Cathedral

by Michael A. Martin, Andy Mangels

  Shar’s antennae rose in evident curiosity as he fell into step beside Vaughn. “Sir?”

  “I want to know whether Sacagawea can shed some light on your translations,” Vaughn said, throwing a backward glance toward the image of the artifact. “Maybe he can even help us use it to get inside that thing.”

  Striding into the medical bay a few paces ahead of Shar, Vaughn found the tableau that greeted him almost too painful to look at.

  Julian Bashir was a mere shadow of himself, his hair mussed and beard stubble darkening his face. The doctor’s dark eyes resembled those of a frightened child. In spite of it all, he persevered through what appeared to be an attempt to examine his D’Naali patient, who sat impassively on one of the biobeds. Ezri and Ensign Richter hovered close by, their faces masks of pained sympathy as the doctor moved haltingly, waving a medical tricorder before Sacagawea.

  “You’ve taken good care of him, Julian,” Ezri said, sounding awkward. “He seems…quite healthy now.”

  Vaughn cleared his throat, immediately drawing the attention of Ezri and Richter. “I’d like to speak to our guest for a moment.”

  Bashir turned toward Vaughn, staring at him without any apparent recognition. Vaughn found the idea of such a loss of self chilling in the extreme. Being over a century old, he sometimes wondered if senility would one day overcome him in much the same manner. It was difficult to imagine any worse fate.

  “With your permission of course, Doctor,” Vaughn said, keeping his eyes on Bashir rather than on either of the two women. Regardless of his current condition, this was still Bashir’s medical bay; Vaughn wanted to be as solicitous of the doctor’s dignity as possible, without drifting into condescension.

  Quietly lowering his tricorder, Bashir nodded.

  Vaughn approached the tall, willowy alien, who regarded him with unfathomable, fist-sized eyes. Shar looked on quietly, evidently content to observe.

  “We need your assistance,” Vaughn said.

  As though mounted on gimbals, the alien’s head swiveled closer to Vaughn. “Debt/obligation I have,” it said, the universal translator rendering the words in incongruous bell peals. “With delight do I discharge same. What need/desire have you?”

  “Your adversaries are preventing us from getting close to the…cathedral. We must find a way around that difficulty.”

  The creature’s mouth parts moved laterally in what Vaughn thought might have been a smile. “Understand. You need/require interior access to the cathedral/ anathema.”

  So far, Vaughn had had no luck in getting Sacagawea to explain why his people and the Nyazen were such bitter enemies. The creature either did not understand or was deliberately holding something back. Vaughn hoped he would make better progress pumping the alien for information about the artifact itself.

  “Yes,” Vaughn said.

  Sacagawea pointed a long, branchlike finger toward Bashir first, then Ezri. “Access you desire/require because of this pair. Touched by the cathedral/anathema have they been both. Misaligned in their worldlines are they both as consequence/result. And both deteriorating/worsening steadily, per timeunit.”

  Remarkable, Vaughn thought as he parsed the alien’s tortuous locutions. Ezri and Richter both stood by, saucer-eyed.

  “How could it know that Julian and Ezri have been altered by their contact with the artifact?” Shar said, sounding nonplussed.

  His own curiosity already moving at high warp, Vaughn wanted that question answered as well. But he also felt an irresistible desire to learn more about the artifact itself.

  “The cathedral has a special meaning for your people, doesn’t it?” Vaughn said. “And for the Nyazen as well.”

  “Source of all things is cathedral/anathema. Feared/ revered by all D’Naali. Feared/revered by all Nyazen. But Nyazen wish exclusion. Desire/require cathedral/ anathema for Nyazen only. This exclusion D’Naali cannot countenance/abide.”

  “Does anybody in the Gamma Quadrant know how to share?” Ezri said with a smile fit for the gallows.

  Before Vaughn could respond, the medical bay’s door slid open and Nog bounded into the room, his excitement palpable.

  “Lieutenant?” Vaughn said.

  “Sorry, sir. I hope I’m not interrupting anything critical.”

  “Never mind that. What’s on your mind?”

  Nog grinned. “I think I’ve finally found a way to get us around the Nyazen blockade.”

  Cutting off Vaughn’s response, Sacagawea suddenly turned toward Nog. “Touched by the cathedral/anathema is this one as well. Worldlines as misaligned as the others.”

  Vaughn felt a serpent of apprehension beginning to turn in his gut. This creature had somehow identified everyone affected by the artifact, apparently by sight alone. “Nog,” Vaughn said, “when you interviewed Sacagawea about the artifact earlier, did you tell him who had been aboard the Sagan during the survey mission?”

  “Not exactly, sir,” Nog said, looking embarrassed. “I mean, I did tell him that I was aboard, and that I wasn’t alone. But I didn’t tell him who was with me specifically.”

  “And what did he tell you?” Vaughn said.

  “Not much that made sense. Mainly that everyone who was ‘afflicted’ had to go aboard the artifact together.”

  Vaughn turned his attention back to Sacagawea. “What do you mean by ‘misaligned worldlines’?” He noticed that Shar had opened up a tricorder and was waving it in the direction of Ezri and Julian.

  “Misaligned,” Sacagawea said with what Vaughn thought sounded like a tinge of impatience. “Untethered. Adrift/lost midworlds. Is clear enough/sufficient, I judge.”

  Taking a step backward toward Shar and Nog, Vaughn shook his head in frustration. The alien’s explanations were still about as clear as the Coal Sack Nebula.

  Shar quickly scanned Nog, then shut the device down. “I think I understand at least part of what our guest is trying to tell us, Captain,” he said. “Those peculiar quantum resonance patterns that each member of the shuttle crew is exhibiting seem to be growing steadily more extreme hour by hour.”

  Vaughn wasn’t sure, but he thought he liked Sacagawea’s explanation better. It, at least, had been somewhat poetic. “Explain.”

  Shar adopted a polite, not quite pedantic lecture-hall tone. “When a person’s quantum resonance patterns drift far enough from normal, that person can become incompatible with the quantum signature of our universe. Imagine becoming ‘unmoored’ from our universe because of a quantum-level conflict. You would be hurled randomly into some alternate world.”

  Vaughn recalled some of the mission files he had read during his brief time aboard the Enterprise shortly before coming to DS9. About six years ago, a member of Jean-Luc Picard’s crew had experienced something quite similar.

  “Are the shuttle personnel showing any signs of…‘unmooring’ anytime soon?”

  Shar sighed, obviously frustrated by his paucity of hard information. “Not that I can tell. But as the effect progresses, who knows?”

  Vaughn glanced briefly at Nog, who was shifting his weight anxiously from his old foot to his new one. He was clearly not enjoying the discussion, and seemed to be avoiding looking directly at either Ezri or Bashir.

  Vaughn turned back to Shar. “Maybe those quantum signature readings show that something else is going on. Instead of being sent to some parallel world, maybe everyone affected is gradually transforming into some alternate self. For instance, a Julian Bashir whose genes were never resequenced.” To Nog he said, “Like the one from the alternate universe that your father and uncle visited last year.”

  Ezri was nodding. “Or an Ezri Tigan who never joined with Dax.”

  “Or a Nog who listened to his uncle and went to business school instead of Starfleet Academy,” Nog said, regarding his left leg with a wistful expression.

  Shar pursed his lips as he considered the idea. “I’ll grant that it’s possible. But given the increasing flux in the quantum resonance readings, I can’t rule
out any sudden, permanent disappearances.”

  Vaughn sighed. “Lovely.” Approaching Sacagawea again, he said, “How do we…realign these ‘worldlines’?”

  “Ingress to the cathedral/anathema,” Sacagawea said. “Only inside may the four afflicted ones be resolved/restored. Only the four may enter. Others will be misaligned, ending badly.”

  Four?

  “Hold it,” Nog said, obviously having noticed the same discrepancy that had caught Vaughn’s attention. “There were only three people aboard the Sagan.”

  Vaughn saw that Ezri was quietly shaking her head. She raised her hand and pointed across the room toward a gurney. On the gurney, the Dax symbiont’s nutrient tank sat, evidently in preparation for a medical examination.

  Four afflicted ones, Vaughn thought, understanding.

  “Oh,” Nog said.

  “The four afflicted ones need/require ingress to cathedral/anathema,” Sacagawea said. “While time persists/endures/lasts.”

  “Before it’s too late,” Vaughn whispered. Though he had nothing to go on other than the D’Naali’s words and his own growing conviction, he felt more certain than ever that the key to everything lay somewhere within the artifact’s enigmatic depths.

  It’s either there or nowhere.

  “Okay,” Ezri said. “Now we just have to get around that blockade.”

  “Option nonexistent,” Sacagawea agreed, “to battle/ weapons discharge.”

  He’s saying we have no alternative other than to fight. Vaughn was beginning to feel boxed in by circumstances. But he remained determined. A viable win-win scenario had to exist. He simply hadn’t found it yet.

  “Fighting’s not our best option,” he said at length. “Not with so many Nyazen tubes aimed right down our throats.”

  “Even if we could fight our way through the blockade,” Ezri said, “what right would we have to do it? The Nyazen seem to be claiming the artifact, and they’ve already, ah, asked us to leave in no uncertain terms.”

  “That’s not precisely how I see it, Lieutenant,” Vaughn said, gently brushing her objection aside. “The jurisdictional issues seem to be in dispute here, at least from the D’Naali perspective. And since both the D’Naali and the Nyazen are spacefaring species, the Prime Directive doesn’t apply.”

  Which means it falls to me to cut the Gordian knot.

  “So what are you going to do?” Ezri said.

  Vaughn knew without looking that everyone’s eyes were upon him. He chose his words with great care before beginning to speak. “If I have to, I’ll fight my way out of this and sort it all out with Starfleet later. But only after I’ve tried every other alternative.”

  Ezri and Ensign Richter both appeared relieved. Sacagawea was, as usual, unreadable, though Vaughn assumed that the alien was listening with a great deal more attentiveness than was apparent. Bashir merely looked bewildered, though he was clearly trying to appear brave—perhaps for Ezri’s benefit.

  Nog seemed fairly beside himself with the need to say something.

  “I am not eager to belabor this point, Captain,” Shar said, his features drawn and solemn. “But our alternatives are fairly limited. Fighting may become inevitable.”

  A brilliant, snaggle-toothed grin spread across Nog’s face then. “Why fight over the front door,” he said, “when you can just…sneak in through the back?”

  Vaughn returned the grin as all heads, including Sacagawea’s, turned expectantly toward the chief engineer.

  16

  Solis Tendren noticed right away that many of the vedeks were missing from this regularly scheduled meeting. The Vedek Assembly chamber was barely half full, and some of those in the room were ranjens, not vedeks. Most of the others had already departed for Deep Space 9 to witness the signing ceremony; many of the ministers were now on their way there as well.

  Vedek Yevir, however, was conspicuous by his absence from either location. Bellis Nerani had a holonotarized document from Yevir, giving the vedek the right to act as the would-be kai’s proxy during the Assembly’s votes. Solis found it interesting that all of the other members of Yevir’s inner circle were present; he knew that Bellis, Eran Dal, Frelan Syla, Scio Marses, Kyli Shon, and Sinchante Jin all sided with Yevir in virtually everything. They always voted the same way, a steadfast conservative bloc whose unified voice unwaveringly supported the strictest of orthodox positions.

  This presented an unusual challenge to Solis. Each member of Yevir’s cabal was a high-ranking vedek; frail Frelan was one of the oldest members of the Assembly, and she was fond of reminding the younger members that she had been a fixture in the clerical leadership hierarchy while they were still toddlers. Scio seemed malleable, willing to follow the prevailing beliefs of his fellows. Kyli was a thoughtful woman of middle years, who was willing at least to appear to consider divergent opinions, while Sinchante—also a middle-aged woman—was both pious and something of a zealot. Solis found Bellis to be noxious, a man with whom it was difficult to converse for any length of time, much less to debate on the Assembly floor. Shiny-pated Vedek Eran seemed the most open-minded of the lot, though Solis suspected that he had higher political ambitions than he let on.

  Despite the lack of attendees—or perhaps because of it—the meeting had run longer than usual. Eran chaired the Assembly today, a role he had been taking on more and more often of late. They had discussed the effect that the Europani refugees were having on the North-west Peninsula lands to which they had been temporarily relocated; the local water tables were falling, and food supplies were stretched to the limit. The matter was not yet a catastrophe, but was a cause for real concern.

  Solis sighed. Would that we had been as generous with those lands when those Skrreean farmers had asked to settle there seven years ago. Those lands would be supplying food and water in abundance by now.

  Next, Vedek Teetow had brought up some nonsense about a girl in his temple who claimed to have seen a vision of a Prophet in her flour-cakes; the Assembly had been ready to dismiss the topic out of hand until he also claimed that she had—after experiencing the vision—healed several people in her village who still suffered from lingering war wounds. That spurred another lengthy discussion about what to do with the apparently gifted child.

  Vedek Grenchen—an amiable man whom Solis always suspected had become a vedek because he loved the pageantry and embroidered robes almost as much as he did the Prophets—brought up the coming celebrations marking Bajor’s entry into the Federation. Most of the public parades and parties were scheduled to begin approximately a month after the signing of the treaty, in deference to those partaking of the abstemious rites of the Bajoran Time of Cleansing. Grenchen felt that a new annual holiday should be declared on Bajor, a symbolic day on which the people could celebrate their role in the greater fabric of the galaxy. Most of the vedeks seemed to be in agreement with Grenchen, but the topic was tabled until a full meeting of the Assembly could be convened.

  “Is there any final business before we adjourn?” Eran asked, looking around the chamber to see if there were any hands on the tables, which would signify a desire to address the Assembly. Slowly but firmly, Solis put his hands out. Eran saw him, and Solis saw a momentary flash of hostility in his eyes. “Yes, Vedek Solis?”

  Solis rose, gathering his robes around him. All eyes turned to him, some with great suspicion. Since he had publicly embraced the prophecies of Ohalu and announced his candidacy for kaiship, he found that his presence among the Bajoran people had become an increasingly polarizing one; people were largely either with him or against him, while but a few remained completely undecided. This held true with the vedeks as well, and it was to those undecided clerics that he felt he had to appeal most carefully.

  “We are now, as a people, looking to the future, and to what that future will bring,” Solis said, looking each of the vedeks in the eyes in turn. “By joining the Federation, we are attuning ourselves to a presence in the galaxy greater than our own. Every sentient species on e
ach of the planets within the Federation has a history, a tradition, a set of ‘old ways.’ Some of these have the potential for coming into great conflict with each other. There are people in the Federation who believe in a single god who created everything in the universe, who rules from a heaven above them. Others believe in a pantheon of gods and goddesses, each representative of an element of their lives. Others believe that there are no gods, that life itself is a cosmic happenstance. Still others believe that they may become gods themselves, if they work to perfect themselves during their lives.

  “These are but a very few of the personal belief systems held by the peoples we will be joining within the Federation. That body is a diverse and ever-expanding construct, filled with people who are deeply religious as well as those who are indifferent, atheistic, or agnostic. We are about to become a people who side with all these others, whether pious, mystic, or empirical, peoples who share a common bond and goal of peace and exploration and growth.”

  Although a few vedeks were actively scowling at him, Solis saw several more nodding, even if barely. He continued. “Here on Bajor, the belief in our Prophets is what drives our people. And though we sometimes deny it, Bajor is ruled by its theocracy. The Chamber of Ministers is filled with Bajor’s faithful, most of whom attend services conducted by some of us who are gathered here today. Even our planet’s name is based upon our religious beliefs. If things had gone differently millennia ago, our people might be known as Perikians or Endtreeans. But we are Bajorans. Our faith defines us.

  “But how do we define our faith? Does faith mean an unwavering, unquestioning belief in the doctrine of the Prophets? Or do we often question, often interpret what we believe the Will of the Prophets to be? How many of us saw the Occupation as the will of the Prophets, some horrifying test that we had to endure? How many of us saw it as a moment in time when the Prophets had abandoned us, or had chosen to punish us? And yet, even if we believed those things, we did not lose our faith; we merely interpreted events in ways that buoyed that faith.