It usually took several tries to connect with Valo II, but after dozens of futile attempts throughout the day, Kalem had finally managed to do so in the stillness of the cool night. It was late, and everyone else in Vekobet should have been asleep by now—though Kalem knew that nobody would get any real sleep for a long time to come.
A successful call meant that Kalem would reach whoever happened to be in the vicinity of one of the very few working comm systems on Valo II, and that person would either agree to fetch Keeve, or they wouldn’t. This time, Kalem was lucky enough to have contacted someone who knew exactly where Keeve Falor was, and who was able to bring him quickly. Kalem hadn’t waited long before the other man answered his call.
“Falor,” Kalem said, his voice heavy with sorrow. “It’s Kalem Apren.”
“Kalem. I have conveyed all the messages you have asked of me, but Jas Holza still says—”
Kalem interrupted. “I have another piece of news for him. I only wish for him to know that the kai’s son is dead. The Cardassians massacred Opaka Fasil’s resistance cell. The people in Kendra—the people on the whole of Bajor—have sunk into a state of complete despair.”
Kalem heard a sound that could have been interference, or it could have been Keeve Falor sucking a hard breath. “I will pass on the word,”he said gravely.
Kalem had an afterthought. “Just ask him…ask him if he still feels it is too great a risk for him to enter the B’hava’el system.”
There was a pause, and Kalem repeated himself to be sure he had been heard, but Keeve finally answered. “I will relay the message to him, Apren. I hope this accomplishes your objective.”
“If it doesn’t,” Kalem replied, “then nothing will.”
“Kubus! Come to my office at once!”
The gray-haired Bajoran on Dukat’s monitor frowned, his expression grim. “I cannot leave my quarters, Gul. Are you aware that Prylar Bek has committed suicide?”His manner was that of a man struggling to maintain control—a sensation that Dukat was all too familiar with. Reports of more attacks on the surface were coming in by the hour, and the prefect could feel himself coming undone at the seams.
“Of course I’m aware of it,” he snapped. “Do you think I don’t know what goes on at my own station?”
“You didn’t know the grid was going down,”Kubus said.
“Is that an admission?” Dukat snarled. “Did youknow that they were going down, Secretary?”
“Of course not!”The Bajoran cried. “Would you truly doubt my loyalty at a time like this? I am perhaps the most hated man in the B’hava’el system right now, Gul! I can’t even leave my quarters—my throat would be slit by some scheming worker the instant I stepped into the corridor!”
“You should have thought to shift the blame to Prylar Bek, Secretary.”
“The Bajorans on the station have their own ideas about my involvement. Many of them are sure that I am entirely to blame. For the death of the kai’s son! Gul, you cannot understand what it means!”
“I am sure it is difficult for you, Secretary, but this isn’t why I have called. I need to know who among the Bajorans still carries influence—who is an easily reachable spokesperson—”
“I am their spokesperson,”Kubus interrupted, clearly perturbed at the implication that it was otherwise.
“Kubus, this is no time for your posturing! You just said yourself the Bajorans would rather have you murdered than listen to a word you say. I need to know, in your estimation, who I can contact, whose voice might make a difference among the rebels.”
“The Kai, of course,”Kubus said, still sulking. “But now that Prylar Bek is…gone…I couldn’t tell you how to reach her.”
“Not a religious leader,” Dukat said. “Someone with political clout, someone—”
“Don’t think for a moment that the kai does not have political clout!”Kubus said.
“Shall I ask one of the other members of the cabinet?” Dukat asked, with false patience. “Perhaps Kan Nion, or Somah Trac?” The secretary’s dislike of some of his Bajoran colleagues was amusingly pronounced, and Dukat often brought up his political rivals’ names in order to get results from the taciturn Kubus.
“I suppose if you’re looking for a secular voice…there is always Kalem Apren, of the Kendra Valley. Many are still quite loyal to him, or so I’m told. In fact, if youwere to ask Kan Nion, he would undoubtedly tell you the same thing.”
“Get me in touch with Kalem Apren immediately, then.”
“But, Dukat! I can’t risk going to the surface! I told you, if I so much as—”
“He can’t be reached by comm?”
“I…don’t know.”
“There is no need for you to speak to him yourself,” Dukat said impatiently. “Simply patch him through to me.”
Kubus was still hesitant, and Dukat changed his tone.
“Get me in contact with this man—I don’t care how—and I will see to it that you are relocated to Cardassia Prime, where you will be protected.”
“A Bajoran, on Cardassia Prime? Do you honestly think I would be any safer there than—”
“Yes,” Dukat said. “Think of it, Kubus. You would be a celebrity—an example to the Cardassian people’s cause!” Dukat felt quite pleased with the image as he saw it; for if Kubus was controlled carefully enough, Dukat was sure that he could do much on his homeworld to promote Cardassia’s position here. Dukat’sposition here.
But there was another reason the idea appealed to him: Kell had never cared for the secretary, and there was a pleasantly perverse symmetry to Kubus’s exile to Prime. After all, Kell had forced Dukat to take in that fallen operative from the Order, who had turned out to be the very man the prefect held responsible for the death of his father, long ago. And while Dukat was powerless to exact revenge, he thought it was only fitting to burden Central Command with the responsibility for protecting a Bajoran national who symbolized the benefits of continuing the annexation.
On the screen, Kubus hesitated. “Yes,”he finally said. “I’ll find a way to contact him.”
Dukat’s door chimed just as he said it, and he absently pressed the panel to admit his visitor. One of the officers from Ops appeared in the door, and Dukat gestured him inside as he ended the call with Kubus.
“More reports of sabotage on the surface, sir. A worker revolt at a mill in Rakantha Province—sixteen Cardassian guards killed. The facility is burning as we speak—”
Dukat let his head sink for a nearly imperceptible beat before snapping to attention again, to redeploy troops to the region—but his forces were simply spread too thin. Should he even bother to contact Central Command about this? Should he wait for the Bajorans to forget about the so-called massacre, for the unrest to die back down to manageable levels? But Dukat did not believe that they would “forget.” For an instant, he was taken back, to the first time he had ever come to Bajor. A Bajoran man from his memory reminded him; permanent grudges, he’d said. They were like Dukat himself, that way. Maybe it was something Dukat had started to forget, in recent years. Maybe he’d forgotten it when he’d ordered the execution of the resistance cell in Kendra, so excited was he at the opportunity to get at the son of the kai…
He stopped to consider the possibility that the execution of that cell could have been as grave an error as he had ever made. It had only fueled the resistance, where Dukat had expected to deter them. It was all he could do now to contain the aftermath. But if it had been a mistake, it did no good to acknowledge it as such. No good except perhaps to learn from it, to use the lesson in a future he hoped he could secure for himself.