by Diane Carey
On the starboard helm deck, the High Gul was kneeling at a smoldering collapsed body.
"Elto …" he called softly. He lowered himself to his young guard's side.
A long purple burn cut across the front of Elto's smoldering uniform. His eyes were open, his mouth gaping in amazement, but he never took another breath.
"Oh, Elto," the High Gul moaned. Grief-stricken, his face flushed, he looked up and motioned to the body. "This was unnecessary … this wasn't in my plan!"
Sisko gazed down at the High Gul and spoke to him in person for the first time. "I didn't read your plan."
The High Gul looked at the body of his assistant again. "I would have protected him over my own life. I'd rather you had killed me instead. Whatever you think of me, he deserved to live."
"You made that choice for him," Sisko said. "I didn't."
The old soldier nodded, then shrugged and accepted what he had just heard.
"Thank you for leaving his body for me to touch in the end. I wouldn't want him disintegrated. He has a family."
Sisko kept his phaser up. "I wanted physical proof of all this. And of who did it."
"And you came back from the dead to get proof." The High Gul patted one hand on the lifeless chest of his assistant. "I understand. My others … in the engineering area … gone also?"
"Yes, gone."
Keeping one eye on the High Gul, Sisko sidestepped along the perimeter of the bridge until he was over Kira now and looked down.
"You all right?" he asked.
From behind the hand across her mouth, she actually felt a moist laugh blurt between her fingers. The laugh was pure nerves and naked relief. She looked up. "I'm so happy to see you."
"Same here. Stand by."
Abruptly light-headed as the weight of responsibility poured off her shoulders, unable to take one more shock, she could only manage a silly nod.
"She's a scrappy one," the High Gul said. "Your sentinel, here. I played to her fears, but she had none. She was as fearless as an Elite. I told her I would cut out her heart as I tried to cut out yours, and she gave me the knife. I was an inch from success, and a woman stood in my way. I'm very impressed."
"Fransu was lying to you, you know that," Sisko said. "You've been betrayed."
"Yes. So you tapped into our conversation?"
"Some of it. The part about the two thousand soldiers. I'll bet he never awakened anybody. He probably slaughtered anybody associated with you."
"I know. He likely took over the conquest of Tal Demica and took credit for what I and my men had built. Today he comes to make sure the truth never shows itself. The battle between us has been for nothing. He's going to destroy the station."
"Attacking the station with a foreign-flagged ship is an act of war," Sisko said.
As she watched him, Kira thought he was testing the water, trying to see what the High Gul thought of the prospect.
"That doesn't frighten Fransu," the old warrior said. "Your Federation will have only a melted-down hulk in space and a mystery." He shrugged with his eyes and faced Sisko. "The strong taste of battle shows on your face. You're too good at this not to enjoy it, Captain. Instead of standing against me, stand with me and we will rule here."
"It's my duty to stop you," Sisko said.
The High Gul held out a beckoning hand. "Stand with me, and duty will be what we say."
Sisko didn't offer an answer, but only looked at Kira.
Aware of the High Gul, she responded to Sisko's silent question. "Sir, the other ship is bearing down on us and we don't have shields."
"I know we don't. Take the helm, Major. Come about one half, then give me a two-second warp-speed burst, heading four-one-one-four."
"Aye-aye, sir! Coming about!"
CHAPTER 21
"WHAT ARE YOU that you cannot be killed?"
The High Gul of the Crescent stared up at the ragged, shredded form of Benjamin Sisko in all its bloody stature, and in the old soldier's eyes there was undeniable, perplexing relief.
"A man with a good crew," Sisko croaked, wavering like a marionette, twitching a dozen muscles at a time to keep on his feet. Only his phaser hand was absolutely stable.
Sisko could imagine what he must look like to the Gul, and to Kira, his half-swollen body demanding each two steps as they came, his hair and face plastered with bloody dust, his uniform in shreds, showing the bandage across his chest. On his bare left shoulder and arm he felt the heat of the burning port bridge and felt the icy spritz of the fire retardant that had automatically come on.
On the helm deck he saw Kira poised, only one hand on the piloting controls, as if ready to step between the High Gul and the command chair. She wasn't going to let the Cardassian go there again.
Sisko appreciated that. He knew it was all for him. He could see that in her face.
"Stand aside," he said to the High Gul. "It's over for you, do you understand that?"
"Yes," the High Gul said. "I've lost my battle. We must do whatever we can to save your ship and your station. Though I do not know what. The ship is shutting down around us, with no one to repair it. I don't know what to do."
Realizing the power of personality it took for a man like the High Gul to admit something like that, Sisko unlocked his knees and winced his way to the lower deck, where he scooped up Elto's phaser and made extra sure the younger Cardassian was dead. He was done trusting even his own eyes.
"Do you think you can get Fransu to follow us?" he asked.
"Technology may have changed," the High Gul said, making a conciliatory gesture toward Kira that Sisko couldn't translate, "but the nature of men has not. Fransu is like a puppy that grows up always timid of the older dog, even though he is bigger now." He gestured at the aft angle being shown on the main screen, of Fransu's ship following them but not overtaking. "Notice that he's pressing his advantage, but pressing it from a distance. He expects to be disciplined. It's why he couldn't kill me all those years ago, and I can tell in spite of all this that he's having trouble killing me now. Yes … I can make him follow."
"I'll stay out of the picture," Sisko said. "Let him think you're still in charge."
"Captain Sisko," the High Gul began, "I've lost. There is no reason for you and your people to die. Hail Fransu … raise your phaser and kill me in front of him. Then he might break off the attack."
"No!" Kira burst in. When they both looked at her, both surprised at this sudden accommodation, she added, "It won't work. We've all seen you. He's not going to let any witnesses survive. You know that."
The High Gul smiled at her. "She has a keen mind."
"She has," Sisko agreed. But he knew there was more. Somehow in these past reckoning minutes, Kira had come to respect the High Gul. So that was why she had cooperated.
Better than torture.
He decided not to pry. For those minutes Kira had been in command and had possessed the prerogatives of office. She didn't owe him an explanation, though he thought he might have just seen it.
"Coming out of warp, sir," Kira said. "Two minutes on the button."
"Full impulse and maintain course."
"Maintaining course. We'll come up with the station on our starboard and the wormhole on our port side."
Sisko pawed the comm panel on the command chair. "Garak, can you read this?"
Seconds ticked by.
Kira looked at him. "Garak? He's here?"
"He's here. Garak, this is the bridge. Come in—"
"I'm reading you, Captain, barely."
"We need thrust, not weapons. Do what you can."
"I was working on the shields. I think I can give you one-quarter deflector power."
"I'll take it, but I really want impulse thrust."
"Thrust it is."
"Sir"—Kira gulped as her displays flashed—"shields at one-quarter!"
"Put them all forward and keep them to Fransu."
"Forward, aye—here he comes, sir!"
Sisko dropped into the n
avigation/weapons seat beside her. "Skimming phaser power over to the shields … shields coming up to forty percent. . . ."
Kira squinted through the smoke at the console displays around her scorched hands. "He's looping deep … coming around in front of us … he's maintaining … well, quite a distance."
"You see?" the High Gul said.
"He's too far away," Sisko ordered. "If we turn around, he'll make the same loop again and he'll still be too far away. I need to lure him in closer."
"Cut thrust," the High Gul told him, "then slowly drop your shields again."
"We just got'm up!" Kira leaned forward past Sisko and stared at him. "One photon and we're dead!"
Sisko motioned her down. "I've been dead. Do what he says."
She rubbed her hands on her knees to scrape off the sweat, then picked at the controls until the shields dropped.
And here they sat.
In the visible distance, Fransu's ship hung in space, just out of phaser range.
"Dammit, he smells a trap," Sisko gritted. "He's not coming in."
"His only real fear, Captain," the High Gul said, "is that I might somehow escape. The one thing he cannot have is my escape."
Sisko looked at him appreciatively.
"Then let's give him your escape," he said. "Major, move us toward the wormhole. Bring us to proximity that'll make it open up." His right hand was almost completely numb as he punched in another code on the comm panel. "Sisko to Deep Space Nine. Dax, do you read?"
"I read you, Benjamin, are you all right?"
"Still in one piece. All of you stand by at station controls. This is it."
"Standing by."
"Here he comes," Kira rumbled.
On the main screen, Fransu's ship drew closer, slowing down cautiously. He didn't trust them—but the High Gul was right … he wasn't bearing down like a locomotive either.
Closer, closer—
Normally invisible, the fabulous natural phenomenon of the wormhole sensed the ship's proximity and burst open. Out of empty dark space came the sudden bloom of its white-blue spiral, a great maw beckoning them to come through and abruptly be somewhere else, far away. It was a door to another quadrant, a bridge over tens of thousands of light-years, as valuable to the Federation as it was guarantor of Bajor's critical position.
It whirled and whirled, waiting for one of these ships to take it up on its temptation. Even now, in the middle of battle, it was enchanting and hypnotic.
"Sir," Kira said, "Fransu's coming between us and the opening. He's cutting us off."
She sounded despondent.
"It doesn't matter. I'm not going in there." Sisko eyed the screen. "Sisko to Quark—shut down the station's starboard weapons. Flush radiation out the portals. Make him think there's residual damage and we're making a last-ditch stand. Dr. Bashir, I want you to activate thrusters and rotate the station as if you're trying to bring the port weapons sails around to fire."
"Yes, sir … thrusters on."
For a moment, nothing happened. Then, on the wide vision of space before them, backdropped in one corner by the planet Bajor, ten million metric tons of station began to slowly pivot.
"What're you doing?" Kira asked.
"Giving him something to concentrate on. Making him think the station's about to fire on him. I want him to turn his forward screens toward the station."
"Why?"
He didn't answer. This wasn't a classroom.
When Fransu's ship responded on the screen, Kira came up in her chair and pointed. "He's doing it! He's swinging around! He's putting his bow to the station."
Calculating distance and speed ratios in his head, Sisko picked at the controls in front of him, eyeing Fransu's ship at the same time. "It's where his stern is that I'm interested in," he said cagily.
Kira looked at him, but didn't ask.
The wormhole's mouth was now directly behind Fransu's ship.
"Get ready to veer off, Major," Sisko uttered, eyes fixed on the wormhole and Fransu's ship.
He tapped his controls.
Out of the wormhole came a tiny dot, shooting out and up toward Fransu's ship, a pea attacking a shark.
"What's that?" Kira asked.
Sisko ignored the question and shouted. "Veer off, Major!"
She scrambled for her controls and the Defiant dropped out from under them like a broken turbolift.
Just as the pea got to the shark's tail, Sisko gritted his teeth and whispered, "Detonate!"
He punched his remotes.
The pea blew up into a ball of sparkling shards with such violence that there couldn't have been a piece of it left bigger than a human fingerprint.
Whining, howling, the Defiant rocked bodily and went up on a nacelle. At the helm Kira scrambled to keep control, to keep the ship from going into a spin. With effort she brought the ship to a balance and swung around. The whining faded away.
"Just right!" Sisko shouted, and lay a fist into the helm. "Nothing like a little physics to level the odds!"
At the station's outer firing perimeter, the Cardassian ship twirled like a top, canted badly off its gravitational center, cocked to one side with the power of the blow, and it wasn't righting itself. It hung in space, wounded and smoking, with part of its tail section blown clean off and green liquid dispensing into space in a spitting funnel of spray.
"Brilliant!" the High Gul offered. "Splendid, Captain!" He laughed. "We've each been beaten by dead men!"
Sisko glanced at him. Somehow they had come to be standing side by side. "For two dead men, we did all right."
"But it was just a runabout!" Kira gasped. "It doesn't have that kind of ballistics!"
Sisko glanced at her with narrowed eyes. "It does when you pack its impulse core with antimatter, Major."
She gawked at him and slammed her palm to the navigation center. "A booby trap?"
"Right. Hail the booby, would you, please?"
"I would please!"
Shaking her head in amazement, Kira worked at her controls to call up the right frequencies and tap in the right codes for what was really a function of the communications station over her right shoulder. It could be done from the helm, but it took a couple seconds.
"Go ahead, sir," she said finally, burying a smile.
Sisko nodded. "Visual."
"On visual."
The screen crackled, forcing its damaged circuits to pull in a picture of Fransu on his bridge—a smoldering place littered with bodies. Fransu himself was scorched in the face, his severe gray-silver uniform smeared with blood and bluish lubricant. He was kneeling beside his command chair, with the gory body of a dead Cardassian officer cradled in his arm. The officer's skull was imploded. Blood and brain matter drained down Fransu's arm.
Crouched in unshielded misery, Fransu glanced at the screen, and it was obvious that he saw them.
Offering a few polite seconds to his aggrieved enemy, Sisko squared his shoulders with painful effort. "This is Benjamin Sisko. Surrender immediately and prepare to be boarded, or I and the station will fire on you. Without shields, you can't stand against us. Respond."
Fransu looked for a few moments at the body of the officer he cradled. He seemed almost to forget what was going on. Palpable grief traveled between the two ships, and there was a time of silence during which animosity between enemies broke down.
Gently Fransu let the body of his companion slip out of his arms to the deck. Slowly he pushed himself to his feet.
Then he looked up at Sisko.
"Is the High Gul alive?" he asked.
The High Gul moved closer to Sisko's side. "Yes, Fransu. I am still alive."
Fransu swallowed with difficulty, once, twice. He motioned to his right.
"Then, look."
He stepped out of the picture, and someone else moved into it—a thin, withered figure, of faded skin and frosted hair, whose eyes were nearly blind and teeth were worn to points, whose skin was parchment and whose arthritic hands were clenched l
ike the claws of a dead bird, as if sprayed with the rime of extreme old age.
Paralyzed with shock, the High Gul stared at the fossil on the screen, and into the dusty past which to him was yesterday.
The ancient figure squinted its one functioning eye, stretched its thin cracked lips until its cheekbones showed like rocks under a spider's web.
And it spoke. Its voice was paper ripping.
"Husband?"
CHAPTER 22
"WOMAN …"
An old music played in the eyes of the High Gul and his million-year-old wife as they gazed at each other in bizarre harmony, and the many years fell away.
Ben Sisko stared at the crone on the screen and knew they were in trouble. Fransu was smart—he'd kept this as a last-ditch move, and it was working.
Now what?
Certainly Sisko knew they couldn't fire on that ship anymore, not with a hostage on board.
Nearby, the High Gul's face became strangely pacific. His voice was hardly more than a scratch.
"You are … beautiful. . . ."
She may once have been. Sisko tried to imagine her empty cheeks filled out, her eyes clear, her hair dark, color in her skin.
During this tense breathing spell he tried to imagine her as an enchantress, strong and alluring, but somehow that didn't fit with what he saw. Or perhaps it just didn't fit the High Gul.
He realized he was looking at the grande dame of a whole civilization, a duchess of bedlam for Cardassia, part of the hinge upon which the change had swung that even now affected him, the Federation, Bajor.
"This is a divine gift before I die," the dowager said, "to look into your face once more and know the rumors were lies."
"They were lies," the High Gul confirmed. "Have you been well treated?"
"As the wife of the High Gul, I had the best care."
"Have there been birds in your life? Ornamental grasses?"
"I lived in the mountains. The wild grasses rustled every night."
The answer seemed to accommodate the High Gul's dreams. He smiled wistfully. Then his eyes widened and he asked, "How long did the dog live?"
The old woman grinned so hard that her blind eye disappeared, leaving only the tiny sighted one and its thin flap of skin. "Six more years!"