Cardassia and Andor Read online

  “Miles,” she said weakly, “what have you done to my home?”

  “Eh?” He looked around. “Oh, don’t worry about this. I’ll have it all back inside and the panel on again before you know.”

  But I already know…! she thought, and sighed, putting a hand to her forehead. From on top of her desk, the padd blinked at her, doggedly.

  “Aren’t you leaving for the capital in a few hours?” she said. “And are you packed yet?” Something else crossed her mind. “Is your presentation even ready?”

  He stuck his head again inside the panel and mumbled something.

  “I can’t hear you with your head in there, Miles.”

  He twisted his neck a little and glared at her. “I said, I’ll finish it on the ride up.”

  Keiko, who was a mother of two and had once been a schoolteacher, knew guilt the moment she saw it. “So,” she said, putting her hands on her hips, “Let me see if I’ve got this straight. Instead of finishing a presentation on which the whole future of this project may hang, you decided you were going to open up the wall, pull out a bunch of cables, and play with them?”

  He looked round at her, his expression one of complete bafflement. “To fix the temperature modulators,” he explained, as if to someone not quite following something very straightforward, and then he leaned over again. “Don’t you know by now that everything I do is done to make you happy, sweetheart?” he added, and then quickly, and wisely, put his head back inside the panel—where he bumped it, and swore again, under his breath.

  Keiko came away from the window, and cleared a space on the couch to sit. Yoshi climbed up beside her, and put his hand in hers. “Don’t play the innocent with me,” she said, stroking his hair. “I know you two—you’re both in this together.” He gave her a wide and guilt-free grin. Keiko tucked him under her arm, looked round at the anarchy into which her home had descended, and sighed.

  Earth, Deep Space 9, Cardassia…Nothing really changes….

  2

  Miles O’Brien is by no means the only person making a journey around Cardassia this night. As evening claimed the day, he packed and repacked an overnight bag. It is almost as old and tired as its owner feels right now, a little frayed at the seams, but still serviceable. A padd sits within it, pressed between the underclothes and the clean shirt. It contains almost half of a presentation. Almost. There is a faint hope that it will somehow have written itself in the morning. Not very rational, of course; but then improbable desires will persist, even in a modern man. Now it sits silent in the bag, which sits silent on the knee of the man who sits silently staring at his fellow travelers, rattling along in a curious vehicle, inhaling unburned hydrocarbons from an antiquated combustion engine that someone…how might he have put it…rescued from a museum, and put to more profitable use. With a few modifications, of course, to deal with the problems of fuel. Miles would be fascinated, if the night weren’t hot, and the driver weren’t the tiniest bit drunk.

  Eventually, this torment will end, of course; he is among a very few on the planet with access to Federation technology, and soon the starship orbiting Cardassia will relay him from the transporter station to which he is headed, passing him molecule by molecule to his destination in the capital.

  Others—no matter how elevated their status or urgent their business—are making do with more traditional means of transportation. One man, anxious to be home before full dark takes the capital city, nevertheless must pick his way cautiously over what was once the Department of Rhetorical Administration at the university. Eyes to the ground, flashlight casting thin rays before him, he is alert in a particular way, and so it is that he spots something most other men would miss. He stoops, and scrabbles at the debris, and exhumes it—a book. Most of the cover is torn off, the pages are blackened and a little charred at the edges. He turns it reverentially, as if fearing that further handling may cause it to disintegrate entirely. Enigma tales, he sees, and enjoys a fleeting moment of triumph. He does not have a copy of this one. He slips the book inside his jacket, and moves on. The oily blackness of the lake laps against the rubble, and his unsteady feet tingle at the thought of slipping beneath the cold ripples. In better days he never failed to enjoy this journey—perhaps that is why he had chosen this place for his business tonight—and as he stumbles on he takes some comfort in his find.

  Another traveler, slightly luckier, is nonetheless unused to the combination of broken roads and antiquated vehicles that passes these days for infrastructure. One hand clutches at a plastic cup while the other manipulates the contents of a padd, and he has braced himself by planting both feet firmly—if inelegantly—against the seat in front. And then his carriage jolts forward, and he lurches with it, and he hisses in pain and irritation as the hot liquid of his fish juice slops and spills upon his lap. He looks around for something to use to wipe up the mess, and then tuts as he must make do with dabbing it away with his sleeve. How, he wonders, can one meet a valued colleague and friend when one is…mired?

  It is no mean feat, then, to make a journey around Cardassia these days—and all these gentlemen are, in fact, exceptional. For most of the populace elects not to risk the new perils that the streets present, and on the whole choose to remain indoors—or, at least, under shelter—from the dark, and from the rain. On another night, even these men would have remained in the peace of their homes, offering what hospitality they can to their friends, and what comfort they have for their families. But the call has been put out and, ever dutiful, they must prepare themselves. They must brave the streets, and all their intractable ways.

  This, then, is how things are set tonight upon Cardassia. The ordinary folk are hunkered down and hoping for nothing more than the sight of another gray morning. Some are more ambitious, and they move about, and take their business onward with them. And Miles O’Brien sits at a makeshift desk in a wreck masquerading as a hotel room, drafting and redrafting until, long after Keiko would have despaired of him ever coming to bed, he is finished, and the dawn is clawing at the window.

  3

  A forlorn morning light touched what remained of the capital city. Garak raised his face for a moment to savor the rays of the pale sun, and then hurried across the street. He chose the shortcut over the flattened ruin of Victory Square (something of a misnomer now, he thought), rather than taking his usual route and following what had once been the boulevard itself. Now, that was a strange habit, he decided, as he picked his way expertly over the rubble, always choosing the path that was no longer there—as if walking along the lost paved ways of the city would somehow conjure them up, as if mapping out the geography of the place would somehow bring it into being once again.

  A damp breeze began to lift, picking up a bit of rubbish just ahead of him. Garak contemplated stopping and clearing it up, and then kicked it out of the way instead. He was already late, and not much inclined to engage in futile endeavor this early in the morning. Better to save that for later.

  He hopped over what was left of a wall, and spied O’Brien already waiting for him outside the squat, gray block of offices. He was looking in the other direction. A smile crept across Garak’s lips. It was…unfortunate, what had happened between himself and the chief on Empok Nor. O’Brien had always been so exceptionally polite about it, indeed had never mentioned it again, although it was—perhaps inevitably—always there…. Garak slowed his pace to move more quietly, came up behind O’Brien in his blind spot, and tapped him on the shoulder.

  O’Brien nearly went into orbit. He swung round, and then glared when he saw who it was. “Chrissakes, Garak—are you trying to give me a heart attack?”

  “My apologies, Chief,” Garak said cheerfully, and without a hint of contrition, his mood much lifted. “I didn’t mean to startle you, I’m sure.”

  “You’ve got a bloody strange sense of humor, do you know that?”

  “You wouldn’t deny me a little joy, now would you?” he murmured, and held out his hand. O’Brien took it, shook it.
“Welcome back to the capital,” he added. “How was your journey down?”

  “Fine, thanks.” O’Brien hesitated before releasing his hand. “You’re looking tired,” he said, frankly.

  “No doubt because it’s far too early in the morning,” Garak responded smoothly. “And—I confess—the thought of the day ahead does weary me a little…. Shall we get some breakfast? There’s still time before the session starts.”

  The sky was clouding over and it was starting to rain—thin, black rain. O’Brien grunted his assent. Garak led him round the side of the office block, down what had once been a side street and was now an uneven patchwork of temporary buildings, and toward an odd structure put together from larger pieces of stone and metal that had survived the Jem’Hadar onslaught. A welcoming smell of cooking emerged from this odd place, getting stronger as Garak pushed the door open. O’Brien sniffed appreciatively.

  “A lot of the Federation staff from the embassy come here,” Garak told him, leading the way in and picking a table next to the window. “So you won’t have to suffer Cardassian cuisine.” And it was warm, and it was dry. And, in addition to these advantages over much of the city, it was also a good place to sit and listen to what government officials—onworld and offworld—were talking about. Garak didn’t bother to add that. He took the seat in the corner, put his back to the wall, and surveyed the room. Old habits died hard. O’Brien sat down opposite.

  They exchanged pleasantries as they ordered and then waited for the food, Garak asking about O’Brien’s family, hearing the news from Andak.

  “Big day for Keiko today,” O’Brien said. “Vedek Yevir is paying the base a visit.”

  “Ah yes,” Garak said softly. His eyes lit briefly in amusement. “The turbulent priest. Try not to mention him when you see Ghemor later—he does tend to start grinding his teeth rather when the vedek’s name comes up. Our beloved but harried leader would like even a little of his favorable press coverage.”

  “Yevir certainly knows how to make a splash.”

  “All for the glory of the Prophets, I’m sure,” Garak said, sitting back as the plates arrived, and noting with some relief O’Brien’s evident satisfaction at what had been put in front of him. “And in selfless pursuit of peace between our peoples. We’re all on the same side these days, it seems. Although I do wonder sometimes if I preferred it when I knew precisely who my enemies were.”

  O’Brien looked at him, furrowed his brow, and didn’t answer.

  Garak made a preliminary assault on his breakfast, and brooded a bit. “This place is on the site of what was an Obsidian Order facility,” he said after a moment or two, in a conversational tone. “Well, its cellars were, at any rate—I think the offices on top dealt in transportation logistics. I often wondered, after the Order collapsed, whether there was anyone still Down Below—” He put the capital letters on for O’Brien’s benefit; no one at the Order would ever have been so vulgar. “—whether they languished on for a while, waiting for someone who would never come…” He waved his fingers suggestively.

  O’Brien stopped to look at him, his fork halfway to his mouth. “Remind me never to take you up on that offer of a tour of the city,” he said. “I’m not entirely sure I want your, ah, unique perspective.” He took the forkful, swallowed, stared at his companion, and frowned. “I think you should get away from the city for a bit, Garak. Go offworld. You’re getting morbid.”

  Indeed, I seem much possessed by death these days. When I look at my fellow citizens, all I see is the skull beneath the skin.

  “My apologies,” Garak said, meaning it this time, and shifting the food around on his plate with his fork. He looked out of the window. The rain was coming down more heavily. Across the way, there was a medical center, and a queue already stretched outside, despite the early hour, despite the rain. Tzeka fever was not a killer—if you could get the drugs and the water filters out quickly enough. If you could. Now how would O’Brien put it? Oh yes, that was it. Bloody depressing.

  “Do you ever regret leaving the station?”

  Garak looked up sharply, but O’Brien’s attention was firmly fixed upon his breakfast.

  “Where I could have spent the rest of my days sewing? Not quite my style, wouldn’t you agree?” He glanced out of the window again. “Anyway, Cardassia doesn’t let go that easily…” he murmured, and then forced out a smile. “Better to be directing events on a ruined world than directing nothing at all, don’t you think?” He sighed, overdramatically. “What a fate! At my time of life, to be reduced to upholding democracy.”

  O’Brien snorted. “How is the castellan?”

  Garak raised an eye ridge. “Alon?”

  “Oh, first-name terms, I see!”

  “Old school friend,” Garak murmured, and then admitted defeat—as far as his breakfast was concerned, at least—and put down his fork. “The same as ever. Shrewd. Dedicated. Perhaps a little too sincere for his own good…” Reminds me a bit of Damar, in fact—although his oratory is not so interminable. Nor impromptu, thankfully.

  “I would have thought a little sincerity would go down well these days.”

  “I think a decent supply of water would go down better.”

  “Early days yet, Garak,” O’Brien said gently.

  “He’s appointed a new political advisor,” Garak said, changing the subject. “A youngish man, name of Mev Jartek.” He frowned. “I’m not too sure of…his background—not yet, anyway. He wasn’t military, at any rate.”

  “What do you think of him?”

  Garak tapped his fingers for a moment on the salvaged plastic of the table, and stared at the queue outside. It didn’t seem to have moved. And the rain was still falling. “He wears bad suits,” he said.

  O’Brien choked slightly on his coffee. “Surely you can’t hold that against him…!”

  “What else do you need to know about a man?”

  “Well—friend or foe?”

  Garak gave a dry smile. “But I thought we were all friends these days,” he reminded O’Brien, then shrugged. “You’ll see him for yourself later. I wouldn’t mind hearing your opinion of him, to be honest.”

  “Will he be at the committee meeting?”

  Garak nodded.

  “I’ll keep an eye out for him then.” O’Brien set down his cup, suddenly businesslike. “How do you see this session playing out, Garak? Anyone I need to watch out for? Any foes?”

  Garak glanced round the room again. No one to worry about that he could see, but he leaned in a little further, and lowered his voice. “You’ll be giving the S.C.E.’s recommendation that the funding goes to Andak, yes?”

  The conclusions of O’Brien’s report were technically embargoed until he had made his presentation to the appropriations committee—but he was among friends, after all. He inclined his head.

  Garak took that to mean assent. “Well, I should hope so,” he murmured, with a curve of his lips. “You’re in a strong position as the representative from Starfleet—well, few of us on Cardassia are overly keen to get on the wrong side of you these days; hardly unreasonable of us, as I’m sure you’d agree—but there are still some fairly strong opponents of the Andak Project on the committee. There’s Entor, for one.”

  “Entor?”

  “Former gul. And the Directorate’s main representative on the committee.” Garak drummed his fingers on the table again, impatiently this time, and pursed his lips. “I’m sure it’s not the case that the Directorate go out of their way to oppose each one of Ghemor’s policy initiatives, but it certainly seems that way. The cut and thrust of the democratic process seem to have gone straight to their pompous heads. Entor will be tough in his questioning.”

  “I can cope. And the S.C.E.’s recommendations are perfectly clear, after all.” O’Brien had taken care to lower his own voice, Garak noticed. Well, he’d done covert ops too, of course. “Starfleet won’t be pleased if funding is diverted from Andak into a project like the one at Setekh.”

  �
��Well, don’t expect Entor to roll over and agree just because Starfleet says so. And…” Garak hesitated, lowered his voice further, “don’t be surprised if he gets in a few shots about your wife being director of the Andak research.”

  O’Brien nearly spluttered his coffee over the table. “He wouldn’t dare—”

  “Be prepared—I mean it. Ghemor’s staked a lot of political capital on getting the Andak Project funded, and Entor won’t shy away from using anything at his disposal to undermine him. He’ll count blackening your name and that of your lovely lady wife as a good day’s work.” Garak shifted in his chair, leaned forward again to emphasize his point. “This man is hardly committed to the cause of Cardassian democracy, O’Brien. He sees quick solutions as the most desirable solutions, and he sees the military as the ones to deliver them. So have your answer to that one ready.”

  O’Brien nodded. “You’re the expert, Garak.”

  “Indeed I am.” And will he spot that lie? Garak wondered. This game is new to me, although I seem to recognize many of its rules…. Or am I just mapping the old city onto the new one, hoping to find something familiar? That could be a mistake….

  “Anyone else I need to watch out for?” O’Brien asked, dragging Garak’s attention back to him.

  “For the moment, no. Ghemor wants to talk to you after your presentation—you’re not hurrying back to Andak, are you?”

  “No particular rush. Keiko’s got everything under control—well, I hope she has, it’s her job, after all.”

  They stood up, paid, left. Outside, the rain and the queue had settled in for the day. A Federation patrol passed by, four young officers, peacekeeper forces. They eyed the queue warily. The queue eyed them back, balefully.