by Неизвестный
"Below estimation threshold. Not statistically significant."
Odo blanked the screen. Another interesting datum: Quark, with his needle-like Ferengi gaze, had looked into this individual's mercenary soul . . . and hadn't recognized him. His old business partner.
There was a lot to gnaw on here. He nodded slowly to himself; as disturbed as he was by the threat to his DS9, a certain pleasurable tension came with such a tangled knot to pick apart. And even more satisfaction to come, when all the strands would be laid out neatly before him.
But that was still in the future. Right now there was another to take care of, a duty that he was ashamed that he had put off. Something that he should have already told Commander Sisko, no matter the pressure of time on both of them. He should have forced the commander to listen to him. . . .
All the while he had been digging information out of Quark, it had still been at the back of his mind. Before anything else could happen, before he could concentrate his full attention on the epidemic of murder, this needed to be laid to rest.
Odo picked up the data padd and drew aside the security curtain. It would be only a matter of minutes before he was at the Ops deck and in Sisko's private office.
Now he was alone.
His chief of security had departed, after having caught him as he'd left Ops and coming back with him to his private living quarters. Sisko sat leaning forward on the couch, his forearms against his knees, hands knotted together; the surrounding lights had been dimmed to a soft glow. He sat and thought about what Odo had told him.
"Is it really that urgent?" Sisko felt a pang of remorse for having asked that. "I really need to get some rest."
"I think it is," Odo had replied. He had insisted—rightly so—on getting away from the crowded Ops deck, where the other crew members might inadvertently listen in.
So it had been here, in this little world, as much of a home and refuge as was possible to create inside DS9, that Odo had informed him of what he had discovered during his investigation.
"It's about your son Jake." Odo had been forthright, even blunt, in telling him. There had been no other way. "I've extracted the list of frequent users of the altered holosuites. And Jake is one of them."
His thought processes had seemed to take a step back. operating at a safe remove from the world. "Are you sure?"
Odo had nodded. "I had O'Brien check out the device he constructed for me, that reads out the access codes. The device is working perfectly; the data I've obtained with it is reliable."
"I see." He remembered glancing over his shoulder, toward the corridor that led to his son's bedroom; Jake was already asleep there. Despite all his pledges to himself, he had again missed having dinner or spending any other time with him. "How bad is it?"
"Your son's usage of the altered holosuites appears to still be in a preliminary stage; the pattern we've seen, of increasingly frequent use, has only just started to accelerate in his case. There's time . . ."
Time, mused Sisko. The memory of Odo's words faded away. There was always time; there had always been time enough. If he had remembered what was important.
Odo had said something to him about being sorry, and had left him to his thoughts. And his being alone.
If Jake's mother were still alive . . .
Inside his head, he closed a door firmly against the empty rooms that those words led to. He had spent enough late-shift hours in there already, and would spend more, he knew. It was unavoidable; she had been the only woman he had loved. But now he had to think just of their son.
He looked over to the side of the room. The wooden crate that Kira had brought from Bajor had been moved there; it sat mute in the shadows, still unopened. That was another person gone from him, whose advice he could have used. It seemed, in moments like this, that the function of time itself was to carry away, one by one, all those closest to him. . . .
Perhaps that had already started to happen to Jake.
A current of anger rose inside him, enough to force his fists clenched. Seconds passed before he sat back and used his comm badge to reach the security chief.
"Constable—were all of those CI modules removed from the holosuites in question?"
"Actually, they weren't, Commander." Odo's reply was clipped and professional. "We left one module on-line with a security monitor attached, in case we needed to investigate its effects in situ, as it were. As long as the sector is sealed off, I felt the chance of any further harm being done was minimal."
"Thank you." He broke the connection.
For a moment, Sisko stood outside Jake's bedroom, listening in the dark to his son's breathing. Then he turned away and headed for the living quarters' door.
As commander of the station, he had no problem in entering the restricted sector—with a simple computer override. The small light on the access panel told him that the last holosuite along the corridor was the one that had been left functional. He peeled away Odo's security seal and dropped it on the floor beside him. With a press of his finger, the door slid open and he stepped inside—
To a sunlit world. The doorway closed behind him, completing the holosuite's illusion. A warm summer wind moved across a field of yellow grasses; the barely perceptible scent of cool running water came from beyond the dense stand of trees some apparent distance farther on. He had been here before, with Jake; he had set the holosuite's programming for what he knew was one of his son's favorites. The path's loose earth and broken stalks—or the perfectly contrived sensation of them—moved beneath his steps, the sun overhead hot enough to bring beads of sweat onto his brow.
In the woods' darkness, he found the first wrong thing. The whitening bones of a cat, the dry fragments spread obscenely apart by coarse twine looped around the nearest tree trunks. The blood had long ago soaked into the leaf-covered ground, but there was still a gut-tightening sense of pain and death in the shade's motionless air. The cat's skull bared its teeth in a silent howl.
What Dax and Bashir had stated in their preliminary report was true. This was how the CI modules worked, taking the normal, benign holosuite programming and warping it into something different. There had been no reason to doubt his officers, but he had to see it for himself. He could only wonder how far it went, what he might find on the other side of the perceived horizon.
He walked on. Back into the sunlight, to the creek's edge. The water purled against the rocks, glinting achingly bright. When he shaded his eyes with his hand, he found more death. Less than a meter away, the body of a man sprawled facedown, fingertips clawing into the muddy bank. Kneeling down, Sisko turned the body over. And found himself gazing at his own face, sightless eyes fixed upon the sun.
Somebody was watching him; he could feel it. He looked up and saw a man with arms folded across his chest, eyes dark as holes into the night on the other side of this world. A mocking smile twisted one side of his narrow face.
"Who are you?" Sisko let the corpse with his face slip from his grasp.
"Don't you know?" The figure's voice was a parody of gentleness. "I'm McHogue. I live here."
The rage he had felt before burst like a red flower in his vision, blinding him as he leaped forward, hands outstretched for the throat of the image—
Which vanished. His fingers scraped hard into the wet earth and rounded stones at the creek's edge.
He drew back onto his haunches. His hands slowly curled open; the illusion of water, mingled with his own blood, fell into the stream and was borne from his sight.
McHOGUE
CHAPTER 6
From an arched, open window of the temple, she could see the runabout Mekong, which had brought her home once more. The rough stone, set into place centuries ago and ornamented with the carved tracery of a long-dead artisan, contrasted with the smoothly functional lines of the craft.
"We did not expect to see you again, so soon after your last visit." One of the acolytes stood beside Kira; they had both come to the tower to watch the first rays of morning d
isperse the flocks of birds that nested beneath the compound's tiled eaves. The last of the fluttering specks were even now disappearing into the vastness of the golden sky. "Was there something else of the Kai's that we forgot to give you, that you wanted?"
"No—" Kira shook her head and smiled sadly at the acolyte. "I'm afraid the only thing any of us want of Kai Opaka is for her to be with us again."
"You speak truly. For her to have answered the call of the Prophets . . . did we not know that it would happen someday? Such being the nature of time, for even the wisest among us. And yet we find ourselves weeping like children, at the fulfillment of the inevitable." The acolyte gazed across the dew-wet fields surrounding the temple. "And as always with unguided children, we are in danger of wandering off and becoming lost."
The acolyte's words touched a nerve of apprehension in Kira. "What do you mean? The faith . . . our people's faith . . . it can't be lost."
"Perhaps not." The acolyte kept her hands tucked inside the heavy sleeves of her robes. "At least not while it remains in the heart of one such as yourself. A fire that can light worlds is contained in a single spark. But as for the people of Bajor . . ." She fell silent for a moment. "These are difficult times."
"We've been through some pretty tough times already. The Cardassians—"
"Ah, but those times were a forge. The oppressors could never have destroyed us, but their efforts to do so made something harder and more resilient of us, like a sword blade hammered upon an anvil. You yourself, child, were born of that process. All that was taken from you—your home, your family, all that would have been a comfort in your most lightless hours—all that was given back to you in a different form. So that you could serve Bajor and its people."
If that's true . . . She had heard that simple teaching before, from the Kai herself. Not just redemption through suffering, but apotheosis: a transformation into another order of being, carbon to diamond. But if it was true, if all she'd lost had been restored to her, she had no way of explaining the emptiness she felt inside herself. Except by admitting the possibility of failure, unworthiness; the blade forged in the purifying fire had broken at the first blow, the diamond had shattered like false glass.
She had told no one, not even Kai Opaka, of the doubts came to her in sleepless nights, along with the bad dreams and memories. The commander and all her fellow officers aboard Deep Space Nine—none of them had ever suspected. Or would ever, as long as she could keep her perfect mask and armor in place.
"Now," continued the acolyte, "the people of Bajor face trials that are as dangerous as those that came before, but are of greater subtlety. When the Cardassians ruled us, we knew who our enemies were, and we knew by what sacrifices our freedom would be achieved. But now that we have that freedom in our hands . . ." The acolyte watched the last straggling bird dart toward the east. "We find our bitterest enemies in those of our own blood, those for whom such a little while ago we would have given our own lives."
"It's harder now. To know what to do." Kira laid her fingertips against the rough stone sill. "We all wanted the Cardassians gone, or in their graves. Even the Kai, I think, could envision them being . . . translated, so to speak, to another plane of existence. But with the Cardassians gone at last, we have to face the fact that we don't all want the same things for Bajor."
"Is that not what you have learned, Kira? That one may be a Bajoran, a sharer of the same blood and past, and still disagree—even disagree violently—with another Bajoran?" The acolyte smiled gently. "And if that be so, and if among those who disagree some may be right and some may be wrong about what should be done—then it raises the possibility that it is you who are in error."
Kira laughed, short and mirthlessly. "As if I hadn't thought about that already. Everything I do—everything any one of us does—we could all be messing things up in a big way."
"The cynical among us might say that that is why, in retrospect, our oppression seems such a state of grace. When one is a victim, there's no doubt that one is in the right."
"I don't know. . . ." Kira shook her head, fighting off a familiar weariness. "Maybe we should ask the Cardassians to come back—that would solve all these new problems, at least. Then we could just go on suffering and struggling in glorious martyrdom. We did it for so long, is it any wonder we neve learned how to be good at anything else?"
"Now you're the cynic," chided the acolyte. "It ill suits you. What shall we do if you are lost to us in that way, when you are Bajor's link to the worlds beyond our sky?"
"They don't even know I'm here. I didn't tell anyone at Deep Space Nine where I was going, I didn't submit a flight plan before I left; I just went. And came here."
The acolyte nodded. "We knew that your return must have come of your own initiative. The station notifies us beforehand of any official visit." The acolyte turned to study her. "What we don't know is your purpose in coming this time."
"I'm not even sure I know myself." The sun's edge had risen over the horizon, enough to bring a smokelike mist up from the damp fields. "There's some other, completely unrelated crisis going on aboard the station; right now, Commander Sisko's attention is completely taken up by that. And frankly, if he were burnt out on dealing with every little twist and turn in Bajoran politics, I wouldn't blame him. He must feel sometimes like a nursemaid to a whole planetful of squalling brats, every one of them trying to climb into his lap."
"So you decided to take care of this latest problem all by yourself."
"I suppose." Kira shrugged. "This business with the Severalty Front—it's too important to let it slide, and then just hope that we can pick up the pieces later. There might not be a later, if Aur and the other Front leaders get their way. At least not as far as Bajoran involvement with the Federation is concerned."
The acolyte raised an eyebrow. "And you feel that, yourself, you can change all that?"
"There was one person who kept it from happening before."
"Yes—but you're not Kai Opaka."
Kira sighed. "Don't think I'm not painfully aware of that. I don't have her saintly patience, for one thing—I'm afraid that if I start talking with some of these people, and they don't immediately see things my way, I'm going to be sorely tempted to just clop them over their heads."
A smile from the acolyte: "I don't think that would accomplish what you desire. Though perhaps if you persist in this endeavor, you will learn much; I doubt if even the Kai was born with all the virtues she possessed before she answered the call of the Prophets."
"The problem is," said Kira glumly, "I don't think I was born with even the ability to learn patience." She stepped back from the arched window. The morning birds had long since vanished, and the shadows stretching from the horizon had crept back into themselves. As much as the temple's quiet had restored a measure of strength to her soul, she knew that the time to leave had come. There were people in Bajor's capital whom she needed to see, words to be spoken, and—with any luck—negotiations to be made.
"Perhaps not." The acolyte turned toward the worn steps that led back to the temple's central courtyard. "But you have something that will help, despite your failings."
"What's that?" She followed the other woman down the twisting stone.
"You have our hopes. And the blessing of that one who is no longer with us."
"And why do you think the general would be interested in seeing you?"
The man behind the wooden desk was one of those, she knew, who had never had power in his life—until now. A little taste of it had turned him into a petty bureaucratic tyrant; he had the power to make life difficult for others, to say yes or no to anyone who had business with the truly powerful ones above him. That savoring of that much authority had intoxicated him; the pleasurable effect could be seen in his glittering eyes.
Kira didn't have time to waste with him. "I think that if you'll let General Aur know I'm here, he will in fact be greatly interested in seeing me. I am, after all, second-in-command of the Deep Sp
ace Nine station and Bajor's main liaison with the Federation's Starfleet."
"Ah." The young man did not appear impressed; he barely concealed a sneer. "The famous Major Kira. A true luminary—of the past regime. I take it that your appearance here is as part of an official mission to the Severalty Front?"
The building to which she had come was no more than a hundred meters away from the council chambers of the Bajoran provisional government; it had once held the offices of one of the Cardassians' puppet organizations, a sham workers' committee that did little more than give rubber-stamp approval to whatever murderous conditions the occupiers dictated. The oppressive atmosphere that had filled the corridors, equal parts toadying obsequiousness and seething hatred for the hands that held the other ends of the leashes, had been replaced by a bustling energy. The confidence in the faces Kira saw around her was only a few degrees away from blind fanaticism.
"No—" She shook her head. "I came here of my own initiative. I represent no Federation interests. Except, of course, the friendship and goodwill they've shown toward the Bajoran people."
"Indeed." The sneer froze sourly in place. "How kind of the Federation to have our welfare lodged so firmly in its heart And of course history bears out how much we can upon the charitable feelings of offworlders."
Kira felt her temper boiling up inside her; with an effort, she held it in check, not wanting to give the officious little twit front of her the satisfaction of seeing that his needling marks had hit their target. Plus, as much as she could anticipate the momentary pleasure of wrapping her hands around his neck and plucking him from the chair like pulling a sun melon from its vine, she recognized that the action wouldn't be likely to accomplish what she wanted in the long run.
Patience, she told herself. Emulate those wiser than you. It sounded good in theory, but putting it into practice was proving difficult.
"Look," she said, leaning forward to plant her hands on the desktop. "I know that General Aur is a busy man; I can assure you that my own schedule is not exactly filled with leisure time. You're doing your job, and that's fine. I'm sure you get a lot of loose cannons rolling in here and you're supposed to filter them all out. But let's face it: I'm one of the senior officers aboard the DS9 station, and I report directly to Commander Benjamin Sisko regarding Bajoran affairs. The path of communication with Starfleet and the Federation goes through me. One way or another, either now or later, I'm the person that General Aur is going to have to deal with." She heard her voice growing steelier and decided to go with it. "If it's later, he and I will first have an interesting little discussion about how somebody sitting way down the line prevented me from seeing him. If you think General Aur will be happy when I tell him that, then carry on as you have been. If not . . ." She straightened up. "Do I make myself clear?"