She woke in the dead of night, instantly alert. Someone was in the room with her. She sat up and saw a figure sitting by the bed. She peered through the darkness.
“Doctor Pulaski. May we talk?”
“This is starting to get ridiculous,” she said. “Don’t you boys need to sleep?”
The light came on, and, to her surprise, Pulaski saw that her visitor was human. “I’m guessing you’re not with the Cardassian secret service,” she said. “Are you one of ours?”
“Well done, Doctor,” he said. “Not much gets past you, does it?”
“A lot gets past me. Why are you here? What do you want? Why couldn’t we just have a breakfast meeting?”
He smiled and shook his head.
“All right,” she said grudgingly. “I’ll stop asking questions. As long as you give me some answers. What’s your interest in all this?”
“Your kidnapper is one of ours—”
“He’s from Starfleet Intelligence? I could take that personally, you know.”
“It would be more accurate to say that he was from Starfleet Intelligence. He was in deep cover before the war. Embedded within the dissident movement—”
“I thought we supported the dissident movement,” said Pulaski.
“We supported parts of it. Part of what our man was doing was investigating whether Natima Lang was a credible leader for a democratic Cardassia. Of course, we never got the chance to find out. Lang defected, Dukat took power, and that was that.”
“And your agent has been stuck here ever since?”
“We lost track of him until the start of this, when he came to our attention again.”
“I bet you’re popular with him,” Pulaski said.
Her visitor looked rather strained. “No.”
“I should think not,” she said. “Stuck here during the Fire. What he must have gone through. And all the time waiting for a pickup that never came.”
“It was impossible here after the war,” he said. “One lost agent? No chance. We assumed he died.”
“Poor guy,” she murmured. Then, “You know, I should tell the castellan,” she said. “He wants to know why Lang was being targeted. A shame, for some scheme cooked up by a bunch of spooks who think they’re serving Federation interests.”
“What?” He stared at her. “We’re not targeting Natima Lang.”
“You’re not trying to discredit her?”
“Why would we want to do that? She’s a force for good—pro-democracy and pro-Federation.” His voice became testy. “We don’t want a destabilizing demagogue running Cardassia! We don’t want another war!”
“Then who targeted her?”
“Something our man cooked up on his own, I think. Maybe all that time he spent inside the dissident movement inoculated him against her. Maybe he knows things about her that we don’t. He was undercover as a student for a while. Perhaps she gave him a bad grade.”
“That’s not good enough.”
“It will have to do,” said the visitor. “If there was any evidence of wrongdoing on Lang’s part, I doubt it exists now.”
No, thought Pulaski, you’ll have made sure of that. And what would be gained from insisting he come clean about some transgression on Lang’s part? She liked the woman; she had no desire to harm her. The whole thing could be a fabrication, created by the traumatized mind of an agent who had spent too long undercover.
“All right,” she said. “We’ll leave it.”
“Anyway, chiefly, I wanted to thank you. We wanted our agent brought back, and you’ve done that for us.”
“I think you’ll find he’s in the custody of the Cardassian constabulary,” Pulaski said. “He’ll probably tell them the truth about his activities here before the war.” She saw her visitor’s smile, and she stopped. “He’s not in Cardassian custody any longer, is he?”
“It would be immoral to leave him at the mercy of the Cardassian legal system.”
“It’s been reformed,” Pulaski said, through gritted teeth, but the agent just smiled, and dematerialized.
“Damn!” she cried out into the darkness. “I hate spooks!”
* * *
Before the move to the official residence, Garak would spend his evenings gardening. Even in the high dust seasons—particularly then—he would be outside, persuading his garden to stay alive. He was, after all, a persuasive man. One of his secret complaints about the official residence was that there was no garden here, or not one suitable for puttering. He flicked through a padd and put it down.
Parmak looked up from his book. “Have you started on the Sayak yet?”
“Of course not. Haven’t read a word. I have been too busy proving to people that I have not turned into some kind of monster.” He jabbed at the padd. “Turned back into some kind of monster.”
“Poor you,” said Parmak, without a shred of pity in his voice. “You could start it now, if you really wanted. Put down that padd, pick up the book, and start reading. You’re the power here, remember?”
“These reports don’t read themselves.”
“Sometimes I think you find things to keep yourself busy,” Parmak said. “Rather than do the things you need to be doing.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“I think you know,” Parmak said agreeably, and then changed the subject. “Have you heard Elima Antok at all on the ’casts?”
Garak studied him for a moment, and then let the conversation continue on its new course. “No. Has she been impressive?”
“Very. Marvelous work defending Carnis.”
“Well,” said Garak, “the signs are that she’s tapping into the public mood. Particularly among the young.” Or that was what their information told them: the young people—who felt they had nothing to be ashamed of, who didn’t want to be citizens of a nation that hadn’t come to terms with its past—wanted to be able to travel, go out and be part of the quadrant. “But even those of us who were present—well, some of us—think that these wounds cannot be left untended any longer.”
“So the work goes ahead.” Parmak nodded. “Good, good.”
“I’m meeting with representatives from Bajor next week to begin negotiating how we go about it. Trials here, or extraditions and trials there. Or trials somewhere else in the Federation, perhaps, to satisfy all sides.”
“It will be worth it, won’t it?” said Parmak. “It won’t cause more harm?”
“It will cause pain to many people,” said Garak. “Not least the victims, when they have to give evidence. But what was done on Bajor cannot remain unaddressed. Not if we are ever to be admitted—” He stopped himself, as if he thought he had suddenly gone too far. But he could get nothing past Parmak, who was always listening, and who pounced at once.
“Admitted, Elim? Admitted to what?”
“What do you think? To the Federation, of course.”
If Parmak was surprised, he gave no visible sign. He closed his book and put it down on his lap. “So that’s the next plan, is it?”
“It’s a plan. I’m not sure it will happen in my lifetime.”
“All we’ve worked for. A reconstructed and free Cardassia—do you think people would want membership of the Federation?”
Garak shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“And what about what we learned about how the Federation worked. About how it was set up. Thirty-one. Uraei.”
“Have we been any better, with our Obsidian Order?” Garak sighed. “I believe we have something to offer, Kelas. Cardassians—we have something unique. Which empire has looked so boldly into its own darkness? Which empire has striven so hard to redeem itself? The humans?” He tilted his head. “Perhaps.”
“You are besotted with that species,” Parmak said dryly.
“I admire them for how far they’ve come. But in one respect
they fail. They continue to be convinced of their superiority. But not us.” Garak shook his head. “We will never—I hope—tell ourselves such lies again. And perhaps that is what we have to offer.”
“It’s a bold vision. Do you think you can sell it to the Cardassian people?”
“I have no idea. I have no idea if they will want it—and we have years of work yet. I might not be there. I might be . . .” He smiled. “Altogether elsewhere.” He looked out of the window, at the day, ending. “We are a democracy now. It’s not for me to say. But the choice—the choice must be there.”
Parmak was nodding slowly. “Well,” he said, “you will have my support, as ever.”
“Thank you.”
They fell into a quiet, companionable silence. Garak felt himself relax for the first time in weeks. He opened up his padd and began to write.
“Still,” said Parmak, “and speaking as a medical doctor, you would do more concrete good right now by going upstairs and visiting Bashir, rather than writing him letters that you never send.”
And Garak, who knew when he was defeated, sighed, and closed the padd, and did what he was told.
* * *
Cardassia Prime retreated slowly into the distance. Pulaski, standing at an observation port, and in a rare moment of sentimentality unusual for her, raised her palm in farewell.
“Good-bye, Cardassia!” a voice cried out happily behind her. “Good-bye, good-bye, until we meet again!”
She turned to see Enek Therok lumbering toward her. “I didn’t know you were on this flight,” she said.
“My first trip away in some time,” he said. “Retirement will sit very well with me, I think.” He beamed at her. “Thank you for all your efforts on my behalf during your visit, Doctor. I have been extremely grateful.” He gave her a broad and knowing wink.
Pulaski was baffled. “I only gave a lecture,” she said. And caused an interstellar incident, but that was par for the course.
“Oh, you did so much more than that. Tricky times ahead on Cardassia for those of us who found themselves on the front line in the old days. We’re none of us entirely sure whether we’ll find ourselves suddenly on the wrong side of history.” He shook his head. “Most unfair. These young people today don’t understand the world we lived in, the compromises we had to make. It’s all very well to judge with hindsight, but it’s very different from how it was. Still”—he gave her another wink—“your people have made good on their promises.”
“My people.”
“But then, I did do a lot at the time.”
Pulaski thought she was beginning to understand. Her people. Starfleet Intelligence. A man like Therok would have been useful to them once upon a time, well placed to pass on information, well placed to advance their agenda. But he had certainly not been clean. And that would not reflect well
on them.
“Difficult times,” she agreed. “Like living in a riddle wrapped in an enigma.”
He smiled and shook his head, as if to say that he wasn’t going to fall for that. “I have no regrets,” he said. “I did what I was asked, and I saved a lot of lives.”
And prospered from it, she thought. Had he been the one to sign off on Project Enigma? She could imagine the justifications he would come up with: better with good Cardassian families than living as orphans on Bajor. It was always possible to come up with justifications. “Well,” she said, “it’s all turned out for the best in the end, hasn’t it? For you, and for Cardassia.”
“ ‘For Cardassia!’ ” he cried, and laughed, and went on his way.
She went straight off to find Alden, who was resting in his cabin. “All right, mister, time to start talking.”
“Kitty,” said Alden, rolling up from his supine position to sit on the side of the bed. “It’s always a pleasure to see you.”
“What did you do?” she said. “How did you get him away?”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about—”
“The agent, dammit! Starfleet Intel’s man on Cardassia Prime!”
“Ah,” said Alden, rubbing at his cheek. He was unshaven, and it gave him a faintly roguish look. “I was wondering whether you’d work any of it out.”
“Were you sent here to get him? Goddammit, Peter, if I found out you used me—”
He held up his hands. “Kitty, I promise you, it was nothing like that. I didn’t come along intending to get involved. But just after we arrived—the first day, you were busy—I was contacted by Starfleet Intelligence and asked to help.”
“To help?” She stared at him. “To kidnap Elima Antok? To murder that aide?”
“No, none of that, quite the contrary. The agent—they were worried he was out of control. And they were right. He’d been undercover too long; he was making bad decisions, hasty and irrational. They asked me to track him down and bring him back.”
“And you said yes.”
“I said yes.”
She thought awhile. “You didn’t come to help us, did you, at the warehouse. You were after him.”
“Well, I was there to help too.”
“Is that when you gave him the transponder?”
He looked down at the ground.
“Come on, spit it out!” she said.
“I put a transponder on him, with a delayed recall. I don’t think he wanted to leave, although he’s surely better in our hands.”
“Peter, he murdered someone!”
“My understanding is that she agreed to help him tamper with Lang’s files, and then she tried to blackmail him—”
“That’s no excuse for murder!”
“No, it’s not,” he said calmly. “He won’t get away with murder.”
“You mean he’ll be tried?” said Pulaski. “In an open court?”
“No—”
“Of course not. So what? Court-martial?”
“Well, he’ll need a psych evaluation first. And if he’s well enough, then, yes, a court-martial would be in order.”
“Not open.”
“Kitty,” Alden said, exasperated, “these things have to be held behind closed doors. There might be other agents on Prime who could be endangered if this was conducted in public.”
“I’m glad we’re carrying on the time-honored tradition of spying on our allies.”
“Or, if you prefer, there might be people who spied on the Cardassians before they became our allies who might end up with covers blown and attract retribution.”
She thought of Therok. “Or people we worked with whose reputations might not stand up to scrutiny.”
“These were brave people, Kitty! They don’t deserve your scorn! They put themselves in danger—for the sake of the safety of ordinary Federation citizens—”
“Yes, but you love it, don’t you? The intrigue, the secrets, the risks. The riddles wrapped in enigmas—you love everything about it.”
“I promise you I do not.”
Pulaski snorted.
“That’s why I left, Kitty.”
“And then jumped back into the fray at the first call!”
“He was a colleague—”
“He killed someone! He shot me! I’m a damn colleague too!”
“He was in trouble . . .” He put his head in his hands. “Kitty, please, that could have been me, on Bajor, or on Ab-Tzenketh . . .”
Pulaski restrained herself and listened. She knew he had been undercover on both places. Bajor during the Occupation. Ab-Tzenketh . . . well, the whole place sounded like one giant prison camp. It had been a bad time for him.
“I nearly lost my mind on Ab-Tzenketh, you know,” Alden said. “I thought I was never going to get away. That I’d spend the rest of my life a slave to the Autarch . . . I began to believe everything they said—that he was a god, that I was there to serve him, that I was lucky to have
left the Federation and found myself there. But someone came and got me out. Someone saved me, Kitty. I’m paying that back.”
“But you left, Peter. You knew that it was doing you harm! That’s why you joined us on the Athene Donald. Why you went back to your research—”
“When they ask, you can’t say no.”
“You can say no. Try it! Say it! Say no!”
“If not me, then who? Someone less careful? Someone less kind? I can’t escape my past, Kitty. Those experiences made me who I am. I can only live with the consequences. He’s safe. He’s under guard. He’s had a bad time. They’ll take care of him. We always take care of our own.”
“Sounds like you’re not so much paying it back as paying it forward, Peter.”
He shrugged. “Who knows? Perhaps one day I’ll need their help again. Need someone to look out for me. Take care of me.”
She reached out to touch his hand. “Dammit, man. You have those friends already. You have them elsewhere. They used you, Peter. They shouldn’t ask you to play the game again.”
“Once a player, always a player,” he said. “Ask the castellan, next time you see him.”
* * *
The castellan of the Cardassian Union sat alone in his office. Not even Ziyal’s picture was there to guide him—or distract him. Sometimes, Garak thought, one did not need a confessor. One needed simply to sit and examine one’s conscience alone.
He pondered the events of the past few days: the interruptions that Pulaski had provided; the complications with Lang; the relationship with T’Rena; the worries of the Carnis report, and where it might lead . . . I did nothing wrong, he thought, and marveled at the sensation. Innocence. He had often wondered what that might feel like. Now he knew. He had committed no murders, he had framed nobody, and he had broken no laws . . . And he had lost nothing. In fact, everything had turned out as he hoped. Natima Lang was cleared, and he had laid the groundwork with her to persuade her to become his successor. A working relationship had been established with the new Federation ambassador. And the final, necessary act of contrition, which would allow Cardassians to hold up their heads with pride across the quadrant, was now under way.
He had lost nothing, and yet he felt utterly defeated. Crimes had been committed: murder, kidnap, and the attempt to blacken the name of one of the best people that Cardassia had ever produced. He was not able to punish. But he could, perhaps, warn.
Enigma Tales Page 25