“Hello, Skrain,” she said, her voice hollow.
Dukat frowned. It was unusual for Meru to act this way. Even though Dukat knew she wasn’t always entirely happy, she almost always managed to put on a convincing smile for her lover-it was one of the reasons Dukat had kept her around this long.
Dukat sat down on the bed behind his mistress, touching the back of her bare neck. He nudged away the few tendrils of hair that grazed her skin, having worked themselves loose from the arrangement on top of her head-similar to how a Cardassian would wear her hair, but especially striking on the delicate-featured Bajoran. “Is something troubling you, my dear?”
She shook her head, but she continued to avoid his gaze, and Dukat began to feel annoyed. She was acting a bit like a petulant child. He would find no solace from his worries here.
“I must go,” he said irritably. “Gil Damar is not on the station. My duties will keep me busy for the next few days.”
Meru finally looked up, and Dukat saw that her eyes were quite red, the edges of her nose laced with pink. A strange effect that Bajorans often experienced when upset, it did not flatter her.
Dukat turned away in disgust. “I won’t be back tonight,” he announced, and left the room.
Rain had come to the Kendra Valley, and a heavy downpour was soaking the muddy terrain that surrounded the old cottage once occupied by the Opaka family, the cottage where Gar Osen now resided. The same cottage that had been built in the time of Kai Dava.
Opaka Fasil pulled his oilcloth cloak over the top of his head to keep the fine spray of misty rain from his head and shoulders. Despite his best efforts, rivulets of water ran down the tip of his nose, and his fingers were cold and slippery where they clutched at the little shovel he was using to poke around the foundation of the little stone house.
“Quiet,” whispered the older man who had come from his mother’s camp-the artist, Ketauna. “The vedek will hear you!”
“He won’t hear me,” Fasil assured him. “I lived in this cottage for most of my childhood. It’s very well insulated.”
“But you’re tapping the shovel right up against the house!”
“Let him work,” the other man said, the younger one with the phaser pistol. His name was Shev. “If you’re worried about it, go round to the front and watch the door. You can warn us if they come out.”
The older man did as he was told without a word. In the half a day it had taken them all to reach the sanctuary, Fasil had learned that Ketauna was unexpectedly stodgy, for an artist. Fasil thought his sour mood might have something to do with the news they’d heard earlier, on their brief journey.
Gul Dukat had issued a list of new edicts. It was all that anyone could talk about. Among other restrictions, all religious personnel were to register with the work office for identification numbers within the next week, just like any other Bajoran citizen. Dukat was also planning to raze several of the sanctuaries and to discontinue the practice of allowing religious counsel in the work camps. The people of the villages and camps they’d walked through were horrified by the news, as was Fasil’s mother, but it also gave her a legitimate reason to seek counsel with Vedek Gar, who apparently wouldn’t see just anyone anymore. Fasil supposed they should be thankful for that.
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Fasil found the ground near the foundation of the house to be quite soft underneath the superficial layer of rotten needles and leaves. It would have made excellent compost, he thought, for the little garden tended by the members of his cell. Beneath that was a layer of humus that gave way to rich, soft soil that lifted away easily, even with the unwieldy little tool he was using.
He dug quickly and quietly, Shev keeping watch. When the hole was deep and wide enough that he could stand in it, almost up to his knees, his shovel began to hit much more solid ground, a layer of soil that differed in composition, blackened, as if it had been burned.
A trap door. To the cellar. This had been wood, he could see by the splinters he was turning over with the sharp tip of the shovel. He was startled, though not terribly surprised, when the shovel chunked through the soft wood and hit air a moment later. Dirt and pebbles rolled down into the crack he had just made, rattling thinly as they hit the ground somewhere below. He scrambled up out of the hole, wary of falling through what he was sure was an old hatch. It was a wonder it hadn’t caved in long ago, just from the weight of the soil.
Shev examined the hole from the edge, looking at the ovoid black spot in the center that seemed to open up into nothingness. “I have a palmlight,” he offered, and produced a torch that he waved down into the hole. From the flash that crossed the small opening, Fasil could see uneven ground-a set of steps? Both men reacted to the sight, and Fasil felt his heart begin to pound in a fashion that was unrivaled by even the sketchiest missions he had been involved in with the resistance. He knew, now, that his mother had been correct. He was about to find something precious here.
“There’s a cellar behind our house. There’s something there that belongs to us. Will you help me?”
Fasil turned to the other man. “Hold the light while I finish digging. I don’t want to fall through the hole.”
Shev nodded wordlessly, and Fasil carefully set his feet back in the ditch he had dug. He scraped away the dirt that covered the old cellar door, checking his footing periodically, then started widening the hole with the shovel. The wood had rotted, swelled by seasons of rain, and it was only a matter of minutes before the ragged opening was wide enough to admit him.
Fasil put one foot through the inky black square, testing his weight on the rest of the old trap door. He put the other foot through, his feet dangling above the broken stairs beneath him. Shev handed over the palm beacon, and Fasil placed it into the waistband of his pants. He wedged his hands up against the sides of the hole. He looked up at Shev, who nodded without a word. Taking a tremendous breath, he lowered himself down into empty space and let his body fall.
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Natima could not tell if the palmlight was flickering or if her eyes had simply grown too tired to see clearly. She had no idea how much time had passed since they had been taken belowground, but she was certain that it must be long past sundown by now. Her hands were covered with tiny cuts, her knees and elbows bruised and scraped. She was exhausted and hungry and scared for Veja, but oddly, it was the unpleasant sensation of the dried clay, jammed underneath her fingernails, that seemed to annoy her the most. She thought it might be the very thing to send her over the edge of tolerable misery.
“Hey,” she said to the Bajoran. It occurred to her, not for the first time, that she didn’t know his name. “Maybe we should take a rest. If we wear ourselves out, we’ll never get out of here.”
He shook his head and continued digging at the pile of dirt in front of him. “If we go to sleep, we may never wake up. I’d rather die trying to escape.”
Now Natima was certain it was the palm beacon that was flickering, as it had been earlier. Seefa had adjusted something or other, made the beam softer, but now that was beginning to go, too.
“If you aren’t going to sleep, you should make yourself useful with that communicator instead of just digging away in the dirt like a vole,” she said. “The light is going to go out before we ever make a dent in that heap, and you know it.”
The Bajoran finally stopped digging. “If we use it, I’m as good as dead,” he said quietly.
“That isn’t true! I promise I will tell them this was all an accident. I will tell them that you tried to save us. I know you have no reason to trust me, but I give you my word.” She sighed, annoyed with his silence. “And anyway, what other choice do you have?”
He did not look at her, sitting back on his haunches to regard the tumble of rock, which looked very much the same as it had when they had begun digging. He heaved a sigh of his own. “I suppose I have to trust you. It’s either my neck, or all of our necks. That’s not much of a choice.” He was quiet for a moment.
Natima spoke quietly. “Please,” she said. “Please. For Veja…?”
He turned. “Fine, I’ll do it.”
Natima picked up the light, crawled to her feet. “Let’s go down to where Veja is. I want to keep an eye on her.”
He nodded, and they walked the length of the conduit, picking through the rocks. When they reached Veja, the Bajoran held out his hand.
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“Give me the phaser,” he said.
Natima was taken aback. “What do you want with it?”
“I’ll need some of the components in it to fix the communicator. Give it to me.”
“But you said the power cell was dead.”
“It is. That isn’t the part that I need. There’s a pin inside the trigger mechanism that I can use to reset the relay, to send out a general distress call.”
Natima hesitated. She didn’t want to give up the phaser.
The Bajoran looked annoyed. “Here you are, talking about trust. What am I going to do, shoot the two of you, so I can die in here without any company? Give me the phaser.”
Natima knew it was no use, but she wanted to feel like she had a little leverage, at least. “What is your name?” she finally asked him.
He stared at her a moment, then shrugged. “Seefa,” he said. “Aro Seefa.”
Natima swallowed. “Fine, Aro Seefa,” she said softly, and she handed over the weapon. Seefa crouched on the ground next to Veja, picking the weapon apart with his hands, and a thin piece of wire he had pulled from one of his boots. Natima set the palmlight down, focusing on Veja. Her breathing was a little less shallow now, her expression peaceful, but Natima knew she needed prompt medical attention.
She watched the Bajoran work as the light began to grow dimmer and dimmer, the gray shadows cutting across the orange light on his face. He was sorting through a handful of tiny pieces of metal and composite, carefully setting them aside. He removed the combadge from his pocket, cracked it open, and laid it next to the phaser’s components.
“How do you know how to do that?” Natima asked. “I thought Bajorans weren’t allowed to practice things like engineering, unless they work for the government.”
“Bajorans do a lot of things they aren’t allowed to do.”
“But… who taught you to do that?”
Seefa shrugged. “People,” he said. “Since nobody follows D’jarras anymore, we had to learn by doing, not by being taught.”
Natima was surprised, remembering some of her past interviews. “You mean, you don’t approve of the caste system?”
Seefa snorted. “Hardly anyone does. It was never an efficient system, even in the old times.”
“But your own government-“
“Right,” he said. “Each and every politician appointed by Cardassians, for being fastest to sell out their friends and family. Not my government.”
Natima considered it. She had always believed the Bajorans’ caste system to be remarkably foolish and backward, and it interested her to hear that this Bajoran actually agreed with her. And that others did, as well.
The light went out entirely for a split second before popping back on again, and Natima and Seefa both breathed in audible relief. “That’s all I need,” Seefa muttered. “To have to fix this thing in the dark.”
Natima felt annoyed. “If you don’t mind my saying so,” she said, “if you had started work on it when I initially suggested it, we wouldn’t have to worry about the light going out.”
“You may find this to be madness, but I’d rather avoid calling on your friends for help,” Seefa said. He carefully poked at the combadge with a curved metal rod he had removed from the weapon. An infinitesimal spark shot up, and Seefa dropped the device. He mumbled what she took to be some kind of Bajoran expletive and then picked it up again.
Veja groaned slightly, and Natima stroked her forehead ridges, quieting her.
“Of course, we wouldn’t be here in the first place if you hadn’t been so stupid as to attack a couple of unarmed civilian women.”
“How was I supposed to know you were civilians?” Seefa said, looking up at her sharply.
“Two women wandering around a vineyard? Didn’t you notice the way we were dressed?”
“Yes, but I didn’t know if it was a trick… and women can be every bit as dangerous as men-if not more, in some cases.”
“Our military does not usually employ women,” Natima informed him.
Seefa snorted. “That’s foolish,” he said. “Half of your population wasted-twice as many people that could be fighting.”
“Women are viewed very differently in our society than Bajoran women are in theirs.”
“As less capable, because they carry young?”
Natima frowned. She had often thought the same thing herself, but she wasn’t about to discuss it with a Bajoran.
Seefa reacted to her silence. “There are plenty of things about my own culture that I don’t like. The D’jarras, for example. There’s nothing wrong with disagreement.”
“My government doesn’t look kindly on dissent,” Natima said.
“That doesn’t surprise me much,” he said. “But if you can get enough people to listen to your viewpoint, then there’s nothing the government can do about it, is there?”
“They can have those people arrested and executed.”
Seefa laughed. “What a great society the Cardassian Union has created. Everyone must agree, or die. No matter how ridiculous or outdated the policies.”
Natima said nothing. She felt that she should be furious with this man, this Bajoran man with the temerity to criticize her world, but she was too tired to argue with him. Too tired, and more than a little confused. She considered herself an upstanding member of the Union, but had sometimes questioned the wisdom of her superiors…
You should not think on these things. Not here, not now.
“I haven’t been this hungry since I was a child,” she said, determined to change the subject.
“Really?” Seefa had looked up again, his expression unknown to her, his eyebrows raised.
“We do eat, you know. Aren’t you hungry?”
“No, I mean-why were you hungry as a child?”
“Oh,” Natima said, realizing that the comment was somewhat more revealing than she might have intended it to be. “I suppose… you must know that our world suffered great hardships in years past. Before the annexation, many people on Cardassia Prime starved to death. We had to go elsewhere to find the resources to sustain our people.”
“Ah,” Seefa said. “Yes, I suppose I did know that, in a roundabout sort of way. So, your childhood was difficult.”
He seemed to be mocking her, and Natima felt a spark of anger. “Yes, my childhood was difficult,” she snapped. “My parents died during an epidemic, and they left me alone to fend entirely for myself. None of my relatives would have anything to do with me-lone children are seen as an unwanted burden, an extra mouth to feed on a world whose resources were already stretched thin. After nearly a year on my own, I was picked up by authorities and put in a terrible facility on Cardassia II, worse even than living on the streets had been. If it hadn’t been for the Information Service…” she stopped, her breath coming fast. She couldn’t imagine what had compelled her to share such details from her life with this… person.
Seefa had stopped working. “So,” he said softly. “That’s why you don’t care for the orphanages.”
Natima didn’t trust herself to speak.
Seefa picked up the gutted phaser. “Before my parents died,” he said, “I never went without anything. I didn’t know the meaning of hunger.”
“How cozy that must have been for you.”
Seefa went on as if he hadn’t heard her. “It’s too bad, really.”
“What’s too bad?”
“It’s too bad your people didn’t simply ask for help. There was once enough here to sustain both worlds.”
“My people tried to set up trade agreements with your world. We were turned away.”
“So I understand it. But Bajor didn’t need anything you had to offer. We were self-sustaining, and it never occurred to us that a world would be any other way. If we had only known how dire your situation…”
“Cardassia could never be self-sustaining,” Natima said. “Our world’s conditions wouldn’t permit it.”
“But it must have been, at some point, before your people developed interstellar travel. Otherwise, how could your civilization have developed in the first place? Perhaps if you were to look back to the time when your world relied on its own resources, you might learn something. You wouldn’t have to go about stealing from everyone else.”
Natima shook her head. “That’s absurd,” she told him. “Cardassian civilization thrives on progress and technology. My people would never look backward toward a time when life was primitive, and… and…”
“And simple, and self-sustaining? Like the Bajorans’? We were happy here, before we were occupied and attacked and robbed. If Cardassia had followed our example instead of just…” Seefa stopped, and shook his head. “It’s no use talking about it,” he said.
“No, I suppose not,” Natima replied. She enjoyed a good argument, but the thoughts their conversation had inspired were uneasy ones. And if Seefa didn’t want to talk anymore, she wasn’t about to try and make him. The communicator wasn’t going to fix itself.
Damar could see what appeared to be footprints in the soft, ruddy-colored mud on the floor of the conduit. He nodded at Garresh Trach, who held his weapon ready. They moved into the dark, Damar switching on his palmlight to illuminate their way.
They didn’t have the tracks for long; standing water on the passage’s floor had filled in the murky impressions, prints that confirmed his earlier readings and Natima’s message. Two women in sandals, a Bajoran’s cracked boots.
They ventured deeper into the cold, dark passageway. The thought of Veja here, against her will… Damar moved them along quickly, watching his scanner.
A number of twists and they reached what appeared to be a main artery of the system. As soon as they stepped into the wider tunnel, the tricorder picked up a trio of life signs, faint but distinct. Two were Cardassian, the third Bajoran. Damar had to force himself not to run. The insurgents had shown themselves to be violent and ruthless and very, very careful. Recklessness on his part might put Veja further in harm’s way.
They followed the signs down a smaller offshoot that was completely blocked by a recent collapse, recent enough that they could still smell the torn, sun-warmed soil in the air. Damar checked the tricorder again, recalibrating to medical. As close as they were, he could see that one of the Cardassian signals was quite weak.
He felt his fear give way to angry panic. One of them was injured, badly enough to alter a direct sensor reading. Could he attempt to find a back entrance to the tunnel? That would take too much time.
He wanted to shout, to call for her, but dared not. He could hear water rushing from somewhere, the sound echoing through the maze of collapsing tunnels, and reached up, touching the low ceiling. Flat rocks, lined with moist, crumbling clay. He crouched, touched the loose soil that had collapsed into the tunnel. It was soft.
We’ll have to go in from above. Leave one of the scanners so we can find this spot easily, dig somewhere past the blockage…
He didn’t want to leave, knowing that his beloved was just on the other side of the fallen rubble, perhaps hurt or even dying, but that was all the more reason to hurry.
“Garresh Trach,” he said quietly. “We must briefly return to our ship for some equipment. Leave your tricorder here, we’ll follow its signal back.”
“Yes, sir.”
Trach set down his tricorder and the two men hurried back through the tunnels, Damar refusing to second-guess himself. He had no time for doubt.
Opaka had made the ratamba stew she had been offered last as long as she could, savoring each bite. It was not only for want of diversion that she did so; it had been weeks since she had eaten such a substantial meal. Finally, she finished, smiling her thanks to the attendant prylar who promptly walked over and took her empty bowl.
“What do you have to say of my proposal, Vedek Gar?” she asked. In light of Gul Dukat’s amended laws, she’d suggested that he consider officially disbanding the Vedek Assembly temporarily, so that its members might avoid further prosecution. She believed she already knew his answer, and knew also that he would take his time coming up with it, to show that he was giving it due consideration; it was why she’d asked.
The vedek smiled hesitantly. He glanced at the monk, gave a nod. The robed servant left the cottage, and Opaka prayed that her son had already finished his work, that the other two were keeping careful watch for him.
“I don’t doubt, Sulan, that Dukat may very well elect to disband the Vedek Assembly,” Gar said. “But I feel that it would be cowardly for me to run away from my people at a time like this, when the faithful will be seeking our leadership more than ever.”
“There is logic in your answer,” Opaka said. “But you cannot be of much good to the people if Dukat has you taken to a work camp.”
“Now, Sulan.” The vedek wore a pinched smile. “You cannot expect me to believe that you came all this way to discuss Dukat’s new policies, for it would seem to me that you only learned of the announcement this morning. We only heard it last night. What was your true purpose for traveling all this way?”
Opaka had anticipated this possibility. “I… have come because I have been hearing rumors… that you are now beginning to support my position. You who were once so firmly opposed to the abandonment of the D’jarras-and I suppose I only wanted to find out if what I was hearing is true.”
Vedek Gar nodded. “I see. It is true, I have begun to preach that the old ways are no longer effective for us, and that we would be wise to follow your advice. You see, I believe it is important for any official-religious or otherwise-to be flexible as conditions change.”
“Certainly, Vedek Gar, I agree with you. But what I do not understand is, what exactly has changed that made you so abruptly shift your position? Other than the death of Kai Arin?”
Vedek Gar looked uncomfortable. “Sulan, I must inform you that I intend to reinstate you as a vedek of the faith, if I am elected kai. I am pleased, in fact, that you have come all this way, so that I can inform you of this decision in person. It would honor me greatly if you would rejoin us here at the monastery, though I’m afraid I can’t offer you your old residence right away-” He spread his hands and gave an awkward laugh.
Opaka was not a political creature, but she understood now that he was. The awareness saddened her. The way she saw it, the Bajoran people needed hope and unity, they needed spiritual healing and a call to action, in support of their faith. She was only the messenger, a carrier of words, and sought no recognition for her acts. But she could see it through his eyes, too, listening to him speak. By endorsing “her” message, he would gain the support of “her” followers in the choosing of the new kai. It seemed inevitable that the ones who sought power were the ones most lacking the humility needed to truly lead.
I will not judge, she thought. She did not know his heart, no matter what her vision implied.
“Will you come back to us, Sulan?”
Even as he asked, she saw a hand appear in the window behind Gar, a simple shake of the fingers that represented success.
They found it! Was it as she’d seen? She did her best to keep her sudden excitement hidden, but she had no further reason to prolong their conversation.
“Vedek Gar-Osen-you have my apologies. I see now that my journey here was a mistake. I wish you luck in the outcome of the choosing.” She stood.
Gar looked disarmed. “Sulan! You leave me so abruptly! Can I at least offer you accommodations for the night? You’ve come far, and we still have not discussed your status-“
Opaka smiled at him. “Your graciousness is appreciated, but my path lies elsewhere. The Prophets will look after me. I pray Their guidance will always be with you.”
Gar’s expression hardened slightly, but he stood also. “Of course,” he said. He bowed to her politely as Opaka let herself out of the cottage.
Shev was waiting for her. He grabbed her arm and half-sprinted into the copse of trees behind the keep, practically carrying her. Her son waited there with Ketauna. Ketauna had his arms around a large object, too large to fit in his pack, wrapped in a piece of wool from his bedroll.
“It was just as you said, Mother!” Fasil told her. “A cellar, converted to a reliquary-“
“The Orb,” Ketauna breathed, his face shining with the brilliance of new hope. “As you saw.”
“We must go,” Opaka said quickly. “We cannot stay here.”
“As you say, Kai Opaka,” Shev said reverently.
“Did you cover over the place where you-What?”
“You are the kai now,” Ketauna said, nodding. “You were visited by the Prophets. The people will hear of this.”
“After we find a place for you to hide,” Fasil added.
“And a place to hide the Orb,” Shev said. “The Cardassians will not find this Tear of the Prophets. We must all agree to keep this information to ourselves, until it is safe to reveal it. Do you agree, Your Eminence?”
Opaka nodded, too concerned for the Orb’s safety-and their own-to laugh at her new title. She would refuse the position later, when she had time to consider her arguments, when she was sure the Orb was safe.
They started immediately, heading back toward the mountains, Opaka looking often at the bundle Ketauna carried. How precious, to find such a thing, at such a time! They could speak to the Prophets again, could seek Their wisdom upon the scourge of their world.
You will be secret, but the faithful will know, she thought, watching Ketauna shift the ratty blanket as he walked, carefully, reverently shifting the long-hidden Tear. The Cardassians would not take it-she had seen as much, in the knowledge granted her by her vision, her pagh-tem-far.
Things were unfolding as they should. She prayed again for strength, to do as They wished, to find in herself the potential that They had seen in her.
Basso Tromac walked in his usual quick manner as he returned from the shuttle pad. He carried a rather imposing bouquet of Bajoran lilacs, which embarrassed him somewhat. He knew what the flowers were for; Dukat always ordered them when he was trying to patch things up with his Bajoran mistress. Idle gossip saw to it that nearly everyone on the station knew, too. Basso supposed that he felt uncomfortable because he didn’t like to advertise the prefect’s business so blatantly; he considered that the ins and outs of people’s relationships ought to be kept private.
He was relieved that he didn’t see any other Bajorans on his way to the habitat ring, though he did encounter some snickering Cardassian soldiers. Basso wanted to believe that they were laughing because they found Dukat’s personal life to be a source of amusement, but he knew that there was more to it than that. He knew that they had no respect for him, that they considered him nothing more than a simple errand boy, and consideration of this never failed to create a rise of fury in his throat. Well, at least the Bajorans were afraid of him. Though they sometimes acted bold, they knew that he could deliver a death sentence with a single transmission to Dukat. He supposed he should have pitied the idiots on the station for being so stupid as to have landed themselves in ore-processing. If they had only cooperated, as he had, their lives could have been perfectly comfortable. Although, he considered, there would always have to be someone left to do the dirty work. It was just the natural order of things, like the D’jarras.
Basso knocked softly on the door of Dukat’s quarters. There was a door-chime, but Dukat had instructed him to always knock, and to always do it softly. The prefect answered the door with his usual stretchy smile. “Thank you, Basso.” He accepted the flowers and turned away briskly.
Basso bowed. “Is there anything else?”
Dukat shook his head wordlessly and the door closed, but not before Basso caught a glimpse of Kira Meru, sitting on the bed with her head down. The back part of her dress was unfastened, which made Basso flush. The image of her bare back, the delicate knobs rising up from her spine, the golden color of her skin… Basso could not immediately erase it from his consciousness. He found it replaying back to him for a moment, and he was forced to swallow down a lump in his throat.
Something compelled him to linger for a moment in the hallway, straining to hear, but he couldn’t make out much of anything. Just the low timbre of Dukat’s rumbling voice. Basso didn’t have to make out specific words to know what was probably going on. Not that it was anyone’s business, but he was well aware of the nuances of Dukat’s relationship with Meru. She would feign sadness for a little while, maybe about her children or something, and Dukat would be patient with her for much longer than Basso thought was reasonable. Basso had to admire Dukat’s patience, for he himself had never been able to maintain much of it when it came to women. He supposed that was why Dukat was prefect-patience. An admirable quality, to be sure-one that simply did not come naturally to everyone.