“Yes, sir. I’m on my way.”

After returning with the team to the surface, Dax wasted no time ordering the Rio Grande’s computer to begin preflight preparations and to beam everyone in the party aboard the runabout. Seated beside her in the cockpit, Julian silently stared out at the icy, twilit wasteland of Minos Korva’s south pole as Dax operated the transporter controls, sending Vlu, Ro, and Taran’atar directly to the nearby Federation settlement.

She turned her seat toward him. “Your turn, Julian. It’s time I got under way to Trill.”

He nodded absently, then rose slowly from the copilot’s chair. But instead of walking aft toward the runabout’s transporter pad, he doffed his heavy field jacket and tossed it beside hers on one of the other cockpit seats.

“I’m going with you,” he said simply.

Ezri shook her head gently. “I’m not sure that’s such a good idea, Julian. This is Trill business, and—”

“—and Trill are notoriously reticent about letting non-Trill in on their affairs, yes, I know.” Though he had interrupted her, he continued to smile ingratiatingly as he resumed his place beside her in the copilot’s chair.

“I appreciate the offer, Julian,” she said, looking directly into his dark eyes. “But I really think this is something I ought to handle on my own.”

“And I think you’re going to need my help. Or at least my moral support. You told me yourself how guilty you feel over Audrid’s cover-up of the discovery of that first parasite more than a century ago. And I’ve seen with my own eyes how traumatic this entire business has been for you. That parasite nest must have dredged up some painful memories.” He paused. “Memories of the parasite that killed Audrid’s husband, unless I’m terribly mistaken.”

Suddenly feeling defensive, Dax crossed her arms across her chest and leaned back in the pilot’s seat. She knew it was useless to deny his assertions; he’d been at Jadzia’s side five years earlier when Dax’s equally painful suppressed memories of an ill-fated joining with the psychotic killer Joran Belar had resurfaced. Julian obviously knew the signs of mnemonic trauma. Still, she didn’t have to like it.

“Well. This is all very ‘who counsels the counselor?’ isn’t it?” she said.

“You’re not a counselor anymore, remember?”

A deep frown sprang to her brow unbidden. “And you never were one. I love you, Julian, but I think you’re straying a bit too far from your specialty.”

He leaned toward her, taking her hand between both of his in an obvious effort to soothe her. Looking into his chocolate-brown eyes as his hands warmed hers, she had to concede that it was working.

“Listen, Ezri, I’m not trying to beat up on you. And I can give you three very solid, rational reasons why I should accompany you to Trill.”

For the first time in what seemed like hours, she returned his easy smile. “All right. Let’s hear them.”

He began ticking off points on his long surgeon’s fingers. “One: We haven’t spent nearly enough time alone together since before this whole parasite business erupted. Two: I have entirely legitimate medical concerns about your current emotional state after observing your behavior here on Minos Korva.”

Dax opened her mouth to protest, but he rode right over her words. “And three: I outrank you, my darling.” His smile became an impish grin as he gestured toward the lieutenant commander’s pips, two gold and one black, that adorned his collar.

Anger and affection wrestled for a protracted moment before calling it a draw. She disengaged her hand from his, turned her seat forward, and quickly entered several commands into the instrument panel. The Rio Granderose swiftly into the gray Minos Korvan sky.

Julian grinned.

“You win, Julian. But just remember: I’m the only one here dressed in command red. And Kira placed responsibility for this mission with me,not you. So that extra pip on your collar doesn’t mean all that much at the moment.”

He dipped his head toward her in a fair approximation of a courtly bow. “I remain, as ever, your obedient servant.”

As the runabout went into warp, Dax couldn’t help but wonder if Julian would actually live up to that promise.

4

Julian Bashir was gratified that Ezri had relented and allowed him to accompany her on what otherwise would have been a solitary voyage to Trill. After having seen her obvious emotional distress back in the Minos Korvan parasite nest, he felt it prudent to keep an eye on her. Besides that, he simply wanted to spend some time alone with her, though he worried that he might have pushed a bit too hard in his efforts at persuasion.

Seated beside her in the copilot’s seat, he watched Ezri as she flew the runabout and occasionally monitored its instruments. She spent most of her time looking silently through the transparent aluminum windows at the ever-changing star field, her gaze directed straight ahead.

Ezri had been uncharacteristically quiet and standoffish ever since the Rio Grandehad gone to warp nearly an hour earlier. A glance at the instrument panel told him that she was pushing the runabout’s engines nearly to their limit. At this pace, we’ll reach Trill in about three standard days,he thought after performing a quick mental calculation.

It was easy to guess that much of her current mood stemmed from the parasite crisis and the fallout it was continuing to generate back on Trill. Or perhaps my twisting her arm until she agreed to bring me along has something to do with it.Either way, he knew that if she didn’t unburden herself about it soon, the next three days would pass very slowly indeed.

Whatever Ezri might think of his counseling abilities, he knew when it was prudent to back off. And whenever stimulating conversation wasn’t an option, there was always the pursuit of knowledge for its own sake. Excusing himself, he quietly rose from his seat, fetched a few items from the pockets of his field jacket, then continued past the runabout’s dual transporter pad on his way to the aft compartment. The sliding hatch hissed shut behind him, and he was alone.

Smiling to himself, he held up the small ceramic shard that Ezri had found in the parasite nest on Minos Korva. He studied the palm-size fragment carefully, turning it over and over in his hands as he wondered how and why it had come to be where it was.

Taking a seat before the computer console on the runabout’s starboard side, he said, “Computer, show me the xenoanthropology database.”

Dax heaved a relieved sigh a few moments after Julian left the cockpit. While she had to admit it was nice having the man she loved at her side during difficult times, she was less than eager to share this burden with him. She knew he couldn’t be terribly surprised by her reticence. She was a Trill, after all, and he was already well acquainted with her people’s penchant for keeping secrets, thanks to his role in discovering the Symbiosis Commission’s systematic suppression of the fact that nearly half of her world’s humanoid population were suitable for joining with the symbionts, not the one-tenth of one percent that was still the common belief.

Maybe it’s that very secrecy that’s at the root of all of our current troubles,she thought.

Putting aside her glum musings, she decided to take advantage of this solitary time in the cockpit to try to get a handle on the situation back on the Trill homeworld. Her hands moved with deliberation across the instrument panel, activating the runabout’s subspace transceiver. She quickly keyed a personal subspace reception code within the Trill Defense Ministry.