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"Now Chief, if you would please start the meeting with your situation," Commander Sisko spoke, his voice soft against the background hum of the stations generators.
Chief O’Brien looked distinctly uncomfortable, Ezri realized, being the center of attention all of the sudden, clearly uneasy with what he had to say, "Well, you see," he paused, almost as if thinking it over, "We have a Code Seven Emergency in effect, as of this morning."
The whole room was disquieted at that. Everyone knew Starfleet Operations’ Code Seven was an incredibly specific — yet quite often activated — emergency code: When a psionic entity of any kind interacted with Federation personnel. Ghosts, as some might say.
"It’s ah, a weird situation alright," O’Brien continued, "At first we were sure it was something physical, or some old protocol of the station, but security footage and some, uh, personal evidence has proven that we’re not dealing with a simple systems malfunction on our hands."
"What the Chief is pointing out here," Sisko said, as he took the reins of the meeting once again, "Is that this ‘Ghost’ of ours seems to target specific persons on this crew, as if it’s trying to provoke a specific emotion," He turned towards the oval windows of the wardroom, his nostrils flared slight as they do when he’s trying to suppress irritation, Ezri noted, "Take Doctor Bashir, for instance," He pointed at Julian, who seemed to be in a world of his own, and startled slightly at his name.
"Ah, yes, it was uh," He cleared his throat, re-focused on the situation at hand, "Yes, well, as some of you may uh, know" Julian looked so embarrassed there was probably only one thing this could be about, "I have a prized infancy keepsake, a stuffed bear," Ha! I knew it, Ezri though. Why was he so embarrassed of a stuffed animal she would never understand.
"Now, I keep Kukalaka on a shelf over my desk, but for the last three days I have woken at station’s morning, uh, embracing it." Julian cleared his throat again, seemingly finding difficult to continue his story.
Ezri couldn’t place it, but she suspected he was almost on the verge of tears for some reason. Weird.
"And at first i assumed the logical, of course. That I had risen in the middle of the night and took Kukalaka with me to bed, but after digging up the computer’s records of those nights, I discovered this, ah, eerie situation," He turned to the wardroom computer screen and presses a button on the table’s keypad.
A short video of Julian sleeping started playing. Julian, as he held the covers bunched in his hands, when from the right side of the screen Kukalaka the Bear floats over to the bed, and, as if sensing it, Julian turned over to grab him.
"As you can see," Sisko tilted his head, coming to stand in front of the screen suddenly. He seemed to take personal offense at the entity’s meddling, not an unusual thing, surely, with his crew being targeted individually, but there was an underlying something that Ezri couldn’t put her finger on, "This entity seems to be trying to communicate, somehow. And it’s trying to do so specifically with this senior staff." He turned to Odo, with a serious face on, "Constable, if you could relate the happenings of yesterday to us?"
Odo got up from the chair, that upon closer inspection quickly morphed back into being him, and took a position in front of the table, "Yes, well. It all started at around 0600 hours of yesterday’s shift, I was about to head out to the Security Office when I noticed something quite peculiar," pausing, he proceeded to extend his whole arm towards the table where he clicked the keypad, the screen showing the interior of his quarters, with the changeling regenerating inside his container. Suddenly, the smallest of movements could be perceived, like a stuttering in the playback, and all of his furniture moved a couple centimeters to the right. There was something in the back of Ezri’s mind, she couldn't seem to grasp it clearly — she supposed the distractions of the day had been wearing on her, but she knew that something looked very familiar, for some reason. On the screen, Odo had fast-forwarded the footage until he had risen from his regenerative state, ready to go out the door, "As you can see, I discovered the situation right as I was getting ready to leave, my room comm’s sound having come from a slightly different angle."
Odo then turned to a PADD he fished out of his insides, "And lastly, I have here the transcript of a formal complaint issued by Quark," His face twisted into a grimace, as if Quark’s name itself tasted unpleasant, "And it seems that his personal latinum stash has been emptied and all its contents moved to his nightstand, of all places — and hrm, well," He paused, as if re-reading something on the PADD, "This is an older complaint, as it has happened before some time ago, but it’s worth investigating it again, when there is footage of the latinum just floating out of the small coffer."
At this someone let loose a small gasp, nearly inaudible if not for the fact that Ezri was seated just beside her. She turned to Kira, who had a face she tried to maintain when something hurt her deeply, and she decided to let no one know.
"Are you alright?" Ezri asked, softly, so no one else would hear. Kira just nodded, steeling herself even more, before turning towards the screen again.
"—And with that, please: Ezri?" Ezri startled a bit at Ben's voice, having been so engrossed in watching Kira for a moment that she completely forgot where they were. Blushing a bit, she turned back to him. "You and the Colonel are the only people on-station right now that have your Code Seven Situational Permits up to date, so I would ask you two to investigate this situation as fast as possible." Face grim, he looked to the side, as if staring at the middle distance, "Even if this entity seems nonviolent, I wouldn't provoke it. Keep us posted." He turned a concerned look to Kira, closed his eyes for a moment and then pivoted to face everyone, "Dismissed."
"So, where do you think we’ll find the entity?" Ezri asked, as they were gearing up in the Security office.
Kira’s face was solid, made of stone, as if there was something terrible happening that Ezri had not yet noticed. It was starting to get irritating.
"I don’t know," she said, voice hollow, "we could try the upper ore processing bays? There’s never that many people there, most of the time. And it's usually where the weird things start."
"Yeah! Let’s start there, and I was also thinking around the Temple? A lot of spooky stuff seems to happen around there, too," and that’s when Ezri heard the sound of something heavy hitting the ground. She managed to turn around in time to see Kira clutching her foot, on which a heavy Science Field Tricorder had fallen, "Kira! Are you alright?"
Ezri dropped to her knees, looking Kira’s feet over. Ensuring there was no lasting damage, she let her go, looking instead into Kira’s eyes. They wouldn't meet hers. They looked vacant, almost dissociative.
"Kira? Nerys are you alright?" At that, Kira finally looked at her, startled.
"I-I’m fine Dax, really," When Ezri just shot her an incredulous look, she elaborated, "nothing’s wrong with me, I promise, I just remembered something unpleasant, is all."
Assuming she was talking about her time fighting with the resistance, Ezri chose to drop the subject.
"Well, then. No time like the present! Let’s go be Kira and Ezri, Paranormal Investigators!" She shot Kira a small smile, which the bajoran reciprocated. "Time to find this ghost — I'm sure nothing will go wrong!"
Ezri should’ve known. She should have realized, before, why all those pranks — because that’s what they were — looked and sounded so familiar. She had done them. Not as she was now, true, but she remembered, no, Dax remembered having planned all of them. Jadzia had done all of them.
As they entered the underchamber of the Temple, a place that mirrored the main temple’s footprint, and that was used mostly as storage for its belongings, with access only by way of a small lift behind the main entrance, she finally understood. There, at the end of the small narrow room, facing the bajoran flags where on the temple would be the Orb of Prophecy and Change, with her back towards Ezri, stood a tall figure: Wearing a Starfleet uniform edged in blue at the shoulders, Her long hair tied behind her.
She would’ve been convinced she was seeing another Starfleet member of DS9’s staff, were not for the fact that she could faintly see through them. Transparent, nearly opaque against the background of the multi-colored flags. The entity turned slowly, her features becoming more prominent as she pivoted, until she was facing them both.
"Hello, Ezri." Said Jadzia Dax, smiling faintly at her.
She then turned to Kira, who let out a soft, pained whimper. Jadzia’s face contorted into longing and melancholy.
"Hello, Nerys," Ezri thought she could see a tear rolling down her cheeks when Jadzia — her voice rough as if from disuse — smiled softly at Kira, "I’ve missed you."
Kira almost bowled Ezri, in her haste to embrace Jadzia. And Ezri was ready to shout for her to wait, concerned that Kira might just sail through the transparent entity when Jadzia took a step forward and caught her. Ezri could hear Kira’s sobbing, and to her surprise, she found herself crying, too.
"Jadzia, but — but how! I-I saw you — I saw you die, Jadzia!" Kira’s sobs were uncontrollable, but she had let go of Jadzia, almost falling into Ezri in her haste to get away.
"Yes, that’s the difficult part. I did die." At this, Jadzia’s eyes go unfocused, as if recalling something that had happened a very long time ago, "I remember it. And now I’m, well, here." she came to stand next to Kira, who was being embraced by Ezri to stay upright at all, and as she came close her shape become clearer and clearer, less transparent, "I don’t know what that means for us, now. Or if I’ll disappear tomorrow, without explanation, but I don’t think I could stay away, not while I knew you were here. Not while I knew you were all so close," Jadzia looked up and Ezri could now clearly see her tears beginning to form, her eyes red. She looked down, at Kira who had lifted her hands to hold Jadzia’s face, "I couldn't, well — manifest before, not without you close to me, the way you are now," And that is when Kira kissed her, soundly, taking Jadzia's breath away. They stopped before long, but they kept looking at one another.
She was fully crying now, Jadzia. But so was Ezri, her vision blurry around the edges at seeing something so essential to her being, in front of her. She could see Kira, her face contorted in emotion, her hands now firmly holding Jadzia’s face, her sobs vibrating through Ezri’s body.
Jadzia eyes fall on her then, her smile playful through the tears, "Besides," the smile turned into a grin, infections to Ezri who found herself smiling back, "I would like to get to know the one holding the ol’ Worm now,"
Kira starts to laugh, her giggles soft while embracing Jadzia.
And that was the moment. The moment Ezri realized she had never felt so content.