Kira had not intended to get anything for herself from the replicator, but now she decided otherwise, wanting to maintain every small measure of control over this meeting that she could. She turned away from the admiral and ordered a raktajino.The replicator brightened and hummed, a mug materializing on the shelf in a haze of illumination. The hearty scent of the steaming liquid immediately floated through the room. Kira wrapped an index finger through the handle of the mug and lifted it to her lips. She imagined Akaar seething behind her at her deliberate movements, but when she turned and walked back to her desk, his face remained impassive. He had put his padd on the edge of her desk, she saw.

“So—” Kira said as she set the mug down and sat in her chair, but the admiral interrupted almost before the word had even left her mouth.

“Colonel,” he said, “it has come to my attention that, in the past two years, the Federation has provided Bajor with a number of large and mid-scale industrial replicators. Would you please detail for me the uses to which they have been put?” As had happened during their first meeting, Kira found the admiral’s inquiry more like an order.

“Well,” she finally said, “I’m aware that two of the large replicators are in use at the Bajoran shipyards.” And as quickly as that, she realized, Akaar had seized control of the meeting. She peered down at the cool, reflective surface of her desk, at the inverted image of the admiral between her padd and the mug of raktajino,and she thought it fortunate that no weapon happened to be lying within arm’s reach at the moment, or she might not have been able to resist the temptation to use it.

“Two?” he asked. “Do you believe that is a sufficient number to support military readiness for Bajor?”

Kira felt as though a warning shot had been fired across her bow. These questions followed in the same vein as those Akaar had asked when he had first arrived at the station, implicitly impugning the Bajoran government, and perhaps even the Bajoran people. “Forgive me, Admiral,” she said, striving to retain some measure of diplomacy, “but isn’t this information available to you from other sources than me?” She resisted her inclination to further suggest that Akaar had already acquired the data he now purported to seek from her.

“Regardless, Colonel,” Akaar said, “does that mean that you cannot—or will not—answer my questions?”

A surge of energy coursed through Kira’s body along with the anger rising in her. She felt the need to get up and move about her office as a means of dispersing her frustration. Such an action, though, would likely cede even more control over the meeting to Akaar. Instead, she reached up and rested her arms atop her desk.

“I can answer your question, Admiral, and I will,” she told him. “But I’m the one who asked you here.” Three days ago,she added to herself, and then it occurred to her that his meeting had nothing at all to do with her request to see Akaar; it was taking place now only because hewanted to see her.

“Of course, if you are not comfortable discussing your people…” the admiral said, as though Kira had not spoken at all. He allowed his thought to remain unfinished.

“Not at all,” Kira responded, with what she took to be just a little too much detachment to be completely convincing. She worked the console on her desk, accessing the latest reports she had regarding Bajoran shipbuilding. “There is a third large-scale IR in use at the shipyards, as well as two mid-scale units,” she said.

The admiral nodded almost imperceptibly. “Do you think Bajor is committed to its own defense right now?”

“Of course it is,” Kira said, her voice rising. “The common defense is one of the central foundations of our government. But I don’t care how many replicators the Federation has provided, they’re still spread pretty thinly across Bajor. If you’re implying that there is some other—”

“I am implying nothing,” Akaar said calmly. “I only wish to know if you believe that Bajor is prepared to stand on its own.”

“I believe that’s what I said, Admiral,” she told him, and she could hear her anger slipping into her voice.

“And what are your reasons for believing that?” he asked.

Kira brought her hands down flat on the surface of her desk, spread wide, fighting the urge to push herself up out of her chair and stalk through the office. “You know what, Admiral?” she said. “I think maybe this is a conversation you’d be better off having with First Minister Shakaar or Minister of Defense Reydau.”

“I am having this conversation with you,” Akaar said, and for an instant, his eyes smoldered. Kira thought she saw anger there, but not just anger—something else that she somehow perceived had nothing at all to do with either her or Bajor. “Your people are widely regarded as spiritual, Colonel,” he went on, the look on his face gone so quickly that Kira wondered if she had imagined it. “Is it possible that your collective spirituality defines your society so much that it precludes developing a strong military infrastructure?”

“Admiral,” Kira said, taking her hands from atop the desk and dropping them onto the arms of her chair. “The number of replicators we choose to use in the shipyards can’t be used to characterize our dedication to defending Bajor. There are other needs: housing, roads, dams, power plants…” Kira did not appreciate having to defend her people. But she also believed in her people, and she took strength from that belief. “As a society, we must defend ourselves, but we’re also accountable for other responsibilities. And yes, our spirituality guides us along our collective path.”

“What about those not on the path?” Akaar asked.

Kira erupted, the oblique reference to the Attainder the final disrespect she was willing to take from this man. She slapped her hands onto the desktop and shot up out of her chair. “That’s it,” she said. “This meeting is over.”

Akaar looked at her, his eyes almost on a level with hers even though he remained seated. He wore his face like an empty mask. He did not move. “Colonel,” he said. “I am simply asking about your people, trying to learn about their ways of life, about who they are.”

“There’s been nothing simple about any of your questions, Admiral,” she said. “In the few times you’ve talked to me since your arrival, you’ve managed to question Bajor’s commitment to providing aid to Cardassia, our willingness to defend ourselves, our spirituality, the way I run this station, and now the Attainder.”

Akaar gradually stood up to his full and imposing height. Kira, at half a meter shorter, never took her gaze from his. She refused to be intimidated—not by his size, not by his rank, not by anything. “I was not making reference to your Attainder,” Akaar said, and Kira thought that maybe— maybe—his demeanor had melted a bit; had he perhaps perceived that he had crossed the line? “I am not here to pry into your personal life.”

“Why areyou here?” she demanded. Kira did not expect an answer, since none had been provided by the admiral during his time on the station, but this time, she actually received several.

“I am in the Bajoran system to meet with Councillor zh’Thane and Minister Shakaar,” Akaar said. “I am on Deep Space 9 to help preside over a summit. And I am in your office to inform you that, three days from now, a delegation from Bajor, and two from the United Federation of Planets, will be arriving on this station.”

“A summit?” Kira echoed. “Delegations.” Her mind spun back to her first meeting with Akaar, when she had guessed at the reason for his visit. “Does this have to do with Bajor being admitted to the Federation?” she asked. Again she did not expect the admiral to be forthcoming with information, and again he surprised her.

“It does,” he told her.