The shuttle doors hissed open with Shar jumping out first, standing aside while two Yrythny exited; the tall, handsomely dressed male cradled an unconscious female in his arms. All three passengers trudged toward him as if heavily burdened.

“Doctor,” Shar called. “We have a medical emergency.”

Thoughts of Ezri temporarily forgotten, Julian pulled out his medical tricorder and scanned the wounded Yrythny. “We’ll need to operate. It may take me a few minutes to synthesize her blood, but she should be fine,” he said to the Yrythny he now recognized as Jeshoh. “Shar, take our guests to sickbay. I’ll be right behind you.” Tapping his combadge he said, “Bashir to Richter. Prep for surgery. We have a Yrythny with a subdural hemotoma. I’ll be there presently.”

With the distraction of a new patient, Julian hadn’t heard Ezri exit the shuttle. He stopped when he suddenly heard:

“Hey. Can I walk with you?”

He paused, smiled broadly and reached for her proffered hand. All of him relaxed at her touch. For a moment they said nothing. Her appearance worried him, dark circles around her eyes, porcelain skin paler than normal, her shoulders hunched with fatigue.

“What exactly happened in there?” Julian asked, concerned.

She smiled weakly. “Ask me later. I just…I just want you to know I love you.”

“I love you, too,” he said simply, deciding it would be best not to press her for explanations now. They were back together. For now, that was enough. Julian draped an arm around her waist, and together they headed for the medical bay.

20

“Computer, lights at full illumination,” Shakaar ordered. He dropped his travel bag on his desk and began rooting around inside.

Kira waited for him to toss out some clothes and his other personal belongings before deciding to interrupt him. “I hope all is well on the Gryphon.”

Startled, he spun around. “How did you—?”

“You may be First Minister of Bajor, but this is still my station, Edon.”

“This couldn’t wait until morning?” he asked.

“No,” Kira said simply. She walked over beside him, braced herself against his desk and watched him sort through his travel bag.

Shakaar thumbed on his desk screen, perused a memo or two and replicated a glass of pooncheenee.Kira watched sedately, following his every move with her eyes. Finally, he motioned for her to take a seat; he dropped into his own chair, a rare occurrence since he preferred standing.

Electing to perch on the edge of his desk, she peered down at him. “Yesterday, Lieutenant Ro discovered that the Ziyal exhibit had been brutally vandalized.” Brutal understated the degree of calculated destruction. Twisted, maybe. Depraved, better.

His eyebrow shot up. “Have the culprits been identified?”

“No. But the damage was extensive.” Acids melting paints off canvases, water smudging delicate charcoals, knives slashing obscenities…as if Ziyal, through her work, had been tortured incrementally, murdered anew.

“Can the artwork be repaired?” Shakaar asked, putting away personal items from his bag.

“The curator can restore some of the pieces—it could take weeks.” Assuming she can be persuaded to stop crying at some point,Kira thought ruefully. “But there are a few that are beyond repair. Those pieces might be holographically reproduced, but the originals are irreparable.”

“Tragic,” Shakaar muttered, thoughtfully rubbing his chin with his thumb. He took another sip of his juice, pausing to peer over the glass at Kira who remained fixed where she sat. “You didn’t have to make this report in person.”

“I didn’t,” Kira admitted. “But I felt like what happened tonight at the exhibit can be attributed, in part, to a station environment hostile toward Cardassians. And I think you’re feeding that hatred, Minister.”

Mustering indignation, Shakaar spouted off a biting retort, but Kira dismissed it. “You know what I’m talking about, Shakaar. Don’t play coy with me.”

Lips pursed, he glared at her. Kira had known him long enough to recognize his shift into tactical mode as he tried to ascertain whether she was friend or foe. She sat, unflinching, while he appraised her. Finally, he said, “Go ahead. Get it off your chest. You’ll feel better.”

“You told Asarem to back out of the talks,” she said, modulating her anger by infusing her voice with syrup.

“Straight to the point, Nerys,” he smiled grudgingly. “I always liked that about you.”

“You don’t deny it, then?”

“You’ve never asked me for my position on the talks, you’ve only complained about Minister Asarem’s behavior and asked me to use my influence on her,” he rationalized.

“Don’t mince words with me, Shakaar,” Kira growled. “You knew what I was asking.”

“You wanted Minister Asarem to be nice to your Cardassian friends. I told Asarem to be less confrontational. I did what I said I would.”

“You have a chance to help Bajor and you run away like a deserter.”

“Part of being a leader is choosing between equally good options. Forging peace with Cardassia, as a Bajoran nation, is a good choice. But a simpler path—one that recognizes that our relationship with Cardassia will be normalized when we join the Federation—is also a good choice. Why choose the more complicated option?”

“Because we aren’t whole, as a people, without closure. As Bajor, sovereign and independent,” she argued. “You’ve always fought your own battles and now you’re turning the biggest one of all—the one that wins the war—over to someone else?”

Shakaar continued his oratory as if Kira weren’t even in the room. “Consider their gift, even. How like them, to remind us of our humiliation.”

“What?”

“All those pretty pictures, Nerys, they came from Dukat’s bastard. Because Dukat took a married woman from her home and children and raped her, a great artist was born. I’m not one who believes the ends justifies the means.”

“What does Ziyal have to do with peace negotiations?”

“The Cardassians don’t really want peace. They came here, with their gift,”he spat the word, “to remind us exactly who we are to each other. They’re the masters and we’re the slaves. Not while I’m First Minister of Bajor. Never again.”

“Ziyal was Bajoran, too!” she protested.

He laughed, dismissing her with the indulgent mien of a wise teacher amused by his student’s naïve assertions. Sipping his juice, he studied his desk screen and continued to putter about his office, blithely indifferent.

He’s misdirecting you. He wants to provoke you, make you lose your temper so he can discredit your accusations.Kira called on memory for strength. Holding the soft, cool hand of her dying friend against her cheek…Cackling voices from her childhood hissing that Cardassians were withoutpagh …The smell of her mother’s hair as she said good-bye….

Lies. Shakaar lied.Trembling, Kira dug her fingernails into the palms of her hands and rushed through a silent prayer. “Lending your support to the talks—giving Minister Asarem the go-ahead to negotiate—will help you let go of the past, Edon,” she pleaded softly. “Let it go.”

His face softening, Shakaar tenderly took her by the wrists and one hand at a time, pried her fingers off her palms, feather-tracing the remaining angry red indentations with his index finger.

A searing wave of bile scalded her throat. Who are you?

Jerking her hands away from Shakaar, she clenched them into fists and thrust them at her sides, sending his travel bag and the metal box he had just unpacked, clattering onto to the floor. The box opened, but nothing spilled out.