Chapter Text
In the beginning, darkness. Then light— blinding, searing, brilliant. Far too brilliant for eyes which had up until that point rested comfortably in the oblivion of half-awareness.
Time had no meaning to her, not yet. She did not know how long she’d been in the incubation chamber. The only existence she’d known until this point was insensate blackness, interrupted only occasionally by brief pulses of neurochemical stimulation and soothing whispers that gently taught her things she didn’t know she had a reason for needing to learn.
In her slowly dawning awareness, she learned that the word for these interruptions was conditioning — that it was meant to prepare her for this exact moment. The moment in which she would be born into the service of the Dominion, and into the world at large. It was all beginning to knit together. There was no randomness to her existence, every element of her design had been constructed with the greatest care. Was there any other species in the universe that was so special, so loved? Was there any other species that—
“There, easy now. Don’t try to move yet. Let me lower the lights for you.”
The lights were lowered, and she found her eyes far more readily adjusting to the decreased brightness. The room was stark white and largely empty, save for her incubation chamber, a table against one wall, and—
Oh.
The room’s other occupant immediately drew her eyes and stole the breath from her (still unused to breathing) lungs. She knew, on sight, what this entity was in relation to her. If they hadn’t told her not to move yet, then she would have fallen to her knees immediately upon exiting the chamber.
The Founder— that was what this being was, she knew that as certainly as she could know anything— stepped closer, and held out a hand to support her in her first steps. Now, that was unexpected. What had she done, so early in her life, to earn the reward of touch? She stared at the offered hand as if contemplating what to do with it.
"I won't hurt you," they coaxed. "You have nothing to fear from me, or from any other of my kind, for as long as you are in my service."
Convinced by their words (for how could one not be convinced by the words of a God), she took the offered hand, stepping out of the incubation chamber on wobbly legs. All the while, she shivered. It was awfully cold in the room, but she didn't know if that was because she was still partially covered in the fluid of the tank or simply because, as her conditioning was quick to remind her, the Founders liked it cold.
A towel was wrapped around her shoulders almost before she realized what was happening, and she reached to pull it tighter around herself. "Good, little one. You're doing so well already." The words of praise were paired with a gentle hand cradling her cheek, a combination that made her reflexively avert her gaze in humility. "Would you like a name?"
There it was. One of the questions that her pre-activation conditioning already seemed to anticipate and know exactly how to respond to. "Only if this servant is worthy of it, Founder," she replied in quiet reverence.
The hand that cradled her face reached to comb through her still-wet hair, and she wasn't sure whether to interpret the gesture as comfort or as reward. "Your name is Cerin, first of your line. You are in my care, under my direct supervision, and will be for the duration of your training and afterwards. Your purpose, once you've been taught all you need to know, will be to aid in repairing relations between the Dominion and the powers of the Alpha Quadrant."
She couldn't help but lean into the gentle, grounding touch. Cerin, she repeated to herself, holding her new name close like the gift that it was.
The Founder paused, and the newly named Cerin could tell that there was more he wanted to say. "My name is— was Odo, before I joined with my people and discovered that I no longer needed it. I am telling you this because I would like it if you came to see me as a caretaker, not a distant and unreachable deity." She didn't know what to make of that. She came into the world knowing that she was beloved by the Founders, but somehow, that hadn't prepared her for the possibility that a Founder could be kind. "Now, Cerin, I'll leave you to get cleaned up and dressed, and then I want you to meet me outside. I'll have a meal prepared for you, and we can talk more about how we're going to proceed."
This new Vorta was the culmination of a plan that Odo had been planting the seeds of for many years, and he was quietly overjoyed that the day had finally come. Convincing the Link to agree to it had been one matter, but then there was the matter of building enough trust within the Alpha Quadrant that the major powers would even consider entertaining the possibility of allowing a Dominion ambassador to sit among them. The only easy part, which was still fairly complicated, was the requisitions. He'd asked for the unactivated first iteration of a newly developed Vorta line, and a ship that was comfortable and spacious enough to provide long-term accommodation to himself, his attendant, and a complement of others, including this new arrival.
The ship was perhaps the most difficult. Dominion vessels were not designed to be comfortable to solids. But he'd managed, because in the end, he was not going to leave the training of the first Dominion representative to the Alpha Quadrant in fifty years to just anyone. No. He only trusted himself with that duty of care.
"Computer, mixed greens salad, rippleberry vinaigrette," he said, after giving some thought to what her first meal after activation should be. It didn't matter too much, but he was hoping that it would mean something to her that he was offering her unique textures and at least one flavor that she could enjoy.
And there she was. He hadn't really gotten the chance to look at her yet. What struck him immediately was how young she looked. If she had been Bajoran or human, he would have assumed that she was no more than ten years old at the most. This was the only iteration of hers that would ever experience anything resembling childhood. She would mature quickly, of course— not as quickly as a Jem'Hadar, but she would be ready for deployment in four or five years. For a brief moment, he found himself wishing that he had a bit longer to spend with her.
She bowed deeply, arms open at her sides. "Founder," she acknowledged, waiting for permission to be seated.
"Please, sit," Odo offered. "I replicated something a bit special for your first meal. I hope that you like it."
Taking her place at the table, she began to pick at the green salad, hesitantly at first but more enthusiastically once she realized that she enjoyed it. “It’s very good indeed. This servant is grateful for the consideration,” she said with a slight smile.
“You’re welcome to browse the replicator menu on your own time. I know that your sense of taste is limited, but texture can be interesting to explore.” Of all the things he’d managed to get used to since rejoining his people, the objectifying impersonality of Dominion Ceremonial dialect was not one of them. If he was going to be responsible for Cerin’s education, that was one of the first things he was going to change. “We’ll be spending a lot of time together during your training. I would…” he paused, pondering how best to approach this without causing her too much distress. Vorta were often incredibly vulnerable to any suggestion that their devotion was being rejected. “I would like it if you spoke to me in Dominion Standard, as you would to a direct superior of your own species. Do you know Standard?”
Cerin tilted her head to the side. That was an unusual request, but she did know Dominion Standard, as well as several other languages, most from Alpha Quadrant species. “I speak it fluently,” she said, switching from Ceremonial to the less formal dialect that he requested. It felt strange to be talking so casually in his presence, but many things had felt strange to her in the short time that she’d been aware and conscious. “Among others. If you’d like, I can list them.”
Odo gave her arm a proud pat, happy to see her adjusting so quickly to his admittedly unorthodox methods. “Perhaps later,” he suggested in his childhood Bajoran, an impromptu test to see if she would recognize it and respond in kind. “For now, I think we should focus on the subject at hand. We still need to discuss plans for your education, after all.”
“Of course, Founder,” she answered, also in Bajoran, though the holy title was spoken in Dominion Standard. The spontaneous challenge made her forget, at least for the time being, about the strangeness of Odo’s request. She was discovering that she liked opportunities to prove herself. “I’m eager to begin.”
In the moments that followed, Odo laid out a plan for the daily schedule of Cerin’s training. There would be time for lessons on the history and comparative philosophy of both the Dominion and the various major powers of the Alpha Quadrant, exercises in political strategy, virtual reality simulations designed to train her in the finer points of interspecies social relations, cultural and linguistic studies, and significantly more time devoted to independent pursuits and leisure than Cerin was expecting.
“The goal of this project is to create an environment which will allow you to grow as a person, not merely as an ambassador,” he explained, noting her confusion. “Things are very different in the Alpha Quadrant, Cerin. Competency in your work will not be enough. To succeed there, you will need to develop yourself beyond the parameters set by your conditioning, and I will be here to help you.”
He left off the part about how this had never been attempted before, and how experiments like this one were an important step in the transition towards a true partnership between the Founders and their servants. The poor girl had enough pressure on her shoulders already without being told that her existence was part of such a colossal restructuring of the order of things.
“I see,” she replied, attempting to internalize this new information as best as she could. She still didn’t particularly understand, but she wanted to. A dutiful servant of the Founders must be willing to become what the Founders need them to be, whispered the voice she dimly remembered from her time in the incubation chamber. Though limited in form and perspective, you must allow your duties to shape you into a version of yourself through which the glory of your Gods can be reflected. Somehow, she doubted that her Founder meant any of that when he talked about allowing her to develop as a person.
That was another thing she was learning about herself. Sometimes, bits of her conditioning just… surfaced, even if she wasn't consciously aware of them before.
Odo must have noticed the faraway look in her eyes, because when she was next reminded of his presence, it was because he'd snapped his fingers in order to bring her back to reality. "Cerin," he said, his voice both strict and concerned. "Care to tell me what's got you so preoccupied?"
Her tail coiled tightly, deferentially, around her legs. "Forgive me, Founder. I'm still not used to being active," she answered, unsure how else to describe what had just happened.
"I can imagine you're not. You've been active for less than an hour. But maintaining focus is an important skill to learn, and one that must be learned from experience." Reaching across the table, he squeezed her hand in a gesture of reassurance. The gesture said I'm not upset with you, you've done nothing wrong. I just want to help you learn. "Are you understimulated? I can see about getting you something discreet and quiet to do with your hands if it would help you pay attention."
Was she understimulated? Obviously not in this specific case, but was that a problem she would have in the future? It was too early to tell. "Is a need for additional stimulation common to my species?"
Odo gave a fond chuckle in response. "Highly, in my experience. I'll see what I can do." Again, he left off the part about how, in the vast majority of cases, such issues were either punished or ignored.
There was one more question on her mind, that she'd been waiting to ask, but wasn't sure if she was allowed to. "Founder?" she ventured, bracing herself to be reprimanded for impertinence. "May I ask an unrelated question?"
"You can always ask questions, Cerin."
"Are there—" she paused, wondering whether she should go through with it or not, before ultimately deciding to trust that nothing bad would come of her asking. She'd never met another of her kind before. All she knew was the preconceived notion, shaped almost entirely by her conditioning, of what a Vorta should act like and concern themself with. She needed to compare that to reality, the same way she had been able to compare her preconceptions of the Founders to what she'd seen from Odo. "Are there other Vorta on the ship?"