Thank you! I would've liked to see more of Julian's reactions in that episode, too, even though it was primarily about O'Brien. I can't imagine how it would feel coming in and seeing your friend with a "gun" to his head, knowing if you can't talk him down, you're about to witness something that will screw you up for a very long time, if not forever, and lose somebody so important to you.

The O'Brien moment made sense to me where it was and in the context of what was happening, since it was something I had been hinting at a little bit all along. It felt like the right place to give that some resolution. They're not really my ship, either. I saw enough connection between them in the show to want to play around with that a little bit anyway without fully *going there*. Thus, unrequited love. :( Sad.

I dunno. He read pretty paranoid to me in the show, to the point of taking a phaser with him into the holosuite, so I decided to play with that, ratchet it up a little bit. He also never seemed to understand her attraction to him, even after they had spent a good deal of time together. His bad history with Dukat colored a lot of what he was seeing. I hope you wind up enjoying where it goes with those two. It's not an icky place. :D

I'm glad you had a chance to sit back, relax, and read. Thanks so much for the review!