Title: Beyond Gloomy Chaos
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Following Sisko's entry into the Celestial Temple in "What You Leave Behind," the Q find themselves facing a dilemma that could result in interplanetary catastrophe. Can Picard, Kira and Data retrieve the mysterious Book of the Resurrection before all hell breaks loose on Cardassia?
DISCLAIMER: Paramount owns the Star Trek universe and everything it encompasses. This story is not intended to infringe on any copyrights, and the only profit I gain by it is emotional satisfaction.
PART SIX CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Kira felt her heart leap with joy and relief. The Emissary had returned! She would not fail the Prophets now. She would not run like a spooked gettle again.
She tried to roll Dorek aside, so she could retrieve the book and hand it over to the Prophets, but he refused to budge. Determined, she kicked him in the ribs. He groaned when one of them cracked against the toe of her boot, but still would not yield. "Help me, Emissary!" she cried as she tried to wedge her hands beneath Dorek.
Wind whistled past her ear, then Dorek was flying backward across the cavern. The far wall stopped his flight with a bone-shattering crunch.
* * * * *
Despite his protestations to the contrary, Q knew the time would come when he would have no choice but to intervene. When his insides churned at the sight of the Cardassian's brutally broken body, he knew that time had come. With a brief prayer, in the hope that something more powerful than himself was watching, he hurled a bolt of energy at the Prophet.
* * * * *
Picard helped Kormet to her feet again. He had already begun to assist her when Dorek's fatal flight forced them back down. He felt sick at what Sisko had done, and now knew for certain the Prophet shared none of Captain Sisko's moral sensibilities. If this is what being a god is all about...he thought with disgust.
They had all been so shocked by Dorek's fate that no one realized the scroll once again lay unguarded. Thinking as one, Picard and Kormet went after it.
* * * * *
Only the instantaneous link between thought and action all Q possessed saved Picard from sharing Dorek's fate. To Q's great regret, however, he could not deflect the Prophet's power in time to save Kormet. Soon she, too, lay shattered and broken on the opposite ledge. If he survived the confrontation with Sisko -- and he understood only too well the possibility of failure -- he would mourn her loss.
* * * * *
Damar lurched to his feet, his insides roiling. First Dorek, then Kormet... he had long since grown accustomed to the casual brutality of death, but the viciousness with which Sisko had murdered them...he hoped he would never again have to witness anything so horrific.
Still shaking, he staggered across the ledge to the span, hoping he could get to that damned book before Kira did. As dear as she was to him, he would not allow Dorek and Kormet to have died in vain.
* * * * *
Kira stared at the Emissary, stunned. What had happened to the Captain Sisko she had grown to admire and even love? What had become of the Prophets she worshipped? The cruelty with which he had killed Dorek and Kormet was more characteristic of a Cardassian, not of the Emissary of the Prophets!
She saw movement out of the corner of her eye and turned her head. Damar was only a meter away, bending down and reaching for the book, which she could now see was actually a scroll. Despite her revulsion at what the Emissary had done, she could not allow the book to fall into Cardassian hands.
With a loud cry of protest, she flung herself at Damar, knocking him down and the scroll out of his hands. A jumble of arms, legs and parchment, the three of them tumbled down the bridge's gently curving arch.
* * * * *
Q saw the window of opportunity open. He knew it was the only opening he would get. Before Sisko could act, he erected a sphere of cosmic energy around Damar, Kira, and the scroll. Now that all the actors were in place, the most he could do now was wait for them to play their parts, and hope he could hold off the Prophet's destructive fury long enough.
When the first bolts of white-hot Prophetic fury lashed his body, he feared 'long enough' would come much too soon. Q... he cried out in silent supplication when another bolt struck him, hoping at least one of his brothers and sisters would come to his aid before it was too late.
* * * * *
From within the safe confines of the Continuum, Q's mate watched the unfolding disaster with growing horror. "Help him!" she cried, turning to the Moderator. "You must send someone to help him!"
The Moderator shook his head sadly as Sisko threw bolt after bolt of energy at Q. "There is nothing we can do. Q knew the rules. He should not have interfered. Now he must pay the consequences of his disobedience."
In agony, Q watched her mate falter, his pain all too evident. If she went to him, she knew the consequences. Nonetheless, she could not let Q die all alone down there. "You can take your rules and go to hell!" Q snapped in reply, just before disappearing.
* * * * *
Damar disentangled himself from Kira and looked up to find an oddly shimmering wall of white separating them from the fierce battle beyond. As though seeing through murky water, he watched as Sisko pelted Q with jagged streaks of energy while Q struggled to uphold the barrier protecting Damar and Kira. Then another Human appeared mysteriously beside Q, a woman with long red hair and a uniform like Q's. Damar watched as she joined her energy with Q's, then recoiled in apparent agony as she also joined him in his suffering.
The book! a voice resounded in his head. It was the same voice he had heard when his mind awakened from hibernation. Q's voice. The book? He had momentarily forgotten it. It lay, unrolled, next to Kira. He reached for it, curious that such an unprepossessing document could incite such warfare.
"Don't." He glanced up to see Kira also reaching for it.
"I just want to see what it has to say."
"Then we'll do it together." She gave him a hard, unblinking stare as she pulled herself to a sitting position next to him. "I'm not going to let you use it against Bajor."
"I have no desire to use it against anyone. I just want to find out for myself what could cause so much hatred and suffering." He lay the yellowed document across his lap and Kira's, smoothing out the creases left over millennia of storage.
"Where are the words?" Kira asked. "There's nothing on it!"
He could see that for himself. Thinking that perhaps the scroll was incomplete, and the writings were closer to the beginning, he completely unrolled it. Still nothing. Surely the ink had not faded into oblivion? Is this what they had come for -- a blank page? Still searching for an answer, he turned the parchment over.
"Wait!" Kira said, excitedly pointing at the scroll. "I see something."
The print was tiny, so small he had to squint to see it, but she was right. He held the parchment close to his face and read: "And so we return to the beginning." Confused, he looked at Kira, who had bent over the scroll and was mouthing the words to herself.
He never saw the blow coming.
* * * * *
"Just... a few... more seconds!" Q said through clenched teeth, trying to stave off the pain threatening to tear apart his quintessence.
"Can't... hold... on... much longer," his mate gasped, her body shaking violently as the Prophet assaulted her again and again.
"We must destroy the book!" Sisko thundered. "There must be no turning back."
"Over... my... dead... body!" Q said, just as a bolt of energy hit him broadside, knocking him off his feet. He fell to the ground with a jarring thud. He cried out when a second shockwave sent his mate sprawling, leaving Damar and Kira unprotected. Unable even to raise his head, Q closed his eyes when he saw the final, fatal ball of light form in the Prophet's hand and felt the world shake violently all around him. He had failed.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Damar lurched to his feet, desperate for any signs of life from his companions. Kormet and Dorek were dead. Kira sat slumped against a fallen boulder, the object of their quest lying open in her lap, her eyes frozen in catatonia, her jaw locked open in a futile effort to utter the first syllable of the mysterious text. Picard, knocked unconscious by Prophetic wrath, lay nearby. On the opposite ledge the two entities named Q lay unmoving in a crumpled heap. For all Damar knew, they too were dead.
Of them all, only he remained standing. Only he remained to bear witness to their failure.
Light flickered in the direction whence they had come, where the river of magma churned and seethed. Damar trained his sight on it, hoping for the best, fearing the worst. Sisko had promised that none of those who pursued the book would ever leave alive. He had already fulfilled that promise against at least two of them, and by Damar's reckoning there were still at least two more to dispatch. He pressed his back against the cliff, wishing he had a weapon even though he knew any would be futile if the Prophets were determined to kill him.
The light approached, its flickering now a steady glow. Within it Damar could see a dark form advancing upon him. Then a voice he thought had been silenced forever echoed with heart-stopping substantiality in his head: "Damar. It's been a long time."
Ice formed in Damar's veins. He shook his head, partly in disbelief, partly to dislodge the hallucination that haunted him. Of all the infernal specters to torment him with, the Prophets had chosen well. He gulped noisily, then licked his lips. "Dukat."
That unnerving laughter he had once found so intrinsically Cardassian filled the cavern as his former mentor came into view. Damar could not help recoiling at the sight of this man he had once revered more than he did his own father, now rendered horribly, fantastically unreal, his eyes glowing demonically red out of his fire-blackened face while tongues of fire caressed him like a lover's hands. "No..." he whispered.
"What's the matter, Damar?" Dukat challenged. "Where's that sneering, servile sycophant who used to fantasize about fucking my daughter? Have you forgotten how to show respect for your superiors?"
"Y-You're not D-Dukat," Damar stammered. He forced strength into his voice. "You're not the Dukat I knew."
"The Dukat you knew never existed! He was nothing more than a product of your pathetic idealism. That Dukat never existed. I am Dukat."
His pronouncement, as unbelievable as it sounded, drove Damar back even farther. With growing alarm, he realized the light that had heralded Dukat's entrance had taken on a life of its own. It filled the cavern, plumes of unnatural fire careening off the walls like gusts of wind, blanketing the bodies strewn about the ledge, brushing past his head and entwining around his legs, catlike, with sensuous murmurings of promises no man could resist. For a moment, Damar thought he heard Weyoun's voice tickling at his ear, but when he swatted at the phantom it drifted away.
Whatever this creature claiming to be Dukat might be, Damar had no doubt its intent was to hurl him, and his companions, straight into the bowels of hell. Damar vowed to himself that if such were to be his fate, he would take this wraith with him. Emboldened by his resolution, he asked, "What are you?"
Another laugh, this one deeper and more menacing. "Oh, I suppose it depends on what you are," Dukat said. "The Prophets who sent me here know me as the Adversary, the one who does their dirty work. On Bajor, I am called Kosst Amojin, the Evil One. The Klingons call me Fek'lhr, guardian of Gre'thor. On Earth, they call me Ha-Shaitan."
A small voice on the other side of the chasm croaked, "The devil."
Damar whirled. Picard had regained consciousness and was struggling to sit up. If he were not already otherwise occupied, Damar would have gone to his aid. Instead, he turned back to Dukat. "The devil? That's just superstition. There is no such thing as a devil."
"Hm," Dukat said with a leer, swaggering even closer, stalking Damar like a bloodthirsty beast. "Oh, but I can assure you, there is. The betrayer. The prince of darkness. The destroyer of souls. The lord of hell. The father of lies. The serpent of death." His eyes gleamed ravenously. "I am all of these things."
A light flashed at Damar's feet. Fearing the worst, he leaped to one side, only to lose his footing and stumble on the rocky ledge, almost plummeting into the abyss. At the last moment, however, a beam of fiery light shot out from Dukat's hand, snaking around Damar's waist like a lasso and pulling him upright before releasing him. "Not yet, my old friend," Dukat said. "The Prophets may have sent me to escort you and your friends to hell, but I intend to teach you a lesson first. Stand to," he ordered, and a flash of light coalesced into a long, starkly curved minetsa saber in his hands.
Damar looked down at his feet to find a similar weapon lying there. He obediently picked it up, judging the weight and balance as he hefted it in his hands. "Why this?" he asked as he turned it left and right, observing how the light reflected off the razor-sharp edge. "Why not phasers, or bare hands? For that matter, why don't you hit me with one of those bolts of fire?" Although he had not wielded a minetsa in many years, the weapon felt good in his hands. He raised it high above his head, then released it to the pull of gravity, catching it at the last moment to swing it around his head.
Dukat imitated his movements, barely missing Damar's chin when he flipped the saber from hand to hand. "The Prophets don't let me out very often, and never for such a valuable prize. I've been waiting for this moment for an eternity. I intend to make the most of it." He swung his weapon high in the air, then brought it down with immortal force, curving harshly to the right at the last second as he aimed straight for Damar's head.
Damar barely had time to raise his saber and deflect the blow. The force of Dukat's attack sent him reeling, but with a series of quick feints he managed to maneuver himself toward the center of the ledge, away from the precipice. At least here, with room to move freely, he had a fighting chance at success.
It was the only chance he had.
* * * * *
Picard ached all over from the blow Sisko had given him. He had been a fool, he realized with a flood of regret; he had stupidly assumed Sisko the Prophet shared the same concerns and morals as Sisko the Starfleet officer. Now, as a consequence of his arrogance, Dorek and Kormet lay dead, Q and his mate probably mortally wounded, and Colonel Kira frozen in a state of unimpeachable catatonia.
Metal clashed against metal with a shower of sparks. Picard looked up from his self-recrimination to see two Cardassians locked in fierce hand-to-hand combat. The younger one, Damar, wielded his weapon with greater skill and agility, but Picard could see he was fighting a losing battle.
His opponent, the one who had so brazenly proclaimed himself the devil incarnate, fought with what Picard could only describe as immortal speed and strength. Each time his blade slashed through the air it flew with increasingly greater speed and force, until the whirling weapons were little more than a blur. Damar fought off each attack with spirit and courage, but Picard could see he was tiring.
He would soon fall.
* * * * *
"I must say, Damar, that I am disappointed at how you've let your training lapse," Dukat almost crowed as he leaped on to a nearby boulder, depriving Damar of the advantage of weight by attacking him from above. Damar knew he could taste his approaching victory. "What happened to that nimble young soldier who placed second in the middleweight championships?"
"That was eight years ago," Damar grunted as he slashed at Dukat's legs, "and I've been dead for the past three."
Dukat jumped back down, forcing Damar into the defensive once again. "Pah! Death is nothing. I've been in hell for over 100,000 years, nearly a third of which was spent locked in a stone tablet with Sisko. Can you imagine what that must be like?" He grinned fiendishly as he sideswiped Damar, tearing a diagonal gash across his upper arm. "You'll be finding out soon enough!"
* * * * *
Damar howled in agony as the beveled blade sliced through skin and muscle, leaving the sensation of icy-hot fire in their wake. The pain was so fierce tears sprung to his eyes, further endangering him from Dukat's lethal onslaught. Rather than succumb to the pain, however, Damar fed on it, nourishing his fury. Uttering a loud cry of murderous outrage, he drove Dukat backward with a mercilessly rapid succession of lunges and counter-strikes.
He knew he would eventually lose.
* * * * *
Picard...
Picard jerked, looking about. Where had the voice come from?
Picard...
He recognized the voice, but when he looked over to where Q had fallen with his mate, he saw no sign of movement.
Help us...
"Q?" he whispered. "Where are you?"
Help... us...
The voice grew weaker. Picard realized the entity was dying, and had summoned up the last reserves of his once-boundless vitality in a final plea for help. "What do you want me to do?"
Stop... him... Don't... let... him... win...
Picard looked over at the two combatants. What the devil does he expect me to do from all the way over here? he wondered. He could not very well get up and leap across a ten-meter chasm to take up arms in Damar's defense. Phasers were out of the question. What was he supposed to do?
He had an idea.
* * * * *
Damar threw himself, body and soul, into the fight of his life -- for all he knew, the fight of the cosmos' life. He fought for himself. He fought for Kira. He fought for the Kerdish, for Dorek and Kormet and his long-dead wife and child. He fought for all the Cardassians slaughtered in the waning hours of the Dominion War, and for all the Bajorans tortured and murdered during the Occupation. He fought for those who yet lived, who had no idea their lives were about to come to a final, horrible end. He fought for Garak, and Rusot, and Mila, and Ziyal, and for the Dukat he had once cherished as a father. By the faith of the gods, by the blood of his ancestors, he fought for them all.
Slowly but surely, step by incremental step, Dukat drove him back.
Damar knew he was losing -- knew he had already lost -- but still he fought. As long as there was breath in his lungs, he would fight. If only he could gain one small advantage. If only...
"Dukat!"
The voice came from the other side of the chasm, from... Picard. Damar hesitated, afraid a second's inattention would hasten his doom.
Dukat turned.
Damar saw his opportunity and seized it. Summoning every remaining microcosm of strength he had left, he swung the minetsa straight for Dukat.
Dukat turned back to him at the very instant the blade cleaved through his neck, irrevocably severing the serpent's head from its body. The expression of surprise flash-frozen on Dukat's face at the moment of impact would haunt Damar's memory for all eternity.
The force of the blow sent Dukat's head flying into the abyss. For a moment, Damar remained frozen in place, his chest heaving, his muscles burning, his heart hammering, his gaze fixed on the decapitated corpse standing before him, smoke rising in wisps from the cauterized stump.
Overcome, he fell to his knees. He had done it.
Then a bellow exploded forth from the depths of the abyss and a wall of flame leaped sky-high, the force of the eruption hurling him backward into the cliff. For a long time, he knew nothing but the sensation of extreme heat, rocks pelting him from all directions, and the violent shaking he felt sure would tear the mountain in half.
When Damar emerged from the shelter of his arms and looked up again, all that remained of Dukat was a pile of ashes.
He had won. He had defeated the Kosst Amojin: he had defeated the Prophets!
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Picard staggered to his feet and wiped the sweat from his face. He walked unsteadily to the cliff edge and peered into the abyss. Still dazed, he could not quite understand what he had just witnessed -- for that matter, he was still unsure what he had just witnessed. Whatever may have taken place, however, he was quite certain he would never forget it.
"Captain." He looked up at the sound of the semi-strangled voice to see Damar still cowering on the opposite ledge. "How is Kira?"
Colonel Kira! He had forgotten all about her. He hurried over to her, still crouching to protect himself against the occasional falling missile, and checked her pulse. Faint. He held his finger beneath her nose. Nothing.
"She's dying." He knew they would have to free her from her catatonia before she strangled. But how? He shook her vigorously, hoping that would rouse her, but she flopped like a rag doll in his arms and remained frozen. Desperate, he slapped her. Still no response.
"Q!" he barked as a last resort. He looked over his shoulder at the two crumpled entities, silently begging them to live. "Q, please, you have to help us."
Can't... too weak... dying...
Picard refused to admit defeat. He knew that, somewhere deep within his quintessence, Q had enough vitality left to perform just one more miracle. "Q, after all we did, after all we've risked for you, you owe us this much."
No strength... need help...can't...
"Dammit!" He lowered Kira to the floor and bowed his head, both trying to think straight and hoping for a miracle. If only he had brought Data. If only Kormet were still alive. If only he had a communicator. If only he had never agreed to this foolish mission to begin with. If only...
"Captain, look!" Damar's excited voice interrupted his increasingly despondent musing, and he looked up.
At first, he could not believe his eyes, so he rubbed them vigorously. It was still there. A stone bridge that he knew had not been there a moment ago now spanned the gulf between the two ledges. Had Q...?
Hurry...
The voice was not Q's. Picard looked over to see Q's mate stretching her hand toward the precipice, her entire body shaking with the effort to bring about this last, most desperate, miracle.
Hurry...
"Hurry, Damar, before it's too late!"
The Cardassian needed no further encouragement. He nearly hurdled the bridge in his zeal to reach Picard and Kira. Just in time, too; the instant his foot touched the other side, the span vanished in a cloud of dust and Q's mate fell back, mortally unconscious.
Damar snatched up Kira and hugged her to his chest. It took Picard a second or two to recognize the man's profound grief as he cradled her head in his arm and rocked back and forth on his knees, letting the tears flow freely. Out of respect -- although he did not fully understand what he should be respecting -- Picard turned away.
* * * * *
Damar felt as though his chest would burst with grief. So many deaths, all of them senseless -- would it ever end? His wife and child, Rusot, Mila, all those brave men and women who fought so valiantly to purge the Dominion blight from Cardassian space, Dukat... and now Dorek, Kormet and, perhaps worst of all, Colonel Kira who, more than any of them, had taught him the value of life. It seemed as if the entire universe had collapsed around him, leaving only him to pick up the pieces.
Forcing himself to regain control over his emotions, Damar gently laid Kira on the ground. He tilted her chin toward the ceiling, then pinched her nose and bent over her to force his own breath into her mouth and, he hoped, her lungs. He felt, rather than saw or heard, Picard kneel opposite him and begin compressing Kira's chest.
For several minutes the two men worked in silent tandem -- one of them trying to coerce her to breathe, the other trying to restart her heart -- without any sign of success. Then, as Damar held his cheek near her nose while Picard pressed down on her chest, Damar thought he heard something. Not quite speech, but more than a breath. He frantically motioned to Picard to repeat the gesture and strained his ears to listen.
"...we... return..."
Astonished, Damar looked up at Picard, hoping the Human might have an answer. Picard shook his head, obviously as baffled as Damar. Nonetheless bolstered by his limited success, Damar again forced air into Kira's mouth, then bent forward to listen while Picard massaged her chest.
"...to... the..."
Once again the two men looked at each other in silent puzzlement. Lacking any logical explanation for Kira's disembodied exhalations -- or any reason not to continue -- they again applied themselves to the task of reviving her.
"...beginning..."
When her head lolled to one side and her chest deflated until it was nearly concave, Damar knew she was dead. He hung his head in regret that he had not been able to do more to save her.
"'We return to the beginning'?" Picard asked. "Do you have any idea what that refers to?"
Damar raised his head. "No. It --" His gaze fell on the scroll, the object of their quest, where it lay fallen, discarded and forgotten, by Kira's side. "The book..." he murmured, distracted by the whisper of a memory. He reached across Kira to retrieve it, then ran his finger across the brittle parchment until he came to the only section with any writing on it. There he read again: "And so we return to the beginning."
"She must have read that just before we were attacked," Picard said. "The words were probably right on the tip of her tongue when Sisko -- when the Prophet -- locked her into catatonia."
"He'd warned us not to read it," Damar said. "So he prevented her from uttering the words."
"Then why didn't he inflict the same punishment on you?" Picard wondered.
Damar struggled to sort through the rapid sequence of events that had befallen them over the past hour -- the discovery of the book, the Prophet's re-appearance, the assistance of the two Human-like entities, the Prophet unleashing his fury on them, the duel with Dukat.... "He was too late," Damar said with stark realization. "I'd already read the text. Kira was right beside me, reading along with me, when he attacked her. He couldn't stop me, so he stopped her instead."
"Even so..." Picard began. Damar glanced up from the book when he heard Picard's voice falter, to see the Human staring, wide-eyed, over his shoulder. "Turn... around... very... carefully," he said.
Obediently, Damar turned slowly to see what was behind him that had unnerved Picard so much. The sight made him drop the book to the ground.
The cavern pulsed with light. Not daylight, not the artificial glow of a lamp, not even the unholy light that heralded Dukat's approach, but a sort of living light, a light that throbbed with so much radiant energy Damar was convinced of its sentience. Where is it coming from? he wondered, and was startled to hear his own unspoken thoughts reverberating back to him in a gradually accelerating crescendo of whispers. Unlike the murmuring voices that had accompanied Dukat, however, these voices filled him with a sensation of joy and peace. In fact, they almost sounded like Kormet.
Brighter and brighter it grew, plumes of glowing incandescence swirling around them, covering every surface and all the empty spaces between. His heart swelling with uncharacteristic rapture, Damar asked silently, What are you? He almost laughed out loud at the chorus of voices echoing his thoughts in his head.
He did not feel like laughing when the light brushed across the fallen forms of Dorek, Kormet and the two Qs. In fact, it seemed to emanate such profound melancholy he felt tears spring to his eyes. Somehow, he knew, they were not entirely of his own making, and found a disquieting sort of comfort in the light's shared grief. He watched with a mixture of bliss, sadness, and wonder as the light flowed all around the bodies, blanketing them in illuminated caresses, entering them through their nostrils, ears, and mouths.
Although almost the entire cavern was by now flooded with the humming, throbbing, pulsating light, a small space around Damar, Picard and Kira remained untouched. Then Damar saw a small slipstream coursing across the floor through the ever-expanding ocean toward them. It slowed as it reached the edge, then gradually changed direction until it flowed upward, converging into a defined shape within. Then, as Damar watched in wide-eyed awe, it stepped out of the sea of light and into the unilluminated sphere.
It was Danal Kormet.
Only it was not Kormet as Damar remembered her. Like the specter of Dukat, this creature looked like Kormet, but it was at the same time fundamentally different. Could this be another wraith sent by Sisko to finish what Dukat had failed to accomplish? Suddenly fearful, Damar crept backward away from the being, at once both afraid to turn and run and afraid to stay and face whatever challenge lay before him.
The being must have recognized his terror, because it stopped and held out both hands, palms up, in a placating gesture. It then opened its mouth as if to speak, but the voice Damar heard seemed to originate from within himself as it said, "Be not afraid."
Unsure how to respond, Damar turned to Picard for advice. The Human was leaning against the cliff wall as though he were afraid he would collapse if he tried to stand on his own, and his eyes were very wide. Damar summoned what little courage he had left to turn back to the being and ask, "What are you?"
The being tilted its head as Kormet often did and smiled at Damar. A warm blanket of peace enveloped him. If this is the end, it's not an unpleasant way to go. "We will not harm you," he heard. Irrational as it might be, he believed the statement to be true. The being -- or beings -- would not harm him.
The being resumed its course toward him, but Damar's fear had long since vanished. He watched in almost stupefied bliss as it glided past him to kneel beside Kira's body. While he and Picard continued to watch, it passed its hands across her form, then leaned forward to kiss her in the center of her brow -- right where her third eye would be, if she were Cardassian, Damar thought, at the same time wondering what made him think that.
Damar almost choked when the being moved away from Kira to reveal her body wrapped in a soft, vibrating glow not unlike the light that filled the cavern. "Wha--?" he tried to ask, but his tongue failed him.
The being turned to face him. "She helped set us free. In gratitude, we will restore her life to her." As before, its mouth moved, but the sound of its voice came from within Damar.
Apparently the sound also came from within Picard, because he said, his voice barely more than a whisper, "But she wanted to destroy you."
The being rose to its feet. Damar felt compelled to do the same. "She did not. That is all that matters."
Suddenly desperate with hope, Damar forced himself to ask, "Then you'll do the same for Dorek and... and Kormet?" He was unsure if he should name her, with her shade standing a meter away. "Can you bring them back to life, too?"
The sadness he had witnessed and experienced earlier returned, magnified by the being's closeness. It shook its head. "We cannot. Their path has ended. They have passed through the gates to Paradise." It looked at Kira. Although she still lay dormant, Damar could see a faint bloom of color in her cheeks, and his hope surged again. "Her path has not yet ended. She still has far to go."
"What about Q?" Picard asked. "After all, it was he who sent us here, and both of them came to our defense against Sisko."
The being nodded. "The Q tread an unending path. They yet live." As it spoke, Damar thought he could see movement coming from the female Q.
"You still haven't told us who or what you are," Picard said, slowly regaining his familiar self-assurance. "Are you Q? Prophets?"
Rather than respond, the being simply gazed unblinkingly at them both. For an instant, Damar thought he saw a flash of red fire in its eyes, then the flash, and the being, was gone, reabsorbed into the light. Then, while he and Picard watched in silent amazement, the light gathered itself into a massive column of shimmering, living luminescence and propelled itself upward, soaring higher and higher, like the eruption following Dukat's death, until it escaped through a miniscule patch of daylight peeking through the cavern's roof. A few small stones broke free of their moorings to tumble down into the chasm below, but the light's departure caused none of the calamities the Prophet's and Dukat's had. Instead, it left in its wake a persistent sensation of exhilaration.
"Perhaps we should have asked for a lift," Picard said, the corners of his eyes crinkling slightly. Damar smiled and lifted his chin again to gaze in the direction the light had gone.
A low moan came from behind them, and both men turned to see Kira struggling to sit up, her hand rubbing at her throat. "What... happened?" she croaked.
Genuinely elated to see her alive again, Damar knelt beside her to offer his physical and psychological support. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you," he said.
She gave him a baleful look. "Try me."
He chuckled and glanced over his shoulder at Picard. "I don't even know where to begin."
"The beginning is usually a good place to start."
So he told her, from beginning to end, everything that had taken place since Sisko knocked her unconscious. When he got to the part about Dukat's appearance, her face paled, but when he told her of his victory -- with Picard's help -- she rested her hand on his arm and gazed at him with an expression of utmost gratitude.
When he told her about the living light and the gift of life it has restored to her, however, she trembled and drew back. "So then I failed," she whispered, her voice breaking. "I failed the Prophets." Damar longed to wipe away the tears glistening in her eyes. He knew only too well the crushing disappointment at having failed an entire world.
"Not at all," said another voice, and all three of them turned to see Q staggering to his feet. "You may have failed to do what the Prophets wanted, but you succeeded in accomplishing the miracle the Kerdish have prayed for 100,000 years."
"What do you mean?" Picard asked.
Q grunted and waved his hand at them, as though he were shooing away a bothersome insect. "If I tell you, you'd never believe me. So go and see for yourself." Then he snapped his fingers, and he, his mate, and the cavern disappeared.
Damar blinked. Beside him, Kira gasped. Picard simply turned around in circles, his mouth hanging open. Where had Q sent them?
They were in Paradise, or at least as close to Paradise as the physical world could ever come. Life exploded all around them, in the lush green meadow they stood in, the thick forests covering the mountain range, the herds of wild animals larger than anything Damar had ever seen, the broad, clear brook burbling merrily a few meters away, and the bright sky filled with birds, so clean and blue Damar's eyes hurt to look at it.
"Where are we?" Kira at last managed to ask.
Picard stopped turning long enough to answer, "I think we're on Cardassia."
"What?" Damar and Kira asked, in unison.
Picard shook his head. "I don't believe it myself, but I'm almost positive we're standing where the Kerdish had their tents pitched two days ago."
"But... but..." Damar left the thought unfinished. Instead, he reached down to pluck a large white flower and hand it to Kira. If he remembered his paleobotany lessons correctly, that species of flower, native to Cardassia, had died out 4,000 years ago. Those herds consisted of Vikna's wapiti and tuznars, also extinct. If they were indeed on Cardassia, then when were they?
Voices in the distance provided the answer. Cresting a nearby hill was a band of Cardassians, clad in the traditional garments of the Kerdish tribes, and... Commander Data. "Captain!" he called, waving his arm.
"Data!" Picard called back. As if that was the cue they had been waiting for, the Kerdish, with Data in the lead, raced down the hill toward them, some of them hurdling the brook in their haste, some of them splashing through it, all of them laughing and crying at once.
Damar felt himself assaulted on all sides as the Kerdish clamored to welcome him back. Women of all ages kissed his cheeks, children wrapped their arms around his legs, almost tripping him, and men jostled each other to shake his hands, clap him on the shoulder, or throw their arms around him in a fierce, rib-crunching embrace. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Kira and Picard being subjected to the same joyous adulation. He only wished he knew what he had done to deserve it.
After several minutes, as the din began to lessen, Damar heard Picard's voice ring out above the noise, "Mister Data, can you tell us what happened?"
The Kerdish fell silent. "You do not know?" Data asked, clearly puzzled by their ignorance.
"No, Data. Please tell us what happened."
"We saw the mountain torn in half!" a woman said.
Data nodded, as if to confirm her account, and pointed in the direction Picard, Damar and Kira had come from. "She is right. An eruption tore off the upper half of that mountain." Damar turned to see for himself, and was astonished to see the mountain they had entered reduced to a mere foothill. "We feared the worst," Data continued. "Then, as the Kerdish debated what action to take, we saw a strange light emerge from within the mountain. Within a matter of seconds, the light had expanded to cover everything in sight. Then, before our eyes --" He spread his hands, to indicate the abundance of life surrounding them. "-- everything was transformed. The desert became a meadow. Herds of strange animals appeared. Saplings emerged from the ground and grew to full size in seconds. The sky became clear. The stream filled with water and fish." He paused, and tilted his head to one side. "It appeared as though someone had detonated a Genesis device here."
"It is because our gods have finally been set free!" the woman said.
Data looked at Picard with a puzzled expression. "Captain?" he asked.
"She may be right," Picard said, lifting a young boy into his arms. "It's as good an explanation as any I can provide."
"But what of Bajor?" Kira asked. "The legend of Ha-Bajra --"
"-- has nothing to do with Bajor," Damar said, frustrated and angry. "Kormet told you that, Q told you that, I told you that. I should think that, after everything that took place in there --" He gestured toward the ruined mountain. "-- you would realize the truth in what we said. But, if you don't believe me, you can always contact Deep Space Nine when you get back to the capital and find out for yourself."
Chastened, Kira looked down at the ground. "It can wait," she said. "I'm sure the Prophets wouldn't let any harm come to Bajor."
"Especially now that they have no other place to go," Picard said. "If Q was right and what happened in there served to expel the Prophets from the Celestial Temple, then naturally they would seek refuge on Bajor." He narrowed his eyes. "Q did say this would all ultimately benefit Bajor. I can't imagine anything more beneficial than a closer relationship between the Prophets and their people."
"Except, perhaps," Damar said, stepping forward to take Kira's hand in his, "a closer relationship between Bajor and Cardassia."
EPILOGUE
The ceremony was mercifully short and uncomplicated, considering the months of planning and diplomatic maneuvering that had preceded it. Nonetheless, when Premier Damar and First Minister Shakaar, accompanied by Ambassador Kira, her Cardassian counterpart, the Bajoran kai and his Kerdish counterpart, each leaned forward with a torch to ignite the eternal flame meant to symbolize the union of the two worlds, Picard heaved a deep sigh of relief. So much could have gone so horribly wrong, and no one would be more pleased than him to see the union succeed. Both Bajor and Cardassia needed this -- for themselves, and for each other.
With the diplomatic and ritual portion of the unification ceremony complete, the politicians gathered at the podium for their moment in the spotlight. Picard had seen all he had come to see, and rose to leave. Not far away, a familiar voice shouted, "Jean-Luc!"
He peered down to see Vash grinning up at him, and grinned back in delighted surprise. "What brings you here?" he asked, leaping down out of the stands.
"Are you kidding?" she asked, linking her arm through his as they walked away from the central plaza, skirting the piles of rubble and construction vehicles that signified a city about to be reborn. "When I heard that Jean-Luc Picard had taken a leave of absence from Starfleet to lead the team of archaeologists excavating the ancient Hebitian capital, I hopped on the first shuttle out of the Gamma Quadrant!"
Picard laughed, genuinely glad to see her again. "It's a lot of hard work," he cautioned. "Not much chance you'll find priceless treasure."
"Oh, Jean-Luc," she sighed, "you are treasure enough for me!"
* * * * *
Q chuckled as he watched Picard and Vash walk off, arm-in-arm, toward the refurbished shuttleport.
"What's so amusing?" Q asked, nuzzling at his neck.
He groaned in pleasure and slipped his arm around her waist. "Oh, nothing. I'm just laughing at Jean-Luc. He's always been a sucker for a beautiful woman." He gasped when his mate nibbled at a particularly sensitive spot below his ear. "My love," he murmured, "I believe that near-death experience has done wonders for your libido."
Her responding laugh conveyed multiple layers of meaning. "Care to find out what else it's done wonders for?" she asked, her voice husky.
Q growled lustily. "Only if it involves borrowing the Celestial Temple for the next several millennia," he said.
"Just give me a few minutes to slip into something more comfortable," she purred before disappearing.
He sighed in giddy anticipation. Before departing to join his mate in conjugal bliss, however, he took one last look around. The Cardassian capital was still in ruins, but the rejuvenation of the planet's natural resources, brought on by the release of the W from the prison the P had banished them to 100,000 years ago, had also rejuvenated her people, and a massive rebuilding campaign was well under way. In time, the capital city would surpass the magnificence of even the ancient Hebitian capital.
The Continuum would likewise be a long time recovering; the expulsion of the P had sent ripples of discord far beyond the small cosmic corner inhabited by Bajor and the Celestial Temple, and Q's brothers and sisters would be busy preventing the humiliated P from taking their revenge out on the W, imprisoning them for another hundred millennia. The P had spent so much time as sky gods, they would have trouble adjusting to their new roles as earth gods. Perhaps this was a transition Sisko could help them through. Q would have to look into that -- after his second honeymoon, of course.
As he raised his hand, Q's gaze swept the panorama one more time. Just before he snapped his fingers to join his mate, he glimpsed a certain Cardassian and a certain Bajoran sitting beside each other, their hands clasped as though the union of their two worlds depended entirely on their own nascent bond. Only then did Q know beyond all doubt that he had succeeded.