They were created to be killing machines. Highly intelligent, resourceful, and deceptively complex, the Jem'Hadar are a species engineered for war and programmed at the genetic level for one purpose: to fight until death as soldiers of the sprawling stellar empire known as the Dominion. No Jem'Hadar has ever lived 30 years, and not even their masters, the shape-shifting Founders, know what such a creature is capable of becoming were it to be freed of its servitude.

In this action-packed adventure from David Mack, one of the Jem'Hadar elders lashes out against Odo and his other Deep Space Nine allies - and leads the Defiant to a series of shocking discoveries.