by Diane Carey
"Fear?" Lourn's small eyes flared and his brow ridge puckered. "In the Klingon fleet? I'm disappointed that you carry a tale like that. We were willing to take on the changelings! What's more brave than that? Sisko is mistaken."
"He is not mistaken. I saw the truth for myself, and my eyes were opened. There were never any changelings. Gowron and the High Council acted on empty fear and rumors when the Cardassian revolution came. They moved against those who were not enemies. They reacted the way Klingons react when they feel threatened. Lourn, it is the way you and the others here are teaching our warriors to behave. Attack something. Anything. And that is what occurred. When they felt threatened, the Klingons acted like children. They attacked anything in sight, including the Federation. That is exactly what the Dominion would want, and the Empire nearly handed it to them."
Lourn blinked as if stricken. He squinted at Worf, trying to peer under the mask to see what mad alien had taken Worf's identity to come here and say these things.
Scrapes on the walls and within the bare archways gave away the presence of others, students and clerics who were drawn by the excitement of Worf's daring presence and who now peered in at the two and listened.
Lourn seemed affected by the fact that they had an audience, and that whatever they said here would not be private, but also by the fact that Worf didn't seem to care.
"Our solidarity has given us survival, Worf," he insisted, speaking fiercely, but there was a quaver in his voice. "Our past is heavy with tales of—"
"Yes, I know what our past says." Nodding in token appreciation for history, Worf said, "While this may have helped us survive on some inhospitable planet long ago, we cling to it in the wrong times. We still act like children. And this time, by alienating the Federation, we may have ruined our best chance for surviving what the future brings. In our solidarity we may have caused such a disruption that others will have to destroy us. Because we were so afraid, we had to attack someone. Now we can no longer stand together against the Dominion. To oppose that, I am going to still be a Klingon, but I am a better Klingon, for I am working toward our true survival. You were wrong to teach me that I should be ashamed of going beyond my nature. That is what intelligence is for. I am no less Klingon because I stay in Starfleet. There is nothing you can teach me. In fact, you could learn much from me."
Lourn stared and stared, for he had very likely never heard phrases like these in his entire life.
As he shredded the cleric's pulpit, Worf understood that he might be called cruel, but there was too much at stake. A generation of young Klingons would come here, and they deserved to hear the facts of the open galaxy.
"Go out into the stars, Lourn," he said. "Remove your robes and leave these courtyards, and go out. Become more than you are. We must be more than our songs and legends if we are to flourish. A race that cannot get along with others will be its own death."
His face chalky and his hand trembling, Lourn breathed in shallow gusts through his open mouth. He stared at Worf, then at the flagstones beneath them, then at Worf again.
"But…we are Klingons!" Lourn insisted, flaring his hands between them, to engulf the peering eyes and straining ears around them.
With patent diminishment, Worf shook his head. "Is that all you can think of to say?"
His mouth dry as dust, Lourn stood shuddering in his robes that now hung on him as rags hang on a hook. His eyes were hollow, his icons shattered, and it would be his thoughts from now on that would be plagued.
At last Worf felt complete. He took a step backward that signaled his time to leave this place and go back to his post, to the people with whom he had things in common.
"I will always be Klingon," he finished calmly, "but now, I am more than Klingon."
EPILOGUE
"LIEUTENANT COMMANDER WORF reporting for duty, sir."
Such victory—over his own fears, he realized. The words flowed as easily as ever. There was no taint upon them, no bitter taste, no twinge of mistake.
The uniform he wore was no longer the gold of Security, but the red of Command.
After all, a man had to make some changes now and then.
In the Ops center, Captain Sisko gazed up at him. "You all know our new Strategic Operations Officer," he said with flair.
Around Worf, new eyes beamed at him also, but he realized that in fact they were no longer the eyes of people he didn't know. They were O'Brien and Major Kira, Jadzia Dax and Dr. Bashir. And even Odo offered a controlled nod that reassured Worf he was welcome.
His mind blurred with self-consciousness as they uttered phrases to him that made him feel good—
"Welcome aboard…"
"Congratulations…"
"Glad to have you here…"
Almost as if he hadn't been here—or was somehow reborn here.
As Worf stepped down, Sisko let the welcomes echo, then said, "Assume your post, Mr. Worf."
"Yes, sir," Worf said.
His post was next to O'Brien's engineering station, and that was an added sustenance for him. He had already plunged into the soup, and now he would have the chance to ease in with a little less attention focused on him. He would have the chance to get to know this station, its purpose, its mission, and the responsibilities that fate, government, and science had dropped at its distant door.
After all, this was still the deepest of space.
Captain Sisko scanned his crew as if to gain a sense of balance.
"Now that everyone's here, I wanted to let you all know that I just spoke to Dukat and several members of the Detepa Council. They've returned to Cardassia Prime without incident and asked me to convey to you their personal thanks."
Kira shook her head. "Who would've thought I'd help save the Cardassian government?"
"Don't worry," Odo told her. "I'm sure Dukat will take all the credit."
"Poor Garak," Bashir put in. "Dukat's a hero, and he's still stuck in his tailor shop, hemming pants."
Dax interrupted their banter. "Captain, I'm receiving a Priority One message from Starfleet Intelligence." She turned and looked at him. "The Klingons are refusing to give up several of the Cardassian colonies they seized during the invasion. They're fortifying their positions…and deploying orbital defense systems."
No one looked at Worf, but he felt their hearts turn to him. He had made his effort to spread the word to the Klingons, and could only hope that in time it would spread. Until then, he had new people to get to know, a new situation with which to become familiar, and a hundred new dimensions of function and espionage that made up this place called Deep Space Nine.
He would have to pay close attention.
As if she had forgotten he was here, Kira looked at the main screen and sighed. "Looks like the Klingons are here to stay."
In the disquieting moment of tension, Ben Sisko gave Worf a sidelong glance and a tenor of determination.
"Maybe they are," he said. "But so are we."
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