The sunrise took Bashir's breath away, figuratively thinking. Since he didn't actually have to breathe. It was stunningly beautiful. The sky, being in general red, was more yellow at the horizon, only turning more orange as the sun rose above that horizon's edge and bright red as it climbed even higher.

It was much easier going since they could now see. They moved away from the track but kept it in sight. It might be strange to see two Honored running in the fields. But no train had yet come by.

So they kept running and found themselves in another forest. It wasn't so thick that they couldn't look left and spot the track beyond the trees. As Bashir looked up into the red, yellow, and orange leaves of the trees, he noted they were moving despite the lack of wind this morning.

Kira altered her trajectory to run closer to him. "Darglin," she whispered, and he remembered the bright feathers she'd brought him. These were the birds that had saved the Gidari people from the Dominion's plague. Now that he knew what to look for, he could see them. They were well camouflaged among the leaves, but now and then he spotted a black eye or a reddish-brown beak. Kira had said they were large, as large as a man. She had also said they were predatory.

"Will they attack?" he whispered back.

"Did when we took a sample."

They were coming to a clearing, and, as they left the trees and their birds, he could see a flat plane with bushes and other small animals. They were dark with leathery skin and stood on their hind legs at about waist height.

"Oh, no," Kira said, still whispering. But one of the little creatures must have heard her or maybe it was just the sight of two people in purple running into their field. "Don't look at them." Kira turned her face up, trying to avoid them.

The creatures did have sharp teeth, but Bashir could see they were gorging on the bushes. Two of them, however, had taken to flight, running parallel to him and Kira. Well, not quite parallel. They were getting closer and it finally dawned on him why Kira didn't want to see them. These were the midulkas. By the time they'd crossed the valley, the two creatures were behind them. Bashir thought for sure they'd lose interest. There was nothing to mimic except running after all.

He tried to ignore them and kept running. But soon he noted a sudden darkness pass over him, and then there was a shadow on the ground, the shadow of the bird. He hoped it was a small one, not one of the darglin. He looked around, trying to spot it. It was high in the sky but Nailati had been right. It looked like fire flying on wings.

As he watched, the darglin dove, and it seemed to wheel around until it was diving right toward him.

Kira must have seen it, too. She had her finrittor out. It was coming fast and he was running to meet it. It was huge and its talons were the size of his own foot. As soon as it got to within a meter, he drove for the ground. He could feel the brush of the talons across his back and then he heard a squeak. He flipped to his back and saw the darglin beating its wings as it lifted the flailing midulka into the sky. Kira was on the ground, too. She pushed herself up and starting running again. He did the same. A glance behind him showed the other midulka was gone as well. Either there had been another bird he hadn't seen or it had run off. He realized he hadn't heard the darglin he'd seen. Perhaps there had been another.

That darglin had been large enough to carry off a smaller person, maybe even Kira. Did they hunt Gidari? Bashir now preferred running in the trees. It would be harder, perhaps for the birds to navigate around the trunks and branches with their three-meter wings. But there were no trees in their immediate vicinity.

They'd been running for nearly thirteen hours and still there had been no train since the one they'd seen in the evening. He wished he'd paid better attention to just how far they'd gone from Nardinosti the day they arrived. He hoped they'd reach it before the twenty-six-hour mark. They needed at least a day to reach DS Nine, and already, he had less than two days left.

For a moment, as the turbolift lifted her head above the floor of Ops, Ezri had expected to see Kira at the Ops table. By the time it had risen all the way, that fleeting moment was replaced with the harsh memory that her friend was dead. And it was Major Jaresh who had asked her to come up.

He smiled when he saw her, and she managed an upturn of her lips in response. She didn't feel much like smiling. It hadn't even been a week yet. "How can I help, Major?"

"The captain has left it to me to open negotiations on the arrangements for the meeting between the Dominion and the Gidari," the young man said. "The Dominion is sending one of their Vorta. She should be here in two hours."

That didn't surprise her, even though the meeting was many hours away still. "They're crafty but generally easy to talk to," Ezri told him. "And you're not brokering a treaty, just arrangements to satisfy both parties while maintaining security on the station."

He nodded. "I'm actually looking forward to meeting her for that reason. But I don't know anything about the Gidari. I was told you had some experience with them."

A memory floated to the surface. Cold darkness in her lab and a crick in her neck. Then a blue glow as Gidari transported in. She backed toward the door. "What do you want?" Jadzia's voice was calm, but Ezri could feel her fear.

A woman's voice: "Quiet or we'll make you quiet." A smooth cloth brushed against her. There was a hiss and then she grew heavy. A blue-lit rod swept the lab as the woman found Bashir's tricorder and the samples they'd been studying and destroyed each one in a red beam of light. Another blue glow took the Gidari away, and then Jadzia realized she was only weak and not in pain. She let her fear go and slowly, and with great effort, stood, releasing the door manually. Then she crawled her way toward Sickbay until Kira had found her.

Ezri raised her eyebrows as she took a seat. "My previous host did." Really the captain had had more interactions with them. But he wasn't asking for a story. He wanted a profile, a behavioral analysis. "We don't know much about the Gidari, and that's the way they like it. They're often mistaken for xenophobes, but they're really highly ethnocentric. They hold the Gidari over all other species, and that includes you. They do what they want, when they want. Fortunately for most of the galaxy they want to trade and keep to themselves."

Jaresh nodded. "So they'll be harder to satisfy?"

Ezri thought about that. "Maybe. Though they called the meeting, not the Dominion. That might be something to balance out their arrogance. A little. Look, in the end, they can beam on or off the station at will, regardless of the state of our shields. If I were you, I'd think getting the Vorta to agree to the Gidari's desired arrangements will be harder, as you won't get far challenging the Gidari."

"Right." He pressed a few controls and brought up a transmission's text. "The Gidari representative is one Harglin Nastroff. I checked the name but only found a reference to a young murder victim from several years ago."

Ezri's breath caught at the name. Jadzia had known about Harglin Nastroff's murder. The first for a serial killer that plagued the station while they were also dealing with Bajoran terrorists. But Julian had seen the Gidari, unhooded, draw a cloned child from the body of Ensign Justin Tsingras. The less people who know that story, the better. Though Julian wouldn't have to face the consequences now if the Gidari should find out. Not anymore. "Could be a relative," she suggested. "Good luck."

"Thank you for your insight, Lieutenant," Jaresh offered.

"You're welcome." She slid off the stool and headed toward the turbolift again. As she descended, she brought Jadzia's memories of that time back to mind. It was possible that some of Tsingras's DNA went into that clone. That could be why he was engaged to be liaison here. Knowing that there had been no justice for Tsingras's murder in that ritual, or even a body for his family to bury, had been hard. And now the Gidari had robbed her of Julian's body. What could they have wanted with it? Or Kira's?

The train had finally passed by, heading toward Nardinosti. But only once. And it hadn't made any stops as far as they could see. It was also colored gold. The sunlight made it look more like rose gold. Every car was the same color. Julian didn't know if that was the default color or if it was a status he hadn't been exposed to yet. The train had sped by so quickly that they hadn't been able to get half-way to the station before it was gone again. The station itself was deserted.

But from the eastern edge of the station, Julian glimpsed the next. And he thought he maybe recognized it from the station outside Nardinosti. The station where Tarlingen had led them onto the train that took them to Nodgarin. They were almost there. He estimated it would take approximately four hours at their average speed. And then they'd have to navigate the gates of the port city.

Bashir pointed out the far-away station to Kira. "I can barely see a glint of it," she told him, "but I'll take your word for it. We can make it."

They stayed near the track this time, trusting that there wouldn't be another train to run them over from behind. And that no one would pay attention to their passing. There was also less wildlife near the tracks. The occasional haftha gave it a go, but Kira and Bashir swatted them off each other and kept running.

Physically, Bashir found it all rather fascinating. He was running at top speed, sustaining it for hours as the kilometers rushed by beneath his feet. He should have been winded and parched for water. His feet should hurt from the constant pounding on the turf. His legs should be spasming from the strain.

But none of that was true. If there hadn't been a expiration date on the glowing liquid in his veins, he could have worn out his boots before he ever tired of running.

Kira still had fully working lungs and heart, but she was breathing evenly as she kept pace with him. He never heard her gasp or gulp for air. "I see it now," she said, as calmly as if she'd been standing still. "You're sure it's same one?"

"More sure now," he replied. "The train is stopped there. And I can just make out the gates."

The station, when they neared it in just under four hours, was similarly deserted. The train was likewise empty. Either it had arrived empty, or its passengers had passed through the gates into Nardinosti.

The sky was darkening now, and they were faced with the biggest challenge since they'd left the caves. They could not pass through the gates as Gidari did. The Gidari had to linger, to have their bodies altered to breathe different air. Bashir and Kira were already able to breath that air. If they lingered, they'd be changed. And since their bodies were not Gidari bodies, Bashir couldn't predict what changes would result. They had to pass through without stopping, which would give them away to the guards as aliens.

"Maybe they shut down the port, too," Kira suggested. "Maybe there are no guards during this time of mourning or transition."

"It's possible," Bashir agreed. "But someone is in there. Why else would the train have come?"

"Well, we can't get back to DS Nine without getting through the gates."

The gold color of the train had gotten him thinking. The only gold he'd seen on Gidar was in the throne room or on the leader. But it was too early for Tarlingen--Nailati--to be up and about. She didn't just have to assimilate the symbiont, she had to grow in the process. Growing that much in such a short amount of time had to be incredibly painful. He found it hard to believe she'd make this journey to the port city in her condition. And if she did, why? Was it that important to stop their Honored from escaping?"

"Maybe we shouldn't risk the closest gates," he suggested. "We could run a bit north or south and come in where we wouldn't be expected."

Kira nodded. "South. It's closer to the ships."

They circled the city to the south for fifteen minutes. Then they each stood in front of a gate. "On three," Kira ordered. "One, two, three."

He stepped through, expecting to be thrown to the ground by a guard. But there were none. Kira was right beside him. They'd made it. Bashir looked around in the bright, white light.

Kira began to cough. Hard. She dropped to her knees. Bashir pulled out his tricorder and scanned her. "You'll be alright," he assured her. The coughing subsided and she caught her breath. "You were just expelling the Gidari air. You were breathing it in all along."

"You weren't?" she croaked.

Bashir did have a bit of a tickle in his throat. "Not as much."

"We're going to get that fixed," she told him, standing again. She cleared her throat and looked around. "Where are the ships?"

She was right. Not only were there no guards at the gates, but there was only one ship docked. And Bashir recognized it as the Gindarin or one of the same class.

"Honored."

They spun around in unison. A lone figure in black had appeared. A Liytner. This time a male. He bowed in the familiar pose.

Kira and Bashir looked at each other and then repeated the bow. They were out of options.

The Liytner stood. "I am Harglin Nastroff, the Elder, your liaison. The Leader has requested your presence. Please follow me."

He walked past them, toward the gaping loading port of the Gindarin.

Benjamin Sisko rolled the baseball over and over in his hands as Jaresh laid out the plans for the meeting. The Gidari had proven predictably stubborn in their demands. "The entire Promenade?" His patience was stretching to the breaking point. But not at Jaresh. Sisko had dealt with the Gidari before.

"The upper deck, though they did stipulate that all civilians be evacuated to the Habitat Ring. We are allowed a security presence. The size of which they left to our discretion."

"How very generous." Sisko frowned. He wouldn't want civilians around anyway, not with Gidari and Jem'Hadar. "And the Dominion?"

Jaresh sighed visibly. "The Vorta was more pleasant but just as adamant. If the Gidari were going to surround the Promenade, the Jem'Hadar would, too."

That would be a lot of Jem'Hadar. Sisko held his breath to keep his temper. He squeezed the ball until it hurt.

Jaresh went on. "They'll dock on opposite pylons, one high and one low. All non-security personnel were to be removed from their paths to the Promenade. Senior staff--no more than six people--are allowed to be present at the conference site, here."

Jaresh pointed to one spot on a diagram of the Promenade. Just across from the upper level of Quark's bar. "This is where the Founder and the Gidari representative will speak."

"And all those Gidari and Jem'Hadar will leave after?" Sisko was already planning the security sweep that would follow the Dominion out.

"Yes, sir," Jaresh replied. "The Gidari liaison assured me it wouldn't even last half a glif. Those I'm not sure how long a glif is."

Sisko sighed and put the ball back in its spot on the desk. "Let's hope it's short."

Bashir and Kira were placed in the same room they had awoken in nearly a week before. Or all such rooms looked alike. Bashir felt the ship take off. They were leaving Gidar. But going where? He checked the tricorder. Twenty-six hours and twenty minutes. He would have made it. They both would have.

Kira was pacing. "The whole planet closed down for the transition. That explains the empty stations, the lack of ships."

"Except this one," Julian added.

"And the train brought her here? Why? She can't have changed yet."

"You did say the captain is her brother."

"Right. So he's trusted. This has to be something important. But what?"

"Maybe they'll attack the Dominion in retaliation." That seemed a likely option.

She paused her steps and turned toward him. "Just one ship?"

Julian shrugged. "One ship might be enough. We don't know what the Gidari are capable of. Even now. For all we know, they only have one ship."

Kira resumed her steps. "Why do they need us?"

Bashir didn't have a response to that. Why indeed? He'd fulfilled his purpose and, as his helper, so had she. They were supposed to be off to the clearing in the woods by the lake.

The door opened. Nastroff, flanked by two of the clergy, entered. The priestesses each carried a folded purple cloak. "Your robes are soiled from your journey. Please change. We will return in five minutes, as you count time. Then you will go before the Leader."

They took the offered robes but waited until they were alone to change. "Well," Bashir noted, "we just might get some answers."

Kira started an inventory as soon as she had the new cloak on. "Make sure they've got everything." She took the PADD from her dirty cloak and tucked it into the new. Bashir wasn't sure what all had been in his previous cloak. He watched Kira to see if she found something amiss.

They had just gotten the new claoks settled when the door opened again. Nastroff was alone this time. "Please follow."

As he led them down passages and around corners, Julian half-wished Nastroff would remove his hood. He wanted to ask him if he remembered Justin Tsingras, if he felt human at all. But he kept those thoughts to himself. Tarlingen had said he was Gidari. She probably hadn't meant half.

They stopped beside a tall, gold and black door. Nastroff turned to face them. "You go before the Leader. All must remain covered. When in the Chamber, you must remain silent. Answer if you are spoken to, but be brief and respectful. You must march silently and place your hands--"

Bashir held up a hand to stop him. "We remember. Life and death reside together in the chamber."

Nastroff stood to one side. Bashir hoped Kira remembered Tarlingen's teachings from their first meeting with the leader. They both stood five feet from the door. Bashir waited until the door was fully open, then snapped his arms up, crossing his thumbs beneath the sleeves of his cloak. He saw Kira do the same in his periphery. Together they pranced into the chamber.

Some of the same weapons were festooned on the walls of this smaller chamber. A red carpet led, not to a throne on high, but to an oversized bed at eye level. Bashir stopped at the same distance Tarlingen had from the throne and began to bow. Kira was right in synch with his movements. They ended in the Gidari equivalent of parade rest and dropped their heads.

"Look at us, Healer." The voice was changing. Some words sounded like Tarlingen, others like Nailati. They rose and fell in pitch, which told him she was still in transition. He raised his head. He was right.

She was reclining on a bed with the head raised, like a chaise lounge. But the bed was enormous and she was not yet as tall as her predecessor. Her breathing was forced and she was tensed in pain.

And he just had to risk it. "May I give you something for the pain?"

"No," she snapped. "My Trill host suffered as did my first Gidari host. We are no better than they." She hissed and shifted her position slightly. He hated to see her like this but he knew better than to argue.

"I regret we cannot give you the Leaving we promised. Though it shall still be painless. We have need of you yet. Both of you."

"We have little time left," Kira said.

"Your new Purpose will be fulfilled in that time. When we reach our destination, you will follow Harglin Nastroff's instructions. This day you will stand with me in front of our Enemy."

"Will you have completed your change?" Bashir asked.

"Not quite. But we shall not portray any weakness before the Enemy. Neither will you. We will be changed enough."

She was already taller than Tarlingen had been, but not yet as tall as the previous leader. He and Kira had roughly a day. How much taller would this new Nailati be by then?

"Go now," she told them. "Return to the chamber from which you awoke as Honored. Wait for Nastroff to return to you. Follow his orders. You may bow but we will not be stepping away."

Bashir and Kira repeated the bow and waited for her cue to rise. She didn't keep them long. "Arise and go."

The two of them turned about face and pranced back out the door. Nastroff was there but he didn't move or speak until the door was completely closed. "I shall show you the way."

Likewise, Kira and Bashir didn't speak until they were alone in their room.

"So they are going to confront the Dominion," Kira said, throwing off her hood.

Bashir lifted his as well. "Looks that way."

She went to a corner and dropped to the floor. This time, there were no crates to sit on. "We could have made it."

Bashir sighed and sat down beside her. "We tried. But there were no other ships."

"She didn't so much as scold us for running away. What do you make of that?"

Bashir wasn't sure what he made of that. Had Tarlingen or Nailati expected them to run? Nastroff had been respectful, even deferential, back in Nardinosti. Was it just esteem for their status as Honored? Maybe they couldn't be scolded?

"Do you feel any different?"

Bashir hadn't expected that question. "Disappointed," he replied. "But if you mean physically, no. I could run another hundred kilometers. But we still have just under a day. I'll probably feel it by then."

Kira took his hand and squeezed. "At least it won't hurt, right?"

Bashir squeezed back. "I don't think she'd lie about that."

In the hours since their meeting with the new leader--Tarlingen before, now Nailati--they had considered leaving their room. Their status may have afforded them the freedom to do so. But every time they'd been out, the walls and corridors had been non-descript and monotone. And at least one wall was a holographic door. They weren't sure where they should try to go and didn't think they'd find their way even if they had been.

There was really nothing interesting to keep them busy. The medical supplies that had been retrieved from the runabout and stashed against the walls the first time they'd occupied this room were back in the palace at Nodgarin. There were no consoles, no viewports. In fact, there wasn't any furniture of any sort. Just four gray walls and one door.

Bashir found he wasn't scared, though, now that he only had a few hours left. It wasn't like waiting for an execution. It was more like getting a terminal diagnosis. Kira considered that when he told her. "Yeah, I can see that. The executions already happened. I still wish it wasn't going to happen at all."

To while away the hours, they'd taken turns telling each other stories about their childhoods. Bashir's stories were a bit more cheerful than Kira's. Now they just shared whatever thought came to mind, just to have some conversation. Like whether Gidari quarters were anymore decorated than their plain room. Kira had posed that the leader's were and surely the captain's.

Death didn't leave Julian's mind long though. He'd been so close several times before. Well, more than a few. And, of course, he actually had died in the runabout. Had it been a foregone conclusion? He cheated it and cheated it but was it going to catch up eventually? He'd cheated it this time in spectacular fashion. But it was definitely catching up unless by some miracle the Gidari dropped them off at DS Nine or some other Federation outpost.

"How much longer?" Kira asked again. Death didn't leave her mind long either.

"Four hours or so," Bashir replied without annoyance. He even wished he could sleep. A nap would save him from an hour or two of boredom and the slow crawl of time. But he wasn't the least bit tired.

The first thing they'd done was to use the PADD to record messages to their loved ones on the off chance that the PADD would find its way back to Federation territory. Kira had written to Odo and Sisko, and even the ministry. Bashir had written to Ezri, his parents, O'Brien, Garak and even his friend Felix back on Earth.

They left vague their last week and how it had come to be. If the Gidari read the PADD and discovered details of their planet or culture, the messages would have even less chance of reaching their recipients. The Gidari had revived them temporarily to assist with an illness. Kira had left out her adventures foraging for specimens, and Bashir had not shared that the leader of the Gidari was joined with a Trill symbiont or how that had come to pass. It made for awkward transitions.

Three hours later, Harglin Nastroff came to the door. Kira stood easily enough, but Bashir found his energy had started to decrease. He had to push against the wall for the leverage to rise to his feet.

"Forgive, Honored," Nastroff said. "Your time is short so we will dispense with the bowing and other ceremonial actions. We have arrived. You will fulfill your Purpose very soon. Cover, please, and follow me."

"I didn't even feel us docking," Kira remarked. "How do you feel Julian?"

"A bit tired," Bashir admitted. He pulled his hood over his head and met Nastroff at the door. Nastroff led them down one corridor to another filled with Gidari crewmen. He pushed past them, all the way to the front of the line where priestesses stood in their red robes. This time they weren't facing a holographic door but a more recognizable docking port. They weren't on a planet, then, but a station or another ship. Wherever it was, the Dominion was near. Nailati had said they'd stand with her front of their enemy this same day.