Terran Calendar)
Lenaris was never so happy as he was when he was piloting a craft, whether it was within the atmosphere or out in open space. But right now, surrounded as he was by the seemingly endless vacuum of darkness, Bajor’s night-side a vast black well beneath him, he felt his exhilaration heightened to almost dizzying effect. He felt… free. All the months of careful planning and preparation had been more than worth it.
A bubble of static surrounded an incoming transmission, and he remembered himself. He was not free. It was imperative that he stick to the boundaries of the flight plan until the crucial moment when Lac would take the plunge into Derna’s atmosphere.
Lac’s voice sounded light-years away, even though Lenaris actually had a visual on the fuel burn from his friend’s tiny craft. “I’m not detecting any interference in our communication channel,” he said.
“Good,” Lenaris said, at a loss for words. His exhilaration turned sharp, excitement changing to unease as the looming, skeletal figure of Terok Nor drifted closer into range. He’d had no idea what the station would look like, but of course this was it. The menacing curvature of the arms, arching possessively over the top of the structure like the bleached-out rib cage of a corpse-it could only be Cardassian in design. Lenaris suppressed a shudder, and continued carefully on his course.
It was a simple enough exercise to fly their small ships around within the atmosphere-the Cardassians didn’t seem to pay much attention to Bajoran comings and goings, and when they did, it had been established that their overpowered ships lacked the agility to chase a sub-impulse raider in atmosphere. But the raiders’ capabilities in space were far less certain. The cell had only made a very few offworld excursions, and it had not yet been determined exactly how safe it was to be flying around in these tiny, vulnerable craft-they could withstand space travel, but they hadn’t been built for prolonged voyages. The danger was made even greater by the fact that, without more sophisticated scanners than they currently possessed, the raiders had no means to detect each other except by comm.
And of course, there were the Cardassian patrols… Mustn’t forget those.
“Target is in sight,” Lac reported.
Moments later, they began to approach Derna, an unassuming gray satellite partially bathed in glowing reflection from faraway B’hava’el.
“I detect no patrols in the immediate vicinity,” Lenaris informed his friend.
“I’m not finding any either,” Lac relayed back. “I’m taking the dive in ten… nine…”
Lenaris, in closer formation now, watched as Lac’s shuttle suddenly broke away from the safety of the flight path. If there were any patrol vessels that they had missed… if Terok Nor just happened to be doing a sensor sweep at the wrong moment… But there was no evidence of Cardassian presence, no nearby warp signatures, no Cardassian transmissions coming through on the comm, adjusted for enemy frequencies. Lenaris drew in a breath and followed Lac into Derna’s atmosphere.
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He broke through without issue, weathering the resultant turbulence, holding to the flight yoke as he experienced the temporary sensation of freefall. The raider caught itself, and there was Derna stretched out in front of him, a dreamscape, mostly barren but for a thin, dry algae that covered the plains of endless rock. He concentrated on setting down, trying not to think about patrols, about Terok Nor.
Lac had set his raider down a few linnipates from Lenaris, nearer to the wreckage of the Cardassians’ ruined base, abandoned more than a decade earlier. He got out of his raider and began to unload the transmission equipment, while Lac assembled the components of a scrambler that would allow the high-bandwidth transmissions to escape the Cardassians’ notice.
The two worked silently, leaving behind their equipment and a narrow-band homing signal so that others could find it, should it ever need repair. Then, with a breath of poorly masked excitement, Lac brought the transmitter online.
Finished with their work, they stood for a moment, both searching the cold sky, Lac scanning for Cardassian signals with an old tricorder. Satisfied that they were still alone, Lac gave Lenaris a definitive nod.
“Ready when you are,” he said, and Lenaris walked back to his raider without another word.
He gave the engine a burst of fuel and prepared to lift off. He felt a vast relief-the hard part was over. Of course, breaking through Derna’s atmosphere still posed some risk, but if they stuck to the same flight pattern they’d followed when they came through, the Cardassians would never know they’d taken to the skies.
Lenaris was the first to exit the atmosphere, and he wasted no time retracing their path back to Bajor. His ship safely back on course, he was practically home free. His confidence mounted as Terok Nor’s imposing figure fell behind him, but then he realized that Lac had not reported back to him after breaking free from Derna’s atmosphere. He put in a call-and simultaneously saw an unfamiliar power reading on his instrument panel. A patrol from Terok Nor? His mouth went dry.
“Lupus 2, do you read me? This is Lupus 7. Lupus 2-please respond.”
Nothing but dead air.
Holem cranked his transmitter through seven different channels, repeating his request, until his panic finally convinced him to try an unsecure channel-one that the Cardassians could easily pick up. He was desperate. “Lupus 2, please respond.” Bajor was coming closer, but he didn’t dare try to turn back, or even slow down.
His comm crackled and he almost relaxed before he recognized the fragmentary transmission as Cardassian. “Terok N… reporting… prisoner… ip… out.”
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Holem could scarcely breathe. He spun the ship’s dials frantically, trying to pick up any other transmission, but there was nothing else. Bajor loomed ever larger in front of him, and he had to prepare for the heat and violence of re-entry.
Swallowing his terror, he clutched the flight yoke and shot his raider through the turbulence. He struggled to orient the ship once it broke through, struggled with feelings of shock and disbelief as he pointed the little raider in the direction of Tilar. There was nothing he could do. Lac was gone.
It had been a full day of study and prayer. Final services had ended, the late meal had been taken; Kai Arin was exhausted when he finally retired to his chambers, hoping to read a bit and go to bed, and the last thing he wanted to do was discuss Opaka Sulan with one of the vedeks. Especially Gar Osen. Vedek Gar had been very vocal in his opposition to Opaka’s activities these past two years, ever since she had taken her son and left her stone cottage. Arin had publicly renounced Opaka’s status as a vedek of the church, but he had not issued an Attainder, despite having threatened to do so. Vedek Gar had been trying to persuade Arin to make good on that threat ever since.
Of course, it was possible that Gar wished to speak of something else, he told himself when he answered the late-night rapping at his door, but the kai doubted it. And truly, it was just as well. He’d known for some time that he and Osen needed to speak; it could be put off no longer. Much as he did not wish it, the kai invited his old friend into the small library that served as his study chamber, trying to prepare himself for the conversation ahead.
Arin owed much to the vedek, owed his very life to him. When the old Kendra Shrine had been destroyed, Arin had tried in vain to save the Orb that had been housed there. He could still clearly remember stumbling through the smoke, the walls falling all around him, retaining the divine object his only thought. He would have died, but that Gar Osen had pulled him to safety.
Gar began before he’d even taken his seat, his tone pleading, his words coming rapidly. “Your Eminence, surely you are aware of the dwindling numbers of faithful who come to attend our services. Opaka’s message is becoming widespread, not just in this province, but on all of Bajor. Others are spreading her teachings. Other vedeks, Your Eminence! You must denounce her words by formally Attainting her. You must stop this… this wildfire before it spreads any further.”
Arin chose his words carefully. “The fire of which you speak has already consumed most of our world, Vedek Gar.”
Gar was taken aback, as the kai knew he would be. “Your Eminence, what am I to conclude from such a statement? Surely you are not trying to tell me that you now reject the D’jarras? That you’ve… given up?”
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Arin shook his head. “No, Vedek Gar. I have not given up. I have… reconsidered. In the two years since Opaka left, I have studied and prayed and thought upon her words. And I have come to see the power behind them. Bajorans are finally becoming free of the despondency that has plagued us for twenty years. They no longer see themselves as victims. They are fighting back.”
“But of course you do not condone the fighting, Your Eminence. You must not condone it.”
Arin was troubled. “I have begun to question many of my own beliefs, Vedek Gar. What you say is true… but our world has never known such a struggle, and I fear that if we cannot unite, we will be broken. A successful leader must be able to admit that he was mistaken.”
“Yes, of course, Your Eminence, but you must tread lightly around this delicate matter-“
“Vedek, I should inform you that I mean to write a series of new sermons, with a very different message from what I have taught in the past. I will call for an assembly tomorrow, to announce the change.”
“Your Eminence, I must-“
“I thank you for being such a valuable adviser to me over these many years, Osen,” Arin said. “I will forever be grateful to you, for your counsel and your friendship. But I believe that for now, my closest adviser must be my own heart.”
Gar’s eyes flashed with anger. “Kai Arin, I believe you pay too much mind to false counsel, and not enough to the prophecies.”
Arin felt a flash of annoyance. Had Osen just accused him of having a false heart? He gestured to an ancient book spread open on a kneehole desk behind him, an original printing of the Oracle of Spires, a collection of prophecies from long ago.
“Vedek Gar, I have studied the prophecies all my life. There are many verses that contradict what is said regarding the D’jarras. You know as well as I do that it is possible to twist the meaning of these verses to suit one’s own agenda. I will not be accused of picking and choosing among the prophecies in order to bolster a particular argument.” Arin was aware that his hand had tightened into a fist. He consciously relaxed it, and continued. “The Prophets have fallen silent to me, but I know They watch over us still, and make Their voices known to those who would listen. When I see how Opaka Sulan’s efforts have been rewarded, I see-I hear-what Bajor is telling me to do. And I believe it is time to listen.”
Gar was speechless as Arin dismissed him. The kai was ambivalent as the other man left the small chamber, sorry for his old friend-Gar had been unwavering in his faith, in his reliability as an assistant and counselor. They had worked closely together for many years. But Arin had come to acknowledge that the old caste system was not serving them well, and as Opaka and others like her had spread their message, he’d felt the change in the air, a feeling of possibility among the people that seemed like a kind of rebirth. Contrary to what he’d believed all these years, it had been far from injurious to morale for the people to leave their D’jarras behind. He realized that what he felt was mostly relief, to finally admit to Gar what had vexed him so in recent times. Gar had always been the greatest supporter of the D’jarra way.
He turned back to the book of prophecies he had been immersed in before Gar came to call. He found the verse he had been reading, and traced a finger along the line of text. The time of accord shall bring an Emissary, and the Emissary shall bring a new age to Bajor.
“The Emissary,” Arin murmured, just before he felt cold fingers slip around his throat.
“I’m sorry,” said a familiar voice, and the kai, clutching at those icy fingers, turned to stare into a pair of eyes that seemed strikingly reptilian, though Arin had never noticed it before. “I’m afraid I can’t let you call that assembly, Your Eminence.”
The kai didn’t understand. He struggled, but the pressure only increased, and images of joy and sorrow and regret ran through his mind; it was as though it was all coming together, becoming a coherent story. His last thought was of the Orb he had lost, the great tragedy of his life in service to Them…. If Gar had not dragged him out of the shrine when he had, could he have saved the Orb of Truth? Could it be, as the people often murmured, that the Orb had not been destroyed at all, but… taken…?
Black flowers bloomed in his eyes, and the struggle was too great, blotting out his thoughts, and then there was nothing, nothing at all.
Miras Vara sat up abruptly in her bed, sweating and cold. She swept her damp hair from the nape of her neck, breathing deeply as reality began to piece itself together again. She was in her bedchamber, in the small apartment where she lived alone, across the way from the Ministry of Science, where she worked. It had been a dream, only a dream… never frightening, exactly, but it was the same dream she’d had with increasing frequency in past weeks. This time, it had been different.
As always, she had been walking alone in the night, outside the periphery of Cardassia City where she lived and worked. Her feet had been bare, and the stony road had pierced her soles, but there was no blood, no pain. The ground beneath her, invisible in the dark, gave way to softness, coolness like nothing that occurred in nature, at least not on her world… And it occurred to her that she was going somewhere, some specific destination that she had never visited before, and that it was vital she continue on.
This was the part of the dream that she had experienced many times before-walking alone at night, a sudden understanding that she had a purpose, even though she didn’t know what it was. But before tonight, she’d always woken shortly thereafter. This time, she had continued to walk for a much greater distance than ever before, traveling blind until the darkness gave way to the fragile light of dawn.
The ascending sun cast a yellow pall across the ground, which, to Miras’s astonishment, was coated in something spongy with an undercurrent of subtle prickliness-something green. She knew what it was, but only from books, from her brief school rotation through the agri program.
In the distance, not far from a deep stand of wood-real, living trees-she could hear noises, not mechanical, not humanoid, but soft gruntings and cluckings that she recognized as being from animals, from livestock. She was drawing close to a farm. But Cardassians were not farmers, and Miras began to suspect that she was no longer on Cardassia Prime at all. It was then that she recognized she must be dreaming, the most realistic dream she could ever remember having.
She walked through the misty, early light. It was cool, but not uncomfortably so. She marveled at the scene unfolding before her. A farmhouse stood near the copse of dark trees-she’d never seen so many trees together. There were animal pens, a broad stable, a vegetable garden, variations of things she’d seen in captures but never in life-and yet everything was astonishingly detailed, the dirt floor of the yard, the strange, rich smell of growing things. Insects fluttered up from the ground cover, which was everywhere.
She approached a farmhouse, a sturdily built cottage made of clay bricks, black clay like that which could be dug from Cardassian mountains. But she had already decided that she was on another world, and became more certain when she saw the figures moving beyond the windows of the small house. Though she couldn’t make out their features, they were not Cardassian-they were leaner and more graceful than any Cardassian she had ever seen. And yet there was something familiar about them, too…
One of them emerged from the house then, and Miras felt her breath catch. The woman was a Cardassian-or, at least, she had the same Cardassian cranial ridges, with dark hair and pale gray skin.
She’s Hebitian. The awareness dawned on her like the early light that played across the fertile land. An ancient ancestor, from the first great civilization to arise on Cardassia Prime. Miras had been to see the Hebitian ruins, and she realized suddenly that she was not on another world, after all. She was in another time.
The woman was carrying a jug, fashioned from the same ebony clay as the bricks that made up the farmhouse. Her long, obsidian-black hair was loose about her shoulders, and she was dressed in a white linen garment, cut on the bias to grace the curves of her body. She teased a strand of hair around one of her slender, tapered ears, and then she turned. She saw Miras, and smiled at her. Raised her hand.
Miras was startled, having somehow assumed that she was only observing. This attempt to interact… Her dream was realistic to the point of uncanniness. Could this be real? Could she have been drugged, somehow, and brought here without her knowledge? It was absurd to even think such things, but she was helpless not to, it was all so realistic.
The woman began to speak, and Miras could not at first understand her. The Hebitian seemed to realize it, spoke slower, more minimally-and Miras suddenly found that she could understand her perfectly well, as though she’d just remembered that she already knew the language.
I do. The words the woman used were presumably Hebitian, a language that all schoolchildren learned the fundamentals of, as their modern language was built upon it. She’d studied linguistics at university, as well. The third time the woman repeated her simple statement, Miras understood it perfectly.
“I have been waiting,” the woman said.
“Do you mean-you have been waiting for me?”
“I have been waiting.”
Miras looked around for any evidence that the woman could be referring to another-and was struck anew at the strange, rich beauty of this long-ago world, understanding now where she was. The landscape was hilly, but the hills were gentle and rolling, not the usual needle-sharp crags of obsidian that made up her Cardassia. The grunts and screeches of animals were clearer now, more pronounced, mingling with the sounds of a trickling brook somewhere in the trees and the chir-chir-chir of what she imagined were wood-crakes, birds that most experts believed had been extinct for centuries.
“I have something to show you. It is something precious.”
“What… what is it?”
“It is for your eyes only, Miras.”
Miras followed her into the farmhouse, not surprised somehow that the woman had called her by name. The room they entered was clean and filled with light, aesthetically pleasing in a utilitarian way.
The woman went to a wood table that sat against one wall. She opened a flat obsidian box that lay atop it, reached inside-and as she started to lift out whatever was within, the edges of Miras’s perception began to blur. The colors of the room became indistinct, began to meld into the cacophony of unfamiliar sounds and smells. She closed her eyes, and then opened them again-
-and found herself sitting in her own room, kicking at the bedclothes and pulling her sweat-soaked hair away from the back of her neck.
She closed her eyes again, took another deep breath. Tried to hang on to the indistinct image from the dream’s very end, wanting to know what the woman had been about to show her. Something larger than the palm of her hand, something flat with a slight curve, made from dark polished wood and adorned with bright pigments. The object was heavily carved with an ornate design, a design that resembled… a face. It was a mask. The Hebitian woman had been trying to show her a mask.
What does it mean? Miras lay back in bed, closing her eyes again, but she slept no more that night.
Opaka Sulan settled for the winter at a large camp near the northernmost edge of the Sahving Valley. There had been a city here once, Genmyr, that had extended almost to the edge of the forest, more than twenty kellipates away. Genmyr had been a major textile exporter, in Bajor’s simpler industrial times. The majority of the residents-those who had stayed behind, who either couldn’t afford to leave when the occupation had turned ugly or had still believed the Cardassians meant to treat them fairly-had chosen to resettle after an “accidental” fire had swept through the city many years before. The fire had destroyed the livelihoods of hundreds of families, made the greater community even more reliant on their oppressors. There were people who said they’d actually seen a group of Cardassian soldiers set the fire, but of course word was not proof and even if it was, there was no recourse.
Many of the broken city’s natives had made camp here for more than a decade, year round. There were temporary shelters here, like Opaka’s fabric tent, and there were a few more substantial dwellings, though nearly all the buildings had a transient quality, lending a kind of anxiety to the camp, as if all its inhabitants expected the day to come when they would have to pack up their families and move on.
The land itself was still mostly barren, but the valley was sheltered from the worst of the cold and there was a river only a few minutes away. It was a good place to winter, and many families came each year, seeking community in the hard months. The camp had already swelled to twice its size since the leaves had begun to fall, since the last of the meager crops had been harvested, and the former vedek knew that more would come-many more, to hear her message of unity. She hoped she was up to the task. The people here had embraced her as their guide in matters of spirit. Many were already coming to her for direction, alone and in groups, and while she did the best she could, offered advice from the heart and spoke what she believed, she was often afraid of faltering.
She sat on the floor of her shelter, alone. A few of the camp residents had taken it upon themselves to build her a wood pallet, which made sleeping on the ground much more comfortable. They’d wanted to do more, but she wouldn’t have it; they had few enough resources, and she tried to see that all was shared.
She folded her arms around her legs, listening to the movements of life outside-children playing, people working together. Good sounds. It was often difficult for her to find a moment to herself, and usually she was thankful for it; the company of her spiritual family helped to stave off the loneliness that sometimes overwhelmed her, since Fasil had gone his own way. She’d been without him almost two full turns of the season, and still missed him terribly. But today she wanted to have a moment of peace, needed a moment to herself to reflect on the man who had been one of the greatest living inspirations to her-because he lived no more. She had received word that Kai Arin had been found dead in his sanctuary, apparently of natural causes.
Looking back, Opaka could see how her spirituality had grown under his tutelage, could recall many of his services that had touched her faith so profoundly, and she indulged in a moment of tearful regret as she recalled their last conversation. She wished she could have parted ways with him on more amiable terms. But of course, were it not for the disagreement, she would never have left. It was more reason to be grateful to him, for forcing her to be stronger, to be brave enough to do as she had.
Someone whipped back the flap of her makeshift tent, and she hastily wiped her eyes. “Yes? I… I wish to be alone for a moment, if it can wait.”
“Mother.”
She turned, and saw her son standing in the entryway of her rough home. It had been over a year since he had left to fight in the resistance, and many months had passed since he had visited her last-months during which she had not known if he was alive or dead.
His face was more gaunt than it had been when he first left, the soft edges of his childhood replaced with the craggy features of an adult. He sported a new scar that crept diagonally across his left cheek, but his eyes were still the same, warm and wise. She stood and hurried to embrace him, her tears joyful now.
After a long, lovely moment they parted, Opaka smiling up at her boy. She’d never been a tall woman; Fasil had gotten his father’s height.
“It is good to see you, Mother. You are looking well.”
“You also look well, my son. Of course, just to have you here…” Her eyes welled again.
“I can’t stay long. I came because I heard about Kai Arin.”
She nodded. “Yes. He was a good man, and he will be missed. Surely, you can stay a few days?”
He smiled at her, but did not answer. “I came to ask you what you have considered, regarding who his successor will be.”
“I suppose there will be an election,” she said. The Vedek Assembly was no longer a powerful force in her world, nor was it in the realities of the people she spoke with each day. Perhaps that was why the Cardassians still allowed it to exist.
“I imagine Gar Osen will be a candidate,” she added, then shook her head. “It doesn’t matter who the kai is now.”
“It does matter,” Fasil said. “I believe the next kai should be you.”
Opaka laughed briefly before realizing that her son was serious. “Fasil, I have no interest in holding that office.”
“Do you know how many people know about you?” Fasil asked. “And what better way to spread your message than under the authority of the kai?”
“I do not wish to be kai,” she repeated. “Let the people choose who they want, it will not affect my work.”
“The people will want you, Mother.”
“The kai is chosen from the Vedek Assembly,” she said. “I’m not even-“
“-a vedek anymore, I remember,” Fasil said, a touch of young male exasperation in his voice, and she smiled, loving him so much that it hurt her heart.
“But think, Mother. This new prefect cares not about our religious beliefs. You would have access to travel permits, to political functions, to so many more people.”
Opaka considered him seriously for the briefest of moments. If she were the kai, she could spread her message everywhere, she would not be dependent on word-of-mouth among small fringe groups. She might even have access to media-Kai Arin’s Festival sermon on the D’jarras had been recorded and broadcast, had even reached Bajorans who had settled offworld…
But it was only a moment before the absurdity of it made her laugh again-Kai Opaka!-and she took her son’s hand. “You must be tired,” she said. “Let us eat something. Help me prepare food, and we’ll talk of this later.”
He grinned. “I admit, the offer of food is enough to make me agree to anything. It is very good to see you again, Mother. I have… missed you.” He squeezed her hand, looking away, his face working to avoid tears.
Opaka was nearly overcome to see her son so affected. It seemed she wasn’t destined to have dry eyes today. She embraced him again.
“I have missed you, too, Fasil. So very much.”
The days had turned into weeks since the Derna incident. Lenaris had not entirely given up hope that Lac would return to them-his disappearance had been so abrupt, Lenaris still couldn’t quite believe it-but he knew better than to mistake hope for possibility. Lac was not coming back.
Seefa, who had always leaned toward the anxious, had become convinced that the Cardassians would be coming for them any day now.
“The Cardassians have Lac’s raider,” he’d said, on more than one occasion since Derna. “They know he was using balon to power it, and they know there is a massive balon deposit right here. Mark my words, they will come. After that, it’s only a matter of time before they find the rest of our ships and take us all to work camps-or worse. Most likely, they’ll execute a few of us to make examples, and then-“
“Let’s not get hysterical, Seefa. There are plenty of other balon deposits on Bajor.” It was always Taryl who pulled him back. She refused to be rattled by what anyone had to say regarding Lac, choosing instead to approach the situation with her customary calm rationality. It worried Lenaris not a little that Taryl seemed so placid in the face of her brother’s disappearance; he feared that one day the reality of it was going to hit her, and then-he didn’t know what would happen then, for he had never seen Taryl succumb to the kind of upsets that he himself was prone to. Taryl had a fiery temper, but sadness and worry were not usually in her repertoire. Lenaris envied her for it. If he could have drawn on that kind of strength when Darin had died… Lac’s disappearance held certain parallels to that particular tragedy, but Lenaris was determined to keep himself together this time.
Still, he was overwhelmed with guilt that it had been Lac who had been caught, and not himself. It was just dumb luck, of course. But then-Lenaris had forgotten to put in a transmission to Lac after exiting the atmosphere himself. What if he could have helped his friend somehow? He didn’t know how, but still… He could not help but agonize over every detail of that ill-fated mission.