Lost Time by Ilsa J. Bick Read Free Book Online

terrific. What did Jadzia say?”
    He was alone in his ready room; Salek was on the bridge. They were on a secured channel, so he could say what he thought. Kira was good that way; hell of a woman. She was the only Bajoran Gold hadn’t felt like throttling. The other religious types were so…pie in the sky, he wanted to punch in their teeth. “Dax thinks that the Bynars were getting messages from these Prophets or something equally absurd. If you want my opinion, I think the Bynars tripped into an Androssi snare. But try getting Dax to face up to it. She’s being totally unreasonable. Demands we go back to Terok Nor.”
    “That could be a problem.”
    “You’re telling me. You didn’t get shot at. Do you think you can talk sense into her?”
    “Probably not.” Kira took a sip from a tall mug of something piping hot; Gold saw curls of steam. Probably Reman coffee. Wretched drink; the stuff smelled like sweaty feet. “You’ve got to remember that Jadzia did find that Orb, and she does appear to have accessed it before it went dark. But the stories go that only a select few are allowed to commune with the Prophets. So maybe Jadzia’s the Emissary.”
    “Do you believe that?”
    “Anything’s possible, David.”
    “Yeah,” said Gold, rubbing the knuckles of his left hand with his right. “And maybe she needs her medication upped. Maybe she’s lying.”
    “She got evaluated, remember? All the psychiatrists say otherwise. The Betazoids swear she’s telling the truth. Anyway, why would she lie? She’s a xenoarchaeologist; she’s Trill. Why should she care about Bajor? There was nothing in her record to suggest she was looking for an Orb, and it was only dumb luck that she stumbled on that Cardassian derelict.”
    “Doesn’t it bother you a little bit that a non-Bajoran is the only person who’s talked to these Prophets? If they even exist, I mean.”
    “I could say that the Prophets move in mysterious ways.”
    “If you want to watch me get sick,” said Gold, “yeah, you could.”
    Kira’s mouth twitched into a grin. “Might be worth seeing. Of course, it bothers me, more than a little. Makes me wonder what we Bajorans are doing wrong. Maybe our faith doesn’t run deeply enough, or it could be that we just like money too much. What about you?”
    “What about me? You mean faith?” Gold’s eyebrows arched for his hairline. “I’m a die-hard pragmatist and card-carrying cynic. I’m just following orders. Starfleet says jump; I say how high.”
    “Oh, right,” Kira drawled. “That’s why you volunteered for this. I think you like rooting for the underdog.”
    “Excuse me, but we are the underdogs, remember? This is a long shot at best. It’s something to which Starfleet could commit a limited number of ships—namely, the Gettysburg. It’s a big galaxy, Kira. Easier fights than this one.”
    “So why aren’t you off somewhere else fighting the good fight?”
    It was a good question. Because he hated injustice? There was plenty of that to go around. Didn’t have to go to Bajor for that, although he couldn’t exactly call the Cardassians unjust. More like benevolent dictators.
    For the Federation, then? No, that wasn’t it either. Gold looked at Kira and saw her passion, the set of her jaw and the fire in her eyes; and he thought back to Dax who royally pissed him off—and made him envious as all hell.
    Because I want to believe in something strongly enough that I’d be willing to die for it. His gaze dropped to the gold circlet of a wedding band he still wore, and his throat balled as he thought about a girl with a mane of chestnut hair. Because I’d like to care about something again as much as I loved you….
    Kira must have read his struggle because she came to his rescue and said, “Whatever your reasons, I’m grateful you’re here, David. The Assembly won’t be able to pull together a government to ratify the Cardassian treaty if we can give Bajor a reason not to. Nothing