Akaar looked up. “What word on the public reaction?”

“Grief, confusion, uncertainty—and a lot of angry voices talking over each other,” Lenaris said. “Militia HQ is receiving reports of demonstrations being organized by the isolationist groups, supposedly to commence in the next few hours. On the other side, the Vedek Assembly has come out in support of the First Minister’s call for calm and her request that people refrain from rushing to judgment until all the facts are known. Councillor zh’Thane’s appearance before the Chamber of Ministers and her interviews on the planetary newsfeeds have also gone over well. Advocates of unity with the Federation are planning a march on the Chamber of Ministers in Ashalla as a show of their support.”

Akaar shook his great head. “After all my years serving the Federation, I still marvel that democratic systems work at all.”

Lenaris looked faintly amused. “That’s not something I ever though I’d hear a Starfleet officer say, much less a fleet admiral.”

“Most Starfleet officers did not start life on Capella IV, General,” Akaar said. “There, clashes between conflicting ideologies are resolved on the edge of a sword, or a kligat.”

“General Lenaris,” Ensign Ling called from communications. “I have Vedek Yevir standing by. He wishes to speak with you about returning to Bajor.”

Lenaris sighed, but wasn’t surprised. After instructing Ling to put the call on screen, the general looked up to face the hollow oval frame suspended from the ops ceiling. An instant later Yevir’s face filled the frame. The Cardassian woman, Ekosha, was visible behind him. “Hello, General. Thank you for agreeing to speak with me. I know you must be very busy.”

“My communications officer tells me you want to return to Bajor, Vedek.”

“That’s correct, yes. In the face of the tragic events we have just experienced, it is more imperative than ever that we work together to give the people hope. Cleric Ekosha and I will bring the recovered Orbs to Bajor together, and begin moving forward with our plans for the Vedek Assembly and the Oralian Way to exchange permanent religious embassies.”

Ironic,Lenaris thought. Yevir is willing to create a foundation for peace with another planet through its religious leaders, yet he’s afraid of new ideas on matters of faith from his own people.Lenaris looked at the acting chief of operations, Lieutenant Nguyen. “Next available transport to Bajor, Lieutenant?”

“Departing from docking port three at 0830, sir.”

“Please arrange for Vedek Yevir and Cleric Ekosha’s passage on that ship, along with their cargo.”

“Aye, sir.”

“Thank you, General,” Yevir said.

“You’re welcome, Vedek. As you say, this is a time when we must all come together.” He allowed the real meaning of his words to sink in before adding, “Walk with the Prophets.”

“Walk with the Prophets,” Yevir echoed, and signed off. But Lenaris knew from the look on his face as he spoke the words that the general had scored a hit.

Lenaris had never cared much for Yevir Linjarin and his rigid orthodox pontifications on the Bajoran faith. That he had once been an officer in the Militia until a chance encounter with Captain Sisko changed his life somehow made it worse. Lenaris knew Yevir to be intelligent and sincere in his dedication to the spiritual welfare of Bajor, but it sometimes seemed as if the vedek had come to believe the touch of the Emissary had made his judgment infallible.

Yevir’s spearheading the Attainder of Kira Nerys had been the final straw for a growing number of the faithful. Increasingly alienated by a religious leadership that had become mired in politics and conformity since the halcyon days of Kai Opaka, many of these Bajorans, including Lenaris, had recently broken away from the mainstream religion. Now they walked their own path, choosing to exercise the free will that Kira Nerys had sacrificed her place in the faith to empower them with.

Bajor was evolving, Lenaris believed. Not just in body and mind, but in spirit. And it was this fundamental idea that Yevir and his fellow conservatives seemed incapable of accepting—that there might be more than one true way to experience the Prophets, more than one true way for Bajorans to explore their pagh.

The thought spurred him to look at Akaar. “Admiral, there’s something I’ve been meaning to ask you.”

“What is it, General?” said Akaar, who had been watching Lenaris’s conversation with Yevir without any obvious reaction.

“Bajor’s religion,” Lenaris began. “It can’t have escaped your notice, or Councillor zh’Thane’s, that a schism has developed among our faithful these past few months. Doesn’t such growing internal disharmony work against our eligibility for Federation membership?”

Akaar tilted his head to one side. “Are you attempting to convince me the Federation should reevaluate its acceptance of Bajor, General?”

“No,” Lenaris said. “But I confess to being a little confused. I had always understood that a planet had to be united before it could become a part of the Federation.”

“Politically united, yes,” Akaar said. “But no world—no union of worlds—is a monolithic entity in all things…most especially metaphysics,” he added with a wry smile. “Besides—and this is something that frustrates many of my fellow admirals, but amuses me no end—Federation science has yet to discover anything—and I do mean anything,General—about the Orbs, the wormhole, or the beings within it that is in any way inconsistent with the Bajoran religious interpretation. Many of these things still defy the understanding of our finest minds. Who, then, are we to judge your internal debates on the question of Bajor’s relationship to the Prophets? It may be that Bajor has much to teach us about that, and about many other things as well. That is our hope with every new world we embrace.”

Lenaris considered that before asking, “And where do you stand on the question?”

Akaar looked at him and smirked. “I am a soldier, General. I stand with the people I took an oath to protect. Always.”

The irony of having his own earlier words to Akaar bounced back to him didn’t escape Lenaris, but before he could fire off a retort, the illumination level in ops abruptly fell. The situation table and several interface screens went completely dark. Emergency lights came on, but the room was only a third as bright as it had been.

“We’ve lost primary power in ops,” Nguyen said. “Auxiliaries have kicked in, but most of our systems are down.”

“Can you get the primaries back up?” Lenaris asked.

“Trying,” Nguyen said. “It looks like an override from somewhere….” He tapped different sequences into his control interface, then slammed his hands on the console in frustration. “I’m locked out. We no longer have control of the station.”

“Then who does?” Akaar demanded.

An electronic hum from the transporter stage gave him his answer. A figure materialized and took a single step forward, phaser in hand, surveying the operations center with a glare that, Lenaris thought, could melt neutronium.

Ro Laren.

7

Bowers couldn’t believe what he was seeing. A Borg ship, here in the Gamma Quadrant—a region of space the collective wasn’t known to have penetrated before. And if the evidence could be believed, it had clashed with a Dominion ship, to the destruction of both vessels.