A Simple Investigation

*** (3 stars out of 5)

The station's new cat burglar Arissa doesn't trust policemen, which she attributes to growing up on Finnea Prime.  In her defence, the Finnean ambassadors DO seem like horrible people. Wait, those are hired goons.

Arissa has a dataport, the little cyberpunk! Odo thinks the implanted computer access devices ought to be illegal, since they're often used to find information people don't want other people to know. Or, in her case, to work as a Net-Girl. In case you're considering a new career outside that nice, safe Federation Utopia, a net-girl has nothing to do with hockey: she sells access to her mind. It's a job that makes Assistant Crack Whore sound like a step up.

Hannah Bates' Identical Ex-Prostitute Cousin was trying to contact an Idanian (they make spiced pudding, you know) on a search for the daughter she gave up 15 years ago.  She's trying to get all Jenny Neumonic on the station's computers, but Odo's got plenty of protection. But enough about sex, let's talk firewalls!

I'm just kidding, this episode is all about Odo getting it on. Practicing his undercover skills. Dusting her for fingerprints. Providing complimentary pat downs. I can't think of any other law enforcement nookie innuendos. Something with handcuffs? Nah, the moment's gone.

Odo persuades his semi-reformed love bunny into testifying against her crook boss Draim of the Orion Syndicate. But who's playing who? What's up with what? And how shall we avoid the hired goons?

"A Simple Investigation" has a cool twist. Which I have barely managed to resist telling you. The hints lie in the words cyberpunk, Neumonic, and erased memories. Crap, I wasn't going to mention erased memories. Too late! Also, Odo loses his humanoid virginity. Idanians enjoy their pudding, but there's always room for Jell-O.

Necessary Evil

***** (5 stars out of 5)

If a Bajoran femme fatale has a big gaudy earring, is that like a human with a ruby-studded crucifix for a necklace? I guess I never wondered that before.

Odo never kept a log before Sisko insisted. From his perspective that's why humans invented more and more ways to store their journals and lists microscopically: "Otherwise their records would overrun all known civilization." To that end, his first entry is 'Everything's Under Control'. If only I could master Odo's brevity, my blog would just say 'Superlative Episode. Go hug your family.'

Rom is a much better thief and tech guy than Quark expected. With electronic skeleton key and magnacite drops to eat through duranium, the femme fatale's list of eight blackmailing names is theirs! Quark also receives a free trip to a coma courtesy of a Bajoran hit man, and a free ride on the anti-gravity gurney Bashir somehow got working now that Melora doesn't need it.

Sisko and Odo play good cop, gestapo cop with 'grief-stricken' Rom. But there was a time when Odo was the good cop, and "gestapo" was not mere tasteless hyperbole.

Ever wondered what Terok Nor was like back in 2365? Not a vacation spot.

Recently having shed himself of the Bajoran Center for Science, sullen young Odo is brought in as an investigator by the tyrant Dukat. Odo has been a neutral observer and resolver of disputes, and if the shifter finds the murderer of the station's chemist Vaatrik, Dukat won't have to 'solve' the problem by killing ten Bajorans at random. This is also how Dukat solves plumbing problems and long lines at the movies.

The widow Vaatrik (Quark's future femme fatale) fingers Kira (not like that!) for the deed. Sullen young Kira just lost a job in a replicator plant for hitting a supervisor who came on to her. Grilled by Colombodo, Kira says she's hoping to get a job at Quark's rather than wind up in the mines. Quark breaks that alibi pretty quickly. She didn't pay him enough for a spine that functions in front of Hitler Lizard. Kira confesses that she sabotaged Ore Processing for the underground... and since that's technically not his case, Odo lets her escape.

Back in the present, the truth comes out: Kira's confession back then was really her alibi. She did kill the collaborator Vaatrik. Was lying to Odo about it somehow worse than the crime itself? (Please put your responses in the form of a baked apple pie.)

"Necessary Evil" brings us Odo's nearly genetic devotion to justice, a closer look at Kira's misdeeds, and the recognition that under Dukat nobody was exactly doing the right thing.