Worf grumbles to Kira that Odo seems permissive about Quark’s shady doings.
On a runabout, O’Brien stops himself just before saying he wishes Keiko were more like Bashir.
Plot contrivance particles get the runabout crashed on a planet and the spacebros captured by Jem’Hadar ground forces before the opening credits roll.
The leader Goran’Agar rejects his subordinate’s suggestion to kill them in a tactical exercise.
Back on the station, Sisko reminds Worf he’s not DS9’s chief of security, but the script requires him to leave just enough ambiguity in his friendly advice that we know the B-plot will involve Worf second-guessing the constable.
Goran’Agar says he and his men want to escape their Vorta rulers, who control the supply of the drug they’ve been genetically addicted to. They are keeping Bashir alive not so that he can synthesize more of the drug for them, but rather to cure their addiction. Goran’Agar himself crashed on this planet several years ago, and though he expected to die when he ran out of ketracel white, for some unknown reason, he no longer needs to take the drug.
O’Brien rigs up a techno-thing to disable the guards, but this is way too early in the episode for an escape attempt to work.
Bashir begins to get to know Goran’Agar, and later tells O’Brien their captor is questioning everything he’s been told about the Founders. O’Brien thinks Bashir is being naive.
Bashir pulls rank, and orders O’Brien to retrieve a technical jimberjam from the runabout. Instead, O’Brien beams himself into the surrounding jungle, and puts up a pretty good fight At Bashir’s request, Goran’Agar’s agrees to protect O’Brien from his men.
When O’Brien arrives to rescue Bashir, the doctor won’t leave his research. O’Brien solves that problem handily, but they’re soon captured again. Goran’Agar has a surprising reaction — he lets them go.
Bashir can’t comprehend why Goran’Agar won’t escape with them. Goran’Agar asks O’Brien — the trained soldier — to explain it to Bashir. (That’s a nice bit of empathy in action — the suspicious O’Brien must articulate for Bashir’s benefit Goran’Agar’s noble motive.)
In the B plot, Worf’s eagerness to apprehend a petty criminal botches Odo’s bigger plans, but the constable’s official report omit’s Worf’s role. Sisko encourages Worf to get to know the “shades of gray” that define life on DS9.
In the final scene, Bashir and O’Brien deal with the aftermath of their disagreement. Bashir won’t file charges on O’Brien, but the two friends sharply disagree on the morality of their respective actions.
