By: Carolann C. Potee
You don't know a man until
you've walked a mile in his shoes.
This story is dedicated to
my good friend, Robert Baker,
and to all of my teachers and friends
who gave me help and advice.
"I didn't know you were interested in anthropology, Doctor," said Benjamin Sisko,
Captain of the space station Deep Space Nine.
"Not usually," Doctor Julian Bashir explained in his light English accent. "But I've
been invited on an expedition to explore an ancient Bajoran tomb, believed to be over a
millennia old."
"Kind of like the Egyptian tombs of Earth?" Sisko asked.
"Not really, Captain," said Bashir. "We believe the person or people buried in this tomb
were put there to prevent the spread of a plague or disease, and I doubt if very many, if any,
were very rich. There has been no such other tomb found in the past; if there were, they would
have been plundered long ago by the Cardassians. It is rather ornate and forty meters
underground."
"All right, Doctor, you've got your leave," Captain Sisko sighed, "on one condition..."
"That is?" Bashir asked.
"Bring me back a souvenir."
"Yes, Sir," said Bashir, grinning widely as he left Sisko's office in Ops.
"Hey, Julian," yelled the Chief of Operations Miles O'Brien. "Do you think I could join
you? It sounds interesting and I could use a little time off, that is, if the Captain'll let
me."
"I don't see why not," said the doctor. "Go ahead and ask him. If he says yes, come by
my quarters tomorrow morning, packed, with your camping equipment, and with a warm jacket."
"Thanks, Julian," said O'Brien. "This'll be a lot better than a holosuite."
"Oh, I don't know about that, but it will be good to have some company. I hope he'll let
you come."
"So do I. Thanks again," the chief said as he headed for Captain Sisko's office. Julian
and he had spent more time than usual together in the holosuites lately, taking turns choosing
which program they would use. In the last year or so, they had really become close friends and
shared much of their free time together either in Quark's bar throwing darts, or in one of the
holosuites, playing heroes.
The door opened and Sisko looked up to see Chief O'Brien stride in with one of his
excited looks.
"I saw you talking to Julian," he said. "I suppose you want leave now, too."
"Well, sir," said the chief, "I thought since we're not going to be too busy lately, you
could spare me."
Sisko thought about this for a second, making it very obvious, and finally sat back in
his chair.
"What about that malfunction in docking port four?" he asked.
"Well," O'Brien said uncomfortably, "I thought Ensign Martis could take care of it. He's
a very capable engineer."
"Hmm...Make sure everything is taken care of and you may go."
"Thank you, sir," exclaimed O'Brien while backing up toward the exit. "I'll bring you
back a souvenir, sir."
"You do that, Chief."
The next morning, Doctor Bashir was up early, packing the rest of the last minute things
he decided he needed. The door chime sounded and Miles O'Brien came in carrying a large shoulder
pack.
"Ready to go, Chief?" asked Bashir.
"Yup," O'Brien answered.
"All right then," Bashir said. "Let's meet the shuttle."
The two men hefted up their baggage and they left the doctor's quarters for shuttle bay
three.
As they neared the surface of Bajor, an image appeared on the comm screen. It was the
leader of the expedition, Markun Shan, who was tall and relatively thin, even for a Bajoran.
Wisps of sandy blonde hair, graying at the edges, curled slightly on his forehead.
"You're clear to land on pad six," he said. "I see you brought a friend with you,
Doctor. We can use the help."
"You're welcome," said O'Brien. "I'm glad to be here."
"Good," Markun said. "Meet me at the equipment transporter."
He signed off and the shuttle set down soon after. The two of them disembarked with
their packs and headed to the equipment transporter where Markun had said he'd be. He was
supervising the transport of the equipment: A carbon dater, mining tools such as laser drills,
several different scanning devices, and a few other things they might find a need for.
The three men left the flight center and caught a land shuttle to a forested area, thick
with trees resembling oaks, covered with vines, with no underbrush or grass. Just a scant,
ragged bush here and there. The sky was dark and the wind was kicking up, although there was no
rain in the forecast for that area. Chief O'Brien praised himself for bringing a heavy parka.
"It's this way," said Markun as he got out of the vehicle and pointed a finger toward
their left. O'Brien and Bashir followed him to another clearing where there seemed to be a large
hole in the ground. They got closer and looked down into it. There was a ladder descending about
ten meters and then a sort of tunnel leading another thirty meters down.
"Shall we go, gentleman?" Markun asked as he grabbed some flashlights and some scanning
devices.
"Lead the way," said Bashir.
They descended down the ladder, then through the tunnel to enter a chamber of stone.
There had been paint on the walls, but it was so old that what was left was just barely
distinguishable as figures. It was a guess to say they depicted the builders and occupants of
the tomb, though probably right, they couldn't be sure because it was incomplete. They still
didn't know why it was built or the significance of the dead inside.
"Looks like there's not much here anymore," O'Brien said.
"Over there," said Bashir as he shined his flashlight on a corner of the room behind
them. "There's a doorway."
He led them through it into another chamber of stone with more fading paint on the
walls, but this time it was writing. Markun pulled out a tricorder from his pack to record it.
"I think I can translate it," said Markun.
"What does it say?" asked O'Brien.
"It says: `Leave these chambers untouched, and leave unharmed. A great curse is
imprisoned here and will ascend upon you if you disturb these premises,'" he recited.
"Kinda creepy, don't you think?" said O'Brien.
"Definitely," Bashir replied.
"I think the bodies were placed back there," said Markun as he walked to the entrance to
yet another chamber. Inside, there were three rectangular outlines on the walls: one on each
side, and one on the far wall. They were obviously the resting places of the dead. The space had
been carved out of the rock, the bodies placed inside, and then sealed with a boulder shaped to
fit the hole. They would need the power of a phaser rifle to break through the old seals, but
laser drills would do nicely.
"There are some laser drills with the mining equipment back in camp," said Markun.
"I've been around a few lasers in my time," said O'Brien. "I can show you how to work
them in a few minutes without cutting your arm off,"
"I think we could use your expertise," Markun said.
They all went back up out of the hole, dug through the mining equipment, and each found
a laser drill. O'Brien showed the two others the basics of cutting with a laser. They then
returned to the stone chambers and each started on a sarcophagus. When the seals had been
broken, the only way available for them to move the boulders was with an old fashioned crow bar.
The three of them eventually pried the boulder loose, and almost crushing O'Brien's left foot in
the process. When the dust settled, they bent over and peered inside. The bones of a Bajoran
skeleton lay inside, it's clothes now all tattered and colorless from the passage of time. It
was a male, as Dr. Bashir had pointed out with his professional knack for anatomy, but he was,
or had been, wearing a mask of some sort, now broken also through the passage of time.
"The position of the bones indicate he was struggling fiercely against the boulder when
he was sealed in and died soon afterward rather than before," said Bashir.
"You mean he was buried alive?" asked the chief, clearly shaken by it.
"According to my scans, there is no sign of severe injury, disease or contamination
before he died."
"Then why would he have been buried alive?" O'Brien asked Markun.
"I don't know," he replied.
"Let's open the other ones and see if we find anything," the doctor said.
They cut through the seal and dragged out the boulder on the opposite sarcophagus to
find the same exact circumstances as the first one. After a quick break, they started on the
last one. This one was basically the same as well, except this time, the mask was intact. There
was also evidence the man accepted his death rather than struggling which was very unusual
considering anyone else being buried alive would have struggled like the dickens. The intact
mask he was wearing seemed to be something similar to steel, but when Bashir scanned it with his
tricorder, the configuration of it's molecular structure was unfamiliar. He showed it to O'Brien
and he had never seen anything like it before, either. Doctor Bashir reached out his hand to
grasp the mask from the skull of the dead man and received a shock as his fingers just touched
the surface.
"Ouch," he said. "It shocked me."
"Probably residual static buildup from a thousand years," said O'Brien.
Bashir reached out again for the mask and took it, with no shock that time. He brushed
off the fine layer of dust on it's somewhat glossy surface, careful not to stress it in case it
had become fragile over the years. The metal was warm and seemed to be still fairly solid and
strong.
"It doesn't feel cold," Bashir said. "It's warm to the touch."
"That's strange," said O'Brien, taking out his tricorder again. He scanned it and a
frown creased his brow. "It has some kind of unusual energy signature emanating from it."
"That is strange," said Markun. "I wonder what's causing it."
"I have no idea," the chief said. "The metal is too alien."
They placed it and the remains of the other two masks in a protective bag and started to
pack up their equipment. By the time they were done, it had been dark for several hours. Markun
Shan's assistant took the bag with the masks in them to a storage tent while the doctor and
chief went to their own tent together. There wasn't enough room for each of them to have their
own, so they had to share. They unrolled their sleeping bags onto the ground and climbed into
them.
"Well, today has certainly been interesting," sighed the doctor.
"Yup," the chief replied.
"I don't know if I'll be able to sleep very much."
"Me neither," said O'Brien. "You know, I brought a little something with me to pass the
time if I got bored."
"Oh, yeah?" said Bashir, genuinely interested. "What is it?"
Chief O'Brien leaned over to his pack, unfastened it, and pulled out a dart board and a
bundle of red and yellow darts.
"Want to play?" he said, holding it up.
Dr. Bashir smiled, got out of his sleeping bag, and helped Chief O'Brien hang the board.
"No fair," O'Brien complained. "You stepped past the line."
"No, I didn't," said Bashir, grinning at his bulls-eye.
"If you didn't, that was one damned lucky shot. Go on and throw the last one."
The doctor missed the board completely. O'Brien then stepped up to the line they had
drawn in the ground with a confident smile and, on his first shot, missed the board completely.
Bashir's grin returned just as O'Brien's faded. On his second shot, he scored a twelve in the
center circle. He was about to throw his third when they heard someone yell in the darkness. A
man. Surprised, they looked at each other and ran out of the tent to see who it was that was in
trouble and if they could help. It was still pitch dark and wouldn't be light for another few
hours. The cry did not repeat itself and they couldn't quite tell what direction it came from,
so they stopped and listened for a minute. They didn't hear anything at all except some
nocturnal insects native to Bajor.
"That couldn't have been the wind," said O'Brien.
"Let's go back and see if anyone else heard anything," said Bashir as he turned around
with chief O'Brien still at his side. They walked through a patch of thick trees soon after
they started walking back. A few moments after the chief took the lead, then there was a soft
crash behind him and a muffled "Chief--." O'Brien spun around to see what was the matter, but
there was nothing there. Dr. Bashir was gone, disappeared.
"Julian?" he called out. "Where are you?"
No answer.
"Julian?" he called again while pacing the immediate area. "Come on, Julian. This isn't
funny."
He waited five whole minutes, calling out to Julian each of them, but to no avail. He was
gone and O'Brien had to go back to camp to get help, so he started off, saying to himself,
"Where could he be?"
Dr. Julian Bashir watched helplessly, unable to talk or even move, as Chief O'Brien
searched for him and then ran off back to camp to get help. He had wanted to cry out, to yell
"Here I am!" to the chief. He had been so close, but he would have choked on the vines gagging
him if he moved his tongue. They were all over him, preventing him from even taking a deep
breath. When they had come upon him as he was walking, it scared the dickens out of him. He had
tried to yell out, and got out one word, but the vines wrapped around his face and mouth,
stopping the sound, and dragged him down against the base of a tree. O'Brien hadn't even seen
him, he was so entangled, and only Bashir's left eye hadn't been covered by the vines. Maybe it
would have been better if he hadn't been able to see how close the chief had been; he would
still have been scared either way, so it didn't really matter.
The chief's running footsteps on the ground eventually faded from his ears. Everything
seemed utterly silent. After a while, the vines covering his face slowly receded to his neck and
stopped. He tried to call out, but he knew that Chief O'Brien was too far away by now to hear
him clearly, if at all. Then, he noticed something. There was a person off to his far right. The
man came closer and Bashir saw that he was wearing the intact mask they had found in the tomb.
The man stopped only a few meters away, and he could see nothing behind the mask; it was a
walking shadow, distorting what little light there was around it's vaguely humanoid form when it
moved. It knelt down and began to speak.
"Do not struggle and you will feel nothing."
"Who are you?" demanded Bashir. "What do you want? How did you get that mask?"
"It is my mask," it said, "or, rather, it is me."
"I don't understand," Bashir said.
"You will." The shadowy figure then took off the mask and placed it on Doctor Bashir's
face. The voice in his head telling him to run ceased as alien thoughts flooded into his mind
and drowned any thought of escape.
"Finally," O'Brien said to himself as he neared the edge of the camp. He ran over to the
tent on his left, Markun's and his assistant's tent, and yelled inside.
"Markun!" he shouted. "Julian's disappeared!"
"What's happened?" asked Markun as he peered out of the doorway.
"We went into the woods to check out something we heard, someone yelling for help. We
couldn't find anything so we started back. I thought I heard him start to say something to me
and when I turned around to ask him, he was gone."
"Do you have any idea what happened to him?" Markun asked.
"No," O'Brien said. "He was just gone."
"Can you take me to where he disappeared?" inquired Markun. "Maybe I can help you find
him."
"This way," said the chief as he and Markun started off in the direction where Bashir
had been lost. They reached the exact spot and the doctor was still nowhere to be seen.
"Is there a problem, Chief?" said a voice directly behind O'Brien, making him jump. He
turned around and saw Doctor Bashir standing in front of him with his hands clasped calmly
behind his back.
"Julian!" he exclaimed. "Where have you been?! I've been looking all over for you. What
happened?"
"Well," he began, "I think I tripped over a vine or something somewhere around here and
knocked myself out. I woke up a few minutes ago and found myself in a bush."
"Oh," O'Brien said. "You all right?"
"Other than a little headache, I'm fine," Bashir said with a reassuring smile.
"Good," said Markun. "You gave us a little bit of a scare. You certainly got Chief
O'Brien all worked up."
"Sorry about that, Chief."
"Just don't scare me like that again," said O'Brien with a little smile tugging at the
corners of his mouth. Doctor Bashir smiled again, too, and they all began walking back to camp.
"Have you been able to figure out who or what it was that you heard?" asked Markun's
assistant.
"I'm afraid not," Bashir said. "It must have been an animal or something."
"I've never heard an animal that sounded like that," the chief said.
"What else could it have been?" Markun asked.
"What else, indeed," said Bashir as he put his attention back into remembering the way
back to camp. O'Brien shrugged, took up stride next to him, and then happened to notice the
doctor was carrying a bag.
"What's in the bag?" the chief asked the doctor.
"Oh, uh, just some indigenous vegetation samples. I wanted to take them back to the
station to scan for the different effects that recent environmental changes has had on them and
how they are coping."
"You want to finish up that game of darts before we turn in?" O'Brien asked, the tension
stress gone from his voice.
"No, thanks," said Bashir. "I'm kind of tired after all that's happened. I'm just going
to take a little stroll and go to bed. Thanks anyway though."
"Sure," said O'Brien as Bashir walked away. He was disappointed and confused. It wasn't
like Julian to leave a game unfinished. He had gotten hit on the head, so O'Brien tried not to
think too much of it. Still, it was very peculiar. Now that he had thought about it, there was
only one dart left to complete the game. He was sure he had heard Bashir yell out to him before
he had supposedly fallen, and had looked all over for him afterwards as carefully as he could.
It was just too weird, so O'Brien decided to follow the doctor and see if there was any more
strange evidence he could pick up.
Bashir led him through about 800 meters of trees and then sat down against the trunk of
a large tree and spread the contents of his bag onto the ground in front of him. O'Brien heard
the faint clink of several pieces of metal hitting each other. They definitely weren't samples
of indigenous vegetation. He couldn't see what they were from his hiding place behind another
slightly smaller tree almost directly behind Bashir. O'Brien quietly crept, step by step, about
ten meters closer to a distance of about twenty meters. He stuck out his head to look around the
tree and definitely had a better view in the morning twilight. The pieces of metal the doctor
was handling were the fragments of the broken masks from the chambers, obviously stolen, but the
chief didn't see the whole mask that had been placed in the protective bag along with the broken
ones.
His curious gaze followed Bashir's hands as he began putting the pieces together, and,
miraculously, the edges of the two fragments came together to form a single piece. O'Brien was
dumbfounded. Then he noticed something on the doctor's face. He tried to take a few more steps
closer to get a better look, when something snapped under his left foot. Looking down, he
realized he had stepped on a twig, then also realized he had made a fatal mistake and looked
back at Bashir. He had stood up and was looking right at O'Brien through the other unbroken
mask, his eyes glowing an evil red. For a second, they simply looked at each other, and then the
inhuman-looking Bashir started running towards him. The mask then started to glow brightly as
well and all the sudden, Bashir was clad in alien armor made of the same material as the mask
and armed with dangerous-looking blades and barbs extending from the gauntlets and shin-guards.
It was like a nightmare come to life to see the doctor charging O'Brien like that. He had no
idea what was going on and so got very worried when Bashir did not stop.
"Good God!" O'Brien yelled as he turned tail and started running for his life. He
glanced behind him and saw Bashir still catching up. As O'Brien neared camp, Bashir slacked off
in his pursuit, seeming unsure whether or not to risk detection by the others. He ran into his
tent and turned his pack upside down to find his combadge. He slapped it so hard, it almost fell
out of his hand.
"O'Brien to Deep Space Nine! This is an emergency!"
"Kira here. What's the problem, Chief?"
"Something's wrong with Julian," he said. "I think he just tried to kill me. I barely
escaped with my life."
"What's happening?" Kira demanded. "What's going on?"
"Never mind the explanations, Major," the chief said. "Just get a security team down
here on the double."
"Chief," said another voice from the combadge. "This is Captain Sisko. What is this
emergency?"
"Julian's gone crazy and he tried to kill me. I need a security team right now or I'll
be dead before--"
The last part of his sentence was cut off by a shriek of surprise and pain as a blade
suddenly cut a monstrous gorge in his back.
"Chief!" Sisko yelled. "What's going on?!"
O'Brien fell to his knees and dropped his combadge. He could see Bashir's armored feet
next to him. He grasped for the combadge just as the doctor grabbed his other arm and flung him
up against a table. He knocked it out of the chief's hand and, as it skittered across the table,
there was one last inquiry from Captain Sisko. A blade from Bashir's gauntlet pierced the
combadge right through its center and several centimeters through the table as well. It emitted
a slight crackle, then a flash of light from the dying power cell within, and finally, nothing.
O'Brien stared at the armored figure holding a second, reconstructed, mask. He was gasping for
air as the sheer terror he was feeling made it almost impossible for him to breathe. This time,
there was nowhere to run...
"The signal's been cut off, Benjamin," said Lieutenant Commander Jadzia Dax from a
computer console. "Your guess as to why is as good as mine."
"Can we get him back?" Sisko asked.
"No," she replied. "The transmission was cut from his end."
"Damn," he muttered. "Major Kira, get a couple of security officers from Odo, take a
runabout, and find out what's going on down there."
Kira piloted the runabout expertly through the atmosphere with Ensigns Darsey and
Markeson waiting patiently in the back for the craft to land.
"We're approaching the excavation coordinates," she said.
"Any sign of them?" asked Sisko over the comm link.
"Not yet," she answered. "We'll be landing in two minutes."
After landing, she and the other two security officers drew their phasers and cautiously
approached the hatch. As it opened, Kira took a step outside and was immediately hit by the
unconscious body of Chief O'Brien, swung around from the right side of the runabout. She hit the
floor as O'Brien slumped against the runabout's hull.
An armored figure appeared in the doorway. Darsey, being the closest, raised his phaser
and shouted a warning. The figure took a step forward and, quick as lightning, slashed Darsey's
hand with the phaser in it with a blade on his gauntlet. Darsey cried out in pain as his
lacerated hand began to bleed profusely. Markeson saw what happened and moved to take out the
attacker before he got any farther. Major Kira grabbed the first-aid kit from a storage
compartment and went over to help Darsey. Markeson and the armored figure began to fight
viciously.
Punch after punch came from Markeson's fists, but they didn't seem to have any effect on
the person under the armor. He dodged a vicious slash and slammed his palm into the face of the
man's mask, knocking him off his feet. Markeson took a few steps back, purposely letting his
opponent to sit up, hoping that he would perhaps surrender. Instead, he jumped to his feet and
jabbed for him again with the gauntlet blade on his left arm. Markeson blocked it and was about
to give him a good right hook when the blade from the gauntlet on his other arm impacted into
his abdomen. He felt it tear into his small intestine and through muscles and arteries. He fell
to the floor as Kira gasped in horror at what she had just witnessed. She dragged the kit next
to the fallen man and gave him an anesthetic to numb the pain. Bashir touched the control panel
which closed the door, started toward her, and past her to the navigational console. He started
the engines and set a course for Deep Space Nine.
"Who are you?" Kira asked him as she tried to slow down the hemorrhaging of the wound in
Markeson's abdomen. "Why are you doing this?"
He set the runabout to auto-pilot and got up out of his seat to face her. Suddenly, his
armor disappeared to reveal a Starfleet uniform, a blue one to be exact.
"Doctor Bashir?!" she said, stunned.
He said nothing and walked over to O'Brien's unconscious form. Bashir kneeled next to
him and pulled out a mask from a bag hanging at his side and placed it onto O'Brien's head as he
began to awaken. The mask glowed and he seemed to fall back into unconsciousness, but Kira
couldn't be sure. She finished stopping Markeson's profuse bleeding and bandaged it, but he had
lost a lot of blood and was going into shock. It was a real possibility that he could die.
Bashir stood up again, went back to the pilot's seat, and emptied the rest of the contents of
his bag onto the floor in front of him. He then began putting the pieces together to form what
looked to Kira like a third mask. As soon as she was sure the two security officers were in a
relatively stable condition, she stood up, grabbed the nearest heavy object she could lift, a
chair, and hefted it at him. It struck him in the right shoulder, creating a ten-centimeter cut
on his upper arm, and he didn't even flinch. He looked up at her and, for a moment, contemplated
whether or not to restrain her, but decided a warning would suffice.
"Do not do that again," Bashir said.
"Or what?" Kira demanded. "You'll kill me?"
"You will stop or I will restrain you."
Kira was still too shocked from all that had happened to really be able to think
rationally about what she said, but she knew, most of the time, when to put her foot in her
mouth. This was not the young and egotistic doctor she knew, so she just sat down with Darsey,
keeping an eye on Markeson's life signs, and waited for a chance to possibly escape or stop
Bashir at the station.
"Captain, the Orinoco is heading back to the station."
"Hail them," Sisko ordered.
"The Orinoco is responding, on screen," said Lt. Dax.
"Major, what's going on?" asked Sisko just before the image of a dirty Doctor Bashir
appeared on the screen.
"This is Bashir," he said. "There was a cave-in at the excavation site and Chief
O'Brien was caught in a resulting rockslide. Major Kira tried to help me get him out, but was
hurt as well."
"We received a communication from the chief saying you had gone crazy and that you were
trying to kill him," Sisko said, confused. "That's why Major Kira was sent down to find you."
"Chief O'Brien is suffering from a serious head injury and was delirious for quite a
while," Bashir said. "I don't know why he thought I was trying to kill him."
"We'll tell your nurses and assistants in the infirmary to expect you."
"Right," Bashir said. "Their conditions are stable, so there shouldn't be any--"
He was cut off as Major Kira jumped up to the viewscreen, shouting, in extreme urgency.
"Don't listen to him, Captain!" she yelled. "It's not--"
Bashir turned quickly, blocking the viewscreen with his back, then cut the transmission.
"Major!" Sisko shouted. "What's going on?! Dax, get them back!"
"I can't," she said. "There's no response."
"Damn," he swore. "Monitor the sensors. I want to know about any change, no matter how
small."
"Yes, Sir."
"Sisko to Odo."
"Odo here, Captain," came a voice over the comm system.
"The Orinoco will be docking in less than five minutes," said Sisko. "I want you there
to meet them. I think something is wrong."
"I'm on my way," Odo said.
"Take a few more security people with you."
"Do you think that will be necessary?"
"I hope not, but we'd better be prepared. I'll meet you there. Sisko out. Dax, you're in
charge up here."
"Right," she said. "Be careful, Benjamin."
"I will," he said as he stepped into the turbolift. It took him directly to shuttle bay
one where he met Odo and two security officers just outside the door.
"Sisko to Dax," said Sisko. "Any communications yet?"
"No, Captain," she reported. "Not even a request for docking assistance. She's totally
silent and still coming in."
"All right. Keep monitoring the sensors. Sisko out."
"What is this all about, may I ask?" asked Odo.
"I sent major Kira, as you know, down to Bajor to look for Dr. Bashir and Chief O'Brien
on the Orinoco. On their way back, we received a communication from the doctor saying the chief
and the major had been hurt in a cave-in and were unconscious."
"So, what's the problem?" Odo inquired.
"Right before Dr. Bashir cut the transmission off, Major Kira appeared on screen,
started yelling frantically, and told us not to listen to him. We haven't been able to
reestablish contact with them since," he said.
"Very strange," Odo said. "Let's go, the shuttles landing."
They filed inside, one by one, as the Orinoco touched down on the landing pad. The two
security men drew their phasers and stepped protectively in front of Captain Sisko as the
runabout's hatch slowly opened. They watched anxiously as Dr. Bashir briskly strolled out of the
shuttle and stopped when he saw the two security officers with their phasers drawn.
"What's going on?" asked Bashir in confusion. Captain Sisko stepped through the two
security officers and confronted him.
"We were going to ask you the same question," he replied. "Why did you cut off the
transmission on us?"
"Well," he started uncomfortably, "the major became delirious as well. I had to sedate
her."
"Then why didn't you answer our hails?"
"She put up quite a fight, as you can see," he said as he pointed to the wound on his
shoulder.
"Right..." Now, he knew there was something wrong. That wound had been on his shoulder
before the communication from the Orinoco, not after. Where were the security officers? He began
to there really was something terribly wrong with the doctor himself, as chief O'Brien had tried
to warn them from the surface. He turned to face Odo and shook his head back and forth to
indicate that he didn't believe the doctor. Odo nodded in consent, apparently noticing the
doctor's discomfort in answering as well, and approached him.
"I think you had better come to the infirmary with the major and the chief for a check-
up as well," he said as the security officers went into the shuttle to bring out Chief O'Brien
and Major Kira. The expression on Bashir's face changed from one of confusion to one of
annoyance and he took a step backward. As Odo attempted to apprehend him, there was a yell from
one of the security officers in the runabout just before he flew backward out of the hatch and
slid on the floor to impact into Odo, knocking him off his feet. Sisko saw a vicious smile crack
Bashir's lips as an armored figure appeared in the hatch doorway with the throat of the other
security officer in his right hand, the ensign's feet not even touching the deck. Sisko could
see the unconscious form of Major Kira just behind O'Brien at an almost hidden angle. He was so
stunned, he couldn't get his legs to work to help Odo or even run.
Dr. Bashir walked back over to the runabout's hatch, picked up a mask similar to the one
Chief O'Brien was wearing and put it on. Once again, he was clad in the alien armor that
appeared around him. Odo had gotten up and appeared to be just as stunned as Captain Sisko at
what he had just seen, but was able to get ahold of himself. Odo moved to intercept Bashir as
the doctor stepped over the unconscious security guard toward Sisko and charged him. Odo managed
to grab him before he slashed Captain Sisko to shreds. Bashir stopped, turned, and pulled his
fist back to slash Odo as the blade almost seemed to grow a few more centimeters longer. Odo saw
it coming, but was unable to block it or move fast enough to avoid it.
The blade entered his torso just above his right hip and exited below his right armpit.
He then immediately reverted back to his liquid state and was unable to gather enough strength
to resume his humanoid form, but still grabbed at Bashir's ankle in an attempt to slow him down.
He was kicked off and Bashir looked up as a security team entered the shuttle bay. O'Brien saw
them, too, then grabbed the uniform of the officer he still had in his grasp, picked him up over
his head, and threw him at the team. They didn't expect their enemy to be capable of such a
thing, and so they all fell from the impact except one who went over to defend Captain Sisko.
He fired his phaser at O'Brien, then Bashir, and hit them dead center in the chest, but
there didn't seem to be any effect, so he dropped his phaser and picked up a piece of broken
conduit from a stray phaser blast to use it as a club. Instead of waiting for one of them to
attack him, he charged at Bashir wielding his club menacingly. The ensign swung the club with
all his might and Bashir just barely managed to block it from impacting against his head, but
fell down in the process. O'Brien came up behind him and tried to disarm him, but was struck
with blow after blow with the club and was knocked down as well.
He turned back to Bashir and struck him in the head to knock him completely unconscious,
but careful not to hit him so hard as to crack his skull. Bashir's mask flew off to the side as
the club struck him, and the armor disappeared. Odo was then able to reform himself and came
over to help the victorious ensign with the still conscious O'Brien who was sitting on the deck
contemplating whether or not he should fight or run. He decided on the latter as he saw Captain
Sisko approaching him as well, so he got up and ran for the door. The ensign tried to follow,
but was pummeled to the deck by a slash to the face, creating a gash that almost penetrated his
cheekbone. Before he could crawl to his feet or one of the others could help him, O'Brien was
gone and could be at large anywhere on Deep Space Nine.
"What's happened to him?" asked Sisko in the infirmary as he leaned over the bio-bed to
get a closer look at Bashir's injuries.
"I did a brainscan," said Dax while performing another scan, "and I think an alien
consciousness is imposing its neural patterns onto him. I've scanned the mask and it appears to
be the source of energy the alien is using to create the armor that he was wearing. The mask
isn't on him now, but he's still being affected by it."
"Any theories as on how to get it to release its control over the doctor and the chief?"
asked Sisko.
"We might be able to free him by exposing him to a low electromagnetic pulse that would
disrupt the alien's energy source," she said. "As long as Julian isn't wearing the mask when we
give the treatment to him, we should be able to get him back."
"What about Chief O'Brien?" asked Captain Sisko. "He's still wearing a mask."
"The pulse would definitely weaken him enough so that we would be able to get the mask
off his face and hit him again," Dax replied. "It'll work on him, too."
"All, right," Sisko said. "Get working on an electromagnetic generator and make sure you
test it first before you use it. I don't want you accidentally blowing someone's head off."
"Right," Dax said with a hint of a smile as Sisko left the infirmary and went back to
Ops. Major Kira had come back from the infirmary just before him and looked a lot better than
she did on the runabout, but she still had a little bit of swelling around her left eye.
"You should be resting, Major," he said to her.
"I've been through worse," Kira said. "Besides, you need me here."
Sisko sighed, realizing she had a point. "Can you find the chief with the internal
sensors?"
"No," she replied. "There must be something shielding his life signs."
"It's that armor he's wearing, no doubt," he said. "Dax says it's also emitting an
energy signature. See if you can scan for anything unusual."
"I'm picking up a foreign energy signature on level seven, approaching the promenade,"
Kira said.
"Send a security team to intercept him," Sisko ordered. "I don't want anyone else
getting hurt."
He watched as Kira's hands flew over her computer panel and as she communicated his
commands to Odo in the security office. "I'll be in my office," he said when she had finished.
She nodded, then he shuffled through the door and sat heavily into his chair. He closed his eyes
and let out a long breath. He frowned and then dragged himself back out of his comfortable chair
and back through the door.
"I've changed my mind," he said. "I'm going down to meet Odo at the promenade."
"But, Sir!" protested Kira.
"I know, Major," Sisko said firmly. "I'll be careful."
Kira gave him an annoyed scowl as he stepped into the lift. It took him to the
Promenade, level seven, and, as he stepped out, he saw Odo struggling with the chief. Odo was
doing much better this time, probably because he had been prepared, or at least a little more
so. Two of his constables were unconscious on the deck and one was trying his best to help Odo,
but also trying to stay out of his way at the same time. O'Brien caught sight of Sisko and was
distracted for just a moment, but it was enough to let Odo's fist to come crashing into his
mask, causing him to lose his balance and fall backward. O'Brien, now hurt and noticing he was
going to be overwhelmed as Sisko came over, took off into the opposite corridor and into the
nearest turbolift where he quickly overrode the circuits to shut the door on his persuers. Odo,
who had followed the chief immediately after he bolted, ran full speed into the lift doors and
bounced off into a puddle of gelatinous liquid on the deck. Sisko skidded to a halt next to him
as Odo laboriously reformed into his usual humanoid shape.
"Are you all right?" Sisko asked.
"Yes," Odo replied. "A little rest and I'll be fine."
"I don't think either of us will be getting much of that anytime soon," said Sisko.
"Sisko to Kira. We lost him in turboshaft twenty-nine. Can you tell me where he's headed?"
"I'm not sure," Kira said over the commlink. "Wait. He's headed for the infirmary!"
"We'll be right there, Sisko out. Let's go."
The corridor was unusually silent, mainly because the nearest section of the promenade
had been evacuated, and he could hear his breath behind his mask. The infirmary was just ahead
and O'Brien could see a guard standing at the door. He slowly crept forward as far as he dared
and, when the security officer looked down the other side of the corridor, he charged the man
and slammed him against the wall with is heightened strength and hit his head against the
bulkhead until the ensign was completely unconscious and fell to the deck.
Inside, Lieutenant Commander Jadzia Dax was observing the now conscious Doctor Bashir
when she heard the thumps through the bulkhead. The doctor had simply been staring at the
ceiling before, completely ignoring Dax's attempts to talk to him. He turned his head to look at
the door and was not at all surprised to see Chief O'Brien walk through. Commander Dax, however,
was startled and fell off her chair. Bashir began struggling against the force field restraints
and O'Brien went to help him by trying to turn it off, but was interrupted as Captain Sisko
burst into the infirmary. O'Brien was trapped as Odo came up behind him, so he did the first
thing that came to mind: he took a hostage. He pulled Dax to her feet and put a blade on his
gauntlet under her chin.
"Stay back!" he threatened. Sisko and Odo stopped. O'Brien took a few steps back towards
the bio-bed Bashir was lying on and Sisko took a few steps forward.
"Chief," Sisko said slowly, "you don't know what you're doing."
"I said stay back!" O'Brien yelled, and to prove he meant what he said, he slowly pulled
his blade across her cheek, drawing blood. Sisko did what he was told. O'Brien quickly reached
over to the computer console and tapped a sequence of keys that released Dr. Bashir from the
force field. He sat up and put on his mask that was sitting on a scanning platform. The armor
appeared around him again and he pulled out the third mask he had recently completed, then put
it on Commander Dax's face. Her arms and legs stiffened slightly, then she fell limp to the
deck, hitting the table she had been working on to build the electromagnetic pulse generator.
Fortunately, though it came very close, it didn't fall to the deck or it would have broken into
a hundred pieces. Chief O'Brien picked her up and carried her out into the corridor as Bashir
fought off Captain Sisko. They ran off back towards the promenade and Sisko watched as he
clutched a sprained ankle with his back against a bulkhead. Odo slowly came over to help him
back into the infirmary and he sat on a bio-bed.
"Was there any damage to the electromagnetic generator?" Sisko asked Odo.
"I don't think so," Odo said as he picked up the device. "Yes, it's still functional."
"I think Dax was trying to find the right frequency to use when she was interrupted."
"Let's test it and see if she was correct," Odo said.
He aimed the device at a special sensory port next to the computer console and activated
it. A fuzzy, light blue beam hit the target and the resulting data appeared on the screen. The
two men studied it carefully.
"She did it," Odo said. "This frequency should have the maximum disrupting effect on the
alien energy. The computer confirms it."
"Good," sighed Sisko. "Can you handle another encounter with them? You don't look so
good."
"I don't know if I'll be able to do much more fighting, but I can activate the device."
"Get Major Kira to help you. She's back in Ops. I'll see if I can help you get a bigger
security team together."
"Right," Odo said as he turned to the door and jogged off to the nearest turbolift.
Sisko then jogged off into the opposite direction to the security office to see how many
personnel he could find. They finally had something they could use to fight back without killing
them. All the security team had to do was provide a distraction.
Major Kira, Captain Sisko, and Constable Odo met in a corridor in the promenade, Kira
carrying a phaser, and talked quietly as they waited for Chief O'Brien, Doctor Bashir, and
Commander Dax to show up. Kira had checked their movements on the internal sensors before she
left Ops to assist Odo, so she knew where they were going. She also brought a tricorder with her
to keep track of them.
"How far away are they?" Sisko whispered.
"About three-hundred meters," she replied. "We should get into our positions."
"All right, everyone know what to do?" Sisko asked. "Half of the team will come in
behind them to cut off their escape and the other half will block them in while Odo activates
the electromagnetic generator. Make sure you get the masks off their faces so we can get them
again or we'll just have to do this thing over again. Let's do it right the first time. Places
everyone."
They all hid behind corners or inside adjoining corridors and waited for the three
armored figures to walk by. Kira, monitoring her tricorder, motioned for them to get ready.
Finally, Sisko spied them rounding a corner in the corridor, cautiously looking for an
unexpected attack, and Dax fully conscious. Sisko signaled for the first half of the team to
fall back so they wouldn't be seen and they waited for them to get closer. The three continued
forward, and, when they got to the distance of about ten meters, he yelled, "Now!" and they all
surrounded the armored figures.
Constable Odo revealed himself with Captain Sisko and aimed the device at the three
startled crewman. Doctor Bashir was the first to be hit and fell to the deck in agony. Major
Kira reached over and ripped the mask off his face as Odo shot him again, freeing him from the
alien's control. He fell partially unconscious and Kira heard him moan as Commander Dax lashed
out at her in retaliation, causing Kira to fall backward. The mask flew out of her hand and
Sisko caught it in mid-air.
Chief O'Brien charged Odo and was shot square in the chest. He fell to the deck and Odo
bent over to try to grab the mask off his face, but Commander Dax got there first and snatched
it up. Odo shot the chief, who then slumped back into the same partially conscious state, and
chased after the commander as Major Kira followed close behind. Dax plowed straight through the
security team blocking her and they almost gave Odo enough of a chance to shoot her, but he
missed as she turned a corner. Major Kira cut across an adjoining corridor to cut her off and
shoulder-tackled her to the deck. Constable Odo fired the generator and shot Dax, ran over to
help Kira as she took the mask off Dax's face, then shot her again. The Major picked up the
other mask as well and helped Odo carry the semi-conscious Dax back to Captain Sisko and the
others, who were regaining their senses. As soon as they put her down, the two masks in Kira's
hands cracked and fell apart through her fingers.
"What happened?" asked Sisko.
"We chased Commander Dax through several corridors before I cut her off and Odo got her
with the electromagnetic generator," Kira said.
"Yes," he said. "I meant the masks."
"Oh," she said while still trying to catch her breath. "I don't know what happened to
them. They just... broke. Sorry, Sir."
At that moment, Dr. Bashir regained consciousness, rolled over, and sat up. "What's
going on?" he asked groggily as Chief O'Brien sat up as well.
"Thank God," Sisko said to them. "You're back."
"Back?" asked the chief. "From where?"
"Remember this?" Sisko said as he held up the remaining mask. Dr. Bashir visibly shrunk
away from it, and both had slightly terrified looks on their faces.
"I thought th-that thing was going to kill me," Bashir stuttered.
"When you were wearing it, I thought you were going to kill me," O'Brien said to Bashir.
"Neither of you remember what you did when you were wearing the masks?" Sisko inquired.
They both looked at him and said, "No," simultaneously. Then, Commander Dax woke up and
sat upright, rubbing her head as well.
"What hit me?" she said.
"Major Kira, that's what," replied Sisko. "You were wearing a mask, too. Dr. Bashir got
you in the infirmary."
"I did?" Bashir asked, confused.
"Yes," Sisko said. "You and the chief were both wearing the masks before you--"
He stopped in mid-sentence as the mask he was holding began to glow again and he
immediately dropped it, then backed off. The chief and doctor backed off as well as Odo came
forward with the electromagnetic generator. The alien energy within the mask lifted it into the
air and it coalesced into a shadow-like figure that defracted some of the light that passed
through it's vaguely humanoid shape. It took a couple of steps toward Bashir, who almost tripped
over his own feet in fright, and Odo stepped in front of the doctor protectively.
"Stay where you are," Odo demanded as he aimed his weapon at the figure. It stopped.
Sisko stepped forward. "Who are you?"
"I am a soldier of the Zaskian homeworld," it said. "I must return to reclaim my honor."
"Zaskian?" Dax said. "I've heard of them. They're from the Gamma Quadrant. Captain, no
one knows anything about them because they were isolationists, except that they made beautiful
artwork, all now destroyed, and that they have been an extinct race for almost six centuries."
"That is impossible," it said. "We are a superior race."
"It's been over a millennia," Sisko said. "A lot can happen in that amount of time."
"I had no idea I was dormant for that long," it said. "You beings are strange. I had
thought you to be mere animals when I first encountered your kind."
"Why did you continue to hurt us then after you realized we weren't?" Sisko asked.
"My honor and my need to return home were more important to me," it explained. "We could
not take the chance your kind would not willingly assist in our journey, so I used my skills as
a soldier to try to take control of this station in order to use your technology. But now, I am
alone and, if your words are true, my people are gone. Before, we were desperate, but we are not
a violent people. We have laws against what we have done to you in our culture and I really am
truly sorry for the pain we have caused you. I will not lie when I say I will welcome my
punishment; kill me."
"Among most of the societies that have joined the Federation of Planets, capital
punishment is not a reasonable option when other alternatives remain," Sisko said. "I believe
this as well and I have no intention of killing you. I would rather see you make up for your
mistakes by helping us repair the damage you caused."
"I no longer have a home now," it said. "I am alone."
"Have hope," Sisko said. "You'll find another among people who would be your friends."
"You put those other two masks together before," O'Brien said. "Can't you do it again
and bring your friends back?"
"Yes," it said, "but they do not have the ability to manifest themselves as I do. They
did not live long enough to learn. They would need bodies and this is still very difficult for
me."
"If I allow a sort of compromise," Sisko asked, "will you agree to help repair the
damage you caused?"
"Yes, my subordinates will follow me," the figure said. "What sort of compromise did you
mean?"
"Since you have agreed," Sisko said, "I will volunteer my own body for you."
"No, Captain," Bashir interrupted. "I'll do it. I believe him."
"Are you sure, Doctor?" asked Sisko, concerned.
"Yes," he replied, excited and yet also shaking in his boots at the same time. "This is
a truly unique experience and hopefully, this time will be better now that I know he's not going
to hurt anyone. Besides, he can't hurt us any more now that we have the generator, can he?"
"I'll volunteer, too," Chief O'Brien said, stepping forward.
"I guess I will, too," said Commander Dax, feeling a surge of bravery.
"Just give us a little time to recuperate," Bashir said.
"Of course," the figure said. "I will wait."
The figure disappeared and the mask fell to the floor.
"Are you ready, Doctor?" Sisko asked.
"As ready as I'll ever be, I suppose," Bashir said as he picked up the mask and just
looked at it for a moment. It started to glow slightly, and Dr. Bashir stiffened, but made
himself relax. He slowly put the mask on his face and at first, nothing seemed to happen. He
stood up to face Captain Sisko and his eyes were glowing a soft red. He removed the mask and
picked up a bag with the pieces of the other two masks in it.
"Shall I start putting them back together?" he asked.
"Go ahead," Sisko said. "I'm going to leave the chief and commander here with a couple
of security guards, just as a precaution."
"Of course, I understand," Bashir said, then sat down and emptied the contents of the
bag onto the table.
Sisko left for Ops and, after a few minutes of watching Bashir put together the
fragments, Chief O'Brien frowned in utter confusion.
"How do you do that?" he asked. "I still don't get it."
Bashir smiled and said, "The energy I have control over lets me alter the molecular
structure of the material these masks are made of. I can form it into any shape I wish."
"That's amazing," Lt. Commander Dax said. "Tell me, can Dr. Bashir hear or see anything
in that state?"
"Right now, yes," he explained. "Before, I would not allow him to interface with my
actions, but now we are one, the same being. We both see and hear everything."
"Darn," said the chief. Bashir gave him a strange, surprised look, and then O'Brien
said, "I was just kidding," with a smile.
Bashir smiled and fit in the last piece to complete the first mask, then started on the
second one. "I understand now why you must be nervous about this, and I can assure you, it will
be a much more pleasant and interesting experience, and that's coming from both of us," Bashir
said. "You will remember everything this time and we will not force you to do anything you would
be uncomfortable with."
"Good," said Chief O'Brien sarcastically. "That makes me feel a whole lot better."
Commander Dax giggled and said, "Me, too."
The next few minutes passed in silence as Dr. Bashir finished the second mask and slid
both of them down the table to the chief and Commander Dax.
"Well," said the chief as he picked up the mask and put it on. "Here goes."
Dax did the same and Odo, who was one of the security officers observing, walked up to
the table and said, "Shall we visit the promenade first?" as the two took off their masks.
After several hours of fixing up phaser blasts on the promenade, they decided to take a
break and go to Quark's Bar. As usual, the bar was filled with the ramblings of both successful
and unsuccessful gamblers, traders, and regulars, all looking for strong drinks and
opportunities for profit. The three sat down at a table, Odo keeping an eye on things from the
entrance, and a cheery Quark came over to take their order.
"Good afternoon," he said. "What can I get you? The usuals?"
"Yes, thank you," Bashir said.
Quark was about to turn around to get their drinks when their masks sitting on the table
caught his eye.
"Ooooh, interesting," Quark said as he leaned over to inspect the unusual objects, then
whispered to Bashir, "How much would I have to pay to get some of those? I smell a profit."
"They're not for sale, Quark," O'Brien said firmly.
"Can't I just replicate one?" he whined. "What's the big deal?"
"So, you want to know what the big deal is?" Bashir said as he stood, picked up his
mask, and put it on. "Watch and you'll see."
The mask glowed again and the armor appeared around him. Quark's eyes bulged and he
shrieked as his knees gave out in fear. His eyes rolled back into his head and he fainted in
front of at least ten of his customers who were watching. Two of his employees then came over
and dragged him back behind his bar, out of sight, then started fanning him. Captain Sisko had
just joined Odo at the door. He saw what happened and they came over to the table to talk to the
three.
"What happened here?" Sisko asked.
"I don't know," said Bashir. "He just fainted."
Odo had a smug and amused look on his face and Sisko smiled. "I think you'd better take
that off before you scare anyone else."
"Of course," he said as he and Sisko sat down and the armor disappeared. Everyone
giggled to themselves at Quark's reaction to Dr. Bashir's armor.
"I don't think I've seen anything so satisfyingly amusing for quite a while," Odo said.
"Do you mind if I ask you a few questions about yourselves?" Sisko asked them, changing
the subject.
"Go ahead," Dax said.
"How did you get in that tomb on Bajor?"
"Well," Bashir began, "we were piloting our ship in the Gamma Quadrant, this is when we
still had our own bodies, when we encountered the wormhole for the first time..."
"Commander," said the helm officer, "the neutrino particles are originating from
directly in front of us."
"Approach it slowly," the commander said, "and scan it with the new sensor array."
"Scanning," said another bridge officer. "Sir, there's some kind of reaction going on
inside it. We're being pulled in by some kind of gravitational field!"
The ship shook and an opening appeared in the fabric of space in front of it, drawing it
inside.
"Activate the shields!" yelled the commander. "Full reverse thrust!"
"We're still being pulled in!" yelled the navigator.
"The wormhole engulfed the ship and it disappeared from the Gamma Quadrant, then the
other end of the wormhole appeared in the Alpha Quadrant near a planet with primitive life on it
and three moons. The trip disrupted the power systems, engines, sensors, and life-support
systems of the ship and the commander had no idea where they were, but knew they would have to
abandon ship.
"Are any of the new arrays or other equipment salvageable?" he asked one of his crewman
on the bridge.
"No," he replied. "I'm afraid not. Everything is severely damaged, most beyond repair."
"All right," the commander said, disappointed. "Abandon ship."
There were twenty-seven among his crew, now some were probably dead, and ten escape pods
that would fit three people each. There wouldn't be any difficulties getting anyone away safely.
The commander, and the two other senior officers on the ship as helm officer and the other at
the science station, took a pod together and headed for the M-class planet nearby, then signaled
for the others to follow.
"Which of them were you? Did you have names?" Sisko asked Bashir.
"I am, or was, the commander, he," he said pointing to the chief, "was the navigator,
and she was the science officer. We are not designated by names, but by a status of a certain
lineage indicated by the designs of our masks."
"Interesting," Sisko commented. "Please continue."
Their escape pod was about to enter a descent into the planet's atmosphere when a meteor
shower struck. They were lucky as they were partially protected by the atmosphere, but were
still heavily damaged. They watched helplessly as all nine of the other pods were obliterated by
the barrage of meteors. The thrusters were only partially operative, so they were forced to
crash land on the surface. Soon after the pod stopped, it exploded, killing all three occupants,
but spared their masks with little damage.
"You see," Bashir explained, "when we die with our masks on, our life forces become a
part of it and we sleep until someone comes along and wishes to know of our experiences, unless,
of course, they are not at peace with their current place. So, if they are as experienced with
the power as I am, they can manifest themselves as I did to change or affect something going on
around them. My comrades here were still fairly young when they died, but we all had our masks
on. It's too bad none of the others made it."
"So, all of the others besides the three of you were destroyed," Sisko said. "Go on."
On the surface, after the fire burnt itself out, a small group of primitive humanoids,
who called themselves Bajorans, found the smoking heap of metal that had fallen from the sky and
decided to see if had been sent to them by their gods, the Prophets. As they rooted around the
twisted pieces of metal, one of the men found a mask, covered in ash from the fire, but intact.
Two more men found two other masks, of different designs but made of the same material as the
first, but nothing else of any value or significance. They would never have guessed it had been
a spacecraft. The three men packed up their belongings and traveled west toward a town until the
sun sank behind the far mountains, then made camp. Two of the men fell asleep rather quickly,
but one was just too curious about where the strange masks they found came from. He pulled out
the mask from amidst his belongings to look at it. It was strange-looking, but beautiful, at the
same time. He laid down to go to sleep, even though he didn't think he'd be able to, and looked
up at the stars. To him, they almost looked brighter than usual. A tiny movement off to his
right caught his eye. He sat up and looked around to find nothing, though he was sure he had
seen something. He laid back down again, thinking it must have been an animal, and made himself
relax. Suddenly, something was covering his face and he began to panic as he tried to get it
off, but it wouldn't let go. He couldn't scream and the world slowly disappeared from around him
into a jet-black oblivion.
He was no longer a Bajoran. He was wearing the mask, and now he was the commander of his
two subordinates that now only existed inside their own masks as well. He took the other masks
and put them on the faces of the other two sleeping men. His comrades were now resting in their
new bodies, and he decided he should do the same, so he laid down, fell into an unnatural sleep,
and dreamed of an alien world with alien animals like the one he had taken, and also of his own
home which was so far away, and since the wormhole was probably gone by then, he may never see
it again.
The next morning, the three traveled to a nearby town and arrived by noon. People who
walked by them gave them strange looks because they were wearing their masks which were of a
totally different design than anything any of them had seen before. They went to a blacksmith's
shop, locked him in his tool shed after knocking him out, then began examining his tools for
anything they might be able to use to build a communications device in order to contact a search
party or something of the sort that may have heard their automatic distress call and came to
help them. The blacksmith's tools were extremely primitive and would be of almost no use to them
except for the fact that they were used to make shields, hand-held weapons, and other tools. The
science officer recognized them as being signs of the beginnings of a developing civilization.
If this was true, were the acts of taking over the bodies of those people they had encountered
justified? It was unethical to violate any of their own people in such a manner, and they were
still reluctant to think of the Bajorans as any more than animals. Still, the concept that a
race so different could possess the ability to become a civilization such as themselves, made
them think hard about the ethics of their actions, but they finally decided that it was more
important for them to return home; their hosts would remember nothing. They took some of the
blacksmith's more intricate tools and stuffed them in their pockets, then left the small
structure to seek out another source of tools or means to build a communications device. They
were about to enter the structure designated to a craftsman of fine jewelry when they heard
frantic shouting behind them. Everyone's attention, including theirs, was drawn to a raving man
in the center of the group of structures.
"Those men locked me in my shed and robbed me!" he yelled as he pointed a shaky finger
at the three masked men. Four big, burly men put down their wares and offered to help the
blacksmith recover his property. They took a moment to contemplate whether to fight or run, and
ultimately decided that the construction of a communications device was imperative. They moved
closer together, back to back, and took defensive positions.
The crowd watched in astonishment as three sets of armor unlike anything they had ever
seen appeared around the men. The four opposing Bajoran men stopped and gaped at the awesome
display, then, regaining their composure, charged the three armored men. A couple of them were
slashed by blades protruding from different parts of the armor, and, when it was obvious to all
in the crowd that the Bajoran men would most likely lose, some screamed in fright and started
running for their lives as others, seeking punishment for the crime, joined the four men in their fight.
After several minutes of struggling, the crowd had managed to pin down the armored men,
but with heavy casualties. Out of the sixteen people who had joined the fight, three were dead
and nine were injured, two of which were hurt enough that they would probably die. The
townspeople had no choice but to leave them pinned underneath some heavy farm equipment while
they arranged a town meeting. In this meeting, several people said they recognized the men
wearing the masks, but none had any idea why they behaved so strangely and with such strength and demonic powers.
The Vedek of their area, their local spiritual leader, was present and suggested the
possibility that they were possessed by demons and had come to destroy them. Everyone seemed to
agree that it was the only reasonable explanation. The men underneath the masks were good
Bajorans.
For the next three days, the townspeople tried everything at their disposal to exorcise
the demonic presence from the three men, but were unsuccessful. After another exhausting town
meeting, it was decided that it was unethical to kill the men, but the only alternative was to
imprison them forever. They dug several stone chambers deep under the ground and three small
compartments in the farthest chamber to contain the poor, possessed souls. The three were
dragged in, two of them kicking and screaming, but the other was completely placid and
depressed. They all knew what was going to happen to them and the two struggled so fiercely, the
Bajorans were forced to bash them both over the head with clubs, cracking their masks in several
places and knocking them unconscious so they could seal them in without opposition. The older,
more experienced, commander knew better than to risk destruction by struggling, so he told
himself that someday he would be freed from his prison to continue his journey back home, and he
let them lead him to the last compartment where they sealed him inside.
He fell willingly into a blissful, black, sleep-like state where he repented to the
Bajoran who's life he had now destroyed in order to save his own. He could hear the other
Bajorans sealing the boulder into place outside and he breathed deeply while he still could. He
could feel the fright of his comrades, but could do nothing about it. The oxygen content of the
air inside was approaching zero and he heard his gasping cease as death claimed his body for the
second time. As the Bajoran's body functions shut down one by one, he sighed one last time, then
his life force relapsed back into dormancy inside his mask.
"Well," Bashir said, "that's the story."
"It must have been terrible," Sisko said.
"Yes," O'Brien said. "I still cringe just thinking about it."
"What will you do now?" asked Sisko.
"I don't know," Bashir replied. "Our homeworld is gone and we have nowhere to go. I
suppose some of your scientists would be glad to welcome us."
"As an object of study," O'Brien remarked.
"We're dead," Dax said. "Where could we go where people would welcome us into their
bodies?"
"I have an idea," Sisko said. "What did you do before you became soldiers?"
"We were all artists, sculptors, and architects," Bashir answered. "As a matter of fact,
she was a healer."
"I have an anthropologist friend who teaches at Starfleet Academy who would welcome your
expertise," explained Sisko. "Some of the cadets might even volunteer to let you use your skills
to learn from you. I know it's not the same as being among your own people, but we are willing
to treat you with the same respect we would accord anyone else. After all, you could say this is
a kind of first contact. We are always willing to learn from other species, no matter how
different from them we are."
"That sounds like a wonderful idea," Dax said. "It's not home, but these people seem
very nice."
"Maybe we could learn to like it," O'Brien said.
"I think that's a definite possibility," Sisko said, smiling. There was a loud crash
behind him and he turned around to see a very pale Quark scolding a waiter for dropping a drink
all over himself, even after being tripped by Quark himself. Dr. Bashir got up and approached
the raging Ferengi.
"Why are you yelling at him?" he demanded. "You're the one who tripped him."
Quark turned angrily to face him, not realizing who it was, and was about to give him a
piece of his mind when he looked up to Dr. Bashir's tan face and red eyes. Quark fainted, again,
and fell backward. The others, including Sisko, got up to join him and laughed cheerily as, once
again, the waiter put down his tray to drag Quark back behind the bar.
"I'll arrange it all for you," Sisko said. "Now, it's getting late. I'll escort you back
to your quarters and then I suggest you all get some rest. You really look like you could use
it."
Sisko, Bashir, O'Brien, and Dax left the bar and the promenade with a sense of hope they
hadn't felt in a long time. They would look forward to Starfleet Academy as an opportunity to
coexist with others and once again work on the arts they had come to miss so much. Who knew what
friends they would make. Perhaps someday, they would meet others of their own kind. Until then,
they would be happy doing what they originally did best: creating works of art. They would have
lots of stories to tell. Maybe they would draw a big audience. And maybe, the audience would
have stories to tell them as well. Home really is where the heart is and Sisko had a feeling
they would become well adjusted. Maybe he would visit them sometime, but first things first. His
friend at the academy was going to be very excited.
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