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“Good. Take me to her.”

Tarses, predictably, flinched. “Of-of course, sir.”

The Defiant’s medical bay was not a particularly impressive facility. Worf had seen emergency medikits that were as well equipped. But the Defiant’s mandate was battle, and that meant that most medical procedures that would be performed on board would be quick-work holding actions until the ship could reach a proper facility at a starbase or on a bigger starship.

However, it was sufficient to allow Tarses to operate on Kira Nerys and repair the considerable damage done to her on Romulus. The others in her team weren’t so lucky. When they beamed her up to the Defiant, Kira had regained consciousness long enough to say that the shapechanger posing as Koval had been killed. As per the mission specs, Worf then beamed down an explosive to Koval’s retreat, vaporizing it and everything inside-including the bodies of Eddington, Corsi, and the rest of the security team. The Defiant did not have the capacity to store that many bodies. Besides, nobody signed up for Starfleet security expecting to actually leave a corpse behind to be buried.

Then they proceeded to Qo’noS.

Garak’s list had three high-ranking generals as the ones most likely to have been replaced by a shapechanger: Martok, son of Urthog; Talak, son of Yorchogh; and Goluk, son of Ruuv. Worf did not know any of them particularly well, though he knew all were experienced veterans of the Defense Force whose long lives were due not to shirking battle, but to being unable to find anyone worthy enough to defeat them. All three of them had Gowron’s ear, and any one of them could have been responsible for the bizarre tactical decisions that had served to prolong the Romulan war. It was impossible to be sure because all such orders were said to come from Gowron regardless of who might actually have suggested them or come up with the plans of battle. In times of war, the chancellor led the Defense Force, and that was all there was to it.

Worf admired the principle, but it complicated his life right now.

Kira was lying in the medical bay with a device of some sort on her forehead. Her skin was pale, and she looked as if she had lost half a kilo off her spare frame.

Her eyes, however, still blazed with the same righteous fury Worf had first faced in the interrogation room on the Enterprise.

“Welcome back,” Worf said.

“Thank you. I can’t believe I’m still alive.”

“You have Doctor Tarses to thank.”

Again, Tarses flinched. “She, ah, she really doesn’t. Honest, if she wasn’t clinging so hard to life, nothing I did would’ve mattered.”

Kira gave a sad smile. “Furel always said I was too stubborn to die.”

Worf assumed that to be one of her compatriots in the Bajoran resistance. “We will arrive at Qo’noS in three hours.”

“I know Garak’s information on the Klingons was spottier, but he did work in Romulan space and still has contacts.”

“Yes, but the Klingon Empire is allied with the Federation,” Worf said. “That is a conduit of information that we may exploit.”

Kira hadn’t thought of that. To her, everyone was the enemy-the concept of nations cooperating wasn’t something she was used to. “Of course,” she said lamely. “I’m sorry about Eddington and the others.”

“They died well. We are fortunate that there is a meeting of all of Gowron’s top generals in two days. We shall wait in orbit of Qo’noS until that meeting has commenced, then beam down with your device.”

Kira started to sit up, then, amazingly, got even paler, and lay back down. After letting out a burst of breath, she said, “We can’t wait two days. Koval knew.”

Worf frowned. “Knew what?”

“That we killed Jaresh-Inyo. He was waiting for us down there. It was just dumb luck that I was able to kill him, and it wasn’t until he killed everyone else. Whoever it is on Qo’noS, they know what we did and they’ll be waiting for us.”

“That is unfortunate,” Worf said, his mouth twisting in annoyance. “But this meeting was called by Gowron because