The Regent’s tactical officer noticed the incoming vessel on his monitor. “Bird-of-Prey closing on intercept, sir. Sensors indicate it’s the I.K.S. Marcus.”
“Kruge’s ship!” Worf growled. Just then a volley of photon torpedoes came from the Marcus, which Kruge had named after the Terran rebel of an earlier era.
“Our sensors are being disrupted!” the tactical officer continued as the Negh’Var shook. “Our warp fields are destabilizing!”
“The p’tahk!” Worf uttered as the Negh’Var and other Alliance ships were forced to drop out of warp by the Marcus’ graviton burst. Kruge’s ship continued firing at the other vessels. The others returned fire.
“Today is a good day to die, Kruge—for you!” the Regent said out loud. The Marcus’ shields were on maximum, but they wouldn’t hold for very long. But they didn’t need to.
On the Marcus, Kruge agreed it was a good day to die. “When I get to the gates of Sto-Vo-Kor I will sing of your battles, of your courage and honor Marcus,” he said as if David was in the room. “I’ll be your cha’Dich.”
Dax and Bashir, who also felt the graviton’s effect, witnessed the battle at the edge of their sensors. The Marcus was taking heavy fire and its shields were finally collapsing. A final shot from the Negh’Var’s disruptor batteries finished it. The Alliance fleet would soon be able to resume warp. But Kruge had bought them enough time. They were ready to generate the warp shadow decoys.
Smiley met up with Dax and Bashir after their ships docked at Terok Nor. Tuvok joined them. Dax briefed them on Kruge. Together they’d bought enough time to drive off the Alliance fleet. “So I guess this would qualify as winning the victory he wanted?” O’Brien asked.
Dax nodded. “I think so.”
“I’d have to admit though that like most Terrans I’ve never really felt we have souls,” O’Brien said.
“Vulcans call them katras,” Tuvok said. “We are able to place them into another person just before we die, if someone is present at the time.”
“Of course two centuries ago your people encouraged the belief that the rest of us didn’t have souls, or katras,” Dax reminded him, “because the rest of us can’t do that.”
“Unfortunately that is true,” Tuvok admitted. “Many Bajorans also believe in a ‘soul’ or ‘katra’. They refer to it as one’s pagh, or boryha.” Bajor’s vedeks and prylars had sheltered a number of people on the station from the Alliance at one time or another, often at great risk to their own lives.
“Of course I have a new life every time I’m placed in a new host,” Dax pointed out. “Whether that qualifies as a kind of life after death I can’t say.”
The topic got Smiley thinking about something Dax said earlier when the first met Kruge. “Was Spock able to place his katra into anyone?”
“He was,” Tuvok answered. “What is not widely known is that they used a device Spock had obtained from the first crossover to take him to the other side, because Mt. Seleya was under Earth control following the coup.”
They noticed Captain Sisko and his son off to the side, looking very tired. “We lost Professor Sisko,” Tuvok explained. The others looked down.
“I’m going to miss her,” O’Brien said.
“I just hope they’re at peace, especially David,” Dax said. “What happened wasn’t his fault.”