Disclaimer: Paramount owns Star Trek, characters, cannon and concepts. I =
only borrow them for the odd joyride.

ObWarning: I killed off Kira before this story even started :) Don't =
worry, though, she gets better :)

ObMoreInfo: This week's Song To Look Up is _What in the ... World_ by =
Ringo Starr.


         The Sun Will Shine, But There'll be no Light
Catherine Allan

  Bajoran winters were cold, snap-frozen fields of snow covered the land 
like an evil down. It covered boulders and chasms alike in deceptively 
even falls.
  Thanks to decades of Dominion rule, no-one bothered with orphans, 
much, let alone those who ran away from their provided shelter. Lyne 
preferred it that way. The orphanages were always run by Vorta who had 
very strange ideas about what children were for. She was better off on 
her own, even if she was currently thigh-deep in freezing, wet powder.
  "Whoa!" Make that chest-deep.
  Something approached her hole, and a hand dipped into her field of 
vision. "You really aught to be wearing snowshoes in weather like this." 
Suggested a voice made of gravel. "Come on, I'll show you how to make 
them." The voice's owner pulled her up with ease, revealing himself to 
be a Founder. Why he bothered with her, let alone carry her as a father 
would a child, was beyond her. The Founder shaped part of his arm into a 
thick, warm blanket  that surrounded her. "Better?"
  No Founder had thought her worth a second glance, let alone so many 
words. For once in her life, Lyne was struck dumb. Not wanting to 
offend, she nodded and smiled. She was puzzled, though, since she'd 
never seen this Founder on any newsvids. Lyne squinted at his face, 
trying to place his careworn features.
  "Try to stay awake for me,"  He jounced her a little. "You're 
suffering a bit of hypothermia right now, and sleep is very bad idea."
  Obediant, Lyne did her best to fight lethargy. She recited the names 
of the Most Honoured Founders. "D'Jalam, wisest of the elders. Sheishah, 
mother of many. Reishoch, our beloved leader. Y'thl, full of wisdom, 
strength and the beauty of motherhood. Shaidyr, he who keeps the 
Jem'Hadar for our protection..." Lyne named a dozen more. "Out of these 
few sprang the new generation, safe in the Great Link. And our prayers 
go to the lost and lonely one, who has forsaken the Link and who wanders 
Bajor with no-one to love."
  The Founder snorted. "I have someone to love. They've never believed 
it, but I loved her, and will always love her."
  "*You're* the lonely Changeling?"
  "My name is Odo Ital, thank you. And yes, I'm the only Changeling in 
the Dominion who refuses the Great Link."
  "Because of your lady?"
  "Her name's Kira Nerys, and I'll love her forever. I was just on her 
way to see her when I bumped into you."
  Lyne noticed Odo was doubling back, walking over his tracks in the 
snow. "Won't she be mad at you for being late?" It was easy to forget he 
was a Changeling. He reacted as if she were an old and dear friend; it 
felt nice. "It looks like you're headed back home."
  "You're very observant, miss-?"
  "Lyne."
  "Lyne; and Nerys won't miss me at all."
  "*Why*?"
  He gave her a puzzled look, as if she should know the answer already. 
"She's been dead these thirty years."

  It was a moment Odo would never forget for the rest of his life. One 
moment, Nerys was happy, laughing beside him, and the next, someone shot 
her.
  He caught her as she fell, removing the dart from her in one, swift 
motion.
  "Nerys!" He held her close, tried to will her life back to her. 
Bashir, also, was doing everything he could. "Nerys..."
  Bashir closed his tricorder. "I'm sorry, Odo. It was already too late 
when you pulled the dart out. According to these readings, she was dead 
before she had time to blink."
  A year ago, the Promenade had gathered to watch him kiss her, to watch 
the happiest moment of his life. Now they gathered to watch him mourn.
  Odo couldn't weep as humanoids did, and he no longer had the willpower 
to cry out from anguish. All he did was - stop.
  He was a statute made flesh, cradling the body of the one who was 
everything to him.
  Kind, well-meaning hands took her from him, while others helped him to 
his feet and collected the dart from his unresisting fingers. His feet, 
unbidden, followed Nerys into the infirmary. He ignored everyone else 
around him, focusing only on the occupant of the stasis box.
  Kira Nerys was pale, beautiful and dead.
  "Nerys," he whispered, placing his hand on the forcefield by her face. 
"I don't know what to do. What do I do without you?"
  He should have listened to the stranger he'd caught earlier that day. 
He couldn't know. She had no identification, no proof, and only a 
handful of excuses and one wild story on her side. But she'd also been 
*right*.
  "What do I do without you, Nerys?"
  In thirty years, he'd never find an answer.
  If people spoke to him, during that first decade of mourning, he 
didn't hear them. All he could do was follow her, and ask her one 
question.
  "Nerys, what do I do without you?"
  Only after the second decade, was Odo able to say anything else to 
her.
  "Do you remember when I told you that I was willing to settle for a 
short and interesting relationship?" He asked as he tended her grave. "I 
lied."
  Nerys, as ever, was silent.
  He found that he had the strength to leave her, that day, and took a 
tour of the surrounding countryside. In the afternoon he found a little 
cabin that was almost tailor-made for him. Perhaps it *had* been made 
for him. Odo sheltered there that night, and the next morning found him 
back at his beloved Nerys' side.
  "Did you miss me?" No, of course not. She was with the Prophets, now; 
far beyond feeling. "I still miss you. I found a little cabin, 
yesterday, you'd have liked it up there, if--" the words, _if you were 
alive_ stopped in his throat, and silence reigned once more.
  "That cabin *is* yours." The voice behind him belonged to the 
Foundress. Odo now remembered she'd been visiting him, on and off, for 
years. "We accepted some time ago that you wouldn't join us, so we made 
some provisions for your comfort."
  "I'd have been more comfortable with Nerys by my side."
  "In a handful of decades, she'd be where she is, now. Whoever did this 
saved you the anguish of watching her grow old, wither and die."
  "I was prepared for all that. I wanted to share all the time I 
could... and now I'm lost."
  The Foundress actually knelt by his side. "We did a thorough 
investigation, even though her assassin suicided, rather than be 
questioned. The poison is called Xyt. Even Dominion technology has 
difficulty synthesising it. There was enough in that dart to *buy* the 
Dominion."
  Odo remained silent, staring at his beloved's grave.
  The Foundress gave up. "There's a comm unit in your cabin; you can 
call me if you need anything."
  "I need Nerys."
  "I'll give you your privacy, Odo. You have my word that no-one will 
deliberately seek you out. No-one will even know your name."
  That was nine years ago.

  It was dark outside the cabin, now, and was doubtlessly colder than 
ice. If Lyne were still alone, she'd be burrowed under the snow by now, 
if she was lucky. It could have easily been a sad, frozen death with 
none to note her passing. Lyne gripped her hot chocolate with renewed 
appreciation.
  Odo fell silent after his tale. He'd checked her fingers, toes and 
ears in passing and pronounced her free of frostbite. He was such a 
sweet man, and he didn't deserve what had happened.
  Lyne took her turn. "I don't remember having any other name but Lyne. 
My parents died in a freak shuttle accident when I was little. The 
structural integrity field collapsed; they got me into the escape pod 
just before it sheared off... The shield on the pod worked, but the 
shuttle's ones didn't. I can still see Mama's face, calling for me. Papa 
hung on to her, trying to keep her away from the breach. Then the whole 
shuttle blew up." The images replayed in her mind. Lyne shuddered. "I 
was blind for two years after that, and clinically blind for another 
two." She spared a one-shouldered shrug for her opinion of her fate. 
"No-one would adopt a disabled child, and by the time I could see 
properly, I was too old. I finally ran away this summer when I got sick 
of what the Vorta there was doing to me." She yawned and wished Odo had 
a clock. They'd both spent a long time talking, or staring at nothing 
very much. Lyne found herself blinking for longer periods at a time. She 
finished her drink, lest she somehow offended the Founder by spilling 
it.
  Odo observed her nodding and soothed, "Go on and rest, Lyne. I have 
some research that needs doing, and I'm very bad company when I'm 
staring at a computer."
  Lyne needed no further invitation.

  She woke the next morning refreshed, warm and unreasonably happy. She 
had a warm place to stay, friendly company, and delicious food laid in 
front of her as if it were a matter of fact. Orphans usually didn't get 
a life that good, since they were often purchased as a source of cheap 
labour. The most she could have expected from life, had she stayed at 
the orphanage, was an unpleasant and brief youth followed by a short and 
ugly life somewhere in the mines. If she was *truly* unlucky, an 
overseer's rape could spawn another orphan for the cycle.
  Lyne had never expected kindness, and even though it was unfamilliar 
to her, she loved it already. She wolfed down waffles, eggs, samatt and 
toast, and almost drowned in the hot chocolate. Hunger, she decided, was 
now going to become a stranger to her. She munched idly on a Bajoran 
dish that she'd forgotten the name of, and went wandering through the 
cabin.
  It had the look of a place that was only kept clean through force of 
habit. Nothing much was used, yet it felt old. At last, she understood 
that Odo still didn't *live* in the cabin. He merely kept it while he 
lived with Kira Nerys' memory. The thought gave her chills until Lyne 
found the Changeling - he never was and never would be a Founder; 
sitting in front of a console, staring in fascination at an old image on 
the screen.
  It was her face.
  Odo must have heard her murmur of surprise, since he turned and 
welcomed her. "I see you're awake. I knew I'd seen you before, Lyne, but 
I kept thinking you'd be older instead of younger." He gestured her over 
to his side. "But this is definately *you*, maybe a year older; but this 
image was taken thirty years ago."
  Lyne fought Deja Vu while she stared at her face. She had evidently 
grown a bit, and obtained a decent haircut. The orphanages never 
bothered once a child was over a certain age, they merely gave a child a 
pair of scissors and told them to help themselves. "I've got new 
clothes," she blurted, and was instantly ashamed of herself. A year in 
*this* place would almost guarantee new clothes, especially if Odo 
decided to keep her here.
  Odo apparently hadn't heard, looking down the long length of thirty 
year's time. "You *were* there to save her... and I didn't believe you. 
You stunned Nerys and abducted her from her quarters, just minutes 
before the bomb exploded. I thought you were some kind of assassin, 
since you didn't turn up in any records."
  "I guess it makes sense that I didn't," Lyne supplied, desperate to 
look smarter than she'd sounded a minute ago. "I wasn't born then." 
_Mama and Papa were still alive... If *only* I remembered my other 
*name*!_
  "It's all coming together," Odo murmured. "I sent you to save her, and 
I didn't believe you. This time around, we're going to get it *right*."
  Lyne, who had heard everything Odo had said about Kira Nerys and his 
love for her, nodded grimly. "Let's start, then."

  The ship itself was the work of a year, dark, streamlined, and 
state-of-the-art. It almost glittered with promise, despite the fact 
that it was built for stealth.
  Other equipment had also cost much, but Odo was a Changeling, and 
Changelings got what they wanted. The hypospray, deceptively light in 
Lyne's hand, contained a fortune - the antidote to Xyt. The poison 
itself had been recently prey to technological advancements, and was now 
the 'sure-kill' poison of the known galaxy.
  Only the Dominion worked on its cure, for Odo's sake and because he'd 
asked. None asked him the reason why, they were just glad he'd 
resurfaced from his mourning.
  "Are you ready?" Odo asked.
  Lyne nodded. She'd studied the security recordings for a year, she 
crammed her head with data and specifications, and her neck was adorned 
with an interesting little device made to guarantee her freedom. "Ready 
as I'll ever be."
  "Then there's one last thing before we go," he reached into a faux 
pocket and produced a silver earring for her.
  "But--" tears pricked her eyes and her throat closed. Odo, with this 
simple gesture, had made her part of his family. Her main objection - 
that she hadn't been wearing one in the recordings; vanished when she 
saw what the clan symbol was. It was another message to Odo-of-the-past. 
A circle inside a circle with a v-notch missing from the top. The symbol 
of the Dominion and Changelings alike. It would tell Odo-of-the-past 
that Lyne was *family*.
  Considering what his family was up to at the time, Lyne wondered if 
he'd trust her despite the symbol.
  "'But' nothing, Odo Lyne. You're my daughter, now; whatever happens 
next."
  She'd waited a year for this. Odo had waited Thirty-One. It hardly 
seemed fair to her. "Let's go then, 'Papa'." The word sounded nice, and 
fell comfortably off her tongue.
  Together, they stepped into their ship.

  Kira Nerys woke with a start. Someone was in her quarters, moving as 
stealthily as a shadow. She didn't sit bolt upright in her bed, like so 
many others. Nerys had better instincts, honed by her years in the 
resistance. She lay still, feigning sleep and slowly reaching for the 
knife under her pillow.
  The shadow crept closer, holding something in one hand as it moved. 
Whoever it was kept low, a relatively smart move; but they were sneaking 
up on Colonel Kira Nerys, and that was a stupid one.
  She leaped into action at last, seizing the occupied hand of the 
stranger with one hand and readying the knife with the other. "LIGHTS!"
  It was a kid. A nine-year-old, scared witless and staring little girl.
  "Who the hell are you?" Kira demanded, noticing that the immobilised 
'weapon' was a hypospray.
  "Someone who has to save your life." Answered the girl.20
  Kira knew the look in the kid's eyes. She remembered seeing that look 
in herself when she was in the Resistance.
  Quicker than thought, the girl's other hand whipped out a little 
phaser and fired.
  _Damnit,_ thought Kira as the world went dark, _that wasn't supposed 
to happen._

  Lyne swore under her breath as she hoisted Kira's slumbering form. 
_Good thing she keeps her weight down,_ She grunted as she lumbered out 
the door. _otherwise I'd be flattened._
  Lyne dragged her rescuee to a safe, out-of-the-way place in the 
coridoor before settling Kira down. Odo had cautioned Lyne against using 
the antidote on someone who was stunned, and she'd hoped to get it to 
Kira before she woke up. _To bad, move on to the next plan._ She'd set 
her little phaser to a light stun, and only had to wait a few minutes 
before it wore off.
  Footsteps startled her, but she stood her ground. That was the 
security team arriving at full pelt. Odo would be among them. The Odo of 
*this* time, not 'her' Odo. She decided to call them Papa-Odo and 
Now-Odo, just to keep them straight.
  Kira Nerys murmured just as the security team confirmed that she 
hadn't been in her quarters when the bomb went off. _Just a few more 
seconds..._
  Now-Odo's voice, "Fan out, sweep the area. I want her found, and I 
want her found *yesterday*."
  Lyne had to hold her breath to stifle an ironic giggle. Kira's eyes 
flickered. _Come on, come on, come on..._
  "Sir, I found them."
  _Not *you*. I wasn't thinking of *you*._ Lyne watched as Now-Odo 
rounded the corner. If only she'd had a few seconds more... Just as Kira 
blinked awake, she tried a second time to administer the antidote.
  She was stopped by the solid grip of a Changeling. "Hold it right 
there, *miss*."
  She sighed. Everything had turned out almost exactly the same, so far. 
Maybe she'd have better luck with the interview.

  Odo was in a bad mood. In times past, it would have been a normal 
state of affairs, but now that he was part of Nerys' life, it was a 
callendar event, no matter how good his acting skills were.
  After she was captured, the suspect remained passive, accepting his 
restraining grip and not trying to explain anything. Even now, when she 
was supposed to.
  "What were you doing in Colonel Kira's quarters?"
  "You won't believe me."
  Odo frowned. Obviously, asking the same question was going to result 
in the same answer. Lovely. "Try me."
  "I was there to save her life."
  He scoffed. "If you were there for that, why didn't you just raise an 
alarm? And what were you doing with that hypospray?"
  "It'd take too long, and trying to save her life."
  Odo glared at her. It was his best glare, and many years had gone into 
its manufacture. It slid right off the girl as if it were water off a 
duck's back. "Just *who* are you?"
  "Lyne."
  Joy. A literalist. Straight answers for straight questions were well 
and fine, but there were times when he wished ferverently for a little 
elaboration. "Lyne, what?"
  A quick grin crossed her face as she thought of something funny to say 
and rapidly stepped on the idea. "Well, up until yesterday, I didn't 
*have* any other name *but* 'Lyne'. The new one's taking a bit to get 
used to." She swept back the hair covering her right ear. "It's Odo Lyne 
now."
  Dual shocks. The use of *his* name, and the earring that had special 
meaning to Changelings only. The family clip was a circle in a circle 
with a v-notch missing from the top.
  "You won't believe me, but I have to tell you anyway. I'm from thirty 
years in your future, and I was sent here to stop Kira Nerys from being 
assassinated."
  "Who sent you?"
  "You did. Or is it 'you will'? Well, it's *my* past, so it's 'did'."
  A quick check of Bajorans matching her description turned up negative, 
and there was no mention of escapees from any mental institutions. He 
decided to play along. "How do we know *you're* not the assassin, and 
that hypospray doesn't contain some sort of poison?"
  "If I was, I would have left her in that room with the bomb. It *was* 
right under the bed, after all."
  "You could have easily placed it there to divert suspicion."
  "Come *on*. She was awake before I'd come two steps nearer. Besides, I 
think your forensics will uncover that it was placed there by a Vorta, 
at around Eleven Hundred hours." Lyne looked upwards, searching her 
memory. "Eleven Twenty-Six, to be exact. I wasn't even on the station 
then."
  Odo glared at her - for all the good it did. "If you're *really* from 
the future, what is the first thing that Kira is going to say to me 
after Bashir releases her?"
  She got every cadence right. "You think she planted it while I was 
*asleep*? Odo, how *could* you?"
  Odo growled. "We'll see about that... Alright, now what do *you* think 
is in the hypospray?"
  "It's the antidote to the poison that she gets shot with tomorrow," 
informed Lyne. "It has to be administered before the poison, because it 
acts instantly. The antidote will just sit around in the body until it 
encounters the poison. Where is it, by the way?"
  "Doctor Bashir is analysing it." Odo announced, watching the little 
stranger's face.
  "That's alright. We allowed enough extra for Bashir to analyse."
  "And this antidote is *so* safe, you'd be willing to give yourself a 
shot?"
  "Yes, sir."
  At that moment, Kira Nerys barged into his office, temper flaring. 
"You think she planted it while I was *asleep*? Odo, how *could* you?"

  Elsewhen...
  The Foundress was vexed. Odo was nowhere to be found; not even by that 
idiot Solid's grave. So much for eternal loyalty.
  She'd found that he'd been requesting things from a wide variety of 
places, and immediately journeyed to his cabin. If he was using his 
Dominion perogatives to order events, there was a chance that he was now 
willing to join the Dominion itself.
  Nothing was there. Literally. The cabin was void of any signs of 
habitation - which was nothing unusual; but this time it also held a 
fine layer of dust. Ever since Odo had moved in, he hadn't tolerated the 
substance.
  He'd moved out; but to where?
  The Foundress overrode the security on his console and called up the 
ten most recent files.
  A ship's schematics, design of the antidote for Xyt, and the 
recommended dosages. There were also schematics for the old Cardassian 
mining station, with a specific date in mind. The day before Kira Nerys 
died.
  The Foundress put two and two together and saw her dreams crumbling to 
dust. If Kira Nerys stayed dead, there was still a chance the Dominion 
would eventually welcome Odo. Without that certainty, there was no 
telling what would happen.
  The Foundress called her most faithful Vorta, and started working 
against Odo for the first time in thirty years. All this time, the 
Dominion had wondered who had sent the Vorta assassin. Now she was privy 
to such sensitive information, the Foundress nearly laughed.
  For the Dominion to thrive, Kira Nerys had to die thirty years ago; 
and the Foundress, if nothing else, had the Dominion's best interests in 
heart.
  She sent the Vorta back, disguised as a Bajoran Engineering worker, to 
the time, roughly two days before the shooting. He had a bomb, a dart 
and dart-gun, and very clear instructions about what to do with them.
  Only after the assassin was gone, did the Foundress wonder if Odo 
would ever forgive her.

  Lyne stirred the contents of the tray. Compared to the fare Papa-Odo 
regularly fed her, it was disgusting glop.
  "What's the matter, aren't you hungry?" Teased Now-Odo. "Or don't you 
*eat* in the future?"
  "It smells funny," Lyne objected.
  "You'd better eat it while it's hot," Now-Odo cautioned. "I've been 
told it only smells worse when it gets cold."
  Lyne watched him go, then spent a few minutes trying to pretend she 
was back in the orphanage. It didn't work. She sighed, used her little 
device and crept out of her cell. Feather-footed, she made her way to 
the door which lead to Now-Odo's office. She had to listen for her 
chance. Any minute, now, Nerys would wander in for another chat.
  >K-whhhiiirr-ch'nk<
  Lyne didn't bother listening to the exchange, she'd heard it hundreds 
of times in the past year. Now, no mater what happened, she was doing 
something *different* from the security vids. She dodged through the 
crowds, and ducked into Bashir's office.
  There, the depleted hypo of the antidote, there were still plenty of 
doses left. Quick fingers took it from the doctor's desk and hid it in 
her pocket, then she crept out into the Promenade again.
  It was a good thing her height allowed her to hide so easily. Trying 
not to act covert, she made her way back to the security office. She had 
to get it right now.

  "Feel better now?"
  Nerys smiled. "You know I can't stay mad at you, Ale'al."
  He smiled. Just a minute ago, he'd sent an APB out for his security 
teams, looking for Lyne. It was hard to believe the child was likely to 
be a Dominion assassin, but the Dominion was capable of a lot of things. 
She was Bajoran, but she could easily be the child of a prisoner of war, 
programmed to say what she said and do - Prophets knew what. Odo 
realised Nerys had just said something. "I'm - sorry?"
  "I said, 'do *you* feel better'?"
  "I'll be happier when this assassination debacle is over."
  The door opened again, "It will be, soon. Look." Lyne pressed the 
hypospray against her arm, giving herself a dose. "It's not poison. 
Bashir's told you the same thing, and now I've proved it's non-fatal to 
Bajorans. *Now* will you let me safe Kira's life?"
  "I don't believe it." Odo snorted. "You risked everything escaping 
from here just to bring *that* back?"
  "I believe her," said Kira, "Gimme the shot."
  "Nerys--"
  "If it's all true, imagine what you've been through in the next thirty 
years. I don't want you to go through that sort of thing yet." She took 
the hypospray from Lyne and pressed it against her arm. "There. Happy 
now?"
  Lyne shook her head. "Tell your security teams to be on the lookout 
for a suspicious Bajoran on the third level of the Promenade. This won't 
be over until you catch him. Please? Just do it before you go out 
together for lunch--"
  Odo and Nerys exchanged looks.
  "-- you'll thank me for this, later."

  Lyne couldn't stop the vertiginous feeling of Deja Vu as she watched 
them walk down the Promenade. She knew what they were saying off by 
heart, so she barely had to watch their lips move.
  "Here we go," said Nerys.
  "There *must* be a better way of testing that girl's psychotic story. 
Assassins from the future, hurrumph..."
  "At least if it *doesn't* happen, nothing can go wrong. This stuff is 
completely intert, after all."
  "I'm just worried for you," Now-Odo confessed. "When that bomb went 
off last night, I spent longest two seconds of my life dreading you were 
dead. Promise me you won't do that again."
  Kira Nerys smiled. "You have my sincere word, Constable, that I will 
do everything I can to outlive you."
  Then the shot was fired. Nerys cried out in surprise and collapsed 
from the shock of the dart hitting her. Now-Odo caught her, removing the 
dart in one swift motion.
  "Nerys!" He held her close, and Bashir appeared by their side as 
Now-Odo knelt and gently laid his love down. "Nerys..."
  She was still breathing! Lyne's eyes blurred as she watched Kira Nerys 
open her eyes.
  "See? I told you I'd be alright. I feel very sick though."
  Lyne could barely make out Odo's response, "Good thing we didn't have 
lunch yet." She kept watching until the security teams bought down a 
struggling Bajoran. He was bleeding Vorta blood.
  She pressed her hidden communicator. "It's over, Papa. Kira Nerys will 
live." Lyne watched the couple, and the Promenade around them, dissolve 
into sparks.

  The journey back had been rough. Lyne could tell by just how much her 
head hurt. It was full of two sets of memories, one becoming a fading 
dream even as she surfaced into consciousness.
  Why would she be chest-deep in snow at age eight, when Papa had taught 
her about snowshoes at age three?
  "Did you two have fun in yesteryear?"
  Lyne turned to the voice, and was glad to recognise her adopted Mama, 
the one who had nursed her most when she was blind. "It was weird, 
Mama," she explained, "I remembered a totally different life."
  Papa, by this stage, was as wrapped around his wife as he could get 
and still be humanoid. "Prophets, I missed you, Ale'al..."
  "Yeesh," exclaimed Lyne, "Aren't five kids of your own and three 
adoptees *enough*? I don't *want* a little baby sibling for my birthday 
this year!" She joined in the hug anyway.
  It was going to be great to go home.

End :)

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