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“I have always endeavored to do so.”

With that, he departed, his business for the Federation completed. He headed to the nearest transporter station, intent on beaming to the Rozhenkos’ house in Minsk. Since he was on Earth until at least the following day, he was going to take advantage of the opportunity to spend time with his foster parents. I have not had Mother’s rokeg blood pie in far too long. Nor, he added to himself with the tiniest of smiles, her latkes.

The musty smell of old buildings and canal water assaulted Esperanza Pińiero’s nostrils as she materialized outside Bacco campaign headquarters on Earth, located in the city of Venezia. United Earth government regulations stipulated that transporters were not allowed within any building designated a landmark, and almost the entirety of the Italian city was so designated. To compensate, transporter stations were constructed all over the walkways that snaked around and over the canals.

Helga Fontaine had chosen the site for their campaign headquarters, and Pińiero was still of two minds about it. It was a lovely place, no doubt about it. In many ways, the city had not changed in a thousand years, and it had a medieval beauty that no modern architecture that Pińiero knew of could match.

But that beauty could be very distracting, and the last thing a three-week campaign could afford was distractions. It’s going to be enough of a challenge to win this thing. Hell, it’s gonna be damn near impossible to win this thing.

She walked the few meters to the headquarters entrance, which was an old-fashioned door that had to be opened by hand. More of that landmark foolishness, Pińiero thought. I should’ve overridden Helga on this. We need to be looking at the future, and all this place does is romanticize the past. The past is Min Zife and Koll Azernal. The past is Jaresh-Inyo letting Starfleet make an ass of him. If we’re going to win, it has to be by embracing the future.

Then she caught it.

It had been late evening in San Francisco when she left there moments ago, but dawn was just arriving in Italy. The sun started to peek out over the horizon, bathing the ancient buildings in a beatific molten butter glow. The canal water bounced the light in all directions, looking like a pile of scattered gemstones.

Pińiero just stopped and stared at the pure glory of daylight shining on millennia-old stonework. Again, she inhaled, feeling the sea air waft into her nostrils, admiring it rather than viewing it as an intrusion the way she dismissed the smell when she first beamed in.

That’s why we’re here, she realized. Because the Federation is a thing of beauty, and we need to preserve it the way the government has worked to preserve this most magnificent city.

Opening the door, she thought, How the hell am I going to explain this to her?

At least the governor was still on ship’s time from their trip through the Rigel colonies, so it was late afternoon for her. There would be no worries about waiting for the caffeine to kick in. The time changes mattered little to Pińiero, whose Starfleet career took her to so many planets that her internal clock had given up the ghost by the time she made lieutenant. But Nan Bacco still had trouble with ship lag.

Even as Pińiero made her way through the lobby area—which was empty of all save the security guard at this early hour—she wondered if she should even share this latest news. Maybe she’ll be better off not knowing. If we lose, this knowledge can only

She shook the thought off. What is it Fred keeps saying? We’ve got to act as if we’ve already won. If the voters see a lack of confidence, they won’t have any reason to be confident in us.

She could hear Bacco’s voice in her office before she turned the corner to face the open doorway. “Look, Piers, I shouldn’t have to explain this to you. Talk to Lieutenant Governor Gari, she’ll be able to handle everything. That’s her job.”

“But Governor, she is the one who told me to confirm with you.”

Bacco ran her left hand through the curls of her paper-white hair just as Pińiero