out for the man who had been chasing Nesta.

“My ship is near by… they can beam us out of  here…” she said to Nesta. She pointed to the secluded area.

“Of course,” Nesta said and then followed her toward the area she pointed to. “I hope I haven’t been or will be too much of an inconvenience.”

Hina shrugged.

“My Captain may not be too happy with it… but I doubt she’ll be all that upset when learns why I brought you aboard…” she said as they reached the secluded area. She dug around in her pocket and pulled out what appeared to be an old style flip-top Starfleet communicator. Something that might have even been sold in these markets at one point.

“Morishita to Valkyrie… two to beam up.” she said, looking to Nesta, gesturing for her to stand closer.

Nesta stepped closer and waited. She had been transported before but she always got a little nervous each time. Thankfully, she wasn’t alone this time and that seemed to help.

Hina smiled.

“Energize.” she said.

Nesta looked to Hina and smiled back at her. She was actually going to be safe. Just an hour ago, she was sure she had lived her last day and what a boring one it had been.  She didn’t know how she would ever show thanks to Hina but she would try. As for the other members of the crew, she would have to meet them first. For the first time in a long time, she was actually excited. She had no target or any crazy mission to perform for her brothers. That thought had her smiling even bigger.