Chapter 72
Betrayal By Friends
Government Palace
Cardassia Prime
February 10, 2278
"It seems like he doesn't even see how he is leading us down yet another road to defeat! Has he not learned the lesson from last time, when he embraced the Dominion so eagerly, only to be betrayed by them when the Breen came along?"
"No, he only sees what he wants, and that's him in charge of our world! He doesn't care who puts him in charge, just as long as he gets to call the shots!"
"Someone has to put a stop to this, and to him, before he leads us to another defeat, and this time, we may not survive it! Look at what the Dominion did towards the end of the war!"
"I agree, but how do we go about stopping him? He's got the Jem'Hadar aligned with him, as well as those damned Ragendorans, but from what I've seen, those aliens only want us to do their dirty work!"
"What about this resistance I've been hearing about? Can they do anything?"
"I don't know. I used to dismiss them off, but it seems like that they have momentum building behind them. Not that I trust them completely, but if they can help us bring back some form of the civilian government..."
"Coming from you, that's a surprise! Then again, I've heard a lot of grumbling inside the military about the coup. Even some of Dukat's old supporters have distanced themselves from him."
"All we need is a rallying cry, and we can topple this regime! We can take out those damned Jem'Hadar! If there is one thing that I'll always believe in, it's the fighting spirit of the Cardassian soldier!"
"So, how do we contact the resistance? Because if this goes on any further, we won't have a world for the resistance to free!"
Packna Gronk found the sound file inside the latest intelligence briefing and secretly deleted it from the report that she, being Dukat's head of intelligence, would give him. She still had the file in her computer, and she'd get around to finding out who all were in the meeting recorded by the agents. The longer this wore on, the more and more prominent people began to turn against Dukat. They weren't ready just yet to go public with their objections, but they were close to making their views known.
She could sense the tide turning against Dukat, and the longer he stayed in the blind, the harder the fall would be for him. The reports that she gave him did show him that there was a resistance, but it was so small that he didn't even bother mounting a full suppression. He left the details of the suppression to her, and she made it seem like she was going after them with her grim ruthlessness.
He'd become taken with Dureena, and she helped blind him even further from the realities. She thought him pathetic as to how he could just let a woman run roughshod over him. His wife knew of what Dureena was doing, and was supportive of Packna's plan. His wife no longer loved him, and would rather see him dead than continue on as leader. His son also no longer could stand his father, but he was much more circumspect with his comments. Packna was the only confident he had, and she found out a lot about Dukat from him.
She had a meeting with him in a couple of hours. It was their daily briefing, and she knew he would want to rush it, as well as his other meetings, so he could get back to Dureena. If they both lived through this, she fully intended to ask Dureena how she kept Dukat so happy these days. Whatever sexual techniques she was using, it clearly made an impact with him.
She saw him walk by her office, singing an old Cardassian love ballad, of all things. He never did that for any of his past concubines. She looked out into space and tried to imagine having sex with Dukat. The very thought made her shudder in repulsion. She had been loyal to him,but no longer. Her patriotism ran deep inside her, but she knew that Cardassia wasn't standing on its feet anymore. It had under the civilian government, but Dukat and his allies had yanked the rug out from under them.
All her reports, from the resistance and her agents in intelligence, showed that the tide was turning against Dukat. They were closing in on where they would need to be in order to overthrow Dukat and his allies, but they weren't there yet. But soon, with some more help from Wildstar and his forces on Orak Tor, they would be ready. She looked out at the rest of the capital from her window in her office, and could sense the change coming. She remembered those years under the civilian government,and she wanted those back, and if it meant she would not be around to see them, so be it.
She had no children of her own, but if she survived what was to come, she pledged herself to finding a suitable mate and having as many as she could. Her work no longer interested her, and she wanted free of it.
The time came to meet with Dukat, so she gathered her papers and began to walk towards his office. If all went well, she wouldn't have many more of these trips to make.