by S. D. Perry
“You okay, Simon?”
“Nothing eight days of sleep won’t cure. What can I do for you, Lieutenant?”
“A Mr. Amenguale should be reporting to you with a case of arithrazine rash. If he isn’t there in the next five minutes or so, send someone from security to find him—I think he might get lost.”
“Got it. And hey, you don’t exactly sound hale and hearty yourself.”
“I promise to get some sleep as soon as I can, Simon.”
“Why am I not reassured?”
Ezri chuckled as the turbolift arrived at the wardroom level. “Dax out.”
As she exited the lift, she heard the familiar voice of Shar.
“I understand, Zhavey.”
“No, Thirishar, I don’t think you truly do. You mustn’t, if you’re going to insist on acting like this.”
The second voice wasn’t immediately familiar, but given the way Shar addressed her, it must be the infamous Councillor Charivretha zh’Thane. They were obviously right around the corner from where Ezri was walking—or, rather, standing, since she had stopped short of proceeding once she heard the voices.
“I am acting like myself, Zhavey. I don’t know any other way to act. I am sorry for that, but—”
“In Thori’s name, Thirishar!” zh’Thane cried out in a voice that, Ezri suspected, had intimidated many on the Federation Council floor, “you cannot afford to take such risks when you know what is at stake!”
“Exploring the Gamma Quadrant is hardly a ‘risk,’ Zhavey.”
“Please don’t tell me you’re that naïve. If you want, I can quote casualty figures on starships exploring unmapped space for the last two hundred years.”
“That won’t be necessary.”
“Then what will it take?” zh’Thane snapped. “To what part of you should I appeal? Clearly you feel no sense of duty to your own kind, nor to me. You have no fear of what may befall you before the window is closed. Have you even considered what your obstinancy is doing to Anichent, to Dizhei, to Thriss? Are you even thinking about anyone besides yourself?”
There was an unexpected sound, like a bulkhead being struck, and Dax almost moved to see what had happened, to intervene, but the sound of Shar’s voice, raised to a hiss and seething with emotion, stopped her in her tracks.
“I have thought of everyone but myself my entire life, Zhavey! That’s how you raised me, isn’t it? How all Andorian children are raised? We don’t live for ourselves, we live for the whole, always the whole.
“You ask me if I love them…as if I had a choice. As if every cell in my body didn’t long to be among them every day.”
“Then why are you doing this?”
“Because it isn’t working! I’ve kept track, Zhavey, more closely than you imagine. I’ve seen the numbers, and I see what we’re doing to ourselves as a people because of them, because of our desperation to delay the inevitable. We’re so consumed with keeping ourselves alive, we have no conception of what we’re living for.”
“And so your answer is to turn your back to us? On everyone and everything?”
“You don’t understand. You never did,” Shar said in a deadly whisper.
The last time Ezri had heard an Andorian use that tone of voice was thirteen years earlier, when she was Curzon. The person to whom the Andorian had spoken was dead five minutes later.
There was a terrible silence. And when zh’Thane broke it, her voice was firm. But also, Ezri thought, tinged with sorrow. “Don’t force me to act, my chei.”
“Stop meddling in my life, Zhavey.”
“Don’t walk away from me, Thirishar!”
Uh-oh, Ezri thought, and she immediately started walking forward in a pointless attempt to cover up her eavesdropping.
Shar turned the corner just as Ezri approached it, and the two almost collided. Shar’s antennae were standing straight up, and his eyes—normally the inquisitive eyes of the scientist that Ezri knew quite well from Tobin and Jadzia—were smoldering with emotions Ezri couldn’t begin to read.
At the sight of Ezri, though, the antennae lowered slightly, and he regained his composure. “Lieutenant! I’m sorry, I didn’t see you there.”
A tall Andorian woman with an impressively elaborate hairdo came around the corner, and she was similarly brought up short by the Trill’s presence.
Well, this is awkward, Ezri thought. She supposed she should have turned and walked away the minute the first words came within earshot, but her own curiosity—and her counselor’s training—had kicked in.
Finally, after the pause threatened to go on for days, Ezri offered her hand to the tall woman. “You must be Councillor zh’Thane. I’m Lieutenant Ezri Dax.”
The councillor took it. “Dax—you used to be Curzon Dax, yes?”
“Two hosts ago, yes.”
Sourly, she said, “Well, I’ll try not to hold that against you.” Turning around, obviously unwilling to air her family’s private affairs in public, she said, “If you’ll excuse me.”
She walked off. Idly, Ezri tried to recall what, exactly, Curzon might have done to offend Andor’s representative to the Federation Council. She couldn’t remember ever having met her, but that was hardly conclusive—Curzon had annoyed plenty of people he had never met.
Shrugging, she turned to Shar, who looked as unhappy as Ezri had ever seen him. In fact, it was really the first time Ezri could ever remember seeing him unhappy.
Based on the conversation, she could guess why.
“Do you want to talk about it, Shar?”
“I’m afraid I can’t, Lieutenant, but thank you for asking.”
Ezri thought a moment, then decided to go for broke. “I take it there are three people on Andor waiting for you to come home to take part in the shelthreth?”
Shar whirled around, his antennae raised. In a quiet, stunned voice, he asked, “You know about that?”
“I’ve been around for three centuries, Shar—I’ve known a few Andorians in my time.”
Nodding, Shar said, “Yes, of course you have.”
“And I know how important the shelthreth is.”
Shar’s face hardened. “Not you as well, Ezri. I know that I have a duty to Andor. And whether anyone back home understands this or not, I’m fulfilling it in my own way. But now Zhavey is making threats.”
“What can she do?”
“She can have me reassigned to Andor.”
Ezri frowned. “Last time I checked, Federation Councillors didn’t have any influence over Starfleet personnel assignments.”
“Respectfully, Lieutenant, I don’t think you fully appreciate the power of politics. And she knows Commander Vaughn.”
Dax’s frown deepened. “You think she’d convince Vaughn to transfer you? I think you underestimate him, Shar. You’ve been doing superlative work. I ought to know—I sort of used to have the job,” she added with a smile.
“Thank you, but unfortunately, I think you underestimate Charivretha. It would be just like my zhavey to talk him into transferring me. She might even go so far as to explain why.”
“Even if that’s true, Vaughn doesn’t strike me as the type who’d authorize transfers for personal reasons. And even if he did, I can’t see Kira approving it.”
“Your confidence is touching, but I’ve only been here a few months. I haven’t done anything to command that kind of loyalty—certainly not enough to refuse the request of a Federation Councillor. Besides, why do you think I’m not on the Defiant?”
“That’s a good point,” Ezri said. “Why aren’t you on the Defiant?”
“Because Zhavey asked the commander to leave me behind so we could talk.” Some of Shar’s coarse white hair fell into his face, and he brushed it out of the way. “Although the talk accomplished nothing that we haven’t already said in our private communications.”
Remembering how much more painful it was to deal with her own mother in person than over subspace, Ezri could see Councillor zh’Thane’s logic in believing tha
t an in-person plea might be more effective. Saying that, however, would not help matters, so she tried another tack:
“Shar, maybe you should consider what she’s saying.” At the Andorian’s sharp look, she added, “I’m not taking her side. Believe me, I can quote you chapter and verse on the subject of parental guilt and not doing what they expect you to do. I’m not saying you should reconsider your position because it’s what your zhavey is telling you to do. What I am saying is that you should examine the situation without considering her at all. Forget about what she wants. Think about yourself—and think about the three people waiting for you back home. They deserve some consideration, yes?”
Shar said nothing.
“Just think about it, okay?”
Sighing, Shar said, “I have thought about it. I appreciate what you’re trying to do, Lieutenant, but I’ve already made up my mind. Being in Starfleet is what I want—it’s all I’ve ever wanted, since I was a child. I’m not going to give it up now, and I’m certainly not going to let Zhavey hold me personally responsible for the fact that the Andorian species is dying.”
Chapter Twelve
The Delta Quadrant
The stars are wrong.
Kira had that same thought every time she left the Bajoran sector. For years in the resistance, she had depended on the stars in the sky over Bajor. It was better to move at night when they were on the run from Cardassian patrols. Scanners could fail or be jammed, but all she had to do was look up to know precisely where she was. Even when most or all of the moons were visible, she still could see enough of the constellations to orient herself.
In space, it was the same thing. Navigational equipment wasn’t always reliable, particularly when you were being fired on. Again, the stars were always there for her—as long as the Prophets provided a view of the other suns in the galaxy, she could find her way.
Before becoming first officer on Deep Space 9, she had spent very little time out of the Bajoran system, and even when she did, she’d had other things on her mind—picking up supplies, or some other errand related to the resistance. For most of the first twenty-six years of her life, the stars as they were seen from Bajor were her anchors. It was something she could depend on in a life that had precious little of that.
The first time she went through the wormhole and into the Gamma Quadrant, the disorientation had been almost painful. Her anchor was gone. Everything was arranged differently, and Kira—at the time, still not accustomed to working with reliable Starfleet equipment—found herself in the uncomfortable position of being forced to depend on technology far more than she was used to.
Now, seven years later, it was hardly an issue. She’d made dozens of trips to the Gamma Quadrant, and had traveled all over the Alpha Quadrant, from Cardassia Prime to Earth. Still, every time she found herself far away from home, there was that feeling that the sky was somehow lying to her.
As the Euphrates came careening through the gateway, piercing the thick green jet that choked the passage, the sky told her a new lie, one as big as the one it told her when she went through the wormhole.
She kept going at full impulse when they cleared the gateway—she wanted to get away from the radioactive waste as quickly as possible. Taking up a position about a hundred thousand kilometers from the gateway, Kira did a sensor sweep.
Her eyes went wide and she felt her jaw go slack. “Oh no…”
“I assume,” Taran’atar said, “that you have just noticed the waste concentration bearing 273 mark 9.”
Kira nodded. “That single mass is putting out more radiation than everything that’s in orbit of Europa Nova right now combined. If we let that go through, the planet’s as good as dead.”
“Can we destroy it?”
Kira shook her head as she studied the readings. “Best we could do is blast it into smaller pieces. Impact damage might be less, but it wouldn’t alleviate the radiation.” She didn’t have to remind Taran’atar that they no longer had a tractor beam, so trying to alter its course as they’d done before wasn’t an option.
“Colonel, I’m picking up a vessel,” Taran’atar announced. “It’s the source of the jet.”
“Do you recognize it?” Kira asked.
Taran’atar said, “No. It does not match anything in Starfleet records, nor any ship I have knowledge of.” He peered at his sensor readings. “Length, seven thousand meters. Hull is made of an unidentified alloy that appears to include elements of duranium and holivane.” Kira had no idea what holivane was and, just at that moment, didn’t care. Taran’atar continued, “Indeterminate weapons capacity. They appear to operate on channeled matter-antimatter reactions but, based on what I have been able to read through the interference from the radiation, it’s an inferior engine design.”
“If they’re producing antimatter waste on this scale, that’s not surprising. Anything else?”
“Fully ninety percent of the ship is dedicated to cargo space. Based on its size and configuration, I believe the ship is a barge for the hazardous material.”
“And they decided they had a perfect dumping ground.” Kira felt revulsion build up in her gut and work its way to her extremities, which she had to keep from shaking. Even at their absolute worst, the Cardassians never did anything so repugnant as to dump highly toxic material into a populated region. “It must’ve thrilled them when the gateway opened. I wonder if they even bothered to see if there was an inhabited planet on the other side.” A brief urge came over Kira to lock the runabout’s phasers on the ship and destroy it just to teach these people—whoever they were—a lesson. She set the impulse aside. “What else?”
“There are no docking ports. They also have an unusual shield configuration.”
“Unusual how?”
“There are seven of them, though most are offline right now. They appear to have been enhanced in some way. I’ve never seen a design like this.”
Kira noticed that there was none of the scientific curiosity she would expect from, say, Nog or Shar in Taran’atar’s tone. He was simply reporting the facts as he saw them.
The Jem’Hadar continued, “At present, most of their systems are offline. I am not reading any life signs.”
Blinking, Kira said, “None at all? That ship’s got to have a crew of at least several hundred. Could the radiation be interfering?”
“The radiation could not interfere so much as to mask that many life signs, Colonel.”
Shaking her head, Kira looked down at the display. They had a little over two hours before the mass would go through the gateway, so there was time to figure something out. But what? With no tractor beam and no way to destroy it effectively…
Then she noticed something. “I’m reading some debris. Sensors say it’s primarily irradiated monotanium—along with organic matter. Looks like a ship was destroyed by the waste.”
“A ship with a monotanium hull,” Taran’atar mused. “Even the Dominion was never able to refine enough monotanium to make spacecraft from it.”
Kira couldn’t resist. “Looks like the Dominion doesn’t have the market on high technology.”
“It would seem so.”
Growing serious once again, Kira said, “Still, if even a monotanium ship couldn’t hold up to that waste, Europa Nova won’t, either.”
“There is a Class-M planet in this system,” Taran’atar said, “less than a million kilometers from our position. There are, however, no high-order life signs.”
Kira took a deep breath. “All right, I’m going to assume that someone is alive over there.” She opened a channel. “Unidentified vessel, this is the Federation runabout Euphrates. Respond please.”
There was no reply.
“This is the Federation runabout Euphrates contacting unidenti—”
“The tanker’s systems are coming online,” Taran’atar said suddenly. “Weapons are powering up—”
“Raise shields,” Kira said half a second before the weapons fire struck the runabout. She immediately sent
the Euphrates onto an evasive course that would take them farther away from the radioactive waste.
“Shields at sixty percent,” Taran’atar said. “Shall I return fire?”
Kira hesitated only for a second. The Jem’Hadar was bred for combat. So why not let him do what he does best?
“Do it,” Kira said, and as she piloted the Euphrates away from the tanker, another salvo of weapons fire struck the runabout.
“Shields are down,” Taran’atar called over the din of alarms. “Shield generators offline.”
“Lucky shot,” Kira muttered.
“No, Colonel,” Taran’atar said. “That shot was carefully aimed and modulated. Our opponent knew precisely where and how hard to strike.”
Before Kira could respond to that, the runabout faded into an incoherent jumble. Her body suddenly felt disconnected from reality. The sounds of the alarms in the runabout faded, the feel of the cushioned seat under her dissolved. It was akin to being transported, but that didn’t come with such a feeling of disorientation—of removal from reality.
For a brief instant that felt like it would never end, she was nowhere, felt nothing, was nothing.
Then, slowly, her senses returned. Except what she now felt beneath her was hard, cold metal; she was lying down instead of sitting, and her hands were now bound behind her back. Instinctively, she struggled against her bonds, but they did not yield.
She no longer heard alarms, but she did hear the constant thrum of a ship’s systems. The ship, however, was not the Euphrates. The silvery-blue colors that Starfleet favored had been replaced by dark browns and greens—the latter accentuated by the dim green lights on the ceiling. She saw unfamiliar interfaces and a smaller, cruder style of screen—a rounder design than the usual flatscreen displays Kira was accustomed to. A green-tinged miasma hovered in the very air of the ship, and it smelled like someone was burning plastiform. The gloom was palpable.
Adding to it were the three humanoid corpses which also lay on the deck. Golden-skinned, wearing bulky uniforms, and most in pools of their own greenish-blue blood, these, Kira suspected, were the life signs that the Euphrates could no longer read. One appeared to be female, the other two male, one of the latter with thinning hair. All three had been cut to pieces.
