But what is he thinking about?Sisko wondered as Jake absentmindedly rubbed his chin. Never an early riser, this one, not unless he has something on his mind.Sisko amended the thought. Or when he’s working on a story, but then it’s not getting up early; he just doesn’t sleep.But Jake had not been working on a story or, near as his father could tell, much of anything since Rebecca was born. Considering it now, he realized that Jake had been looking restless the past couple of days. Thinking about the past, he concluded. And thinking about the future. Thinking about anywhere but here.

“Hey, Jake-o,” Sisko called. “Aren’t your feet going to get soaked?”

When he heard his old nickname, Jake’s shoulders slowly stirred and he shook off his reverie. Turning toward his father, he smiled the familiar old smile, the happy grin of open, unaffected pleasure, though Sisko felt a peculiar nostalgia creep over him seeing the smile through the beard. It was like when Jake was ten and had just discovered stage makeup. Marveling that he had not thought about it in over ten years, Sisko remembered that summer—the pancake makeup, the spirit gum, the hair appliances, Jennifer chasing a half-denuded werewolf out of their bathroom. How many bathroom towels had the boy ruined?

“Hey, Dad,” Jake responded, though not too loud. He looked down at his drenched boots, then lifted each one off the ground in turn. “Too late.”

“Then no reason to hurry in,” Sisko said. “Unless you want to help me make breakfast.”

Jake’s eyebrows lifted. “French toast?”

“Do we have sourdough?”

“I made a loaf yesterday.”

Sisko beamed. “I brought you up right, didn’t I?”

Jake shrugged, and Sisko saw the smile turn down a little at the corners. Then, in a moment, it was gone and Jake replied, “Yep, you did.” Looking again into the south, Jake pointed out across the rolling hills and asked, “Do you know what’s in that direction?”

Sisko considered. He knew the names of all the major land-masses on Bajor—the general composition of each continent and their positions relative to each other and the oceans. He imagined he knew as much as any average high-school student, which was to say a lot about a few places and a very little about many others. He answered, “Valley plains and forest spreading out on either side of the Yolja for hundreds of kilometers, and then the sea.”

“Anything on the coasts?”

“The usual sort of thing: fishing towns, light industry, ocean farming. No big cities due south of here, though. Why?”

“Just wondering,” Jake said as he stared into the rising sun, then added, “Mrs. O’Brien tried to teach us about Bajor’s geography, but I don’t think too much of it stuck.”

“Not everything does, son. It’s not like we lived here.”

Nodding, Jake said, “But we do now. You do now. I guess I just feel like I’m a guest here. It’s not my home. I guess I always thought that we’d end up back on Earth again.”

Smiling, finally understanding, Sisko replied, “Well, that’s up to you, isn’t it?”

“Yeah. Guess it is.”

Sisko felt a chill creep up through his feet. It was too cool to be outside without shoes, and his robe whipped around his knees in the morning breeze. “I’m going to go start breakfast. You want coffee or tea?”

Still staring into the purple and gold sky, Jake said, “I’ll wipe my feet before I come in, Dad.”

Shaking his head, Sisko ducked back inside.

Kasidy

Ten minutes later, just as the coffee was beginning to perk and the tea water was coming to a boil, Kasidy came into the kitchen, face scrubbed, hair held back with a headband, and baby Rebecca over her shoulder. After kissing her husband, she spun around and showed baby to daddy, who stopped sawing at the loaf of sourdough long enough to say, “Hi, sweetie,” and wipe baby’s spit-up-covered chin with the towel he had over his shoulder.

Kasidy lowered the baby into the crook of her left arm, found herself a teabag, and dropped it in the mug Sisko had left on the counter next to the hot water. “Where’s Jake?” Kasidy asked as she poured. He’s not out on the couch.”

“Outside.”

Kasidy pulled aside the curtain over the kitchen window and peered out. “What’s he doing?”

Sisko sawed off another slice of bread. “Trying to figure out how he’s going to tell us he’s leaving.”

“Ben?”

Happily engaged with his egg beating, he didn’t look up. “Hmm?” he asked.

Kasidy said, “I’m going to go talk to him.”

“Then I won’t make your toast yet,” he said. Looking up at Rebecca in her bouncy chair, sucking her fist contentedly, he grinned and said in the high, excited tones the baby responded to, “I’ll talk to Miss Rebecca. Yes, I will. We’re going to have a nice chat.”

Surprised, she asked. “Aren’t you going to tell me to leave him alone? No ‘He’ll come in when he’s ready’?”

Placing the bowl of batter in the refrigerator, Ben shook his head. “Why would I say that? You’re his friend. More, you’re family. If I were him, I’d want you to come out.”

“Oh,” she said, not knowing what else to say.

“Not what you were expecting?” he asked as he stooped to lift Rebecca out of her chair.

“Not exactly. Are you sure the Prophets didn’t do anything to you while you were gone?”

Sisko made a “Why would I tell you the answer to that?” face, then offered a finger to Rebecca that the baby promptly grasped with raptorlike force and pulled toward her mouth.

“She shouldn’t be sucking on your dirty fingers, Ben,” Kasidy said.

“Babies,” said the Old Hand at Parenting, “do whatever they want to do and nobody can tell them they shouldn’t.”

The sun was high enough in the sky that the dew was rapidly drying and the kujaflies were beginning to spiral up in loose clouds from the grass. Another half-hour and it would be unbearably warm out in the sun. Jake had his head tilted back, eyes shaded, intent on something high up. Stepping out from under the arbor, Kasidy saw what he was looking at: a black shape drifting in slow, lazy circles. Kasidy’s pilot instincts kicked in and she judged that the shape might be as high up as a thousand meters and must have a huge wingspan—at least four meters and maybe as much as six.

“Wow” was all she could think of to say.

“Yep,” Jake answered.

“Glider?” she asked.

“Nope,” Jake said. “It was a lot lower a few minutes ago and I saw its wings pump. Whatever it is, it’s alive.”

“I repeat,” Kasidy said. “Wow. I’ve never seen anything like that around here. Do you have any idea what it is?”

“None,” Jake said. Then he added a bit testily, “I’m not the one who lives here, though.”

“Less than a year,” she said, trying not to sound too defensive. “And I’ve been too busy to do much bird watching.”

Jake looked down at her, hand still shading his eyes, and said, “Sorry, Kas. I didn’t mean it that way.”

“ ’Sokay, Jake.” She took a half-step closer to him, then took his arm loosely in her hands to steady herself.

“They used to have avians like that in South America,” Jake said. “On Earth.”

“I know where South America is.”

“Right.” Again, he sounded apologetic, but only barely. “Anyway, one was called Ornithochirus.Huge wingspan. It lived most of its life in the air because it could barely move on land. It had to live near cliffs because the only way it could get off the ground was by jumping off something high.”

“A pterosaur?”

“Yeah.” He looked down at her. “How do you know about them?”