With great reluctance, Ezri tore her eyes away from the ceilings, and offered a courtly nod to two door attendants awaiting permission to admit her to the Grand Assembly Chamber. She had assumed upon seeing the hexagonal domes, the vaulted ceilings trimmed in gold, the filigree archways and the kilometer of inlaid marble floor, that she had reached the Chamber, but her escort, with some amusement, had informed her this was merely the lobby. She had gasped audibly when she saw the exterior chamber walls were encrusted with mosaics made of salmon, red, black and melon-colored corals, gemstones and burnished metals. Her escort, upon seeing her interest, explained that the pictures told the tableaux of Yrythny mythology and religion. How the Other had come from a faraway world to stir the primordial oceans of Vanìmel with its magic, thus allowing the Yrythny to leave the dark depths where they had always dwelt and be quickened into warm blooded sentience. Within the artistic flourishes, exaggerated proportions and motifs, Ezri recognized the various stages of Yrythny evolution from amphibious animals to upright sentients, to a space faring people who had constructed Luthia and developed warp drive. The picture-book story spread out above her was a helluva lot prettier than the pages of text she’d been force-fed. Certainly studying the mosaics could qualify as job related; she resolved to request the time to do so.
Shar cleared his throat and she realized the door attendants had placed their ceremonial scepters in a wall rack in preparation to admit her to the Chamber. Breathing out, she smoothed her uniform and waited for her cue. She could do this. Of course she could do this. Hadn’t she made dozens of presentations before her classes at the Academy? This would be a piece of cake. She could tell that joke about the human, the Klingon, and the Romulan who walked into the Vulcan embassy, and then…
Upon seeing close to a thousand stern-faced Yrythny, dark eyes fixed on her, Ezri’s mind blanked. She gulped. All the representatives stood in unison—a thunderous sound in the vast chamber—acknowledging her entrance. Those sitting closest to the center dais, the Upper Assembly representing the Houseborn, wore heavy robes of sapphire; those sitting on the balcony levels rimming the oval-shaped room, the Lower Assembly representing the Wanderers, wore green robes. She climbed a small number of stairs onto a rostrum of the presiding chairs. A backless bench was placed in front of a long flat table where Assembly Chair Rashoh, Vice Chair Jeshoh, Lower Assembly Chair Ru’lal and Lower Assembly Vice Chair Keren sat, soberly waiting for her.
As soon as she sat down, the entire Assembly resumed their seats. Ezri shifted on the bench, trying to remember whether sitting with her legs crossed or tucked neatly together with ankles linked was more dignified.
The Assembly Chair touched a control, illuminating one of the closest representatives. Ezri guessed this was how the chair recognized a speaker. Her guess was confirmed when the delegate stood and addressed the Assembly.
“We have discussed, Assembly Chair, the matter of this outsider, Lieutenant Ezri Dax, functioning as a Third, and both assemblies have agreed by a narrow margin, to accept her input. I propose a resolution, which I am now sending to my fellow representatives.” He thumbed a switch, ostensibly sending the text of his resolution to the other desks in the Chamber, “…that this Ezri Dax take up residence, planetside, in the House of my birth, Soid, where she can best learn the manner of our people and then render a judgment. I move for a vote.”
He hadn’t been sitting more than a minute when hundreds of lights began flashing on every level of the room. The Assembly Chair recognized a delegate seated near the Yrythny who had just spoken, but without permission another delegate on the opposite side of the room stood up and began speaking until yet another delegate stood and began speaking over the words of the other. Ezri jerked back and forth, trying to keep track of what was being said, the speakers, the lights, the points of order and resolutions, but found it impossible. The Assembly Chair’s fingers flew across his desk panel, his jaw clenched, but none of those clamoring for recognition heeded his points of order. Jeshoh, Keren and the others looked on helplessly.
From what little she did follow, Ezri learned that members of each House protested any House but their own being designated as the one she would visit first. In turn, the Lower Assembly representatives felt that focusing on the Houseborn issues would prejudice her before she had a chance to hear the Wanderer side. As lights from the top of the Chamber went off and on, voices grew more heated, argumentative rhetoric stopped being funneled through the Master Chair and instead went directly toward the “enemy” party. Several delegates, robes catching on balustrades or on chairs, climbed over barriers separating delegations and further punctuated their arguments with their fists. Jeshoh shouted for order, as did Keren, but their calls were ignored.
And Ezri discovered that many hate-infused faces directed their venom at her. Seeing contempt and mistrust wherever she looked, she hoped the leadership had a plan to protect her, just in case she was mobbed. Thinking she could even attempt something of this magnitude was such a mistake. Have you lost your mind Ezri? This is crazy!
And then she remembered. A crumb, a fragment of a memory and she rooted around for the rest of it.
…Lela felt their hostility, their scorn, as she made the long trek from the door to her seat. As if being a woman, being young and being her symbiont’s first host weren’t enough to prejudice them against her, she knew she had a controversial proposal to make. Most of her colleagues would vehemently disagree with her idea, and it stood little chance of passing, but she knew that she had to make the proposal anyway because she couldn’t live with herself if she didn’t. Further, she knew that she would deserve their sneers and mocking whispers if she couldn’t stand on the courage of her convictions. She knew that courage wasn’t the absence of fear, but rather, acting in the face of fear. Rising from her desk, she lifted a hand, requesting the president pro tempore’s attention and when he refused to see her, with a shaky voice she said…
“…I am here because I believe in the cause of peace,” Ezri began. “Because I believe that my unique perspective gives me the ability to see through the thick forest of rhetoric and rivalry and find the clarity that lies beyond the dark and shadowed path.” And as Lela’s words flooded back to her, Ezri’s confidence increased, her voice ringing out more clear and strong, striking a chord with the quarrelling Yrythny until gradually, they settled down, resumed their seats and prepared to listen.
Of course I can do this, she thought triumphantly. I’m Dax.
6
“What is this, the eleventh time you’ve searched Jake’s quarters?” Ro observed, the door hissing closed behind her.
Sitting on the couch in front of a storage box, Kira looked up from the antique book she perused. “These items were transported from B’hala. I think I’ve only looked through them three or four times.” She took a sip from a mug sitting on the coffee table. “A fifth time can’t hurt.”
Ro sat down in a chair across from Kira. “Nothing new, I assume.” In the course of her duties, she, too, had examined the contents of every box stacked against the walls. Anything he’d left behind had been systematically analyzed and catalogued. Though foul play wasn’t readily evident in the circumstances surrounding Jake’s departure, Bajoran and Starfleet security were treating the disappearance like a criminal investigation.
“I thought maybe knowing Jake’s frame of mind when he left might give us some clues. I’ve been thumbing through the book the investigators found on his nightstand, but so far,” she paused, examining the spine of the novel and reading aloud, “The Invisible Man hasn’t proved to be much help.”
“The forensic behavioral specialists from headquarters combed through his personal logs, his books, his schedule, who he was eating dinner with—his diet even—and they didn’t draw any conclusions.”
“But I know Jake. I should be able to see nuances that the experts might not,” Kira said, dropping the book back into the carton. Replacing the lid, she pushed the carton aside and moved on to ope
n another numbered container. She examined an insert listing the carton’s contents. “Looks like work clothes and family pictures in here.”
The depth of Kira’s loyalty never ceased to astound Ro. To her, it appeared that Kira spent every minute she could spare from her regular duties focused on solving the mystery of Jake Sisko’s disappearance. Ro didn’t find fault in Kira’s single-mindedness. Jake’s vanishing coupled with Captain Sisko’s mysterious disappearance and Odo’s departure made for a major string of losses. Kira’s behavior was more than justified to Ro’s way of thinking.
“I’ve followed your updates throughout the day and the situation generally appears to be under control. I’ll send a strongly worded memo to the Klingon ambassador reminding him that docking on Deep Space 9 is a privilege, not a right.” Kira reached into the box, flipped through a pile of photos, and pushed aside a neatly folded sweater before removing a padd. “What did you think of Ambassador Lang and Gul Macet?”
“Lang surprised me,” Ro confessed, smiling as she remembered. “We started talking—even had a few laughs—and we’re meeting for drinks in a few hours. I think she’s curious about what’s going on around the station…to see if anyone from the old days is still around.”
“You know about her history with Quark?” Kira circled her hand two or three times to indicate “the rest of the story.”
Ro shrugged. “Quark doesn’t kiss and tell unless it gives him more room to maneuver. The look on his face when I walk through the door with Lang should be pretty revealing.”
“I imagine it will,” Kira said dryly. “Anything else come out of Macet’s presence aboard the station that I should know about?”
“Minor accidents. An unfortunate incident with a jumja stick when Macet made an unexpected appearance near the arboretum.”
Kira winced. “Prognosis?”
“Dr. Tarses said a few sutures and an analgesic would cover it. A fainting here and there. An irate prylar who swears we’re seeing the second coming of Gul Dukat—based on an obscure passage from the Larish Book of Prophecy.”
“Macet…” Kira said, absently tracing shapes on the coffee table with her finger. “Do you have any thoughts?”
“Yeah. I want to run my own DNA tests because it’s too bizarre to be believed.” Ro had been eager to say those words aloud since she met Macet. Standing face-to-face with the physical reincarnation of Dukat had catapulted her thirty years into the past. From her days on Bajor, she recalled waiting in the soup line, staring at the screens bearing the prefect’s holo, wondering if the image was of a real person or something the Cardassians invented to scare their slaves. The way Bajoran mothers would invoke the pah-wraiths to warn their disobedient children. Ro never bought the folklore about the pah-wraiths anymore than she now accepted what she’d been told about Macet.
“Ro, your reaction’s understandable, but—” Kira said, doing her best to sound like she believed what she was saying.
“Colonel, there have been no confirmed sightings of Dukat since your own experience with him at Empok Nor,” Ro stated emphatically. Believing Kira was about to protest, Ro pressed on. “And I know the rumors about the fire caves. Without concrete confirmation, they’re just that—rumors. Dukat could be anywhere, doing anything,” Ro argued. “He’s insane! Who’s to say he hasn’t developed some alternate personality and it’s this Macet.”
“Akellen Macet was known to the Federation even before the Occupation ended,” Kira said patiently. “Starfleet Command sent me his file right after I notified them of his role in the Europa Nova evacuation. And Alon Ghemor transmitted the gul’s DNA records as well as his own personal assurance of Macet’s identity.”
Why Kira insists on sticking to the official party line, I don’t get, Ro thought. But I suppose being in charge means you have to appease the brass. That doesn’t mean I have to.“Asking Gul Macet to submit to a station security ID verification wouldn’t be out of line considering our current alert status.” Ro wanted her shot at him. Have him in her office on her terms.
Kira’s eyes drilled into Ro’s. “While I have no doubt that Macet would agree to it, I won’t authorize it. Consider this issue closed, Lieutenant.”
Knowing the debate was over, Ro pursed her lips and said, “Yes, Colonel.”
“Anything else?” Kira took a deep breath and leaned back against the couch.
“In direct violation of your orders, Taran’atar has been shrouding and spying on our Cardassian guests.” Ro conveyed the details of the Taran’atar incident to Kira with more objectivity than she felt. Part of her was glad Taran’atar might be out gathering the intelligence that would, with any luck, put her own lingering doubts to rest.
“I’ll handle Taran’atar,” Kira said, her expression pensive. “But continue to note any disruptive behavior. What’s next?”
Kira’s lack of reaction to Taran’atar’s disobedience surprised her. Ro paused, wanting to ask how Kira planned on managing the Jem’Hadar. How could Kira be comfortable with Taran’atar playing by his own rules? Under usual circumstances, she’d pass off responsibility for Taran’atar without a second thought. This time, Ro had to trust that Kira had a plan to prevent him from provoking the Cardassians. Macet and Lang she didn’t worry about. Macet’s soldiers were another matter. If Macet’s soldiers reciprocated Taran’atar’s undisguised animosity, trouble was inevitable.
“Problem, Lieutenant?” Kira asked.
Shaken out of her thoughts, Ro answered, “We do have a delicate situation involving Councillor zh’Thane.” Without sharing the finer points of Andorian physiology, Ro explained zh’Thane’s end-of-shift visit and the resultant request to Kira.
Kira nodded. “How do you want to handle this?”
“Perform in-depth background checks on zh’Thane’s staff. Send a crew to scan every centimeter of her ship. Everything checks out, she gets a pass off the station.”
“All right. I’ll update Admiral Akaar on zh’Thane’s request. He shouldn’t have any objections if he’s in the loop from the beginning.”
“Good point.” There came a moment in every conversation when enough had been said; for Ro, it was the mention of Akaar. Until he had shown up, Ro had been able to put off sorting through her issues with Starfleet. His presence triggered many unhappy memories. At least Kira’s dealing with him.“Will there be anything else, Colonel?”
“You’re dismissed. Oh. Wait.” Kira looked sheepish. “Just to satisfy my own curiosity, but you wouldn’t know how the reception plans are coming along, would you?”
“Would that be why Quark was following Ensign Beyer around begging her to sample his tube grubs with icoberry sauce? Come to think of it, she had tablecloths draped over her shoulders and a mouth full of food last time I saw her,” Ro said.
“The tube grubs must be for Ambassador Gandres—he has a fondness for all things Ferengi, or so I’m told.”
“I’m impressed, Colonel. You managed to delegate party planning duty pretty quick.”
“Shakaar insisted on having the job done correctly. As station commander, it’s my obligation to find the individual who can best meet the minister’s expectations.”
“Whatever you say, Colonel,” Ro said, grinning as she turned toward the door.
“Oh—and if Ambassador Lang says anything you think I might find useful—”
Ro paused. From appearances, Kira’s evening would consist of replicated raktajino and a cold floor. I bet Kira would enjoy a night out. I should…no. I wouldn’t want her to feel like she had to accept my invitation, and it might be awkward to turn me down. Maybe another time. She finally said, “Goes without saying, Colonel.”
Kira had removed another box from the stack before Ro made it to the door. Persistent as she was, Ro couldn’t imagine starting and restarting the tedious process of searching for answers in those boxes—especially since she was confident there were none to be found.
The difference between a believer and an unbeliever, Ro thought.
/> When Charivretha entered Thirishar’s quarters, Anichent raised his hand to request that she refrain from interrupting his conversation. She recognized the Vulcan on the viewscreen as a well-known scientist. It pleased her to see that Anichent was working on his post-doctoral research instead of frittering away his time, moping as Thriss seemed bent on doing. How capably Anichent navigated his technically dense conversation with his colleague! All their talk of rips in space-time fabric fascinated her, but she doubted she could explain it if called on. Science had never been her forte.
During her student days, Charivretha had taken only the minimum requirements in physics, chemistry and biology, choosing instead to fill her schedule with extra courses in political science and government. Still, she found the physical sciences exciting in a mysterious way. In relaxed, intimate moments, one of her bondmates, a warp propulsion theorist, whispered to her the subtle poetry of swirling galaxies and interstellar fusion—a unique ritual between lovers to be sure. Her devotion to him was not unlike Shar’s love for Anichent. In this one way, she and her chei were similar.
Anichent deactivated the subspace link and turned to her. “Thank you for waiting, Zhadi. I meant no disrespect.”
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