Chapter Text
As predicted, their lunch at the replimat garnered a lot of attention, with Bajorans and Federation Citizens alike staring at them unabashedly. Kira did her best to ignore them, and to bear in mind this had to be jarring when they had been at each other’s throats only the day before. Only Jake seemed unfazed, chowing down on Larish Pie and something called a burger with equal enthusiasm.
Mercifully, lunch had been quick; Benjamin had to rush back to his office in Ops to soothe whatever Federation authorities had read his report on the Saltah’na, the Bajoran mutiny, and the resulting violence between Bajorans and Starfleet. Kira had stayed with Jake, determined to give the young boy both some company and some sense of family before he went back to a lonely afternoon pretending to study on his clutter of PADDs. Maybe Keiko’s school was needed more than she had realized.
By the end of the day she was lagging – the aftereffects of the antihistamine medication Julian had given everyone to help their bodies recover from the events of the day before. Benjamin had insisted she take off early, to settle into her new quarters and rest.
She moved through the motions of unpacking, caught somewhere between a calm, methodical autopilot and a screaming alarm inside her head that only she could hear. This was it. Moving in with the Siskos had been quicker than she had anticipated, thanks to the help of Starfleet’s generous allowance of transporter credits. Jake kept assuring her transports weren’t restricted, but Kira knew all too well the amount of energy it took to scramble and reassemble molecules, and it blew her mind to see such expenditure on a simple move of quarters. Not that she had a lot of stuff, mostly it was boxes full of the gifts the Bajoran people kept bestowing on her as the Emissary’s intended. (She ignored the small voice inside that said she hadn’t yet opened a single one because she held onto some fantasy of running at the last minute, leaving these for some other woman, someone more worthy to bear the honor of being the bride of the Emissary of Bajor).
It wasn’t until she finally gave in to the advice from both Julian and Benjamin to rest that she grasped the import of the farmhouse doors in her new quarters. She lay down on her new bed hoping the scent of the Bajoran wood furniture would offset the alien softness of the bedding. But as soon as she closed her eyes her stomach dropped and the familiar prickle of panic crept over her.
She opened her eyes again, her gaze alighting on the door. She was betrothed to the commander of the station. There were no off-limits areas, he could override any electronic door lock. But a simple deadbolt on these old fashioned doors – the frames so solidly built – would take quite a lot of force to penetrate. Even a Federation phaser would take a minute to vaporize the steel bolts, and would give her enough time and sounds of warning to grab her own energy weapon (her eyes drifted to her nightstand) compared to someone simply walking through a regular space station door.
Of course, Benjamin would never do that, unless there were exceptional circumstances (like a Saltah’na psychogenic infection, her traitorous mind whispered). She sighed, forcing her hands to uncurl from the fists hey had formed. She was being ridiculous. They hadn’t been themselves. Benjamin wouldn’t hurt her, not when he was in his right mind. And anyway, they were to be married, so doors and barriers were pointless.
She rolled over and buried her face in her pillow, but sleep was a long time coming.
“We need to equalize the deflector shield sub-system pressure.”
“Nuh uh.” Jadzia sat back at her Ops station and folded her arms. “What we need to do is discuss you moving in with Sisko and Julian last night.” A sly smile played at the corners of her mouth, but it faded when Kira studiously ignored her. “Okay, will you at least tell me about your first dinner as a family?”
Kira busied herself at the command console, refusing to look up. “It went well. Benjamin got shria from Bajor somehow, it made his hasperat much closer to the real thing.”
“And..?”
“And nothing.”
“Afterwards? Your first night in your new quarters?”
Refusing to look at her, Kira crossed to the aft panel. “All inner deflector shield sub-systems are showing equal intensity.”
Dax sighed melodramatically, then matched Kira’s all-business tone. “Power balance levels are reading normal.” She looked up from her console, her eyes twinkling. “You ate at home then. I didn’t see you anywhere on the promenade. And I had my sources...I was great at recruiting confidential informants you know, I could canvass my whole neighborhood in an hour as a kid.”
Seeking any distraction from the topic at hand, Kira saw an opening. “Uh... which ‘you’ are you talking about?”
Dax smiled, then reacted to an alert on her panel, falling back into professional mode. “We're being hailed by an incoming freighter.”
“Open a channel. On screen.”
The screen filled with a Kobheerian captain in the command seat of her Federation vessel. She didn’t appear to be in any distress. Kira greeted her, wondering if there was a ship on the docking schedule she had forgotten about.
“This is the Kobheerian freighter Rak-Miunis, requesting permission to dock.”
“Docking Port Six is clear for approach,” Kira supplied, listening for Benjamin coming out of his office behind her.
“Thank you. We have a passenger on board requiring medical assistance.”
Benjamin cut in calmly. “Can you tell us what's wrong with your passenger?”
“He says it's a condition called Kalla-Nohra. It's apparently chronic, but he doesn't have his medication.”
Kira looked up sharply. Kalla-Nohra, that could only mean…
“Beam him directly to our Infirmary, we'll have our doctor standing by,” Benjamin continued smoothly. Despite his unruffled composure she could tell he had noticed her reaction.
“Thank you, Commander. Rak-Miunis out.” The view screen went blank.
Dax was messaging the infirmary now. Kira let Julian’s calm voice on the comm wash over her, as soothing as Benjamin’s steady presence at her side. Moments after beaming over their patient the Rak-Miunis turned tail and departed. Kira frowned slightly. Clearly they had no care for the very sick Bajoran they had just transported to DS9.
She turned to Benjamin. “Commander, I'd like to go down to the infirmary and meet that patient.”
His eyes creased in consternation. “Of course... Why?”
“The only cases of Kalla-Nohra I know of were the result of a mining accident at a Bajoran forced labor camp I helped liberate. The survivors of Gallitep have always been a symbol to us of strength and courage.”
He inclined his head, but not before she could read the sympathy and understanding in his eyes. “By all means, Major, take as long as you want.”
She found Julian in the infirmary, his happy tone at seeing her almost made her smile despite her worry for the Gallitep victim.
But then she caught a glimpse of the patient and adrenaline flooded her, she was immediately on alert. Her hand slammed onto her combadge automatically, summoning security. She fought her instinct to step back at the sight of the Cardassian – this was a Gallitep monster and he was far too close to Julian for her liking.
Taking one glance at her, Julian tensed. “What’s the matter, Major?” He was already turning towards her when the Cardassian pushed off from the biobed, knocking into Julian as he did so. Instantly, Julian’s stance became protective, putting himself between Kira and the Cardassian, so much so she had to put a hand on his arm; the Cardassian was fleeing and she had no intention of letting him get away.
Keeping her behind him, Julian led the pursuit, pulling up short when they saw the Cardassian already apprehended by Odo and one of his Bajoran deputies even as they hurried out to the promenade. Taking one look at her, Odo hauled him off to a holding cell after exchanging only a few curt words.
At her side she could feel some of the tension leave Julian’s body when the Cardassian was out of sight.
“Nerys, are you okay?” he asked, his voice too quiet for any of the crowd that had gathered to overhear.
She nodded. She was far from okay, but she would be when she had locked up this war criminal for the rest of his life. “I’m going to interrogate him.”
“Let me get my medical bag and come with you, okay? There are protocols, we can’t be seen to deny medical care to someone in custody.”
She nodded once.
Julian found so many excuses to check on the Cardassian – whose name was Marritza if he could be believed about anything – throughout what turned out to be one of the longest days of Kira’s time on the station so far. As much as she appreciated Julian’s concern, she finally asked him to give her space. Marritza’s story kept changing and she needed to focus. It meant a lot to her that Benjamin had entrusted her with the investigation despite his clear misgivings that she was too close to this.
And when it all started to be too much, when the vile poison spewing from Marritza’s mouth reached its lowest point, it was to Odo that she found herself turning. She needed someone who had lived through it, who didn’t see things through some distortion of “Federation fairness”, some sick notion of seeing both sides. She couldn’t stomach it, not when you were talking about a labor camp where the elderly were buried alive when they got too frail to work. When it came down to it, she was alone up here: anytime a Cardassian Gul or Legate found an excuse to visit the station, Benjamin shook their hand; Julian sat down to lunch with Garak at least once a week; in the end even Odo had had to walk a line.
Julian honored her request to give her a wide berth, only returning to consult on the use of dermal medications that had facilitated Marritza changing his appearance - evidence that turned out to be pivotal in establishing if who they were actually dealing with was Gul Darhe’el.
By the time she was kneeling on the promenade, Marritza bleeding out in her arms, Kira was too numb to process much of anything. She returned to her old quarters to shower before dragging herself, exhausted, to the Siskos’ home (no, your home she reprimanded herself). She had a perfectly good shower in her new quarters, but she hadn’t wanted to bring any of this into the Siskos’ lives, especially not Jake’s.
She palmed open the outer door to her own rooms and made her way to bed as quietly as she could, hoping Benjamin would understand she wouldn’t be good company that night.
To her surprise it was actually comforting to hear the sounds of the little family through their adjoining door. Benjamin was good-naturedly teasing Jake – she couldn’t make out the words, just the light tones, the warm rumble of her commander’s laughter, the thud of the couch as Jake jumped off it.
In a way it was as if the day had never happened. The aroma of a cooked meal almost made her stomach rumble, but the thought of eating was quickly dispelled by a rising nausea at the memory of a Cardassian’s dead weight on her – and most disturbing of all – that she regretted his death.