N'ivryn paced her quarters like a probe trapped in a subspace eddy, bouncing between the same coordinates with frenetic, restless urgency. Garak, ever calm and composed, watched her with an inscrutable expression, waiting for her to explain why she'd dragged him up here.
"I've blown it, Garak. I've completely blown it." N'iv blurted out.
Garak raised an eyebrow, his interest piqued. "My dear, surely it can't be as dire as all that. What exactly has happened?"
N'iv stopped pacing. "The Andorians are sending delegates to the station. They're supposedly here to assist with data retrieval on my ship."
"Will they find anything?" Garak already knew the answer, but he didn't need her to know that.
She massaged the back of her neck, then went to her bag on the small table. She pulled out a few of the data chips so he could see. "I removed them before we docked. I couldn't risk anyone using them to locate Alaris."
"Anything else of interest in these data files? The Andorians must be expecting something if they're coming all the way out here just to get them." Once again, he already knew the answer, but he was curious to know how much of it she would share willingly.
N'iv's hesitated for a split second. Sisko's warning about trusting Garak flashed through her mind leaving a trail of uncertainty. "Just the old logs of the ship before it crashed on our planet. It was generations ago. I can't imagine it's that important, but they sound motivated to get them."
She sunk into a chair, rubbing at her face. "How am I supposed to fool actual Andorians into thinking I'm one of them when I couldn't even fool you?"
"You know," Garak began, "I've actually been quite curious how you managed to pull off this disguise in the first place. From everything you've told me of your people, they don't strike me as the type to have that kind of technology."
"They don't. It was one more thing left behind in the crash." She returned to her bag once more, this time pulling out a handheld device with the hallmarks of Andorian tech two centuries prior. She pressed a few buttons then motioned for Garak to give her his hand.
He hesitated but finally extended his hand. N'iv's fingers wrapped around his wrist as she activated the device, waving it slowly over the back of his knuckles. Slowly, the skin began to change, transforming into the pale blue of an Andorian's.
"It's not a painless process," Garak noted, his voice tight but intrigued.
"Tolerable." N'iv countered. She press a few more buttons and repeated the motion, returning his skin to its usual gray.
"Quite sophisticated for its time."
N'iv switched off the device, satisfied with the demonstration. "Looking like an Andorian isn't the problem. Acting like one is."
"You're still moving about the station freely, so you must've convinced Sisko to let you go. How did you manage that? He doesn't strike me as someone who would let you walk away without getting what he wanted."
N'iv let out a sigh, leaning against the table. "I gave them the identity codes of Pilit Zh'raothoss, the chief medical officer on the Valiant Glory when it crashed." Her voice held a hint of frustration. "I only did it because I figured it would be enough to please Sisko and the others, but I wasn't planning on it holding up against Andorian scrutiny."
Garak folded his arms, studying her. "And now you're worried they'll see right through you."
"They will," she said flatly. " Maybe we should've gone with the time travel excuse after all."
"Trust me, it wouldn't have made things any simpler. Too many paradoxes." Garak walked to the viewport, finding the vastness of space helped him to think. "How much do the Andorians really know about this Pilit?"
N'iv scoffed, throwing her hands up. "How should I know?"
Garak continued to deduce. "If Sisko is indeed in contact with the Andorians and didn't immediately call your bluff, then one of two things must be true. Either the Andorians don't have the necessary information about the ship and its mission, or they're not willing to share it with Starfleet."
"So you think I should keep leaning into it?"
"Given the covert nature of the Valiant Glory's mission, they may not have been regularly transmitting their logs back to Andoria over subspace." He mused on the words, saying them more to himself than to N'iv.
N'iv's brows furrowed. "How does that help me?"
"If it were just about getting closure about a long-since missing crew, the Andorians wouldn't bother sending special delegates. They'd be perfectly fine trusting Starfleet to handle things. No, there must be something on those logs they don't want Starfleet finding, and they're hoping to get to them before Sisko does."
N'iv's expression remained puzzled. "I still don't understand how that helps me."
Garak stepped away from the window. "Even if they do see through your disguise, they'll have little motivation to expose you. They'll know you have the leverage to expose them if they do. If they know you have those logs, and they have something to hide, they'll be forced to play along with your charade."
N'iv looked to the data logs, lying innocently on the table. It was as if she was seeing them for the first time, realizing the full weight of the power they carried. "Then we have to get rid of them—destroy them so no one can ever find them."
"A wise idea, especially given how nosey the Constable can be when he puts his mind to it."
"But how? I can't just throw them away."
He tilted his head to the side as he inspected the data chips from afar. "I may be able to procure you something. A rather nasty little caustic solvent that disintegrates data storage matrices. Inaccessible to Starfleet, of course, but quite available to a simple tailor like myself."
N'iv looked at him with a heavy dose of skepticism. "You know, Sisko said something earlier–he seemed to think you had some sort of questionable past. You wouldn't happen to know what gave him that impression, would you?"
"Oh I couldn't say. People on this station do love to let their imaginations run wild.