I, the Constable

by Paula M. Block

  She’d prevailed, of course.

  “Computer,” he tried one more time. “Contact Mother.”

  “Mother is unavailable,” the computer’s electronic voice responded.

  “Contact Brother.”

  “Brother is unavailable.”

  “Oh, lizard lobes!” he cursed.

  “Lizard Lobes is not—”

  “Disregard!” he shouted angrily.

  If he’d had hair on his bulbous head, Bakke would have pulled it out by now. Lacking that option, he expressed his mounting frustration by pounding his fists against the shuttle’s companel and emitting every colorful metaphor he could muster.

  Pushing the small shuttle’s abated impulse drive to the limit, Bakke ignored the craft’s engine-monitoring device as it flashed dire warnings about pushing the drive to the limit. He had worse things to worry about. He was certain he would receive yet another clout on the head when he finally found his mother and broke the news that Smooth-face was still alive. Fortunately, Smooth-face couldn’t possibly know who he was. Or where he had gone. That, he hoped, would prevent Yrena from delivering a real pounding.

  Still, time was of the essence. And he’d have been there by now, he told himself, if she’d allowed him to get a shuttle with warp capability. Or even one with full impulse capacity, instead of that wimpy “abated” drive. Then I wouldn’t be facing the risk of burning out the drive and crashing into some icy swamp in the middle of nowhere.

  But luck was with him, and he finally saw the lights of the construction site ahead. Flying to his usual landing spot, he saw Yrena’s much larger shuttle parked nearby, right where he’d hoped it would be. He pointed the nose of his craft down and landed next to it. When the door panel slid open, Bakke leaped out. Three sets of footprints, barely visible in the accumulating graupel on the ground, told him what he needed to know. Ducking his head into the frosty wind, he followed the indentations to the entrance to the dome and hustled inside.

  As Quark had suspected, the entertainment dome had a huge kitchen, where, Yrena promised, the very best chefs in the quadrant would be employed. Her description of some of the meals she intended to serve made Quark’s mouth water. He hadn’t eaten Gamma Trianguli Boa Alfredo since . . . well, actually he’d never eaten it, but he’d seen holopix of it in Gourmet Galaxy, and it looked amazing.

  At the moment, however, Quark didn’t see any chefs, nor, for that matter, any foodstuffs. I’ll bet there’s nothing in those big refrigeration units over there, either, he thought. Without question, he was feeling quite peckish after his lengthy internment.

  “Stay with your cousin,” Yrena said to Rascoe, and she walked away, toward the door under a sign that was flashing the word REFRESHER.

  While she was gone, Quark strolled over to a bar area, which, he had to admit, was extremely inspirational. The barstools were situated in a way that would encourage ordering, while at the same time discourage dawdling at the bar. The better to get customers back to the gaming tables, he realized. Very smart.

  Feeling on familiar ground, Quark scribbled notes on the padd Yrena had given him. Maybe I’ll incorporate some of these elements back home, he thought. Assuming I ever get there. He also noted several refinements that he knew would boost Yrena’s profit margin. That done, he wandered through an open door, and found himself in a large L-shaped room with a high ceiling, its walls covered with shelves. Long empty shelves.

  Wow, he thought. What a great pantry.

  “What’re you doing in here?” came a gruff voice from behind him.

  Rascoe.

  Quark wasn’t surprised. The lout had been shadowing Quark since they landed.

  “I’m fantasizing that there’s something in here to eat,” he said, turning around to face him.

  “You’re not too bright, are you?” smirked his shadow.

  Quark glared. “I suppose you have a way to magically wish food into existence.”

  “As a matter of fact, I do,” Rascoe said, pointing to the far wall.

  Quark walked to the end of the pantry, turned the corner, and found himself staring at a newly installed, state-of-the-art industrial food replicator!

  “Be still, my heart!” the hungry Ferengi gasped in delight. But as he moved closer to inspect it, Rascoe’s large hand locked on to his shoulder.

  “No one gave you permission to play with the toys,” he said.

  “Oh, Rascoe,” Yrena said as she entered the room, freshly powdered and rouged. “Our guest is familiar with the operations of those things. I’m sure he’s aware that this replicator won’t let him do something stupid, like, for instance, create a weapon.”

  “Me?” said Quark, effecting his most innocent look. “I’m just hungry.”

  In truth, his only thought had been to program a bowl of tube grubs—but now that she’d implanted the thought of making a weapon of some sort, well, that seemed like a pretty good idea as well. Maybe something that would do double duty, like a meaty Antarean sausage. When rendered correctly, the meter-long delicacy, consisting primarily of ground Antarean tree beetles encased in targ intestine, was so dense it could be sharpened and used as a spear (which is why it had been a favorite Klingon field ration for decades).

  Yrena, however, was thinking in a different direction entirely. “Let’s inaugurate the equipment by programming a little snack, eh? Let’s all have tea!”

  “Tea?” both Quark and Rascoe uttered at the same time.

  “Yes!” Yrena said cheerfully, punching buttons. “A nice pot of slimy peat tea and some finger food, like algae puffs, foraiga, groat cakes, some little Altair sandwiches, and—ooh—sea snail brûlée for dessert. I’m just addicted to that!”

  Quark eyed Rascoe, who looked as dubious about the menu as he was. But food was food, and he was starving. As soon as Yrena piled the completed items on a serving tray, he took it from her and carried it to a table in the bar. Rascoe followed with another heaping tray, and Yrena brought the teapot.

  “Well now, isn’t this nice?” she asked them as they all sat down.

  “Yes, very civilized,” Quark responded, while thinking, Just so it’s not my last meal.

  “I love a refined repast!” the fe-male said while reaching for a spoonful of aphid aspic to spread on her groat cake. “Dig in.”

  With no further prompting, the trio began to devour everything on the table.

  “I have some additional . . . mmpph . . . ideas about your menu—” Quark said between bites.

  “Write it down, write it down!” Yrena said, slurping in her third brûlée.

  Quark was downing the last drop of his tea, and wondering what tactics he could use to delay an impending demise, when Bakke came racing into the building.

  “We’re in trouble!” he shouted, nigh hysterical.

  Yrena and Rascoe froze, still holding their teacups. “What are you talking about?” his mother asked, looking calm in spite of the tension that had flowed into the room along with the icy wind.

  “That funny-looking guy I told you about. I tried to get rid of him! I blasted him—and I’m sure that I hit him! But he didn’t go down! It’s like he was shielded or something! I couldn’t blast him again, because I was drawing attention.”

  “So you came here,” Yrena said, her voice chilly.

  “You dope!” Rascoe said. “You never did learn how to shoot straight. And I’ll bet anything the guy followed you here.”

  “No!” Bakke said, defending himself. “He was on foot, and I flew out of there so fast, nobody could have followed me!”

  At that, Yrena stood and walked toward the entrance. Her sons followed. Quark, feeling he had nowhere else to go, tagged along. As they stepped out into the frosty, wet Bowoggy atmosphere, she looked around. Nothing, it seemed to her, looked amiss.

  “Perhaps you have escaped undetected,” she stated, “But that .
. . person . . . will be looking even harder now. We have to be prepared in case he finds something that will lead to us.” Turning to Quark, she hissed, “Sorry, Nephew. It seems that we’ll have to terminate our plans while we take care of an impending problem.”

  All previous tea-cozy compassion left her eyes. She jerked her head toward Quark and said to her sons, “Lock him in the construction shed.”

  “Wait!” Quark yelled, attempting to back away. “I thought we were working together—”

  “Partnership terminated!” she responded, leveling an energy weapon at his head.

  Quark raised his hands. The bullies grabbed him and dragged him over the slippery ground. Rascoe unlocked a nearby tool shed, and they unceremoniously tossed the ambassador inside. As Yrena turned to go back into the dome, she called out, “When you’re finished with that, boys, come in here. It’ll be warm and dry, and we have a number of things to talk about.” Then she disappeared inside.

  Rascoe glanced back at the shed and said, “I think we should kill him now, don’t you?”

  “Be patient,” his brother answered. “I believe Mother wants him held in reserve, just in case. We can use him for target practice when she’s finished.”

  Chapter 19

  Twice, the Tarkalean condor had been forced to shake off tiny globs of ice that collected on the aubergine primary feathers of its wings as it circled high above the construction site. Navigating to this place through the heavy weather hadn’t been easy, and keeping up momentum while in pursuit of the much fleeter shuttle had, at times, seemed a ridiculous challenge. But even when the craft wasn’t in sight, the large raptor’s ability to detect wavelengths of light allowed it to maintain a sense of where the shuttle was heading. A straight line is a straight line, and allowing for the curvature of the land’s surface, the determined hunter successfully tracked his prey to its destination. Directly below, it could distinguish the outline of the shuttle, parked next to a larger vehicle. And judging by its infrared signature, it hadn’t been there long; the engines were still warm.

  The predatory bird’s keen eyes initially caught no sign of the life-form it was pursuing, so it circled the site. At last the door to a domelike structure slid open and four humanoids emerged. One of them was the tough-looking Ferengi who’d been at Frin’s tavern—the fellow with the itchy trigger finger. A second, who resembled the first in a way that only littermates and siblings can, seemed to be arguing with its likely sibling. Behind this pair were two additional Ferengi: Yrena, Frin’s second wife, apparently no longer in mourning, judging by her colorful ensemble; and Quark, brother to the nagus.

  As far as Odo could tell, Quark seemed undamaged, although there was no telling how long he’d stay that way. The bickering of the two brothers grew louder and louder, until Yrena uttered an even louder vocalization, and they closed their mouths. She directed a comment toward Quark, who shook his head defiantly. Then she pulled an elegant nano disruptor from her large shoulder bag and pointed it at his head. All signs of resistance vanished and the bartender raised his hands.

  The two males stepped forward, each grabbing one of Quark’s arms. They dragged him, kicking and screaming, across the permafrost to a nearby shed and pushed him in, sealing the door behind him. Then they returned to the dome.

  The great bird circled the area one more time.

  Good. Quark is alone.

  The condor emitted a sharp cry of victory: “HAWWW!” Then it changed the angle of its wings to increase the drag and decrease the lift. Making a wide, low approach, it dropped toward the frost-covered ground and landed, gently, behind the shed.

  Turning its head from side to side, the imposing creature examined the back of the structure. It spotted a small hole, probably chewed through by a rodent of some sort. Poking its head into the hole, the raptor ruffled its feathers. Then the feathers, and everything they were a part of, melted into a viscous liquid that coalesced into a new shape—and slipped into the hole.

  “This is worse than being in that basement closet,” Quark grumbled to himself as he attempted to pry open the door with his hands. He could see that he was inside a construction shed, but there was no construction equipment, nor tools of any sort, to be found. Just containers of smelly chemicals—and a tub filled with a nasty-looking granular substance that he couldn’t identify and didn’t dare touch. The only “tool” he could find was his shoe, which he removed and used to bang against the door in the hopes that whatever locking mechanism holding it might give way.

  “Hopeless,” Quark spat out after a moment. He wondered if his captors planned to return and blast him. It wasn’t a pleasant thought, but the alternative was even worse.

  Sitting in here by myself until I starve to death.

  Or freeze to death.

  Shoe in hand, the imprisoned ambassador suddenly stiffened. A rustling sound from the back corner of the shed caught his ear.

  Or get eaten alive by . . . something.

  Squinting in the shed’s dusty light, he looked around fearfully, trying to determine the cause of the sound.

  There!

  A rodent’s head, poking out of a hole in the wall! And then the rest of the creature squeezed through, and sat facing him, as if assessing the situation.

  What the—a Cardassian vole? It can’t be!

  But it was, one of the same mangy, disgusting creatures that had infested the old space station.

  When did Ferenginar get infested with Cardassian voles?

  The rodent crept forward, its beady eyes fixed on Quark. Then it rose up on its hind legs and wiggled its ugly nose at him.

  “Vermin!” Quark shouted, flinging his shoe in that direction. “Get out of here!”

  The vole easily dodged the object, but rather than fleeing in terror, it continued to stare at Quark . . .

  And then as Quark watched, the vole began to grow, its body lengthening, growing taller, fur melting into fabric—and the ugly little head morphing into a man’s head, one with a very familiar face.

  “A fine way to greet your rescuer,” the man said.

  “Odo!” Quark cried out, breaking into an ecstatic grin. He practically leaped into the shape-shifter’s arms. “I’m so happy to see you I could kiss you!”

  “Please don’t,” Odo responded, gently pushing Quark away. “I just popped in to let you know I was here. I’ll be back in a while.”

  Quark’s happy grin froze and shattered. “In a—what? Wait—you’re leaving me in here? No! No, Odo! Open the door—let me out!”

  “For the moment, this is the safest place for you,” Odo explained patiently.

  “Safe? What if they come back before you do? I think they’re planning to kill me!”

  “I’m sure you’re correct,” Odo agreed, doing nothing to calm Quark’s fears. “But try to . . . relax. Take a nap or something.”

  Then his body began to shrink and lose definition, re-forming into a small furry rodent. He ducked into the hole . . . just in time to dodge Quark’s other shoe.

  Chapter 20

  Near the base of the storage shed, a clump of graupel shifted and tumbled away as the head of a Cardassian vole poked through. Shaking particles of ice from its long, sensitive ears, the scaly creature squinted at its surroundings, focusing on the huge entertainment dome a few meters away. In a flash, the vole skittered across the permafrost, pausing when it reached the base of the structure. It rose up on its rear legs, turned its tapered yellow eyes upward, and contemplated the curve of the half sphere. Then the rodent’s lips stretched into a repellent smile, revealing a row of tiny, but sharp, incisors. With a twitch of its ratlike tail, it dropped to all six legs, and began to climb.

  “I still think we should get rid of him,” Rascoe grumbled. “I could bury him under the footing for the hotel. After we pour the foundation, no one will suspect.”

  Bakke glanced at his mother for input a
nd saw her shake her head. His brother was impetuous, but, Bakke knew, he wouldn’t do anything without their mother’s approval. And she’d already nixed his “great idea” twice. Bakke was about to tell his brother to give the subject a rest, when an earsplitting bang resonated throughout the largely empty dome. The two brothers jumped to their feet and stared upward at the arched ceiling as they tried to figure out what had created the sound. But even before the vibrations had died away, a new series of sounds began: thuds, booms, and, most unnerving of all, the distinct sound of scratching. All of this clearly emanating from over their heads.

  “What in Gint’s name—?” Yrena gasped.

  “I think something’s on the roof,” Bakke said, pulling out his disruptor.

  “Brilliant deduction,” his mother said. “But what is it? Can we pull up an image on the external monitors?”

  “They . . . they’re not hooked up yet,” Rascoe mumbled nervously.

  “You mean you haven’t hooked them up yet,” Bakke corrected, giving his brother a cold stare.

  “I’ve been busy!” the younger brute said, staring right back.

  “I don’t care whose fault it is,” Yrena shouted, stepping between them. “One of you needs to go outside and see what’s making that infernal noise, and make it stop. Now!”

  “It’s your fault,” Bakke said, shoving his disruptor into Rascoe’s hand. “You go.”

  “It’s your disruptor,” Rascoe retorted, attempting to return it. But Bakke backed away and refused to take it. Rascoe glanced down at the weapon in annoyance. Then an ugly smile formed on his face. “Fine!” he said, glancing at his brother. “It was yours. Now it’s mine.” And he headed for the door.