“Of course,” Ro said.
“I wanted you to know that I submitted a measure this morning to the Chamber of Ministers,” Asarem said. “In it, I have called for the immediate approval of Starfleet’s plans for a new space station to replace Deep Space Nine.”
“I didn’t think that the Federation Council had authorized those plans yet,” Ro said.
“They haven’t,” Asarem said. “Some representatives are arguing that posting starships—existing starships—would be a better solution than the huge commitment of time and resources a new station would require.” The first minister stopped walking, and so Ro did too. “I don’t agree with that assessment,” Asarem said. “Since the end of the Occupation, Starfleet has completely altered Bajorans’ perceptions of Deep Space Nine. In our daily lives, we no longer referred to it as Terok Nor, nor did we even think of it in terms of its terrible history. For us, it became a symbol of both hope and strength. It sat on the doorstep of the Celestial Temple, and for so long, provided a home to the Emissary of the Prophets. The space station became a part of who we are right now, and even though it’s gone, we don’t want to give it up.”
A sense of pride and accomplishment filled Ro, since she had served as the commander of DS9 for three and a half years. But she also felt shame, for the station had fallen while under her command. She had not slept well in the last week, and didn’t expect to for some time to come. When she did not lie awake in bed mourning the nearly eleven hundred who had died aboard Deep Space 9, she struggled to deal with her guilt for allowing it to happen. Again and again, she replayed the final events before the reactor went critical and started the chain reaction that led to the station’s destruction. That she had been unable to find the flaws in how she had reacted to the crisis did not assuage her guilt, but instead caused her to doubt her own abilities. If she could not figure out how she could have prevented the loss of DS9 and so many lives, how could she trust herself to safeguard her crew aboard Defiant, on Bajor, or on another space station?
Asarem reached forward and lightly touched Ro’s arm. The captain realized that her attention had drifted, that she had pulled into herself, and clearly the first minister had noticed. “You did everything you could,” Asarem said, as though privy to Ro’s inner monologue. “And you saved many lives.”
Ro forced a smile onto her face that she did not feel. “Thank you,” she said, trying not to choke on the words.
Asarem looked to the side, and Ro did too. She saw that the others in their group had continued on and reached the portable transporter platform at the front of the building, though the two Militia officers remained closer than that to the first minister. To Ro, in a quiet voice, Asarem said, “You think I can’t know about what you did in those last hours and moments aboard Deep Space Nine. And maybe I can’t, even though I have read a report from Starfleet Command. But I also know what your leadership has provided over time, and I have been told in recent days that your efforts during the disaster are to be lauded.”
“Thank you,” Ro said again. She appreciated the first minister’s sentiments, and this time, she offered Asarem a genuine smile.
As the two women started toward the others, Ro’s feelings of loss and shame eased, if only for the moment. But something else replaced their intensity, something that she knew would plague her until she put it to rest. The Typhon Pact had for some reason sent three starships into battle against DS9 and Defiant, and they might have prevailed had Robinson not arrived in time. But such a victory would not even have been possible, and the destruction of Deep Space 9 far less likely, had the station not been sabotaged beforehand.
Somebody had planted bombs aboard Deep Space 9, and Ro would not rest until she found them out and brought them to justice.
6
Kasidy dragged the spatula across the surface of the cake, spreading the white, orange-flavored icing over the chocolate dessert she’d baked. She swayed gently as she did so, feeling the rhythm of her coordinated movements—feeling, for the first time in a long time, the rhythm of her life. She smiled to herself, and even that simple act seemed as sweet to her as the confection she prepared.
Beside her in the kitchen, Ben pulled open one drawer after another, apparently searching in vain. “Are you sure they’re here?” he asked. “Maybe I should just replicate more.”
“Yes, they’re in there,” Kasidy told him, mildly exasperated, but somehow even that struck her as a positive emotion. She set the spatula across the bowl of icing, then crouched down beside her husband. “Ben, I said the top drawer,” she told him as he reached for the lowest one on that side of the kitchen and hauled it open. “Does that look like the top drawer?”
Ben rooted around for a few seconds, pushing around various utensils and checking under some dishware. Finally, he pushed the bottom drawer closed and stood up, shrugging in obvious frustration. Kasidy followed him up. “I already looked there,” Ben said, pointing to the top drawer, “and they’re not there.” As though to prove his claim, he tugged it open.
Kasidy forced the smile from her face as she reached forward and scooped up the package of small candles. She held them up before Ben. “They’re not there, huh?”
Ben looked at the candles, then stared down at the open drawer as though it held the secrets of the universe within it. “How did you—? Where were—?” He peered back up at her, then reached up and took hold of her wrist.
Just the feel of her husband’s touch sent a charge through Kasidy.
“Are these Romulan candles?” he asked with a smile. “Did they come equipped with a cloaking device?”
As Kasidy gazed into Ben’s eyes—and oh, how she’d missed doing that—she slyly lifted her free hand up to the counter. “Don’t blame your tired old eyes on the Romulans or anybody else, Mister Sisko,” she said, playfully reprimanding him. “You just need to pay more attention to what you’re doing.” She quickly raised her hand to his face and touched her finger to the end of his nose, depositing a gobbet of icing on it.
Plainly startled, Ben released her wrist and stepped back. “Kasidy Danielle Yates,” he said reprovingly, but the shine in his eyes told her something different than his tone. He swatted the icing from the tip of his nose, then made a show of tasting it. “Not bad,” he said.
“‘Not bad’?” Kasidy asked in mock indignation. “I’d like to see you do any better.”
“Next year,” he said.
“I’m going to remember you said that,” she told him, and she thought that she probably would. The very idea of Ben staying with her and Rebecca for the next year—and beyond—filled her with happiness, but also a strange sense of relief. That odd relief sprang not from the realization that her long separation from the man she loved had finally come to an end. No. Rather, Kasidy felt liberated from the need to understand what had happened to her aboard Deep Space 9, on the fragment of the destroyed station that had carried her and Nerys into the wormhole.
But it’s more even than that, she thought. More than having to figure out the meaning of her experiences, she desperately didn’t want to have to explain to Ben what had taken place. If he knew—
She could not finish the thought. It scared her too much.
“Kas?” Ben said. “Everything okay?”
Kasidy mentally shook herself, trying to shed her thoughts of the past like a dog ridding its coat of water. She wrestled for a moment with what to say, but then a peal of laughter suddenly erupted from the other room. Kasidy and Ben both looked in that direction, though they could not see the living room through the doorway. When they peered back at each other, they both smiled widely, and Kasidy knew that they shared the same joy that all parents must feel when they know that their child is happy.
“What’s going on out there?” Ben called lightly.
Another burst of laughter, and then Rebecca yelped, “Jasmine’s tickling me!”
“I don’t know what Miss Rebecca is talking about,” claimed Jasmine.
More laughte
r. “She’s ticklin’ me!”
Kasidy had appreciated Jasmine Tey from the moment she’d come into their lives, but in the three and a half years since, Kasidy had come to adore her. A former member of the first minister’s security staff, both highly trained and widely experienced in law enforcement and personal protection, she helped rescue Rebecca from the Ohalu zealot who abducted her. Afterward, she agreed to “help out around the house” a few days a week, with the understanding that her real purpose would be to provide additional protection for Rebecca. More protection for Rebecca, Kasidy thought, and peace of mind for Ben and me. But even though the importance of her presence had grown after Ben left to take command of Robinson, Jasmine had become less like somebody who provided a service for their household and more like a part of their family.
“Come on,” Kasidy said to Ben, nodding her head in the direction of the cake she had baked. “Let’s finish this up. They should be here any minute.”
Kasidy applied the rest of the icing to the cake, then watched Ben use the decorating bag to spell out HAPPY BIRTHDAY REBECCA! in bright orange letters. Together, they positioned the candles around the edge of the cake. “It’s hard to believe she’s seven already,” Kasidy said, the sweetness of watching her daughter grow into her own, unique person balanced by the bitterness of life’s evanescence, of the blissful, bygone times that would never come again.
“I know,” Ben said, his voice nothing more than a breath.
When Kasidy looked at him, she saw that his eyes glistened. “Oh, Ben,” she said, placing her hand on his arm. As quickly as the seven years of their daughter’s life had passed for Kasidy, she knew that the time had gone even faster for Ben. Yes, he had brought it on himself by leaving his family, but that didn’t make his melancholy any less real.
“I’m sorry,” Ben said as a single tear spilled down his cheek. Without thinking about it, Kasidy stepped forward and into his arms, resting her head against his shoulder.
It had been a week since the last time they had held each other like that, when she had found him in Robinson’s sickbay. They had said little that day, other than to explain how each of them had arrived at Deep Space 9 when they had. Kasidy wanted to get home to Rebecca, though, and Ben agreed that she should go as soon as possible. He also promised to follow her to Bajor, a vow she refused to trust. But two days later, after he had conferred with Starfleet Command, and after Commander Rogeiro had taken Robinson to Starbase 310 for repairs, Ben showed up on her doorstep.
On our doorstep, Kasidy thought.
Chimes rang out from the front of the house, but Ben didn’t let go. “They’re here,” Kasidy whispered to him, and she felt him nod his head. When she stepped out of his embrace, she reached up and dried the track of his tear. Then they both headed through the doorway into the dining area.
Jasmine stood at the front door, holding it open for Jake and Rena. They both wore light jackets—spring had definitely begun to take hold in Kendra Province—and wide, easy smiles. Jake held a small cloth bag in one hand, while Rena carried a wrapped gift tucked under her arm.
“Jake-O!” Ben called out. Kasidy followed her husband as he cut through the small sitting area in front of the stone fireplace on the right. When Ben reached his son, he grabbed him in a manly bear hug that had become something of a ritual for them over the past few days. Jake had long ago surpassed his father in height, but in the last couple of years, he’d also filled out. No longer the lanky young boy Kasidy had first met on DS9, he’d grown into a solid, handsome man. She loved seeing him with Ben.
After everybody finished greeting one another, they all moved off to the left, to the living room proper, where a sofa and several easy chairs sat arrayed before picture windows that offered a tranquil view of the Kendra Valley. Rebecca jumped into her brother’s arms—Kasidy had yet to explain to her daughter the subtleties of her half-sibling relationship to Jake—and they flopped down together in the corner chair. As Kasidy sat down beside Rena and Jasmine on the sofa, she noticed through the windows that buds had begun to appear on several of the moba trees. It seemed that everywhere these days, she perceived new life.
“So,” Kasidy said, tapping Rena on the leg, “you two never told us about New Zealand.” Jake and Rena had arrived back on Bajor from Earth only three days earlier, and they’d been in transit when the crisis on Deep Space 9 had unfolded. Fortunately, Ben managed to reach them before they heard anything about what happened, sparing them any anxious moments about the safety of the family.
“New Zealand was wonderful,” Rena said. “Wellington is a beautiful city.”
“Oh,” Jake said. “Speaking of Wellington . . . before we talk about our trip, Rena and I brought something back . . . for you.” He playfully poked a finger into Rebecca’s midsection, which sent her into a paroxysm of giggles. Jake reached to the floor beside his chair, where he’d placed the cloth bag he’d brought. “This isn’t your birthday present,” he said. “It’s just a souvenir Rena and I wanted to give you.” He handed the bag to Rebecca, whose eyes widened as she accepted it.
“Can I open it, Mommy?” she asked.
“Yes, honey.”
Rebecca found the mouth of the bag, which had been closed by a drawstring, and she pulled it open. Then she peered inside and let out a squeal of delight. She overturned the bag and a model starship slipped into her lap. “What is it?” she asked Jake. “I never saw one like this. It’s got three nacelles.” Like most Starfleet vessels, a pair of warp shells extended upward from the secondary hull, but a third such structure also depended from it.
“That’s a Niagara-class cruiser,” Jake told his half-sister. “And here, can you read its name?” He pointed to the top of the wide primary hull, to the ship’s identification.
Rebecca leaned in and studied the letters intently. “U.S.S. Well . . . ing . . . ton,” she read, then looked up excitedly. “It’s the Wellington.”
“That’s right,” Jake said. “And look at this.” He took hold of the top and bottom of the model and pulled them apart, the two sections dividing across the midline of the secondary hull.
“Oh!” Rebecca said, then pointed inside the ship. “What’s that?”
Jake reached in and lifted out what looked like a very large bug, measuring maybe fifteen centimeters from one end to the other—nearly as long as the model of the ship. To Kasidy, it resembled a giant grasshopper. “This is a replica of a weta,” Jake said. “It’s a type of insect that lives only in New Zealand.”
Rebecca held out her hand, and Jake placed the weta on her palm. She studied it for a few seconds. “You know what?” she said. “This can be the alien captain of the ship.” She gathered up the two pieces of the model, then scooted from Jake’s lap and onto the floor.
“What do you say, Rebecca?” Kasidy asked.
“Thank you, Jake,” she said, jumping back up to hug her brother. Then she raced across to the sofa. “Thank you, Rena.” Then she threw herself back onto the floor to play with her gift.
“Well, now we’ve lost her,” Kasidy said.
“That’s okay,” Rena said. “This way, we can tell you about New Zealand. We had a great trip.”
“It rained quite a bit while we were there,” Jake said, “and the temperature was on the cool side, but it wasn’t too bad.”
“We did a lot of sightseeing anyway,” Rena said, “even when it was wet out.”
“Did you get to the Te Papa?” Jasmine asked.
“We did,” Jake said enthusiastically.
“That’s the national museum,” Rena explained. “They’ve got exhibitions on New Zealand’s art and history, on its environment and geology, on the Maori, who are the indigenous people. It’s really something.”
“And plenty of the exhibitions are interactive,” Jake said.
“What about the Botanic Garden?” Jasmine asked. “It’s one of my favorites.”
“Yes, we went there too,” Rena said. Gazing across the room at her husband, she added, “We
even had a romantic picnic in the Lady Norwood Rose Garden.”
“Romantic and wet,” Jake said. “It rained on us there too.”
“That made it even more romantic,” Rena said, offering knowing glances to Kasidy and Jasmine.
“I guess the big question,” said Ben, who sat in a comfortable chair across the room, “is whether you think you’d like to live there.”
“That depends on whether or not I’m accepted into the Pennington School,” Jake said.
“I’m confident that he will be,” Rena said with pride. “They accepted him once, and now he’s a better writer. Why wouldn’t they accept him again? And yes, I definitely think we can make a home for ourselves there while Jake’s studying.”
“Actually, I think I really would enjoy spending some time in New Zealand,” Jake said. “It seems like a really interesting place.”
As Rena and Jake described more of their trip, Jasmine asked lots of questions. She explained that during her secondary education in her native Malaysia, she’d spent a semester abroad in Wellington. Kasidy had never visited New Zealand, and so she listened with great interest. Ben appeared to do so as well, but he didn’t say much himself.
That’s how it’s gone since he’s been back, she thought. The two of them certainly talked, but their conversation really remained on the surface. They did speak about the events at Deep Space 9, but not about the two and a half years that preceded them. Nor did they discuss the future.
Forget about the future, Kasidy thought. We really haven’t even talked about the present.
Since returning to Bajor, Ben had spent his days at the house, but his nights at Jake and Rena’s—both before and after the couple had come back from Earth. Kasidy and Ben didn’t decide together about the arrangement; it just seemed to happen. And while it removed the pressure of immediately having to reacclimate to each other, and to deal with the awkwardness that their separation had created between them, it also disappointed Kasidy not to have Ben fully back in her life.
Star Trek: Typhon Pact: Raise the Dawn (Star Trek, the Next Generation) Page 12