“Oh, those look good,” Prynn said.

Nog walked over to her and handed Prynn one of the glasses before sitting on the deck next to her. “Ensign Lankford mentioned you’d been in here since 0800 without taking a break. I figured you were on a roll and wouldn’t want to hit the mess hall—I know what that’s like—but I thought you’d spare time for a milk shake.”

Prynn accepted the shake gratefully and toasted Nog with it. “May the Blessed Exchequer deliver you from Destitution, Lieutenant.”

“I’ll drink to that,” Nog said, clinking her glass.

Prynn wrapped her lips around the straw, then stopped, looking at Nog suspiciously. “Tell me you didn’t puree any tube grubs for this.”

“No way. I learned my lesson the first time.” A few months back, at Nog’s urging, Prynn had sampled a tube grub for the first time. She’d spat it out like a projectile, right past Nog’s ear. “Mine’s a grub shake,” he explained. “Yours is milk and ice cream. Lieutenant Candlewood mixed them himself.”

She eyed the glasses skeptically. “They look the same.”

“Trust me, Prynn, I wouldn’t do that to you. Cheers.”

Prynn took a slurp and closed her eyes, rapture filling her face. “God, that’s good. Thanks, Nog. I’m sorry I doubted you.”

Nog grinned. “My pleasure. Glad it helped.” He took a sip from his own straw and almost immediately spat it out in disgust, spraying the hull of the Sagan.

“Hey, watch it!” Prynn cried, startled. “What’s the matter?”

Nog was still trying to spit the remaining droplets. “Milk and ice cream!” he said, grimacing.

“Both of them? Hmm, that’s ironic.” Prynn resumed slurping her shake. “Lieutenant Candlewood strikes again.”

Nog regarded his glass disgustedly. “I’m gonna get even with that guy, so help me….” Candlewood had recently taken on the role of the ship’s resident practical joker, and this marked the third time Nog had fallen victim to one of his pranks.

“Maybe he has a crush on you and this is just his way of expressing it,” Prynn said pleasantly.

“Oh, thanks,” Nog said sarcastically. “As if I wasn’t sick enough from the milk shake.”

Prynn chuckled. “How’s Shar doing?”

“Better, I think,” Nog said, then shrugged. “Hard to be sure, sometimes. But I think he’s passed the worst of it. At least, until we get back to the Alpha Quadrant.”

Prynn nodded. Although it wasn’t discussed openly, word had circulated among the crew about the news Shar had received last month—the worst possible on a voyage like this one: the death of a loved one back home. Dad had given Prynn a general idea of the circumstances, and her heart went out to Shar. Having endured her own share of loss, she understood what Shar must be going through.

Nog set down his unfinished shake. “Hey, hand that over,” Prynn told him, finishing the last of the ice cream in her own glass. “No point in letting it go to waste.”

Nog shook his head and passed his shake over to Prynn. “So what did you do to get banished down here, anyway?”

Prynn rolled her eyes. “I wish I knew. I haven’t been on the bridge in three days, ever since the course change.”

Nog nodded. “Have you talked to your father—I mean, Commander Vaughn?”

“Is that why you came down here?” Prynn asked. “To see if my relationship to Vaughn made me privy to what was going on topside?”

Nog shrugged innocently. “Not at all!” At Prynn’s dubious look he admitted, “Well, not entirely.”

“Nog…”

“It was Senkowski’s idea!” No protested. “He thought someone should ask you, since even Dax and Bowers have been tight-lipped about the whole thing.”

“Let me guess, you drew the short straw?”

“Uh…did you like the milk shakes?” Nog asked hopefully.

Prynn sighed. “One thing you should know about my father, Nog, as present circumstance should aptly prove,” she said, gesturing at the shuttlebay around them, “is that no one has ever accused him of nepotism. And with good reason. Whatever’s going on, he hasn’t told me. I’ve hardly talked to him the last few days. And I’m usually the last person to find out anything around here.”

“I’m sorry, Prynn,” Nog said. “You’d think the only son of the Grand Nagus would know better than to try to take advantage of your relationship to the commander. I know how irritating that can be. Uncle Quark’s waiters have been falling over themselves to engage me in conversation ever since my father took over the Ferengi Alliance.”

“Hey, it’s all right,” Prynn assured him. “No hard feelings, honest. I suppose it’s only natural that people assume I’m somehow more inside the loop than anyone else where my father’s concerned. I wish it were true, but…” She shrugged. “The milk shakes weregreat, by the way.”

“I’m glad,” Nog said. “It’s funny…I never really thought about it much, but you, me, Shar, Jake…we’re all the children of some pretty important people who have intersected at DS9.”

“I dunno about that,” Prynn said. “My father’s not a world leader, or a Federation councillor, or a religious-icon-slash-Starfleet-captain. Vaughn isn’t quite that prominent.”

“You know, that reminds me of something else I’ve been meaning to ask…”

Prynn sighed. “Go ahead.”

“Well, it’s just that…he’s been in Starfleet for eighty years, right? Why is he still just a commander?”

Prynn laughed. “You’re wondering if he somehow managed to piss off the wrong people at some point in his career?”

“Well…yeah, I guess,” Nog admitted.

“Wouldn’t surprise me if he did,” Prynn said wryly. “But that’s not the reason.”

“Then why—?”

“Nog, how big do you think the Tal Shiar’s file is on, say, Jean-Luc Picard?”

“Pretty big, I’d think.”

“And how big a file do you think they have on Elias Vaughn?”

Nog shrugged. “I have no idea.”

“Then I’ll tell you—they probably don’thave one on him. At least, I’d bet they didn’t before he was reassigned to DS9. By advancing no higher than commander, and taking no long-term assignments for the last eighty years, he’s managed to go relatively unnoticed. Anonymity was a powerful tool on the kinds of missions he used to go on. It’s how he survived.”

“But he’s given it up,” Nog said. Becoming first officer of Deep Space 9 and commander officer of the Defianthad to be like stepping into a spotlight for somebody like Vaughn.

Prynn shrugged. “Times change. People change. I don’t completely understand the circumstances that led him to take his current assignment—all that Orb business is lost on me, frankly—but I do know how bitter he’d become about his life during the last ten years. Whatever happened to convince him to make the changes he’s made, it’s renewed him. I think he felt trading his anonymity for a new lease on life was worth it.”

Nog seemed to consider what Prynn told him. Then he said, “Candlewood has a theory about what the course change is all about.”

“Oh?”

“He thinks it’s Cardassians.”

Prynn frowned. “What leads him to suspect that?”

“You know he periodically checks the logs of computer use on board?”

Prynn nodded. That was no secret. Standard operating procedure for a ship’s computer techs.

“Well, he noticed that there’d been a download of a classified file on the planet Uridi’si three days ago. That’s nearest to Cardassian space. And Commander Vaughn is the only person on board with clearance high enough to download the entire file.”

Prynn was silent a moment, slurping the last of her second milk shake. “That doesn’t really prove anything.”

“I suppose not,” Nog said. “Still—”

“Vaughn to Nog.”

Nog reached for his combadge and tapped it. “Go ahead.”

“Report to my ready room immediately, Lieutenant.”

“Aye, sir. I’m on my way.” Nog tapped off and turned to Prynn. “Looks like something’s up.”

Prynn smiled. “Told you, Nog: I’m the last person to find out anything around here.”