Star Trek: Terok Nor: Dawn of the Eagles - By S.D. Perry & Britta Dennison

The woman could speak to him only via voice transmission, but Odo still felt quite certain that it was really her. It had been the sound of Kira’s voice that had finally brought her identity back to him those few years ago.

“So, will you help me, Constable?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “I still don’t understand why you’ve come to me.”

“Because I trusted you once before, Odo, and I want to trust you now. I believe that ultimately—despite your position, I mean—you are on our side.”

“I’m on nobody’s side,” Odo said firmly.

“If that’s true, then why did you help me before? Why not just arrest me?”

“Because,” he said, not immediately sure how to follow it up. “I…suppose I regarded you as an individual, in need of help. It wasn’t your cause that provoked my sympathy—it was just…it was just…”

“What?”

“I don’t know,” Odo said. He really didn’t know. It was true that he had helped her once, and it was therefore true that he had helped the Bajoran resistance movement once, too. But he’d been much less experienced then—he had been reacting to his immediate circumstances without thinking through the consequences.

“You’re lying,” the woman said. “You knew the Cardassians were wrong then, and you know it now.”

“Do I?” Odo said, trying to sound threatening, but it fell flat.

“Yes, you do. You’re not one of them, Odo. You’re one of us.”

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the authors’ imaginations or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

™, ® and © 2008 by CBS Studios Inc. All Rights Reserved. STAR TREK and related marks are trademarks of CBS Studios Inc.

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Cover art by John Picacio; cover design by Alan Dingman

ISBN-13: 978-1-4165-9905-0

ISBN-10: 1-4165-9905-3

Visit us on the World Wide Web:

http://www.SimonSays.com/startrek

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For Britta, who works harder than me

—S. D. P.

For Lucy and Ruth

—B. D.

Acknowledgments

S. D. Perry would like to thank Paula Block and Marco Palmieri; James Swallow and all the Trek writers, past and present; her marvelous husband, two perfect kids, and the lovely ladies at the School of Autism who keep the faith. And again, thanks to Britta.

Britta Dennison wants to thank anyone and everyone who contributed to the Star Trek wiki sites, along with Marco Palmieri, Paula Block, James Swallow, and everyone who has contributed to the Trek universe. Thanks to my family, especially Thad. Thanks to S. D. Perry, who prevents me from friendlessness and joblessness, and to every teacher I’ve ever had, with the exception of my ninth-grade algebra teacher.

OCCUPATION YEAR THIRTY-THREE

2360 (Terran Calendar)

Prologue

Opaka Sulan was silently watching the landscapers as they worked under the direction of Riszen Ketauna, an artist from a nearby village in the Kendra Valley. She stood at the edge of a covered porch, one of the more recent additions to the shrine, and looked out at the patch of land that had been cleared of brush, trying to envision the finished product as Ketauna had described it. She had no doubt that the gardens would be beautiful within a year or so. But while she appreciated Ketauna’s hard work in planning the aesthetic of the grounds, she was concerned about the use of resources. She couldn’t help but worry.

Ketauna called out orders and encouragement to those who surrounded him on the crumbly blackness of the newly tilled soil. Later, they would break for what amounted to a feast, soup made from porli fowl and kava root, fresh berries, iced deka tea. One of the workers had gifted the new shrine with a sizable coop, and there had been eggs and meat for weeks now. It was a sunny day, the land bright with it, and Opaka struggled with a sense of guilt that they should have so much when their world was so troubled. The Cardassians had only tightened their grip since the resistance had truly begun to fight; elsewhere, she knew, Bajorans were hungry, were suffering…

She closed her eyes for a moment, praying that she