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| - Picard goes undercover as merchantman “Dixon Hill” on Oblivion, an unaligned space station cobbled together from myriad derelict spacecraft and located near Ubarrak and Cardassian space. His mission is to retrieve Nuadra Demmix, a Zartani individual with vital technical data on Ubarrak spacecraft. This intel would allow Starfleet to easily defeat the Ubarrak war fleet, thus allowing it to concentrate its defenses on the increasingly threatening Cardassian border. Demmix’s wife and daughters were killed by the Ubarrak and he since has dedicated his life to their defeat, though he refuses to meet anyone but his old friend, Jean-Luc Picard, forcing the captain to undertake this mission alone. On the station, Picard first meets a mysterious and strangely intuitive woman named Guinan. She, howe
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| abstract
| - Picard goes undercover as merchantman “Dixon Hill” on Oblivion, an unaligned space station cobbled together from myriad derelict spacecraft and located near Ubarrak and Cardassian space. His mission is to retrieve Nuadra Demmix, a Zartani individual with vital technical data on Ubarrak spacecraft. This intel would allow Starfleet to easily defeat the Ubarrak war fleet, thus allowing it to concentrate its defenses on the increasingly threatening Cardassian border. Demmix’s wife and daughters were killed by the Ubarrak and he since has dedicated his life to their defeat, though he refuses to meet anyone but his old friend, Jean-Luc Picard, forcing the captain to undertake this mission alone. On the station, Picard first meets a mysterious and strangely intuitive woman named Guinan. She, however, remembers meeting a future version of Picard in 1893, when the older Picard risked his own life and mission to save her. Unfortunately, this Guinan is still despondent following the loss of her homeworld to the Borg and having been painfully wrenched from the complete joy of the Nexus. She believes that Picard can again be her salvation. Meanwhile, the Stargazer crew awaits their captain’s return. Cole Paris walks into Jiterica, literally, while she is out of her containment suit. The encounter makes Paris rather awkward around his friend, though he ultimately decides to pursue a more romantic relationship with the Nizhrak, having enjoyed the intimacy he experienced when immersed within her true form. Nikolas is listless and despairing following his loss of the alternate Gerda Idun Asmund. He shirks his duties and gets into fights with Lt. Hanta while rejecting any of his shipmates’ efforts to improve his mood. Ulelo finds his loyalties divided between new friend Emily Bender and his mysterious benefactors, whom he has been secretly supplying with intelligence reports. Just as Picard is about to make his rendezvous with Demmix, their meeting place is bombed. Picard is fingered as the responsible party and is arrested by station security commander Steej, while Demmix flees. Guinan breaks Picard out of confinement and the pair alters their appearances to that of bald, purple Cataxxans. The pair tries to track down Demmix, though they are not alone in their pursuit. A Cardassian team, led by Enabran Tain, also hopes to find the Zartani and profit from his intelligence. They notice Picard and Guinan and follow them, expecting that they will lead them to their quarry. Similarly, Steej and his security staff search for the escaped Picard, his new companion, and later his target, Demmix. Both Steej and Tain eventually realize that Picard and Guinan have disguised themselves and expand their search to include a pair of Cataxxans. Steej’s men eventually find and arrest Guinan, and though Picard escapes, he is captured soon after by the Cardassians. Picard convinces Tain that he does not know Demmix’s location but that Guinan does, coercing the Cardassians to help him break Guinan out of confinement. As soon as Guinan is freed, she and Picard slip free of Tain’s men, and finally track down the Zartani informant. The reunion is short-lived, as the Cardassians confront and disarm Picard, Guinan and Demmix, though Guinan intuits that Demmix is lying about his information. The Zartani shakes one of the station’s component ships free from the rest of the structure and imprisons everyone else inside a force-field. He reveals that he has come to believe that his grief entitles him to some recompense, and that the Ubarrak have agreed to pay him handsomely for delivering a Starfleet captain into their waiting hands. Several well-informed Cardassians should supply him with a sizable bonus as well. Guinan destroys the compartment’s environmental systems, forcing Demmix to drop the force-field lest his bounty suffocate. Picard takes the opportunity to disarm his former friend and disable the vessel’s shields. Tain kills his subordinates in order to take all the credit for himself, then threatens to kill Picard, but the captain, Guinan, and Demmix are resuced by the Stargazer. Tain is left with a months-long journey back to Cardassian space, during which he intends to spin the failed mission in his favor. Picard decides not to prosecute Demmix under Federation law, instead opting to leave him on an unaligned planet where the Ubarrak may find their failed operative and exact their own punishment. He finds comfort from Demmix’s betrayal in a new friendship with Guinan.
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