Dr. Mora Pol, the Bajoran scientist who studied Odo and first discovered that Odo is a living creature, arrives on DS9 to enlist the shapeshifter's help in another research endeavor - this time a journey into the Gamma Quadrant to investigate a world that may once have harbored beings similar in nature to Odo. Finding only the ruins of some past civilization at first, the away team also find some local flora that appear to bear some resemblance to Odo. A geological upheaval on the planet sends the members of the away team scrambling for cover from suffocating natural gases. After returning to their runabout and going back to the station, most of them wind up recovering in the infirmary recovering from gas inhalation. Only Odo appears to be unaffected, which is fortunate since something the away team has brought back from the Gamma Quadrant would appear to be lose aboard DS9 - something with abilities remarkably similar to Odo's.
