Текст книги "Twilight "

Автор книги: David George

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Kira glanced back across the room, over at When the Prophets Cried.She had felt the urge to consult the old book this morning, not because she sought direction for herself, but because she hoped to gain some insight into the current, tumultuous times. Dramatic events had unfolded for Bajor during the past few months—the Ascension of the Emissary, the death of the kai, the banishment of the Pah-wraiths, the unearthing of the Ohalu text—and Kira had begun to wonder if a new era might be dawning for her people. Allusions to a restoration of all the highest accomplishments the Bajoran people had ever achieved appeared in several canon sources, though conventional interpretations held that such a time, if it ever came, would be far in the future. But with the return of the Orb of Memory, Kira had started considering the possibility that the future had arrived.

She lifted the mug to her lips, then rose from her chair and went over to the replicator. She deposited the raktajino,no longer hot enough for her liking, on the pad, then touched a control to recycle it. Hazy, whirring strands of light swallowed the mug and converted it back into energy and raw materials. “Raktajino,”she said, once the mug had disappeared. “Extra hot, two measures of kava.”As the replicator hummed back into action, she turned and looked again at When the Prophets Cried.

The title referred to the Orbs, which, at the time Vedek Synta had written the tome, had been known only as the Tears of the Prophets. Bajoran faith represented the Orbs as indirect physical links to the Prophets themselves. During Vedek Synta’s time, seven Tears had been known, and since then, three more had been found. When the Cardassians had withdrawn after the Occupation, they had taken all but the Orb of Prophecy with them, and the Orb of the Emissary, which had yet to be discovered. But over the last few years, the Orbs had begun returning to Bajor, a prophecy foretold by Vedek Synta, and which she hinted might be a preamble to the restoration and Bajor’s greatest age.

Almost four years ago, Kira remembered, the Orb of Wisdom had made a circuitous route home, acquired by the Grand Nagus of the Ferengi from the Cardassian black market and eventually sold to the Bajorans when Ferenginar and Bajor had come to the brink of war. And then the Cardassians had given back the Orbs of Time and Contemplation. And now, after Commander Vaughn had found the Orb of Memory aboard a derelict Cardassian freighter, five of the original nine Tears of the Prophets were in the possession of the Bajoran people for the first time in Kira’s lifetime.

Kira turned and picked up the new mug of raktajinofrom the replicator pad, but she remained standing there a moment, still considering Vedek Synta’s old work. Kira could picture herself sitting on the ground, her legs up, with the book set open against her thighs, the pages, fragile with age, crackling as she turned them. As a child, as a teen, in the Singha refugee camp or on the run with the resistance, she had most often read the book that way, her back against a fence or a tree or a cave wall, wherever she happened to be. And prior to the Attainder, that was how she still read the book, very often, on the floor of her quarters or in a hidden corner of her office.

A short laugh escaped her lips when she remembered the day– How long ago was it? Three years? Four?—when Captain Sisko had paid an unexpected early-morning visit to her quarters and caught her reading on the floor, leaning against an outer bulkhead. She had been embarrassed, but the captain had quickly made her feel at ease, revealing his own predilection for lying out in the middle of a baseball diamond he re-created in a holosuite. That image of the captain sprawled out in a grassy field had amused her back then, and it amused her now.

She missed Benjamin Sisko. Not the Emissary or the commanding officer of Deep Space 9—though she missed those aspects of the man as well—but just her friend. He was an unusual man, not only because he had been touched by the Prophets, but because he was worthy of being touched by Them. A man of robust principles, quick to action, loyal, and strong. Kira believed that he would return one day from the Celestial Temple, as Kasidy had been promised in a vision, and she hoped that day occurred during her lifetime. She missed her friend.

A signal chirped in the quiet office, followed by the voice of Ensign Ling. “Ops to Colonel Kira,”she said.

“This is Kira. Go ahead, Ensign.”

“Colonel, theU.S.S. Mjolnir is hailing the station,”Ling said. “They’re requesting an approach vector and permission to dock.”A note of hesitation played in the ensign’s voice, echoing Kira’s own confusion.

“Mjolnir?”she repeated. Captain Hoku and her crew were not due at the station for another three weeks. Kira put the raktajinoback down on the replicator pad and moved back behind her desk. She sat down and quickly skimmed her overnight correspondence again, the computer interface beeping as she scrolled through the list. She saw nothing from Starfleet. “Ensign,” Kira asked, “did they say why they were arriving so far ahead of schedule?”

“No, sir,”Ling answered right away. “Should I inquire?”

Kira’s initial inclination was to say, “Yes, inquire,” a remnant, no doubt, of her days in the resistance, when even a single, small piece of information might prove vital to the cause. Even as first officer and now commander of DS9, she frequently sought as much data as she could about any particular situation. But if Captain Hoku had wanted to provide that information right now, Kira realized, she already would have done so.

“No,” she finally said. “Send my greetings and bring them in.”

“Aye, sir.”The channel closed with a short tone.

Kira sat back in her chair, her arms sliding back along the glossy surface of the desktop until her wrists rested atop its rounded edge. Mjolnirhad been slated to arrive three weeks from now, she knew, and a week after that, to begin a three-month tour of duty at Deep Space 9 while Defiantexplored the Gamma Quadrant. Kira wondered if those plans had been changed.

A sudden, wild thought occurred to Kira: perhaps Mjolnirwas carrying yet another Orb back to Bajor. The notion was an idle one, she knew, but it brought her back again to Vedek Synta’s book. “Bajor Rising” was the title of one prophetic tale in the collection, a tale from which some inferred that the return of the Orbs would usher in a resplendent new age for the Bajoran people.

When the children have wept all,Kira quoted to herself, anew will shine the twilight of their destiny,and she realized that When the Prophets Criedhad not been taken from her; as often as she had read it, as well as she knew it, that could never happen. When the children have wept all,she thought again, anew will shine the twilight of their destiny.This single sentence had sparked more controversy and disagreement than any entire section of Vedek Synta’s book. Did childrenrefer to the people of Bajor? Did the mention of weeping allude to the Tears of the Prophets? Did the word destinyonly mean fate,or did it also connote the Orb of Destiny? And was twilighta reference to dawn—a beginning—or to dusk—an end? Even the very language itself evoked debate, with numerous translations generating wildly divergent versions of the passage.

Kira sat back up in her chair and spoke toward the center of her office. “Kira to Ensign Ling,” she said.

“Ling here, Colonel,”came the response.

“What’s the ETA of the Mjolnir?”

“Checking,”Ling said, and then, “Ninety-four minutes.”

“Thank you, Ensign. Kira out.” She knew there was no merit to the idea that Mjolnirmight be carrying an Orb. Her intuition had served her well over the years, especially with respect to tactics and warfare, but this was not intuition; this was fantasy, and she knew it. Still, she could not shake the feeling that something was coming. So much had happened during the past half-year, so many extraordinary events had come to pass, that she somehow felt that it could not be less than the auguring of things to come.

And she remembered too what the Iconian—if, indeed, it had been an Iconian—had warned: do not forsake the journey for the destination. Whatever was going to come to pass, and despite the Attainder, Kira had a role to play in the scheme of future events, a path the Prophets had paved for her, one she was not only willing to walk, but eager to walk. She had endured much anguish in her life, but so many of her people had endured so much more. The time had come to move past that. One day, she hoped, Bajor would become a beacon to the rest of the quadrant—even to the rest of the galaxy—that shined the way to freedom and faith and love. And Kira would do whatever she could to help make that happen.

The airlock warning signal pulsed in the small room atop the docking pylon, and Kira looked through the hatch window to see a giant standing in the inner compartment. A moment later, the alert ceased, and the circular hatch rolled open, its toothed circumference meshing along its matching track. A rush of air hissed briefly as the atmospheres in the airlock and the receiving bay equalized. Then the hatch retracted into the bulkhead, fully revealing the largest human being Kira had ever encountered.

She assumed he was human, anyway. He wore a Starfleet uniform with an admiral’s insignia—five pips framed in gold, she saw, a fleet admiral—and stood at least two and a quarter meters. Even taller than the Hirogen,Kira thought. Not as tall as the Iconian, but larger. The man’s physique rivaled his height, with a broad chest and shoulders, and a torso that did not taper as it fell to his waist. His legs looked as wide as tree trunks, easily three times as big around as her own. He appeared fit, neither overweight nor overly muscular.

“You are Colonel Kira?” the man asked, the timbre of his voice rich and deep. A vague accent she could not place tinged his speech.

Kira raised her eyes to look at the man’s face, and only then realized that she had been peering at the rest of his body, struck by his considerable presence. She felt discomfited, but if the man noticed the accidental indiscretion, he gave no indication. He had no doubt elicited such reactions before, she concluded.

“Yes,” she answered. “I’m Colonel Kira Nerys. Welcome to Deep Space 9.” She moved forward toward the hatch, her right hand extended in the traditional human greeting.

The man stepped over the threshold separating the airlock from the receiving bay, and then down the steps, ducking as he did so. Kira could not tell if his head would have connected with the upper bulkhead, but she supposed the movement had been a practiced one, born out of necessity. “How do you do,” he said, his measured words sounding formal. “I am Admiral Akaar.” He pronounced it Aka-ar,and rather than shaking Kira’s hand, the admiral raised his right fist to the upper left portion of his chest, then opened his hand and held it out away from his body, palm up. “I come with an open heart and hand.”

Kira withdrew her hand, caught off guard by the greeting. She felt clumsy for having breached this protocol, despite being unfamiliar with it. Akaar must have perceived this. “A traditional salutation among my people,” he explained.

Perhaps not human, then,Kira thought, although she recognized that not all Earth customs were uniformly practiced by all humans. “Well, welcome to Deep Space 9,” she said.

Akaar inclined his head in acknowledgment. He met her gaze confidently, almost forcefully, with brown eyes so dark that they verged on being black. His face was pale and soft, Kira saw, almost doughy, with lines etched deeply into his features. His hairline began high up on his forehead, his hair steely gray and long, pulled backward into a knot behind his head. It put Kira in mind of Lieutenant Commander Worf– Ambassador Worf,she reminded herself, though she still had trouble envisioning the fiery Klingon as a diplomat—but Akaar’s hair was not nearly as long, ending just a few centimeters below his neck.

“Do you have time to speak with me, Colonel?” the admiral asked. Though phrased as a question, the request sounded very much like an order. “It will require perhaps thirty minutes.”

“Of course,” Kira said. “May I ask what this is about, Admiral?” She wondered about the early arrival of Mjolnir,and about the presence on board of an admiral.

“I am headed to Bajor,” Akaar said, “to assist with the resettlement of the Europani, and to observe the labors to send aid to Cardassia.”

“I see,” Kira said, curious about the need for a Starfleet admiral in either endeavor. She also realized that he had not actually answered her question. “Excuse me, Admiral, but I wasn’t asking why you’ve come to Bajor; I was asking why you’ve come to DS9.”

Akaar seemed to consider the question before answering, though his eyes remained on Kira. “Councillor zh’Thane will be accompanying me to Bajor,” he told her. Charivretha zh’Thane, the Andorian representative on the Federation Council, had been visiting Europa Nova prior to the gateways crisis, and she had subsequently been evacuated to the station. “And I wanted to speak with you,” he added.

“All right,” Kira said, taking a step toward the turbolift. “The wardroom is closest, or we can go to my office—”

“If you don’t mind,” the admiral said, not allowing her to list all of their options, “we can use a conference room aboard Mjolnir.”Akaar moved aside and motioned back toward where the starship sat docked at the end of the airlock.

“All right,” Kira said. Again, she felt uncomfortable, as though she had somehow tripped up with the admiral. She tapped her combadge, a quick burst of electronic tones signaling its activation. “Kira to ops.”

“Ops, Nguyen here,”came the immediate response. The words carried the slightly hollow quality of a transmitted voice.

“Chief, I’m going to be in a meeting on board the Mjolnirfor the next half-hour,” Kira informed him.

“Acknowledged,”Nguyen said. “Should I consider you unreachable, Colonel?”

Kira looked to Akaar for an answer, but while he returned her gaze, he offered no suggestion as to his wishes. “Yes,” she finally answered, slightly frustrated at her seeming difficulty in communicating with the admiral. “I’ll check in when I’m back on the station. Kira out.” She deactivated her combadge with a touch. She did not have to tell Nguyen that she should be contacted if an emergency arose.

Akaar turned and stepped back into the airlock. As Kira followed, she realized that she still had no idea why the admiral wanted to see her.

The conference room sat far forward in Mjolnir’s primary hull. The outer bulkhead angled dramatically inward toward the bow of the ship, giving the room an essentially triangular shape. A third as big as DS9’s wardroom, it held a table that could accommodate eight people– Fewer,Kira thought, if they were Akaar’s size.Great floor-to-ceiling windows lined the entirety of the outer bulkhead, and a large viewscreen was set into the long inner wall.

Akaar sat down at the conference table, his back to the windows. The chair actually creaked beneath him as he settled his enormous bulk. Kira felt a moment of embarrassment for the admiral, but he gave no sign that he felt similarly.

“Will Captain Hoku be joining us?” Kira asked as she sat down opposite the admiral. Past Akaar, she saw the tips of two of DS9’s docking pylons reaching upward into view like great metallic fingers clawing at the heavens. In the distance, a Bajoran transport drifted lazily outside their grasp.

“No, she will not,” Akaar said. He rested his forearms flat on the reflective black surface of the table. “I must inform you, Colonel,” he said, “that Mjolnirwill not be standing in for Defiantwhile it explores the Gamma Quadrant.” He did not have an accent after all, Kira decided, but a tendency to overpronounce his words, enunciating with a slow, cautious clarity. “Gryphonwill instead substitute for Defiant.”

“I see,” Kira said, not pleased to have been left unaware until now of the change in Starfleet’s plans. “I typically get some notice of these things.”

“I am giving you notice now,” Akaar said. Although his voice remained level, Kira detected a note of antipathy toward her that she did not understand. In the past, she had experienced few difficulties with members of Starfleet Command, who had always shown confidence in her abilities to command DS9—

Except for one person, she suddenly remembered. It must have been six weeks ago, back when the first minister had been returning from a monthlong trip to various Federation worlds. Shakaar had warned her of an admiral who had been championing a reversion to the station’s former hierarchy, with a Starfleet captain installed in the top spot. The possibility that the unnamed admiral had been Akaar occurred now to Kira. If that turned out to be the case, she would not allow his presence here to threaten her. Although she had been in command of Deep Space 9 for only four months, she had served in the position well, and she had every intention of continuing to do so.

“Thank you, Admiral. I’ll note the change for my crew,” Kira said, determined to maintain an even bearing. During her tenure as the station’s first officer, she had learned to better control her impulses, to think twice before acting. Now, as DS9’s commanding officer, she had been further pressed to hone her diplomatic skills.

“Colonel,” Akaar said, “I would like you to detail for me the evacuation of the Europani to Bajor.”

“Almost three million people have been brought here from Europa Nova,” Kira said, “and Defiantis scheduled back in a few days, accompanying the last of the convoys from Torona IV.”

“Yes,” Akaar said, but the word seemed less an agreement than merely a placeholder, a word to fill the time and segue to the next subject. “How are the Europani being housed on Bajor?”

The question surprised Kira. The information Akaar was seeking had nothing to do with either Deep Space 9 or Starfleet. “I’m not sure what you’re asking, Admiral, but I received a report just yesterday that the refugees have been divided up into groups—large groups—and taken to several dozen cities.”

“Where are the Europani staying?” Akaar persisted.

“In hospitals, some of them, obviously,” Kira said, not really knowing the precise answer to the question, but making logical assumptions. “In schools, government facilities, inns. Perhaps even in private residences.”

“And the Europani on the station,” the admiral asked, “why have they not gone on to Bajor?” Akaar’s voice held a neutral intonation, but his words seemed to carry an implicit criticism.

“Some of the smaller vessels in the evacuation came directly to the station…Bajor’s orbit got a bit crowded for a while. It was faster for some of the refugees to disembark here. And for those who’d suffered radiation poisoning, we were able to treat them. Since we have the facilities, I saw no problem with that.” Kira realized that her last statement might have sounded defensive, as though she were attempting to support her decision to allow thousands of the refugees to remain on DS9. She brushed the characterization aside. “We’re functioning close to capacity right now,” she went on, “but the station is in good shape.”

“Do you know how the Europani on Bajor are being fed?”

Again, the admiral seemed to be asking for information well outside Kira’s purview. She turned her chair away from the table and toward the inner wall of the conference room. “I can have one of my officers in ops upload whatever data we have about the Europani operations on Bajor.” She pointed to the viewscreen set into the wall, then tapped her combadge. “Kira to Ensign Ling.”

“Ling here. Go ahead, Colonel.”

“Ensign,” Kira said, “I’d like you to aggregate all of the information—”

“Colonel.” Akaar raised his hand, the flat of his palm toward her, a clear signal that he wanted her to stop what she was doing.

“Stand by, Ling,” Kira said, then closed the channel with another touch to her combadge. “Admiral?”

“Colonel, I have already seen the data you have available on the Europani situation. I do not need to see it again.”

An angry response rose in Kira’s mind– Then why are you wasting my time?—but she controlled her impulse to shout it across the table at Akaar. Instead, she stood from the chair and activated her combadge once more. “Kira to Ling.”

“Ling here, Colonel.”

“Belay my last order. Out.” Kira ended the communication without waiting for a response. She looked over at Akaar, who remained seated and very still. “If you don’t mind, Admiral,” she said, barely able to contain her annoyance, “I have duties to tend to.” She started for the door.

“Colonel.” Kira stopped, the double doors sliding open before her with a soft whoosh. She turned back to face Akaar. “Colonel,” he went on, “I am interested in what you have to say about the Europani rescue and resettlement operations. Raw data and reports have their places, but I wish to hear from you.”

The words bordered on flattery, intimating that he held Kira’s opinions in some regard, but she put no trust in them. Nevertheless, she chose to honor Akaar’s request. She walked back over to the table, the doors to the conference room sliding shut behind her with a whisper. “What would you like me to tell you, Admiral?” she asked as she sat back down.

For forty-five minutes, Kira responded to Akaar’s questions about the rescue and resettlement of the Europani as best she could. She doubted that her perspective added anything new to the admiral’s understanding of the situation; some of the questions involved the station, but many concerned Bajor, which she was not always able to answer. They paused only once, so that Kira could check in with the station, letting them know that she would be aboard Mjolnirlonger than anticipated. When she thought the admiral had finished speaking with her, she rose to leave.

“I have one more question,” Akaar said. “Have the efforts to help the Europani had an impact on Bajor’s aid to Cardassia?”

“Deep Space 9 is continuing to function as a staging platform for Cardassian aid,” Kira said, placing her hands on the back of the chair she had been sitting in. “The situation has become more complicated with the Europani on the station, and all the ships and crews waiting to take them back to Europa Nova, but we’re managing.”

“Yes,” Akaar said, seeming to acknowledge and dismiss Kira’s reply at the same time. “What I am asking about is the aid going to Cardassia directlyfrom Bajor…directly from the Bajoran people.”

“Oh,” Kira said. This was not an issue that she particularly wanted to address. Following the war with the Dominion, Bajor, by virtue of its close proximity to Cardassia, had been the natural place from which to coordinate and launch relief efforts. DS9, with its docking and cargo facilities, and its status as the nearest Federation starbase, had been a further logical choice to assist. Kira had been comfortable with those decisions, though her tolerance for Cardassians had developed by degrees over the years. She had not come to such acceptance easily, nor even always willingly, but her experiences with men like Aamin Marritza, who had sought to force Cardassia to accept responsibility for the atrocities perpetrated by Gul Darhe’el and others during the Occupation; and Tekeny Ghemor, who had fought the military dominance of his own government, had helped her understand that not all Cardassians were evil. And she had also come to believe that Bajorans could find both peace and strength in forgiveness and charity for their enemies.

Now the Cardassians required both. The choking stench of the fires consuming the Cardassian capital at the end of the war recurred to Kira, bringing her back to that horrible time. She remembered battling beside Damar to free his people from Dominion control, to help them escape the perfidy that would ultimately see eight hundred million Cardassian dead, including Damar himself. Kira had grown to respect Damar as a rebel and as a man, and she had to admit now that she had seen more than a little of herself in him.

She stepped back away from the conference table and gathered her thoughts. She paced the length of the room, searching for an appropriate way to respond to Akaar’s question. “Yes,” she said at last. “There’s understandably been an impact.” Understandable, because there was only so much food and medicine on Bajor, only so many resources.

But there’s more to it than that,Kira thought. Her experiences with the Cardassians after the Occupation were very different from those of most Bajorans. For most of her people, their last contact with the Cardassians had been during the Occupation itself. And while the people of Bajor could be merciful, and while their government had agreed not only to help organize relief efforts but to contribute their own food and medicine and other necessities to Cardassia, many seemed to support the measures with great reluctance. And there were even those Bajorans who opposed the humanitarian efforts.

“Colonel?”

Kira turned at the far end of the room. “Yes, there’s been an impact,” she repeated. “There’ve been fewer ships, fewer supplies, going to Cardassia from Bajor since we’ve been dealing with the Europani crisis. But we’re still continuing to coordinate the Cardassian relief effort, with supplies being provided by other worlds.” The admiral said nothing in response, and Kira suspected that he wanted her to say more. But there was nothing more she wanted to say about it.

Looking toward Akaar from where she now stood, with the conference table no longer between herself and the windows, Kira saw a large portion of Deep Space 9 laid out below Mjolnir.She allowed her gaze to sweep along the arc of the station’s outer ring, from which the docking pylons emerged like the impossibly tall towers of a great city. Her eyes traced the shape of the station around the outer ring to a crossover bridge, and from there, into the habitat ring and the central core. Light shined from ports throughout the structure, testament to the thousands who worked and lived here. The oval windows encircling the Promenade glowed brightly, and she could even discern movement within.

Atop the upper core sat the operations module, and visible to one side was a window in Kira’s office. She recalled looking out this morning at the ships arrayed around the station, and then she thought about When the Prophets Cried.Her fanciful notion that Mjolnirmight be bringing another Orb back to Bajor returned to her, and as quickly as that daydream had occurred to her earlier, it now abandoned her completely. She knew that none of the sacred artifacts were aboard. And still, she could not escape the feeling that something significant was coming to Bajor—something more than a taciturn Starfleet admiral.

And then suddenly Kira knew. Mjolnir wasbringing something to Bajor. She regarded Akaar, who sat mutely observing her. She said nothing, and after a moment, the admiral interrupted the silence.

“Colonel Kira,” he said, using her name for the first time since asking her identity in the receiving bay. “How do you like commanding Deep Space 9?”

Kira smiled. She could not be certain, but she thought Akaar might have seen her come to the realization. She walked back to her chair and sat down again at the conference table. The admiral wanted to know about her running the station, and so she told him. She spoke for an hour about the challenges of command, about the responsibilities of leadership, about the gratification of striding confidently into the future, all the while thinking about just what that future would hold for her people.

It was not an Orb of the Prophets that was headed to Bajor, she had realized. It was the Federation.