“The weapon, please,” he said.
Mechter stared back at him and did not move a muscle.
“No weapons on the Promenade,” Odo said. Behind him, he heard Steyn start laughing.
“I’d do what he says if I were you, Mechter,” she said. “Unless you want to take that bunch on as well.” She nodded back toward the security team, who were watching the exchange with a certain amount of professional interest. Mechter contemplated them for a moment, as if gauging his chances and then, with ill grace, he reached into his jacket, pulled out the weapon, and surrendered it to Odo.
“Thank you,” said Odo. “You can get it back when you leave the station.” He went back over to Steyn. “Is he likely to accompany you to Quark’s?” he murmured, examining the little pistol and noting its weight and impeccable pedigree.
Steyn pulled a face. “I can almost guarantee it. Can’t seem to shake him off.”
“I can imagine his employers might take that amount of latinum very seriously.”
“Probably almost as seriously as I do. I’ve had enough trouble with this job, and I want it finished up….” She frowned at Mechter’s back.
“At least you must be making a good fee from it—”
“I should be so lucky,” she replied, glumly. “I’m not making a damned thing out of any of this. Not to mention the cost of repairs.”
“I beg your pardon?” Odo gave her a puzzled look. “I’m not sure that I understand—”
“Well, not to get into the extremely complicated details—”
“However complicated, I am always very interested in listening to details, Captain Steyn,” Odo said, “as you have no doubt already ascertained.”
“Well,” Steyn said, giving him a shrewd look, “I’m afraid I’m not particularly eager to relate them.”
Odo inclined his head. That was, of course, Steyn’s privilege. Should the truncated story she told prove of interest, Odo had his own methods of filling in detail.
“So,” Steyn carried on, “let’s just say that I made something of a miscalculation a little while back. And as a result I owe Mechter’s employers…” She frowned. “Well, let’s just say that I owe them. And this trip is part of the payment. Just my kind of luck to get stuck with this job.” She turned back to Odo and gave him a bright smile. “Anyway, this bar you were telling me about. Any games there?”
“What kind of games were you thinking of playing, Captain Steyn?”
“Oh, I wasn’t thinking of playing anything!” she laughed. “I told you—I’ve got no luck.” She nodded over at her silent crewman. “But Auger likes a game of chance.”
Quark watched with fascination as the cavalcade surrounding the latinum progressed past the bar in a very stately fashion, and slowly on along the Promenade. He turned to Dax, standing with him at the sealed door of the bar. “Where do you think shapeshifters go when they die?” he said to her. “To the Great Link in the Sky?”
“What makes you think they go anywhere?” Dax said. “They’re gods already, don’t forget.”
“That,” Quark replied, “is something that is definitely a matter of perspective—”
Dax quirked an eyebrow at him. “What, I wonder, could be making you so metaphysical this morning?”
“Look at all that!” Quark pointed at the last of the security guards—stern-faced and heavily armed—as they went past the area just outside of the bar. “I haven’t seen so much security on the Promenade since the Cardassians were running the place. If there is a changeling heaven, Odo must be in it right now.”
“How about the sight of all that latinum?” Dax said slyly. “That must be like seeing the Divine Treasury set up next door.”
“Take it from me,” Quark said, “I can imagine a lot more latinum than that.”
“But I can imagine it must pose a temptation…” Dax said. “So close, and yet so far….”
Quark looked back at her with a shocked expression. “Commander,” he said, “are you saying what I think you’re saying?”
“I’m just saying it must be tempting—”
“And I’m saying that it’s not.”
She gave him a disbelieving look.
“Have I ever lied to you?” he said, in an injured tone.
“Let me see,” she laughed. “How about every time we play tongo?”
“That’s different—”
“So you’re telling me, Quark,” she said, “that you have absolutely no designs on all that latinum?”
“I have absolutely no designs on all that latinum.”
Dax moved a little closer to him. He found himself staring at her thick dark hair.
“And what about your friends?” she said.
“My friends?” He looked at the patterns made by the marks that so delicately lined her neck.
“People who come in and out of the bar,” she said, reaching out and straightening his collar for him. “Who want to talk and tell somebody their business. I know you’re always willing to lend an ear to people like that, Quark.”
Quark looked into the depths of her dazzling eyes and sighed. Females, he thought. They always were my downfall. “So,” he murmured to her, “you want to know all of my secrets?”
Jadzia gave him her most beautiful smile.
Quark returned it with a smile considerably less beautiful, but easily as cunning.
“Then you shouldn’t have married the Klingon,” he said.
Dax burst out laughing. She pressed a fingertip against her lips and then tapped it against Quark’s nose. “It’s going to be a stressful few days,” she said. “Try to leave Odo alone.”
“He’d hate it if I did,” he replied.
Dax checked the door. The locks had been released. “Goodbye, Quark,” she said, still laughing as she left.
Quark went back to the bar, still with a smile on his face. It broadened when he saw two new people come in. They looked like they were bringing a whole array of opportunities with them.
First came a woman, human, more than a little frayed around the seams, and Quark did not miss how her eye fell straight on the dabo table. He knew the type, welcomed them with open arms. They were the kind that never failed to turn opportunity into profit…for Quark, that was. Walking just a little behind was a young man—still a boy, really—who was staring around the bar as if it was the most remarkable sight he had ever seen. Quark knew his type too: fresh-faced, trusting…the pockets were usually light, but that did not, in Quark’s opinion, make them any less worth emptying.
“So,” Quark murmured, looking fondly from one to the other as they came toward the bar, “what do we have here?”
A very small matter, but nonetheless Garak seemed to be taking his time to ask about it, Sisko thought. He examined the bowl of the spoon with more interest than it merited, looking at his own face, upside down. Garak had not referred to Vreenak even in passing since their conversation, but surely all these Romulans must have been keeping the matter at the forefront of his mind too…and Sisko knew Garak had been watching him very closely all day.
“Am I correct in thinking,” Garak said, at last, “that there is some sort of reception being held this evening?”
Sisko looked at him in surprise. He had been assuming this would be another series of leading questions about Ross and Batanides. “That’s right,” he said cautiously. “Councillor Huang is holding it at her embassy.” He glanced at Garak. “She has been one of the councillors most supportive of continuing the war. When the peace initiative was underway before the Romulans joined the alliance, Huang was one of its main critics.”
“You may assume, Captain,” Garak said, “that I have taken the trouble to find out exactly who she is.” Then he lightened his tone again. “Now, as I understand it, the idea behind this event is to foster dialogue between all the conference attendees. A very fine goal and I, for one, am all for fostering dialogue. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again—Cardassians excel at conversation.”
S
isko frowned. “Are you going where I think you are with this, Garak?”
Garak smiled back. “Well, I would like to come along this evening, if that’s what you mean.”
Sisko snorted. “After that fiasco the other night? Why the hell would I let you anywhere near this reception?”
“Oh come, Captain.” Garak frowned back at him. “You and I both know that was just an unfortunate series of misunderstandings. Opinions expressed in the wrong place and at the wrong time. Which brings me to my point—”
Sisko threw the spoon into his own cup with rough impatience. It landed there with a clatter. “At last,” he said.
“I hear that the leaders of the antiwar campaign have also been invited to this little soirée. Which means that…Tomas Roeder will be there this evening.”
“I should think he would be, yes,” Sisko said. “He’s the most high-profile member of the campaign after all.”
“Indeed he is. And I,” Garak tapped his chest, “am one of the few Cardassians on Earth. So—in the professed interests of fostering dialogue—I would very much like to meet him.”
Sisko leaned an elbow on the table and looked across at him. Garak’s expression was bland, polite, and thoroughly inscrutable.
“Why all this sudden interest in Roeder?” Sisko said suspiciously.
“I’d hardly say it was sudden,” Garak pointed out. “I did want to hear him express his views at the meeting the other night, remember. It’s just that…the way things turned out I didn’t exactly get to hear much of them.”
“You really only have yourself to blame for that.”
“Forgive me for being so unfamiliar with your customs, Captain,” Garak replied, with an attempt at penitence that was blatant in its falsity. “I am after all a very long way from home.”
Sisko began to laugh. What had Ross said? Might as well enjoy ourselves. Making polite conversation to conference delegates who were only talking to him in the hope he might inadvertently let something slip rated very low on Sisko’s list of entertainments. Watching a conversation between Garak and Roeder had at least something to recommend it. So long as Garak wasn’t up to something…
Sisko looked thoughtfully at the tailor, still smiling blandly. Garak had managed to cause quite a scene at the rally the other night, but Sisko suspected that had more to do with his frustration with Rhemet than with any hidden agenda. Perhaps he’d gotten that out of his system now. Perhaps this was a genuinely innocent request…if Garak was constitutionally capable of making a genuinely innocent request.
“I was under the impression,” Sisko said, rubbing a finger along the side of his nose, “that the security team assigned to you had requested that you not go any further than the HQ building.”
“In its immeasurable wisdom, Starfleet Intelligence has seen fit to change its mind about that for this evening.”
“Oh yes? And how exactly did you manage to persuade the two lieutenants that that was a good idea?”
Garak gave an unrevealing shrug.
“Don’t tell me,” Sisko murmured. “I already know you excel at conversation.”
“Something like that. But,” Garak raised a finger, “they were insistent that I would only be permitted to attend if somebody they trusted accompanied me. Someone such as you, Captain. And I am loath to make life harder for your intelligence services than I already have.” Sisko watched him suppress a smile. “Call it collegiality.”
Sisko really could believe that Garak had just kept on talking until Chaplin and Marlow had given him what he wanted. “All right,” he said, softly, “say I do agree to take you along this evening to meet Tomas. Just what exactly do you plan to say to him?”
“Rest assured, Captain, I have nothing to say that will make you feel uncomfortable at having made the introduction. Very simply put, I am intrigued to know why a Starfleet officer decides to resign his commission and speak out against the evils of war. Particularly this war, which,” Garak smiled, “is surely a just one, if ever there was.”
A fair enough question. Sisko had, after all, been wondering the same thing too. “And that’s the only reason you want to come this evening?”
“Well…” Garak hesitated. “I suppose there is another reason too.”
“Oh?”
Garak gave a sigh. “I’ve been stuck in this building with nothing better to listen to than the blustering of the Klingons, the insinuations of the Romulans, and—forgive me—the homilies of Starfleet. I’m bored, Captain. I want to hear something new. And what Roeder has to say…” He shrugged. “…intrigues me.”
Intrigue. That word again. Still it was, Sisko suspected, probably the closest thing to the truth that Garak was going to tell him. “I suppose,” he said, “that’s as good a reason as any.” He straightened himself up in the chair and made his decision. “All right, Garak, I’ll introduce you to Tomas. Just—stay close and don’t wander off anywhere. And don’t cause any trouble.”
Garak beamed at him. “Captain,” he promised, “you have my most solemn word.”
Back in his office, Odo was listening to O’Brien’s assessment of the state of affairs on the Ariadne.
“I’ve had a good look around now,” O’Brien was saying . “It was definitely sabotage, Odo. Someone’s made a real mess of pretty much all the systems here. The engineer here has done a good job of patching things together till they could get here, but we’ve got plenty of work to be getting on with. Anyway, I thought you should know in case it made a difference to security at your end.”
“Thank you, Chief. I believe I have everything under control. Are you willing to make an estimate yet of how long the repairs will take?”
“I think we can get everything done here within thirty hours. The sooner we can send the Ariadne back on her way the better, I think.”
“I certainly won’t disagree with that, Chief. And any time you can take off that thirty hours will be most appreciated. So I’ll leave you to your work. Thank you for all your assistance.”
“You’re welcome, Constable.”
Odo cut the com, and came out from behind his desk. Thirty hours. It was still plenty of time for something to go wrong. He stood for a while in the doorway of his office, looking along the Promenade. It was very quiet. He nodded in satisfaction.
He went out into the unusual silence. As he walked past Quark’s he peered inside, and caught a glimpse of the captain of the Ariadne down by the dabo table. When he reached the forcefield, barring his way, he tapped on his combadge, and, after a moment or two, one of the officers detailed to the doors of the assay office came up to the field to speak to him.
“Is everything in order, Lieutenant?” he asked.
“Everything’s stayed quiet, sir,” he answered, “in the twenty minutes since you were last here.” He gave a smile. Odo arranged his features into a frown.
“Although,” the lieutenant said, “as you predicted, someone wanted to get in here to retrieve something from the assay office.”
“Really?” Odo pursed his lips. All residents and visitors to the station had been given ample warning that access to the assay office would be restricted, and when those restrictions would apply. Whoever it was should have accessed their property the previous day. “I assume that you didn’t let them in?”
“Of course not, sir!”
“Do you know who it was?”
“A visitor to the station, I think. I’ve seen him around the station the past day or two. I would have known if he was a resident. He looked…well, odd. I think he’s Hamexi.”
All of a sudden, things no longer seemed to Odo to be quite so well under control.
“Hamexi?”
7
THE BAR WAS FULL; full of more noise and more color. Auger was feeling the station as an assault on his senses. He was relieved when Steyn took him gently by the elbow and began to navigate him over to the bar. But there was something there. It was orange, and it had ears. Auger stared at them. It was an epiphany. He realized now
that all the ears he had ever seen before had just been fooling with him. Pretending that they deserved to be called ears. Because these were ears—
“Auger,” Steyn was saying, “would you like something to drink?”
Auger felt Mechter step into place just behind him and the captain. “Water,” he gasped at Steyn. “Water.”
“We don’t serve water,” said a voice, coming from between the ears.
“Isn’t there a law about that kind of thing?” Steyn was complaining. One of life’s sureties. Auger took a deep breath, and looked properly at the alien behind the bar.
“There should be a law against people coming into a bar just to ask for a drink of water,” it said. He. It was definitely a he. Auger thought.
“All right,” Steyn said, “some kind of tonic water. And I’ll have a Samarian sunset. Auger,” she said, turning to him, “I have to get you drinking. The markup on nonalcoholic stuff is criminal.”
The alien put down a glass in front of Auger. “I have to draw the line at criminal,” he said.
“How about—opportunistic?”
The alien smiled. Which meant that he was showing teeth. “Now that,” he said, handing Steyn her drink, “I’m prepared to take as a compliment.” The alien looked at Mechter. “And can I get anything for you, sir?”
Mechter stared at the alien until he took a step back. “Synthale,” he said.
Steyn put her glass down on the bar. “Watch this, Auger,” she said. “You’ll like this.” The drink was clear, like water, and then Steyn tapped the edge of the glass, and the liquid exploded into a blaze of color before settling to bright orange.
“A Samarian sunset,” Steyn declared. “Pretty, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” Auger murmured. “It is.” He admired the color a bit longer, and then smiled up at the captain. She looked back at him fondly.
“You feeling better now?” she said.
“A lot better,” he said.
“Ready for a game?”
Auger took a fortifying sip of his tonic water and then looked at Steyn’s face. He liked the creases at the corners of her eyes, and he liked the way that her hair did not stay tied back. She had pulled him from a backwater, and shown him strange stars, and planets with moons, and now a Samarian sunset. She was funny, and sometimes a bit sad; he had a strong suspicion she was addicted to risk, and he knew without doubt she was shameless in using his talents toward this end. He liked her for all of these things.
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