The War of the Prophets Page 5

  encountered the Bozeman—a Starfleet vessel that had been caught in a temporal

  causality loop for almost a century. Once we broke the loop, the crew of the

  ship was in the same situation we face now."

  "What happened to them?' Jake asked.

  Worf frowned. "Historical records stated that the Bozeman had disappeared

  without a trace. Since it had never returned home in our timeline, Starfleet

  could not risk sending it back. Under Starfleet regulations, her captain and her

  crew were ... resettled in their new time."

  "And that's what's going to happen to us?" Jake said, dismayed.

  "That appears to be the most likely outcome," Bashir said, when no one else

  offered an answer to Jake's question.

  "Not for me," Vash said. "I'm not Starfleet. I'm going home."

  "Really? How?" Jadzia asked. Bashir could tell she

  44

  intended her challenge to reduce Vash to inarticulate si­lence.

  But Vash merely issued her own challenge. "I thought you were the big expert on

  the Bajoran Orbs. You've never heard of the Orb of Time?"

  "She's right!" Jake said.

  Vash smiled dazzlingly at Jake. "Okay. I've got one partner. Anyone else?"

  Bashir shook his head, refusing to play Vash's game.

  "Too dangerous," Jadzia said. "We didn't get here through the Orb of Time, so

  there's no Orb-related Feynman curve connecting back to our own time."

  Vash rolled her eyes. "C'mon! You're a scientist— think outside the warp bubble.

  Let's say you hadn't reached this time period on the Defiant. You could have

  lived through the past twenty-five years, easy. Are you telling me that under

  those conditions you couldn't use the Orb of Time to slip back twenty-five

  years?"

  "Of course I could," Jadzia said, and Bashir could hear the growing annoyance in

  her tone. "Because the subatomic chronometric particles bound within my

  molecular structure would be in perfect synch with the current universe's

  background chronitronic radiation environment. I would belong in this time. But

  all of us are out of phase, Vash. We can't establish a second Feynman curve in

  this time because we're already con­nected to the first curve, stretching from

  our own time. Either we go back the way we came—by traveling through the

  boundary region of the wormhole that brought us here—or we don't go home at

  all."

  Vash groaned in frustration, her expression becom­ing almost that of a wild

  creature held against its will.

  Bashir leaned forward, lightly touching Vash's arm.

  45

  "We're still simply speculating," he said in his most re­assuring tone.

  "Starfleet might send us back at any mo­ment."

  "And if they don't?" Vash retorted.

  Bashir took a deep breath and said what he knew someone had to say. "Then

  considering all the possible timelike curves we might have followed, perhaps

  twenty-five years isn't all that bad."

  "What?!" Vash exclaimed.

  "You said it yourself. This time period is within our natural lifetimes. People

  we know will still be alive. The places we know won't have changed all that

  much. It will be easier for us to adapt than it was for the crew of the

  Bozeman."

  This time Vash grabbed his arm, and her tone was not at all reassuring. "Is it

  that easy to make a quitter out of you?"

  Bashir peeled her hand off his arm. There were larger issues at stake. "Are you

  that willing to risk the lives of the billions of beings alive in this time who

  might be wiped from existence by a single act of self­ishness on your part?"

  Vash's cheeks reddened as her voice rose in anger. "I didn't ask to be beamed to

  the Defiant. 1 didn't ask to... oh, I hate you Starfleet types. The good of the

  many ... it makes me sick!" Then she whirled around and marched off toward the

  main personnel door lead­ing from the hangar deck.

  Bashir resisted following, but he called out to her, "Vash! If you go out that

  door, you only increase the odds they won't send you back!"

  Vash's pace did not lessen.

  "Don't worry," Jadzia said. "The door will be sealed."

  Just then the status of the door ceased to be impor­tant, because Vash suddenly

  collided with—nothing.

  Bashir saw her come to a sudden stop, as if she had run into a slab of

  transparent aluminum, undetectable in the dim light of the hangar deck. Vash

  stepped back and rubbed at her face, then reached out and slapped her hand

  against something that was solid, yet ab­solutely invisible.

  "She's hit a forcefield," Jadzia said.

  "Unusual," Worf commented. "Most forcefields emit Pauli exclusion sparks when

  anything physical makes contact."

  "Whatever it is, I don't think it's anything to worry about," Bashir said. He

  watched Vash turn and begin to walk across the deck, sliding her hand as she

  moved along the forcefield's invisible boundary. "I mean, even if it's a

  forcefield, it's not delivering a warning shock. I think it's further evidence

  that they want to keep us from interacting with ..."

  He stopped as a throbbing vibration began to sound through the deck, and he

  heard the rest of the Defiant's crew begin talking excitedly as—

  —the main hangar door slid open to reveal stars streaming past to a vanishing

  point.

  Bashir reflexively held his breath. The ship was trav­eling at warp, and only

  the hangar deck's atmospheric forcefield was preventing the fifteen of them from

  being explosively decompressed into the ship's warp field.

  "I think someone's trying to get our attention ...," Jadzia said lightly.

  Bashir turned as he heard the quick hiss of an open­ing door.

  Three Vulcans stood in the corridor beyond, two fe-

  males and a male, their impassive faces offering no clue as to their intentions.

  One after the other, the three Vulcans stepped onto the hangar deck, and Bashir

  took some solace from the fact that the uniforms they were wearing reflected

  Starfleet traditions. Their trousers and jackets were made of a

  vertically-ribbed black material, with the en­tire left shoulder of each jacket

  constructed of a block of contrasting fabric in a traditional Fleet specialty

  color, in this case red on two of them and blue on the third. In the center of

  each colorful shoulder was what could only be a communicator badge, identical to

  the modi­fied emblem on the crates and complete with the colors of the Klingon

  k'Roth ch'Kor. Only one element was completely new to Bashir: Two of the

  Vulcans—those with the red shoulders—were wearing large clear visors over their

  eyes, like some kind of protective shield.

  As the three figures halted at the boundary of the forcefield, Bashir took the

  chance to study their uni­forms more closely for rank markings. He found them on

  small vertical panels, a centimeter wide by perhaps four centimeters long,

  centered on their jackets just below their collars. Instead of the round pips

  that Bashir wore, these uniforms used square tabs, though he felt it was likely

  the number of tabs would carry the same meaning.

  "The woman on the right, with the blue shoulder," Bashir said quietly to Jadzia

  and Worf. "The captain?"

  The Vulcan in question had four
square tabs in her rank badge, and seemed older

  than her two compan­ions. Her skin was a warm brown, almost the same shade as

  Jake's, and a few strands of gray ran as high­lights through her severely-cut

  black hair. Since the

  specialty color on her shoulder was blue, Bashir guessed that either blue was

  the current color signify­ing command or this was a science vessel with a

  scien­tist for a captain. She was also the only one of the three not wearing a

  visor.

  Bashir looked at Worf. "Commander, we should probably follow the temporal

  displacement policy to the letter, and you are the ranking command officer."

  Worf gave Bashir a curt nod, then stepped toward the silent Vulcans.

  "I am Lieutenant Commander Worf of the Starship Defiant. I have reason to

  believe these people and I have been inadvertently transferred approximately

  twenty-five years into our future. Under the terms of Starfleet's temporal

  displacement policy, I request im­mediate assistance for our return to our own

  time."

  The Vulcan captain put her hands behind her back as she began to speak.

  "Commander Worf, I am Captain T'len, commander of this destroyer, the Augustus.

  You and your people have been positively identified by your DNA signatures,

  obtained from transporter records. As you have surmised, you have traveled in

  time almost twenty-five years from what was your present. The cur­rent Stardate

  is 76958.2."

  She paused, and Bashir concluded it was to let her confirmation of their fate

  sink in. "As I suspect you have also already surmised," she then continued, "the

  historical record shows that the ship on which you made this temporal transfer

  was lost with all hands on Stardate 51889.4, concurrent with the destruction of

  the space station Deep Space 9. Under these circum­stances, Starfleet

  regulations are clear. Do you agree?"

  Worf's voice deepened. "I would like to examine the historical record myself."

  Captain T'len raised an eyebrow. "That would be a waste of time and resources.

  If you do not believe me, logic suggests you will not be able to believe any

  his­torical transcript I provide."

  Bashir was slightly surprised that T'len wasn't aware that Klingons preferred

  physical proof to logical infer­ence. "Then I wish to be put in contact with

  officials from the Federation Department of Temporal Investigations."

  T'len's deep sigh—a most atypical expression of emotion, unless Vulcans in this

  future were somehow different—strongly suggested to Bashir that the Vulcan was

  under some undisclosed yet incredible strain.

  "Commander," she said almost wearily, "your per­sonnel records indicate you are

  a reasonable being. In­deed, the records available for most of the other

  non-Bajorans with you indicate a high degree of proba­bility you can still be of

  use to Starfleet in this time pe­riod. All you need to know now is that the

  Federation Department of Temporal Investigations no longer ex­ists. Twelve years

  ago its responsibilities were assumed by Starfleet's Temporal Warfare Division.

  I assure you that under current conditions the personnel of the TWD are most

  unlikely to expend any effort in trying to con­vince you that this present is

  everything I say it is. You must either accept my word, or not."

  Worf's grim expression betrayed his struggle to maintain composure in the face

  of what he obviously considered a threat, though it was as yet of an

  unspeci­fied nature.

  "What are the current conditions?" Worf asked, im­mensely pleasing Bashir. That

  was exactly the question

  he would have asked first, to be quickly followed by in­quiries about the exact

  nature of the ominously named Temporal Warfare Division and what the Vulcan

  cap­tain meant by her cryptic reference to the Bajorans among them not being

  useful.

  "The Federation is at war with the Bajoran Ascen­dancy. And my crew and I have

  no more time to waste with you than does the TWD. Therefore, I put it to you and

  your people as straightforwardly as I can. The non-Bajorans among you may now

  take this opportunity to reaffirm your loyalty to the Federation and to

  Starfleet, and to join us in our war. Those who comply will be al­lowed to leave

  the hangar deck and will be assigned to suitable positions within the fleet.

  Those who do not comply will remain on the hangar deck with the Ba­jorans until

  the atmospheric forcefield is dropped, in..." T'len tapped her communicator

  badge twice. "... three minutes."

  Immediately, yellow warning lights spun across the deck and bulkheads as the

  familiar Starfleet computer voice announced, "Warning. The hangar deck will

  de­compress in three minutes. Please vacate the area."

  All around Bashir, the other captives began to talk in groups again, their

  mutterings and exclamations full of anger and shock. But Worf, interestingly,

  seemed only to become calmer, as if now that he understood the challenge he

  faced, he could focus all his energy on overcoming it

  "Am I to believe," the Klingon growled, "that in only twenty-five years

  Starfleet has degenerated into a gang of murderers?"

  "Believe what you will," T'len replied crisply. "We are fighting for more than

  you can imagine. Logic de-

  mands that we waste no time or resources on any­thing—or anyone—that does not

  help us in our strug­gle. Commander Worf, your choice is simple: Join us in our

  war against the Ascendancy, or die with the Ba­jorans among you."

  "Warning, the hanger deck will decompress in two minutes, thirty seconds. Please

  vacate the area."

  Worf turned to face the fourteen others who looked to him for leadership. He was

  about to speak when it suddenly came to Bashir what the Vulcan was actually

  doing. He held up his hand to stop Worf from saying anything more.

  "She's bluffing, Worf."

  Worf's heavy brow wrinkled as he considered Bashir's emphatic statement, but

  T'len spoke before he could.

  "Dr. Bashir, Vulcans do not bluff."

  Bashir's response was immediate and to the point. "And Starfleet doesn't kill

  its prisoners—war or no war."

  The captain held his gaze for long moments, then without a sign, suddenly

  wheeled and walked back to­ward the personnel door. "You know what you have to

  do to survive," she said without looking back. "The prisoner containment field

  is now deactivated. This door will remain open until five seconds before

  decom­pression." Then she and her two companions stepped through that door and

  were gone.

  "Warning, the hanger deck will decompress in two minutes. Please vacate the

  area."

  Vash started for the unseen edge of the forcefield. "Hey! You didn't ask me!

  I'll join up!"

  But Bashir moved forward and pulled her back. "Get back here!"

  Vash twisted out of his grip, slapped his hand away. "Look, all due respect to

  your Bajoran friends, but I don't plan on getting sucked out into hard vacuum!"

  "We are in no danger," Bashir said forcefully. He looked around at the others.

  "Captain T'len will not de­compress the hangar deck!"

  "How can you be sure?" Worf asked.

  "Because she is a Vulcan, and there is no logic to... to ki
lling Bajorans, even

  if somehow they are en­emies of Starfleet in this time. And there is absolutely

  no logic in killing us. We're completely contained on this hangar deck. We're no

  threat to anyone. And you heard what she said about confirming our identities

  through DNA scans—she knows that none of us is in­volved in... current

  conditions."

  "Then why is she threatening us?" Jake asked.

  "Warning, the hanger deck will decompress in one minute, thirty seconds."

  Bashir registered Jadzia's and Worf's matching ex­pressions of less-than-full

  confidence in his argument, as well as the outright look of fear on the five

  Bajorans, now standing apart from the others. "She's testing us."

  "Where's the logic in that?" Jadzia asked.

  Bashir knew he lacked a definitive answer. "Maybe what she said about DNA scans

  wasn't the truth. If they really don't have a way of confirming our identities,

  they don't really know who we are."

  "And why would that be important?" Vash snapped.

  But then Jake snapped his fingers. "Founders can fool a DNA scan, right?"

  Bashir nodded, equally impressed by and grateful for the young man's quickness.

  "That could be it. If this ... Bajoran Ascendancy is a result of the Domin-

  ion establishing a foothold in the Alpha Quadrant, Starfleet could still be at

  war with the Founders. For all Captain T'len knows, we might all be

  shapeshifters who've impersonated the lost crewmembers of the De­fiant."

  Jadzia narrowed her eyes. "Then why didn't they just strap us down and cut us to

  see what happened to our blood?"

  Bashir winced. She was right. Though the Founders could mimic almost any living

  being down to the level of its DNA, once a single drop of blood escaped from

  that duplicated form, it immediately reverted to the Founders' normal gelatinous

  state. As his Trill col­league had just pointed out, there were easier, more

  di­rect methods of being certain Worf and the others weren't changelings.

  "Warning, the hanger deck will decompress in sixty seconds. Please vacate the

  area."

  'T'len!" Vash shouted. "I'm on your side! Beam me out!"

  "If this is a test," Bashir said sharply, "you are most certainly failing."

  "Me?" Vash hissed. "I'm the only one acting like a human being. I want to live!"

  "Forty-five seconds to explosive decompression," the computer warned.

  "Commander Worf!" Everyone turned to the Bajoran who had called out. He was an