Explanations:

Dogs of War (episode): "Kira, Damar, and Garak are ambushed on Cardassia; Quark receives a message from Grand Nagus Zek appointing him the next leader of the Ferengi Alliance." – memory-alpha

Paldar Sector: "The Paldar Sector was the second oldest sector, home to the bureaucrats and civil servants who worked in the Tarlak Sector. It was not uncommon for homes to pass down through families for generations. Residents of this sector included Enabran Tain and Rokan Du'Lam." – memory-beta

Chapter 13

"You're such a - forgive me - a talkative man, and it's so unusual for you to have secrets."
"Well, I must have picked up that habit from you."

- Garak and Bashir in 'Our man Bashir'

(Dogs of War) "I thought you might want to read this," Odo tore Tallara Shran out of her thoughts.

She looked from the stars to the Constable, they were standing at the upper Promenade level and she had been gazing outside, forgetting everything that happened around her. "What is it?" she asked with a smile and took the PADD.

"It's an…incident report, from the shuttle crash of the Andorian transporter on Cardassia IV."

"Why…have you been reading it?"

"I wanted to find out more about you and I also searched the more…informal data."

"What have you found out?" she asked and had a look at the text.

"The cause for the emergency landing was a defect plasma relay just beneath the main support cable of the Warp Core. Only nanograms of matter and antimatter collided before the emergency system went online."

"Too late," she mentioned and remembered her father dying in a Cardassian hospital in her arms.

"The plasma relay shouldn't have been defect."

"But that's what things are."

"Not this one, with the access codes you gave me, I managed to get some important data Section 31 has gathered within the last decades. It seems…as if Sloan was indirectly responsible for the crash."

"What do you mean?" she asked fully surprised. She has, of course, never trusted Sloan, but at least they had developed a healthy working relationship until…she had betrayed him.

"I need to ask you to accompany me to the infirmary. I need to proof a theory," he said and knowing that asking more questions would have no effort, she did so, trying to read the PADD while walking to the lower deck of the Promenades.

=/\=

Garak already had a bad feeling when his molecule structure was reassembled. It took only a second until he heard phaser fire and the unmistakable shouts of Jem'Hadar soldier. He immediately ducked down in cover and so did Kira and Damar. They had come here to meet one of their contacts but something has obviously gone wrong.

"How could they have found them?" Damar asked having already pulled out his gun.

Garak just hoped for that he didn't decide to use it. "Someone must have betrayed them," he whispered back and tried to figure out how many of them were down there.

The smoke was too thick and the only person he could make out was an escaping Cardassian who was hit by a phaser only seconds after he has fled from the war zone. A Jem'Hadar clone stepped over him to make sure that he was dead. "Was it all of them?" the First asked and received positive answers from all sides.

"Seskal, beam us back up," Kira hissed into her communicator. But she got no answer until a beeping voice declared that the other end of the line was gone. The ship was either out of range or destroyed by the enemy. An eye contact with Damar and Garak made clear for her that it was the latter.

She moved forward but Garak held her back. "No," he said fiercely when she didn't understand.

"What are they going to do with the captured ones?" she turned back.

"Either put in cells or killed," Damar summed up the difficult process of deciding which Cardassian was worth an interrogation and which one wasn't.

"But whatever, we can't stay here," she said and crawled out of sight. Damar gave Garak again the knowing look and without a word they followed her to walk down deeper into the cave.

Eventually, they reached the outside again. "Great, and what now?" Damar asked grumpily.

Kira looked around, only now did she notice again the unbearable heat of the planet. She wiped the hand through her hair and tried to figure out where they actually were standing right now. It was somewhere in the mountains, so far was clear but she was also the one who absolutely had no clue.

"We need to go that direction for the capital," Garak suddenly said and pointed toward the horizon. Most of the way seemed to go downward, a mixture of climbing and walking down the mountain and the forest which was starting further down.

"Are you sure?" she wanted to know.

"My dear Colonel, I've spent three years at the Bamarren Institute where they not only teach you how to differentiate a hyper spanner from a phase compensator," he said and led the way.

"I didn't know you were at Bamarren," Damar suddenly said when they had started the climb downward.

Kira was falling a bit behind, she needed time for her own to think about what she was actually doing on this alien planet.

"Oh well, I don't recall it as the most important years of my life," Garak lied with the smile he had learned there.

Damar nodded, "why three years?"

"Hm?"

"I doubt that you weren't fit enough to carry on with the second-year-period."

"My father had other plans for me," Garak answered wondering how much Damar had heard about the Institute as he has been taught at a different one on Cardassia III. "There it is," Garak finally said and pointed at the outlines of the formerly so pretentious capital of the Union.

Now, it seemed to have lost its beauty and you could easily see the marks of the Dominion authorities. "How can we enter? I bet they're still having controls at the entrances," Damar asked when they tried to use the cover of the near-by forest as long as possible.

"I know a complex underground tunnel system which might be of interest," Garak mentioned and headed not straight toward the city but to something that appeared like an old Hebitian ruin aside of the city.

"Is there any place on the planet you don't know?" Damar wondered and followed him.

=/\=

"Just as I thought," Julian Bashir said when he read the results of the testing on the computer screen.

"Doctor?" Odo reminded him that he also wanted to know what happened.

"I told you about the theory I had?"

"Yes."

"But you haven't told me yet," Ensign Shran mentioned and stood up from the bio bed to join them.

"Odo has found the data of manipulating the transporter systems over twenty years ago."

"I know that."

"I also did some research," the changeling said, "your father has been in a high command in the Andorian Imperial Guard, right? He was also involved with genetic research for the battle field. It is quite a small area in which the United Federation allows modifications and with the data you gave me access to, I discovered that he was cooperating with Section 31 who – of course – have no limits concerning ethics, laws and especially not the Federation rules. They supported his project even after he was first reprimanded by Federation scientists that he was probably going too far. You have never found out this, have you?"

"No, I haven't been looking for this."

"Of course not. However, I believe the transporter crash to be no accident. As I said, the project of your father was short to be stopped because they didn't like the way it went. But they haven't even had the time to proof their theories on enough test subjects," Odo continued to explain.

This was when Dr. Bashir intervened, "when Odo told me all this over lunch, I immediately knew that a father like yours, I'm sorry if this sounds rude but all I've heard from him strengthens my opinion that he couldn't be stopped just because the Andorian Science Cooperation didn't allow any test subjects. Section 31 favored his work and…I think they wanted to own the prototype test model on their own…"

It took her a second for her mouth to drop open, "you mean me?" she asked and raised an eyebrow.

Dr. Bashir and Odo nodded in common.

"But why…?" Somehow it all started to make sense to her. "I've always known that Sloan and Pythas Lok were good friends," she muttered.

"Pythas Lok?" Odo wanted to know suspiciously. He never missed the possibility of finding out foreign top secret matters.

"He was an Obsidian Order operative and he adopted me after I lost my parents."

"Sloan knew that the Andorian government had no good relation to the Cardassian Union but he had. So he arranged that you survived and that this agent Lok raised you. He always had an eye on you and how you developed," the doctor said fascinated.

"It all makes sense now. What especially does this kind of genetic enhancement include?"

"Oh, a great variety of things laid out for war and fight. Superior strength, easier fitness, adaption to the environment. Do you mean that you noticed the differences?"

"I know that you're also genetically engineered, doctor. You know what it feels like because you know what has been done to you. But I have wondered of course…I could adapt to the absolute heat on Cardassia, it can be up to plus 60 degrees there, especially in the Mekar Wilderness. Pythas sent me to the Bamarren Institute, its educating is directed to state intelligence operatives. He has visited the school himself…that's where he also met Garak," Shran answered and mentioning the tailor's name, there immediately rang a bell for Odo's always suspicious mind.

He nodded and his eyes showed the working progress which tried to remember every detail about the Cardassian who he always trusted less the more he knew about him.

"But…it means Pythas has lied to me all the time, his kindness, his nice words, all of it has been wrong," she said and tried to imagine that her whole life has been a lie. A game of powerful men trying to get their hands on a weapon, on her.

"Why have you left Cardassia?" Bashir asked curiously. Garak has never told him about his training at the institute.

"The Federation was intervening in the conflicts with Bajor and it was only a matter of time until the Obsidian Order would fall. Lok knew that Tain had deeper plans for me and he successfully smuggled me out into Federation space, using my Andorian origin for hiding me at Starfleet Academy. I always thought he did that because I meant something to him."

"But actually he just wanted to protect a living biological weapon and handed you back to where you originally came from: Section 31," Bashir concluded fascinated.

"Doctor," Odo reminded him on being more carefully because he could see how close Shran was to tears. Not even this genetic mutation could prevent her from feeling betrayed and lonely.

"When have you had first contact with Section 31?" the doctor then asked with more respect.

"Lok had informed me about his contacts of Federation intelligence and about half a year after I started my terms at Starfleet Academy in London I was transferred to San Francisco. There I met with Sloan for the first time and he has immediately had a contract for me. Since then, I was obliged to do their dirty work."

"But secretively, they studied you and your skills to plan what to do with you…especially now when the Dominion war was progressing."

"There is no doubt that they would have used you very soon for defeating the Dominion. This is also the reason why you were first stationed here, nearly at the front line," Odo said and nodded, still trying to understand everything the three of them have just figured out.

"Fascinating," Dr. Bashir said with an amazing look in his eyes and regarded his test subject Ensign Shran who only shook her head in disbelief.

=/\=

"This place hasn't been used for quite a while," Garak said when he picked up an old laser-torch from the bottom and blew away the dust of it. However, it was still working although not spending much light.

"Perhaps it has been forgotten since you were gone," Kira mentioned. "I bet not a lot people know about it."

"At least one person I know should," Garak muttered thinking of his former superior and wiped away more dust from the control panel in the mid of the ruin. "Ah, here it is," he said and typed in his command codes.

Suddenly, the noise of stone scratching stone could hardly be overheard and a small entrance into the ground was formed a few meters ahead of them. "I assume you want me to go first," Garak joked but when none of them moved, he took that as 'yes'.

He sighed and climbed down the stairs into the tunnel. He held his torch high but it seemed that they were alone down here. "These tunnels form part of the canalization and garbage transport system. The Obsidian Order expanded it once for their own purposes," he explained while trying to remember which way lead to a safe point where they could leave the undergrounds again.

After nearly an hour of walk, Garak suddenly stopped and inspected a ladder that was leading back up. Both Kira and Damar have already lost the orientation of where they were and it felt like walking in an infinite circle because all tunnels looked the same and all the garbage and water floating next to them looked identical as well.

"We're there," he explained and wanted to climb up but Damar held him back.

"Where?" he asked and his eyes showed a sudden distrust in everything of his close environment.

This war was not good for the soldier, Garak thought shortly, but then answered, "there is only one person left that I trust. I think we should go and pay her a visit."

"Are you sure, Garak?" Kira asked doubting as well.

"Of course, whatever happens, I'd trust her with my life," he reassured and continued climbing up to the daylight again. It has become evening already and no one noticed them coming out of the underground into a small street of the Paldar Sector. Garak had a quick look around for orientation and then led this little group to a wider street.

People were getting home from work, going out for dinner or meeting friends, it was perfect to walk among the crowd without being identified as an individual. Kira held her head low and has somehow gotten hold on a robe that had hung somewhere to be dried after washing.

Finally, Garak stopped in front of a huge house and his glance met with Damar's. "Just go on," he said and Garak rang the door bell. It took a few seconds but finally the door opened and Garak looked into a familiar face that he hadn't seen for too long.

=/\=

"How much does the Federation know?" Odo asked concerned.

"Nothing."

"Nothing?"

"Not yet," Sisko answered. "I saw no point of telling them yet. We have enough to do these days and a genetically engineered Andorian who works for an Intelligence Service they even deny after its fall is not quite the topic you want to talk about when reporting an Admiral your last incidents."

"I see," Odo said and continued after a demanding look of the Captain. "Ensign Shran gave me her access codes and with some modifications I got hold on some important data. Although we still haven't determined the current residences of the other members of Section 31, my men and I assume that most of them are currently in San Francisco.

"But there is another thing: I have complete insight on the projects of the Andorian Imperial Guard and the Tal Shiar and all still valid access codes regarding the Obsidian Order. Although they do not longer exist, its members have not disappeared over night," he said with a you-know-what-I-mean look.

Sisko nodded and picked up his baseball as he always did when he was nervous. "So what do you want to tell me, Constable?"

"I downloaded all information but I think they could only be useful for ground forces. Even Section 31 had no record about the Dominion fleet."

"You mean Kira and Garak, right?"

"Right."

"We lost our contact with them when they left into Dominion space and even our unofficial contact when I think their ship exploded. Kira, Garak and Damar weren't on it anymore but the chances that they stay undiscovered on Cardassia Prime are low."

"I know, Captain. I just want your permission to try to contact them."

"You have it," Sisko decided quickly and dismissed the Constable. Since they have lost contact to the Colonel and Garak, he was willing to take any chance to win an advantage in this war. It didn't look well for them, the Federation, Klingons and Romulans against the whole Dominion, the Breen and the Cardassian Union.

=/\=

It was nice from Mila to keep them in their cellar and as soon as she brought them a comm unit, Garak started improving its system as it was hardly working. While still switching the receiving channel, he suddenly noticed the use of a rare frequency. It was a subspace transmission with a wavelength used for long-range messaging.

It took him some time to notice that it wasn't audio only and he waved over Kira and Damar to have a look at it. Suddenly, the screen got clear and to his surprise, they had successfully established a communication with Deep Space Nine.

"Odo," Kira said in joy, seeing that her boyfriend has fully recovered.

"We don't have much time," the changeling explained. "The unstable link is about to breakdown soon again. We've had some contacts with the Federation intelligence service Section 31 and due to a traitor we received a lot of information concerning Cardassian security. I'll transmit the data as soon as the visual transmitting is gone. It includes all the data we have about the Dominion government and also the current codes of what is left of the Obsidian Order so that you, Garak, don't need to hack into it. I–"

The screen went black but then there appeared the codes. Damar reacted quickly and put a padd into transmitting range so that all the data was copied on it. "Why the Obsidian Order codes? The agency is gone," he wondered.

"The Obsidian Order used to keep information about everyone and everything that was important for Cardassia. I bet they also stored valuable information about the Dominion and possible weaknesses – especially about the headquarters in the center of the city," the ex-agent explained.

"That means, if we can get hold of the secrets and weaknesses of the headquarters, we might find a way to destroy the central command who demands all forces from just one point. It could end the war!" Kira answered enthusiastically.

"If the timing is right. It needed to be done while the Federation is attacking and could defeat the Jem'Hadar forces or the central command could just rebuild their operational station," Garak reminded her.

There was one worst thing in being a terrorist, a soldier or a spy: waiting. They had nothing to do than to meet with new interested Cardassians who wanted to overthrow the government or support them with weapon. But since their main base was destroyed by Jem'Hadar, it seemed as desperate as never before.

All they could do was lie in the cellar or help Mila cleaning the house and cooking. Garak betted that Kira and Mila got along well, two strong women exchanging their life of fights. Damar however wasn't very used to be patient and so Garak had to calm him down from time to time so that he also liked cleaning up the upper floors to get out of a room with an impatient soldier and an aggressive Bajoran.

It took him a while after he dared to enter Tain's old office. Dust lay everywhere and Mila has been right saying that this place needed a cleaning. Garak sighed and started working. But while scrubbing the old duranium-wooden desk, he wondered how often his father has sat here and approved another killing just by pressing his thumb on a padd. How many people have left their lives because some fat man in his office had said so? How could Tain live with the consequences of his acting? How often he has wondered that and now, he found himself sitting here, wondering how many Cardassians have died through his orders. How much blood was on his hands?

And he knew that he could never clean them again. It wasn't only Romulan ambassadors or Federation cadets, also Cardassians, not only of the rebellion, but what happened to the alcohol-addicted one with whom he used to fulfill a mission? He didn't remember much of it, but it stayed in his mind as the mission with the first contact with humans. How alien they had appeared toward him and how alien they still were.

"Your father often got lost in thoughts sitting there as well," someone suddenly said. Garak turned around and saw Mila standing in the door.

"Well, I think it is the whole house that makes me think," he answered and stood up.

"Where have you been all the time, Elim?"

"Exile," he answered quickly, trying to avoid eye contact with her. He grabbed the piece of tissue again and continued the cleaning.

"Enabran had proposed you to return."

"He has gone mad, battling the Dominion on his own. By the way, I have shortly considered joining him again…like in the old times. But these times are over, Mila, and I think you and I know this best."

Mila shook her hand and laid her hand on his to stop him rubbing the dusty desk. "You don't know how much I missed you," she confessed and stared into her own eyes. How could she permit Tain to send their own son away?

"And you don't know how much I missed Cardassia but right now, I need to save it…or what is left from him," he said and dragged his hand back.

"Have you made friends there, Elim? On the station, I mean."

"Everyone left me there, I was the only Cardassian, I was the alien, mother. You have no idea how that feels. But yes, I have made friends but they could never replace what I have found here."

"What do you mean?" Mila asked confused if this sentence had a deeper meaning to his son.

"Has he never told you why he exiled me?"

"He said it was for your own good. That you have gotten in some trouble here."

"Trouble? That's the right word for it, it's what we always were to him, trouble," he said with a mixed feeling of grief and anger.

"Elim, have you…found someone here?" she asked with hesitation.

Garak didn't reply, his throat was dry as the Mekar Wilderness.

"Why have you never told me?"

"I haven't told anyone. She was married and had a daughter. I felt safe when I told no one. And I was mistaken. He found out," Garak answered and walked over to the door. The last person who should see him cry was his mother.

"What happened to her?"

"I don't know. I left to Terok Nor only little while after I killed her husband. Even if she still lives now, I don't think she wants to see me for what I did," he answered and before Mila could ask any unpleasant questions, he left the office.

He had no idea where he should go. He didn't want to climb back down into the dark cellar where he had to endure the never-ending argument between Kira and Damar. He needed to be on his own and so he walked into the huge library on the second floor. He doubted that Tain has every touched one of these books but he has in his childhood.

Fascinated by the literature about alien interaction, he was bored to death by the stories about glorious battle of the Cardassian Union and the Klingon Empire or the Romulan Star Empire. Only when he became older, did he become interested in politics, although more from the perspective of his father.

And right now, he was doing what he had never considered: Fighting his own government, being the traitor himself. Weakened, he sacked down on the floor and leaned against a heavy bookshelf. Then, when he knew that no one could see him, only then did he begin to cry.

=/\=

It would have been foolish to return home and so she found herself wandering around in the Tarlak sector trying not to be recognized by some Breen, Jem'Hadar or Cardassians. She had thought about believing the rumors and joining the rebels in the main base but she didn't feel safe enough to find it on her own.

So she decided to look out for the few people that she could still trust. Since the death of her husband, she wouldn't count his family as too trusty although they have never found out that she has had a relationship with his murderer. But thinking of Garak again and again, there was only one person who also he could trust here in the city. It had turned night and she felt free to go out from her hiding again.

She has stayed too long in the underworld of the city and she felt sick of the misery around her. She was walking down a Jem'Hadar filled street when she suddenly heard the noise of a huge explosion nearby. She ducked down instinctively and looked around. She ran over to the origin of the sound and stopped when she saw the fire blazing from an administrative building.

Cardassians were lying around everywhere as were Jem'Hadar but as it was night, most of the workers were clones and it was obvious that they have been the main target. While people were still trying to get up, the noise of muttering and whispering got louder until someone screamed "It's Damar!"

More and more people joined and finally also Palandine could see the shillouette near the fire.

"Citizens of Cardassia!" the legend was already screaming toward them. She had a look around and helped up an old woman who couldn't get on her feet on her own.

"Thank you," she whispered and walked past the other ones to have a closer look.

Palandine rather preferred to stay in the background, when the authorities were spotting her here, she wouldn't be so lucky like the first time.

"The Dominion told you that the rebellion has been crushed. What you have seen here today proofs that it is yet another lie!"

The crowd was still moving, people were trying to figure out if this really was their ex-leader, now the famous face of the rebellion, the one who survived any attack and any assassination attempt by the Dominion.

He truly must be the leader to dare going out on the streets and fight with his own hands, to place the bomb by himself and even warning his people about it and not running away cowardly from the Dominion. "Our fight for freedom continues! But it will take place here in the streets, I call on Cardassians everywhere to rise up and join me! If we stand together, nothing can oppose us. Freedom is ours!"

Palandine's breath got faster with every word he shouted. Only weeks ago nothing like this could have happened. The Cardassians have been feared, scared to be arrested and killed by the Dominion. But when they all stood together, nothing could push them down again.

"Freedom!" another voice of the crowd then shouted and Palandine wanted to join the screams but she couldn't. She knew that unmistakable voice, she hasn't heard it for nearly a decade, but here it was again. She looked around and spotted him among the people.

And she didn't doubt that he has been the main reason for the attack, the way Damar looked at him, he must have supported him all the way. And this thought made her smile. Her lover, Garak the exiled, came back to save his home world from an occupation. And here he was, back on his beloved planet, fighting for freedom and struggling for survival and nothing could hold him back.

The chants were repeating themselves and suddenly all people have found back to their words, knowing what they actually wanted. And while all of them were still caged by their enthusiasm and happiness hormones, Damar was stepping down again and Garak pushed him out of the crowd.

Yes, he had come with him, Garak had been bringing back their leader. Palandine left the shouting Cardassians as well to get a better view on Garak until she noticed that she was observed as well. A single, hooded person was standing beside them, watching the actions from distance.

Garak turned around and nodded this person over and Palandine recognized a woman under the robe who joined the two leaving Cardassians. And as much as Palandine still believed in the salvation of Cardassia, she also hoped that this wasn't Garak's girlfriend because it would end up painfully – for her.

=/\=

"Why are you always looking around, Colonel?" Garak asked.

"I don't know. I had the feeling that…there was someone…deciding if to follow us or not."

"Another fan of yours?" Garak asked Damar.

"I think she was rather recognizing you," Kira muttered but shrugged her shoulders when Garak was giving her an asking look. "I don't know, perhaps the time here just made me even more paranoid than I usually am," the Bajoran answered and followed the other two rebels back to Enabran Tain's house.