Lest Ye Be Judged

TITLE: Lest ye be judged…
AUTHOR: Moriahlin
SERIES: Deep Space Nine
CODES: Du, K, AU
RATING: PG
SUMMARY: Who's version of events for the last few years are true?
SET WHEN: 7th Season
DISCLAIMER: yada,yada,yada….OK. Star Trek, Deep Space Nine, The Next Generation and all characters in the shows [and large tracts of land in
Wyoming] belong to Paramount. The first name for Dukat is my invention
because it sounds better than 'Elmo'. The character of Horu Lisgin is mine
too. Don't sue me cause I don't have any thing you might want. Any rights
that Paramont doesn't have covered, I'll take. This is not for profit.
ARCHIVING: Please, ask me first.
FEEDBACK: Yes. Detailed is fine but remember this is my first posting so
please, be gentle.

"LET ME OUT OF THIS CELL! DAMN IT, DON'T YOU SEE WHAT HE IS DOING? SOMEBODY, LISTEN TO ME…

The words and cries receded to a tolerable level as Odo walked back to his office. There were times when he would have given anything to not be head of Security for DS9, and this was one of those times. He keyed the comm button at his desk and met the concerned stare of Dr. Julian Bashir on the viewscreen.

"Odo," he sighed. " Is she awake so soon?"

"Yes, Doctor. She is in the process of tearing the holding cell to pieces. The tranquilizers did not last as long as you had hoped and I am afraid of what she might do to herself if we leave her in there much longer." Odo replied. He felt his facial features sag with the worry and fatigue.

"I'll be right over." Bashir replied as he cut the transmission.

Odo sat in his chair and tried to be dispassionate. This was a routine attempted murder case. The suspect, a former terrorist and a high-ranking member of the Bajoran Militia, was in custody in the holding cell screaming loudly enough for the Prophets in the Wormhole to hear. The victims were in the Infirmary being attended to. And Captain Sisko was on Odo's back wanting answers, answers that might be a long time in coming.

He looked up as the security office door opened to see Dr. Bashir and Dax enter.

Dax spoke first. "Odo, how is she? Can I see her yet?"

Odo looked to Bashir for help.

"Not yet, Dax." He replied firmly. "That is my medical opinion-- for her own safety as well as yours. You saw how she reacted to seeing you. It will only make things worse until we can find a way to calm her down."

"But, Julian, she tried to kill me and my fiancé!" Dax protested.

"I know that, I was there as well as Odo. But she is obviously sick and we need to proceed slowly with this." He turned back to Odo. "Constable will you come with me?" Odo just nodded mutely as he stood to lead the way back to the cell.

The volume increased as they neared the cell. "ODO! ODO WHERE ARE YOU?" As the two men stopped in front of the forcefield that separated them from the single occupant of the cell, they felt frightened by the sight that met their eyes. Colonel Kira Nerys stopped her pacing to stare back at them.

"Odo, Julian, why are you doing this to me?" Her voice was rough with the effects of her yelling and her eyes looked wildly at them. "Why did you put me in here? I am trying to protect all of us, can't you see that?"

Odo cleared his throat and stared at the woman he once thought he knew. "Colonel, why did you attack Lt. Dax and her fiancé with a knife?"

"Odo, how can they have deceived you too? He killed Jadzia. He killed her in the Temple. That, that…thing that looks like Jadzia must be a Founder." Kira's voice rose to a shrill pitch as she continued. "We have to find Ezri. We need to find out what that *murderer* has done to her."

Julian spoke at last, "Kira, who is this *Ezri* that you keep talking about? There is no one listed on the station logs with that name."

Kira opened her mouth but no sound came out. She slowly backed away from the cell's forcefield and put her back to the wall as far from her former friends as the cell would allow.

She took a ragged breath, "Ezri, Ezri Dax. She is the Trill that was given the Dax symbiont when Dukat killed Jadzia. Don't you remember anything that has happened? Dukat joined the Founders and allied Cardassia with them. They declared war on the Federation and took back the station." Her eyes pleaded with Julian to confirm this.

"Odo, you and I were left on the station when Gul Dukat took it back. Rom tried to sabotage it so that they couldn't open the wormhole but he was arrested. And then I was arrested along with Leeta, and Jake. Quark and Ziyal freed us, but then Damar found out and killed Ziyal and Dukat went mad with grief and he was caught when the Emissary returned." The two men exchanged looks as she paused to gulp air as though she was in a race.

"Please, Odo, you were on the ruling council with Dukat and Weyoun, you saw what happened. Dukat escaped when he was being taken to stand trial for war crimes and took Captain Sisko prisoner and he swore to Sisko that he would destroy Bajor. He joined with the Pah Wraiths and killed Jadzia and closed the wormhole to destroy the Prophets." Her words tumbled over each other in her haste.

"Then Dukat became the leader of the Pah Wraith cult and kidnapped me and took me to Empok Nor where he tried to kill all his followers, but I broke free and saved them. You and the crew of the Defiant brought us back here," The mad rush of words gave way to an uneasy silence.

Tears were running down her cheeks and Julian thought that he had never before seen her cry.

Almost as an afterthought, she added, " We are still fighting them. Odo say something!"

Odo's face was a mask of grief and pity. He seemed unable to find any words to say.

"Kira," Julian said softly, as though he spoke to a very young and frightened child. "None of this has happened. Dukat did not join with the Dominion, he helped us drum up support against the Founders. He leads the Cardassian Union against the Dominion. He is one of our most valuable allies. Jadzia is alive and well in spite of the fact of the injuries you inflicted when she tried to protect her fiancé from your attack…"

"I did not attack Worf" Kira spat out.

"Worf? I never said anything about Worf" replied Julian.

"Jadzia was married to Worf before Dukat killed her. You and Miles were there at their wedding. Why do you call him her fiancé?"

Odo cleared his throat, "Colonel, Jadzia is…"

"Damn it, Odo! You and I have been lovers since Quark set us up at Vic's. Since when have you started calling me by my rank again?"

"Colonel, er, Kira, there is no Vic's on the station that I know of and you and I have never been together in that way." He paused and took the plunge in spite of Bashir's warning glance. "And Jadzia is engaged to Dukat. They have been together ever since she and Worf broke up." Odo said quietly.

"NO, NO, NO that is NOT possible. I saw him grab her and he was going to hurt her again…." Kira's words trailed off and she sank to the cell floor and started to rock back and forth. Her eyes were tightly shut and she seemed to sink in upon herself.

* * *

"Turn it off please. I don't want to see any more." Dukat's voice sounded tired and strained from shock and the wounds Kira had inflicted upon him. He looked around at the faces that showed grief at the recording of Colonel Kira's breakdown. The Starfleet counselor, Troi, he thought her name was, stopped the recording and spoke to the group.

"Captain Sisko, Gul Dukat, the only thing I can tell you for certain is that the Colonel will need long term treatment. She has suffered a complete break with reality and is dangerous, not only to others but herself as well."

"What happened to her?" Jadzia whispered. "She tried to kill Dukat and me while we were standing in the corridor outside of our quarters."

"What I have sensed so far indicates that her deep guilt from the things she did during the Occupation, especially setting bombs that killed children, surfaced when she lost the O'Brien's child during that terrorist attack by a Cardassian national named Solarian Prim. She learned firsthand what it felt like to lose a child to an attack that was much like the raids she had carried out on Bajor. Not only her own sense of loss, but witnessing the grief that the O'Briens felt too, was devastating to her. Prim's testimony in open court charged her with activities during the conflict that left her guilt-ridden and she could no longer justify her past actions as a terrorist as necessary at any cost."

Jadzia leaned into Dukat's arm and shivered at Counselor Troi's words.

Troi continued, "She has looked at Dukat as a symbolic representation of all that she hated during the Occupation. But, I theorize she also felt a love/hate relationship towards him since he was all-powerful to her during that time and she wanted to be powerful like him. Therefor she felt jealousy and anger when he turned his attention away from her to start seeing Dax as a love interest."

Dukat shifted uncomfortably at the mention of that and cleared his throat. "Counselor, most of her statements to you during your interviews are just not possible. I was only Prefect of Bajor for the last nine years of the Occupation. I have not even been charged with war crimes, although I am certainly not liked on Bajor. But these tales? Tales charging me with crimes like the rape of Kira's *mother*? I was not even on Bajor at that time." He felt Dax squeezing his hand in silent support.

"I am sorry to embarrass you like this but you need to know why it will be best for you and Lt. Dax not to try to visit her while she is in therapy." Troi continued. "The time right after the loss of the child is when she started to break with reality and the more she saw of Dukat's acceptance by her friends, the more she felt she had to keep him as an evil villain so that her world view would stay the same. She rewrote your back history, if you will, as well as changed your present activities to make you the evil one and herself the savior."

Sisko finally spoke, "What is the prognosis?"

Dr. Bashir answered him. "Counselor Troi and I have conferred and feel that the best thing for Kira is a term of intensive treatment in the Mulara Treatment Center in the capital on Bajor. Doctor Horu Lisgin is doing some impressive work with this type of problem. All we can do is wait and see. These types of disorders take time and patience to treat.

"So much hatred of me. I never wanted this to happen to anyone." Dukat whispered to himself. Jadzia heard him, however, and replied too softly for the others to hear, "She never could forgive you so she never could forgive herself, jiYarden." Her voice, as she used his personal name, was a caress. He nodded mutely. When he thought of her throwing herself between him and a wild-eyed Kira his blood turned to ice. Jadzia had torn the knife from Kira's hand and saved his life, but not before she had taken several wounds.

"Well Doctors, we will not seek to interfere with her treatment. If you believe it is best for us not to contact her, we will abide by your wishes." Dukat rose as he finished speaking and Jadzia followed suite, leaving Sisko and the others to work out the arrangements.

As they walked down the Promenade to meet Ziyal at Quark's, Dukat mused at the twists and turns of the crazy fantasies that had eaten away at Kira's sanity. All because of guilt and hatred. He paused and thought of all the hatred he had carried over the years as he looked at another doorway. Dax looked at him with a question on her lips, "jiYarden?"

"I need to see someone," he said to her.

"Can't it wait? We are to meet Ziyal in a few minutes."

"No, I think I should do this now. One should never be slow to forgive one's enemies." He said softly as he turned his steps toward Garak's shop.

'Judge not, and ye shall not be judged: condemn not, and ye shall not be
condemned: forgive, and ye shall be forgiven….' Luke 6: 37 KJV.

~ The End ~

Back to Main Page