“Not a vision,” she told him. “At least, not about the Order.”

The soldier nodded, looked grave for a moment. “The Order can’t decipher the encryption that I have used. Our friend has assured me of that.”

She knew that he was sure of his “friend’s” loyalty, and she didn’t doubt that there was at least one Obsidian Order shadow who walked the Way, whose allegiance to Oralius was greater than his allegiance to Enabran Tain, even though the aging head of the Obsidian Order inspired a fierce loyalty in many of his agents. Still, the Order troubled her—all Cardassians had a healthy respect for the Obsidian Order, and a person in Astraea’s position would naturally fear them more than the average citizen.

“But you have seen something, then,”the soldier deduced.

“Yes,” she confirmed, thinking upon her recent dreams. “A Bajoran. A religious man. I don’t know his name, but I have a picture of where he might be. It is not far from the place where I experienced my first visions of Bajor…”

“Kendra,”the soldier said.

“As you say.” Astraea knew nothing of Bajoran geography, only what she saw in her visions.

“What have you foreseen regarding this man?”

She paused, trying to put into words the things she had sensed about the Bajoran. She was often frustrated by the cryptic “awarenesses” she experienced; even after years of working to cultivate the ability, her impressions were regularly less than enlightening. But then, the Way was a path, not a goal; Oralius taught that many truths were subjective. It was a lesson she continued to struggle with.

“Cardassia needs him. He will bring peace between the two worlds someday, though I don’t know when it will happen.” He seemed to be waiting for more, and she pursed her lips. “That is all,” she told him. “I’m sorry.”

The soldier nodded, patiently accepting the fragmentary nature of her prophecies. “You must tell me if you see anything more.”

“Of course,” she said. “Now. What do you have to tell me, Glinn Sa’kat?” It was clear from his expression that he had information. More often than not, his transmissions bore news that frightened her. While the two shared a mutual affection that sometimes seemed to border on intimate, at least for her, he did not call her without serious motive. Her pleasure at seeing him was always tarnished by what he had to say.

“Our friend tells me that the agent who has been assigned to seek out the Oralians has finally found the object that you hid at the Ministry of Science.”

Astraea felt her heart sink. While she believed that the so-called Orb would remain silent for anyone who was unworthy, she also feared that whoever wielded it would undeniably have access to a great source of power, a means of controlling others who sought it. If the Obsidian Order took hold, the Orb would be impossible to recover.

“It will reveal nothing for them,” she said with flickering certainty.

“Nothing…except perhaps your whereabouts,”the soldier said softly. “The object’s shipping container had a digital log, a log that clearly recorded the identification numbers of all who came in contact with it during its stay at the Ministry of Science. Miras Vara was the last person known to have handled that object. The Order has not yet connected the item to us, but it is only a matter of time. Our friend has very emphatically suggested that you change your location.”

Astraea took a moment to catch her breath. She had just begun to grow fond of the makeshift shrine where she was currently holding services, and leaving it behind would be an unwelcome upheaval. “Where should I go?” she asked him, without rhetoric.

“You must go to Cardassia City.”

“But—”

“It is the only way. The best means to stay out of the sight of the Order is to be right under their nose. Our friend is going to arrange a place in the Torr sector where you will be safe.”

“But the Walkers here…”

“It is the only way,”he replied firmly, and then he stopped speaking as his comcuff signaled. “I must go.”

“May you walk with Oralius,” she said to him, but he had already signed off.

Dukat was agitated, going over the daily output reports in his office alone. There had been a significant drop in productivity in the last few years, and it was getting markedly worse with each service quartile. The reports in front of him painted a bleak picture of whether his tenure here was going to be regarded as a success or failure; he feared it had long been edging toward the latter, through no fault of his own.

He knew that back on his homeworld, many people were beginning to wag their tongues about diminishing resources in and around B’hava’el, the star system that was home to Bajor. But it wasn’t for lack of resources that the output had begun to wane. It was because the civilian government had pressured Central Command into withholding funds for numerous ventures here, ventures begun and then abandoned when the stores of minerals were not immediately as abundant as they had been decades ago, at the annexation’s very start. The Detapa Council had once been nothing but a figurehead, but they were steadily gaining power, thanks in part to the family of Kotan Pa’Dar, a political rival of Dukat’s for many years now. Pa’Dar was the exarch of Tozhat, a Cardassian settlement on the surface of Bajor, and he made no secret of his opinion that the Bajoran “project,” as he called it, should be retired. The prefect could not disagree more, and the reports he saw in front of him were clearly illustrative of why it would be an expensive mistake to think otherwise. Pa’Dar was a shortsighted fool.

His companel chimed. One of the duty officers in operations addressed him briskly. “Gul Dukat, this is Gil Trakad.”

“What is it?”

“Reporting, sir—the delayed shipment of mining equipment has finally arrived.”

Dukat sighed heavily. “Well! How very kind of the Valerians to finally bring us our merchandise! Inform the captain that I expect a formal explanation for the tardiness of this shipment.”

The young gil hesitated. “It was not the Valerians who delivered this cargo, sir. Their ship experienced a mechanical failure and was forced to make an emergency landing in the Solvok system.”

Dukat leaned back in his chair. “I see,” he said. “So, who, exactly, has brought us our much-anticipated package, Gil?”

“It…it couldn’t be helped, sir, the ship grounded on the Solvok moon, and there are a limited number of ships that run through that system, this time of year—”

Annoyed, Dukat switched on his holoframe to have a look at the security images that cycled along the docking ring and the cargo bays. What he saw instantly made his lip curl, for a familiar-looking ship had docked, and its crew was beginning to unload its cargo. The rust-colored vessel had a bloated aft end tapering toward a much narrower front—a bit like a stubbier, backward version of a Cardassian scoutship. But Dukat knew too well the design of this courier, and he spoke with the force of a curse.

“Ferengi.”

Natima Lang did not particularly enjoy these assignments, interviewing soldiers as they arrived home from the conflict along the border territories. The brown-uniformed troops who disembarked from their ships at the Mekisar military base outside of Cardassia City were usually exhausted from the long journey home, not to mention the horrors they had experienced on the front lines against the Federation.

Natima knew that her world struggled to keep up with the superior forces of the Federation troops; the Federation had more sophisticated weaponry, and their ships had much better tracking and dodging capabilities than any Cardassian vessel. But then, the Federation lacked something that Cardassia had in no short supply, and that was a particular brand of pride and self-respect that Natima knew was unsurpassed in the entire known galaxy. Cardassia would fight to its last breath over those territories. Whether it was the right thing to do, however, she could not say. She only knew that she was expected to retrieve appropriate sound bites from the returning soldiers to bolster the morale of her people, and she meant to do her job.