This time Ryton was taking no chances. He had dialled up new clothes on the replicator; he had emptied his pockets before leaving the security office; he carried no map or flashlight, and he stayed well away from any walls that might contain a shapeshifter. He ducked into the service tunnels as soon as he could, and carefully peered down every intersection for anything remotely out of place. When he was certain he was alone, he went to collect his money.

He had just lifted it out of its hiding place in a little used corner of the docking ring when he felt something slide down his shoulder. He turned around frantically and sure enough, there was Odo, coalescing into his familiar shape. "But how -- " Ryton cut off the question as his exploring fingers found the answer. "My earring!"

Odo actually smiled. He was proud of that bit of fakery.

"Odo!" Ryton stamped his foot in frustration. "That isn't fair! You can't impersonate my earring! It's -- it's not proper. It's a religious thing!"

"I had no idea you were so devout. What do the Prophets have to say about theft, trespass, disobedience..." Odo inquired drily, hefting the sack containing Ryton's loot.

Ryton sighed in defeat. As usual, Odo had the final word. All he'd accomplished was to lose his earring, the last possession which had linked him to his parents. "All right, let's go," he muttered, proffering the scruff of his neck.

To his surprise, Odo paused. "This is yours," he grumbled uncomfortably, holding out Ryton's actual earring.

Ryton stared at him in astonishment and delight. "You kept it?"

"You're the thief, not me," Odo said acidly. "Put it on."

"Thanks, Odo!" Ryton hastily obeyed.

"You're welcome. Now come along." Odo's voice was gruff, but the hand he clamped to Ryton's neck was unusually gentle.

Ryton was spared watching Odo distribute his ill-gotten gains to their rightful owners as he was late for work at Quark's. No sooner had Ryton's seat thudded into the chair in Odo's office than Rom appeared at the door. "Quark sent me to fetch you," he said sullenly.

"Odo? Can I go?"

"Hmm? Yes, go ahead," the Constable muttered distractedly, busy reviewing the original theft reports. "Oh, Rom!" he called after them as an unpleasant thought struck him. "Make sure he arrives there," he ordered, directing a menacing glower at the Ferengi.

Rom cringed and hurried away. Odo was less worried by the possibility of Ryton's escaping from the Ferengi than by Rom's doing something unpleasant to the boy. He knew from past experience that Rom was very possessive of his brother, and it was clear that he loathed Quark's growing friendliness towards Ryton.

Odo inventoried Ryton's stolen goods, compared them to the loss reports, discounted the normal 25 from Quark's claim, and sent the money back to the owners. He'd just finished writing his report when a thought that had been nagging at him finally pushed itself to the fore. Why was Quark so eager for Ryton's presence?

Suspicions afire, Odo stalked towards the bar.

Ryton had just finished serving a table of Dozi when he nearly walked into Odo. "What is it?" he asked in surprise. "I didn't try to run."

Odo glared down at him. "Put it back."

Ryton's eyes grew clear and guileless. "Put what back, Odo? I didn't do anything."

Odo didn't move. "Put it back."

By then Quark had hurried up. "What seems to be the trouble here?"

"I didn't take anything," Ryton protested. "Honestly!"
Quark glanced quickly from one to the other. He was much more skilled at deceiving Odo than was Ryton, and he saw immediately that this was a lost cause. "Of course you did!" He turned on the boy. "And what's more, we all saw you! Now take it back at once!"

Ryton's jaw dropped. "But you said -- "

"None of your excuses!" Quark hastily interrupted, cuffing him on the head and thrusting him towards the Dozi. "Do as you're told! Heh, heh, kids," he offered lamely to Odo.

Surrendering to the inevitable, Ryton obeyed. "Excuse me, sir, is this yours?" Ryton showed one of the Dozi a small silver obelisk.

"Huh!" The Dozi grunted in surprise, grabbed at his pocket, and finding whatever he sought was missing, snatched the object from Ryton.

"Wait!" he called abruptly as the boy turned away, and Ryton gulped. The Dozi were very physical in expressing displeasure.

"Yes, sir?" he squeaked, slowly returning to the table. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Odo start towards them.

"Here." The Dozi held out a Dabo chip.

Incredulous, but nevertheless astute, Ryton pocketed the tip. "Thank you, sir!" Odo relaxed with an ironic glance at Ryton.

He trotted back to Odo and Quark. "I just thought he'd dropped it, Odo," he offered ingenuously. "I wouldn't have kept it or anything."

"Of course not!" Quark was quick to agree. "And the instant the trinket was reported lost, I would have returned the item to its proper owner."

Odo turned a look of such distaste on Quark that he subsided without another murmur. "Ryton will no longer be working here."

"What?" Again both regarded him with dismay, and Odo experienced a sensation of deja vu.

"But he hasn't paid for all the damage he caused!" Quark argued.

"I like it here!" Ryton protested.

"I must have been insane to turn him over to you," Odo snapped at Quark. "Instead of teaching him not to steal, you taught him new ways to do it!"

Quark was highly insulted. "I never steal! I do business!"

"Ferengi business!"

"Yes," Quark admitted complacently. "Excellent Ferengi business."

Odo snorted in exasperation and yanked Ryton away. The boy managed to turn his head just far enough to wave at Quark, who waved back sadly. "Such promise..." he sighed mournfully.

Odo's hearing was excellent, and he jerked Ryton's head around with such force that the boy yipped in protest.

"If I don't work at Quark's, what am I going to do all day?" he protested.

"School."

"School?" Ryton repeated in horror. "With kids?"

"Yes." By then they were at the schoolroom and Ryton had no choice but to enter.

Keiko looked up in some apprehension as she saw Odo enter the room, and her expression didn't lighten when she caught sight of Ryton. "Good afternoon, Odo."

"Mrs.O'Brien. I wondered if you might enroll Ryton in your school."

"Well -- " Keiko darted a nervous glance at the boy, who was presently exchanging glares with Jake. "I doubt Ryton is very interested in our curriculum. It might be difficult to -- er -- encourage his participation."

Odo understood what she was too kind to say. "He won't leave."

"Well, in that case..." Keiko spread her hands. "Ryton, why don't you sit next to -- oh, no, that won't work," she belatedly saw the naked antipathy between Jake and Ryton. "Right next to Nog," she suggested. "He can show you how to use your terminal."

Ryton went obediently to the indicated chair and nodded to Nog, whom he knew from working at the bar. Odo took a seat at the back of the room, and after another moment of confusion, Keiko mentally threw up her hands and returned to the lesson.

The next day, Odo was conspicuously absent, and Keiko was certain her newest pupil would shortly follow suit. And in fact, during arts period, when the rest of the class was busy at the front of the room with Aldebaran light-sculpture, Ryton casually drifted towards the back, where the door was situated.

He was nearly there when the chair next to him shivered. He stopped dead. "Odo?" he whispered. The arm of the chair morphed into a humanoid hand and pointed commandingly towards the others. Ryton slunk back to work.

Next they had Comparative Cultures and the day's topic was Delos III. "Now, the Delosians are a very interesting race," Keiko began. "Can anyone tell me anything about them?"

The class was guiltily silent.

Keiko sighed. "Didn't anyone do the reading I assigned?" In a class of twelve, the lapse wasn't quite as unexpected as it might have been.

"There was a null-grav chainball game last night at the gym," Jake explained sheepishly.

"Can't someone tell me one fact about Delos?"

Ryton glanced around the room, then diffidently stuck up his hand.

"Ryton?" Keiko said encouragingly.

"What do you want to know?" he asked. At the class' giggles, he colored and explained defensively, "I've been to the planet. What do you want to know? Just ask me and I'll tell you."

"What's their favorite food?" Jake asked sarcastically.

"Domestic or imported?" Ryton shot back. "They love Delosian fruitstew, especially if it's accompanied by nectar from Vega."

Jake blinked. His attempt to humiliate Ryton had backfired, and Keiko quickly seized the opportunity. "That's a great idea, Jake. Let's all ask Ryton questions. I've never been there, you see," she explained to Ryton, "so I'm sure you know more than I do. Anything Ryton can't answer, we'll all look up tonight."

Ryton proved quite an authority on the Delosians, and the class' homework was commensurately light. Even Jake regarded him with grudging respect by the end of the day. "That was excellent," Keiko praised Ryton lavishly. "I'm so glad you were here to study with us."

He turned pink. Success at school was not what he'd expected.

"Hey, Ryton, have you ever been to Helfredi?" Nog asked, pulling on his arm. "Jake and I have to do a report on it tomorrow. We could sure use your help."

"Yeah," Ryton admitted slowly. "I went through the system not too long ago. But, do you really want my help?" He looked at Jake.

Jake wrestled with himself for a minute, but his father's teaching as well as his own good nature won out. "Yeah, we do."

Keiko looked on, beaming. Strictly speaking, Jake and Nog should do the work on their own, but some things were important enough to bend the rules.

Much to his own astonishment, Ryton quickly grew to like school even more than working in Quark's bar. And because of classes, homework, and activities with the other kids, his daily escape attempts decreased in number. One day, after almost a week of school, he realized with a start that it had been a day and a half since his last attempt. The rest of the class was busy working on a diorama of the first Vulcan-Human meeting, and it was easy to slip out of the door unobserved. Outside the classroom he paused, waiting for Odo's hand to descend.

Nothing happened. "Odo?" he called softly. "Hey, Odo."

Nothing.

He paused a moment longer, thinking. Then, with a shrug, he retraced his steps and reentered the classroom. When the door had shut, Odo detatched himself from the wall and strolled away, looking almost cheerful.

#

He went to Ops where the mood was anything but.

"Major," Sisko sounded aggrieved, "you said you'd be gone a few days. That was over a week ago! There is work waiting for you here."

"What can I do, Commander?" she replied with a helpless shrug. "The Council keeps changing its mind and endlessly debating the same motions, and they insist I remain until they recess."

"The Rigellian ship departed this morning," Dax told her. "They never went near the decoy, and Odo got on board to make sure they weren't carrying any irridial of their own. They weren't."

Kira's brows knit in confusion. "Well then, who was the irridial for?"

"We have no idea." Sisko was blunt. "But it looks as though we're in for a long wait before finding out. Is the Council planning to meet until then?"

Kira smothered a grin at his waspishness. In truth she found it rather flattering. She briefly considered reminding him that he had said they could get along without her, but decided against it. He looked cranky. "I took the liberty of telling Tearas that a situation had arisen on the station that demanded my personal attention. She promised that I could leave tomorrow, even if the Council hasn't adjourned."

"Oh." Sisko found himself with relatively little to complain about, and Kira grinned at his pensive expression.

"It's not really a fabrication," she added, sobering. "I have some bad news about Ryton; the searches came back negative. Either all of his close relatives were killed by the Cardassians -- which is certainly possible -- or they simply aren't in the databanks. The last reply, from Cardassia, came to Minister Tearas today."

"The Cardassians assisted you? Don't they still want his extradition?"

Kira rolled her eyes. "I can't keep up with all the machinations. No, now they are 'only too happy to help reunite him with his long lost family'." She looked as though she wanted to spit. "They were very apologetic when they didn't have the data for us. Tearas must have made some sort of deal."

Sisko returned to the important issue. "Then you'll return tomorrow? Definitely?"

Kira nodded. "And I may have a passenger," she added. "Someone to help Ryton."

"Excellent. Station out." Sisko was in a much better mood. He'd grown tired of having no one with whom he could argue. O'Brien was too polite, and Dax always won their disagreements. He'd gone so far as to try and engage Bashir in conversation, and had quickly learned why Kira and O'Brien avoided him so diligently. He missed Kira's unorthodox, impulsive outbursts.

"Well, Constable? Has our lamb strayed again?" he inquired. "It sounds as though you'll soon be shut of him."

"He's all right. No longer a problem. Quite well-behaved actually," Odo said gruffly. "What about this irridial?"

O'Brien was staring at Odo in shock -- Ryton well-behaved?? -- so Dax answered his question. "As you heard, not much progress has been made. Our best guess is that the Orionite ship brought it here, and either her captain -- or some unknown person -- brought it onto the station."

Sisko took up the tale. "We still don't know whether the station was the target or only a delivery drop. We'll simply have to monitor the decoy and see who arrives to collect it."

"Commander, a Cardassian ship is approaching. They request permission to dock just long enough to drop off a passenger."

Sisko frowned. "Gul Dukat?"

O'Brien grinned. "No, sir. Garek, the humble 'tailor', back from his vacation."

"They're hardly bothering to keep up the pretense, are they?" Sisko commented.

"It is a civilian ship," O'Brien said, striving to be fair.

Sisko just looked at him, and O'Brien chuckled. "I know, I know. I assume we have no objection?"

"No; go ahead and clear them, Chief."