“I had a dinosaur phase when I was a kid.”

“Really? Me, too. How old were you?”

Kasidy thought back. “Five. Maybe six. I liked reading about them.”

“I memorized all the names,” Jake said.

Shaking her head, Kasidy said, “Didn’t do that, but I liked looking at holos of them.”

“Did they have dinosaurs on Cestus III? Something like them?”

They had talked about Kasidy’s homeworld on several occasions, but always in the context of her growing up there and leaving it. “There were prehistoric creatures, sure, but nothing really big before humans starting settling there.”

Jake lowered his gaze and stared out again toward the horizon. “How about here on Bajor? Did they have anything like dinosaurs?”

Kasidy had to admit she had no idea. “We should check. I imagine that’s exactly the kind of thing Rebecca is going to be asking me in a few years. Or, more likely, telling me about.” The idea made her smile. “I guess she’ll be just like me—reading about Earth and learning about dinosaurs and wondering what it would be like to find some kind of gigantic bone buried in the sand.”

Jake didn’t reply for several seconds, and then he said simply, “I feel like I don’t know anything about anything.”

Ah,Kasidy thought. Here we are then.Aloud, she said, “What do you mean? It’s always seemed to me that you know a lot of things. A lot more than I did at your age.”

Scowling, Jake said, “I know a lot of facts. Sometimes it feels like I don’t even know many of those.” Pointing out to the south, he asked, “Do you know what’s out there in that direction?”

Again Kasidy admitted that she did not. Geography had never been her strong suit, and these days she was not very concerned about anything farther away than the horizon.

“Neither do I,” Jake said, the self-disgust making his voice tight. “I have no idea what’s out there.” He tapped the side of his head and added, “And no idea what’s in here, either.”

Kasidy sensed how delicate the situation was and did not know whether she should err on the side of sympathy or truth. “You’ll figure it out,” she said trying to find a compromise. “You’re a writer. That’s your job.”

“Is it?” Jake asked. “And am I? I’m not too sure.”

This is worse than I thought.Kasidy decided that sympathy was no longer useful. “Stop it, Jacob Sisko,” she said sharply. “I’m not going to listen to you indulge in self-pity. You know you’re a writer. If you’re having trouble with something right now…”

“But that’s just it!” he exclaimed. “I’m not doing anything right now!” Looking down at her, eyes wide, he said, “I can’t seem to think of anything I want to say right now. Everything seems either too big or too trivial. I can’t make sense of it, can’t get any perspective!”

“Oh, sweetheart,” Kasidy said, trying to soothe her friend, “that will come. A lot has been happening the past year: The end of the war, your father disappearing, your adventures in the Gamma Quadrant, finding Opaka and the Eav-oq, your father coming home, Rebecca being born. That’s a lot for anyone, let alone for someone…” She bit her tongue, hoping he would let the sentence pass.

He didn’t. “Someone?” he asked. “Someone what? Someone who?”

She gritted her teeth. There was no escaping it now. “I was going to say, ‘Someone so young.’ But that’s not what I meant. I just meant…you’ve had an extraordinary life, Jake. All kinds of things have happened to the people around you….” Wincing, she realized her mistake too late.

“Exactly!” He shouted, arms flung wide. “To people around me! But never to me!”

“Now, don’t do that, Jake,” Kasidy protested. “You had your adventures on the Even Odds.Don’t make it sound like you’re nothing but a bystander. You’ve seen more in your short span of years than most people see in a lifetime.”

“Then why can’t I write about any of it?!”

Frustrated, Kasidy decided it was time for direct action. Balling up her fist, she punched Jake in the arm as hard as she could.

“Ow!” he shouted. “What was that for?”

“Did it hurt?”

“Of course it hurt,” Jake said, rubbing his shoulder. “You’ve got bony knuckles. That’s going to leave a mark.”

“And you know why it hurt?” Kasidy asked, but didn’t wait for an answer. She was angry. These Sisko men,she thought. So brilliant and so dense.“I’ll tell you why: Direct stimulus. You get a shot in the arm and you feel it right away. One shot and you feel it very cleanly and clearly. Now, let’s talk about everything that’s been happening to you lately. Let’s say that they’re the same as getting one shot after another after another. Understand?”

Jake took a half-step away. “Maybe. You’re not going to hit me again, are you?”

“No,” Kasidy said, her tone softening. “But if I did, what would that be like? Would you necessarily feel each punch if I got you three or four more times?” She held up her clenched fist. “With my bony knuckles.”

Wincing, Jake admitted, “Probably not. My arm would go numb pretty fast.”

“You see my point now, don’t you?”

Jake continued to rub his arm, but his gaze had drifted off to the horizon again. “I think so,” he said. Then, with more conviction, “Yeah, I think I do.”

He keeps looking out at the horizon.Grabbing his arm and gently rubbing it, she remarked, “Your father said you were thinking of heading out.”

Annoyance flickered across Jake’s face. “Did he?” he asked. “I didn’t say anything to him. Well, what if I did? Where would I go? Back to Earth to see Grandpa? He was just here and, frankly, I don’t feel like cleaning oysters. Back to the station? I’m not sure I have a life there, either.”

“No, silly,” Kasidy said cajolingly. “Not anywhere out there. Not on a ship or using the transporter. Use your feet. Pick a direction and start walking.” She felt him stand a little taller, as if he would be able to bring the horizon closer. Kasidy felt something in his shoulders relax.

“The house feels too small for all of us,” Jake said, his voice cracking a little.

Whatever it was that was coming up out of him was costing him. Good,Kasidy thought. It should.“You understand,” she said aloud, “that it doesn’t feel that way to us. Only to you. And it should, too. Young men aren’t supposed to like living with their parents.”

Jake tore his eyes away from the horizon and looked down at her. The tightness around his mouth disappeared and was replaced by a slow smile. There it is. The smile. The old Jake.“How did you ever get to be so smart?” he asked.

Kasidy rolled her eyes and grinned. “ ‘Always hang around people smarter than you are and you’re bound to learn things.’ One of the few pieces of good advice my father ever gave me.”

He opened his mouth to reply, but before he could say a word, Kasidy saw Jake flinch and hunch his shoulders. Ducking his head, he lifted his arm protectively, as if shielding her from a blow. Looking up and around his arm, she realized that they had both forgotten about the hovering black shape. Somehow, instinctively, Jake had sensed a change in its disposition. The creature, whatever it was, had tipped its wings back along the sides of its body and was now streaking toward them, growing larger by the second. A tiny ground-living mammalian voice from the back of her mind chittered, Crouch down low and hope it doesn’t see you!,but Kasidy tried to ignore it. The sane, sensible part of her, the part that had accepted the fact that she was married (for better or worse) to the Emissary, was sighing, Okay, now what?Abruptly, the creature changed trajectory and winged away from them, slowly losing shape and form until it became a dark blot against the brilliant morning blue, then vanished from sight.

“Why don’t you find out where it’s going?” Kasidy said thoughtfully after a long moment.