Star Trek: ALL - Seven Deadly Sins (36 page)

It seemed like a very long time before Jennifer and Benjamin finally left the station. Neither of them ate or drank much, and the Intendant scolded them for letting so much food go to waste, though Benjamin couldn’t imagine how she expected three people to make even a slight dent in all the food that had been prepared. When they rose to leave, Kira ordered her servants to discard it all, knowing full well that the Terrans in ore processing likely had not seen that much food in one place in all their lives.

As they rode in the little shuttle back to the tiny, manufactured planet where their living quarters were located, Benjamin at first thought the ride would be as devoid of conversation as the trip to Terok Nor had been. He considered the Intendant’s offer for a time, imagining what it might be like if
he
were the one giving orders, instead of taking them. What it might be like to have his own ship, instead of being confined to the company’s shuttles, having to track every single move he made, never able to be gone for even a moment longer than he had signed out for without having to face a barrage of questions from his father-in-law. But there was no use thinking about
it. If he went to work for Kira Nerys, Jennifer would be furious. There wasn’t much question as to what sort of “duties” he would be required to perform.

After a strained silence of about a quarter of an hour, Jennifer suddenly began speaking, her words tumbling out so quickly, she nearly seemed to choke on them.

“Wouldn’t that be lovely?” she snapped. “Benjamin Sisko, working for the Intendant of Terok Nor. Oh, that would be a plum job for you, wouldn’t it, Benjamin?” She took a hard breath.

“I don’t want to go to work for her,” he said softly.

“Oh, of course you don’t. No, why would you? Your own ship—your own crew? The ability to travel between systems, whenever you wanted? Isn’t that exactly what you always hoped my father could give you? And then, on top of all of that, you’d have the
fringe benefits
that only Kira Nerys would be sure to provide, you’d have—”

“Stop it, Jennifer, I don’t want to go to work for her. I’m perfectly content where I am. Perfectly
lucky
to be where I am.” He tried a laugh. “How could I, a Terran man, possibly hope for any better than what I’ve already got? A beautiful—”

“Don’t even try it,” she interrupted. “We both know why you married me, and it’s got nothing to do with my looks.”

Sisko struggled with his reply. It would do no good to deny it, he already knew that much. He had tried to take it back, what he had said before, but Jennifer would have none of it. She was not the sort of person to just accept an apology and move on; she held grudges forever. “I married you because I
loved
you,” he said.

“You loved me?” Jennifer said angrily.

“I love you,” he quickly amended, but he knew it was too late.

Jennifer turned away from him, and there was a thankful quiet for a few moments before she began again. “I was so stupid,” she said bitterly. “My father tried to warn me. I thought … I thought . . .”

“If I didn’t love you, Jennifer, I would have left you by now, wouldn’t I?”

“Except that there’s never been anywhere for you to go. Until now.”

She was testing him. Daring him, practically, to go to work for Kira. If he accepted the Intendant’s offer, Jennifer would be proven
right. It would be all the evidence she’d need to assure herself that he had never really loved her, was only using her to gain influence within her father’s company.

Sisko’s head sank into his chest. His neck and shoulders felt too weak to support the weight of his skull. “Anyway, if she wants either of us to work for her, then there’s probably nothing we can do about it.”

“That would be a convenient excuse for you, wouldn’t it?”

“Am I wrong?” he snapped.

“My father could probably protect us,” she said. “He won’t want me to work for her, and if I ask him to help you, too, I know that he will do everything he can to keep you from having to live on Terok Nor.”

Sisko was not so sure, but he didn’t say so. Still, Jennifer knew right away what he was thinking.

“I know you don’t think my father has any influence, Benjamin, but you’re wrong.”

Still, he didn’t answer, and his silence seemed to infuriate her.

“Yes, I know you were disappointed when it first occurred to you that my father was not as powerful as you originally thought he was. But he has more clout with the Alliance than you understand. It’s just that he has to be careful. He is a man who learned, a long time ago, what you can and can’t say around Cardassians and Klingons. He knows how to tell them what they want to hear. But he can’t just give you everything you want overnight. That kind of prestige doesn’t come easily, you have to earn it. You have to wait. You have to be patient.”

“I have been patient,” he said, and then instantly regretted having spoken.

“Twelve years is too long for you to have to endure being married to me?” she said. “Is that it? Was it such a high price to pay, then, for what little bit of freedom you enjoy now?”

Her words felt like needles in Sisko’s chest, but he was too weary to even contradict her anymore. He was tired of this conversation, and he knew Jennifer was, too, but maybe it gave her some small amount of catharsis to repeat it again. He hoped so, anyway—that it was somehow worth it for one of them.

The shuttle was coming up on their little terraformed world, a moon of Trivas called Zismer that had been transformed into a habitat
for second-rate employees at Akiem a generation and a half ago. It was not a particularly elegant place to live, but it was exponentially better than most Terrans could ever expect. It was mostly Trill who lived here, Trill, Terrans, Farians, and a handful of folk from other neutral worlds, people who had been smart enough or lucky enough to cast their lots with the Alliance back when it still counted for something.

The shuttle came to rest at the docking port, but Sisko didn’t get out right away. He didn’t look up as he spoke. “I told Janel I’d meet him—” he began, but Jennifer cut him off.

“Of course,” she said bitterly. “By all means, go and see Janel Tigan at the tavern. I could hardly expect you to want to spend your evening with me.” She left Sisko in the shuttle without another word.

Sisko disembarked from the craft after Jennifer was gone. The shuttle did not belong to him, and he did not have the access codes to program a destination; now that it had landed, it was as good as useless to him. Some Alliance officiates in the Intendant’s employ had arranged for Benjamin and Jennifer to use it for this jaunt. It was virtually unheard-of for Benjamin to find a non-work-related occasion for which he would travel in a shuttle, and never in one that had taken him outside the Trivas system.

Benjamin made his way across the surface of the cramped world, looking around at the now dated-seeming architecture. It was designed in a style that had looked modern and sleek when it was new, but everything was inexpensive and trendy enough that it had begun to appear outmoded within just a few years of construction. Retaining walls were cracked and crumbling, walkways shifting under the roots of the fast-growing trees that had been planted but never maintained. The buildings all seemed to sag, the bright colors applied to the adobe walls now faded by the unfiltered light of Trivas’s peculiarly long summer days.

He came upon a squat, ugly building. There was an empty rectangular space set in the front wall that had once been a window, but it had been boarded up years before, making the place look closed. Only the regulars knew better, and Sisko was as faithful a regular as anyone.

Janel Tigan, a handsome young Trill who was employed at Akiem with Sisko, waited in the dusky lamplight at the narrow bar, downing what was probably his fifth or sixth Romulan ale, judging by the empty
cups that littered the bar. Janel could put it away with stunning efficiency. Yet somehow, the cocky young Trill never seemed to get really drunk.

“Ben Sisko,” Janel greeted him, his diction giving no evidence of all the Romulan liquor he had apparently drunk. “I was just wondering when you were going to get here.”

“The … meeting ran a little late,” Sisko said, signaling for the bartender to bring him the usual synthale.

Janel cocked an eyebrow. “Late, eh?” he said. “Does this mean Jennifer is really going to work on Terok Nor? You might really be moving away from this”—he gestured around himself—“place?”

“Not sure,” Sisko replied, accepting his drink.

Janel eyed Sisko for a moment, waiting for more, but when it was clear he was not going to get it, he changed the subject a little. “It seems odd that Kira would have her eye on a Terran to join her staff,” Janel remarked. “Did you think she had any ulterior motives?”

Sisko took a long drink and then paused before answering. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “She … implied that she would have liked
me
to go to work for her. But—”

“You?” Janel repeated, then broke into laughter. “Of course!” he shouted. “Ha! She’s seen the data on you, hasn’t she?” He laughed to himself for a moment. “I guess I worried, Ben, that we’ve caused you to look a little
too
good, haven’t we?”

“Quiet,” Sisko murmured, though there was only one other patron in the tavern, and he was in a heated discussion with the bartender. It was nothing short of astonishing that Janel’s boisterous personality hadn’t gotten him into more trouble over the years; it was lucky for the man that he was so charismatic. The Orions he was acquainted with seemed to love him, despite his loose tongue, to the degree that he was used almost exclusively by the Cardassians at Akiem whenever the company required interactions with stubborn Orions. But Sisko couldn’t afford the same careless indiscretion Janel showed Akiem’s Orion clients.

“Sorry, there, Ben,” Janel said, a little more quietly. “But you have to admit, I’ve done a real number for you, haven’t I?”

“That you have,” Sisko said. “But who knows how long you can keep it up.”

Janel grinned, but Sisko could sense strain behind it. “I’d like to say indefinitely, of course. But the truth is . . .”

“The truth is, you’re starting to worry.”

“Well, I just find it a little disconcerting that word got back to the Intendant, that’s all. That she actually offered you a
job
 . . .”

“And a ship,” Sisko added. “She offered me a ship.”

“Your own ship?” Janel asked, looking genuinely impressed. Janel’s comings and goings were far less regulated than Sisko’s because he enjoyed a much better status with Akiem, but he certainly didn’t have his own ship.

Sisko chortled. “Can you imagine me, with my own ship? Commanding my own crew?”

Janel frowned. “Can
you
imagine it, Ben?”

Sisko didn’t answer.

Janel scrutinized Ben for a moment before breaking into a knowing smile. “You’re considering it, aren’t you? I mean, not just considering—you’re
fantasizing
about it. You’re letting yourself imagine what it would be like to go to work for the Intendant.”

“No,” Sisko lied. “I can’t go to work for her.”

“Why not?”

“Because,” Sisko said, feeling suddenly very helpless, and very tired. “Because it would just confirm for Jennifer what she’s been accusing me of for years.”

“Hm,” Janel said. “Well, then, you are in a bind, aren’t you?”

“No, I’m not,” Ben replied, “because I’m not going to work for the Intendant.”

“Even though you want to?”

“I don’t want to,” Sisko insisted.

“Oh, Ben.” Janel laughed. “What have I told you? When you’re
after
something—be it a woman, money, prestige—”

“I’m not after anything.”

“Or freedom,” Janel went on, as if he hadn’t spoken. “When you’re infatuated with something, when you’re
lusting
after it, you can’t let yourself get too immersed in the picture of what it could be like. No, no, don’t let those pictures come. You have to keep yourself from actually
thinking
about it, if you truly want to get it. Because if you think about it too much, then you
will
yearn for it. And if you start
to actually
hurt
for it, then you become reckless; you’re a goner, Ben. There’ll be no saving you—”

“I’m not going to
work
for her,” Sisko interrupted, his voice much louder than he had intended it to be. “I’ll find a way so that she won’t want me in her fleet. I’ll … I’ll get Jennifer’s father to lean on someone at Akiem—someone who can prevent it. Look, I’ll admit I like the idea of commanding a ship. But I know very well that there’s no way Kira Nerys is going to let me just … work for her.”

Janel’s smile became very wide. “No, of course not,” he said. “The Intendant’s reputation—her …
appetite
… precedes her. But that’s not stopped you from rationalizing it, has it?”

“I … I . . .” Sisko stopped.

Janel continued to smirk, which Sisko was beginning to find a bit annoying. “I know exactly what you’re doing. You’re trying every angle in your mind, you’re thinking of every which way, looking for that elusive loophole that could make it possible. I know how badly you want your own ship. And you’ve got to
stop,
Ben, precisely because, once you have seen a clear enough image of it in your mind, then there are no lengths you wouldn’t go to for it. I would hate to see you in such a position. A
desperate
position, that is.” His smile faded. “You
don’t
want to be that woman’s pet, Ben. Trust me. I’ve heard stories about her that would make an Orion blush.”

“I … won’t let it happen. Not at the cost of my marriage. I care about Jennifer very much. If I didn’t, I would have just accepted the offer right then and there, wouldn’t I?”

Janel’s smile returned, but Ben could plainly see the worry in it now. He wasn’t thinking about the Intendant, or Jennifer. “You need to be more careful with your accounts,” the Trill said pointedly. “We’ll both find ourselves in serious trouble if anyone learns that we’ve been fixing those numbers. And Jennifer and her father could be implicated as well. If you really
do
care about her—”