This Gray Spirit

by Heather Jarman

  “Hurry, hurry!” he squawked, patting the floor beside him. “Sit here. Quickly.”

  As she approached, she began formulating several backup plans and then—there. She grinned. Over there. Beneath his tarp. Right in the middle of his artwork. The crazy creature had built his entire piece around a computer terminal. She could see from the wiring and sensors integrated into the various “sense peelings” that he intended this sculpture to be animated with lights or movement.

  Prynn dropped down on the floor beside Fazzle and looked at him, but not “at” him. Over his shoulder, she had an excellent view of the computer. “What do you need me to do?” she said sweetly.

  Lucky, lucky me, she thought. The terminal was active, the viewscreen displaying a root menu offering options ranging from data retrieval to food replication. I’ve got me a live one!

  “Off!” Fazzle said, cocking his head.

  “Excuse me?”

  “Off.” Fazzle pawed at her uniform.

  Ugh. It just gets better and better, she thought, stripping off her jacket and turtleneck. Thankfully, the Cheka kept the room temperatures high; sitting around shirtless wouldn’t be unbearably cold. Now how to get at that computer, she mused. I can pretend to trip and when I stumble forward, I’ll just—“Yikes!” she shrieked. “What is that!”

  Fazzle brushed the sense-artist goo on her shoulders. “Hold out your arms,” he ordered, demonstrating by holding two of his arms straight out to the side. “Like this.” Prynn complied warily, but cringed when he started in on her neck, down her back, down her front—and as it dried, it itched. Prynn started making her mental list of all the places she would inform her father she would vacation when she made it back to the Alpha Quadrant. Ewwwwww this is so disgusting!

  Shar stood at attention in front of Ezri’s desk, eyes fixed on the wall behind her. In a way, Ezri was grateful that he avoided eye contact. She could say what she needed to without feeling like it was personal. The present situation was about authority—hers—and regulations. And while Shar didn’t blatantly disobey the letter of her orders, he rationalized his way into believing that flaunting the spirit of them was acceptable.

  “While I understand your intentions were honorable, Ensign, your timing was poor. And you should have contacted me with Delegate Keren’s proposal.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Lieutenant McCallum, working with the Yrythny authorities, has been unable to uncover who used this workstation to send the “go” signal to the hydrofoil. Fortunately, no one on our team is under suspicion.”

  “I assure you, Lieutenant, I took all necessary precautions before I left.”

  “I believe you, but in hindsight, there were other precautions that ought to have been taken.” Of all the problems caused by Shar leaving Luthia, this was the worst. Yes, he’d left the offices secure and the terminals locked down, but he hadn’t made provisions for covering his station. There wasn’t a Starfleet officer anywhere in Luthia at the time the offices had been broken into and the signal sent. Lieutenant Candlewood, their computer specialist, had performed every diagnostic he knew and had come up with nothing.

  Shar stayed silent, standing stone-still, his face composed. Even his antennae remained curiously unexpressive.

  His mind must be elsewhere, Ezri thought, leaning back in her chair. She sighed. “Was it worth it, Ensign?”

  “Permission to speak freely, sir.”

  Ezri sat for a long moment, wondering if she was capable of responding fairly to anything that he said, whether her frustration with him had abated enough that she could listen without reacting. The day’s events had taxed her energy. She’d been placating angry Yrythny officials for hours; her rescue mission to the aquaculture village hadn’t exactly endeared her to the military. On the other hand, she was curious to know what incited a usually compliant officer to recklessness. Finally, she shrugged. “Of course.”

  “I brought enough data back from the peninsula to conduct a statistically significant study of Yrythny DNA.”

  “What?” Now this was news. She leaned forward to listen more closely.

  “The farmers on the peninsula have been collecting and mapping Wanderer DNA for several centuries. They wanted to use it to match Wanderers with their proper Houses. That way, they wouldn’t have to be Wanderers any longer.”

  Promising idea. “Go on,” she urged.

  “But I think we can use this data to model Yrythny chromosomal architecture,” he said. “To see if there’s any genetic basis for the caste system.”

  “Those models will only work if you have the Houseborn samples to compare them to.”

  “We don’t have them, but we can get them,” he said pragmatically.

  “That’s pretty optimistic of you, Shar. Do you honestly think the Houseborn will cooperate willingly with your study?”

  “No,” Shar conceded. “But we can obtain the samples surreptitiously through Wanderer domestic laborers. I realize I haven’t mentioned this before, sir, but Delegate Keren took me to a meeting of the Wanderer underground, and through her connections there—”

  “Hold it,” Dax said, standing. “Keren is connected to the underground?” The terrorists. Those responsible for planting the explosives in the village. The ramifications of Keren being the head of the Wanderer Assembly and working in the underground were staggering. All the negotiations, all their strategies, plans and schedules—she could be feeding confidential proposals to the underground. The agitators could have gained access to her office through Keren, if she had the security clearance. Ezri swore under her breath. Has Shar been lying to me? He had to know getting mixed up in this would come back to haunt him later. Please let me be able to trust you, Shar.

  He met her eyes. “Yes sir, she is.”

  “And why haven’t you come forward with this until now?” she asked. Shar hesitated a second too long and Ezri shouted, “I asked you a question, Ensign!”

  Shar flinched. “I should have, sir. I knew I was wrong to go, but my curiosity got the better of me. Afterward I convinced myself that if I pretended it never happened, it would never come up. I was foolish. I’m sorry, sir.”

  “Yes, I’m sure you are,” Ezri said, watching him closely. “You’re certainly full of surprises this evening, Ensign.” How the hell do I salvage this?“Tell me, from your observations of the underground, can Delegate Keren represent the Wanderer side fairly if she has any ties to those terrorists?”

  “Respectfully, sir, to call them terrorists is an overgeneralization,” Shar protested. “They’re ordinary people who have been pushed to the verge of breaking. Not everyone affiliated with the underground endorses violence. Most of the agitators are looking for peaceful solutions.”

  “The fact remains that you’ve consorted surreptitiously with a political leader who may have been involved in the destruction of the aquaculture village, and dozens of casualties. And you still haven’t answered my question. What can you say to convince me that Keren can be trusted?”

  “Nothing, I suspect. But are you convinced that the Houseborn didn’t blow those villages simply to persuade you that the Wanderers can’t be trusted? Has anyone given you evidence that proves unequivocally that the underground is to blame?”

  Ezri tried to ignore his insinuation that the day’s events had been staged to influence her opinion, and remained focused on Shar. “The planetside incident is, more or less, an internal matter. What isn’t in contention is that you acted in bad faith with respect to your commanding officer. You betrayed my trust, Shar.”

  “If you want to discipline me for going with Delegate Keren to the agitator meeting, I won’t protest,” he said. “But we can’t ignore the potential significance of this scientific research. What we discover could transform their lives—”

  “That’s enough, Ensign.”

  “Please don’t punish the Yrythny for my error in judgment,” he whispered.

  Was that the real question, then? Ezri wasn’t a fool: If the resea
rch Shar proposed bore fruit, it had the potential to redefine the Yrythny identity, to find out, once and for all, whether there was any biological basis for the caste system. On the other hand, the Assembly had requested that she help mediate a resolution to their internal conflict—to find a way to help these people live together in peace. They hadn’t asked her to conduct scientific research that would change the paradigm they’d built their society on. But truth was truth. If new truths forced the changes required to live in peace, their mission would be successful.

  She looked at Shar, frustrated by the fact that she knew his intentions had been honorable. During the war, she recalled, even Benjamin had been willing to forgive her theft and loss of a runabout—not to mention subsequent capture by the Dominion—because not only had she managed to rescue Worf, she’d also returned with the knowledge that Damar sought the Federation’s help against the Dominion. That information became the turning point of the war.

  Sometimes, she knew, the only difference between poor judgment and a calculated risk was the outcome. In Shar’s case, the jury was still out. But she couldn’t ignore what he’d learned through his actions.

  “You can conduct your research,” she said finally, “but you can’t use the underground to collect Houseborn data. If the Houseborn in the Upper Assembly agree to provide you with DNA samples, I’ll authorize you to proceed. On your own time.”

  Dubious, he furrowed his brow. “Sir, I thought we agreed that the Houseborn will never willingly provide—”

  “You think that any research performed with secretly obtained samples can be taken seriously?” Dax shouted. She’d spent enough of her 358 years as a scientist that she knew the rules of that game. “You’ll be accused of using doctored samples. If you want your results to be legitimate, you have to start conducting yourself legitimately.” Ezri could see from Shar’s reaction that she was finally getting through to him.

  “May I ask for official cooperation during our meetings tomorrow?”

  “Yes. I’ll present your proposal. If it’s rejected, that’ll be the end of it. Understood, Ensign?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Before she let him return to his quarters, she wanted to address—and bring to an end—the ongoing situation where Shar picked what rules he wanted to keep. “And Shar, I am repeating and reinstating Commander Vaughn’s original order: you’re not to have unauthorized contact with the Yrythny. In the course of your work, I know you’ll deal with them, but you aren’t to be sneaking out to underground meetings or taking trips planetside without first clearing it with me. And I want reports of any interaction you have with Delegate Keren. Until I feel more comfortable with her status, we need to assume she’s hostile to our goals. Is that understood?”

  Shar nodded. “I’m supposed to meet with her later so she can give me the datafiles on the Wanderer genome. In all the confusion of the rescue, she mistakenly kept them when we dropped her off.”

  “Fine. And Ensign? I don’t need an answer to this question, but I think you’d be wise to think about it.”

  “Sir?”

  “Having a desire to answer the Yrythny’s request for help is, by itself, an honorable motive for what you’re doing, but is it possible that there’s a deeper reason?” she said gently. “Maybe a personal one? Because the risks you’re taking are extraordinary. I think whatever you believe you stand to gain from taking these risks ought to be worth the price.”

  Ezri waited for him to raise his eyes from the floor and for a moment their gazes tangled. Shar rarely unveiled his emotions in any circumstance, but she caught a glimpse of a ferocious intensity that might have frightened her, had she been his enemy. “Dismissed,” she said. And when he had vanished into the corridor, she collapsed into her chair, feeling grateful to be alone.

  14

  His uncanny knack for bringing out the absolute worst in Kira notwithstanding, Quark ought to have been rewarded for his triumph at the reception. His heroic efforts had impressed all the guests. Sentients of every stripe, rank and affiliation continued to rave about the exquisite presentation, the excellent food and the unparalleled service. He’d assumed that going out with Laren would be the sauce on the slugsteak. The capstone of this exceptional week.

  Quark pulled the brightly printed blanket tighter around his shoulders, hoping to stave off the chilly night breezes. But being wet made warmth difficult to come by. It wasn’t like he didn’t understand wet; growing up on Ferenginar meant he understood every nuance and permutation of wet. Perpetual wetness had a consistency that one could reasonably acclimate to. When wet was juxtaposed with dry, an uncomfortable state known as “cold” followed.

  Quark hated cold.

  Would he ever feel his ears again, was the question. He had spent a late afternoon hurtling across the water from crest to crest, white foam spitting around his feet, clinging to a skimpy sail and balanced on a board even Nog would find small, only to lose sensation in his lobes. No female was worth this.

  Never mind that, in the aftermath of that ordeal, staying warm necessitated wrapping himself in a blanket, because he’d stupidly refused Laren’s offer to modify the program just to make him more comfortable. What kind of an idiot was his infatuation with her turning him into? He should have at least let her delete the targ-size salmon that kept smacking against the rudder of his windsurfing board. Vile creatures. What kind of animal willingly takes the path of most resistance and swims upstream to spawn? Clearly those monsters with fins had compromised survival instinct because any sensible creature would have hailed a hovercraft and called it good.

  Like me with Laren. Always swimming upstream because I can’t seem to help myself.

  Crouched down beside the flickering pile of sticks Ro seemed to think qualified as a fire, she placed a spit loaded with bird carcasses over the coals. She dabbed sauce into the meat’s crevices; dripping off the sides into the heat, it sizzled and smoked sending up clouds of ash. “Dinner should be ready in a half hour or so. I added a little kick to the fire in the holoprogramming,” she said by way of explanation. “Temperature’s a little hotter than it would be in real life.”

  Sounded better than waiting for that primitive stick heap to make the replicated bird edible, Quark thought ruefully. “Can’t wait. I’m sure it’ll be delicious,” he said aloud.

  Leaving the birds to roast, Ro circled behind the logs surrounding the fire pit to her backpack, which was filled with all the things one allegedly needed to survive in the outdoors. She rifled around inside, removing a wristlight, what looked like a wicked permutation of a knife, another fire starter, several field ration bars, an ax, and two long sticks with handles at the ends. “Aha. Here we are,” she pulled out a clear container filled with dark, roundish objects.

  Hoping she’d answer “tube grubs,” Quark asked, “And those would be…?”

  “Chestnuts,” she answered, dumping them into a metal foil pouch and securing the opening. “Roasted like this, they’re really good.”

  He sighed. If he was lucky, she’d thrown a couple of Slug-O-Colas in that backpack so he could wash down the charcoal-covered bird with something palatable.

  “The windsurfing wasn’t that bad,” Ro said, tossing the foil pouch into the flames. She took a pair of tongs, fished coals from the graying embers and placed them on top of the chestnuts.

  “No, not at all…. If plunging headfirst into water is your idea of fun. I’m thinking next time we ought to pull out Worf’s old Road to Kal’hyaH program and really have a party,” Quark groused. Even his wilderness sojourn with Sisko and the boys a few years back hadn’t made him this uncomfortable, not even after they’d been captured by the Jem’Hadar. Of course, single-handedly dragging a wounded, belligerent Odo up the side of mountain on the freezing surface of a class-L planet had proven, once and for all, that Ferengi were made of sterner stuff than most people gave them credit for, but that didn’t mean he relished such experiences, unlike some people he could name…

  Ro snorte
d indelicately. “Oh please. The Columbia rarely dips below 10 Celsius this time of year and you fell in because you kept letting go of the sail handle.” She retrieved a log from a woodpile she’d gathered earlier. “Besides, you had a wetsuit on. You should have been warm enough. I thought Ferengi were used to water.”

  “Damp, swampy, steady warm drizzle? Yes. Ice bath? No. It’s the difference between wet and drowned.” Shivering, he pulled the blanket tighter around him. “Not that I’m complaining or anything,” he added hastily.

  “You? Of course not,” Ro said, clearly fighting down a smile. Placing the log on a large, flat tree stump, Laren raised an ax over her head and brought it down with a thwack. She gathered up the smaller pieces and fed them into the fire. Greedy fingers of flames gratefully accepted her offering.

  “So,” she said, tipping back on her haunches. Scooting through the dirt, she settled against the weatherbeaten log, leaning back to rest her neck. She continued shifting and adjusting until she’d fitted the curve of her neck with the curve of the log. Her gaze went up at the moonless spring night. Pines jutted up all around them, their straight, prickle-covered branches aimed at the sky, threatening to puncture the smooth night canopy. Only intermittent wind gusts swayed the trees from their rigid posture.

  “So…” he answered, knowing he’d surrender half ownership in the bar to Treir if she’d only page him with an emergency.

  “Not like this matters, but I spent the last week before I started the Academy here. I’ve been to more exotic places since then, but I always feel awed when I come here. Millions of years of the land submitting to the relentless waters. And it’s like the water knew that if all the dirt and rock exterior was swept away, the planet’s soul would be exposed and all could see how majestic that soul was.”

  Quark blinked. “I never took you for a poet, Laren.”