Star Trek: Terok Nor 02: Night of the Wolves (26 page)

The Bajoran looked annoyed. “Here you are, talking about trust. What am I going to do, shoot the two of you, so I can die in here without any company? Give me the phaser.”

Natima knew it was no use, but she wanted to feel like she had a little leverage, at least. “What is your name?” she finally asked him.

He stared at her a moment, then shrugged. “Seefa,” he said. “Aro Seefa.”

Natima swallowed. “Fine, Aro Seefa,” she said softly, and she handed over the weapon. Seefa crouched on the ground next to Veja, picking the weapon apart with his hands, and a thin piece of wire he had pulled from one of his boots. Natima set the palmlight down, focusing on Veja. Her breathing was a little less shallow now, her expression peaceful, but Natima knew she needed prompt medical attention.

She watched the Bajoran work as the light began to grow dimmer and dimmer, the gray shadows cutting across the orange light on his face. He was sorting through a handful of tiny pieces of metal and composite, carefully setting them aside. He removed the combadge from his pocket, cracked it open, and laid it next to the phaser’s components.

“How do you know how to do that?” Natima asked. “I thought Bajorans weren’t allowed to practice things like engineering, unless they work for the government.”

“Bajorans do a lot of things they aren’t allowed to do.”

“But…who taught you to do that?”

Seefa shrugged. “People,” he said. “Since nobody follows
D’jarra
s anymore, we had to learn by doing, not by being taught.”

Natima was surprised, remembering some of her past interviews. “You mean, you don’t approve of the caste system?”

Seefa snorted. “Hardly anyone does. It was never an efficient system, even in the old times.”

“But your own government—”

“Right,” he said. “Each and every politician appointed by Cardassians, for being fastest to sell out their friends and family. Not
my
government.”

Natima considered it. She had always believed the Bajorans’ caste system to be remarkably foolish and backward, and it interested her to hear that this Bajoran actually agreed with her. And that others did, as well.

The light went out entirely for a split second before popping back on again, and Natima and Seefa both breathed in audible relief. “That’s all I need,” Seefa muttered. “To have to fix this thing in the dark.”

Natima felt annoyed. “If you don’t mind my saying so,” she said, “if you had started work on it when I initially suggested it, we wouldn’t have to worry about the light going out.”

“You may find this to be madness, but I’d rather avoid calling on your friends for help,” Seefa said. He carefully poked at the combadge with a curved metal rod he had removed from the weapon. An infinitesimal spark shot up, and Seefa dropped the device. He mumbled what she took to be some kind of Bajoran expletive and then picked it up again.

Veja groaned slightly, and Natima stroked her forehead ridges, quieting her.

“Of course, we wouldn’t be here in the first place if you hadn’t been so stupid as to attack a couple of unarmed civilian women.”

“How was I supposed to know you were civilians?” Seefa said, looking up at her sharply.

“Two women wandering around a vineyard? Didn’t you notice the way we were dressed?”

“Yes, but I didn’t know if it was a trick…and women can be every bit as dangerous as men—if not more, in some cases.”

“Our military does not usually employ women,” Natima informed him.

Seefa snorted. “That’s foolish,” he said. “Half of your population wasted—twice as many people that could be fighting.”

“Women are viewed very differently in our society than Bajoran women are in theirs.”

“As less capable, because they carry young?”

Natima frowned. She had often thought the same thing herself, but she wasn’t about to discuss it with a Bajoran.

Seefa reacted to her silence. “There are plenty of things about my own culture that I don’t like. The
D’jarra
s, for example. There’s nothing wrong with disagreement.”

“My government doesn’t look kindly on dissent,” Natima said.

“That doesn’t surprise me much,” he said. “But if you can get enough people to listen to your viewpoint, then there’s nothing the government can do about it, is there?”

“They can have those people arrested and executed.”

Seefa laughed. “What a great society the Cardassian Union has created. Everyone must agree, or die. No matter how ridiculous or outdated the policies.”

Natima said nothing. She felt that she should be furious with this man, this Bajoran man with the temerity to criticize her world, but she was too tired to argue with him. Too tired, and more than a little confused. She considered herself an upstanding member of the Union, but had sometimes questioned the wisdom of her superiors…

You should not think on these things. Not here, not now.

“I haven’t been this hungry since I was a child,” she said, determined to change the subject.

“Really?” Seefa had looked up again, his expression unknown to her, his eyebrows raised.

“We
do
eat, you know. Aren’t you hungry?”

“No, I mean—why were you hungry as a child?”

“Oh,” Natima said, realizing that the comment was somewhat more revealing than she might have intended it to be. “I suppose…you must know that our world suffered great hardships in years past. Before the annexation, many people on Cardassia Prime starved to death. We had to go elsewhere to find the resources to sustain our people.”

“Ah,” Seefa said. “Yes, I suppose I did know that, in a roundabout sort of way. So, your childhood was difficult.”

He seemed to be mocking her, and Natima felt a spark of anger. “Yes, my childhood was difficult,” she snapped. “My parents died during an epidemic, and they left me alone to fend entirely for myself. None of my relatives would have anything to do with me—lone children are seen as an unwanted burden, an extra mouth to feed on a world whose resources were already stretched thin. After nearly a year on my own, I was picked up by authorities and put in a terrible facility on Cardassia II, worse even than living on the streets had been. If it hadn’t been for the Information Service…” she stopped, her breath coming fast. She couldn’t imagine what had compelled her to share such details from her life with this…person.

Seefa had stopped working. “So,” he said softly. “That’s why you don’t care for the orphanages.”

Natima didn’t trust herself to speak.

Seefa picked up the gutted phaser. “Before my parents died,” he said, “I never went without anything. I didn’t know the meaning of hunger.”

“How cozy that must have been for you.”

Seefa went on as if he hadn’t heard her. “It’s too bad, really.”

“What’s too bad?”

“It’s too bad your people didn’t simply ask for help. There was once enough here to sustain both worlds.”

“My people tried to set up trade agreements with your world. We were turned away.”

“So I understand it. But Bajor didn’t need anything you had to offer. We were self-sustaining, and it never occurred to us that a world would be any other way. If we had only known how dire your situation…”

“Cardassia could never be self-sustaining,” Natima said. “Our world’s conditions wouldn’t permit it.”

“But it must have been, at some point, before your people developed interstellar travel. Otherwise, how could your civilization have developed in the first place? Perhaps if you were to look back to the time when your world relied on its own resources, you might learn something. You wouldn’t have to go about stealing from everyone else.”

Natima shook her head. “That’s absurd,” she told him. “Cardassian civilization thrives on progress and technology. My people would never look backward toward a time when life was primitive, and…and…”

“And simple, and self-sustaining? Like the Bajorans’? We were happy here, before we were occupied and attacked and robbed. If Cardassia had followed our example instead of just…” Seefa stopped, and shook his head. “It’s no use talking about it,” he said.

“No, I suppose not,” Natima replied. She enjoyed a good argument, but the thoughts their conversation had inspired were uneasy ones. And if Seefa didn’t want to talk anymore, she wasn’t about to try and make him. The communicator wasn’t going to fix itself.

Damar could see what appeared to be footprints in the soft, ruddy-colored mud on the floor of the conduit. He nodded at Garresh Trach, who held his weapon ready. They moved into the dark, Damar switching on his palmlight to illuminate their way.

They didn’t have the tracks for long; standing water on the passage’s floor had filled in the murky impressions, prints that confirmed his earlier readings and Natima’s message. Two women in sandals, a Bajoran’s cracked boots.

They ventured deeper into the cold, dark passageway. The thought of Veja here, against her will…Damar moved them along quickly, watching his scanner.

A number of twists and they reached what appeared to be a main artery of the system. As soon as they stepped into the wider tunnel, the tricorder picked up a trio of life signs, faint but distinct. Two were Cardassian, the third Bajoran. Damar had to force himself not to run. The insurgents had shown themselves to be violent and ruthless and very, very careful. Recklessness on his part might put Veja further in harm’s way.

They followed the signs down a smaller offshoot that was completely blocked by a recent collapse, recent enough that they could still smell the torn, sun-warmed soil in the air. Damar checked the tricorder again, recalibrating to medical. As close as they were, he could see that one of the Cardassian signals was quite weak.

He felt his fear give way to angry panic. One of them was injured, badly enough to alter a direct sensor reading. Could he attempt to find a back entrance to the tunnel? That would take too much time.

He wanted to shout, to call for her, but dared not. He could hear water rushing from somewhere, the sound echoing through the maze of collapsing tunnels, and reached up, touching the low ceiling. Flat rocks, lined with moist, crumbling clay. He crouched, touched the loose soil that had collapsed into the tunnel. It was soft.

We’ll have to go in from above. Leave one of the scanners so we can find this spot easily, dig somewhere past the blockage…

He didn’t want to leave, knowing that his beloved was just on the other side of the fallen rubble, perhaps hurt or even dying, but that was all the more reason to hurry.

“Garresh Trach,” he said quietly. “We must briefly return to our ship for some equipment. Leave your tricorder here, we’ll follow its signal back.”

“Yes, sir.”

Trach set down his tricorder and the two men hurried back through the tunnels, Damar refusing to second-guess himself. He had no time for doubt.

Opaka had made the
ratamba
stew she had been offered last as long as she could, savoring each bite. It was not only for want of diversion that she did so; it had been weeks since she had eaten such a substantial meal. Finally, she finished, smiling her thanks to the attendant prylar who promptly walked over and took her empty bowl.

“What do you have to say of my proposal, Vedek Gar?” she asked. In light of Gul Dukat’s amended laws, she’d suggested that he consider officially disbanding the Vedek Assembly temporarily, so that its members might avoid further prosecution. She believed she already knew his answer, and knew also that he would take his time coming up with it, to show that he was giving it due consideration; it was why she’d asked.

The vedek smiled hesitantly. He glanced at the monk, gave a nod. The robed servant left the cottage, and Opaka prayed that her son had already finished his work, that the other two were keeping careful watch for him.

“I don’t doubt, Sulan, that
Dukat
may very well elect to disband the Vedek Assembly,” Gar said. “But I feel that it would be cowardly for me to run away from my people at a time like this, when the faithful will be seeking our leadership more than ever.”

“There is logic in your answer,” Opaka said. “But you cannot be of much good to the people if Dukat has you taken to a work camp.”

“Now, Sulan.” The vedek wore a pinched smile. “You cannot expect me to believe that you came all this way to discuss Dukat’s new policies, for it would seem to me that you only learned of the announcement this morning. We only heard it last night. What was your true purpose for traveling all this way?”

Opaka had anticipated this possibility. “I…have come because I have been hearing rumors…that you are now beginning to support my position. You who were once so firmly opposed to the abandonment of the
D’jarra
s—and I suppose I only wanted to find out if what I was hearing is true.”

Vedek Gar nodded. “I see. It is true, I have begun to preach that the old ways are no longer effective for us, and that we would be wise to follow your advice. You see, I believe it is important for any official—religious or otherwise—to be flexible as conditions change.”

“Certainly, Vedek Gar, I agree with you. But what I do not understand is, what exactly has changed that made you so abruptly shift your position? Other than the death of Kai Arin?”