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The Epidemiology of Hope

By Cardie-ologist

Prologue: the Gamma Quadrant

Borath painstakingly delivered his report at the shore of the once golden lake, now the color of a stormy sky. Status of every world the Dominion controlled. Results of efforts to cure the disease (all negative). Whatever fragments about the war in the Alpha Quadrant had been extracted from the garbled transmissions that made it through the wormhole from time to time. He finished and waited.

The Link was terribly still, but at last a wave lapped about his feet and withdrew. That was the only way the Founders acknowledged his reports these days. The last one of them to take humanoid form to communicate with him hadn't been able to shift back, and the Founder's slow and agonizing death had been the worst horror any Borath had ever witnessed.

With a shiver at the recollection, he gave his obeisance to the Link and transported back to the planet's sole moon, where he and Eris monitored all the goings on in the galaxy as they affected their gods. She turned her blue eyes on him inquisitively. "Still signs of life?"

"Barely."

"What will we do if all the Founders die, Borath?"

"Gods do not die, they move on to another plane," he corrected her. "Should they all go beyond the ability of the Vorta to carry out their bidding, they have left final instructions behind."

"Do you think they'll command us all to activate our termination implants?" she persisted, with a trace of anxiety marring her usual self-assurance.

"Whatever they ask, it is our duty to obey," Borath replied sharply. In fact, he'd wondered a lot about those final orders himself. Please let them command us to wipe out every solid in the quadrant, he thought.

Letting go, turning gelatinous, leaving consciousness behind--he craved that release as the Jem'Hadar must crave the White. The doctor had tried sedation, to no effect. So there was no rest for substance or thought, only the waiting.

I. Odo

Dry. Brittle. Unutterably weary. Alone now, his pain banished by Bashir, his beloved banished by his own request, Odo had little recourse than to dwell on his own sensations as the disease consumed him. It treated him as the first blasts of winter treat the green leaves of summer, altering color and texture until the final disconnection and crumbling into dust. A being, liquid at its core, inexorably desiccated until at last the fluidity necessary to alter shape had evaporated. He, and all his kind, doomed to perish as solids. A grim irony indeed.

Letting go, turning gelatinous, leaving consciousness behind he craved that release as the Jem'Hadar must crave the White. The doctor had tried sedation, to no effect So there was no rest for substance or thought, only the waiting. Should he have let Nerys stay, to make the hours less empty? No, he had been right to spare her. A death so terrible needed no witnesses. He had begun his existence alone; he would end it the same way. Another irony for a drop meant to be immersed in the ocean of his fellows. For a moment, Nerys had banished that unnatural loneliness. He hadn't been condemned to waste away before ever knowing what it meant to be loved.

He tried to fill his mind with memories of their happiness, all too brief, but at least he had gained it before the end. However, the images wouldn't cohere, wouldn't stick with him. The sadness and the weariness drove them away. He tried then not to think at all, at least to dissolve his consciousness if he could no longer dissolve his form. Let loose, the thoughts stubbornly came together again, not in memory but in their oldest configuration, the drive for order, for answers, for solutions. A question completely overtook his mind with astonishing force: "Who did this to my people and to me?" It appeared that the last part of him to dry up would be the policeman.

Why did he think the disease was the result of hostile intent? Virulent epidemics sprang up throughout humanoid history, decimating whole populations. Was he delusional, imagining that this one had been created deliberately? He made himself analyze his conclusions. A good investigator always began with the evidence. Yes, viruses swept through humanoid populations, and the linked nature of the Changeling species assured total infection the minute even one individual became ill. Yet, if Changelings were routinely vulnerable to naturally occurring viruses, wouldn't the species have died out centuries ago? Either morphogenic viruses were extremely rare, or Changeling immune systems extremely effective, or Changeling medicine the equal of any and all viruses that came along. Might it not take a good deal of deliberate engineering to create one impervious to cure?

He heard footsteps, and, turning his head with some effort, saw the concerned, gentle face of Dr. Bashir. "Do you really need to keep checking on me so often, Doctor?" Odo croaked. "We both know how this is going to end."

"There's someone here to see you," Bashir said softly. "I wanted to find out if you were up to having a visitor."

"I told you that I just wanted to be left alone to die in peace. I don't need Quark in here gloating."

"It's not Quark this time. It's Dr. Mora."

"Hmf!" Odo snorted "Here to get the last set of specimens to make his odo'ital file complete?" A reproachful expression appeared on Bashir's face.

Odo regretted the remark the minute he'd said it. He had stayed in contact with Mora ever since their doomed efforts to educate the infant Changeling, and he had come to realize that the Bajoran had an attachment to him that far transcended that of scientist to experimental animal. Bashir had immediately consulted with Dr. Mora when the disease manifested itself, and of course Mora now knew that Odo's end was near. It was natural that he would come to say good bye. "I don't suppose he's brought a cure with him," the constable continued, trying to sound jocular.

Bashir shook his head. "No, he just wants a chance to talk with you."

"Before it's too late?"

Bashir nodded. Odo could see in his eyes the pain it caused him to admit his failure to heal his patient. He averted his gaze from the doctor and muttered, "All right, tell him to come in."

Odo only turned his face back toward the door after he had heard Mora come in and then suck in his breath sharply. Nerys was the only one who had managed not to flinch at his deterioration. Even Garak had been momentarily staggered. Odo found it very painful to watch his effect on those who came to wish him well, so he tried not to look at them until they'd had a chance to put on a false front of good cheer.

Dr. Mora hadn't managed it. Odo had never seen a humanoid look so stricken. He appeared on the verge of tears. "It is kind of you to come," Odo said.

Mora sat down next to the bed and grasped the Changeling's hand in his. "Odo, I am so, so sorry," he whispered. "This never should have happened."

"Diseases don't stop to worry about the right and wrong of things. It's not as if this were your fault."

The look on Mora's face told him everything. He'd questioned enough guilty men in his time to recognize it. Wherever this disease came from, the scientist who had first studied him had somehow contributed to its creation.

The Bajoran spared him the effort of any probing questions. "We didn't intend that you should be infected, no one was supposed to be infected, the virus was only supposed to be transmitted if we lost the war and came under Dominion rule," he stammered out, all in a rush.

"Who is 'we?'" Odo asked, fearing to say too much under the influence of the violent emotions that were forming within him.

"The Federation. The minute they became aware of the Founders and the powers they possessed, they brought me to Earth to help their scientists look for something, anything that could stop them if military measures failed.

"In some of the first tests I ran on you, I'd discovered that your substance was adversely affected by many types of radiation, but it spontaneously regenerated when exposure to the radiation stopped. Two of the other scientists came up with a way to create a pathogen that carried a radioactive charge, yet replicated itself constantly like a virus, eventually robbing the Changeling of the ability to regenerate."

Despite the atrocity he was describing, Mora's posture straightened as the successful researcher displaced the guilty foster father. "Then, when we had infected half our specimens with the disease, we let them link with the healthy Changelings, and, as we had hoped, the infection immediately traveled to those individuals as well."

Odo was shocked and horrified. "You experimented on sentient Changelings in order to engineer the destruction of our race! Didn't you learn anything from being compelled to do the Cardassians' bidding all those years?" he exclaimed.

"Cardassians, Federation when it's their people's survival at stake, I don't notice much difference in the orders they give," Mora shot back defensively.

"But how were you able to capture and restrain these Changelings? The ones we've encountered in the Alpha Quadrant hardly seem as helpless as I was when you first started running your accursed tests on me."

Mora let go of his hand and got up. "Please don't ask me that, Odo. You won't like the answer," he said, turning away.

Odo cursed his weakness. He wanted to spring from the bed and confront Mora, make him reveal the whole sordid story. But here he lay, a brittle leaf poised to fall, incapable even of raising his voice in outrage.

Another outraged voice spoke for him. "You got hold of some of the other infant changelings the Founders sent out, didn't you?" Bashir demanded, his eyes blazing, as he swiftly entered and confronted the Bajoran..

Mora stepped back from him, obviously terrified that his breach of secrecy had been overheard by a Starfleet officer. Odo didn't know whether to be more surprised that Bashir had arrived at this horrifying theory or that he had been eavesdropping.. All those holosuite spy adventures must have rubbed off on him, not to mention the many lunches shared with Garak.

"The baby that died here on the station, it looked like tachyon radiation, but its illness was really caused by the virus, wasn't it?" the doctor said. "When Odo became ill, I should have thought to re examine the samples I took from it."

"Did the Federation send you here to make sure that the infant died, and that their dirty little secret was safe?" Odo added.

"Yes." Mora's answer was barely audible. "The infant was in the last stages of the disease. I knew that purging the radioactive isotope would lead to a temporary remission, but the virus would soon reassert itself, especially if we could induce the baby to change shape regularly. Shapeshifting triggers the virus from its dormant state."

Mora broke off, averting his eyes from Odo's accusing gaze. He walked over to one of the monitors and randomly called up readings. "But there were concerns that Dr. Bashir might realize that the radiation poisoning was not the cause of the illness, but a secondary effect of a pathogen," he continued, staring down at the keypad. "I was to report to Starfleet if that happened." He turned back to the Changeling. "I swear to you Odo, that I did nothing else to hasten the death of your . . . your child."

"Why should you, when you'd already done quite enough?" Odo replied bitterly. Even when his opinion of Dr. Mora had been at its least favorable, he could never have imagined a betrayal on such a scale as this.

Mora ran both hands through his hair and shrank back against one of the walls. "You have to understand, they only brought me in after they had obtained sufficient specimens to assure a high probability of success in concocting the virus. They had already begun the initial tests."

Mora turned his attention to Bashir, seeking his sympathy. "It's your precious Starfleet, Doctor, that rounded up all those infant Changelings, I'm not sure how. All I ever heard about it at the lab was that right after Captain Sisko made first contact with the Founders, one of the admirals from Starfleet Headquarters walked into a shop that specialized in antiquities from the San Francisco region of Earth. They had a shelf full of these curious clear cases filled with moving gelatinous fluids that they called 'lava lamps.' Most of them functioned only when attached to a power source, but the admiral noticed that one of them was operating independently. The proprietor admitted that it wasn't of the true vintage of the other lamps, that a Lurian salvage dealer had found it and included it in a lot of materials this man had purchased. The admiral bought it and sent it to Federation scientists for analysis. It was a Changeling all right.

"By the time I arrived on Earth, they had a dozen infant Changelings. We used them as test subjects until we were satisfied that the disease was likely to eradicate the entire Great Link if even one of its members became infected."

"I still can't believe that the Federation knowingly plotted genocide," Bashir said despairingly. "That goes against everything we stand for."

"All of us hoped that it would never come to that. The disease was to be the weapon of last resort, one of those doomsday devices civilizations develop as deterrents but never use. The vials of virus were stored in a vault in the highest possible secured area of Starfleet Medical. The command staff assured our research team that the odds were a million to one that the vault would ever be opened and the virus released. Only the imminent fall of the entire Alpha Quadrant was to trigger that release."

"Obviously someone got a little trigger happy," Bashir observed icily.

"No, no it was an accident." Mora pounded his fist against the wall for emphasis. "A year after we developed the virus, when the Changeling infiltration scare was at its height, the Federation science team decided it was too risky to keep the Changeling lab specimens on Earth. I had returned to Bajor by then, but I kept in touch with several of my fellow researchers. Later one of them told me that the ship that was transporting the Changelings to a neutral planet was damaged in an ion storm, and because its crew had been told they were carrying replicator components, they left the infected Changelings behind when they abandoned ship. Starfleet Intelligence sent a salvage crew immediately but someone had gotten to the transport before them."

Mora walked back over to Odo's bed and knelt beside it. "Your infant, Odo, was the only one of the infected Changelings to resurface, and the others would surely have died within half a year at most. When rumors of the Link being ill started circulating, my contacts concluded that at least one of the infected infants must have fallen into the hands of an Alpha quadrant infiltrator who took it home before the mining of the wormhole and thus spread the disease throughout the Link."

"You really don't know the truth, do you, Dr. Mora?" Bashir said. "I suppose it's not surprising that Section 31 kept that part of the plan completely under wraps."

"What part of the plan?" the Bajoran asked, clearly perplexed. "And what is Section 31? Are they those sinister people who provided security for our project? They were very different from all the other Federation personnel I encountered on Earth."

Bashir nodded grimly. "Whether or not one of the infected infants found its way back to the Great Link is immaterial. The Link contracted the disease when the Founders brought Odo to them for judgment, because Section 31 arranged to infect him with the pathogen when they tested him on Earth three years ago. I traced the virus in his DNA back to its origins, and there's no doubt whatsoever."

Odo struggled to bring himself to a sitting position. "I know that Starfleet was never very comfortable with my running security on this station, but I never imagined they would go so far as to make me poisonous to my own people, in case I ever rejoined them."

"Either that, or they thought you were their best chance for a pre emptive strike. The Tal Shiar and the Obsidian Order never thought twice about trying to wipe out the Founders, and I'm afraid Section 31 is no better in that regard."

"Yes, they destroyed all the records so no one could use them to attempt a cure. I couldn't understand that, because there was always the chance of the virus getting out accidentally, as we thought it had. Now I know that the virus was already out. I guess that's why they were always doing random searches and computer scans to make sure that none of the data on the disease had been downloaded or copied by any of us scientists."

Odo saw Bashir give Mora a grave look. "So that's it for me then. There's no chance of finding a cure in time."

Mora's stricken expression returned. "Once the baby Changeling merged with you, I knew you'd become infected. Since then I've worked and worked trying to come up with a cure, but I haven't the facilities or the expertise to do it."

"I'm not surprised, since you were working from memory," Bashir said.

For the first time since he had entered the room, Dr. Mora smiled slightly. "Oh, not from memory, Dr. Bashir. We Bajorans have a long tradition of copying texts by hand. I made scrupulous paper notes on all my research, and put them into several prayer scrolls. Your Section 31 never even thought to check them. The papers are secured in my specimen vault on Bajor."

"My God, if I can review the details on how the virus was produced, it's at least a horse race to saving Odo's life. I'm going to ask Captain Sisko for leave to accompany you to Bajor immediately."

Odo felt sensor alerts go off at this proposal. "Doctor," he said, "who else here knows about Section 31 and their use of me as a carrier of this disease?"

"At the moment, only Miles."

"You haven't informed the captain?"

"I didn't want him to feel obligated to take the matter to Starfleet Command. But I think I can get leave by telling him that Dr. Mora has some new insights into the disease, from all his long experience studying you."

"Does Starfleet know you are working on a cure?" Odo probed further.

"They told me to forget about it, I'm afraid, then sent me falsified records on your physiology to put me off the scent," the doctor replied.

"Then I think we are all in considerable danger. I agree that it would be advisable for you and Dr. Mora to go to Bajor-and to take me with you," Odo said. "However, I think it would also be prudent to tell a different story to Captain Sisko. I believe you should report that I have died, and that you are under orders to take my remains to Earth for Starfleet Medical to study. You're going to ask Chief O'Brien to pilot your shuttle. I can instruct you how to arrange for the communication logs to verify that such an order was transmitted."

"You can?" Bashir asked, surprised.

"Yes, I've learned many useful skills working for the Cardassian Resistance." The Constable smiled as much as his shriveled semblance of a mouth would allow. "I would do it myself, but I haven't the strength. I am assuming that since you have already concealed vital information from your commanding officer, you are willing to continue the deception?"

"In for a penny, in for a pound," Bashir grinned.

"Oh, and one more thing, doctor. Tell Captain Sisko that you want to inform Colonel Kira of my demise personally. I don't want her to receive a false report that I'm dead, even though a true one is still a distinct possibility."

II. Kira

Recently, Kira had begun to think of her years with the Bajoran Resistance as one unending adrenaline rush, lightning fast raids, hairbreadth escapes, improvising battle plans on the fly. She had repressed just how much tedium was actually involved, how much time she spent hiding and waiting. Now hiding and waiting seemed to be the main occupation of the Cardassian Resistance. They'd lost so many fighters that they were retrenching while Damar and Garak put out careful subspace feelers to other Central Command officers whom they hoped to sway to their cause.

This left Kira with nothing to do but become more and more painfully aware of Odo's absence and the hole it had opened up inside her, a hole that would become a chasm when, very soon now, word that his absence had become irrevocably permanent would come to her from the station.

Her heartache had been eased somewhat by the surprising support shown to her in countless small ways by the Cardassians who surrounded her. Several of her fellow rebels had served on Terok Nor while Odo was Dukat's security chief, and they praised his ability to do his job despite an atmosphere of hostility so pervasive that it almost seemed to be disseminated by the environmental controls. Damar had simply said, for his part, that Odo would be sorely missed, but he had regarded her with a glance of unutterable sadness, as if confirming their shared pain in having loved ones suddenly snatched away.

Then there was Garak.

On the trip back to the rebel base, while taking her rest interval, she'd finally given into the grief. When Garak came back to relay to her Damar's latest communication, she was face down on the cot, sobbing. She heard the muttered, "Excuse me, Colonel," and the beginning of his retreat, but she'd be damned if she let him believe her weak. She jumped to her feet and snatched the PADD from his hand, all the while making undignified snuffling sounds as she fought to regain her composure. When she finally dared to look him in the face, his expression of sincere sympathy baffled and infuriated her.

"Don't you even think about telling me you understand what I'm going through," she said, glowering.

The Cardassian threw up his hands in mock alarm. "Certainly not. I treasure my continued survival. If you would permit me, however . .." Garak took up the pillow from the cot and held it against the bulkhead. "I have observed that you prefer to work through unpleasant emotions by hitting inanimate objects. We wouldn't want you to injure your trigger hand."

Feeling somewhat chastened, Kira launched a half hearted jab at the pillow, then followed it up with another and another of increasing force. She didn't stop until her arms ached too much to continue. As she stood with them dangling limply at her sides, taking in big gulps of air, Garak fluffed up the flattened pillow, returned it to its place and just touched her shoulder with his fingertips as he walked back to the pilot's chair. "Better?" he inquired, giving her a backward glance.

"Better," she replied, nodding. He bowed his head slightly in acknowledgment and moved on. They never again alluded to Odo's plight or her distress, but for some reason, every time thereafter that her eyes caught Garak's the pain seemed momentarily lessened.

"Colonel!" The object of her reflections hurried into view, looking unusually happy, given their circumstances. "There's a coded subspace message for you from Bajor." The Cardassian handed her a portable comm unit. "I think you may want to take it in private," he added with a conspiratorial grin.

What the hell is he grinning about? And who on Bajor even knows I'm here? She puzzled as she accessed the channel. When the image came into focus, she gave a loud gasp of surprise. "Odo! You're, you're . .. "

"Still alive?" he said drily, grinning almost as idiotically as Garak. "It's good to see your face again, Nerys."

"And yours, looking so much . . . healthier. Has Julian found the cure?" Despite the change for the better in his appearance, she still feared letting herself surrender to hope.

"He has." Now Kira, too, grinned idiotically, silently thanking the Prophets for heeding her prayers. She felt a ridiculous compulsion to kiss the view screen or shout with joy, but she wasn't about to let herself go with all these Cardassians nearby. Then she saw Odo's smile vanish. "And he has found the cause."

His somber tone effectively quelled any manic impulses. "I'm not going to be happy when I hear what the cause is, am I?" she guessed.

"No. The Federation created the disease, and their Section 31 arranged to have me infected, presumably in the hope that I would link with my people and destroy them."

Kira was stunned. After all their holier than thou posturing, the Federation had thought nothing of behaving just like the Cardassians had on Bajor. "Those bastards! I assume we're not going to let them get away with it," she said angrily.

"No, but the . . . counter measure . . . I propose, it will require you to forget that you're currently wearing a Starfleet uniform."

"Odo, when have you ever known me to get fussy about protocol?" she replied. "Now, tell me just what you have in mind."

"I'm going to meet with the female Changeling and offer her the ability to save the Great Link, in exchange for putting an end to this war," Odo said.

"Just like that? You think she'll buy it? You think she'll even agree to see you?" Just picturing Odo in the same room with the leader of the Founders always made her shiver.

"I don't know," Odo said. "And I suspect that the Federation will like the sound of it even less. That's why not even Captain Sisko can know about the cure until I've had a chance to speak with the Founder."

"I'm not sure I like the sound of it myself. The Founders haven't proven themselves very trustworthy. Once they have the cure, what's to prevent them starting the war all over again?"

"I just know that I cannot let my people be destroyed, if I have the means to prevent it," Odo returned urgently.

Kira smiled at her lover tenderly. Only hours reprieved from extinction, and he was already going full tilt in pursuit of justice. A little sob of joy escaped her. "I'm sure we'll figure something out."

Odo acknowledged her display of emotion with a tilt of his head and a grunt. "It will require careful planning" he said. "Dr. Bashir, Chief O'Brien and I are leaving for your base. Get Garak back on the comm for me, and I'll give him a head start on coming up with a scheme."

"Right. I'm sure he'll be absolutely thrilled," she chuckled.

III. Odo

Garak studied his reflection in the metallic cargo container that was the closest thing to a mirror the Resistance hideout had to offer. "The belt needs to be about 2 centimeters wider"-the belt obliged him-"and more of a royal blue, not a periwinkle." This time the belt did not oblige but detached itself into an amber puddle, re-forming a meter away into Odo's humanoid appearance.

"Really, Garak, this is a subterfuge, not a fashion show," the Constable harrumphed.

"If I'm going to meet with the commander of all the Dominion forces in this quadrant, I'm not going to be seen with clashing accessories," the tailor clucked. "Of course, I don't know why you have to take me with you. The Founder always goes on about Changelings never harming one another. I'm sure you'd be perfectly safe setting up the meeting yourself, now that I've provided the secure site"

"I've not spoken with her since I helped Kira retake the station. She may no longer believe that I can ever remain loyal to our people. Even if she did not harm me, she might endeavor to take me prisoner. Who knows what the disease may have done to her rational powers. No, I think we need to take her off guard. If you don't want to come, I could ask one of the other Cardassians. She would no doubt believe that Damar's situation is so dire that any of his men might betray him. It's just that you -"

"Are a far more experienced traitor?" Garak asked.

"Are far more experienced in carrying off such intrigues than the average Central Command officer," Odo corrected. "Besides, she t knows of your involvement with Tain's ill-fated effort to wipe out the Founders. She's more likely to believe that you would have knowledge of the origins of the disease that's killing them now."

"And more likely to agree to a meeting just so she can take a shot at me."

Odo regarded the Cardassian with an exasperated scowl. Garak had greeted the arriving plotters from DS9 with great enthusiasm, having already formulated his plan for luring the female Changeling to a "controlled environment" with the double promise of an end to the Cardassian Resistance and a cure for the Changelings' disease. When Odo had asked him to help carry out the plan, however, Garak's enthusiasm had decidedly diminished. It wasn't unexpected, perhaps, that he dreaded to face the being who had promised him that Cardassia was dead. The constable's scowl faded. "The way you've arranged it, the Founder is the one who's taking the greater risk. If she agrees to the meeting, I think it means she's desperate enough for the cure not to kill the person who's offering it to her," he said, trying to reassure.

"I have built in every possible safety protocol," Garak replied, still without sounding very confident.

"It's an extremely well-considered plan," Odo agreed. "But I will understand if you want to bow out."

Garak exhaled loudly. "No, no, I'll go. We both know I owe you a favor, after what I put you through seeking to regain my father's good graces." Odo only nodded his head stiffly and gave one of his characteristic "hmfs" in response. He and Garak had never once alluded to the "regrettable incident" since it happened. "So many of us do, when it comes down to it," Garak continued. "We've all exploited you, Mora, Dukat, your own people, the Federation, and yet you manage not to hold a grudge. I've never known a creature with such an inexhaustible supply of forgiveness."

"Don't deceive yourself that I've forgotten what recompense I'm owed," Odo said. "But if calling in my debts can save two quadrants, then it's worth everything I've been through."

Garak shook his head. "You certainly never learned to think like a Cardassian, despite all those years working for that idiot Dukat. "Ah well," he sighed, "Let's join Colonel Kira on the runabout."

IV. Garak

As he laid in the course for Pilakta, the rogue moon that orbited half a million kilometers out from Cardassia Seven, Garak once more relished their good fortune. Sensors showed that only a skeleton force of Dominion ships was anywhere in the vicinity of the planet, and there was no evidence that the Dominion had ever set foot on Pilakta itself. Of course, Tain had selected the moon for the Order's "special operations" installation for the very reason that its remoteness and lack of either material or strategic resources would discourage visitors. Still, the Founders were very thorough conquerors, and he wouldn't have been surprised to discover a Jem'Hadar or two skulking about. Garak turned to Odo and Kira and smiled. "Course programmed and locked in. We should be there well before the rendezvous is to take place. Plenty of time to check out the transporter mechanism and make sure my codes can still make it work."

"And if they can't?" Odo asked.

"Then I'll just have to improvise." Garak wished that he felt as casual about the operation as he was pretending to be. From the troubled expression on Colonel Kira's face, it was clear that she wasn't deceived in the slightest.

"No, you won't, Garak," she said. "This whole plan is damned dangerous enough, and if the slightest thing goes wrong, I say we get the hell out and forget about it."

"It has to work, Nerys," Odo pleaded. "Just think of the billions of lives it could save."

"I've just gotten you back from the dead, Odo. I'm not about to give you up again."

"Calm yourself, Colonel," Garak interceded in his most ingratiating tones. "If the plan goes wrong, I'm sure the only one to be killed will be me."

Kira smiled in spite of herself. "It's not worth anyone's life if the Founder refuses our help. And everything I've seen of her tells me that she will refuse."

"I wouldn't be so sure," Odo said. "After all, she has agreed to let Garak transport her and her guards into this secret underground location. I don't think she'd be walking into such an obvious trap if she didn't feel the Dominion had run out of options."

"Just what is this place you're using for the rendezvous, anyhow?" Kira asked.

Garak hesitated. Only six men had ever known of its existence, Tain and his five senior operatives. They'd all sworn to die rather than speak of it to anyone. Of course, other than himself, they all were dead now. The "new Cardassia," in the unlikely event it should ever come into existence, wasn't supposed to need such facilities. If Kira and Odo were putting their safety in his hands, he owed them the truth.

He sighed inwardly. If Mila happened to be alive, and ever found out, he'd never hear the end of it. "It's a very secret interrogation complex the Order used. Sometimes we needed information from people who were neither Cardassian subjects, or the members of occupied populations, or natives of planets with whom we were at war. It was rather a delicate matter, diplomatically, to kidnap and question a Romulan, Tzenketh, or Tholian, and the Pilakta facility allowed us to carry out these operations unknown to anyone but the very top rank of Obsidian Order agents."

"What about the family and friends of the people you were interrogating? Didn't they wonder where their loved ones had gone.?" Odo inquired. Ever the investigator, Garak thought to himself with amusement..

"Oh, no, we always arranged an apparent accident after securing our targets. Something that left no remains to retrieve. Whoever we brought to Pilakta, it was understood that when they had given us the information we wanted, they wouldn't be going home again."

"Charming," said Kira with disgusted sarcasm.

Garak ignored the remark and turned back to the navigational computer. They had arrived at the outer limit of transporter range to Pilakta. He punched in the codes that should allow the transporter beam to penetrate the security force fields and deposit him and Odo within the complex. "All right, Colonel," he said. "Activate the transporter, and we'll see what happens."

"It had better be good," she was saying as he felt himself begin to dematerialize. When he and Odo rematerialized in the room where Garak had once questioned the Tholian Defense Minister for thirty hours straight, he knew it had been.

***

No one would have guessed that the facility had been abandoned for four years or more. Power and ventilation, provided by an antimatter generator buried at the center of the moon, were running full blast. The other systems had automatically reverted to standby mode, but a few touches of Garak's fingers to the controls brought them up to specs. He skipped over the keypad that activated the restraining forcefield around the subject chair, which stood in the center of the room as it always had. A glance through the clear doors of the locked compartments that lined the back wall told him that the chamber was fully supplied for the next interrogation, an interrogation that had never come. Garak thought grimly that he would far prefer to have the Founder in his power in that chair than to be partaking in this little charade.

His eyes met Odo's, and the Changeling's face had a disapproving expression, almost as if he had read Garak's thoughts. "I suppose there's nothing left but to wait," Odo said. Garak returned a curt nod, wishing there were more than the one chair in the room. Somehow he didn't think he could ever bring himself to sit in it.

After a little over a half hour, the comm system bleeped to indicate an incoming transmission. When Garak acknowledged it, the female Changeling's face appeared on the screen. Although she did not look as ravaged as Odo had in the last stages of the disease, her face was drawn and puckered, with flakes of skin peeling away from the forehead. "If this is you, Mister Garak, I am prepared to send you the coordinates." Garak had told her that he would be in audio contact only, the better to conceal his location. "It is I," he replied. "Ready to receive coordinates now."

Pilakta was equipped with long-range transporters, surpassing in scope even the powerful Dominion transporters, although lacking their portability. Garak confirmed that the Founder and the two Jem'Hadar guards he had agreed could accompany her were indeed in their headquarters on Prime. He turned to Odo. "All right, Constable, it's time to become an accessory."

Odo liquefied and wrapped himself around Garak's waist, then transformed himself into the belt. Garak smiled to see that he had changed the color from periwinkle to royal blue. Taking up a phaser rifle, he activated the transporter.

The Founder and her party materialized, her two guards pointing their weapons at Garak, as he was at them. The Changeling woman's expression was unreadable as she took a few shaky steps toward him. "So, the talkative tailor. We meet again," she said.

"I see that the illness has weakened you. Would you care to take a seat?" Garak relished the irony of this apparently considerate gesture. The Founder nodded and made her way to the subject chair. Her guards took their posts behind her, never letting their rifles lose aim on Garak.

"The last time we met, I told you that Cardassia was dead," she said. "Now it appears that my people may precede you to that fate."

"Not if our discussion here results in an agreement. We have the power to save both our peoples."

The Founder cocked her head skeptically. "That remains to be seen. I have no proof that you possess the cure to my disease."

"I have it all right, and I'll demonstrate its effectiveness by curing you--as soon as I can be satisfied that I will get what I want in exchange," Garak replied.

"And that is?"

"I want assurances that you will not retaliate against the Cardassian people because of Damar's rebellion, and I want to be made leader of Cardassia once I have betrayed him and his followers to you," Garak continued, following the script he, Odo and Kira had worked out. "At that point I will give you the cure."

"My intelligence has it that you long ago betrayed your people, and that you now serve the Federation's interests against both Cardassia and the Dominion."

"You've no doubt been listening to my old enemy, Dukat. I'm sure he must also have told you that I value my own welfare above any transient alliances." Garak saw from the Founder's face that his guess was correct. "All I've ever desired is to return home to my rightful place on Cardassia. The Federation can't give me that. You can."

"How did you discover this supposed cure?" she asked him. She was definitely tempted by his offer, although still distrustful, Garak concluded.

"The Obsidian Order developed the disease at the same time we perfected the quantum stasis device that I'm sure your scientists examined thoroughly when they captured Tain's ship. When Tain and I were imprisoned by your forces, he passed on all the specifics to me before he died, including the antidote to the virus's effects." How Garak wished this were the truth. Ever since Bashir had told him of the origins of the disease, he had been deeply humiliated. To think that both Tain and he had been thwarted in their genocidal plans against the Founders, only to have those overly dramatic Section 31 operatives succeed!

The Changeling was silent for a while. "All right," she said at last. "Give me the formula, and I will have our Vorta scientists test it. If they conclude that it is not some even more lethal toxin, I will test it on myself. If a cure results, you will have what you want, provided you also give me the location of Damar and his rebels at that time."

Garak felt his belt come loose as Odo leapt forward and took humanoid shape directly in front of the seated Founder. Her always impassive countenance actually betrayed an instant of surprise. "Odo! Are you in league with this Cardassian, or here to expose some treachery on his part?"

"It would be more proper to say that Garak is in league with me. I am here to tell you that the cure will not be given to you as a scientific formula but that I carry it, as I carried the disease to our people. Link with me, and I will give you back your life as my friend Dr. Bashir has given life back to me."

"How could you have involved yourself in the Cardassians' plans to destroy our people?" the Changeling protested.

"Link with me, and you will understand everything," Odo insisted, his hand outstretched.

Garak had spent enough time reading the faces of people who sat in that chair to know that she didn't trust Odo, but he could also read her longing to join with another Changeling. Odo just stood motionless, his whole arm now liquid gold in front of her, the bait to draw in the starving prey. Finally, the Founder tentatively placed her withered hand in his, and Odo engulfed it. As the other Changeling liquefied in turn, Garak saw that her substance was clotted, and stained with blue. Soon the two blended together into one writhing mass, and the blue stains slowly vanished. Suddenly, however, the two masses separated, as one pillar of amber shot projectile-like to the far corner of the room and then solidified into the shape of the Founder. Garak would have guessed the energetic movement to be a result of the Changeling's joy at her restored health, but one look at her told him she was livid with rage.

"The solids have bewitched you, Odo," she said. "Join me in exterminating them all rather than urging this absurd course of pursuing a peace with the very people who have plotted our annihilation."

"You may indeed exterminate every solid in this quadrant," Odo acknowledged, placing his hand in hers, "but only by trying to talk to them, to eliminate on both sides the mistrust that has led each race to try to wipe the other out, can you hope to gain passage through the wormhole and cure the Great Link before it dies. Is wreaking your vengeance against the solids worth the destruction of every Changeling in the Link?"

The Founder averted her gaze from Odo's pleading expression to the impassive faces of the two Jem'Hadar. Garak tensed and readied the trigger of his rifle.

She didn't, however, order the guards to kill them, as he had anticipated. Instead, she told Odo, without looking at him, that she would at least agree to have Garak beam them back to his runabout so they could send a message to Captain Sisko. "I require first that this Kira, the solid you claim to love"-- she grimaced as she said the word-- "be beamed here as well. I will instruct my guards to kill her and the Cardassian if I fail to contact them once every hour. I know you won't betray me if her life is the price of betrayal."

Neither Garak nor Kira was enamored of this proposal, but the strength of Odo's resolve persuaded them as it had the Founder. They turned over their weapons to the two Jem'Hadar as Odo and the Founder beamed up to the runabout. Garak sat down on the floor and leaned back against the wall. "I suggest that you try to make yourself comfortable, Colonel. I would imagine that we will be here a very long time. You are welcome to the room's only chair."

"No thanks." Kira slid down the wall to sit beside him. "I've been inside a Cardassian interrogation facility. I know what used to happen in that chair."

Garak shrugged. "I can assure you that no Bajorans ever sat in this particular one."

"No, I suppose not. You Cardassians never felt the need to keep your atrocities against us Bajorans a secret," she replied sharply.

"If we didn't," Garak said, "was that not the fault of the rest of the quadrant, which was more than content to let the Occupation continue without lifting a finger to help you? As these revelations about the Founder disease demonstrate, we Cardassians really do not have exclusive rights to genocidal adventures in this part of the galaxy." He was pleased to note that she had no answer to give him on that score.

V. Odo

Contrary to his hopes, total peace did not break out. After endless wrangling, which made Odo for once agree with the Founder that communication among solids was hopelessly inefficient, the best they could come up with was a cease-fire agreement, with the option of peace negotiations to follow. In turn the cease fire would result only when the Founder had been able to return to the Link and cure it. Just getting Sisko to consider meeting that precondition had itself appeared to be impossible. Although shocked that the Federation would attempt genocide, he was even more outraged that four members of his senior staff had taken on the task of developing a cure for the disease and using it as part of a private peace initiative to the enemy. "If I ask the Prophets to let the Founder return to her people, I have no guarantee that she will ask her troops to stand down," the captain declared. The Founder replied that she had no guarantee that the wormhole aliens who did the captain's bidding wouldn't destroy her ship as they had those of the Dominion reinforcements. In the end, Sisko agreed to accompany the Founder back to the Gamma Quadrant and to return with a negotiating team, provided the Dominion troops in the Alpha Quadrant withdrew from Cardassia Prime and maintained a cease-fire in their absence. The Founder demanded in return that the Alliance troops withdraw from all Cardassian territory. Should either side be caught using the time to build up its forces, the agreement would be cancelled and hostilities recommence at once.

Odo had quite exhausted his always limited skills at diplomacy in achieving this meeting of minds between the two wary adversaries. He was glad that it would be Captain Sisko who had to sell the deal to Starfleet and the Federation, although Quark would probably have been the best candidate for the job. The thought made him smile.

The smile faded as hour after hour passed with no word from the captain. Odo had to link several more times with the female Changeling in order to convince her not to summon her guards and take off for Dominion headquarters. Her long deprivation of contact with other Changelings, and her need to renew such contact, proved to be Odo's most powerful ally in persuading her to stick out the slow progress of the proceedings.

At last the comm system crackled to life. The Sisko who appeared on the screen looked so drained by his discussions with his superiors that he might well have been in the first stages of the Changeling disease himself. However, he brought good news. The Federation had approved the plan he and the Founder had worked out between them. When this was all over, Odo had a feeling that his commanding officer would treat him to a very long lecture on just what it had required to win that approval.

As soon as the Captain had signed off, after making arrangements for the Founder's rendezvous with him at Deep Space Nine, she, her face impassive, told Odo that he now had permission to tell Garak to beam himself, Kira and the two Jem'Hadar aboard the runabout. "You may have helped us save our people from the solids, Odo, " she added. "It remains to be seen whether the solids can make an offer persuasive enough to save themselves from us."

VI. Kira

Once the Founder and her guards had beamed to their own ship, Kira piloted the runabout back into orbit above Damar's base. They had relayed news of the cease-fire and likely evacuation of Dominion troops from Cardassia Prime to the rebel Cardassians, and a celebration was already underway.

"I'd forgotten how much of a punch kanar packs," O'Brien said cheerfully as he toasted the returning heroes. He handed Kira a glass of the brown liquid. "Bottoms up." Kira took a polite sip, but the Cardassian liquor had always nauseated her. She drifted over to Odo, who was leaning against one of the cave walls, arms crossed, playing his frequent role as observer rather than participant.

"Believe me, you aren't missing anything not being able to drink this stuff," she said, surreptitiously emptying the contents of her glass onto the floor. Odo acknowledged her comment with only a slight shake of his head and a small grunt. She put her hand on his arm. "You certainly seem preoccupied. I'd think you'd be overjoyed how well your plan has worked."

"It's just a cease-fire, not a peace, Nerys," he replied. "I just hope I haven't done the wrong thing by saving my people."

"No one could have expected you not to save them, Odo. Even if this doesn't turn out well for the Federation, they lost any right to blame you when they turned you into a weapon against your own."

Odo smiled and kissed her on the forehead. "I'll still feel better when Captain Sisko returns safely from the Gamma Quadrant and brings the Dominion negotiating team with him."

"I pray that the female Founder feels the need for a very long re-immersion in the Great Link and sends someone else to the bargaining table," Kira said. "That woman infuriates me more than Dukat and Kai Winn combined."

"You couldn't be jealous, could you, Nerys?" Odo teased.

"Insanely! After all you were alone together for hours, linking and doing Prophets know what while I had to content myself with listening to Garak's accounts of his triumphs in the interrogation room. I haven't had you to myself since we first left the station to hook up with Damar." She made a decision. "Let's go home, Odo. I'll tell the others to get ready."

***

Within a quarter hour she, Bashir and O'Brien had their things packed and were taking their good-byes of Damar and the other Cardassians. (Odo of course required no luggage.) She noticed that Garak wasn't packed, even though she had given him the word along with everyone else. Perhaps he had made some arrangement to stay. After all, Cardassia Prime was soon to be liberated.

"Yes, I thought I would stay here, at least for the time being," Garak responded to her query. "That's if you'll have me, Damar."

Damar strode forward and offered his hand to Garak. "Of course I will. And as the soon to be restored leader of the Cardassian Union, I officially rescind your sentence of exile."

"How magnanimous of you," Garak replied, taking the other's hand. Then, with a few lightning fast motions, Garak had Damar on the ground, grimacing in pain. A few of the other Cardassians drew their weapons, but Garak already had a phaser pointed squarely at Damar. Dr. Bashir, his countenance all bemusement, took his medkit out of his bag and moved to Damar's aid, only to find the phaser turning in his direction.

"I'm going to help him, Garak," Bashir said. "Unless you plan to shoot me." Garak shook his head no and motioned the doctor to proceed, although he still kept both doctor and patient in his sights.

As Bashir knelt beside him with a medical scanner, Damar exclaimed, looking at Garak with complete bewilderment, "You broke my arm!"

"In three places," added Bashir, applying a bone regenerator to the injured limb.

"That's for Ziyal," Garak said with icy calm. "I had thought to kill you when this was all over, but Cardassia needs your leadership more than I need my revenge." He tapped his wrist and immediately vanished.

"I see that Garak managed to acquire a Dominion transporter device on one of our raids," Odo observed. "He could be anywhere by now."

Bashir helped Damar to his feet. "Gul Dukat always warned me never to trust that man!" the Cardassian scowled.

"You know, it's surprised me that Dukat didn't eventually show up here," Kira mused. "I would have bet a Ferengi fortune he couldn't pass up the opportunity to play savior of Cardassia one more time."

"He was the one who urged me to take this course, as a matter of fact," Damar said. "But he insisted that his life was now tied to the will of the pah-wraiths rather than the destiny of Cardassia." He flexed his injured arm gingerly. "I confess that it makes me uneasy for him to be dabbling in all that superstitious nonsense rather than standing here at my side."

"I wonder where Dukat is now, and what sort of mischief he's getting into," said Odo.

Damar looked down at the ground, and when he met Kira's gaze again, he had a decidedly uneasy expression on his face. "I don't know about any mischief, but I do have a fairly good idea where he is."

Kira jumped on the remark eagerly. "Where?"

"If I tell you, Colonel, it would only be because I am concerned about Dukat and want him to come home now that the Dominion is leaving Prime. You would have to promise me not to hold him for trial for any of the acts he has committed against Bajor or the Federation."

"That's a big request, Damar. He killed a Federation officer."

"And my Resistance movement saved the Federation from defeat," Damar replied. "I think the important thing is to have Dukat back among people who can help him get over this religious mania of his, and keep him from doing any further harm while under its influence."

Kira exchanged glances with Odo, who nodded his assent to Damar's proposition. "All right," she said, taking a deep breath. "Where is he?"

Damar beckoned them closer. "He is most likely on Bajor," he confided. "When he was last on Cardassia Prime, he asked me to procure the services of a surgeon--" The Cardassian took a deep breath and then whispered, "-- who changed his appearance to that of a Bajoran."

Kira shuddered with revulsion at the very thought of Dukat becoming a Bajoran. "I can't even imagine what sick plan would make him do that."

Damar instinctively backed away. "I was puzzled, also. But Dukat insisted on keeping his own counsel," he said.

"I'll contact Bajoran security as soon as we're on the runabout," Odo said.

"The sooner the better!" Kira agreed. She took a step toward the Cardassian. "I never thought I'd ever say this, but it's been a privilege serving with you, Damar. I hope we meet again soon with this war behind us."

"I look forward to showing you the glories of Cardassia Prime, Colonel," Damar said with unexpected gallantry.

Not my first choice for a vacation spot, Kira thought, but she acknowledged the Cardassian's offer with a warm smile. Then she signaled to the others to transport up to their ship.

***

"This is incredible, Nerys," Odo told her after sending the information about Dukat to Bajor. "There have been over a dozen reports to Bajoran security during the past few weeks by people who swear that a blind Bajoran beggar who sits on the corner of the gate to the Kai's residence has been speaking with the voice of the former Prefect of the Occupation. The authorities had initially dismissed the reports as a manifestation of mass hysteria connected with fears of a Dominion victory and a renewed Cardassian Occupation. Deputies have been dispatched to take the beggar into custody and hold him until I have a chance to question him."

"Dukat begging for his bread from Bajorans? I'd love to just leave him on that street corner. Of course I'm sure it's just a charade to hide whatever scheme he's been directed by the pah-wraiths to put into motion," Kira said. "Still it galls me to see him going back to Cardassia unpunished for all he's done."

"With Garak on the loose, I think we can be sure that Dukat won't escape unscathed," Odo speculated. "Well, if I'm going to have to deal with Dukat as soon as we return to the station, I had better be prepared for a long session. I think I'll go back to the sleeping quarters and regenerate."

Kira stroked his face. "You've been through a lot recently. I think you should regenerate for the whole journey home."

Odo kissed her on the ridges of her nose. "Being held hostage by the Jem'Hadar can't have been very restful either. Why don't you come back and sleep, too. I've brought along those . . . umm . . gold satin sheets that you like so much."

Kira stifled a laugh. "Yes, right. It's been months since I covered myself with that delicious gold." She took Odo's hand and began to walk with him to the rear of the runabout. Looking back over her shoulder, she told O'Brien, "Chief, you have the con all the way back to the station. We won't want to be disturbed."

"Aye, Colonel," O'Brien replied, giving them both a wink as they walked hand-in-hand to the rear of the runabout.

"Gold satin sheets?" Bashir said with a puzzled expression. "There aren't any gold satin sheets back there, Miles."

"I swear, Julian," O'Brien replied with exasperated amusement, "for a bloody genius, you are sometimes the most obtuse human being I've ever met."

***

Epilogue: The Gamma Quadrant

The lake was golden again, waves rippling from shore to shore. It was the closest Weyoun had ever seen the Founders come to behaving like solids at a party. Borath and Eris stood beside him, awaiting their instructions when a Founder re-emerged from the Link. Eris looked up to the sky, where the orbiting Starfleet runabout was just visible.

"This is the third time this Sisko has been in our power," Eris said. "Surely this time we will hold him prisoner and force him to make the wormhole aliens do the will of the Founders."

"No," Weyoun replied. "One of the Founders and I will return to the Alpha Quadrant with him. We will agree to remove all Dominion troops and personnel in return for the Alpha Quadrant solids' promise never again to cross through the wormhole. The solids value their puny, brief lives. They will consent."

"For now," Borath shot back. "But not forever. The Founders will never be safe until all the solids submit to their guidance. As the Vorta have."

"You have not lived among these Alpha Quadrant solids as I have. Their weapons, their technologies are powerful, developed without any proper submission to the wisdom of the Founders. Some of them pretend to honor their false gods as we honor our true ones, but in fact they honor only their own willfulness. Even one of our gods, Odo, was infected with this willfulness, turning his back on his people out of attachment to one of these solids. This infection is even more deadly to the Dominion than the pathogen that almost destroyed the Great Link.

"So--" Weyoun gestured with a closed fist for emphasis "--we will make peace for the present. We will also manufacture ships and Jem'Hadar constantly and station them at our end of that infernal doorway to the Alpha Quadrant. Our fleet will destroy without question any ship that comes through the wormhole. And all our scientists will labor through one hundred incarnations, if necessary, until we have the power to shut that door forever."