While attending a dinner prepared by Commander Sisko, Jadzia Dax finds an electronic piano once played by Jake. While the others enjoy the food, Jadzia continues to try to play a piece that is floating around in mind. Later, she starts to have hallucinations about a mysterious cloaked figure wearing a mask. A check-up reveals that her connection with the symbiont is growing weaker. Commander Sisko and Doctor Bashir return with Jadzia Dax to Trill to find out from the host doctors what is going on.
When the Cardassian occupation of Bajor ended in 2369, the mining space station Terok Nor was left abandoned, its systems ripped out. By invitation of the Bajoran provisional government, Starfleet stepped in to oversee the rebuilding and day-to-day operations of the newly christened Deep Space Nine.
The years of Starfleet's nonintervention into Cardassian matters, however, had taken its toll on relations with the Bajorans. Consequently, Starfleet's position was a tenuous one; many Bajorans, suspicious and hostile as a result of decades of Cardassian oppression and brutality, did not greet the Federation's presence with open arms. The Federation's assistance is put to the test as DS9 becomes a center of travel and commerce that stretches into the Gamma Quadrant.