Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: Ascendance

by David R. George III

  It’s time, he thought more decisively. It’s time for me to go home.

  * * *

  The door glided open, and he started into the holosuite.

  “Nog?”

  Although the word had been whispered, Nog recognized the voice instantly: Ulu Lani. Nog set the simulation tester down, stepped back out into the corridor, and saw the woman of his dreams peeking at him from around the corner. She motioned him to her, and he hurried over. “Hi, Lani,” he said. “It’s good to see you.” Nog didn’t lie; it was always good to see Lani. One of his uncle’s servers—and not a dabo girl, as he’d initially assumed—she had long red hair that framed her beautiful Bajoran features. Taller than Nog in an alluring way, she filled out a dress in a manner that proved beyond doubt that the Ferengi tradition of keeping females unclothed could not have been more idiotic. That night, she wore a black-and-white print that hugged her body from her shoulders to her thighs in way that Nog wished he could.

  “It’s good to see you, too,” Lani said. She carried a circular tray with several empty glasses on it, and Nog guessed that she had sneaked away for a moment, which she immediately confirmed. “I only have a second. I have to get back to work. I just wanted to see how you were coming with the program.”

  Lani had first learned about Vic Fontaine from Quark, but since then, in the few stolen moments when she visited him outside a holosuite, Nog had regaled her with wonderful stories about the lounge singer. She had listened with great interest, laughing at all the right parts. She continued to say that she wanted Nog to take her to Vic’s casino, and that she couldn’t wait for him to succeed in restoring the program from the simulation tester—an artifice he continued to maintain. Nog worried that if Quark found out about the changes that had taken place in the program, he would make the choice to shut it down and restart it, thus wiping out the Vic Fontaine that Nog considered a close friend.

  If he’s even really still himself, Nog thought dejectedly. It had been six weeks since Nog had successfully loaded the program to the holosuite and he’d gotten to see and speak to Vic. But the meeting had been short-lived, with Vic running out after telling Nog to meet him there the next night. Nog had shown up as instructed, but his friend had not. And I did that every night I could until my “adventure” with Chief O’Brien. Nog had begun to worry not just about the integrity of Vic’s matrix, but about the holographic singer’s safety within the program.

  “It’s going all right,” Nog told Lani. He considered telling her the truth—just as he did whenever she asked about Vic—but he decided not to. At first, he had worried that his uncle had sent Lani to spy on him, but he no longer believed that. If Nog shared his progress with her, though, then he would be burdening her with having to keep a secret from her boss—never a good policy when you worked for a Ferengi.

  “Just ‘all right’?” Lani asked with a disappointed tone. “I was really hoping that we could visit the casino together soon.”

  “I know, I know, so do I,” Nog said, and then he thought of the same thing he thought of whenever Lani talked about going to Vic’s. That night, he finally found the confidence to say it: “Maybe we could pick another holosuite destination.”

  “Maybe,” Lani said, though she sounded less than enthusiastic. “It’s just that . . . for our first date, I want to do something special.”

  “First” date? Nog thought. The Ferengi in him knew all about ordinal numbers, and the notion of a first date implied the promise of a second. “I’m doing my best,” he said. “I’m sure I’ll get it soon.”

  “I’m looking forward to it,” Lani said. She glanced quickly over her shoulder for an instant, then looked back at him and held out her empty hand. At least, Nog thought the hand not carrying the tray was empty. Instead, he saw that she had a small, covered metal dish.

  “What’s this?” he asked, reaching for it.

  “Take it and find out,” she said.

  As Nog took the dish, his fingers brushed against Lani’s. His lobes immediately began to tingle, and he feared that they had flushed as well. To cover his embarrassment, he removed the cover of the dish with a grand gesture. His eyes widened at what he saw: “Toasted tubeworms!”

  “Shhh,” Lani warned him. “You’ll get me fired.”

  “Never,” Nog said with a smile. “I have some pull with the owner.”

  “Mmm,” Lani purred. “I love a man who’s not afraid to throw around his influence.”

  Nog heard the turbolift doors open two corridors away, and at the same time, Lani peered back over her shoulder as though she’d heard the noise herself. Wow, Nog thought. They may not look like much, but those are some great lobes.

  “I should go,” Lani said.

  “Okay,” Nog said. He held up the dish she’d given him. “Thanks.”

  “It was my pleasure.”

  Just Lani’s use of the word pleasure made Nog’s lobes tingle again. He watched her disappear around the corner, and then he leaned heavily against the bulkhead. He popped a couple of tubeworms into his mouth—so succulent and tasty—and thought about how much he wanted to go on that first date.

  The sound of approaching footsteps woke Nog from his reverie. He quickly headed back to the holosuite and closed the door behind him. He ate a few more tubeworms, and then a few more, and finally he set the dish down on the deck beside the simulation tester. “Computer,” he said, “run program Bashir Sixty-two.”

  Once more, as had been the case every time he had executed Vic’s code since reloading it, a run-down hallway materialized around Nog. As was the case most nights, all of the doors were closed. Nog walked over to the one labeled with the number 23, reached up, and tapped one finger against its surface. He expected no response, but the door swung open at once. Vic stared at him. “Nog—”

  Heavy footsteps suddenly thundered up the staircase. Nog saw Vic’s eyes go wide. “Don’t get involved!” the singer whispered urgently. “The fat lady’s about to sing!” Vic threw the door closed.

  Nog turned toward the top of the stairs just as a large, well-muscled man appeared. He had a square jaw and square shoulders, and he wore a rumpled suit that still outclassed the hotel around them. When he saw Nog, he stopped. Two equally large men climbed out of the stairway behind him. Nog saw the glint of gunmetal in one of the men’s hands.

  “Who’re you?” Square Jaw demanded.

  “Nobody,” Nog said, taking a step back down the hallway.

  “Is he one-a Conterelli’s guys?” asked the man with the gun.

  Square Jaw stepped toward Nog, appraising him. “Mebbe,” he said, and he looked over his shoulder at the others. “All dem guys is funny lookin.” Then he turned back to Nog and lurched toward him. “And dey’re always tryin to take what isn’t theirs.” He reached the door and slapped his meaty palm against it. “Fontaine’s ours,” he said. “You let Mistuh Conterelli know dat.”

  Nog said nothing, and the man paid him no more attention. Instead, Square Jaw stepped back, lifted his massive, booted foot up, and kicked the door hard. It flew open in a hail of splintered wood, its lower hinge tearing loose from the jamb.

  “Where d’ya think yer going?” Square Jaw asked, looking through the doorway. Nog could only imagine that Vic was attempting to flee through the window. Square Jaw pointed into the room, and the two other men rushed inside.

  The obvious danger to Vic snapped Nog out of his shock. “Hey,” he told Square Jaw. “What are you doing?” Nog strode forward, the safety protocols of the holosuite making him brave. He’d had enough difficulties loading his friend’s matrix to a Deep Space 9 holosuite, and even more trying to locate him within the program. He had no intention of putting up with . . . whatever this was. “Mister Fontaine is a friend of mine,” Nog said, stepping directly up to Square Jaw. From that vantage, the man looked more like a mountain. “You better leave him alone.”

  Square Jaw moved so quickly that Nog didn’t even see his hand coming toward him. He struck Nog in the center
of the chest and sent him flying backward. He landed in the middle of the hallway. The safety protocols ensured that Nog’s ribs had not been broken and that he landed relatively softly on the floor.

  Vic suddenly called out, but the sound came out garbled, as though his mouth had been covered. Nog rushed to get back up, but as he started down the hallway, the two thugs emerged from room 23, hauling Vic between them. A gag had been tied tightly around his mouth, and one eye was swollen shut. Blood spilled down the side of his head from a nasty gash.

  “Vic!” Nog cried out, and he raced forward.

  Square Jaw held up both his hands, one to his colleagues, and one to Nog. Then he reached into his suit coat and pulled out his own gun. He held its barrel up to Vic’s forehead. “If this guy’s really yer friend,” Square Jaw said, “I’d advise ya take a step back and don’t follow.”

  Nog stopped. The safety protocols would not protect Vic; if he died in the program, he died. There was no bringing him back. “Okay,” Nog said. “Okay.”

  “That’s bettuh.” Square Jaw pointed with his gun toward the end of the hallway, and the two thugs dragged Vic along in that direction.

  Nog watched as the entire group disappeared down the stairs. He waited until he heard them reach the first floor, and then he raced into room 23 and over to the window. He threw the dingy curtains open with such force that the rod they hung from tore from its mounts and clattered to the floor.

  Outside, the three men hustled Vic into a long, dark automobile, then followed him inside. Nog studied it even as it peeled away, its tires leaving skid marks on the street. He wanted to remember every detail so that he had somewhere to start in trying to find his friend.

  Find him, and rescue him.

  * * *

  “This won’t take long,” Ro said, aware that the end of alpha shift rapidly approached. She had gathered her senior staff in the conference room off the Hub: Jefferson Blackmer, Wheeler Stinson, Zivan Slaine, Miles O’Brien, Nog, Ren Kalanent Viss, John Candlewood, Pascal Boudreaux, and Dockmaster Vendora deGrom. She had also invited Aleco Vel. “I want to address the vacancies left by Colonel Cenn.”

  “Have you heard from him at all, Captain?” O’Brien asked.

  “No, I haven’t,” Ro said. Nearly six weeks had passed since Cenn Desca had left Deep Space 9. He didn’t just leave the starbase, the captain thought. He left the system. Ro had verified the safe arrival of the ship on which he’d departed—the Alonis freighter had been on its way to its home port—but she’d lost track of him after that. She thought that he might contact her at some point. They had been crewmates for almost a decade, and she considered him a friend, even if they hadn’t been especially close. But we did work closely together, Ro thought. We relied on each other, trusted each other. The fact that she hadn’t heard from her former first officer hurt Ro’s feelings, but mostly, it signaled to her the depth of Cenn’s despair. “I haven’t heard from him, and I don’t know of anybody who has.”

  “He was in bad shape after what happened on Endalla,” Blackmer said. “I’d never seen him as upset as he was that night in Quark’s.” He didn’t need to specify the incident any more than that; virtually everybody on the starbase, civilian and Starfleet alike, knew about the broadside he’d leveled at the kai.

  “I spoke to him the morning he left,” O’Brien said. “He seemed better. Accepting of everything, I think.”

  “If he had truly been accepting,” Slaine offered, “he would have stayed on Deep Space Nine.” She did not sound angry, but Ro thought that the matter-of-fact tone of her statement demonstrated a decided lack of empathy.

  “If Cenn wasn’t truly accepting, he wasn’t alone,” Ro said. “Right now, there are a lot of people on Bajor, and on this starbase, who are having trouble accepting the Ohalavaru actions on Endalla and their claims about the meaning of their discovery.” Since the kai’s initial public address about the events on Endalla, Bajor had erupted on several occasions. First Minister Asarem had sought to reassure the people, as had the Chamber of Ministers, but the comnets and the public squares had regularly exploded in strident rhetoric. Demonstrations had been staged across the planet, with some of the faithful demanding that no further examination or analysis be permitted on the so-called Endalla falsework. There had been demands for the kai to step down, and a split in the Vedek Assembly had weakened both sides of the argument. There had so far been several incidents of violence on Bajor, but fortunately none that had resulted in casualties.

  If one good thing had come from the clamor, it had arrived that morning. With seemingly everybody on Bajor concentrating on the Ohalavaru, Kai Pralon had finally convinced the First Minister to have her government issue identity and travel documents to Altek Dans. Ro looked forward to sharing the good news with him—which she planned to do right after the briefing.

  “Speaking of people having trouble these days,” Ro said, “I want to commend Commander Blackmer and his staff for the exceptional job they’ve done since all of this happened. We’ve had some peaceful demonstrations on the Plaza, but that’s it.”

  “Thank you, Captain,” Blackmer said with a grin. “There’s also been an occasional screaming match, but overall, security has excelled at allowing people their freedom, but still maintaining the order. I’ll pass along your commendation.”

  “Good,” Ro said. “Regarding the vacancies left by Colonel Cenn, we needed to fill his position as the Bajoran liaison. I came up with a very short list of people who I wanted to see in that role, but because it’s one traditionally held by a member of the Militia, I also reached out to the minister of defense to find out if he had any exceptional candidates on his end. It turns out that he did, but there was one name that appeared on both our lists. So Minister Ranz consulted with Minister of State Gandal, and I checked with Starfleet Command. With their approval, I offered the position to Lieutenant Aleco Vel. He accepted this morning.”

  All eyes in the room turned toward Aleco, and then O’Brien began thumping the table with his palm. Everybody present followed his example, including Ro. Aleco did his best to suppress a smile, but he didn’t completely succeed.

  When the applause died down, Aleco said, “Thank you, Captain. I appreciate this opportunity. I’ll do my best to live up to the high standard Colonel Cenn set.”

  “Don’t worry about what anybody else has done in that post, Vel,” the captain said. “Just perform your duties to the best of your ability.”

  Aleco nodded. “Yes, sir,” he said. “Thank you, sir.”

  As quickly as everybody’s attention had turned to Aleco, it turned back to Ro. They all knew what would come next—the promotion of a permanent first officer—but not whom the captain had chosen. Ro had not even spoken with the two obvious candidates. She had consulted only with Starfleet Command about her choice.

  “Obviously, in addition to replacing Colonel Cenn as the Bajoran liaison,” Ro said, “we need to fill his position as first officer on a permanent basis. As you all know, Commander Blackmer has been acting in that capacity since the colonel’s departure. He has done an outstanding job.”

  Blackmer nodded, but said nothing. That pleased Ro, who just wanted to get through the meeting. “At the same time, Commander Stinson has served as my second officer for more than four years now. He too has done an outstanding job, not only as the second officer on Deep Space Nine, but as the first officer, and even more frequently these days, as the commanding officer of the Defiant.”

  Stinson had the good sense to remain quiet and let Ro continue. “I have nothing but respect for both of you, and choosing between you has been difficult.” She looked across the table at Blackmer. “Jeff,” she said, “congratulations.” Blackmer’s eyebrows rose, and Ro saw him make a conscious effort to lower them. The captain waited for a new round of applause to stop, and then she said, “Starfleet Command has approved my request, and your promotion to first officer of Deep Space Nine begins with alpha shift tomorrow.”

  “Thank you, Ca
ptain,” Blackmer said.

  “You’ve earned it,” Ro said, and then she gazed over at Stinson. To his credit, he did not allow his disappointment to show. “Commander Stinson, as I said, I have tremendous respect for your abilities, and even for your ambition. I think I speak for everybody present when I say that we all know that you’re going to occupy a center seat somewhere in Starfleet, and probably sooner rather than later. It might even be mine one day, if that’s what interests you, though I suspect you’ll want a command that takes you around the quadrant, and beyond.” Stinson looked abashed for a moment. Ro knew that she could have spoken to him in private, and maybe she should have, but she wanted her senior staff to hear what she had to say about the young officer, and she wanted him to hear her tell them.

  “I trust you, Commander,” Ro went on, “and I believe that you have a long and successful career ahead of you. I hope that you will not take my promotion of Commander Blackmer over you as a repudiation of your capabilities as much as an acknowledgment of his. I know that you must be disappointed, but I value you as an important member of this crew. I hope that you’ll consider staying with us.” Ro understood that Stinson would be within his rights to request a transfer to another posting, but she hoped he saw the value in continuing on at DS9.

  “Thank you, everybody,” Ro said, and she stood up from her chair at the head of the table. “Jeff, meeting in my office tomorrow at oh-seven-hundred,” she said. “Don’t be late.” She offered her new first officer a wink, and he smiled.

  “Aye, Captain.”

  “Wheeler, I want to see you at thirteen-thirty,” Ro said. “Don’t you be late either.” She then exited the conference room into the Hub, crossed behind the tactical station, and entered a turbolift. She ordered it to take her to the residential deck—not to her own quarters, but to those of Altek Dans. The night before, they had agreed to meet for a late lunch.

  If our recent time together is any indication, Ro thought as the turbolift whirred into motion, we’ll never make it to a meal. Alone in the lift, she smiled. Since their first night together five and a half weeks earlier, they had been spending more and more time with each other, mostly in his cabin. Ro had yet to break the news to Quark of her new relationship, but she knew that she would have to do so soon—not just because it was the right thing to do, and not just because Quark shouldn’t find out from anybody other than her, but also because of the depth of her feelings for Dans. It had been a long time since she’d experienced such emotions.