CHAPTER 14

IN THE SURGERY, Vash was sitting up in the angled examination bed. She had shadowed circles under her large, expressive eyes and her lustrous skin was pale, but Jadzia could see no signs of trembling or weakness.

Vash's query was unspoken but obvious to all who observed her.

Kira started to speak but Odo coughed and she reluctantly turned to Jadzia.

“You're safe for now, Vash. Odo's using suppression screens to protect against unauthorized transportation.” Jadzia moved to block Kira and Odo from Vash's line of sight. Julian was standing on the other side of the examination table with his hands behind his back, keeping watch on the Cardassian diagnostic displays above his patient. “And there are security officers standing guard outside the Infirmary.”

Vash wasn't impressed. “Oh, I see. Being safe must be some new Starfleet term for being a prisoner.”

Jadzia smiled. Sweetly. “You're not under arrest. Yet.”

Vash's answering smile was just as sweet. “Why would I be under arrest? Is it against some Bajoran law to be the target of an assassin? Or did I obstruct traffic on the Promenade when I collapsed?”

Interesting, Jadzia thought. Of all the experiences of all Dax's previous hosts she had to draw on, the ones she usually found herself returning to least were those of Joran, her sixth. He'd been a mistake, his existence still suppressed by the Symbiosis Commission to avoid alarming the Trill public with the revelation that the selection process was not perfect. Joran had been unbalanced. He'd committed murder.

Jadzia now took the rare step of brushing lightly against the disturbing memories of that perverted mind and its hideous act. Because she sensed a similar lack of equilibrium in Vash.

But could Vash kill? Jadzia wondered. Not in self-defense, because almost anyone was capable of that. Could she kill in the way that Joran had, merely for sport, or lust, or greed?

“On Bajor,” Jadzia said severely, “even the attempt to traffic in Orbs is one of the most serious crimes in their system.”

Vash stretched and moved her shoulders as if verifying the health of her body. “I told him that, huh? The captain? About Quark being involved in selling the Orbs?”

Jadzia nodded, looking beyond Vash to see Kira now caught in an impressive struggle to remain silent.

The archaeologist bent forward, rubbed gingerly at the side of her head. “On the Promenade, when I got hit . . . I thought I was dying, you know? I remember wanting to tell someone . . . the captain . . . something that might make it easier for him to find who killed me.” She gave a sudden, rueful laugh. “My bad luck I didn't die.” She twisted around to look over her shoulder at Bashir. “Why is that, Doc?”

Bashir looked away from the Cardassian readouts. “The dart contained an Andorian toxin.”

Vash suddenly laid back against the angled table, as if all the strength had left her. “Satr and Leen. They've been after me for a long time. Ever since the Mandylion retrieval.”

Jadzia saw Odo shake his head ‘No’ at the possibility that the two Andorian sisters were involved in the attack on Vash. But Jadzia had already deduced the improbability of that for herself. Even if Odo did not have visual records of whoever had fired the dart at Vash, Jadzia was aware the Andorian sisters were under constant surveillance. If they had been anywhere near Vash at the time of the attack, Odo's officers would have known it.

Right now there was no advantage to be gained in sharing that news with Vash. But if her cooperation were needed later, such information would be as valuable as latinum. So Jadzia did not contradict Vash's supposition. She merely said, “Odo's working on tracking the sisters' movements.”

Then Jadzia added, as if the question were unimportant, “Anyone else who might be after you? Captain Sisko said he thought you saw someone you knew on the Promenade, just before the attack.”

Vash stared up at the ceiling, frowning. “This'll sound crazy, but . . .”

“I know all about crazy,” Jadzia murmured comfortingly. “Believe me.”

“Yeah? Well, I thought I saw Dal Nortron following us. How's that for crazy?”

With that, Odo reached his breaking point. “Excuse me, ladies, but there are only two Andorians on the station, and had one of them been on the Promenade at any time close to the instant you were attacked, they'd stand out on the surveillance tapes like . . . well, like Andorians.” Odo stepped back, a hand held up in apology. “I apologize for breaking in.”

But the damage was done. Jadzia had seen a worrisome little flash of calculation in Vash, as if the archaeologist had just learned something of importance from Odo's outburst—such as the fact that the Andorian sisters had not been on the Promenade and thus could hardly be considered suspects.

“What I meant was, he was in disguise,” Vash said, recovering smoothly, but not smoothly enough for Jadzia, who was on full alert, now. “Or altered or something. I mean, no antennae, sort of brown skin. He might even have had Bajoran epinasal ridges. Like I said, I couldn't be sure.”

“We'll study the visual scans again,” Jadzia said evenly, more and more determined not to let Vash control this interrogation. “But in the meantime—Quark and the Orbs. Let's talk about that.”

“What's the point?” All sense of hesitation or unease gone, Vash sat up again and ruffled her hair into place. “If I do, I go to prison. If I don't, it's just something I said when I had a shot of bicuprodyanide bubbling in my brain. I think what I meant to say to Captain Sisko is, Damn, I'm sorry I'm dying before I ever got a chance to have Quark show me an Orb like he promised he would the last time I was on the station. There's one in the Temple on the Promenade, isn't there? Yeah,” the archaeologist continued, staring brazenly right into Jadzia's eyes, betraying no guilt whatsoever, “I'm sure that's the one Quark said he'd show me. Did you actually think I'd deal in a stolen Orb when I know what they mean to the Bajoran people?”

Now it was Kira who was close to the breaking point. Jadzia heard her give a muffled exclamation, but the major said nothing more, keeping to her promise not to interfere.

Julian, on the other hand, was suddenly looking ridiculously pleased with himself. But all he did in reply to Jadzia's questioning look was grin foolishly, once again appearing much too cute for his own good. A good Galeo-Manada workout would cure that in a hurry, Jadzia thought.

“I can certainly see how your explanation of what you said to Captain Sisko might make sense,” Jadzia told Vash. “Of course, part of the problem is that the captain didn't understand every word.”

“I guess I was lucky to be able to say anything at all.”

“One of the more interesting things he said you told him was that Quark was going to have an auction to sell an Orb.”

“Did I say auction or action?” Vash suddenly seemed busy rearranging her tunic. “Sell an Orb, or see an Orb? I bet I wasn't too clear.” She looked up and smiled brightly at her interrogator.

“And then there was a word you used, one he didn't quite get, maybe something . . . Bajoran?”

Vash stopped fussing with her clothing for a moment, looked thoughtful for a moment, then shook her head.

“Let's try it this way, then,” Jadzia suggested helpfully. “What Orb was Quark going to show you at the temple?”

“Oh,” Vash said. She swung her legs off the side of the examination table. “Sure, that was it. The Orb of Jalbador.”

“What?” Kira sputtered. She moved so quickly to Vash's side that she was between Jadzia and the archaeologist before Jadzia had even realized what she was doing. Odo moved forward but Jadzia quietly signaled him to hold back. Perhaps Kira could shake something out of Vash. It was worth a try.

“ ‘Jalbador’?” Kira said to Vash. “Is that what you said?”

Vash shrugged, unintimidated. “Yeah, so?”

“Not one Orb, but the Lost Orbs? The Lost Red Orbs of Jalbador? Is that what this is about?”

“You should talk to Quark,” Vash said. “But, yeah, that's what he said he'd show me. A Red Orb of Jalbador.”

Kira hung her head and shook it, as if berating herself for being a fool. “That's it, we're done here.” She turned away from Vash, as if she had lost all interest in the archaeologist.

“I beg your pardon?” Jadzia asked.

“This is . . . more than ridiculous. I have to contact the Kai at once.”

“Major, why?”

“Because, Dax, the Red Orbs of Jalbador don't exist. They are . . . I don't know a non-Bajoran example. But, they're not part of any of the legitimate teachings of our religion.”

“Apocryphal?” Bashir suggested.

“That's as good a word as any,” Kira said. “But more than that, they're something that . . . fringe people and fortune seekers and . . .” She waved a dismissive hand at Vash, who made a face back at her. “. . . and petty thieves go after all the time. I mean, at least once or twice a year there's some unbelievable story about the Lost Orbs being found, hidden in the ice on Mount Ba'Lavael. Or deep in the Tracian Sea in the sunken ruins of B'hala.”

“But Major,” Bashir objected, “B'hala didn't sink in the Tracian Sea. Captain Sisko found it under the Ir'Abehr Shield.”

“Exactly, Doctor. But until the Emissary found it, B'hala had been lost for twenty thousand years! That's twenty thousand years of legends and lies and outright fraud. Do you know how many people on Bajor—and on a dozen other worlds, I'm sure—have been bilked by swindlers who claim to have an ancient map that shows the location of B'hala or the resting places of the Red Orbs?”

“The Brooklyn Bridge,” Bashir suddenly blurted out. It made so little sense to Jadzia and everyone else in the surgery that they all turned to look at him.

“On old Earth,” he continued, his expression somehow conveying the impression that he expected everyone else to know exactly what he meant. “The late 1800s. People newly arrived in what used to be called New York City were offered deeds to the Brooklyn Bridge—a spectacular public works built and owned by the local government. To buy the Brooklyn Bridge became a colloquialism for gullibility.” Jadzia winced as Julian enthusiastically adopted a broad dialect as he quoted, “ ‘Well, if you believe dat, buddy, then I have a bridge in Brooklyn I wanna sell ya.’ ”

No one said anything right away. But Odo finally broke the silence. “Excuse me, Doctor, but is this the same Brooklyn Bridge that's installed at the big amusement park on Earth's moon?”

“Why, yes,” Bashir said eagerly. “Taking it apart, moving it in sections, rebuilding it—it was one of the most phenomenal engineering feats of the twenty-third century.”

“In other words, eventually, someone really did buy the Brooklyn Bridge?”

Jadzia tried not to laugh as Julian's face fell.

“Well, yes, Odo, but the point is . . . .” He looked plaintively around the surgery, loath as always to accept that no one was really up to appreciating whatever his point was. “Never mind.”

“I really have to go,” Kira said abruptly. “Odo, forget everything I sent you on Orb law. As far as I'm concerned, you can charge this woman with being a public nuisance, or you can . . . ship her out to wherever she's planning on selling her ‘Orbs’ next. Jadzia. Doctor.” Kira left.

“That's it?” Vash asked, slipping off the examination table to stand upright, without any signs of ever having been affected by anything.

“Apparently so,” Jadzia said.

Odo stepped around so that Vash could see him without straining. “Tell me, Vash, what are your plans now?”

“Staying alive is always high on my list of things to do.”

“Then obviously, staying safely behind transporter-proof shields and being guarded by my officers is agreeable to you?”

“That depends on what the price is.”

“Quark,” Odo said. “Where is he?”

“Frankly, constable, I don't know. I was surprised to hear he had disappeared.”

“Where were you going to meet him?”

Vash cocked her head at the constable. “I already had this conversation with the captain and Commander Dax.”

“That's not an answer.”

“At the bar, Odo. Where else would I meet him?”

“And what were you meeting him about?”

“According to the major there, not much.” Vash sighed at Odo's poorly concealed look of exasperation. “All right. This is everything I know. Quark put the word out that he had been asked to be the broker for a transaction involving . . . the Red Orbs of Jalbador.” Jadzia was impressed by Vash's attempt to make it seem she was embarrassed to even say the name of the Orbs. Vash was really good.

“The broker,” Odo repeated gruffly. “So, presumably someone else had possession of the Orbs—”

“And Quark asked me if I knew of any prospective buyers.”

“And did you?”

“Are you kidding? Half the antiquarian collectors in the Alpha Quadrant would bankrupt themselves for a chance to own a Bajoran Orb. Odo, seriously, this was shaping up to be the biggest transaction since the Fajo collection went on the block. I'm talking big.”

“Did you put those interested collectors in touch with Quark?”

Vash drew back in surprise that seemed genuine even to Jadzia, who was increasingly fascinated by the archaeologist's behavior. Her performance, filtered as it was through poor Joran, seemed to Jadzia as if it were being dictated by an already written script. Somehow, the archaeologist had manipulated the situation so that Odo was asking all the questions Vash wanted him to ask. The performance was brilliant.

“Did you?” Odo repeated.

“Be serious,” Vash said. “If I brought in my . . . clients, the bidding would . . . well, you could buy and sell planets for what some people would be willing to spend. And my cut would only be ten percent of Quark's commission.” Vash sat forward, as if suddenly excited by the prospect of such a deal. “But, if I kept my people out of it, well, Quark doesn't have the connections I do. The bidding wouldn't go anywhere as high, and . . . .”

“You planned to buy it for yourself,” Odo said, “and then hold your own auction for the people who could really pay.”

Vash held up her hands as if surrendering. “Guilty.”

“My sentiments exactly,” Odo told her. “You know, of course, what the penalties are for trading in Orbs. Not just in Bajoran law, but under the Federation's own protection-of-antiquities statutes.”

Vash curled a finger at Odo, asking him to move closer. “Odo, remember what the major said? There are no Red Orbs of Jalbador. If someone wants to buy something he only thinks is illegal, that's not a crime.”

Odo rocked back and crossed his arms. “Oh, you are a piece of work.”

“I'll take that as a compliment.”

For a moment, Jadzia's Trill-constant swirl of consciousness paused and then coalesced into the pattern she'd been seeking as she realized what Vash was trying to do. There was now only one last question for Odo to ask.

As if on cue, she heard the constable say, “One last thing. If all of this . . . confusion was brought about by the potential sale of an artifact that you and whoever else was involved knew was a fraud, why would someone want to kill you?”

Jadzia caught her breath as Vash delivered her answer: “I'm not the only one who deals in rare antiquities. My clients buy from several different sources, so . . . any one of them could have decided that the potential payoff was worth taking me out of the picture.”

Odo gazed down at the floor and Jadzia knew exactly what he was going to say next. The only thing a man like Odo could say after the story he had just been told.

“Vash, I have far better things to do with my time than try to stop criminals from killing other criminals. I'll keep all the security precautions in place while you're in the Infirmary, but as soon as Doctor Bashir says you can be released, I want you off this station. Is that understood?”

For once, Vash seemed truly serious. “Yeah, I understand. And . . . it may not mean much coming from someone like me, Odo, but thank you for . . . the transporter shields and the guards. I'll be on my way as soon as the doctor says.”

Odo nodded his head once, said his good-byes to Jadzia and Bashir, then left.

Vash turned to Bashir. “So Doc? How long have I got?”

Bashir studied the Cardassian readouts. “How's your head?”

“Like I've got Gorns playing ten-pin behind my eyeballs.”

Bashir nodded as if he knew exactly what that felt like. “I thought so. At least another twenty-six hours of observation, then I'll make a decision.” He reached into a tray by the table and brought up a hypospray. “In the meantime, this should take the Gorns down to five-pin, at least.”

Vash smiled as Bashir touched the hypospray to the side of her neck opposite to where the dart had struck. She still had a small dressing on that wound. Bashir had not wanted to use a protoplaser to speed the healing of the puncture because any residual toxin might have been trapped in the new tissue growth.

“Are you a bowler?” Vash asked.

“I'm afraid darts are more my game.”

Vash laughed softly, seductively, and being a young attractive woman herself, Jadzia did not need to call upon the experiences of any of Dax's previous hosts to know exactly what Vash was trying to do.

“Maybe we should play sometime,” Vash said.

“Darts or bowling?”

“Or . . . something else?” Vash's smile was sly, knowing. “You can choose. I'm open to just about anything.”

Jadzia rolled her eyes as she saw the sudden flush that came to Bashir's cheeks as he finally realized Vash was no longer talking about the same indoor sports he was. “You get some sleep,” he said.

Vash reached out to touch his hand. “Thank you, Doctor.”

Jadzia had to admire Vash's technique. The touch had clinched it. Bashir was definitely on the hook, though she knew him well enough that he would do nothing to pursue this new opportunity until after Vash was no longer in his care.

Bashir eased away from her hand. “Uh, you're quite welcome. I'll . . . check in on you later, then.”

“I'll be here.”

I don't believe it, Jadzia thought as she started for the door. The silly creature actually batted her eyelashes at him.

Then Jadzia hooked her arm around Julian's and guided him to the door at her side. “Come along, Doctor. You have other patients.”

“I do?”

The surgery door slid shut behind them, and they were in the main work area. Without Vash.

Immediately, Jadzia said, “Julian, I'm surprised at you.”

“Why me? On the contrary, I'm surprised at you and at Odo.”

“That woman was . . . wait a minute. Why are you surprised at me?”

Bashir headed over to the workstation where he had left the neural dart. “Because you—and Odo—were falling for everything Vash said.”

Now Jadzia was doubly surprised. “I wasn't falling for everything she said. You were.” She batted her eyelashes at Bashir. “Oh, Doctor, I'm open to anything. Really, Julian.”

Bashir gave her a look of amusement. “Could it be you're jealous?”

“I am a happily married woman, thank you. I just happen to be concerned for my friend.”

Bashir rolled the dart in his fingers, as if looking for something he and the most sophisticated collection of medical scanners and analyzers this side of Starbase 375 had missed the first time. “Well, your friend is equally concerned about you.” He brought up his other hand and adjusted the position of the dart. “So you should know that everything Vash was saying in there was a lie.” He began rolling the dart again, as if trying to feel for some slight imperfection.

Jadzia sighed with relief. There was hope for Julian yet. “Thank goodness you were able to sense it, too. I really was getting worried about you.”

Bashir looked as if he hadn't quite understood what Jadzia had said. He continued to roll the dart in his fingers. Jadzia eyed him with renewed concern. She didn't like the way he was handling the dart, and she trusted he wasn't going to do something stupid, like accidentally prick himself with the dart's small needle. “I didn't have to sense anything, Jadzia. I knew what was going on the instant she made her mistake.”

“What mistake?”

“Dax! You musn't have been paying attention. Now I'm even more surprised.”

Jadzia put her hands on her hips. “Julian, unlike Miss Batty-Eyes in there, I am not fond of this kind of game. What mistake did she make?”

“Bicuprodyanide,” Bashir said happily, entirely too happily in Jadzia's estimation. “She said she had it bubbling in her brain, if you recall.”

Jadzia thought back. Yes, she could remember Vash saying exactly that. “But what about it? She did have bicuprodyanide in her system, didn't she?”

“Absolutely. Except . . . I never told her that's what it was. All I said was she had been exposed to an Andorian neural toxin.”

Jadzia tapped her forehead with her fingers. It had slipped right by her. But then she thought she detected a flaw. “Just a minute, Julian. Maybe it was a lucky guess. I mean, how many Andorian neural toxins can there be?”

Bashir held up the medical padd he had been working with earlier. “In common use or easily replicated with nonspecialized equipment, one hundred ninety seven. I have no doubt that Vash knew exactly what was in this dart, and because of that, there was no possible way she thought she was dying when she told Captain Sisko about the Red Orbs.”

Jadzia was struggling now to deal not only with what Bashir was suggesting, but with the fact that he had jumped so far ahead of her own assumptions. “But Julian, how could she take the chance that her accomplice would be able to shoot her at the right time, with the right toxin, without being seen?”

Then Jadzia felt Dax lurch within her abdominal pocket as Bashir suddenly slapped his hand to the side of his neck, driving the neural dart needle into his flesh. “Julian!”

But Bashir's only response was to seem to pluck the dart from his neck and then roll it forward in his fingers so that Jadzia could see the needle had been removed. It was in his other hand.

“What better way to make us believe she's telling us the truth, than by making us think that someone would rather kill her than have us hear what she had to say?”

To Jadzia, that moment of revelation was as powerful as if an Altonian sphere had just turned monochromatic. She had become so caught up in the idea that Vash was manipulating the truth in the surgery that she hadn't stopped to consider that that manipulation might have started much earlier.

“She's been lying from the beginning,” Jadzia said wonderingly.

“I think that's likely,” Bashir agreed.

“Which could mean . . . she does know where Quark is—”

“—and she knows who claims to have the Red Orbs—”

Then Jadzia and Bashir hesitated as they drew the ultimate conclusion from what they had discovered.

“And the Red Orbs themselves . . .” Jadzia said slowly.

Bashir nodded. “. . . could very well be real.” He smiled at Jadzia's look of concentration. “As I said, we could be a great team.”

Even his persistence struck her as endearing. But she deflected him by saying, “Julian, we already are a great team.”

He stepped closer to her. “So what does the team do now?”

“Now . . . we go see Benjamin.”

She could see it in his eyes: It wasn't what he had wanted to hear her say, but he knew it was the right thing for her to have said.

What a sweet hopeless romantic Julian is, Jadzia thought with real affection as they left the Infirmary together. Someday, the woman who gets Julian is going to be the luckiest woman in the quadrant.

She wondered who that lucky woman would be.