“Captain, the attackers are veering off and reversing course,” Tenmei said. “Should I pursue?”
“No, Ensign. There’s a ship in distress, and that has to take precedence. Besides, we still have no idea what prompted either their attack on us or their pursuit of the damaged ship.”
Vaughn turned toward Bowers, who was working the controls with calm alacrity, one hand touching his ear-piece. His silent frown of concentration spoke volumes to Vaughn. “Anything intelligible coming from that damaged vessel, Mr. Bowers?”
“I’m getting a lot of audio-channel chatter, sir, some of it on some pretty unusual frequencies. But the UT doesn’t seem able to parse their language.”
Hunter spoke up then, punching a button on his console that restored the screen image solely to that of the noisy aliens. “Captain, it looks like some of the aliens are wounded. Whether we can understand them or not, I think they could use our help.”
Vaughn studied the viewscreen and could see that Hunter was indeed correct. In the background, some of the aliens were staggering, clutching appendages that were slickened with dark, viscous fluids that appeared to have leaked out of compromised exoskeletons. One hovered over a fallen comrade, clearly trying to tend to its injuries.
Vaughn punched a button on his armrest, opening a communication channel. “Nurse Richter, muster up whatever medical staff you can. You’re about to have company, and some of them appear to be in a bad way. Ensign Gordimer, please have an armed security detachment report to the medical bay. Chief Chao, prepare to beam wounded parties directly there on Lieutenant Bowers’s signal.”
Vaughn turned back to Bowers and nodded curtly. The tactical officer began recording transporter coordinates from the crippled alien vessel. On the screen, several of the wounded aliens began to shimmer out of existence, causing even greater consternation among their spindly fellows.
“Oh, for crying out loud.” Vaughn put his fingers to his forehead, wincing. “Mr. Bowers, patch a visual feed from the medical bay to the other ship so they know we’re trying to help their crewmen and aren’t just kidnapping them. And keep trying to find a way to communicate with them.”
“Yes, sir,” Bowers acknowledged and set immediately to work.
Vaughn turned back to the front of the bridge. “Prynn…Ensign Tenmei, please find out where the shuttlecraft Sagan is and get her crew back here on the double. Dr. Bashir certainly picked a fine time to go out on a survey mission.”
Easing back into the captain’s chair, Vaughn sighed heavily. He studied the screen for a moment, watching the panicked, herky-jerky movements of the aliens. The image summoned an unbidden recollection of a comical children’s holovid he had seen during his youth.
“I can’t raise the Sagan, Captain,” Tenmei said, breaking his brief reverie. “In fact, I’m getting no signal from the shuttle at all.”
Comedy was suddenly the furthest thing from Vaughn’s mind.
3
Colonel Kira Nerys had hoped to wend her way through the Promenade without being noticed. She had only been back from visiting Bajor—and Kasidy Yates—for a short time, and she felt certain that she would find every trauma in the quadrant metaphorically stacked on her desk when she reached her office. Thus, when she heard the clipped and slightly reptilian voice calling her name, she had to muster her resolve not to ignore it.
“Colonel Kira, may I have a moment?” the Cardassian said, catching up to her.
“Certainly, Gul Macet. What do you need?” Kira felt a surge of relief at the prospect of being reprieved from her office backlog, however briefly. She smiled; it was gradually getting easier to do that around Macet, though the fact that he was a virtual double of Gul Skrain Dukat—visually, if not morally—still made any sort of exchange of pleasantries a bit tense.
“I wanted to revisit our previous discussion regarding the Cardassia–Bajor peace talks. It’s been two weeks now since the negotiations stalled. Two weeks since I had to ferry Ambassador Lang back to Cardassia Prime empty-handed.”
This wasn’t news to Kira, though she found it hard to believe that two weeks could have passed so quickly.
Nodding, she said, “Yet you’re back here, even without the ambassador.”
“To do whatever I can to hasten the time when she and our other official representatives might be invited back to the bargaining table. I have waited patiently while you have—I presume—applied pressure on the Chamber of Ministers to bring this about. But how much longer must I wait, Colonel? How much longer must my people wait?” Macet opened his eyes wide, a nonverbal signal that, Kira had learned, was common to Cardassians who had just said something provocative and expected a response.
Kira wasn’t at all surprised by Macet’s question, nor by his obviously mounting impatience. Shortly after Second Minister Asarem Wadeen had taken a hard line with newly appointed Cardassian ambassador Natima Lang during the last round of peace talks—thereby causing their collapse—Macet had asked her to weigh in on the matter with First Minister Shakaar Edon, using whatever political pull she could muster.
What a joke, Kira thought. She was well aware that the problem of Bajor’s intransigence extended all the way to the highest levels; culpability for the failure of the talks lay not with Asarem, but with First Minister Shakaar himself. This, of course, wasn’t something she could reveal to Macet, no matter how much she had come to trust him of late.
Macet cleared his throat. “Well?”
Kira sighed, her smile collapsing as she shook her head. “I’m afraid we may have to resign ourselves to waiting a while longer.”
“A while,” Macet repeated, his eyes narrowing slightly.
“A very brief while, if that’s any consolation.”
“Ah. After Bajor officially enters the Federation, you mean. The talks will resume, but only after the Federation takes responsibility for them.”
A hard lump formed in Kira’s throat. She didn’t like this any more than Macet did. “I’m afraid so,” she said, her voice a hoarse whisper.
Macet was silent for a long
