Chapter 12

Quark stared into the blackness. It’s darker than death or night, he thought as he felt a growing (and, considering the gag, futile) urge to scream. His backside hurt where he’d landed on it.

Fighting the bindings on his wrists and legs, he crawled to where he thought the door had been, then inched up until he was standing. Precariously. He placed his ear against the door and listened. Nothing. But someone had been out there before, so probably someone would be out there now.

He took a deep breath and started thumping the wall the way he had before. With his head. Hard. And squealing a muffled cry of agony each time he did.

Bang! “Ow!”

Bang! “Ow!”

Bang! “Owwwwww!”

And suddenly the door whisked open.

Quark’s initial perception of the light from the outer room was of a blinding red flash, but as the throbbing pain in his head began to subside, it softened to a dull yellow. He blinked several times and at last two male Ferengi came into focus in front of him.

They had very similar faces, and for a moment he wondered if he might be seeing double. Then he noticed that they were dressed differently. He had no idea which one had opened the door previously. He hadn’t thought to study anyone’s wardrobe—which seemed a good idea, now that he got a better look. The one directly in front of him had on an ill-fitting checkered green suit with very large lapels. Quark wouldn’t have allowed it in his bar, let alone his closet. The guy was sucking on a tooth sharpener—a disgusting habit, in Quark’s opinion. He recalled Ishka’s ultimately successful efforts to break Rom of the behavior when the future nagus was going through his “I want to be as cool as the other guys” phase while attending (and failing) at the Capital City Brokerage Academy.

The other Ferengi had flabby bare arms that poked out from a shiny orange vest. His baggy pants were burgundy colored, and looking at the two hues together made Quark’s head hurt even more.

Well, these are a couple of real winners.

Still, they were the ones in control of the situation. He’d gotten them to open the door again, but facing his tormentors couldn’t really be considered much of a victory. Nevertheless, their slovenly appearance emboldened him and lifted his spirits. They didn’t look to be the brightest bricks in the bank, so he decided to take a chance on defending himself with his most powerful weapon: his gift of gab.

Or rather, he decided, he would as soon as he got them to remove the gag. He began to grunt at them.

“What’s that he’s saying, Bakke?” the Ferengi in orange asked.

“I think he’s thanking us, Rascoe, because he knows,” the other said, turning and looking directly into Quark’s eyes, “that in a minute WE’RE GONNA PUT HIM OUT OF HIS FRINXING MISERY!”

If the statement was meant to frighten him into silence, it only served to make Quark start grunting faster. Finally—whether out of frustration or curiosity, Quark couldn’t tell—the Ferengi in the orange vest pulled a shiny hunting blade from his belt. Light from the outer room flashed over its polished surface as he waved it in front of his prisoner’s face. Then he stuck the blade under the gag—and cut it free.

Refreshing air rushed into Quark’s gaping mouth for the first time in . . . in . . .

In truth, he wasn’t sure how long he’d been trussed and gagged. But as quickly as the oxygen filled his lungs, he pushed it out, shaping it into his finest salesmanship spiel.

“Gentlemen,” he began. “It might surprise you to know that I’m aware of what you’re experiencing right now. You feel that you’ve got yourself a problem.”

The Ferengi with the blade held it closer to Quark’s throat.

“Aaannnnddd . . . I . . . I know that I may seem to be that problem,” Quark faltered as he attempted to lean back away from the blade without falling over. “Yes, it’s true that I saw what you gentlemen did to Hilt. And I suspect that you’re not quite sure what to do with me. At least I hope you’re not. But please allow me to assist you with your evaluation.” He cleared his throat to give his next statement more impact. “You see, I’m not just your average troublesome witness. I’m the nagus’s brother. The nagus’s brother. Think about it.”

One of his two captors rolled his eyes at this. The other made an extremely rude noise sucking on his tooth sharpener.

The response was somewhat less than he’d imagined, but Quark plowed forward. “And, uh, that makes me more valuable than you know. You shouldn’t be viewing me as an enemy. You should be viewing me as an asset. A huge asset. And what I mean by that—”

“Stop . . . talking!” Green Suit barked.

“Okay,” Quark responded obediently, only slightly cowed. “Okay, I can be quiet. But I really think you need to understand how listening to me would be to your advantage.”

The two Ferengi exchanged glances. And Green Suit—That’s Bakke, Quark thought, matching his name and description in his head—lifted his eyes toward the heavens. Orange Vest—Rascoe—matched the movement, then looked back at Bakke and shrugged. Suddenly, Bakke pushed the button that slid the door shut, leaving Quark once again in the dark.

At least they didn’t knock me over this time, he thought. He leaned against the door, allowing the minutes to pass. He could hear them talking—but not what they were saying. And then everything was so quiet that he almost drifted to sleep.

At last he heard—or perhaps felt more than heard—the pounding of two sets of feet coming closer. And the door again whisked open.

“Get him outta there,” Bakke said, and Rascoe obediently lifted Quark by the scruff of his neck.

Clearly he was stronger than those flabby arms suggested.

As his bound feet left the floor, Quark began to scream, fear of the unknown finally getting the best of him. But the scream was abruptly cut off when Rascoe dropped him on the floor like a sack of larval swamp tubers.

I’m out, he thought. I’m out of there! Out of that awful—

—Storage closet? As he glanced back through the open door at his recent prison, he noted for the first time a cluster of cleaning supplies on some high shelves and a programmable floor mop in the corner. They had me in a storage closet?

He would have been incensed at the indignity of it all if he’d had time. But Rascoe quickly grabbed him under the armpits, Bakke took hold of his bound ankles, and the two of them began to drag him up a nearby flight of stairs.

A very steep flight of stairs.

And Quark’s buttocks slammed against every single step as they climbed.

Bang! “Ow!”

Bang! “Ow!”

Bang! “Owwwwww!”