“But, sir,” said Croth. “You said yourself that the transmitters were destroyed….”

“We need to send Captain Solok a message,” Kira insisted, “something he’ll know immediately is from me so he’ll order the task force to stand down. I need an alternative to conventional communications.”

Croth considered. “We could tap out a message using the running lights on the hull,” he suggested.

“No good,” Kira said. “It might take them too long to notice, assuming they noticed at all. We need to get Solok’s attention immediately.”An idea occurred to her. “What if we used the phasers?”

“Sir,” Spillane said, “if we start using the phasers now, the task force almost certainly won’t hesitate to use deadly force against us.”

The ship rocked again. Bhatnagar reported shields were down to fifteen percent.

“I don’t think they’ve been pulling their punches up to now, Lieutenant. Reconfigure the aft phasers to one one-hundredth power and fire short bursts away from those ships. We want to tap out a message in Starfleet’s most basic code.”

Spillane nodded, working her console. “I can do that, but it better be damn short, sir.”

“Just two words: Manufactured triumph.”

The other officers looked at each other. Kira realized she must have sounded as if she were out of her mind. Fortunately, they all knew they had no time to argue with her.

“Firing phasers,” Spillane said. Her hand danced rhythmically on her control interface. On the viewscreen the phaser beams flashed in perfect synch with Spillane’s taps, firing harmlessly into the void.

Another blast shook the bridge. “Shields are gone,” Bhatnagar announced, and Kira knew she had failed.

“Sir,” Croth said suddenly. “T’Kumbrais matching course and velocities alongside us. Sagittariusand Polarisare doing likewise above and below.”

Kira rose from her chair and stared at the viewscreen, now showing an image of the Nebula-class ship. “Any new transmissions?” Kira asked.

Croth studied his console and shook his head. “Negative. However, their torpedo tubes are open and loaded.”

Kira held her breath, waiting. Come on, Solok, put it together….

Seconds went by in silence. Then the sound of transporter beams filled the bridge, and six columns of light solidified into the forms of a half-dozen armed Vulcans in Starfleet uniforms, standing in front of the view-screen. Solok was among them. His eyes found Kira, who stood in the middle of the bridge, and he raised an eyebrow. “Colonel Kira. Permission to come aboard.”

Kira almost laughed. “Granted, Captain. Thanks for dropping in. We could use some help getting the Gryphonback under control.”

Solok put his people to work with the Gryphon’s crew, then turned his attention back to Kira. “Captain Mello?” he asked.

“Dead,” Kira reported. “Killed by her first officer, who engineered this mess to begin with and who is also dead.”

Solok simply nodded. “You took quite a risk, gambling that I would grasp the meaning of your phaser barrage.”

“Not really,” Kira said evenly. “I had nothing to lose.”

“And what would you have done if you had faced a different starship captain?”

Kira arched an eyebrow at him. “I guess we’ll never know.”

“Indeed,” Solok said. “I’m beginning to believe I may have much to learn from further study of manufactured triumphs.”

“Good luck with that,” Kira replied. “You’ll be hard-pressed to find as good a teacher as the one I had.”

Twenty-six hours later, with the help of T’Kumbra’s engineers, Gryphonwas restored to full functionality. Sagittariusand Polarishad recovered all of Gryphon’s escape pods with no fatalities, and reunited them with their mothership. Kira bowed out of leading the memorial services for Captain Mello and Commander Montenegro, allowing those of Gryphon’s officers who knew them best to eulogize them, while she stood among the crew, mourning as one of many.

When the services were over, Kira returned to the bridge as the ship prepared to get under way for its return voyage to Deep Space 9. Once back at the station, she would relinquish command. This wasn’t over by a long shot, she knew. But at least they’d saved Trill.

“Message coming in, Commander,” Spillane reported from tactical. “It’s from a Trill military transport, approaching us on an intercept course.”

Kira looked toward the viewer. “On screen.”

The starfield was replaced by the face of large male Trill with white hair and deep frown lines mingling with the dark spots that ran down either side of his face. “Colonel Kira,” he began. “I’m General Taulin Cyl of the Trill Defense Ministry. I request permission to come aboard.”

Kira’s eyes narrowed. “May I assume this is about the assassination of First Minister Shakaar?”

“It’s about much more than that, Colonel,” General Cyl said. “I’m aware of what you’ve been through during the past few days. And you deserve to know the truth—you needto know the truth, so we can work together to face what’s coming.”

“Which is what, precisely?” Kira asked.

“The parasites are waging a war, Colonel. And regardless of what you may think, it isn’t a war for power. It’s a war of revenge.”

“Against what?”

“Against the symbionts,” Cyl explained. “Humanoids are not the targets of the parasites’ war, and we never were. We’re the battlefield.”

Epilogue

“Wormhole in one hour, sir,” Bowers said. “Still no response from the station.”

“The relay might be malfunctioning,” Dax said, standing at Vaughn’s shoulder.

Vaughn nodded. “Let’s hope that’s all it is.” Four months ago, in preparation for their mission, Defiantand her crew had deployed a subspace relay at the Gamma terminus of the wormhole in order to make communications practical between the Alpha Quadrant and the Gamma Quadrant. During the last few days, however, ever since Vaughn had lifted the comm blackout, there had been no word from the station, and no indication that Defiant’s own attempts at communications were being received.

So this is it,Vaughn thought. I began this mission with such hopes, with so much exuberance, with a ship and crew ready to take on new challenges in the unknown. Now I end it feeling more battered and weary than I did before I encountered that Orb in the Badlands. Why? Why reunite me with my daughter only so we’d be driven apart? Why guide me here only to make me face the same choice? Why did Ruriko have to die again?

“Captain.”

Vaughn turned in the center seat. There was something in Shar’s voice that demanded immediate attention. “Ensign?”

“Sir, I’m conducting long-range scans of the space surrounding the wormhole,” Shar began. “I had thought to determine the status of the relay…”

“Yes, Ensign?”

“Captain, the relay is gone.”

Shar’s words were like a knife in the gut. Before the Dominion war, the first automated relay that personnel from Deep Space 9 had deployed in the Gamma Quadrant had been destroyed by the Dominion—a prelude to the years of conflict that followed. “Was it destroyed?”