It's been a while, folks, so howdy!

This one's a bit different from my previous efforts. Nothing to do with the CDA twaddle, never fear; but much as I would have loved to set the characters boinking away on that intriguingly adjustable biobed, they just wouldn't (believably) misbehave.

The story takes place somewhere in the hiatus between seasons 3 and 4. It's not everyone's cup of Earl Grey: nothing much "happens," and smack in the middle is a hefty gob of pseudo-Bajoran religion, most of which will undoubtedly be invalidated in future episodes; so far, however (end fifth season at the time of this writing), nothing in the show has actively contradicted it. Don't know damn-all about the books, as the few I've flipped through belong squarely to the type about which Dorothy Parker used to say [paraphrase alert], "I couldn't put it down; I had to fling it." Anyway, a healthy tolerance for talking heads and marinara sauce is recommended.

As always, comments, questions and arguments are welcome and will be addressed as time permits. E-mail me, please, at Diavolessa@aol.com.

Paramount, who art in Hollywood, copyright be thy name; thy will be done in a.s.c. as it is on television. Lead us not into litigation, for thine is the syndication, and the power, and the franchise forever.

          --D.

*     *     *     *     *


Thus Anew to Greet


          "Major... Major Kira, can you hear me?"
          The voice was familiar but sounded very far away. She tried to turn toward it, her head responding sluggishly. Her body and limbs were leaden. Maybe she was really, really hungover. Maybe she was dead.
          Her eyelids were stuck shut. It took some effort to pry them open and immediately she regretted doing so: tiny green spots danced as she squinted against a painfully bright light. "Get that damned thing out of my face," she croaked.
          "Sorry." The hot whiteness snapped off, and Kira ventured another look. Julian Bashir loomed above her, hazel eyes narrowed, broad forehead gathered. Not the Celestial Temple, then, unless the Prophets had a truly warped sense of humor. Something bulky blocked most of her field of view but she could see enough to be able to tell that she was lying on the biobed in the main ward of the Infirmary.
          "What happened?"
          "I was rather hoping you could tell me," replied Bashir as he passed an instrument, its high-pitched whir tickling her ears, around her head. "Your onboard computer sent an automated distress signal right after you'd been cleared for takeoff. You didn't respond when Ops hailed you, so Chief O'Brien beamed you out--just before the shuttle plowed into upper docking pylon two and exploded."
          "Some people have no regard for station property," said a dry voice from the far corner of the room. Kira turned her head to see Dax leaning angled against the wall, a beatific smile belying the Trill's mock-stern words. "We've had to reroute traffic for days. If you had to blow something up, why couldn't you have taken out my quarters? At least that way I'd have had an excuse to put in for an upgrade."
          Kira smiled in return and felt suddenly better despite her overall stiffness and the clawing pressure behind her eyes. "Do better next time. Runabout'll make a bigger impact than a shuttlecraft." She tried to lift her head up but an agonizing pang stabbed her eyeballs and seared down the back of her neck and she collapsed again.
          Disembodied voices swirled around her.
          "Julian, is she going to be all right?..."
          "... have to risk the transient hemoconcentration..."
          "... already got three neurolepts on board..."
          A dark, weightless lull, like drifting underwater; it was so easy to give in to the vertiginous suck of blackness...
*     *     *     *     *

          When she awoke again the pain was blessedly gone. Tentatively she lifted her head: not a twinge. The Infirmary was empty, and from the quietness of the corridor outside she deduced that it was station's night. Kira shoved aside the clamshell lid of the diagnostic array and hoisted herself to a sitting position by degrees. Noting incuriously that the purple and tan hospital gown she was wearing seemed to be letting an awful lot of air in through the back, she plopped her feet over the side of the biobed, letting them dangle as she gingerly assessed her condition.
          First things first. Her mouth was horribly dry and pasty, and her throat hurt. She hitched herself off the bed and shuffled to the replicator for a glass of water. The first touch of cool liquid to her tongue was bliss and with difficulty she forced herself to sip slowly, knowing that if she gulped the water she would probably just vomit it up.
          Kira had walked only a few feet but already she felt drained and impossibly heavy; without noticing it, she had begun to sag against the wall when a slim wiry arm slipped behind her to support her.
          "Good, you're up. How do you feel?" Bashir gently propelled her back over to the biobed and inclined it so that she could swing her legs up by herself; reluctantly grateful but ever practical, she welcomed his assistance.
          "Like shit," she said elegantly, sinking into the cushioned surface. "When can I leave?"
          "Tired of my company already, are you?" Bashir grinned. "Not for a day or so, at least; you've suffered a nasty head injury and I need to monitor you a while yet until I can be sure you're out of danger."
          "Can't wave your Federation magic over the wide-eyed provincial and make the bump on her head go away?" As soon as the words were out of her mouth Kira regretted her peevishness; her joke had not come out as lightly as she had intended.
          "Well, that 'bump' shook you up pretty badly. Even if you are one of the most hardheaded people I know," said Bashir genially, meanwhile checking his tricorder, then shining a small light into each of her eyes. "Look up. Now to the right. Now left. Good. Severe head trauma can have all sorts of unpleasant consequences; brains aren't exactly machines with parts that can be replaced on order, you know."
          He was certainly right about that. Her own brain seemed to be puttering along in slow motion, perceiving everything through a kind of filter. The disoriented enervation unexpectedly reminded her of something from early in her Resistance days...
          All new recruits had had to undergo flight training. For several intense weeks, each of them was checked out on the motley fleet of dilapidated vessels which Shakaar and others had scavenged. Her instructor had gleefully pushed the wrecks well past their limits, ignoring the screams of stressed metal and yanking through rolls and dives that slammed her back into her seat at several times atmospheric pressure. After each session she had come out feeling battered and flattened, as though she'd been beaten all over with rubber hoses...
          But compared with her present state, that had been nothing. Kira massaged her temples. "So what's the damage?"
          Bashir made a face and with his long tapered fingers started to tick off a list. "Here's the highlights: stellate fracture of the left temporoparietal articulation with contrecoup contusion, leptomeningeal hematoma and subsequent edematous transtentorial her--"
          "In words of less than five syllables, please, Doctor."
          "Cracked your skull like an egg and bled like a stuck pig. Better?"
          "Better. Go on."
          "Comatose for three days; four shattered ribs; punctured left lung; severely bruised kidneys; and the finest set of black eyes I've seen outside of a Klingon bar fight. Oh, and a broken nose--hope you don't mind that I had to remove the ridges to set it."
          Her hands flew to the bridge of her nose; it was a little sore, but the familiar bumps of cartilage were still there. Bastard. "Very funny, Julian." But it was funny, in a stupid, silly way. He was looking at her with such an archly innocent expression that despite herself she had to laugh--and then grimace as the movement triggered a sharp pain in her side. "Oof. Thanks," she said as he applied a hypospray to her neck; the stab of pain faded and she relaxed again.
          "Not at all. I was quite worried about you, you know; we had to suspend you in stasis in the burn unit for nearly twelve hours."
          "Did you, now?" Kira said acidly, her head snapping up so she could fix him with a glacial stare. The zero-gravity medical stasis field, popularly known as the burn unit, was something of a running joke among the crew. The recreational possibilities (erotic and otherwise) of a null-G chamber had not escaped notice; when not in actual medical use the burn unit was forever being scheduled for "diagnostics" that tended to coincide with crewmembers' off-hours. Rumor had it that Quark was considering installing something similar over his bar and charging triple the holosuite fee.
          "Yes," Bashir replied simply. "You'd sustained third-degree burns over half your body and in some places your uniform had fused to the skin. That skin had to be surgically removed, and you needed to be in zero-G while it was regenerating."
          That explained the tingling pinkness of her right arm. Now that she was paying attention to it, the whole right side of her body itched a bit, too, and seemed to be far more sensitive than usual. His professional tone and earnest manner mollified her and she lay back down. "Umm... Julian? Thank you," said Kira, somewhat belatedly but sincerely.
          "Don't mention it." Bashir lowered the diagnostic lid over her and she fought to quell a sudden wave of claustrophobia. After affixing a small device to her forehead, he dimmed the lights in the Infirmary. "You should sleep. Captain Sisko will come by in the morning and I need you to be at your best to confirm my burgeoning reputation as a miracle worker."
          Kira harrumphed in reply and drifted off to the sound of his chuckle and the chitter of an activated monitor as he sat down to work at his research station. 
*     *     *     *     *

She could not move. Immobility taunted her and amplified the knell of hopelessness dinning over and over in her mind: no way out no way out no way out...

Her Cardassian captor, a strutting Consul's aide hoping to advance his standing by the successful "processing" of a member of a notorious resistance cell, leaned over her, watching closely as she struggled; then, dispassionately, he struck her heavily across the face.

A red haze of anger and pain registered several shock-delayed seconds after the blow. She stared at him stonily, ignoring the deafening ringing radiating through her head, refusing to look away as he touched his finger to the corner of her mouth, then to his own mouth. With a reptilian swipe of leathery grey tongue he licked the trickle of blood from his glove. And then he smiled for the first time.

The ominously hypnotic drone of the interrogation apparatus grew louder. Probes prodded her temples and inexorably invaded her body, filling every nether orifice with unyielding cold metal...

          Kira jerked awake, sweating. The Infirmary, she reassured herself frantically, she was in the Infirmary. But the probes were still there, hampering her movements and hurting her when she twisted around. "Julian!" she bellowed, jagged shards of fear fusing swiftly into fury.
          Bashir sent his chair tumbling as he rushed to her side, his face a rictus of concern and then mortification. Hastily he adjusted a control on the clamshell and the steel fingers withdrew.
          "What the hell was that?"
          The tips of his ears and the taut olive skin over his cheekbones pinked. "I'm so sorry. The biobed was still set to monitor and support a comatose patient. Among other things, it was programmed to catheterize you every four hours."
          "Fuck that. I'm not dead yet, but you're doing a damn good job to get me there!" Kira snarled as she scrubbed brusquely at the imprints left by the cranial probes.
          Bashir looked at her closely. "Are you all right? I really am sorry."
          She hesitated, trying to control her breathing, willing her heartbeat to slow from its trip-hammer pace. "Just bad dreams. Reminded me of... something."
          "Would you like to talk about it?" He brightened. "I've been considering submitting a paper on some of the experimental medications I used to stabilize you and then bring you out of your coma. The emergence phenomena are really quite interesting and--"
          "No!" Kira snapped. Bile spilled over the dam, seeking a conduit. "If the Federation really wanted to help Bajor, they wouldn't have unloaded mother-wet nurslings like you on us. We'd be just as well off if they'd simply beamed down their precious technology and left a... a trained monkey on hand to run it."
          "Is that so?" Bashir sounded amused. Too amused. Dammit, she wanted him cringing, ground to pulp under her heel... or at least for him to be as angry as she was; somehow that would have made her feel better. "All right. A patient comes in with a headache. What do you, the trained monkey on duty, do?"
          He wants to play games, we'll play games. Fine. She closed her eyes and sighed exaggeratedly, a martyr to forbearance. "What species?"
          "Clever monkey. Let's say he's Bajoran."
          Her jaw ached from the involuntary clenching of her teeth. "Then I'd do what anyone with any sense at all would do: check him for visible injuries, take tricorder readings, put him through the medical scanners."
          "Nothing obviously wrong with him on preliminary physical exam. Computer says that all data are 'within normal reference intervals.' What now?"
          "Give him a painkiller and tell him to get his ass back to work."
          "Patient leaves, disgruntled, rubbing the back of his neck. Analgesic helps for perhaps an hour, then the headache returns and so does he. Scans still detect nothing wrong with him. What now?"
          "Umm... meditation? Umbel leaf tea? Breathing exercises? Check his duty schedule to see if he's maybe trying to get out of an assignment?" Bashir looked insufferably smug. "What, then?"
          "First rule-out? Computer error."
          "Now, wait, that's not fair--"
          "Who said anything about 'fair'? Stray EM pulses, chroniton waves, even a high-level maintenance routine--plenty of things could cause a malfunction or misdiagnosis, so you always have to consider the possibility that the computer is wrong. There's a saying they drill into your head in med school: when you hear hoofbeats, you think horses, not zebras. That is, you start with the most obvious possibilities and work your way down to the more improbable ones. When the signs you observe are at odds with what the computer spits out, then computer error is definitely a horse."
          Kira counted to nine... but was vexed to find she was no longer pissed off at him, couldn't get up enough steam to keep up the fight. He'd managed to defuse her blast of irrational anger and give her a slap on the wrist at the same time; it was a neat trick, but she was damned if she was going to let him know it. "All right, all right. So what is the diagnosis, anyway?" she ground out, as truculently as possible.
          "Oh, could be all sorts of things. Hemorrhage, abscess, neoplasia... crewman trying to get out of an assignment. The diagnosis itself isn't all that important--well, it is as far as treatment goes, of course. But what really matters is the process by which you weight what you can include or eliminate along the way; making a correct decision is often far more crucial to a patient's welfare than is making an accurate diagnosis. It's not enough to simply 'be a doctor'--there is an art to practicing medicine, and therein lies the challenge, and the reward."
          Her heart was no longer racing but her senses were all on edge and the metallic taste of stress lingered. No way she'd be able to get back to sleep now. She cast about for a neutral topic--anything, to keep her mind off those memories and the feelings they had awakened; anything, to get the doctor to quit hovering. "What are you working on?" she asked, gesturing vaguely at the still-active screens behind him.
          Bashir looked sharply at her but she did her best to arrange her face in a blandly interested mask. Evidently what he saw satisfied him that she was neither going to pass out nor stab him in the back with a laser scalpel; he launched happily into a discourse about his ongoing research into the properties of an enzyme for which an isolated population of Bajorans had seemingly developed a genetic deficiency. Kira followed him for a while, as the area in concern was not far from her home, but her attention dissociated as the lecture grew increasingly convoluted. His tendency to run on about anything that engaged his curiosity usually irritated her, but now it had an almost soothing effect. Even worse, she had to admit that she'd always liked the sound of his voice, which had a lilting, musical quality that flowed in honeyed contrast to her own more strident tones...
          "... but I've a theory that the deficit is actually due to a highly selective phytotoxicosis, so I'm designing an isotopic marker that can be incorporated into the DNA of the local flora via hyperplasmid replication transfer." Aware that his audience had been silent for a while, Bashir turned to see that Kira was sound asleep, snoring gently.
          A half-smile pursed his mouth. He double-checked the diagnostic settings, increased the intensity of the delta wave generator, and went back to work.
          He was interrupted a few minutes later by a somnolent mumble. "Julian?"
          "Yes?"
          "What's a horse?"
          "Probably something you ate during the Occupation. Go back to sleep." 
*     *     *     *     *

          Sisko was there beside her in the morning, pecking at a datapadd as he hunched over in a chair too small for his imposing frame. Kira sat up self-consciously; something in his inherent dignity always made her feel as though she were under inspection. "Captain," she nodded, giving a discreet tug and silent curse to the ever-shifting gown. Her hair, with which she had been experimenting at Dax's none-too-subtle prompting, straggled its unaccustomed length into her face, and with difficulty she refrained from patting at it.
          "Major. Doctor Bashir says that you're doing well. How do you feel?"
          "Like I've been run over by a supermass loader. In full grav."
          "That's not surprising. You should see the wreckage; O'Brien's salvage team have it spread out all over Cargo Bay 17."
          "What have they found out?"
          "According to the Chief, it was a bomb. Homemade--ammonium nitrate mixed with fuel oil that some primitive generators still use. Simple but effective. But you'd need something like 32 kilos of the stuff in order to destroy a shuttlecraft, and there was nowhere near that amount on board. And the ingredients were combined in the wrong proportions so that most of the bomb's energy went into actually igniting the explosive. Hard to say if that was due to incompetence or if someone was just trying to send a message. The really interesting part is that, according to the molecular signature, the detonator was Cardassian."
          "Cardassian?" Kira gave a low whistle. "Those don't usually show up on the black market."
          "Exactly. But somehow this doesn't feel like one of their operations."
          "You're right. I'm still here."
          That won a rueful smile, a sudden melting of the stern features. "We'll keep you posted if anything else turns up. How much do you remember?"
          "Everything checked out green across in preflight. I signaled Ops to release the docking clamps and cleared the launchpad. There was an explosion in the engine compartment and I was thrown out of my seat. After that, nothing until I woke up here. Sorry."
          "Anything out of the ordinary?"
          "Not really. Who do you think was involved?" Placing a bomb, however crude, inside a shuttlecraft was far beyond the scope of the usual ragged bands of malcontents--everything from doomsday preachers to Maquis sympathizers--that managed to squirrel aboard the station at any given time.
          Sisko shrugged. "Too early to tell, and no one's claimed credit so far. Any chance someone wanted to prevent your going to that conference on Bajor?"
          "Not unless they're trying to corner the market on fertilizer bids for the north continent."
          "You never know. Our friend Quark, for one, has a lot of outside interests."
          "I've always thought that he was full of sh--er, manure. Maybe someone felt I wasn't going to be an adequate representative for the Federation's soil bacteria." Kira yawned, not realizing that her voice had been fading. "Excuse me."
          Sisko shot a glance over her head at Nurse Jabara, who nodded silently. He stood, patting Kira's shoulder awkwardly. "I have to get back to Ops. I'm glad you're feeling better." Kira caught his elbow as he turned to leave. "Yes, Major?"
          "Captain... Emissary."
          There it was, that barely perceptible look of queasy distaste that distorted his face whenever he was reminded of the role which had been conferred upon him. She reprimanded herself for being annoyed. "Would you mind saying a prayer of healing for me?"
          "Of course not. Umm..." Sisko leaned over a console. Tapping in a few commands, he frowned at the screen a moment in concentration, then recited: "Great Prophets, the pagh of Kira Nerys has been returned to her keeping."
          Kira gave the response: "For this I am humbly grateful."
         "May she guard and nurture it faithfully until it be deemed worthy of its return to your temple of ultimate wisdom and understanding. May her children not be raised by another, and may she never again know of disaster and woe. And may we all dwell in peace and safety in the world."
          Then together: "Omayan." With a slightly abashed look, Sisko patted her on the shoulder again and sketched a wave at her as he went out the door.
          "His accent is getting quite good. Marks off for intonation, though."
          Kira had completely forgotten that Bashir was there. A flare of irritation engulfed the brief peace she'd found. Dammit, Julian! "I'm sorry, Doctor, did you have something to say?"
          "No, no. I've just always found it curious that so much emotional stake has been placed in someone so reluctant to assume responsibility for it."
          It irked her immensely that she had often thought precisely the same thing. "The Emissary was chosen by the Prophets to--"
          "Unite the Bajoran people and discover the Celestial Temple, yes, I know the catechetical response. Tell me something: just what is it that you expect to find there?"
          "What?" Bashir's mind sometimes leapt about like a mountain zegei; it was one of his more exasperating qualities.
          " 'What remains after death is but a shell, a sign that the pagh has begun its final journey to the Prophets.' That's how the teaching goes, isn't it? So what do Bajorans believe awaits them when they reach the Celestial Temple?"
          A bark of incredulous laughter erupted before she could suppress it. "It's not that simple! You're talking about 'Bajorans' as though we all held the same beliefs, the same doubts, the same fears. Like we were subjects in one of your experiments: molecule A reacts with molecule B to form substance C, invariably and in all cases. That's your problem--it's all abstract to you, isn't it? For you, it's just theories, and one is just as valid as the next because you won't or can't believe in anything yourself."
          Bashir reared back as if stung. "All right," he said carefully, "I suppose that's only fair; guess I've always been more sure of what I don't believe in rather than what I do."
          Kira searched his face. His usual open, eager expression was slightly wounded and she felt as though she had whacked a puppy on the nose. She sighed. "Don't you have anything to do, Julian?"
          "Nope."
          "Patients to see, tests to run?"
          "In order, not at the moment, and yes, but they're automated and the results won't be collated for several hours. I'm all yours."
          "Lucky me." One last hope. "Wouldn't you rather discuss this with the vedeks in the temple? I'm sure they'd be happy to explain the finer points of Bajoran faith to you, much better and more thoroughly than I could." And Quark could take side bets on who would wear the other out first.
          "I could, yes, but I'm more interested in the opinions of the man in the street. So to speak."
          "Well, you'd better go round up at least a dozen more; there's quite a few sects out there and some of their doctrines completely contradict the others."
          "Then, I'd much rather hear what you believe. How's that?"
          Kira was beset by a sense of disquiet. She didn't often discuss her spiritual beliefs--with anyone, much less offworlders. In fact, for the first couple of years among her new colleagues she had deliberately downplayed the significance religion held in her life. Not because they would disparage or ridicule her; quite the opposite, really--most of the Starfleeters posted here went out of their way to be "tolerant," seemingly unaware of the faint condescension that implied. Even Dax (especially Dax; and Kira was surprised now by a small surge of resentment) regarded her occasional impassioned outbursts with amused irony, as though humoring a child devoted to a frail and fantastically ugly pet.
          She was unsure where to begin but felt compelled to match Bashir's absolute sincerity. "I guess," Kira said finally, "that it really comes down to whether or not you believe in the soul."
          "The pagh, you mean."
          "Well, yes."
          Bashir's ears pricked up almost visibly at the slight hesitation. "I'd understood 'pagh' and 'soul' to be one and the same. Are you saying they're not?"
          Sessich! but he was persistent! Kira tried to order her thoughts. "The pagh, as you know, is a person's life-force, from which one gains strength and courage; it can be replenished by the Prophets, and it is restored to the Prophets when the body dies. The pagh is what distinguishes all Bajorans and those, like the Emissary, whom the Prophets wish to claim as their own. But I also believe that something else exists within every individual that can only be called a 'soul.'"
          "How does that differ from the pagh?"
          She chewed the inside of her cheek. "If the physical body is the vehicle, and the pagh is the life-force that animates it, then the soul is what provides consciousness and self. It's... unchanging, immortal. Bajoran or not."
          His eyes widened slightly. "Rather a departure from the prevailing view, isn't it? I thought that one of the core tenets of your faith was that spiritual afterlife--what you call 'entering the Celestial Temple'--is the unique provenance of those who believe in the Prophets, not a universal phenomenon."
          That was the very crux of her dilemma. Kira herself had argued constantly about it with Bareil, who had first pointed out to her the limitations of the traditional outlook. Even now she could hear his gentle, bemused voice: "During the Occupation, and for a hundred years leading up to it, there was only Bajor and the Cardassians. We were only peripherally aware of other worlds, other peoples--and only insofar as they could be of use to Bajor. Easy enough then to condemn the Other to eternal unknowing. But we have not always been turned so far inward, Nerys; I do not think the Prophets would have us stay so small."
          She smiled faintly at the memory, at how hard she had fought to disabuse Bareil of his radical notions. As well ask the river to flow through the rock instead of around it, Kira thought wryly. She had never been one for blind acceptance or rejection; the strength of Bareil's convictions had at least made her reexamine her own, and grudging admission that he might have a point had opened the way to further questioning. Four years' association with the people who were now closer to her than family had withstood those questions and begun to forge an entirely new foundation. "You're right, Julian. Orthodoxy teaches that only those who follow the Prophets' guidance--by inference, only Bajorans--are allowed to enter the Celestial Temple. 'Departure' is an understatement; some might call it blasphemy."
          "Ah. Some, like Kai Winn, you mean."
          Her mouth tightened reflexively. He was too damned perceptive. "Like the Kai, yes."
          His eyebrows flew upward. "And you would accept admonition from the Kai for your beliefs, should they become widely known?"
          The delicate manner in which he phrased his question showed her he knew the significance of what he was asking. Admonition from the supreme religious leader was a grave sanction placed on those who publicly profaned the Prophets by improper behavior or belief. In the year since Winn had become Kai, however, admonition had been applied so routinely and automatically to any unacceptable behavior that it had largely lost its punitive, coercive effect.
          Kira let out a long breath. "I'm within my rights to oppose her in matters of state or the military... but the Kai has absolute say when it comes to matters of faith."
          Bashir frowned. "That's a great deal of power."
          "But it goes both ways. Our ancestors laid down strict rules for the guidance of our leaders--including the Kai. Authority isn't private property, it's a trust; those who have it are to carry out the obligations of that trust to the utmost and govern in consultation with the people. The Kai in particular is charged to bear sympathy in her heart and to deal kindly and wisely with all under her protection." Kira's jaw had knotted again without her realizing it; she forced herself to relax. "In turn, we have the power to choose our rulers; it's our duty to invest governing authority only on those who deserve it, and then to give them our full support. Rebelling would only be seeking to demolish what our own hands have built."
          "Even if that trust is held by someone whom you despise?"
          A pregnant pause. "Yes."
          "So that's why you were so, erm, strenuously against her taking over the position of First Minister."
          "Among other things. You know that Bajor still has a provisional government, even though it's been months since Shakaar was elected to office. We've been divided too long; right now there's a huge vacuum of power at the upper echelons--no regional leader is willing to cede territory or influence to the others. Most of Shakaar's energy has been devoted to placating them rather than using his authority to create or enact law. But even though his influence might not yet be comparable to the Kai's, it's still tipping the balance back to level between the secular and religious sectors. Unity at the cost of putting everything into one person's hands would have been far too high a price." Especially that person's hands...
          "So for now it's actually in Winn's best political interest that the secular sector remain factionalized. Fascinating, how intimately Bajoran religion and politics are linked; it's as though the one were a carefully crafted tool of the other."
          "I'd like to think that our religion is a little more than some sort of elaborate political construct designed to keep society in check. Faith is a powerful force, Julian; I have no doubt that it's what gave us the strength to survive and defeat the Cardassians."
          "But there have been rifts in the religious sector as well; as you said, it's hardly a homogeneous body. If I recall, many of the more radical splinter groups sprang up after Kai Opaka... died. Can one Kai be considered less 'holy,' less worthy of reverence than another, and still have absolute say?"
          Kira just managed to keep her mouth from dropping open. Prophets preserve me, he is going to make me blaspheme! She was spared from comment, Bashir's train of thought having started up yet another hare.
          "I thought it interesting that Opaka's belongings were immediately secreted away into the central monastery--as though the objects were considered sacred because of their association with her. That hadn't been done since Kai Maressa's time, nearly two hundred years ago."
          "We don't worship relics, Julian--no one thinks that Kai Opaka is still 'present' in the things she left behind." Though she knew that, privately, many did; the articles had had to be surrounded by a protective force field to keep them from being touched or stolen. "But they serve as a potent reminder of the impermanence of the physical world."
          "And the permanence of the spiritual one. Going back to your idea of the soul, then. So the soul is separate in origin, autonomous from but at the same time integral with the physical body and the vital force."
          She was beginning to get a feel for the way his mind worked: it did not leap randomly, as she had often thought, but rather moved ahead, examining all angles and circling nimbly back around. And he never forgot anything. "Yes."
          Bashir made a moue. "I see."
          "Do you?"
          "It's just... well, 'soul,' 'pagh'... is that so very different from what I call 'life'?"
          "Yes! The soul is... unmeasurable but real, distinguishable from everything that is impermanent, or unintelligent, or insentient. It transcends what remains behind and lives on."
          "Mm. Let's just say that I don't believe there's sufficient evidence to posit either the existence or nonexistence of God and, by extension, the immortal soul."
          Her turn to frown. "God."
          "God, or gods. Whatever you want to call your supreme deity."
          "I'm aware of that, thank you very much. And Bajorans do have gods... some do, anyway. But why should the fact that you don't believe in a God preclude your belief in the soul?"
          Bashir looked startled, then snorted. "You're right; I was making the assumption that the soul stemmed from the divine. So the Prophets aren't gods?"
          "Well, no, we don't worship the Prophets, but look to them for--" Kira floundered for a moment-- "for enlightenment. The Prophets act as the caretakers of the universe and reveal themselves to their believers by manifesting their signs directly, through the Orbs and through people whom they have touched, such as the Emissary."
          "All right; you don't believe in individual deities, in a God or gods, but rather a... benevolent guiding body. So what is enlightenment, and how does one go about attaining it?"
         Don't want much, do you? Kira thought mordantly. "Enlightenment is a process, Julian, not a reward or a judgment. It's not conferred on you--bang!--like a thunderclap from the sky."
          "How long does the process go on, then?"
          "The Prophets don't operate in linear time, remember? It takes... as long as it takes. There is a period of reckoning, in which the Prophets examine the soul to determine whether it deserves to pass through to the Celestial Temple."
          "How is that determined?"
          "You've heard the Emissary's account of what he experienced when he spoke with the Prophets, how the Prophets presented themselves through figures in his own life, past, present and future. Those figures represent aspects of the soul--" She had a sudden inspiration. "Think of the Prophets' revelation as light passing through a multifaceted prism. Every facet--every aspect of the soul--both reflects and refracts the light. Infinite variations of reflection and refraction, separate from and yet intermingling with the light from every other facet. The soul's perception of each aspect is enhanced by its isolation but also by the effect of its blending with the rest. Eventually the light finds a harmonic at which all the reflections and refractions resonate as a single entity: the soul reaches complete understanding of itself--each to its own capacity, you see--and of the Prophets' revelations. But it can only do so if it is also sincere and of pure intention, and thus worthy."
          He cocked his head. "That's it? Enlightenment is some sort of... cosmic question-and-answer session?"
          She would have laughed if she weren't so indignant. "'That's it?'" Kira echoed. "To know--everything. Perfect knowledge of the meaning of life. The origins of the universe. The nature of wisdom and sorrow, causes and effects. Why the innocent suffer. Why we carry within us the capacity for hatred and cruelty as well as love and pity. Why we were given the gifts we have and how in the end they make a difference. To know at last what the Prophets have tried to reveal during our lifetime but without the distractions or cares or prejudices of the walking world. To know everything. Wouldn't that be enough?"
          Bashir stared expressionlessly at the floor, so long that Kira thought at first that he had stopped listening; but when he looked at her again, her breath caught at the stark longing in his face. "Have you any idea how badly I'd like to believe that?"
          She found it difficult to meet his gaze. "Why is it so hard to believe? Because you can't dissect the soul, prove its origin and derivation by breaking it down to the molecular level? I'm afraid it doesn't work that way, Julian. All we have is faith--faith that with the help of the Prophets we will reach beyond our understanding, faith that the soul in its immortality will find its place in the design of the universe. Faith is the only thing that sets us apart from... trained monkeys. The only thing that keeps us from subsisting in a moral and spiritual void. Otherwise, what's the point, beyond mere survival?"
          "I guess... it would be more accurate to say that I don't know whether or not I have a soul. And yes, I do think of scientific evidence as intellectual justification to disregard the existence of the soul altogether. Doesn't mean I'm suspending or withholding judgment, just that I don't believe that one can apply reason to that which is supposed to transcend reason."
          "You're saying that you can't believe in the soul because you're a scientist? Science is fine when it comes to questions whose answers can be tested. But abstract questions, questions that don't have concrete answers--those don't fare as well in the laboratory, do they? Tell me, Julian: is the universe any less a mystery because we 'know' that the Bajoran wormhole is 'an artificially generated stable passageway to the Gamma Quadrant, formed by verteron particles whose point singularity opens into Bajoran space'?" Kira quoted from one of Keiko O'Brien's old schoolroom lectures. "That's the 'what,' and given sufficient time for study and research I don't doubt you could discover the 'how' as well. But don't you ever wonder about the 'why'? For me, there is no hard and fast separation of 'religion' and 'science.' My faith doesn't ask me to ignore the laws of nature or to believe things which are contrary to them; how can I when for ten thousand years philosophers and theologians and scientists have exhorted me to study what I learn in the physical world and apply it to the illumination of my soul?"
          When he spoke at last, his voice was so low and hoarse that she could barely hear him.. "I almost wish that I could believe in your soul, Nerys. Or that we could reach some form of your enlightenment in this life."
          "Some do, Julian. Like Kai Opaka. Or the Emissary," she said, her own voice rough with unaccustomed tenderness.
          He smiled, but his eyes were haunting. "Well, then, maybe there's hope for me yet." 
*     *     *     *     *

          They did not exactly avoid one another--the Infirmary was too small for that--but an uncomfortable silence wedged between them for the rest of the morning. A little too much revelation, like the rawness of skin abraded one layer too deeply. Kira felt guiltily thankful for the physical and emotional distance when a steady stream of patients drew Bashir's attention away.
          Pronounced no longer in critical condition, she was moved to a more private area. Unfortunately, except for a comm inquiry from an unusually gruff Odo, who needed to take her official statement, and a quick visit from Dax, there was little to distract her and she found herself going wild with boredom as the day stretched on. Meditation was impossible, the antiseptic bustle from the main ward just intrusive enough to throw off her concentration.
          Kira got up to pace, sometimes kicking--not entirely by accident--a container or cabinet in her path.
          "You're going to wear a circle into the floor if you keep that up," said Bashir, coming over after briefing the evening shift staff, a skeleton crew consisting of a medtech and a nurse.
          "You're going to wear your balls on a string around your neck if you don't let me out of here. Besides, what else am I supposed to do? I'm not cleared for duty, so I can't catch up on work. My head hurts when I read, so I can't even plow through those dreadful novels that Dax left. And," she hooked a thumb toward an instrument stand, upon which sat a small brightly colored box that seemed to be humming, "I really don't want to know what's in that package Quark sent."
          "You can lie down so I can examine you. If you're a good little patient, I'll even tell you a story, all about your serotonin levels and microcirculation and brainwave activity."
          She submitted with ill grace, arms folded and jaw set as he fussed with readings and entered data into her chart.
          "Don't you ever leave?"
          "Hmm? Follow the light with just your eyes. Good."
          "I mean, it just occurred to me that in all this time, you've never once not been here. Don't you ever sleep, even?"
          "Sleep is for mortals. Turn your head, like this. Aha."
          "Seriously, Julian. I'm a little worried about you. You've been working on that damned research project for months. Leeta said last week that she'd almost prefer it if you were seeing someone else--that it's embarrassing to be stood up for a bunch of test tubes. You're not even listening to me, are you?"
          "Mmhmm." Bashir poked at something on his tricorder, then took a new reading.
          "Oh, that's brilliant. 'Mmhmm' what? 'Mmhmm, you can go, Major Kira'? 'Mmhmm, you're going to be stuck rotting in the Infirmary for the duration of your career, Major Kira'?"
          "The former, I'd say. But you might--" She had hopped off the table before he could finish his sentence. "-- want to put on some clothes first." That brought her to a halt. "Unless, of course, you intend to entertain the Promenade. Well, half of it, anyway."
          Kira whirled around, the loose edges of the gown fluttering; she clapped a hand to her backside before storming back in. "You doctors get together and think up ways to humiliate your patients, don't you?"
          "Of course. Those things do up the back for a reason, you know."
          "Give me your lab coat. I am leaving right now." Kira snatched the proffered blue jacket from his hand, getting tangled up in the process of jamming her arms through the sleeves as she marched out, bare feet slapping the floor, through the ward to the corridor.
          "Yes, Major. Of course, Major. You're quite welcome, Major," he called after her as she disappeared through a rapidly parting crowd. 
*     *     *     *     *

          An ensign hurrying by nodded to Kira as she stood brooding; startled, she returned the acknowledgment and tried to hide the object she was holding, but the man was already gone. Don't be an idiot, she told herself firmly, and pressed the alert.
          "Come."
          Kira stuck her head through the doorway. Bashir was out of sight. She entered and looked around. Strange, that in all the time they'd known each other, she'd never before been inside his quarters. Nothing like her own sparely appointed rooms; these were bursting with curious personal mementos that he must have been collecting for years. He'd done away with the regs furniture, filling the space with squashy, overstuffed pieces and a great many pillows on the floor. And throughout wafted a faint trace of the warm, spicy scent that always surrounded him.
          She wandered over to a table to inspect a small, complicated-looking device lying partly dissected with its tiny components separated into neat piles; as she reached out to pick up the largest section, a hand closed over her wrist.
          "I wouldn't do that if I were you," said Bashir, firmly pulling her away from the little gadget. He led her to the sofa and gestured for her to sit, taking up station on the opposite end.
          "Why? Will it fall apart?"
          "No, but Chief O'Brien might. That's one of his newest toys. I'm not sure what it does but Miles practically goes into cardiac arrest if I so much as breathe on it."
          "He run out of room in that vole's den he calls his quarters?"
          "Keiko's coming next week with Molly. Idle little hands, you know."
          "Oh, yes, the O'Brien domesticity rescue effort. Does that mean I have to go into hiding again to get out of helping him clean up on my off-shifts?"
          "You're going to have to work on your excuses--he's getting pretty sharp about them. Let's see. Last time you had 'late duty in Ops'; that won't wash, it's been too quiet and anyway you've been flat on your back. Time before that was the religious ceremony of isolation, requiring you to meditate in all waking hours outside of work--"
          "That was not an excuse! The sh'gune idet is a sacred ritual--"
          "...which is to be performed by the bride-to-be three days before a wedding," Bashir finished, his eyes flashing with malicious glee. "Why, Major, I never got to congratulate you on your impending nuptials."
          Caught, she was briefly ashamed, then annoyed; but his devil-may-care mood was infectious and she snorted, unable to hide a smile. "I should have known you'd been studying the natives, especially from that discussion we had in the Infirmary. What did you do, anyway, read the Book of the Prophets?"
          "Book" was something of a misnomer for the vast accumulation of incunabulae and illuminated manuscripts that had been gathered by the Vedek Assembly for thousands of years. Several orders had dedicated their lives to the formidable task of preserving the precious texts in holographic format, others to reconstructing the countless documents that had been lost or damaged during the Occupation. New texts--and endless debates over their interpretations--were continually being unearthed or written. Which Bashir undoubtedly knew.
          "Well, not quite; all those prophecies and all the commentaries on them make for rather heavy going. I actually asked Vedek Bareil about it before--erm... before." The lighthearted mood vanished and he seemed at once older, harder. Tired, too; there were dark circles under his eyes, and a crêpey look to the lids.
          "It's all right, Julian. I... never thanked you for what you did for him. And for Bajor; that peace treaty with the Cardassians could never have gone through without your help."
          Bashir made an unpleasant sound. "I hardly think I deserve to be thanked."
          "You did everything you could."
          "Everything I could, yes, but far more than I should have. What I did violated everything I've been taught, everything I believe, or should have remembered to believe. Heroic medicine, the bastion of the egomaniacal." His face contorted, the words spat out with unexpected venom.
          Kira wondered suddenly that she had never before noticed how volatile he could be. Clearly, though, he had not meant to lash out at her, and the naked self-loathing gradually subsided.
          "What's that, then?" he asked, breaking the awkward silence, indicating the object in her hand.
          "What? Oh." She had nearly forgotten the reason she had come to see him. "Present," she said, leaning over to hold up a small, ornately filigreed bottle for him to inspect. "For saving my life. And for not being too much of an ass about it."
          "A very properly gracious sentiment. Trakosan wine, isn't it?"
          "You really have been studying." Trakosa was a tiny province whose vineyards had for generations produced exquisite wine, widely considered to be among Bajor's best. It would be decades before the newly restored and cultivated fields would be able to produce a vintage of comparable caliber. During the Occupation, however, the vintners had managed to hide dozens of caches of wine throughout neighboring provinces; from time to time, one of these precious stores--including a recent discovery by an old Intelligence friend of hers--came to light.
          "This can't have been easy to find. Thank you, Nerys; I'm honored." Bashir fumbled with the fussy, delicate clasp and prised the bottle open. He fetched two wine goblets from a cabinet. Kira watched in horror as he poured the glasses full of viscous amber liquid and handed her one of them.
          "Julian! What are you doing?"
          "Observing Bajoran custom. It's considered rude not to share a gift with the giver, isn't it?"
          She bit her lip. "Umm... I should warn you--"
          "Mmm... smells lovely. Must've been aged in sessila wood. Well, chu ril den b'habus, Kira Nerys." He saluted her with the glass and then drained it.
          "Chu ril den b'habus, Julian Bashir," she repeated faintly, watching him worriedly.
          "Quite... er, strong, isn't it?" He poured a bit more into his glass and sipped more slowly this time. "You're not drinking."
          Kira took a deep breath. "Julian, did you know that you're supposed to dilute the wine with ten parts water before you serve it?"
          That took a few seconds to sink in. "You mean... I just drank--"
          "Enough to put Morn under the table."
          "Oh, dear." He sat down heavily, already beginning to feel the effects, and Kira managed to catch his glass before it dribbled from his hand. His forehead was sweating and his face had gone a greyish-green color.
          She stared at his sprawled body, dismayed. Ordinarily she would have hauled him to his bathroom in a dead-man's lift, but she was in no shape to do so now; he'd have to stay where he was. She settled for dragging his legs up onto the sofa. Even that small effort left her panting and she perched on the arm of the sofa to rest.
          A loud, boisterous crowd passed by outside in the hallway and Kira found herself fiercely resenting their intrusion. No danger of her charge's awaking, however; he slept the deep sleep of the physically exhausted--and the thoroughly soused.
          Bashir still looked preposterously young, though time and responsibility had begun to etch fine lines into his face. His face. She had misjudged his face, not realizing at first that the apparent guilelessness that he burnished with audacious loquacity was as much a facade as Sisko's imperturbability or Dax's sardonic wit. He had been naive, true, but not so much as she'd initially thought; and because he had not experienced tragedy or adversity she had dismissed his capacity to empathize and to understand and to grow. And there had been more than a little jealousy on her part, that someone so young and so brilliant could also be so untouched. Arrogance and innocence personified, to which she responded instantly and instinctually with hostility. It had taken years to see that the face cloaked a pitiless drive to excel, to hold himself to impossibly high standards, to feel ultimately and awfully responsible (however much his reason might tell him otherwise) for the life of every person under his care.
          The ragdoll on the sofa moaned and Kira shook herself out of her reverie. At the replicator, she called up a hypospray and Bashir's own hangover remedy, which she knew from experience worked wonders. Hoping she had the dosage right, she pressed the hypo to the big vessel in his neck, listening as the discharged contents hissed into the skin. He mumbled and twitched, but his movements were less troubled now. Leaving the hypo on a table within easy reach, she watched him sleep a while longer and then ordered the computer to cut the lights as she left. 
*     *     *     *     *

          There was a message queued on her commlink when she woke up late the next morning.
My turn to thank you for saving my life--or anyway my head. Meet me at Harosia's for dinner, 20:00 hours?

--Julian

          Curious; but she put it out of her mind and dutifully followed her prescribed regimen of physical therapy. A slightly different agenda today: the last item on the schedule was one of Dax's nude mudbath holoprograms. Incredulous, she queried the Infirmary; the nurse who answered the call assured her with an admirably straight face that it had been medically approved.
          Submerged in a hot spring to wash away the mud that had set her skin tingling, being silently attended by lovely naked male and female Trills while soft music played in the background, Kira decided that she must have gotten even more banged up than she'd thought because for once she was enjoying the decadent simulation. Not that she would ever tell Dax...
          Afterward, greatly refreshed, she stopped by Ops and was immediately made the reluctant center of attention. Sisko rescued her from the throng by motioning her into his office.
          As she clattered up the metal stairs, Lieutenant Commander Eddington gave her an oddly intense look. Kira nodded but did not speak; she never knew quite how to deal with him. He was a strictly by-the-book Fed who did his job and was willing to help out where needed--today he was evidently lending a hand to O'Brien's overextended Engineering staff--but beyond that she knew little of the man and was just as glad he was outside her immediate chain of command.
          "Any progress on the bomb, Captain?"
          "Odo's still working on it. He's pretty sure the Cardassians weren't involved, and I tend to agree. Which leaves us back at square one."
          Otherwise, Sisko said, everything was progressing uneventfully: ships were arriving and departing on schedule; no crises were imminent; nothing--so far--had gone wrong with the extensive modifications that Chief O'Brien was implementing to upgrade the station's defensive armament. "He's ecstatic. Best stay out of his way, though, unless you want an earful about the dubious wisdom of fitting Starfleet weaponry into incompatible housings 'bollixed up by the eejit Cardies who wouldn't know shite from a shingle.'"
          On a good day the Universal Translator could handle even the more colorful aspects of Terran language, but it gave up here and simply let the words through. It was a familiar enough cadence, though, and Kira grinned at the mental image of O'Brien letting fly at some hapless piece of machinery.
          Caught up on everything from the past week, she was suddenly exhausted; all she wanted to do was go to her quarters and collapse. As quickly as she could and still be polite, she said goodnight to Sisko and left the office.
          "Aren't you late for dinner?" Dax called as Kira headed to the turbolift.
          "What?" She veered back to the science station, leaning over the console to peer at her friend.
          "I said, aren't you late for dinner," Dax repeated with the tiniest twitch of her lips.
         Meet me at Harosia's... Kira flushed despite herself. "Dammit, I forgot. But how the hell did you--umm, why don't you join us?"
          "In case you hadn't noticed, I'm busy." Dax was the very picture of conscientious attentiveness, her eyes fixed unwaveringly on her monitor. "Besides," one eyebrow swooped up suggestively, "I think I'd just be in the way."
          It was no longer wartime but Kira's peripheral vision hadn't lost its acuity. "Yes, I'm sure the manifest from the recycling barge is absolutely riveting," she said pointedly. "Anyway, it's not like that."
          At least Dax had the grace to blush; her spots stood out lividly as she raised laughing blue eyes at last. "Can't fault me for trying. Gods know when either of you last got laid." Kira felt her face go hot as several crewmen behind her snickered. "But you're still late. Go, go!" Dax made shooing motions toward the lift.
          One of these days Kira would find out just how the Trill managed to keep abreast of the most minute details of everyone's lives. Especially when it came to sex; Dax had a bad habit of imagining her friends in bed--and regaling anyone who'd listen with her speculations.
          The computer's directions guided her through an unfamiliar section of the Promenade to a now-defunct Bolian restaurant. Kira noted the sign posted at the entrance way: "Closed by authority of the Bajoran Sanitation Department and Julian Bashir, MD, CMO, Deep Space 9." Palming the door open, she wondered if there had been some mistake.
          "Come on in," called a voice from the back, where someone was clattering about.
          She wandered into the kitchen and stared in disbelief. "You can cook."
          Bashir, wearing an absurd garment that covered the front of his clothing, waved a large wooden spoon at her amid a maelstrom of pots and pans and unrecognizably colorful bits of food. "Oh, I believe in the ancient concept of the Renaissance man, the unique, well-rounded individual who embraces all aspects of life, art and--" Bashir stopped, impaled on her gimlet eye. "Besides, it was a great way to impress women. I didn't get interested in it until I got to the Academy."
          "Figures. Why this place?"
          "Seems the former proprietors weren't too particular about where they got their tube grubs. Instead of raising them on proper sterile detritus beds or having them shipped in from a farm, the Bolians were actually harvesting wild-types from the organic waste processor. Too many cases of enterotoxemia, so I had to shut them down." Seeing Kira's expression, he laughed. "Don't worry, everything's clean; it's just no one's optioned the lease yet. Cooking in my quarters is a little cramped so I thought I'd take advantage of having a fully-equipped kitchen available."
          Sitting on a convenient stool, she cleared a space on the counter so that she could plant her elbows on it and prop her chin on her hands. Silently she watched as he pressed the side of his knife to cloves of garlic, lifting away paper-thin membranes. Deftly he minced the garlic with precise flashes of the sharp blade. Transferring the pungent heap to a saucepan in which chopped onion was heating with a splash of heavy green oil, he sauteed the mixture until the onion was just translucent and the garlic lightly browned, then set it aside.
          "What are you making?" Kira found this elaborate fuss fascinating. Most Bajoran cooking was--of necessity, until recently--fairly plain, with few ingredients and little preparation other than simple boiling or baking. Or being split and roasted on a stick, she thought with a faint shudder; palukku were definitely an acquired taste, one that she was wholeheartedly glad not to have to acquire again.
          "Standard date-night fare," Bashir said with an exaggeratedly louche grin but no further explanation. She rolled her eyes, helped herself to a glass of wine (Terran wine, she noticed, swallowing a laugh) from an opened bottle and settled in to watch him work.
          Using a slotted spoon, he scooped up a bright red fruit from a pile on the counter and plunged it briefly into a huge pot of boiling water and then into ice water before gently squeezing it to slip it out of its skin into a bowl. When all the red globes had been peeled, he chopped them coarsely and added them to the onion and garlic in the saucepan; from an airponics module he picked out some fragrant green leaves, tore them into small pieces and tossed them in, along with dashes of salt, pepper and vinegar. He stirred the mixture until it bubbled and spat, then covered it and turned down the heat to let it simmer.
          A generous handful of slender yellow sticks went into the still-boiling water. Bashir took from an oven a crusty loaf of bread, wrapping it in a cloth and placing it in a basket. From another oven came a dish full of heads of garlic that had been roasted until they had caramelized. Bread and garlic were whisked away to a nearby table already set with a red-and-white-checkered cloth and flickering candles in old wine bottles. Back at the stove, he stirred about in the boiling pot with a fork, frowning slightly until at last he lifted out the pot's insert to let the water drain through the holes in its bottom. A quick scoop and swirl of the contents--now white and stringy--onto each of two large, shallow plates, followed by a huge ladleful of red sauce topped with a few shavings of some kind of hard cheese; these too were placed on the table, along with green salads from the refrigeration unit. At last, with a flourish he pulled a chair out for her and gestured for her to sit.
          Her stomach loudly reminded her that she hadn't had anything to eat since breakfast, and Bashir looked up with a sideways smile. Everything smelled delicious, though Kira couldn't help thinking that the white stuff looked like limp, dead gagh. She took a tentative bite.
          Intense flavors--tart, peppery, biting, sweet--exploded on her tongue. Kira dug in with orgiastic abandon, copying the way Bashir twirled the strands with his fork and slurped the loose ends. Now and then they broke off a piece of bread to messily squeeze some of the roasted garlic over its steaming velvety inside, or guzzled more of the almost meaty red wine. Only when they had depleted everything in sight did they come up for air, regarding with some astonishment the remains of their debauch.
          Bashir nursed a raktajino as Kira finished the last of the second bottle. "You know, no one would ever believe this," he said.
          " 'S that?" Terran wine might not be as strong as Bajoran, but it had a sneakily mellowing effect and she was feeling supremely relaxed. This "Burgundy" stuff was all right.
          "I mean, your being in the same room with me of your own free will and not kicking my teeth in. If I'd known that all it took to get you to act civilly toward me was to cosh you over the head, I'd've done it years ago."
          Kira stuck her tongue out at him. "I'm still recuperating and therefore not fully responsible for my actions." She smiled to take any sting out of her words. "Anyway, Dax knows."
          "You told her?"
          "Of course n--I mean, she guessed. I mean, how does Dax know anything?"
          "Dax, like God or the Prophets, moves in mysterious ways. Damned near as cryptic, anyway."
          "Got that right. So where does that leave us?"
          "Mmm... I've always preferred to play nice with the other children. Truce?"
          "Truce." She tinked her glass playfully at his coffee mug. "I may even cook dinner for you sometime."
          "Is that a promise?"
          "And a threat; you haven't tried my cooking before. How are you at pounding kava root?"
          They laughed and talked well into the night, with an ease born of new-found familiarity and the relief that neither of them felt the need to resurrect the habitual antipathy that had distanced them for so long. 
*     *     *     *     *

fin

[Originally posted to a.s.c. 7/14/97]