Author Topic: Active Mission - The Down Payment  (Read 1292 times)

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Offline Solluk

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Active Mission - The Down Payment
« on: April 16, 2017, 06:07:21 pm »



[Jor Trem's Office, Bajoran System, Derna, Repurposed Romulan Field Hospital]

The door to the room opened, and Roderick glanced at the hulking figures who flanked its entrance.  Nausicaans, each of them about seven feet tall.  But they weren't like most of their kind whom he'd met during his career.  When they eyed him, it wasn't with dull disinterest and dismissal.  They seemed to be measuring him carefully , genuinely considering how much of a threat he might represent.  Their stance was not slack or lazy.  They were ready.


Professionals.

Most people employed Nausicaan bodyguards when they wanted the appearance of strength.  It was a tool of intimidation in the war waged on the battlefield of people's minds, long before they ever thought about betraying or challenging you. 

The fact that these men were something more suggested to him that Jor Trem was something more.

So these Nausicaans had done their usual job, just not in the way Roderick had expected.

'Not in the way Roderick had expected' would turn out to be a theme of this encounter.



As he entered the room, the door closed behind him with a barely audible hiss.  The interior of Trem's office was dark.  Unusually so.  It took Roderick a moment for his eyes to adjust to the light.  Mostly shrouded in shadow, the room was lit by weak purple and red mood lighting.  The figure sitting on the opposite side of the room behind a large desk did not indicate any impatience.  By degrees, his form became perceptable. 



So did the form of another figure.  A Ferengi sitting off to one side.  Roderick nodded his head twice.  Once at Trem, and again at the Ferengi. 



"Please," Trem said, "have a seat.  We should try to get through this as efficiently as possible."  Having waited in silence for so long, now the Bajoran seemed suddenly impatient.  Roderick took a good look at him.  The man initially seemed young, though whether this was the product of good skin or the gift of shadows, he could not say.  Trem's dark hair conspired to ruin the impression of youth.  Gray was streaked into a mane that had once been black, tacking on a decade or two to Roderick's initial guess.  Trem had intelligent eyes, but wore the dour expression of one who found interactions with others to be more a chore than a pleasure.

Taking the offered seat, not far from the Ferengi, Roderick waited for the Bajoran to set the tone of this meeting.  As he waited, he glanced again at the small Ferengi.  He wondered what part the large-lobed man might play in today's affairs.   Was he an accountant?  A secretary?  An advisor?  Perhaps even a business partner?

If so, he was a junior partner.  He had no desk of his own.

"You want to buy a ship," Trem said at last, "but your service record means that no Federation institution will lend to you.  Even non-Federation banks in territories allied with the Federation will not trust you.  Private investors see you as a bad bet.  And your life-savings of Federation credits doesn't mean as much as you'd hoped in regions outside the Federation, where people prefer to trade in latinum.  Does that about sum it up?"

Roderick hesitated for a moment, but there was no denying the truth of everything the man had said.  "Just about," he admitted.

"And so now, a once-upstanding citizen of the Federation has crossed the blue border and entered the red light district, where dark deals are negotiated by dark men.   Men like me."  Trem smiled, a forced expression that somehow seemed unnatural on his face.  He leaned forward, a predatory posture even with the desk between them.

"Can you think of any reason why someone like me should trust someone like you with enough gold-pressed-latinum to buy a ship?"  Trem's dark eyes twinkled in the dim light, "You could easily be some kind of undercover agent working for Starfleet.  Even if you're guilty of everything you've been accused of, this could be your way of earning back the good graces of your straight-and-narrow masters.  And even if we assume the best-case scenario, and you're not working undercover, what are we left with?  Someone who can't follow orders?  Who can't be trusted?   What good is a ruined Starfleet Captain to anyone in an organization such as mine?"

Roderick hesitated for only the briefest of moments.  "I don't have to think of a reason.  You've already thought of a reason.  Or else I wouldn't be here."

The false smile on Trem's face slowly evolved into a genuine smile.  Roderick wasn't sure if that was better or worse.  "Yes.  Quite right.   Maybe this isn't the mistake it might otherwise appear to be.  You understand, of course... there will be crime?  You will be taking things.  Hurting people.  There's no getting around that.  No overlooking it, or explaining it away.  Latinum has its price, and you won't be getting yours cheaply.  It won't be just your down-payment.  It's the interest.  You will owe me.  Sometimes in profit, sometimes in favors.  And you will pay.  This is your last chance to say no."

Roderick was silent for a long moment, then: "If you know as much about me as you seem to, then you know there are things I won't do," he replied, "and if I sat here and promised to do all of your dirty work without question, you'd know I was lying."

Trem glanced to the Ferengi.  Then his gaze returned to Roderick.  "Good.  A lie built from false assurances would be a poor foundation for future business between us."

The Bajoran leaned back in his chair.  "You will always have the option to say no.  And I'm not the sort who will kill you if you say no.  But saying no will cost you everything you've gotten from me.  Everything.  You will walk away from our deal with nothing more than you had when you came here.  And if you ever betray me... then I will kill you.  Fair enough?"

Was it Fair?   

No.  Nothing in Roderick's life these past couple of years had been fair.

But fair enough?

"Yeah," Roderick said, "that's Fair enough.  What's the job?"

(To be continued...)
« Last Edit: April 16, 2017, 06:13:50 pm by Solluk »
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