“We’ll find out, won’t we?” She started to leave. I had no choice but to follow.

“What is this . . . support group?” I asked.

“Abandoned women whose children are either grown or away at school. We’re supposed to support our heroes, but we end up supporting each other.”

“To do what?” I asked naively.

“You don’t want to know, Elim,” she replied. As we left the grounds, I thought I heard a snapping sound. When I looked back all I could see was the shadowy outline of the foliage dancing with the gusting wind against the dying light.

It was no trouble finding the house again, but as we stood on the walkway everything was quiet and dark.

“Is this the entrance?” Palandine asked.

“No, it’s along the side,” I pointed. She moved quickly along the building and stopped in front of the door. As I caught up with her, the door opened and the Guide was standing there as if she’d been expecting us. I couldn’t tell if she remembered me, but she reacted warmly to Palandine’s delighted look.

“Come in, please,” she offered, and without hesitation led the way down the narrow stairs. This time instead of turning left into the main room we passed through a curtained entrance to the right. We then followed her into a dark hallway that opened up into a small room with a few low cushioned chairs and soft indirect lighting. The Guide invited us to sit. Palandine immediately complied, and for a moment my discomfort was so acute I wanted to bolt. Although we were the only people in the room, I was aware of movement all around me. As my eyes adjusted, and I reluctantly and awkwardly settled into the low seat, I saw that the walls were covered with a frieze, and that this was the source of the movement. It began at the bottom of one corner and ran continuously around the room, moving gradually higher until it finished at the top of the same corner. It depicted what looked like the daily activities of another time and culture, performed by half‑naked people who were Cardassian, but leaner and somehow more refined. My discomfort with this unaccustomed low style of sitting and with the Guide’s smiling silence was replaced by fascination with the frieze. As I studied the figures I realized how heavy and restricting my clothes were. How protected we were, I thought. And from what? I tugged at my pants to cross my legs. There was nothing salacious about these people, but they were all attractive. The limbs and torsos of both young and old were exposed as they went about their duties of growing, hunting, gathering, building, communing, raising their families in postures and attitudes that were similar to our own but different enough to be considered archaic. The sequence of these rites and activities began with the miracle of birth and ended with the mystery of death. Palandine and I were spellbound as we followed their sensuous movement along the frieze. It was clear that these people had embraced their lives with vitality and joy.

“Hebitians,” Palandine murmured.

“Celebrating the cycles,” the Guide added.

“I want to get up there and join them,” Palandine said. “But we’re a little late, aren’t we?” Sadness passed like a cloud over her radiant face.

“For them, yes,” the Guide laughed. “But not for us. Look at the way the frieze spirals up as it moves around the room. Because it ends at the top only means that their cycle has ended. What you can’t see is that another cycle begins at a higher spiral appropriate for the next age. Our age.” Palandine and I looked at the place where the visible spiral ended, and we tried to imagine the next.

“You seem less careful this time,” she suddenly said to me. She did remember. Somehow I wasn’t surprised. The threat I had felt years before in this woman’s presence–the fear–had evaporated.

“What’s your name?” Palandine asked.

“Astraea,” she replied.

“Elim says that you’re a guide.”

“Sometimes.”

“My name is Palandine. Can you help me?”

“It would be my pleasure, Palandine.”

“What do I do?” Palandine was unashamedly childlike in her openness.

“Come back. Both of you,” she simply replied. Palandine nodded agreement, and something was sealed between them. Just like that. Now the sadness passed to me. I wanted to cry, and my throat began to constrict.

“It’s all right, Elim. When you can. Everyone moves along the cycle according to his or her fateline.” Astraea looked at each of us. “Both of you have work to finish.” There was a long moment that felt like a lifetime, as we sat in the room, thinking about our work. The frieze now began to move in the upward direction. I was too amazed to ask if this was truly happening. People would disappear at the top while more would enter from below. Certain faces were recognizable, but I didn’t know why. Something was also rising within me, an energy moving up my spine to my head, and I began to feel dizzy. Two of the figures could have been Palandine and me, but I couldn’t be sure. I was almost nauseous with the energy surging within me. The figures completed the cycle and disappeared at the top. The frieze stopped moving.

“Thank you for coming.” The dizziness and nausea passed. My head was lighter, and I felt cleansed. I looked at Palandine, and she now radiated with such light that I turned away, inexplicably embarrassed as if I had seen something I shouldn’t. Astraea led the way back up the stairs and ushered us out.

“Come back,” she said with the same warmth. “You’re always welcome.”

As we took the long walk back to the Coranum Sector, neither of us spoke. When we had left Astraea at the door, Palandine was as serene as I had ever seen her; but when she stopped not far from the Tarlak Grounds and looked at me, her face was troubled. The evening had been like a dream that contained an important message I struggled to remember.

“I care for you, Elim–deeply. But even with her help . . . how can we undo the choices?” Such a simple question, and everything inside me began to shrink. She held her hand up and I attached my palm to hers. We held for a long moment. She nodded and walked off into the night, leaving me undefended against questions I couldn’t answer and feelings I couldn’t control.

“Tonight?!”

Prang looked at me. He immediately knew I was not in full possession of myself. This was not the way an operative embarked upon a vital mission. His face reflected a concern I had never seen before. I summoned every resource within me to gather my scattered emotions. After Palandine had left, I had spent the rest of the night sitting in the Grounds near the children’s area. When Prang informed me that I was leaving for the Morfan Province on Cardassia II on an assignment whose termination was “yet to be determined,” I couldn’t control my reaction.

“You knew this was imminent,” Prang said.

“Yes, of course,” I replied. I took a deep breath, and my disparate parts began to snap back. “I was up most of the night. Perhaps something I ate,” I shrugged.

“You look like you’re not eating anything,” Prang observed. If Tain was the father of the Obsidian Order, Prang was its mother.

“I’m fine, Limor. Please excuse me.” I was now in full possession, and relieved that the demands of work would now push everything else to the side. Prang watched me for another moment to make sure.

“You’re going to the Ba’aten Peninsula in Morfan, where you’ll meet your contact. All the information is on your chip.” The Ba’aten was the last remaining rain forest in the Union, which made it a much‑desired vacation area for Cardassians. How the Peninsula had resisted the great climatic change was still a scientific mystery.

“There is one procedure we need to complete today. Come with me.” Prang led me out of his bare office and took me to the research department, where all the new technologies are developed and tested. Mindur Timot, the cheerful and ancient head of research, was waiting for us. He thumped a raised pallet with one hand while working a computer panel with the other.