by Diane Carey
“Twenty-four minutes,” Damar finalized.
Kira congratulated him with a “Not bad.”
“If the Dominion hasn’t been able to restore the power in the capital,” Garak observed, “then the entire planet must be in chaos.”
“Let’s hope so,” Damar said.
The old woman Mila appeared down the stairs with two more lightsticks.
“I’m afraid I could only find two lightsticks,” she apologized. “I know there are others in the house somewhere.”
“Stop dawdling,” Garak snapped, waving a hand, “and bring them over to me!”
The old Cardassian woman did as instructed. “Ah, how well I remember that tone of voice … it reminds me of the demanding and inconsiderate little boy you used to be.”
On his side of the cellar, Damar chuckled. Only a Cardassian woman could look back with reverie on a nasty child.
Garak gazed up at her. “I haven’t changed much, have I?” he asked.
“Enough reminiscing,” Damar chastised. “We have to get the power back up. I need to know how much damage we have caused the Dominion.”
“If this part of the city is any indication,” Mila commented, “I’d say a lot.”
Damar squinted at the padd. “I’d love to see the look on Weyoun’s face right now.”
“Let’s not fool ourselves, Damar,” Kira cautioned. “At best, we’ve won a skirmish. We have to hit them again—harder this time.”
“That won’t be easy,” Garak said. “They’ll have tightened their security.”
“It doesn’t matter. We can’t lose our momentum.”
Damar offered her a smile. “The commander is right. We can’t rest until we’ve rid ourselves of the Dominion once and for all. And when we do, we’ll have you to thank. This rebellion would’ve died in infancy if not for you.”
“How ironic,” Garak added, “that Cardassia’s savior should be a former Bajoran terrorist.”
“Don’t canonize me just yet,” Kira demurred.
All at once, the lights came back on. So their work had come and gone now.
“Twenty-six and a half minutes,” Damar concluded. “Let’s see what the Dominion has to say for itself.”
As he went to the monitor and tried to get it back online, Garak added, “One thing’s for sure—we’ve inconvenienced millions of Cardassian citizens.”
Kira moved impatiently toward him. “Don’t you think it’s a small price to pay if it helps to bring down the Dominion?”
Garak opened his mouth to shoot back a remark, but his own success cut him off as the power was suddenly restored, at least to this one room. The stairway remained dark, and there was no light shining from upstairs. That could be for the good.
“I always said you were a smart boy,” Mila lauded.
Ignoring their self-congratulating, Damar was concentrating on getting the monitor to operate. Finally it did, flickering to life just as Weyoun appeared on the screen, the hated face of that obsequious clown on the planetwide address system, cooing his pompous opinion around the world.
“Citizens of Cardassia … I speak to you tonight with a heavy heart. This latest wave of vandalism directed against your Dominion allies must stop.”
“I wouldn’t count on it,” Garak muttered.
“The Dominion views these acts of vandalism as nothing less than a cruel betrayal by a once-valued ally. Let me assure you, we know that these disgraceful acts of sabotage were carried out by a mere handful of disgruntled extremists who alone are to blame for this treachery….”
“That’s us,” Kira muttered, “disgruntled to the core.”
“And extreme,” Garak tacked on.
Damar waved a hand. “Quiet.”
“But these radicals,” the picture of Weyoun continued, his violet eyes, bitter and concerned, set in a face abnormally pale even for a Vorta, “must come to realize that their disobedience will not be tolerated … that you, the Cardassian people, must suffer the consequences of their cowardly actions.”
“Uh-oh,” Kira breathed.
Damar couldn’t remain quiet this time. “I don’t like the sound of that….”
“That’s why,” the monitor continued, “a few moments ago, Dominion troops reduced Lakarian City to ashes. There were no survivors … two million men, women, and children … gone in a matter of seconds.”
Mila sank into the nearest chair. Disturbing, since at her age it was she who had seen more atrocity and barbarism than the rest of them put together. Kira folded her arms in visible anguish. Even Garak had no words to ease the astonishment.
Damar was also appalled, the more so because he thought he should have seen this coming. Still, the Vorta had been cunning before, while not openly brutal.
Weyoun had stopped talking for a few long painful seconds, as if allowing the news to sink in all over the planet. What were the other millions of Cardassians thinking, hoping, feeling, wishing? For the deaths of the Vorta? The Dominion? Or the deaths of the rebels?
“Appalling, isn’t it?” he cooed. “Life is so precious … and now all that’s left of those vibrant, precious people are cinders in the dust. And that’s just the beginning.”
“Damar,” Garak began.
“Quiet!” Damar shot back.
“From now on,” Weyoun said, “for each act of sabotage committed against the Dominion, another Cardassian city will be destroyed.”
In each mind throughout the cellar, perhaps throughout the planet, each man and woman calculated how many acts of sabotage must go by before there was nothing left of Cardassia. Hardly anyone lived in the countryside … everyone else lived in a city. It was a planet of cities. There was nowhere else to hide, no way to live without the comforting infrastructure of civilization. Even their farmed foodstuffs were imported.
Such a system had laid itself bare for slaughter. Weyoun had apparently found that out—Cardassians were creatures of modern times, and could easily be herded to the butcher’s block.
No one else had ever figured that out before. In all of Cardassia’s conquests, never before had the battle come to their planet itself.
“I implore you,” the false sympathy of Weyoun continued, “not to let that happen. Let us look beyond the mistakes of the past and return to the spirit of friendship and cooperation that existed between the Dominion and Cardassia. Together we can accomplish what we set out to do—defeat our common enemies … the Federation, the Klingons, the Romulans, and all others who stand against us. Thank you.”
The screen went blank.
No one spoke. Only the sound of Mila’s soft weeping disturbed the blanket of horror.
“I knew there’d be reprisals,” Kira struggled, “but I didn’t think they’d go this far….”
Damar swung away from the monitor as if dismissing it and Weyoun with it. “Do they really think this is going to stop us?” he threatened.
“Doesn’t it?” Garak challenged. “How many cities can we afford to lose?”
“We can’t afford to lose any,” Damar told him, “but we have to be willing to lose them all. We must be free! Even if it costs us everything.”
Would they accept his charge? Were they as committed as he was to throwing off the yoke of the Dominion?
He looked at Garak, then Kira. Oddly, the one who gave him support was the one he didn’t address.
Mila. The old Cardassian woman who seemed the weakest among them, reduced to bringing tea and lightsticks, now turned her tear-streaked face up to him. She was no longer crying, though. She had passed through that, and now drove them on to something far more moving.
“We must be free,” she said.
Damar gazed at her in gratitude, the first gaze of credibility he had ever offered her. She deserved recognition for her bravery, for being willing to stand behind his rash words, indeed words that might result in the utter eradication of their race.
Seeing what was happening, and that there was no going back, Kira unfolded her arms and straightened he
r shoulders. “Then we have to hit them again. Right away. They won’t be expecting that.”
Shoring up his own posture, Damar took a single step to the center of the cellar. “I should’ve killed that Vorta jackal when I had the chance.”
“You might get another chance,” Kira told him. “We have to attack Dominion Headquarters.”
Garak stepped into Damar’s periphery. “Chop off a snake’s head and its body dies.”
“Damar,” Kira said, stepping closer, “for the past two years you practically lived in that building—”
“If you’re asking me whether I know a way to get us inside, the answer is no,” he told her irascibly. “Not without valid security protocols.”
“Then we’ll have to force our way in. Garak, we’ll need some kind of explosive device.”
“I’ll get right on it.”
Mila stood up slowly. “What you’re proposing … is suicide!”
“Mila,” Garak snapped, “if you don’t have anything positive to say—”
The old woman looked at him with an expression that caused even the gregarious Garak to fall silent with respect. She had been through more in her life than the three of them could claim in their combined lives. Something changed for her in that moment, and for them because of her expression.
Though her words were simple and pedestrian, her meaning was profound.
“I’ll prepare you some food. No one should die on an empty stomach.”
CHAPTER
5
Ben Sisko felt his pride buffeted by what he saw on the new battleship’s wide forward screen.
Yes, the combined allied fleet must be an impressive sight—he could only see part of it from the port- and starboard-side auxiliary monitors—but what was coming at them out of the night was even more formidable in its ruthlessness.
Before them the combined forces of the angry, insulted Dominion, Breen, and Cardassian fleets were arrayed, fully armed, shielded, and ready for this last great battle with the civilizations they had decided to conquer.
While Starfleet, the Klingons, and the Romulans were defending their very homes and had much to lose, the Dominion armada had nothing here to protect and could afford to be bold. Sisko would be lying to himself if he hadn’t admitted to a cold ball in the pit of his stomach at the sight of the enemy armada. It was downright intimidating to see them coming.
Emissary or not, Prophet’s son or not, commander and captain or not, Sisko was stricken with an all-too-human instinctive shudder at the sight of Romulan warbirds and Cardassian battleships left over from the days when the Romulans were enemies. Those ships carried with them echoes of two brutal civilizations that had variously targeted human beings and Earth as their ultimate enemy in both spirit and cause. In the past, Starfleet had been forced to fight for the life of the Federation against both those mighty organizations, and more lately against the Dominion and those pesky, purposeful Jem’Hadar who did the Founders’ bidding. How many more times in history would the Federation have to come up against determined conquerors? And could they prevail one more time? This was an old song, and no one yet knew the last verse.
“Sir?”
Ezri shook him out of his doomful thoughts.
He looked toward her, but couldn’t summon a simple response.
“Admiral Ross would like to speak to you,” she said.
Well, he had to find his voice for that, didn’t he?
“Onscreen,” he managed.
The forward viewscreen changed away from the ominous view of the distant and closing enemy armada to the somehow less heartening vision of Admiral Ross on the bridge of his flagship, the Starship Farragut.
“I’d say we have our work cut out for us, Captain,” he simply said.
No point being formal or particularly mystical—everybody could see the armada by now.
“Looks that way,” Sisko bluntly said.
Ross offered a non-regulation shrug. “Good luck.”
That was it? Just good luck?
Sisko suddenly empathized with the admiral—what else could he say? A rousing speech of hope and glory, or just a simple exhortation, like Nelson before Trafalgar … we expect every man to do his duty …
“Sir,” Ezri interrupted. “Chancellor Martok is requesting a three-way communication with you and Admiral Ross.”
Why not? Barring any more bright telegrams from his mother, how many more surprises could happen with the enemy in sight?
Should ask Ross, though, just to be polite.
“Admiral?” he offered.
Ross paused, then said, “Put him through.”
The screen split into two halves, one with Ross, the other with the famous and deserving Klingon warrior Martok who had been so true a friend to Sisko for … was it almost a year?
“Gentlemen!” Martok looked invigorated as he raised both arms in greeting. “A glorious victory lies before us!”
“I trust those are prophetic words, Chancellor.” Admiral Ross said, not seeming to want to commit just yet.
“They are.” Martok apparently read the subdued admiral’s tone correctly, and lowered his own voice. “I haven’t forgotten the promise I made to both of you.”
Sisko smiled. “That the three of us would share a bottle of bloodwine on Cardassia Prime.”
“A bottle! I brought a barrel of 2309! There is no finer vintage!”
Ross nodded resignedly, obviously not in the spirit of this at all. “Then I’ll meet you both on Cardassia.”
“Let us see who gets there first!” Martok raised a fist, and instantly cut off his transmission.
Without ceremony, Ross cut his own off, and once again Sisko was alone with his own ship and crew. He had to admit admiration for Martok’s old-fashioned Klingon spirit, for which the battle gave as much satisfaction as the victory, if any. The mere act of fighting held its own kind of honor. He understood that, in its ancient Viking way, but today he also clearly saw the results of failure lurking in their dim future. They wouldn’t get a second chance against a force as determined and providential as the Dominion. Perhaps it was all the years of close proximity to Odo, discovering and later depending upon the shapeshifter’s strong personal resolve, his versatility, and the depth of his conviction. To come up against a whole race of such mystical beings—so physically advanced, so intelligent, and yet determined … this was a frightening thing. The Founders were advanced in many ways, yes, but their backward sense of superiority and lack of respect for other life forms made them very dangerous indeed.
At the helm, Nog broke the silence. “The chancellor makes it sound like an easy victory.”
Maybe the ensign wanted somebody to agree with Martok. Sisko couldn’t offer him that.
“He knows it won’t be,” he said instead. This was it. He struck the comm unit on the arm of his command chair, broadcasting his voice directly to every deck. “Sisko to all hands. Prepare to engage the enemy.”
* * *
The Federation fleet was made up of six squadrons of Starfleet vessels, each led by two heavy cruiser starships, vanguarded by four assault ships and twenty fighters, and rearguarded by two destroyers charged not to let the enemy get past them. Sisko remembered picket duty—it was critical and frustrating to lag behind, to be the last line of defense, waiting to swat down any enemy ships that punched through the primary line. Here there were no home planets to defend, but the destroyers were charged with making sure that any Cardassian, Breen, or Jem’Hadar ships that ruptured the Allied lines couldn’t turn around and attack unsuspecting ships who might be engaged to forward and not expect attacks from the rear.
Starfleet flanked the main body of the Allied fleet to portside. On the starboard were the Klingon heavy cruisers and their support wings. In the middle, making up the biggest portion, were the Romulan warnings, motherships, and a phalanx of birds-of-prey in front. Over the past ten years or so, the Romulans had been at war least of any of the three civilizations, and simply had more ships in bette
r condition than either the Federation or the Klingons. Sisko might have been bothered by the primary position of the Romulans, except that it was his own idea to put them there. He’d suggested this formation to Ross when they’d first discussed the idea of a mass assault. Unlike the Klingons, who could be rash, the Romulans were unflappable, fearless, calm, and calculating. They would make a very firm trunk for the Allied tree. Bristling with a hedgehog of Klingon fighters along the whole vanguard of all three battalions, the Allied fleet was as well organized and positioned as Sisko could ever have hoped.
Soon, he knew, the beautiful formation would smash headlong into the ovoid cluster of enemy ships, make its best first assault, then dissolve into a hundred individual dogfights. At that moment, the glorious painting of martial wonder would turn bloody.
He was ready. They all were. In fact, they were impatient to get going, to lance the wound that had so long festered.
“There go the Klingon advance fighters!” O’Brien gasped.
On the forward screen they watched as the prickly Klingon line suddenly surged forward, gaining speed in a shocking rush, firing as they went, not waiting to be fired upon.
In the distance, the egg-shaped enemy formation spread apart suddenly as if to engulf the approaching fighters. A fireworks of ice-green bulbs of light erupted across open space, as Klingon streaks of yellow disuptor fire encountered Jem’Hadar shields. Then the Jem’Hadar returned fire and advanced to meet the fighters.
“Hold formation,” Sisko ordered, sensing the rush of adrenaline getting the better of his crew. “Let them come to us.”
To their starboard, the Farragut and Nelson surged forward suddenly, and before them the line of Starfleet fighters broke formation, parted like a melon cut with a knife, and peeled off in two different directions.
“When we engage,” Sisko began evenly, “I want to concentrate on one enemy ship at a time. That’s going to be hard. They’ll be all around us. Unless we’re being fired upon, don’t respond to any passes. Keep your eyes on the one ship we target and stay on its tail. Understood?”
“Understood,” Nog answered, echoed by Ezri and Worf behind him.