Stardate 52039.5 "Where are we going?", Reman demanded. Enoz was marching ahead of him, Syxx behind. "Will you at least tell me what's going on?!" "Don't you know, Ferengi?", Syxx muttered, "Aren't you responsible for all this?" "I don't know what's going on!", Reman blurted. Enoz stopped, noticing a rock of exposed latinum nearby. "Syxx, we can find out if Reman's telling the truth." She pointed her phaser to the latinum as Reman rushed to grab the rock. She fired and Reman landed on sizzled dirt. She pointed her phaser at another rock, "Tell us the truth! Lie and the latinum's gone!" "I swear, I crashed!" Enoz waited for a moment, then lowered her phaser. She turned around and started marching. Reman scrambled to his feet to get the other rock but Syxx vaporized it instead. "What was that for?", the Ferengi wailed as he caught up with Enoz. "For being a barber," growled Syxx, "Your profession is offensive to all Bolians." "-and to Oblokoni!", cackled Enoz. Reman merely grunted at their bald humor. "Reman, we're heading this way because we saw a runabout landing." "Someone from the Equinox?", Reman asked. "We're not sure, we're going to find out," Syxx said. They marched on as Syxx brought Reman up to date on their theory about Mason's activities. "Why are you bothering to tell me all this?", Reman asked. "We might need your help," Enoz said. "Phaser or not, how do you plan on convincing me?", Reman laughed. "Not convincing you, bribing you," Syxx said, chuckling. "If we're right, we'll be down here a while. Time for you to collect more latinum." Reman smiled, but his grin disappeared when Enoz stopped. They had marched right into a small village of the inhabitants. Only then did Syxx remember that the locals were similar to Enoz, except in height. The tallest of the bunch dropped his spear and stumbled up to Enoz. He got even shorter dropping to his knees. "Netak dohcoloni?", he muttered. "What did he say?", Reman whispered to Syxx. The engineer shook his head. Even if he had his translator, it wouldn't have mattered either due to the dampening fields or the untranslatable structure of Oblokoni language. "Jen-netaki dohcoloni, meis dohcol," Enoz stated. Syxx and Reman looked at each other in astonishment. "Ajjaxvuoz erotu zajjekay." The villager stood and marched into the foliage. Enoz followed and the other pygmies caught up behind the confused Syxx and Reman. "Enoz, what's going on?", Syxx demanded. "The good chief here asked me if I'm a god. I told him I was only an angel and that I wanted to see his village." Reman and Syxx ignored the nonintelligible conversation until Enoz stopped at the edge of the village while the chief stroked her pants leg. He muttered something which caused a series of strong questions from Enoz. After the exchange, she turned to Syxx and Reman, "The chief's name is Horx. He says this village is a tribe called the Oblok. He also says someone with a uniform like ours is here, someone they've named the Desacolodoni." "Oblok? As in Oblokoni?", Syxx stuttered. "It's possible," Enoz said, "he told me about a myth saying they were from another star and brought here many moons ago." "Coming from him it must have been a short story," muttered Reman. "What about the uniform like yours, the day-sha-colony-whatever? The other isn't identical to yours?" Enoz shook her head, "The way he described it was with more gray, and a belt." "An Admiral?", Syxx guessed, "What would an Admiral be doing here with a runabout?" Horx was approaching with a commbadge. Enoz exchanged a few more words with the chief, then took the badge. "Syxx, Horx says he stole this from the Desacolodoni. I'm going to call Ensign Zenoz in Deflector Control. Maybe he can help us." The Bolian wondered what had driven the inhabitants to steal, but nodded in agreement. She tapped the badge, "Enoz to Ensign Zenoz, are you there my husband?" "Yes, ma'am. I've been trying variations on the dish to override the dampening fields. There's some ancient power grid underneath the surface that manipulates the unique molecular structure of the latinum veins somehow." "Perfect place for Preservers to hide a race," muttered Syxx. "Zenoz," said Enoz, pulling out her tricorder, "tap into my tricorder and scan the DNA of the villagers will you? And then run it through my personal database to see if there are any matches. And don't report any of this to anyone." "Yes, ma'am." The channel fell silent for a moment, as Enoz wondered if her husband had obeyed her as a junior science officer or as a husband. "Got it, En." "Go ahead," she ordered, not wanting to see Syxx's reaction to Zenoz calling her En, a name she usually only allowed Zenoz and Lenoz to use. "Most of the villagers match records of a pygmy tribe that dwelled in the forests of Oblokonia." "Dwelled?" "The last of them disappeared about a millennia ago." Syxx now took his tricorder and began looking into the Equinox sensor data that was sent to them earlier, "That's shortly before the power grid underground started decaying." "Zenoz," Enoz continued, "You said most of the villagers. What about the others?" "Human, commbadge registry says Admiral Winston!" Hearing a murmur in the small crowd, Enoz turned and saw him walking in, as if on cue. "Maintain an open channel, Zen," she said. "Captain Winston, er, Admiral. What are you doing here?" "The subspace reports we've been getting from the Equinox have been disturbing. Starfleet Intelligence also told me they thought a Dominion Founder was here trying to subvert the planet to use against us in the war. I came to investigate." "What does this planet have that the Dominion could use?", Syxx asked. "Lots of latinum to bribe Ferengi," Reman said. Winston nodded, "Just the latinum could buy out the entire Orion Syndicate. That, and the Preserver technology. The only thing that's been hindering me is that these natives don't seem to understand me." "They're from Oblokonia," Enoz said, "Our language is incomprehensible to translators to date." "Ask them if they know anything that might help, will you?", the Admiral asked. "This may take a minute," Enoz turned to Horx and began a conversation. Syxx turned to his old captain, "Admiral, I know there's a war going on, but I must protest the personnel rotation. We've got a bunch of new officers. Some of them are quite capable, but there's a few that are downright incompetent. Everybody seems to have their own side agenda going on. Is there anything you can do?" "Not right now. I'm sorry if constant transfers and promotions due to the war have hurt crew chemistry and trust. I'm sure it's got everyone's heads going in circles." "More like triangles," Syxx chuckled. Winston's brows furrowed in confusion. "Don't you remember, Admiral?" Winston shook his head. Enoz's head whipped around. Pointing to the Admiral, she said to Horx, "Azureyvus quaycele Desacolodoni?!" Horx nodded rapidly. Ignoring the confusion, Syxx continued, "Admiral, ever since Ming's triangulation lock beamed you off the Breen homeworld, Enoz and I made triangle jokes every chance we could. Don't you remember?" "Yes, of course," Winston muttered. Syxx glared in shock. Enoz squinted at the Admiral. "What did you find out, Enoz?" "All they keep saying is your 'name', Desacolodoni." "Desacolodoni? That's good I hope." The Admiral gave a political smile and chuckle. "No, Admiral. In our language, it means a harbinger of evil." Winston's smile disappeared. "We have a saying in the Wardyssian system, Admiral. Evil may take many forms, and Horx here says you have been seen taking many forms." Syxx's arm went straight up, pointing his phaser at Winston. "A Founder?", Reman asked. Winston stood calmly, "What are you going to do, Syxx, phaser an Admiral you think might be a Founder? If you're wrong, you've murdered a friend." Syxx said nothing, unsure what to do. "On the other hand," Enoz stepped up with her phaser, "we're already in trouble for going AWOL on the away team. So what if we cut off one of your fingers? A blood test won't work, but assaulting an officer in the name of the Federation? I can live with that." She grabbed his hand and pressed her phaser, but it didn't fire. Winston merely shrugged. Syxx pulled out his tricorder and began scanning. "Enoz, it's not the planet's dampening fields! It's his runabout. Why, Admiral?" "I didn't want anyone from the Dominion shooting me." "But that field gives away the location of your runabout! That violates safety regulations concerning Admirals away from starships!", Reman blurted. Syxx, Enoz and Winston all stared at the Ferengi, who shrugged his shoulders, "To do business aboard a Federation starship means I must know the regulations." "So you know when you're breaking the rules?", Syxx asked. Enoz motioned quickly to Horx. Winston's arm shot out, punching her in the face. Syxx and Reman leaped back while Horx whacked the Admiral's arm with a spear, which went right through it. The Changeling turned to attack Syxx and Reman but froze when it heard the whine of two transporter beams behind it. Zenoz and Lenoz materialized, each holding a phaser rifle. They instantly began blasting the Changeling until it exploded into a fireball. Reman walked up to the two Oblokoni, as Syxx knelt down beside Enoz, "How did your weapons work? How did you know we were in trouble?", he said. "As soon as Enoz ordered me to maintain an open channel, I went and got Lenoz. We adapted our rifles with the same frequency modulations that I developed on the deflector dish to compensate for both the planet's and runabout's dampening fields," Zenoz said, gazing in shock at the Oblok. He gazed down at Enoz. A thick stream of brown blood dripped from one of her eye sockets, the eye mashed into it's socket. After shaking her, Syxx was relieved to see Enoz's other two eyes blink. "Welcome back, honey," Syxx smiled. Zenoz and Lenoz glared at each other. Enoz turned and muttered something to Horx, who escorted Zenoz and Lenoz to some party developing by a campfire. Syxx scooped her up in his arms and began stumbling out of the village. Reman followed with a tricorder, leading the way to the 'Admiral's' runabout. Syxx hauled Enoz to a rear cabin with a medkit, ignoring a building nearby. Reman, however, did not, pulling out a tricorder. He scanned the structure. The scanning instrument began registering eight life forms. Four humans, one Pinx, one android, and two more that the tricorder couldn't identify. He yelled to the approaching Lenoz and Zenoz, "This thing says there are some hew-mons and some aliens in there." Lenoz took the tricorder from the Ferengi and looked at the readings. Suddenly, the readings changed. Lenoz looked puzzled, "What the...?" "What is it, Len?", Zenoz said. "Most of the life readings suddenly vanished. Now I'm only reading two unidentifiable life readings and a third that's... another changeling!" Syxx walked out of the shuttle and over to where the Ferengi and the two Oblokoni were standing. "How's Enoz?", Zenoz growled. "She's resting." "Orders, sir?", Chief Lenoz asked. Syxx gazed at the two. Zenoz, the science officer was furious, somehow able to tell what had occurred between him and Enoz. Lenoz was an engineer, like Syxx. The mate was also angry, but more calm. "Reman," Syxx began, "Guard the runabout. Zenoz, see what you can get out of the computers. Lenoz, let's go see the away team." Syxx naturally trusted Lenoz more. As they strolled to the structure entrance, it occurred to Syxx that with a Founder around, the 'conspiracy theory' he and Enoz had developed was utter targ waste. They approached the building cautiously. If the tricorder readings were right there was another Changeling inside the building and two more people that they couldn't even be sure of. They stopped suddenly when they saw the door start to open, and a figure stepped out pointing an alien weapon in their direction. Lenoz immediately fired his rifle, blowing the person's firing arm off. Syxx rushed up to the person Lenoz had just shot and saw that it was Ensign Bruder, blood pouring out of her right arm socket.