“Damar! It’s Natima! We’re in trouble!”
“What? Veja, I can’t hear you. Did you say you’re in trouble?”
Still too loud. Natima pressed her fingers over the pinpoint of a speaker and moved even farther into the blackness. She could see nothing, hear nothing but the ever-present liquid sounds that rushed through the tunnels. She counted on the noise to cover her own, but it seemed that Damar couldn’t hear her. She spoke louder.
“Damar! This is Natima Lang! A Bajoran has taken us hostage just outside of Tilar! There are more of them somewhere around here. He was speaking of something to do with balon, I got the impression it was important.” There was no answer. “Can you hear me?”
“I hear you now, Natima, but your signal is weak.” Damar’s voice reflected something like fear. “Is Veja all right?”
“She’s fine, Damar, I will look after her. But you must send someone. Did you hear all that I told you? There are more Bajorans around here, and this man is concealing something about balon.”
“I will send someone immediately.”
A crooked beam of light bounced into the offshoot. Natima whirled around, her fingers closed tightly around the communicator, as the Bajoran, dragging Veja by the arm, lunged at her, trying to get the device. Natima saw her chance and stepped to meet him, grabbing for his weapon, stuck in the waist of his tattered pants. She dropped the communicator but got her hands on the phaser. Veja ran when Seefa let her go to fight Natima for the weapon. The palm beacon fell to the floor, illuminating nothing.
They struggled in the cold dark, Natima’s terror lending her strength-and somehow the thing discharged, a brilliant burst of light and sound that tore into the low ceiling of the tunnel. Debris rained down and Veja screamed-but only once, the sound cutting off abruptly.
Natima still had the weapon. Seefa scooped up the palmlight, moving its beam across the darkness, clouds of dust obscuring its meager light.
Natima trained the weapon on the Bajoran, searching the murky dark for her friend-and let out a cry when she saw the crumpled heap on the muddy ground, pinned beneath a massive mound of ceiling stones. She was not making a sound, but she was alive, her face pulled back in an expression of agony.
“Veja!”
The Bajoran was there even before Natima, scrabbling at the rubble. Only her head and one arm were visible beneath the pile of rocks.
“Help me!” he shouted.
Natima dropped to her knees, tried to keep the weapon trained on the Bajoran as she dug with her free hand.
“You might as well put that thing down,” the man told her, without looking away from his work. “There was only one good blast left in the power cell.”
Natima did not know whether to believe him, but considering Veja’s condition it suddenly seemed unimportant. She put the weapon in the waistband of her skirt and began hauling the rubble away from Veja’s body. Veja had started to pant, taking in short gulps of air, her eyes shining with fear and pain.
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“Don’t worry,” Natima said, digging, babbling at her friend. “You’ll be fine, we’ll get you to a doctor soon, everything will be fine.”
The Bajoran continued to pull at the rocks, but his expression was grim as he looked over Natima’s shoulder, back toward the main conduit they’d left behind. He saw her looking and nodded in the direction of the tunnel.
Natima turned to look, felt her heart sink at what was illuminated by the dim glow of the light. Where the opening had been, now there was only a wall of crumbled rock and clay that continued to spill its gritty contents into the tunnel. They were trapped.
Gul Dukat finally looked up from his computer screen. “Balon? Are you certain she said balon, Damar?”
“I’m not certain of anything, Gul.” Damar could feel each second tick by. “Except that they need help. We need to send someone to Tilar right away.”
“Yes, certainly, but the part about balon… I received word, just about a week or two ago, that a Bajoran man was apprehended either on or near Derna. If I’m remembering correctly, traces of balon were found in the area after more extensive scans were performed. I didn’t think much of it at the time, but…
“He may have had something to do with the Bajoran who is holding the women captive,” Damar said quickly. “But we must find them if we are ever to know for sure.”
“Indeed, Damar, you have my authorization to take a shuttle to Tilar.”
Damar was taken aback. He had expected Dukat to let him go, but not alone. “I will need backup, sir. There’s no telling how many there are.”
“I thought you said there was only one.”
“Yes, sir, but… But perhaps more are involved. You know how the cells work.”
Dukat nodded. “Very well, take Garresh Trach with you, I can’t spare anyone else while we’re installing the new security features. I’ll inform the nearest ground division; they’ll provide whatever else you need. Report back to me as soon as you find out anything more about the balon. Meanwhile, I’ll try and see what I can glean from the Bajoran with the shuttle. I seem to recall that he was taken to Pullock V…”
“Thank you, sir.” Damar promptly left Dukat’s office and could scarcely keep himself from running to the lift, anxious to get to Veja, though he was still disappointed that Dukat would only appoint a single enlisted man to accompany him. He pressed his comcuff and raised it to his mouth.
“Garresh Trach, this is Gil Damar. Please meet me at shuttle pad 3. We’re going to Bajor. I will brief you en route.”
Natima and and the Bajoran had finally managed to clear the rocks and broken chunks of clay pipe from Veja’s body, and now the man simply sat, speechless, watching Natima as she stroked Veja’s hair and squeezed her hand. Veja had drifted in and out of consciousness, crying in pain during her moments of lucidity. A wet, seeping patch of darkness stained the front of her dress. Natima had found only superficial wounds to account for the blood, but had no doubt that there had been internal damage-how much, she did not know. Veja had finally swooned into a kind of sleep, for which Natima was grateful.
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She sat back on her heels, trying to think. Damar would be looking for life signs in the vineyards, not wherever they’d ended up. By the time he widened his scan, Veja might be dead. She would have to find the little communication badge, tell Damar what had happened.
The Bajoran watched Veja, his expression strange. He seemed unhappy that she had been injured, as if he’d somehow forgotten that this was all his fault. Yet she didn’t feel hatred for him, perhaps because she didn’t feel it coming from him. His intentions, unclear before, were obscured even further. He’d been quick to help Veja-of course, Natima had been holding his weapon by then, so it seemed likely that he was only trying to prove himself useful to avoid being killed.
“Should we try to dig ourselves out of here?” she finally asked.
“We disturb that pile of rubble, we’re going to invite another cave-in,” he said. He didn’t seem angry or crazed, only tired.
Natima looked down the dark passageway in front of her, and pointed into the blackness. “What if we try to go that way?”
“I don’t know. The tunnel ends in another pile of rocks. It’s a dead end.”
“We could at least check,” Natima said. She stood up, looked around her feet for the communication device by the thin light of the palm beacon, lying on the floor by Veja. With the mounds of dirt and rock that had come down, she’d never find it, but unless there was some obvious way out, she’d have to look. It might be their only chance.
The Bajoran also stood, and Natima took a step back, hand on the weapon tucked in her skirt-and heard a synthetic crunch beneath her heel.
She forgot about the Bajoran, dropped to pick up the communicator. She tapped it, but it only squawked strangely in response.
“It’s broken,” she said, crestfallen.
“Give it to me,” the Bajoran demanded, and Natima instinctively pulled it away.
“No.”
“I might be able to fix it. I’m an engineer.”
“You’ve never even seen anything like this before.”
“I’ve fixed plenty of things that I had never seen before,” he informed her drily. “I can do it. Just give it to me.”
Natima hesitated. He might be able to alter the signal somehow, to contact his cell. She knew full well that Bajorans could be frighteningly resourceful when they wanted to be. On the other hand, at least someone would dig them out. She handed it over.
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Seefa popped the badge open with his fingernails, examined it closely with the palm beacon. “I think I might be able to fix it,” he murmured. “But,” he said, looking up at her, “if I do, your friends are just going to put me under arrest, send me to a work camp-or execute me.”
“I won’t let them,” Natima said quickly, though she knew it was no use. Bajorans were suspicious by nature, and she had no doubt that Damar would not stand to see him live, after what had happened to Veja.
He put the badge in his pocket. “Let’s have a look at the other exit,” he said. “We’ll have to consider all our options.”
Natima looked down at Veja. She did not look well, her eyelids shiny and her breathing shallow. She did not like to leave her friend here alone, even if it was only for a little while, but she saw no other choice. She was not about to let the Bajoran out of her sight if she could help it.
Dalin Kruva of the Hideki-class Cardassian patrol vessel Drakamair was just returning to Pullock V from patroling the edge of the system when he received the systems-wide alert. Such transmissions from Terok Nor were not unusual, but they rarely concerned patrol ships that were this far from the Bajoran system. Open calls were usually for troops to go down to the surface of Bajor, with the very occasional bulletin in regard to a Tzenkethi or Federation vessel. The transmission was audio only, but Kruva recognized the prefect’s unmistakable tone and cadence.
“Patrol vessels, this is Gul Dukat. I have been alerted that there may be a handful of Bajoran insurgents who have begun using balon-based fuel sources in order to avoid detection of their spacecraft. I am issuing an alert status in the following sectors…”
Kruva was surprised at the Bajorans’ resourcefulness, though he supposed he shouldn’t have been. They weren’t as primitive as they seemed. Not that he was concerned; the insurgents wouldn’t come near him, not in balon-powered ships. It would take a balon vessel a week to get out of the Bajoran system, at best, and by then it would be out of fuel.
Yawning, Kruva turned away from the transmission as his ship’s sensors read another vessel in the sector-a Cardassian ship, Keldon-class. He hailed the vessel.
“This is the patrol ship Drakamair, authorization code 1-1-4-7 chavat. Please state your code and your purpose in this sector.”
“This is the Koeder, outbound from Pullock V, authorization 8-9-5-5 po’tel. We are escorting Union officials back to Cardassia Prime.”
Kruva scanned the numbers and found them to be legitimate. The officials had been at the colony to witness an execution of Bajoran terrorists, political prisoners, and such; he allowed the ship to pass without further challenge, slightly bored by the repetitive nature of his work. He continued on his course, tuning the midrange sensors’ sweep cycle to maximum. This area was often thick with Tzenkethi vessels, and some of the more adventurous Ferengi pirates operated in this region as well. It was a risk to divert power from the disruptor banks-it was not patrol procedure-but Kruva felt it was worth it. He rarely needed his weapons, and watching the traffic was his only diversion.
As he neared Pullock V, his sensors again alerted him to a vessel coming out of warp. He could not get an immediate read on the ship’s type, but after a moment he discerned it to be an outdated Bajoran carrier, flying erratically as it slowed to impulse. It was obviously damaged, and posed no threat to him. Likely it was manned by Yridians or some other opportunistic people who had no qualms about using other species’ technology, but the cryptic alert from Dukat had left him cautious.
“Bajoran ship, this is the Cardassian patrol vessel Drakamair. State your business in this sector, please.”
The carrier did not respond, continuing to fly in a strange, lopsided manner. At least one of its thrusters was out. Dalin Kruva was becoming annoyed. “Bajoran ship, I repeat: state your business or I will open fire.”
Suddenly, the carrier launched two objects the size of small shuttles. They began flying toward Pullock V, keeping in a tight formation.
Kruva ran a scan on the emissions of the two objects and detected nothing… But his scanners wouldn’t pick up balon, not without recalibration. Kruva frowned. The lack of a detectable fuel signature seemed proof positive. But whether to pursue the small ships or the carrier was the larger question.
He decided to go the easier route, taking care of the tiny ships first. The carrier was practically crippled, he could finish it off anytime, but there was a slight chance that one of the other vessels could get away if he didn’t act now. He quickly transferred power to the ship’s forward disruptor banks, locking on to the nearest shuttle. He took it out easily, its blip on his transponder vanishing as the Drakamair’s weapons blasted it into twisted bits of floating scrap. Without a moment’s hesitation, he targeted the second shuttle, which had managed to get just far enough to force him to power his ship a short distance before eliminating it as well. He turned his attention back to the carrier, but to his surprise, the ship seemed to be gone. Judging by the ion trail he detected, the ship had gone to warp. Powering up his sweep cycle, he followed the ship’s warp signature, and he set a new course to give chase. He was not yawning now.
Glinn Tedar’s senses felt especially dull today. Although it was what passed for summertime on this continent, his fingers still felt stiff in the damp chill. The thin veneer of sunshine did little to stave off the bone-penetrating cold. How he hated this planet! He was counting the days until he would be sent home to his wife and family. The border fights would have been preferable to this backward, icy chunk of misery. He regarded the mud on his boots as he stepped out of the forest, wrinkled his nose in disgust. There was nothing so wretched on Cardassia Prime as this gloppy, sucking terrain that seemed to exist everywhere on Bajor, even when there hadn’t been rainfall in weeks.
He had been careless in his rounds today, ignoring many signs that people had been in the woods. He’d spent countless patrols following such signs, and they never led anywhere. His outfit hadn’t had much luck locating terrorists in this region. They either didn’t exist, or they were just too savvy to leave evidence of their presence. At this point, Tedar didn’t much care which scenario was true; he just wanted to get back to the barracks where it was warm.
He heard a rustling in the trees behind him and hesitated, hoping it would be another soldier from his squad, although they weren’t supposed to meet back together for another kellipate or so. He raised his comm, ready to call for backup, but then relaxed. He saw a couple of Bajoran children picking their way through the forest. They looked awfully small, though Tedar couldn’t begin to guess their ages. Bajoran children matured very differently from Cardassian, and they all looked like babies to him.
It disgusted him that the Bajorans allowed their children to roam so freely, running loose like animals. He would have had sympathy if he didn’t already know them to be petulant monsters most of the time, probably from lack of decent supervision and tutelage. Cardassian children would never have been unaccompanied like this-in fact, Cardassian children would have been studying, honing their bodies and minds for the collective betterment of the State. There were games, but they were practiced rather than played, teaching skills necessary to become productive citizens of the Union.
Tedar wondered if he should acknowledge the children. Of course, they posed no threat to him, and they were not traveling outside the proscribed boundaries-there was no law against what they were doing-but Tedar thought there ought to be one, for their own safety. It annoyed him that these children would no doubt grow to be just as useless and defiant as the adult Bajorans were-that sort of attitude probably originated in the kind of lenient parenting that had allowed these two to roam about the forest by themselves. The children had come close enough now that he could see they were a girl and a boy, the girl being the elder of the two. She was scolding the smaller one, a brother, perhaps. Tedar wasn’t sure-Bajorans all looked essentially the same to him: bland, fleshy features, crinkled nose. The girl child did have one distinguishing feature-her hair was a deep, fiery red.
Tedar decided to put a bit of fear into these two. “Halt!” he barked abruptly, and the children jumped. The girl dropped what she had been carrying, a rough drawstring bag, which fell and spilled its contents-several large, ripe moba fruit.
Tedar trained his disruptor on the frightened whelps, and bent over to pick up the fruit. “Where did you get these?” he asked the girl, whose expression wasn’t as fearful as he’d expected.
“My papa,” she said.
“Papa,” the little one echoed, and began to snivel.
“Quiet,” the girl whispered, but the boy began to whimper even louder. The noise grated at Tedar’s worn nerves.
“Stop that!” Tedar snapped, pointing his weapon directly at the pathetic little urchin.
“Don’t you shout at my brother!” the girl screamed, and to his great consternation, she picked up one of the fallen moba fruit and tossed it directly in his face. Before he could quite gauge what had happened, the girl had grabbed her brother by the hand and begun to sprint through the forest, dragging the little boy behind her.
Wiping the sticky nectar from his eyes, Tedar was amazed at how quickly the child was moving, but he wasn’t about to be bested by a couple of dirty-faced imps. He set off after them, catching up quickly, grabbing the little girl by her tangled, flame-colored hair.
“Ow!” she shrieked. “Let go of me!”
The boy cried out in baby-talk for his sister, and Tedar grabbed him by the arm with his free hand. The child fought to get away, but he weighed about as much as a bird, and Tedar lifted him off his feet with no trouble. The children thrashed in his hands.
Tedar suddenly felt very foolish, wasting his energy on a couple of squirming brats. “What are your names?” he demanded. “I don’t mean to harm you, I just want to know where you belong.”
“We belong in Dahkur,” the girl replied, through gritted teeth. “This is our home, and you can’t tell us we can’t be here!”
He tightened his grip on the girl’s hair, twisting until he felt a good many strands breaking away from her scalp. Tears were running down her face, but he could see that she was struggling not to cry. It made him all the more angry to see her fight against her natural response, and he gave her hair another firm yank before he threw her to the ground.
“I can tell you that I think you’re a disgusting little churl whose parents are negligent to have let you in the forest by yourselves! You’re lucky I have a soft spot for children, otherwise I might have shot you straightaway!”
“We aren’t d-doing anything wrong,” the girl insisted, her sobs finally having gotten the better of her. “You l-l-let my brother go right now!”
Tedar pulled the crying boy close to him. “Perhaps he would be better looked after in an orphanage,” he suggested, “since your parents can’t be bothered to keep track of him. He’s practically a baby!”
The girl hiccuped through her sobs. “I look after him j-j-just fine!”
“Tell me your name, or I will take him to an orphanage-and you’re welcome to accompany him, if you like.”
“K-K-Kira Nerys, and R-Reon.”
“Kira?” he repeated. He considered the name, knowing he had heard it before-knowing that it was supposed to mean something to him. And in a beat, he remembered. Dukat’s Bajoran mistress-her name was Kira… something. He couldn’t remember her other name, but he was certain that her family name was Kira-and that the Kira family was to be left alone. These children could be related to her, could even be her own. He released the boy’s arm, and the child commenced to crying louder than ever, as if jostled awake from a state of shock.
“Go home,” he ordered the girl. “Go and fetch your bag where you dropped it, and go home. I don’t want to see you here again.”
“But,” the girl said, wiping the grimy tears from her face, “we were supposed to take that moba to Sorash Mabey. She’s ill, and Papa said-“
“I don’t care what your papa said,” Tedar shouted, scarcely able to believe that this stubborn child would be arguing with him after he’d just done her such a tremendous kindness. “Just get out of here. If I see you again, I’ll kill you.”
It wasn’t true, of course. Tedar could not have taken the risk of hurting any relation to the Kira family, but they probably didn’t know that. Tedar shook his head, thinking of Dukat and his “cultural” exchanges-disgusting, and a lot of the men on the ground felt the same, but it was not wise to speak of such things.
He holstered his disruptor and watched the two children run back to retrieve their bag of fruit, balling his fists to ward the cold away from his fingers. This loathsome tradition of allowing children to… play… Tedar would never understand it. But then, it wasn’t his job to understand things. He went where they sent him, did as he was told, and left the understanding to others.
Horrible planet. Tedar slogged on, wishing he was home.
Chapter 10
Halpas was struggling with the controls on the old carrier, which had not behaved exactly the way he’d thought it would. It had been a long time since he’d flown a warp vessel, of course, and he’d never flown this particular model, but the ship was bucking and wobbling madly when it was not at warp, the inertial dampers damaged enough that they could actually feel some of it. Perhaps they’d taken it out a bit hastily, but he had managed to get it to the Pullock system, and that in itself should have warranted him significant congratulations.
Tiven Cohr, standing behind him, spoke up. “Do you think it worked?”
“I don’t know,” Halpas said. “We went to warp before I could see what happened.” This was the second patrol vessel they had encountered since leaving Bajor’s atmosphere; the first they were able to evade simply by exploiting the blind spots in their security grid; Halpas had been counting on them-and he turned out to be right. But they weren’t so lucky with this ship-this spoonhead had already spotted them, and Halpas had been forced to launch a couple of their unmanned raiders in order to distract him.
“They’re bound to find us eventually,” Ornathia Taryl said.
“They might, but I’m staying in the wake of a Cardassian transport ship that passed through here. With luck, the patrol ship might actually pass by without noticing us.”
“That would take a lot of luck.”
“It took a lot of luck to get this scow spaceborne in the first place, let alone to warp.” He grinned at Ornathia, whom he’d come to like despite himself. She was certainly a know-it-all, but then, she had been a surprising boon to the planning of this operation-for a farmer. Not to mention the business with the balon. It was hard not to be impressed by that.
“What’d I miss?” Lenaris entered the bridge from the shuttlebay, where he’d been supervising the launch of the autopilot vessels. Like the rest of them, he was dressed warm. The ship ran bare minimum life support; comfort wasn’t a consideration.
“Nothing,” Halpas said. “We went to warp before I could tell if the Cardassians took the bait. Now we’ve got to worry about whether or not they’ve picked up our trail.”
Taryl was examining the sensor readouts. “I think they’ve picked us up,” she said nervously.
“Looks that way,” Halpas agreed.
Taryl looked around the room. “We’ll have to launch another raider in their direction-give them something to stop and shoot at-then they’ll have to power down their sweep cycle, just long enough for us to turn back around and sneak by them.”
Lenaris shook his head. “We only have four shuttles left.”
“I don’t see that we have much choice,” she told him.
Lenaris frowned. “If we need those ships to bail out later…”
“This isn’t the time for cautious pragmatism, Lenaris,” Halpas said. “We’ve got to do whatever works, or there might not be a later.”
Lenaris looked as though he might argue, but then he glanced at Taryl and quickly backed down. “Okay,” he said. He headed back to the shuttlebay to program another of the raiders for an autopilot launch.
Halpas was annoyed with the younger man’s persistent pessimism, but he was not a man who spent too much time thinking too far beyond the most immediate step. Truthfully, he was a little surprised that they’d made it this far, but he’d always felt that way, in every mission he’d taken part in.
There were only nine of them aboard, the bare minimum needed to pop a prisoner free from one of the camps at home-and that was assuming they had schematics, practice time, probably some small intervention bought by bribe… They had none of that, here, their offworld venture entirely carried by Ornathia Taryl’s wish to free her brother. Their plans were vague, their knowlege of the camp minimal; it would be a miracle if they managed to find Lac and get him back to Bajor.
Once the raider had been launched, Halpas watched the sensors closely, waiting to make the call. He couldn’t afford imprecision, not now. The ship might have been damaged, but it was careful piloting that would make this kind of maneuver a success or a failure. A bad pilot couldn’t save them from a Cardassian patrol even if the ship had been whole. His eyes glued to the transponder, he waited just another second, or less, and then-now! He reversed direction.
“I see their signature,” Taryl said, pointing to an icon blinking on the sensors. “That’s them. We’ve passed them.”
Tiven peered over her shoulder, turned to Halpas. “Do you think they saw us?”
“They may have, but it looked like they dropped out of warp, probably checking out the raider.”
“We can only hope,” Lenaris said, returning to the bridge from the shuttlebay once again.
“We’re coming up on Pullock V again,” Taryl said. “Looks like the warp signature we’re hiding in came straight from here.”
“Are you sure that’s Pullock V?” Halpas said. “How many planets are in this system?”
“Didn’t you look at the charts, Halpas?” Taryl’s tone was light. “I should have just committed to driving this heap myself.”
Halpas patted the ship’s flight control panel. “Who would keep her company while the rest of you beam to the surface?”
Taryl’s finger was on the sensor array again. “Look, Halpas. Correct me if I’m wrong, but it looks like… the settlement’s beam-shielded.”
Halpas cursed. He hadn’t expected this. A prison camp on a planet in an uninhabited system-why the extra security?
Taryl sounded worried. “We’ll have to take the raiders down, time ourselves against their sensors.”
“We can’t take the raiders,” Lenaris argued. “Two of them can barely hold two people apiece. We might be able to squeeze four into the third, but there’s no telling how it’ll behave with that much weight. And it won’t leave any room for Lac.”
“We can do it,” Taryl said, though she sounded less than certain. “We have to. If we can get inside, we can shut down the shield. Then Halpas could use the transporters to get everyone else out.”
Halpas nodded along, more certain by the moment that they weren’t going to survive-and more exhilarated, at the very slight chance that they would. What they were attempting was unprecedented, which was why it might actually work. And they’d have help on the inside, once the prisoners realized they were being liberated.
And it’ll make those spoonheads think twice about who they’re dealing with.
“But-” Lenaris began, but he didn’t finish, apparently realizing that it was the only way. “All right,” he said. “Let’s go below and tell the others. Tiven, you can ride with me.”
“I’m riding with Taryl.” Tiven grinned.
Lenaris rolled his eyes. “Halpas,” he said, “set her in orbit, and stand by for our signal.”
They nodded to him, and headed for the shuttlebay.
“I’ve located the transport,” Garresh Trach announced. “Sensors show it to be docked at Tilar, just where it was reported to have landed.”
“Well, take her down,” Damar ordered irritably. He hadn’t expected Veja’s transport to be anywhere but at the vineyards.
Trach landed the shuttle clumsily, and Damar cursed himself for letting the younger man pilot. He had wanted to exercise his authority by being in command, but Trach lacked experience at everything.