> back
> home

Hybrids

By Cardie-ologist

Three years after the beginning of the Dominion War, peace of a sort had finally come to the Alpha and Gamma quadrants. Various accumulated events, including restlessness among the Jem'Hadar and Vorta, and a little trip to meet the Prophets that Sisko had arranged for the female Changeling, brought the Founders to the bargaining table. Six months later there emerged a treaty, laboriously mediated through Odo, the Great Link's link to the solids, that drastically limited Federation activity in the Gamma Quadrant in exchange for a cessation of hostilities and certain modifications of the yoke the Founders maintained on their subject worlds in both quadrants. These planets were now to function somewhat along Federation lines, as the Commonwealth of Dominion Worlds, soon shortened by everyone (saving the Founders) into "the Dominwealth."

After three more years had passed, this hard won peace with the Dominwealth continued to produce benefits beyond all expectations of the Alpha Quadrant worlds. Take the "Jem'Hadar Reclamation" for instance. Once the treaty went into effect, the Founders were obligated to cease production of Jem'Hadar soldiers and scale back the number of worlds upon which those currently living could be deployed. This brought up the delicate question of what was to be done with the surplus. The Link had of course assumed that they would simply order these supernumeraries to immolate themselves, a step they had been bred to take cheerfully whenever the Founders willed it. The Federation negotiators, however, stipulated that the Dominwealth devote at least five years to finding a less drastic solution.

Prodded relentlessly by Odo, the Link agreed to let the Jem'Hadar live if certain goals could be met. The creatures would have to become self sustaining, not tethered to Dominwealth representatives by their dependence on the ketracel "White." They would have to be able to be naturalized as a species, that is to reproduce and evolve and find some purpose other than killing.. Knowing full well how they had designed the Jem'Hadar, the Changelings were smugly confident that the liquidations would begin on schedule. In offering this chance, they had, however, given an appearance of co operativeness. The Link rippled back to observe the solids' frantic efforts to comply with the conditions. It promised to be quite entertaining.

With the iron hand of their former masters tempered, however, the Dominwealth scientists at the Institutes which had specialized in artificial reproduction for centuries found the challenge exhilarating and surprisingly easy to meet. They wasted no effort in trying to wean the Jem'Hadar from the White; they merely synthesized it and programmed it into every replicator in every Jem'Hadar vessel and outpost. The creatures' dependence on the substance now appeared no more exotic or enslaving than the similar need all solids had for appropriately assimilable nutrients.

The second condition was, to be sure, more daunting. The Jem'Hadar had no reproductive organs, no sexual desires, and all of them were male. Since clones did not evolve, that practice, well perfected by the Vorta, did not offer a solution either. Cloning technology, however, had as its byproduct a range of very sophisticated in vitro fertilization techniques. It would be quite easy to introduce Jem'Hadar DNA into the eggs of female donors, and hope for a compatible mixture. Of course there would first have to be willing donors. Surprisingly, a number of former female Klingon and Romulan prisoners of the Dominion had rather enjoyed the company of their Jem'Hadar guards, and, learning of their potential extinction, had volunteered to donate eggs. Several went further and offered to carry the fetuses to term in their wombs. After a number of early failures, the first Jem'Hadar "hybrid" was born. Three years into the five, 124 were living. The scientists had even discovered that with the help of a little intense psychological programming, some gifted plastic surgeons, and some very persistent Klingons, Jem'Hadar could have sexual relations the "natural" way. A dozen such couples had gone through marriage ceremonies.

The hybrid solution was not a perfect one. Since every Jem'Hadar had only male chromosomes, every hybrid born to date had been male as well. The implications for the future were, of course, that hybrids could not breed with other hybrids, and the continuation of the species through repeated reproduction with mono species females of other races would eventually breed the Jem'Hadar out of existence. Compared to the enforced liquidation of 50,000 Jem'Hadar that would have been the alternative, however, this much longer term genocide was an acceptable alternative, and Dominwealth geneticists were still hard at work looking for ways to avert it. Already Dominwealth reproductive technology had become the galactic benchmark, and their jargon, of hybrids, biomothers and biofathers, mono to mono or cross to cross mating, had replaced many less polite terms on hundreds of worlds.

During the same three years that the scientists at the Dominwealth Institute of Hybridology on Udara Prime were solving the Jem'Hadar problem, two recently married couples living on space station Deep Space 9 were looking to begin their own families.

Elim and Ziyal Garak had expected parenthood to come their way fairly effortlessly, but after a year and a half of trying, they remained childless. An examination by Dr. Bashir confirmed their worst fears: Ziyal was totally sterile. While disappointed, she would have been content to adopt a hybrid orphan. She had discovered that Cardassian Bajoran hybrids were shunned and predominantly institutionalized on Bajor, and her tender heart went out to her fellows. Garak, however, had been completely devastated that they could not have children of their own, and she thought it best not to push him on the issue of adoption for a while.

Ziyal's involvement with these cross bred orphans nevertheless did not go completely without positive results. She had persuaded Odo and Kira Nerys, who knew that biological children were not in their future, to adopt two of them, a seven year old girl, Haran, and a one year old boy, Notar, products of the first and second Cardassian occupations of Bajor. An attentive honorary auntie, Ziyal found her part in Haran and Notar's lives some solace for her own childlessness.

Julian Bashir, however, was not prepared to give up. Seeking Cardassian Bajoran hybrids who had successfully reproduced, the doctor discovered Bajor's dirty little secret: every single Cardassian Bajoran hybrid was incapable of bearing or siring children. Because these cross species individuals were either the product of outrage = their mothers having been raped by Cardassian occupiers - or shame - their mothers having been willing lovers of Cardassian - occupiers most Bajorans believed that the Prophets had wisely decreed that such abominations not reproduce. Moreover, the many farmers on Bajor were long used to their cross bred beasts of burden, the toltars and hasperonts and nemblents, being sterile, as were Terran mules.

Outraged, Bashir badgered First Minister Shakaar and Kai Winn until the hybrids' plight became a planetary priority. At the same time, it became Julian's obsession, to the extent that he asked for leave from Starfleet Medical to take advantage of an offer from the Dominwealth Institute to commit their considerable expertise and resources to helping him solve the problem. With these resources at the command of his genetically enhanced abilities they had solved it in only nine months. A combination of enzymic rehabilitation of hybrid eggs and sperm, in vitro fertilization, and intensive hormone supplements could lead to successful pregnancies.

Garak had insisted that they wait until the first wave of births confirmed Julian's high hopes. When they had, he and Ziyal informed Bashir that they were ready to undergo the procedure. The doctor returned to Deep Space 9 to perform it personally. At the same time he dropped a bombshell on Sisko and the rest of his Federation colleagues. The Dominwealth Institute had offered him a permanent position, and he was resigning his Starfleet commission in order to accept it. "This Bajoran Cardassian problem is just the tip of the iceberg," he told his stunned commander. "We've been so used to successful interspecies procreation between monos that we've overlooked the next generation. My figures indicate that nearly 78% of cross to cross matings and 57% of cross to mono matings throughout the Alpha Quadrant are barren. Each species' situation is unique, so there's a lifetime of work to do. I'm convinced that it should be my life's work. But the work will get done faster without the Federation's restrictions on genetic engineering. The Dominwealth has no such restrictions."

"Nor suspicions of bright young researchers who are the products of such engineering?" Sisko had inquired.

"I don't deny that's another inducement," Julian replied. "You don't know what a relief it is to work with people who consider one a work of art, rather than some sort of freak."

"I can understand the appeal," Sisko agreed. "Well, if I can't talk you out of this, I wish you the best."

So now all of Dr. Bashir's equipment, personal effects, and customized holosuite programs were loaded onto a freighter bound for Udara Prime, and he was sitting in the Replimat, having his last lunch on the Promenade with Garak.

"Ziyal's pregnancy is developing splendidly," Julian was gushing. "I've made sure that my replacement's fully apprised of the treatment protocols, and any potential complications to be on the lookout for."

"Are you sure this is the only way to continue with your research?" Garak had been unusually subdued throughout the meal.

"Yes, it is. And it's important work. Couples like you and Ziyal are only the beginning. Someday Rom and Leeta or Dax and Worf will want grandchildren. Thanks to my work, they'll be able to have them." Garak rolled his eyes at the thought of the children these unlikely couples might produce.

"Garak!" Bashir chided. "Your own wife is a hybrid."

"Did I say anything?" Garak returned innocently.

"You didn't have to. Well, if you don't have sympathy for them, I'm sure you'd be interested to know that I think I'm onto a way for Kira and Odo to have biochildren." From the way the Cardassian's eyes got wide, Julian knew that he had sparked him out of his funk.

"So you've got some insights into how Changelings reproduce?" Garak asked eagerly.

"Yes, or more precisely, how they stopped being solids and how they can still become them when they want to. The Dominion scientists were commissioned over the centuries to research the few diseases that Changelings are susceptible to. There are a lot of test results in the database, samples of Changeling substance lying about. Comparing what I learned there to Odo's stories of what happened to transform the Founders from solids to Changelings for someone of my abilities figuring out the precise chemical processes wasn't any harder than adding 2 to 2."

"So what exactly did happen? Even Odo's reports have only been available to selected Federation officials on a need to know basis."

"Garak! You're slipping."

"I've had a busy year," the Cardassian shrugged.

Julian grinned. "What Odo learned from the Link was that several thousand years ago the Founders were a race of technologically advanced telepaths living at the far side of the Gamma Quadrant. Then their planet was devastated by a mutant virus that jumped to the humanoid population from one of their indigenous plant species. It completely scrambled the DNA of their bodies' enzymes, with the result that they began to revert to a gelatinous state from which a very small portion of them were able to re form as solids for only about a couple of hours at a time. For years these Founders worked to find a cure. Their first breakthrough came when they realized that they didn't have to re form completely, that is to recreate organs, bones, blood. If they merely formed into the external simulacrum of a solid, they could still carry on the research, and they would only have to regenerate every twelve to sixteen hours. Later they realized that if they formed a mental image of something other than their own form, they could shift into that, too. And, as the years went by, they realized that in this state they didn't seem to age, and they didn't need nutrients, and that, in sum, the apparent disaster had a number of advantages.

"Nevertheless, the research went on, and a century after the catastrophe the Founder scientists isolated a particular transformative enzyme and developed a procedure that would enable them to purge a Changeling body of the enzyme while it was imitating a humanoid form down to the cellular level. From then on the Changeling would function and develop once more as a solid. The scientists linked telepathically with their still gelatinous comrades in order to convey the good news. But the link immediately enabled all the Founders immediately to shape shift, and eventually the community, which would become the Great Link, decided that it would never again assume solid form."

"And the transformative enzyme technology was lost?" Garak asked.

"Odo couldn't sense any further knowledge of it" Bashir said. "I suspect, however, that it was not destroyed and that eventually the Founders learned how to assume solid form and then return to their gelatinous form. They'd have only done it in extreme emergencies, but it's a valuable safeguard they'd be unlikely to discard altogether."

"Perhaps explaining how they turned Odo human, and how they were able to avoid detection by blood screenings?"

"Quite likely. At any rate, even if the secret has been lost, I'm only a few weeks away from replicating it in my laboratory."

"Very impressive, my boy." Garak's eyes narrowed. "I imagine that your former employers in the Federation became much more amenable to letting you go to work for the Dominwealth when they learned that your research has wider applicability than simply making babies. I assume you've agreed to copy your findings to them on a regular basis."

"Garak, are you suggesting that I've become a spy?" Julian sounded convincingly outraged.

"Well, I have participated in your holosuite fantasies, after all." "Fantasies aren't realities," Julian said with an enigmatic smile. "I'm no more a spy than you are, Garak."

Garak laughed heartily, "Ah, that's an explanation I'll accept."

An awkward silence followed. They had meant the lunch after all to be a farewell meeting, not an opportunity to discuss Founder physiology. Yet neither man quite knew how to begin to say good bye.

Garak surveyed the familiar surroundings from the vantage point of their regular table. Several other regulars, catching his gaze, waved. The Bajoran antiquities shop opposite was having a sale. Turning back to Bashir, he said, "No one would have predicted thirteen years ago, when I first invited a callow young doctor just out of Starfleet Medical school to lunch, that today I would be sitting here with the foremost reproductive biologist in the galaxy."

"Or when I accepted the invitation from a plain and simple tailor, that I'd be sitting with the man behind the most exclusive designer clothing label in the galaxy. Not that you were ever just a plain and simple tailor."

"Or you just an inexperienced young physician, Mr. Genetic Enhancement."

"Touché."

Garak took the plunge. "I'm going to miss you terribly, Julian."

Bashir looked profoundly embarrassed. "There's no reason we can't each pull up a table and chair to our respective holo communicators and continue with these regular lunches."

"I'd enjoy that very much," Garak responded. "Still, it's not quite the same thing."

"And it's not like I won't be back here often," Julian continued.. "So many of my research subjects live on Bajor, and I still consider myself Ziyal's personal obstetrician. I'll definitely deliver your baby myself. So you see, we'll have many more face to face meetings."

"Yes, of course we will."

Bashir got up from his chair. "My transport leaves in an hour. I have a few last minute things to do in the Infirmary. I should go." Immediately he found himself in a fervent embrace from Garak that lasted so long that he finally extricated himself from it forcibly. Stepping back several paces, he took the Cardassian's hand in both of his. "Good bye Garak," he said warmly, then turned and walked away briskly, not looking back.

Garak stood staring at the departing figure, and continued to stand motionless, staring down the corridor for several minutes after the doctor had disappeared from view. At length, shaking his head, he said to himself softly, but aloud, "Julian Bashir, godfather to the galaxy, who would have thought it?"

***

The indentation on Haran's forehead deepened, and her nose ridges puckered with concentration as she studied the tongo board. At last she declared decisively, "Evade." Silence. She punched her brother on the shoulder. "I said 'evade' Notar. It's your move."

"This game is silly," the three year old pouted. "Are Mommy and Auntie Ziyal having cookies?"

"No, they're having those nasty makara herbs with tea. And don't start trying to get some sweets out of the replicator. You just ate an hour ago. Sometimes I wish you were like Daddy and never ate at all."

"Haran," Kira Nerys called from the sitting room, "Could you go to the replicator and get us two more cups of ginger tea?"

"Yes, Mommy," the nine year old responded. "And me a ginger cookie . . . pretty please," begged Notar, cocking his head as far to the right as the neck bones inherited from his Cardassian biofather would permit. "Oh, all right," she sighed. **I'm the one who should be hungry all the time. When I was his age I was begging for scraps in the street, not being fussed over by Mommy and Daddy. Well, those that have done without can best do without, as Kai Winn once said**

Kira and Ziyal, their feet propped up on ottomans as they sat on the airy open porch of Kira and Odo's cottage in northeastern Dakhur Province, waved the little girl through the archway. "Thank you, dear," said Ziyal, taking the cup from the small hands. "Are you and your brother having fun playing?"

"No," said Haran forthrightly. Kira shot her a look, but her daughter ignored it. "Notar isn't a bit interested in tongo. All he thinks about is his stomach."

Kira tried to keep the irritation out of her voice. Children need patience, Odo always said, and patience had never been one of her virtues. "Tongo isn't easy for someone as young as Notar. Maybe you should just work on teaching him the moves and leave the competition for another day." She beckoned Haran to her side and kissed her.

The girl visibly brightened. "Maybe I'll take out the Marauder Moe set instead. That usually keeps him busy." She trotted off back to the playroom.

"Marauder Moe?" Ziyal asked quizzically. "The tongo I thought was from Dax, but . . ."

"Nope. Both from Quark and about a hundred more. He claims to be in partnership with some Ferengi toy manufacturing consortium. Says our household is perfect for market testing cross species appeal. As part of his product research he comes here or to our quarters on the station a couple of hours every week to watch the children play with the toys." Kira's forehead wrinkled in puzzlement. "I was sure Odo would veto *that* plan, but he only said 'Hmf. At least that's a few hours a week he won't be devoting to one of his shady schemes.' And when I then told Quark it was all right to come round, he said the strangest thing: "Of course. I have claims on this family the Right of First Knowledge."

"Do you know what he meant?"

"No. Probably some obscure corollary to one of the Rules of Acquisition."

"Haran's getting so tall," Ziyal observed. "She hardly seems a child sometimes."

"I'm afraid the villagers in Fiseneth pretty much finished off her childhood," Kira responded grimly. "But there is definitely something childish about her jealousy of her brother. It's two years since we brought both of them home from the orphanage, and it only gets worse. I'm quite concerned about her reaction when the new babies are born. If she's this envious of a fellow adoptee and hybrid, what is she going to do when there are two full Bajoran babies in the house. I keep wondering whether Odo and I made a serious mistake in going through with this pregnancy."

"I'm not the one to ask about that. Garak and I were simply, well, driven by a desire for children."

"Once Julian's research suggested that the impossible was now possible, Odo and I were too. But then it didn't really work out the way we had planned. There isn't any way to join Changeling and solid DNA."

"But there was a way for you to have a Changeling baby?" Ziyal still found the science Julian always babbled on about quite confusing.

"Yes, but it's completely Odo's. Julian induced a small drop of Odo's gelatinous matter to form itself into a humanoid fetus, then he extracted the transformative enzyme. That will enable the fetus to develop in the womb the way a humanoid would. It's the same as when the Founders made Odo a solid."

"Will it - he - remain a humanoid?"

"Well, that's the latest child rearing argument in our household!" Kira threw up her hands. "We both want the boy to go through a humanoid infancy. Then the disputes start. I'd like Odo to be a formative influence on a young Changeling. He believes that, for the other children's sake, his son shouldn't receive the transfusion of transformative enzyme until he's a mature humanoid. 'One day his sister has a twin her own age and size, the next a fully formed adult. Ridiculous!' he says. And I can see that point. Maybe we'll compromise at age 12. Prophets, I don't know."

"I'm sure it will all work out," said Ziyal soothingly. "Your other quarrels have."

"True. I guess if I decided to bear my own clone, we can get over anything. It's funny that we fight the most over our attempts to shield each other. I'd assumed that our children would be Odo Kiras, but he objected violently. Said that one name had been fine for him, and he was sure that his children didn't need any foolish surplusage. When I protested, he compromised to the extent of allowing them to bear the Kira clan name, but I realized that would have violated the essential Odo. So we'll have four one named children, and I suppose the sky won't fall.

"It's having two Kira Neryses in the world that scares me. I don't think Changelings have enough of a concept of individuality for Odo to grasp how unnatural it seems to be having a baby that's your genetic duplicate. Again, it was one of our impossible choices. He refused to have his biological child if we couldn't have mine. I felt that using artificial insemination was tantamount to infidelity."

"Even though First Minister Shakaar offered to be the sperm donor?" Ziyal grinned wickedly.

"Edon has a good heart." Kira grinned, too. "He just doesn't have a highly developed sense of tact."

"What persuaded you to go ahead with the cloning then? When you told me you'd decided to, you didn't tell me why."

"The Prophets told me to. Sounds pretty presumptuous doesn't it?"

"Not at all," Ziyal replied, somewhat surprised, but hiding it. "You've always tried to walk with the Prophets. How exactly did they send their message?" Despite earnest efforts, Ziyal had yet to master the complexities of the Bajoran belief system.

"Well, not by subspace radio." Kira saw that Ziyal was still regarding her with an expression of serious interest. She wondered if the girl were this impervious to her husband's infamous sarcasm. "I had decided that Odo and I would finally be better off with the two children we already had. Odo agreed to abide by my decision, and that was going to be that. Then three days later, while the children and I were eating dinner, he suggested - it took him from the salads to the desserts to get it out - that before closing that door forever, we should go to the Kendis Shrine and ask the Prophets."

"I didn't think Odo believed in them."

"He doesn't. He was just looking for an impartial third party whose advice I'd accept. And Odo knows there aren't too many mortals that fit that description." Kira laughed. "Of course it took me a while to agree to go. The whole plan seemed well, an abomination and I felt I'd be committing blasphemy even to bring it before the Prophets. You can imagine my shock when the Vedek interpreted their judgment as 'Blessed births, to repair long sadness.' Odo and I weren't quite sure what it meant, except that we should have these children."

"Perhaps they meant that you were bringing into the world a Kira and an Odo who would have happy lives from the start," said Ziyal thoughtfully.

"Hmm. That wouldn't have occurred to me. I've never had much faith in second chances. Although I suppose Odo and me finally getting together was one hell of a second chance."

"What are their names going to be?" Ziyal knew that Kira rarely became confessional about the twisted path that had led her into Odo's arms at last and that she would not appreciate a follow up to her last comment.

"That's currently a state secret." Ziyal regarded her quizzically. "Not literally, of course," Kira continued. "I just decided that since we'd fought too much over having these children, we'd not risk any friction concerning the names. I'm to name the girl, Odo the boy, and we'll tell no one until we speak them at the Naming Ceremony. I do think I can promise you that it won't be Odon or Nerysa!"

"Do you and Odo really quarrel so often? Elim and I never do." Ziyal hoped that she wouldn't offend her friend by commenting on her own bliss.

"We're both not easy people to get along with, but I'm probably exaggerating. We're really very happy. When we're together, I feel as if nothing will ever hurt me again. It's just that I get so anxious when he's away, dealing with the Link. New Galactic Order or not, I'll never really trust the Founders."

"Or the Cardassians?"

"For you I'll make an exception." Kira smiled. "Who else would leave her home a month before she's due to have her first child, suffering the full pregnancy symptoms of both a Bajoran and a Cardassian, just to keep a grumpy, newly pregnant friend company while her husband's away."

"What about Elim and Father? Can't you finally trust them?"

"I'm sorry, Ziyal. For your sake I wish I could. But for me, what was done during the Occupation can never quite be erased. And Dukat seems bent on adding to his tally of outrages every few years. Still, I am impressed at how happy Garak's made you." "Oh, Nerys, I am happy. I just hope that Elim is too. It's always hard to tell how he really feels."

"Yes, directness isn't his strong suit." Kira saw the hurt on Ziyal's eyes. "I'm sorry..."

"No, you're right; he is still an incorrigible . . . storyteller. His tales are so much of what I find dear in him, so I shouldn't complain that I can't always tell when they're over. And now that we're finally going to have a child our lives are nearly perfect. I feel instinctively that Elim believes that too, no matter what he says. If he and Father didn't quarrel so terribly, and if Dr. Bashir hadn't gone to Udara Prime, we'd probably be so happy that no one could stand us."

"I hadn't realized that Julian's departure was such a blow. I mean, I know he and Garak were good friends, but after all Garak has you and the baby now."

"Yes, but we can't possibly mean the same thing to him that Julian did!" Ziyal colored, realizing she had said too much. "That is .. ... a family can't substitute for a friend. A man needs friends, no matter how much he loves his wife and children."

So, she knows, Kira thought to herself, with considerable surprise. She had always assumed that only loneliness and girlish naïveté could have led Ziyal to ignore everything about Garak that would have indicated to any sane person that it would be impossible for him to become involved with her - their age difference, his dark past, the enmity between him and Dukat, and, most of all, his sexual proclivities, which apparently didn't tend in her direction.

Over the past year, however, Kira had come to realize that Ziyal had probably been quite aware of all these impossibilities from the outset. Yet Garak spoke to her heart, and she had dared to love him anyway. Somehow that love had simply overcome all the obstacles, and here they were, the lovebirds of Deep Space 9. If I'd had her gift for ignoring impossibilities, Odo and I wouldn't have lost five precious years.

She said none of this to Ziyal, obviously. "Odo and I were each other's best friends before we became . . . more to each other, so the distinction isn't so clear cut with us."

Ziyal's response, whatever it might have been, was forestalled by the chiming of the door entry tone. Kira's brow furrowed. "Who could that be? We rarely get unannounced visits out here." She switched on the viewscreen and called up the exterior security scanner. The screen filled with the sharp, arrogantly handsome Cardassian features of Gul Dukat.

"Father!" said Ziyal with delighted surprise.

"Dukat," Kira acknowledged with far less enthusiasm.

"I'm sorry to intrude, Major. But I need to talk to my daughter on a matter of some urgency."

The women exchanged glances. Kira released the door locks. "Take the second left off the front hall. We're through the archway on the porch." She knew it was inhospitable not to come to the door to meet him, but Dukat did not bring out the charming hostess in her.

"Mommy," Haran called from the playroom. "Who's there?"

"Just someone to see Ziyal. Stay in there with your brother."

Dukat appeared in the archway, then swept into the room in his characteristic manner, as if he were invading it, securing the perimeters. "Please don't get up, Major, Ziyal."

"I hadn't planned to," said Kira drily.

Dukat took his daughter's two hands warmly in his and kissed her on the forehead. "You're looking well. I trust my grandson's development is continuing without problems."

"Yes, Father, everything is fine."

"And you Major, I hear congratulations are in order - twins for you and Constable Odo. And to think I first brought you two together all those years ago on Terok Nor."

"How remiss that we didn't invite you to the wedding." Kira's voice was hard.

"I understood, we had just gone through some very trying times." Dukat gave up his efforts to charm. "Uh, Major, I do need to speak privately to Ziyal."

"Father!" Ziyal spoke with dismay. "This is Kira's home. You can't just come in here and start ordering her around."

"Old habits die hard," said Kira, getting to her feet. She waved off the two Dukats' protests. "Stay in here and talk to Ziyal. I need to see how much damage Haran and Notar have done with Quark's treasure trove."

"Father, what is this all about, that you had to track me down here?" Ziyal asked as soon as Kira had left. "Is something wrong?"

Dukat sat down, facing her, on the ottoman. "No. There's something I can make right. Ziyal, I told you how my only son, Mikor, your brother Mikor, was killed during the War when the Federation attacked the dilithium processing plant on Cardassia Tertia that his cadet division was guarding."

"Yes," said Ziyal quietly. "I wish I had met him."

"You would have, if you'd come with me to Cardassia when I asked you to, instead of waiting for that tailor of yours..."

"Father, don't start," Ziyal pleaded.

"Yes, you're right. But what I need to tell you is that if you had come with me then, I had intended to declare you my daughter under Cardassian law, to give you my name. That's beside the point now. What I can do is give your son the Dukat name, make him my heir."

"Our son already has a name; it's Garak."

"Listen to me, Ziyal. The House of Dukat is a great house, and I am its head, responsible for its continuation. I now have no son to pass it on to. By Cardassian tradition, I may either surrender my leadership of the House to my brother Milkan, who has three sons, or adopt one of my daughters' sons as my heir. I've chosen your son. I want you to move to Cardassia and raise him as befits the next head of the House of Dukat."

"And what of his father? Am I supposed to leave Elim behind on DS9?"

"No, I realize it's too late for that. The tailor can come too."

"Really, Father," Ziyal sighed. "You can hardly expect Elim to agree to this."

He kissed her hand, "I think he will if you explain how important this is to you."

"Oh, no, Father. If Elim is to be persuaded, which I strongly doubt, you will have to persuade him yourself."

"That's impossible," Dukat raised his voice angrily. "He'd never assent to anything I proposed."

"You want his son's name? You convince him. I do love you Father, but in my family, Garak makes the decisions. He's in his office on the Promenade, being a tailor, as you never hesitate to remind him."

Dukat stormed out without another word.

"You can come back in, now, Nerys," Ziyal called into the next room. "He's gone."

Kira re-entered, carrying Notar, his mouth stuffed with cookies. Haran was at her side, dragging by the arm a jumbo sized Marauder Moe doll very noticeably lacking a head. "The Jem'Hadar blew up Moe's fighter with six photon torpedoes," Haran announced excitedly. Ziyal was fairly sure who had been playing Jem'Hadar, and what Notar's cookies were a compensation for.

"If Moe had run into Father on his way out, you wouldn't have needed torpedoes to get that result."

"What happened?" Kira asked perplexedly. "Why did Dukat just leave like that? Where's he going?"

"He's either going back to Cardassia in a very bad temper, or he's going to the station to ask Elim to allow him to make our son the Dukat heir and move the three of us to Cardassia."

"You're joking!"

"I wish I were," Ziyal replied with a shrug..

"Prophets!" said Kira, shaking her head in disbelief. "What I wouldn't give to be a fetneri gnat on that wall."

***

Garak was working against a very tight deadline. The order for the Vulcan wedding party's dresses had come in a mere fifteen days before the ceremony. "Since they plan these matches from childhood, you'd think they'd give us poor tradesmen better notice," he clucked. It hadn't helped that the bride was having eight attendants, double the usual contingent. As usual with Vulcans and Romulans it was the headdresses that gave him trouble. The ears had to be clearly visible, yet not made to stand out awkwardly.

He was working in his office on the second level of the Promenade, directly above his tailor shop. After he and Ziyal had married, with the prospect of a family to raise, he had reluctantly agreed to Quark's offer of a "contact" with one of the Ferengi's innumerable cousins, Rox, a man in the retail clothing business. Before he was quite aware of what had hit him, there were "Elegance by Elim" franchises on ten worlds and a booming cyber order business in custom designed wedding ensembles. Garak still personally designed every piece of clothing sold under the Elegance label, but he had nearly a year ago given up any hands on participation in the actual manufacture or sale of the clothing. The profits had gone beyond even Ferengi expectations, but there were many days, particularly days like this, when he wished he were once more "just a humble tailor and shopkeeper."

The door to the office was unexpectedly opened by someone who knew the lock code. It was Kal Latrem, a young Cardassian Bajoran hybrid friend from Ziyal's residence on Bajor during the War. She now managed the original shop on DS9. "I told you I was absolutely not to be disturbed," Garak snapped. Then, noticing the anxiety on the girl's face, and realizing the strangeness of her having come in person, he asked "What's wrong? Is your comm panel down, some emergency at the shop?"

"N...no Mr. Garak," she stammered. "It's just that someone wants to see you, he wouldn't take no for an answer, and I didn't want to talk to you while he was listening in."

"You can go back and tell him that I can't see anyone just now, no matter how insistent. We probably just put in a hem that was a millimeter too short for his liking! You've dealt with irate customers before, haven't you?"

Kal's voice was tinged with dread. "It's Gul Dukat."

"Well I am definitely not in the mood to deal with that arrogant father in law of mine. And stop shaking, my girl. This isn't Terok Nor any longer."

"More's the pity." Dukat's booming voice and imposing frame suddenly dominated the room.

Garak instinctively checked that his phaser was in its accustomed place in the right hand drawer of his workstation. "Kal, you can go back to the shop now." He motioned her away resignedly. Turning to Dukat he said with insincere politeness, "This is a rare treat. To what do I owe the pleasure of your exalted presence in my poor commercial establishment?" Receiving no immediate reply, he swivelled the viewscreen of his computer into Dukat's view. "By the way, while you're here, what do you think of this design is mauve too risky a color choice for Vulcan complexions?"

Annoyed, Dukat switched off the computer. "It's lucky I'd already saved that." Garak continued in his mocking way.

"You said you don't have much time," Dukat growled. "So why don't we drop our usual charade and get straight to the point." And he explained to Garak the proposal he had made to Ziyal.

"You can't be serious!!" Garak often feigned incredulity as a rhetorical ploy, but this time he was genuinely flabbergasted. "To get straight to the point: absolutely not. What you want is utterly out of the question."

"I don't think Ziyal is necessarily of that opinion," Dukat countered .

"Ziyal naturally wishes to please you, but when you have forced her to choose between us, she has chosen me." Garak permitted his pride to show. '"If you had as much fatherly concern as you pretend, you would stop putting her in such a difficult position. And we both know that this isn't about Ziyal or me but about your need for a male heir for the House of Dukat. We've struggled very hard to have this child and I'm damned if we'd turn him over to you."

Dukat cast a glance at the small replicator in the corner of the room. "Garak, why don't you pour us two glasses of kanar. We'll sit down calmly, and perhaps I can persuade you that this course of action would benefit all of us."

Garak hesitated. Liquor would go along way to cushion the unpleasantness of having to put up with Dukat's bullying. On the other hand, the loosening of inhibitions that went along with alcohol was risky considering the barely repressed mutual antagonism he and Dukat shared. He still remembered the Great Dinner of Reconciliation, as he sarcastically called it after the fact. It was the first time that Dukat had acknowledged Garak's marriage to Ziyal to the extent that he had agreed to be a guest in their home. Garak had coached her through the preparation of an outstanding gourmet meal, made with all non replicated ingredients and actually "cooked." And with each course they served the finest vintages of the appropriate wines. The result had been angry recriminations, broken china, and Ziyal awake half the night sobbing. Still, there wasn't going to be any getting rid of Dukat until he had tried all his arguments. Might as well ease the pain.

Garak set the two drinks on a small table where he showed sample materials to clients and motioned to Dukat to sit down. They both took a few sips. Garak decided on a pre emptive strike. "I just said that this is all about your need for an heir. But why our son. Your two oldest daughters each have a son, if I'm not mistaken. Not that Ziyal ever sees her le-git-i-mate--" he over pronounced the word with contempt. "sisters, but you are good enough to share a bit of family news with her from time to time. Why not give the Dukat name to one of them?"

"For one thing, their husbands have their own names and houses to attend to, while..."

"While the Garak name is hardly worth preserving?"

"It's a dirty joke played on you by a sire who wouldn't give you his own, you know that. You should be relieved that your son can escape it." Dukat felt secure in his logic.

"Isn't that all the more reason that a son of mine - and of Ziyal's - two people without one father's name between them - would be totally unsuitable?"

"The boy is of legitimate birth. He's blood of my blood; I have the right to give him my family's name. For that matter, I have no quarrel with your blood. The House of Tain is one of Cardassia's most venerable."

"Enabran Tain was my mentor, not my father," said Garak crisply. "Where did you ever get the idea that he was?"

"For one thing, your dear friend, the good doctor, was never much for reticence."

"If you believed all the stories about myself I've told Julian, you'd have the biographies of a dozen men."

Dukat produced a PADD from an inside pocket and tossed it onto the table. "What I do have is the biography of Enabran Tain. You are, of course, aware of the meticulous records of personal peccadilloes the Obsidian Order keeps on every citizen of Cardassia, their own members not the least. And what does it say? 'Tain, Enabran: children-bastard. One son born on the third day of the sixth month of the 318th year of the Fourth Republic. Name later confirmed to be Elim Garak. Name of mother unknown. Status of child: living'."

Garak, shrugging, gave up the pretense. "I do say that the Order has fallen on hard times when mere politicians have access to the dossiers. Now yours of course was far more colorful than my dear . . . father's. As I recall, a boy and girl bastard on Cardassia. Status: terminated. Four bastard boys, two girls on Bajor. Status: terminated. Only poor Ziyal left to tell the tale."

Dukat colored, "The six on Bajor were terminated in their mothers' wombs. If I had killed my battlefield conquests when I was through with them, like most of my comrades did, the conception of these children would never have been recorded."

"The two Cardassians were, I believe, fully outside the womb. Ages seven and three, weren't they?"

Dukat determined to bluster through. "They were the products of a youthful indiscretion. My wife made their termination a condition of our joining."

Such a charming wedding gift." Garak's voice dripped with sarcasm.

"Now look here, Garak. It's all very well to come at me with those soft headed, weak willed principles the Federation likes to go on about. But you are perfectly aware that by Cardassian law, it is the absolute right of any man who sires a bastard to terminate that bastard without fear of punishment, whether the child is a fetus or a strapping 20 year old."

"Oh, yes, perfectly aware," Garak thought to himself ruefully. It was one of the defining facts of his childhood. To Dukat he said, "In case you're worried, Ziyal knows nothing of this aspect of your past, at least not from me."

Dukat had the grace to thank him. "But why...?"

"Why didn't I try to poison her mind against you the way you tried to poison hers against me? Well, my dear father in law, when a man has made a profession out of causing pain, he hardly likes to bring his work home with him." Softly he added: "I would never hurt Ziyal." Garak hurried on, "All right. The issue of bastardy is moot. You couldn't be more delighted that the blood of the Tains also flows in your future grandson's veins. But there is the little issue of the blood of the clan Tora." On this point Garak was not merely baiting the other man. He was truly astonished that Dukat would even consider "contaminating" his House with Bajoran blood.

"I know it's probably impossible for you to understand. It won't be easy for the rest of the le git i mate Dukats to accept either. The plain truth of it is that Tora Naprem is the only woman I ever deeply loved. Her blood could do nothing to the House of Dukat but enrich it."

Garak marvelled. What a powerful force was this love of the women of clan Tora! To make Gul Dukat want to appoint a hybrid his heir. To make oneself the dearly treasured partner for life of Elim Garak, whose past sexual adventures had travelled many exotic paths, none of which had ever arrived at a destination remotely like Tora Ziyal.

"Moving to Cardassia," said Garak carefully "would entail considerable risk. It's not a very hospitable place for hybrids, bastards, or disgraced members of the Obsidian Order."

Dukat looked up sharply from his drink. Was Garak weakening? "It's changing, Garak. The commonwealth agreement among the Dominion Allies guarantees free access for all Dominwealth citizens to each other's worlds. Cardassia is becoming more diverse than you can imagine. And of course the family would be under the protection of the leader of the Cardassian government."

"You can't imagine how much better that makes *me* feel. And just what would I do there? I doubt the planet has changed quite so radically as to be a center of haute couture."

"You run your business from this office and comm station, don't you?" Dukat queried. "You can run it in exactly the same way on Cardassia Prime as on Deep Space Nine. And if that's not enough to keep you busy, I do have some political appointments at my disposal. Why, you would make an excellent Minister of Commerce." Hard as he was trying to persuade, Dukat couldn't quite keep the contempt out of his voice.

"Minister of Commerce? Cardassia doesn't have a Commerce Ministry."

"As you've always said, we need one," Dukat responded suavely. "This is your chance to make your homeworld into the commercial power it was meant to be."

"Don't think that you're fooling me, Dukat. I know a bribe when I hear one. Still, if Ziyal would really be happy there . . ."

"Ziyal will be happy to have her son achieve his rightful place in the world." Dukat pressed his advantage. "But Cardassia itself means very little to her. You, Garak, on the other hand. To be bred a Cardassian is to love one's homeworld more than any other place in the galaxy. How bitter your exile must have been. Haven't you longed to return?" Garak's expression told Dukat that he had hit a nerve. "Garak, I know that you would rather have found any other way than me to get you home, but I am a way."

Garak swallowed hard, always an indication of severe emotional stress. "Perhaps it could be arranged," he said, with great hesitation, at last. "There are a number of conditions that would have to be met, however."

***

They laboriously worked out those conditions in terms of a written contractual agreement negotiated on Garak's behalf by Quark. Dukat did a great deal of huffing and puffing about honor, the necessity of trust in family life, and the tawdriness of the Ferengi mindset, but in the end he agreed on almost every point. Yes, the male child, if born alive and unimpaired, would bear the Dukat surname, would be raised on Cardassia, and (the one concession that he had wrung from Garak) could be groomed for the traditional military career. However, at any sign of reluctance to follow that path, the young Dukat could foreswear it. The boy would be raised by Garak and Ziyal, not his grandfather. He would not have a Cardassian given name (they had months ago selected Terel, the name of Naprem's father, who had been killed in a mine accident while he was a conscripted laborer during the Occupation.) Any other children of the marriage, both male and female, would bear the name of Garak. Should hostile conditions for or attitudes toward hybrids arise, the entire family would be permitted to leave Cardassia. There was a guarantee that all children of the marriage would have joint Cardassian-Bajoran citizenship. Instruction in the Bajoran religion would be allowed. If any one point of the contract was abrogated, the whole agreement was null and void.

First Garak and Ziyal, then Dukat, pressed their thumbs to the contractual PADD. "Well, that's done at last," Dukat said. "I had better get busy finding you suitable accommodations on the homeworld." He embraced Ziyal, ignored Garak and Quark, and went directly to his ship.

"I hope we've done the right thing," Ziyal mused.

"If we haven't, my dear, there are more than enough escape clauses," her husband responded. Turning to Quark he asked, "Were you as surprised as I was at how easily he was persuaded to accept every condition I set. Given our past history, it was quite astonishing."

"Not from a business perspective," Quark replied. "We have here what's called a seller's market. You had exclusive rights to the only commodity he wanted to buy. Six different Rules of Acquisition tell you that under such circumstances, the price the buyer is willing to pay will be very high."