What the Walls Remember

Posted on Wed Jun 25th, 2025 @ 7:46am by Rear Admiral Rebecca Talon
Edited on on Fri Jun 27th, 2025 @ 3:46pm

2,489 words; about a 12 minute read

Mission: Mission 9: When the Stars Went Silent
Location: Hacienda de Sandoval, Santa Fe, New Mexico, Earth
Timeline: One month post the Battle of Vulcan

The harsh New Mexico sun baked the veranda, sending waves of heat rising from the hard-packed, yellow soil. Cicadas buzzed in the distance as a meadowlark sang its prairie tune as it flitted from one yucca bush to another. The scent of piñon pine drifted from the hills, mingling with the sharper bite of Rocky Mountain juniper and the acrid tang of skunkbush that clung stubbornly to the edge of the yard. A soft breeze rising from the mountains stirred the dust and cooled the sun's burn.

Rebecca's family home stood squat and weathered, a low, single-story adobe built in stages over the centuries. Time marked every surface. The ends of ancient logs jutted from the walls beneath the roofline, blackened with age and cracked from generations of sun and wind. A single, red-painted door was recessed into the adobe wall.

Rebecca's hand fell to the knob, and she paused, staring up at the door's entrance. Carved into the rough, hand-hewn plank trim, cracked with age and buried under layers of paint, were the words: Dios guarde esta casa – 1629— carved by the hand of Juan Sandoval himself.

She traced the D with her index finger, recalling how she used to stare at the old inscription as a child, wide-eyed and fascinated by its mystery and age. Young Rebecca wondered what those words meant and the mystery behind the man who had taken the time to carve them.

But who was Juan Sandoval? Was he just another Spanish colonizer?

He had worked with the local Pueblo people. He fed them from his cattle herds during lean times and traded with them in good faith. The oldest part of the house still bore the skilled touch of these native builders, the adobe work reminiscent of places like Taos. Supposedly, one of his sons had even married into the tribe.

Was Juan progressive? Or simply pragmatic and tolerant only because survival required it? The frontier had a strange way of making unusual bedfellows. And yet, during the Pueblo Revolt, when he and his family fled south to El Paso del Norte, his home had been spared.
That had to mean something.

Juan died in what would become Ciudad Juárez. A single, unremarkable grave among so many others, his headstone worn smooth by the hot Rio Grande wind, far from his Austrian birthplace and the adobe home he had built in the high deserts of America.

In 1703, his grandson returned to the royal land grant with a Castilian wife already bulging with child. They led a dozen vaqueros and three hundred head of cattle to the hacienda tucked away in the hills above Santa Fe. The roof had to be replaced, and the original adobe was expanded with native stone.

From that point on, the family remained rooted to the land and the home. Generation after generation, through war and revolution, through times of bounty and times of hunger. Sandovals fought off bandits, angry natives, and weathered blizzards, droughts, and fires. They kept the taxman at bay during financial ruin by saving in the good years.

The flags of Spain, France, Mexico, the Republic of Texas, the United States, and finally, United Earth flew over the land, yet there was always a Sandoval in this house. The original 25,000-acre royal grant had dwindled over the centuries. Now, only a scant few dozen acres surrounding the old adobe remained in the family's name. The Anglo-Americans hadn't respected Spanish land grants, and every generation had wanted a piece.

Rebecca stood at the threshold, legacy and history pressing against her like the sunbaked adobe walls. This wasn’t just a home, it was the story of her family, etched into every brick and stone. The walls were solid, tied into the land by the generations of blood, as immortal as the mountain peaks that rose above Santa Fe.

At last, her hand turned the knob, and she pushed open the door, stepping into the cool, dimly lit home. The scents of cooked food, oil paints, and paint thinner hung heavy in the air. Sunlight spilled through the kitchen window above the sink, striking the polished stone countertop that had been worn smooth by generations of Sandoval women. Here, meals had been prepared, bread kneaded, onions chopped, and tortillas rolled.

"Mom!"

Screams of delight shattered the silence as her twin daughters burst from their room, once her room and, before that, the very place where Juan and Sarah had lain their heads at night.

The girls scurried across the family room, their sock-covered feet slipping on the saltillo tiles, twisting the rugs beneath their churning steps. Rebecca knelt just in time as they slammed into her, small arms flinging around her neck. She wrapped them up, breathing in the faint scent of strawberry from their hair, her arms full of warm, wriggling life.

She brushed back the wild strands of copper and blonde from her daughters' hair. At that moment, her father emerged from his studio, grinning behind a week's worth of white stubble. His apron was smeared with paint in every color of the rainbow, and his button-down shirt had its sleeves rolled past his elbows. His arms were brown and wrinkled from a lifetime under the New Mexican sun.

"Hey, Pumpkin," Jonothan Sandoval said.

"You're painting again," Rebecca observed.

Jonothan glanced over his shoulder toward the studio and shrugged. "I was inspired."

"It's really cool, Mom!" Aimee chimed in, brushing her curls back from her cheeks. She caught Rebecca's finger and tugged her toward the studio.

"I helped pick out the reference pictures," Olivia added, her light blonde curls framing a snaggle-toothed grin.

The studio sat at the back of the house, facing northeast. The entire exterior wall was floor-to-ceiling greenhouse windows, bathing the room in natural light, with the peaks of the Sangre de Cristos rising skyward over the land.

The walls were lined with shelves of books, some art-related — some not — interspersed with random knick-knacks: little figurines, dried flowers, haphazardly discarded rags, and random sheets of paper from a lifetime of work.

On an open wall above a workbench, marred and stained with time, were several children’s drawings. One, in colorful strokes of crayon and disproportionate shapes of people, houses, trees, and cheery yellow suns that smiled back at the viewer, its paper yellowed with age. In the middle of it all stood an easel, positioned strategically to catch the sunlight streaming in like an alter to some ancient art god. Reference photos were affixed around the painting's parameter, each matching a subject.

At the center of the painting stood Jonathan, smiling gently. To his right was Rebecca’s mother, vibrant in her Starfleet uniform, captured exactly as Rebecca remembered her. Those auburn locks that both she and Aimee had inherited flowed over her shoulders. To his left stood Abuela, tall and proud, younger than Rebecca had ever seen her and wearing the maroon and teal uniform of a Starfleet surgeon. Abuelo, just as young, stood behind her, his hand resting on her shoulder, wearing a wide-brimmed hat and an even wider grin beneath a black mustache.

At the painting's heart sat Rebecca herself, dressed in her newly earned admiral's uniform, her twin daughters curled in her lap. All of them were held in that eternal moment, framed in light and preserved in memory.

Three generations of Starfleet officers. Two of them already lost, one to time, the other to war. And what of Rebecca?

If you had asked her forty-eight hours ago, she would have answered without hesitation: war. Now, there was this new mission. A new Federation to build, far from the Dominion's reach. Would she live to see it?

Probably not.

The edge of the Beta and Delta quadrants was a dangerous place.

"It's beautiful," Rebecca said, breath catching in her throat. "I can't believe how well you captured Mom."

"It's for you," Jonothan said with a proud smile, but there was something strange in his tone. Rebecca couldn't quite put her finger on it. "So you don't forget."

He shuffled over to the easel and swished his brushes through the open can of thinner. He picked up a rag that had once been a pair of underwear, now reduced to a filthy scrap of cloth. With it, he wiped the bristles clean. Then, he carefully placed the brushes and handles down into a jar. The bristles stuck out, stiff and splayed, drying in the desert air like tiny rodents poking their heads over the rim of the stained glass jar.

"Dad, are you packed?"

Silence.

He picked up the can of thinner and moved to a nearby workbench cluttered with tubes of paint, bits of canvas, and a sealed can of gesso. Setting the thinner down, he pressed the lid firmly in place and tapped it shut with a rubber mallet.

"Dad," Rebecca said again, "are you packed?"

"We are!" Livvy interjected brightly.

Rebecca smiled and gave her daughter's shoulder an affectionate squeeze. "That's great, sweetheart." She turned back. "Dad?"

Jonothan looked up at her. This time, the smile didn't reach his eyes.
"I made your Abuela's menudo," he said.

That stopped her; her father was acting strange. Her father never dodged questions. At least, not like this. He was hiding something. The thought tied her stomach into a granny knot, a swarm of butterflies suddenly taking flight in her gut.

"Girls," she said, keeping her tone light, "why don't you go set the table? Your grandfather and I will be there in just a minute."

"Okay!" Aimee beamed. "I've got the bowls!"

"But, I wanted to do the bowls," Livvy whined.

"Girls," Rebecca said with a raised eyebrow.

The twins stared up at their mother for a heartbeat.

"Okay, Mom," Aimee said at last, and they turned and hurried out of the studio, leaving the adults alone with only the heavy scents of thinner hanging in the air. She could hear the twins talking to each other, punctuated with the rattle of silverware and dishes.

Jonothan busied himself cleaning up and organizing the studio. The silence stretched between them as Rebecca waited, shifting her weight from one foot to the other.

Outside, she stared across the rolling hills dotted with clumps of green. She knew every rise and fall of that land. Out there, by the cluster of piñon pines shaped like a "W," was a narrow game trail that led down into a ravine, steep and shaded, hidden from view unless you knew exactly where to look. When the rains came, and the ravine flooded, she would swim in the muddy, frigid waters.

She turned, and Jonathan was standing there, arms folded across his chest, leaning against the edge of the counter. His apron lay folded neatly beside him, and his expression was solemn. He ran a hand through his salt-and-pepper hair, then pushed away before crossing the studio to wrap his arms around his daughter.

There they stood in silence, staring out the window. The bodies mingled in a father/daughter embrace.

"Pumpkin…"

"Dad…"

Jonathan sighed and pulled her closer. "I'm not going with you," he said quietly. "I'm the last of the Sandoval line. My place is here. This land is where my bones will rest."

Rebecca pulled away and spun on him. She wanted to scream. Her fists clenched, and her jaw tightened. But instead, she closed her eyes, drew in a slow breath, and let it out through her nose. Her fingers relaxed.

He was being a stubborn, foolish old man. And part of her had known.

"Dad," she said, locking her green eyes on his brown, "I'm alive. Your granddaughters are here. We all carry the Sandoval blood."

Jonathan shook his head slowly and gave her a half-smile, but there was no joy in it. He turned back to the painting and ran his hand gently over the image of his late wife as if he could still feel the warmth of her cheek.

"You and your daughters are Talons. Your story belongs to Milo's family now."

"Goddam—" She started to shout, then glanced toward the kitchen and lowered her voice. "Damn it, Dad. Don't give me that misogynistic bullshit."

His hurt expression softened her outburst, and she closed the distance between them, wrapping her right arm around his left and intertwining their fingers. Again, silence fell over them as they took in the painting. Her father usually did landscapes, and there was plenty to paint in and around Santa Fe.

"It's your magnum opus," she said softly, just above a whisper.

"Regardless of the name, my place is here," he commented, ignoring the compliment and olive branch. "Our whole family is buried on this land. When your mother was brought home, I promised that I would be buried next to her."

"Dad—"

Jonathan said nothing, and they stood in a companionable silence, the only sound being the twins’ soft chatter as they buzzed around the house. Rebecca drew in a slow breath, the familiar scent of her childhood home settling deep in her lungs. She knew, even if she didn’t want to admit it, that this was likely the last time she would ever set foot here.

“Your granddaughters need you… I need you,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper.

“Becca...” He swallowed hard and reached out, tousling her hair like he had when she was a girl. “I’m not dying. And you don’t need me, not really. You’ve always been so independent. So much like your grandmother… so much like your mother.” He paused, his voice softening. “Your destiny was never rooted in this place. It’s always been out there among the stars.”

He was right, of course. At sixteen, she couldn’t wait to move out and go to the Academy. Graduating early from High School, she was too young to join Starfleet, so she started her degree at the Colorado School of Mines, and she never looked back until Wolf 359.

That battle had messed with her. It broke her, and in many ways, the horrors she witnessed still haunt her in the dark, quiet nights. She tried to deny her destiny and left Starfleet. Hid in the mountains of Colorado with her infant daughters. But the Klingon War and the Dominion brought her back into the fold.

But to leave her dad to the tender mercies of an inevitable Jem’Hadar invasion? She smirked. Knowing her father, he would be as obstinate with them as he was with her, and it wasn’t like he was unarmed. There was a large gun safe tucked away in the back of the closet in his bedroom. Mostly antique firearms collected over the centuries, but she knew for a fact he had several phaser rifles. How he had acquired them, she didn’t ask and didn’t want to know.

“Okay, Dad. I love you.”

“I love you, too, Pumpkin.”

 

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