When Grand Nagus Zek revises The Rules of Acquisition to be more philanthropic, Quark and Rom start to question whether their leader has gone insane. Meanwhile, when Dr. Bashir is nominated for a prestigious Federation medical award, his reaction is less than enthusiastic.

After being assaulted by an alien thief in the infirmary, Dr. Bashir wakes to discover he has a dual mystery on his hands: what happened to the station while he was unconscious and why is he suddenly aging so rapidly?