Empok Nor ( episode ) Scavenging an abandoned Cardassian space station identical to DS9 for equipment , O ' Brien ' s team discovers that the station may not be completely abandoned . Summary . Teaser . Kira , Dax , and Worf enter Quark ' s to find it strangely empty – and the reason soon becomes apparent . No one is able to hear themselves think over the horrible noise resulting from Chief O ' Brien and Nog doing some conduit repairs . The repairs are heavy and O ' Brien soon realizes that he will need an entirely new plasma distribution manifold . Unfortunately , the manifolds are of Cardassian manufacture and cannot be replicated . A team is assembled to scavenge manifolds from the abandoned station of Empok Nor , which is identical in design to Deep Space 9 . Because it is standard for Cardassians to plant booby trap s whenever they abandon an area , Sisko recruits an outside resource to join the mission as the minesweeper : Elim Garak . The rest of the crew comprises O ' Brien , Nog and four other Starfleet crewmembers : Pechetti , Boq ' ta , Stolzoff , and Amaro . Act One . In the runabout traveling to the station Nog and Garak play the Cardassian board - game Kotra . Garak scolds Nog for playing too defensively , he explains that this is an un - Cardassian style , and that the game is about bold maneuvers and sweeping attacks . While en route to the station , Garak brings up O ' Brien ' s past as a soldier in the Federation - Cardassian War , which O ' Brien is hesitant to discuss . They soon arrive at Empok Nor . After Garak disarms the airlock booby trap and restores emergency power to the station , O ' Brien quickly dispatches his teams for the salvage operation . Nevertheless , tension slowly begins to build when two Cardassians left on the abandoned station wake up in their stasis tubes as emergency power is restored . A little while after , Garak and Boq ' ta find the stasis tubes in the infirmary – two are empty , and one contains the skeleton of a Cardassian who died approximately one year before . The stasis tubes are partly filled with an unknown blue biogenic substance . Boq ' ta picks up a regimental badge , which Garak quickly recognizes as the Third Battalion of the First Order . He then alarms the crewman that the other tubes have opened recently . Regarding the discovery , Garak contacts the O ' Brien team to have him come to the infirmary . Nog goes back to the runabout to get a tool , however , he instead witnesses it from the airlock , adrift in space and then exploding . Act Two . The group concludes that the former occupants of the cells are loose on the station with unfriendly intentions . When a dampening field hindering subspace communication is suddenly activated , they understand that their new priority is to contact DS9 for evacuation . It is decided to use the deflector grid to send a series of covariant pulse s . For efficiency , they split again into three teams . The first team , composed of Stolzoff and Pechetti , is ordered to the habitat ring to bring the microfusion generator back online . Boq ' ta and Amaro are to realign the magnetic flow field , and O ' Brien will activate a signal generator in cargo bay 4 with Garak and Nog . In the cargo bay , Garak suspects something else is going on , for the lengths the Cardassians went to for an abandoned station don ' t make sense to him . As he and O ' Brien talk , however , Nog sneaks around on guard , and doesn ' t see the Cardassian in the shadows . He ' s ready to make a move on Nog when O ' Brien calls him back . Meanwhile , Pechetti and Stolzoff are working on the Promenade when they hear a door close upstairs . The turbolift descends , and they get ready when the doors open , but no one is there . Soon , though , they ' re distracted and killed . When O ' Brien arrives on the death scene , he realizes they had the time to do a pretty complete job . Act Three . O ' Brien needs to finish Pechetti ' s job and then get back to the cargo bay . He orders Boq ' ta and Amaro to reconfigure the pulse generator in Auxiliary Control . Boq ' ta is reluctant to split up , so O ' Brien convinces him by having Garak go with him . Garak , however , announces he intends to go after the Cardassians . O ' Brien agrees , since he seems confidant , and stands Amaro down from holding his rifle on Garak . Garak strangely prods O ' Brien a bit more about being a soldier , insisting on inviting the " hero of Setlik III " ( O ' Brien ) to join his fight . O ' Brien sends him off . Garak , at a computer terminal , finds he cannot access it . He senses someone close , and keeps pretending to access it . Hiding in the broken stasis chamber , he succeeds in disabling a Cardassian , though he oddly says to himself it felt good . After running an analysis on the body , he learns that the soldier had been given a massive dose of a psychotropic drug . Garak opines that it appears to be a failed experiment to enhance Cardassians ' xenophobic tendencies , turning already - fanatical soldiers into unstable killing machines . He informs O ' Brien of his discovery , but his strange behavior causes O ' Brien to observe that Garak doesn ' t have the face of a tailor anymore . Garak leaves to go after the other Cardassian . Garak goes on with his task and finds the other Cardassian stalking Boq ' ta and Amaro , but is unable to prevent the death of Boq ' ta when Amaro ' s back is turned . Amaro sees Garak kill him and is relieved , however , Garak finally loses control and succumbs to the effects of the psychotropic drug . Garak stabs Amaro with a flux coupler . Act Four . O ' Brien finishes his task and tries to contact the others , but gets no response . He finds Amaro just in time for him to say Garak killed him . Nog gets nervous as O ' Brien immediately goes on guard . He realizes Garak is under the influence of the drug . Since Garak knows their objective of contacting DS9 , O ' Brien doesn ' t see a choice other than going after him , killing him if that ' s what it takes . Insane , Garak turns his attention towards the only other remaining members of the salvage party : O ' Brien and Nog . He comes across a Kotra board in the station commander ' s office and , also finding a communicator , signals for O ' Brien . He reflects over to O ' Brien on the relevance of Kotra ' s aggressive play style to their current predicament . A cat - and - mouse ( or Kotra ) game follows . O ' Brien sneaks into the commander ' s office while Nog enters Ops . However , O ' Brien is soon trapped in the office and Garak jumps on Nog , grabbing the phaser and capturing him . He tells O ' Brien he ' ll have to come get Nog from him . Act Five . O ' Brien tries to find a way out of the office , but then the door opens , allowing him into Ops . Garak taunts him over the communicator , excited by the " game " while O ' Brien tries to reason with him . Garak continues to push O ' Brien on his experience on Setlik III , saying he enjoyed killing Cardassians and wants to recapture that feeling . O ' Brien finally proposes a hand - to - hand duel , and Garak readily agrees . O ' Brien makes his way through the Promenade , finding his crew ' s bodies hanging from the second level . He soon finds Garak holding Nog with a rifle , and they both disarm in a tense situation . O ' Brien also puts down his tricorder . They begin fighting , and Garak is winning and taunting him . Garak is partly blinded by the drug , but the Chief incapacitates him using a simple trap ( a tricorder - phaser bomb ) . He finds it did not kill him . Later , in the infirmary on DS9 , Garak ' s system is purged of the drug . Garak expresses extreme regret for his actions and asks O ' Brien to personally apologize on his behalf to Amaro ' s wife . O ' Brien agrees , then says that there will have to be an inquest , but O ' Brien will make sure that the board knows Garak wasn ' t responsible for his actions . Memorable quotes . " " Welcome to Empok Nor . " " " " Thanks for having us . . . " " " " Take whatever you need . . . my house is your house . " " " " He asked me to get a coil spanner for him , I just turned my back for a second . " " " " That ' s a shame . And the worst part of it is , this isn ' t a coil spanner . " " ( stabs Amaro ) " " It ' s a flux coupler . " " " " Looking for me ? Oh , that felt - good . " " " " You look different . That ' s not the face of a tailor . " " " " I ' m not a tailor . Not for the moment anyway . " " " " Maybe it ' s true . Maybe you ' re not a soldier anymore . " " " " You ' re right . I ' m an engineer . " " " " Asking a Ferengi to play a Cardassian game is like asking a Klingon to chew with his mouth closed . " " Links and references . References . airlock ; Amaro ' s wife ; Barrica encampment ; beta - matrix compositor ; biogenic compound ; booby trap ; bypass displacer ; Cardassian s ; Cardassian vole ; Cardassian High Command ; Cardie ; coil spanner ; covariant pulse ; dampening field ; deflector grid ; DNA ; docking clamp ; Dukat ; emblem s ; Empok Nor ; EPS matrix converter ; Federation ; Federation - Cardassian War ; Ferengi ; field coil s ; fighter pilot s ; First Order ; flux coupler ; holosuite ; hyper spanner ; infirmary ; inquest ; insignia ; Klingon restaurant ; kotra ; microfusion reactor ; motto ; nervous system ; optronic coupler ; pattern scrambler ; phase decompiler ; phase discriminator ; plasma distribution manifold ; plasma recoiler ; polarity maximizer ; Promenade ; psychotropic drug ; pylon ; Quark ' s ; regimental badge ; rib s ; Rom ; root beer ; runabout ; salvage team ; Setlik III ; smoke signal s ; SOS ; spoon head ; Starfleet Academy ; stasis tube ; strangulation ; subspace transceiver ; telegraph ; Third Battalion ; Til ' amin froth ; tissue sample ; tricorder ; Trivas system ; wish list ;