Nog does little but listen to Vic Fontaine's rendition of "I'll Be Seeing You" on repeat. Bashir played it at the battle of AR-558, and he finds some comfort in it. His roommate Jake finally snaps and steals the music chip, telling him to listen to it in a holosuite from now on. Nog promptly does so, and Vic Fontaine happily runs through 15 variations on the song before taking a break. Still not better, Nog confesses that he doesn't want to go back to his life. Vic invites him to stay in his suite in the Las Vegas hotel. Naturally, Nog's friends are stunned by him now living in a holosuite, but Ezri convinces everyone to let this play out and asks Vic to help ease Nog back into the real world.
Vic starts by gifting Nog a new holographic cane, modeled on Errol Flynn's, but he cautions Nog about its fragility. Nog assures him that he doesn't need to put his full weight on his cane. The crooner then starts finding things to get Nog's mind off his troubles, like his own financial problems, old Earth films, and his shows. However, it doesn't go well at first. When Jake visits with a date, Nog takes offense at her staring at his leg. It culminates in Nog throwing a table on Jake, prompting Vic to throw the Ferengi out. Afterwards, with a little heart-to-heart, Vic is finally able to switch Nog's mind to something else: his bookkeeping.
Nog throws himself into the project of expanding Vic's holographic business. He's soon running around with barely any thought to his leg. But Nog's loved ones realize that he's descending deeper and deeper into the fantasy. Ezri finally confronts Vic and tells him that it's time to pull Nog out. The crooner becomes crestfallen when he realizes that their time will draw to a close.
In their suite, Vic finally tells Nog that it's time to go, but the Ferengi will hear none of it. Vic says that running so long has given him an appreciation for life, so he knows that Nog deserves a real life, not a hollow, holographic fiction. Against the ensign's pleas, Vic turns his own program off. When Nog tries ripping apart the holosuite to turn him back on, Vic finally reappears, and Nog begs him not to send him back. He's afraid he'll get killed in this war. He thought he would be alright, but he's more scared than he's ever been. The hologram delivers some wise words to Nog: "All I can tell you is that you've got to play the cards life deals you. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, but at least you're in the game." With this, Nog finally returns to the real world. As a thanks to Vic, he arranges to have the program run 26 hours a day.
This episode contains examples of:
- Artificial Limbs: Nog has received a biosynthetic leg and isn't happy about it.
- Bait-and-Switch: We were previously told that Nog might not be a candidate for a biosynthetic leg replacement due to his injuries. When we first see him in this episode, he's limping stiffly on a new leg, suggesting that it's an inferior prosthesis. However, he then reveals that he does have a biosynthetic leg that is "working perfectly," but his PTSD is making him feel pain whenever he puts weight on it.
- Batman Gambit: Vic keeps fussing over his tax returns, counting on the fact that Nog will eventually volunteer to do them for him. He does.
- Bloodless Carnage: Nog is surprised to see it in the climax of Shane, having experienced real battle for himself.
- Breaking Speech: A gentler version. It's Ezri who eventually gets through to Vic that he can't keep letting Nog do this to himself.
- Continuity Overlap: Possible example. "It's Only a Paper Moon" was the first episode of the series to premiere after the release of Star Trek: Insurrection. While the events of the film technically aren't acknowledged here, it is worth noting that Worf vanishes from the episode after the Teaser. Worf is also likewise absent from the next two episodes ("Prodigal Daughter" and "The Emperor's New Cloak"). So, it's possible this absence is meant to chronologically sync up the film with the show and that Worf's left the station to assist the security upgrade of the Manzar colony (and become caught up in the Ba'ku incident).
- A Day in the Limelight: This is the only Star Trek episode entirely focused on two characters who are not in the main cast, though Nog is the most prolific character not in the main cast.
- Do Androids Dream?: Or holograms, in this case. When Vic (whose sentient status is never clear to anyone, including himself) tells Nog he's going to bed, Nog asks him if he dreams. Vic's only response is to smile and say, "Goodnight, kid."
- Dude, Where's My Respect?: Bashir gets more and more upset when Jake, Leeta, and Rom say that Nog trapping himself in the Vegas program is better than him going to the Alamo, spy, or Viking programs. All of these are Julian's, and it seems that everybody thinks they are all ridiculous.
- Enforced Technology Levels: Nog asks Vic where his computer is when he agrees to help him with his bookkeeping, and Vic hands him a pencil.Vic: It's 1962. What do you want from me?
- Flipping the Table: Nog does this to Jake when he starts hitting him.
- Get Out!: Nog forcefully tries to get Jake and his date to leave when she inadvertently offends him by staring at his leg. Once Vic breaks up the fight, he tells Nog to take a hike.Vic: You don't come into my club and start hitting customers. Now get out before I throw you out.
- Got Volunteered: Quark.Quark: And just who is going to pay for all this holodeck time? [everyone slowly looks at him] I guess I am.Sisko: And that's very generous of you, Quark!
- Group Hug: Rom, Leeta, and Quark all embrace Nog when he finally leaves the holosuite.
- Hold Your Hippogriffs: Nog calls Vic's club a "latinum mine" rather than a gold mine.
- I'm a Doctor, Not a Placeholder: When Nog asks O'Brien if Vic has free will, O'Brien shrugs it off with "I'm an engineer, not a philosopher."
- I'm Having Soul Pains: A downplayed example: after having his leg replaced with a biosynthetic prosthesis, Nog reports feeling pain in his new leg that causes him to walk with a limp. The pain receptors in his leg aren't causing it, though: the pain is psychosomatic.
- I'm Standing Right Here: During the conference early on, after Ezri suggests Nog living with Vic may be a good sign.Quark: How can hiding in one of Julian's adolescent programs be a good sign?
Bashir: Hey!
Jake: It could be worse. He could be hiding in the Alamo program.
Leeta: Or that ridiculous secret agent program.
Bashir: Hey!
Rom: Or that stupid Viking program.
Bashir: Hey! - Intimidating Revenue Service: Fontaine is having trouble with the IRS. Nog straightens things out and discovers that they owe him a large refund.
- NEET: What Nog basically turns into. Completely locked away from the real world.
- New Powers as the Plot Demands: Vic gains the ability to prevent himself from being activated. O'Brien just handwaves it, saying that Vic is an unusual program.
- Odd Friendship: Vic Fontaine maybe isn't the first guy you think of when you think of Nog's most trusted confidantes, but for several days, they're inseparable.
- Rules Lawyer: Ezri tries to assert her authority as Nog's counselor to kick him out of the holosuite, but Vic and Nog correctly point out that he's on medical leave and so not currently under her authority.
- Shell-Shocked Veteran: Nog - he tells Vic he thought he was invincible, but when he lost his leg, he realized for the first time that he really could die.
- Shout-Out: Vic describes himself as "smarter than the average bear". Darren provided the singing voice for Yogi Bear in The Movie Hey There, It's Yogi Bear!.
- Throwing Off the Disability: It's played with, in that everybody but Nog realizes that he doesn't really need a cane and his problem is entirely psychosomatic. Vic gives him one that looks fancier, but can't support his weight as a way to wean him off of it.
- Title Drop: Courtesy of a song that Vic sings during a Time-Passes Montage. And it's naturally a Meaningful Name too, since the song is about things that are artificial or fake compared to the real thing, which both reflects the nature of Vic and his program and Nog's psychosomatic problems (though of course the latter do have genuine real-world effects).
- Tough Love: It's only after a talk with Ezri that Vic realizes that he can't keep enabling Nog, and he eventually, to Nog's horror, deactivates himself and the program.
- What the Hell, Hero?: After Nog attacks Jake in Vic's lounge, Vic chews him out and tells him to get out before Vic throws him out.
