Hold Your Dominion {Star Trek Fan Fiction}

Third Stage - Bargaining

Gina escaped into the tunnels.  Cities and their streets were connected that way – Andoria was cold and everything living was underground, she remembered. Still, it was difficult not to see a sun, or stars.

The service was just too much. Should she have stayed long enough to hear the clergyman get to the Ns?

Michael Nolan.

Thirty-four years old. Married. Xenobotanist. About to become a father for the first time.

Sheesh. A freakin' Xenobotanist. A plant guy. Why the hell would the Breen – or anyone else, for that matter? – want someone like him dead?

There was a marketplace. She entered its grounds and saw stalls and carts with all manner of odd foodstuffs. Some were recognizable as plants, others as animal matter. Others were – who knew? Anything that still had its own eyeballs was completely out of the question.

"I've got Andorian redbat," said a merchant with a cart.

"Huh?"

"Redbat. It's quite good," he said. He was a Ferengi.

"I don't know." She felt faint. "Can I, uh, can I sit down?"

"Sure, only twenty –" then he thought better of it and vacated the stool he was on. "Sit down." Gallantry wasn't exactly a Ferengi virtue, but if she fainted or barfed, he wouldn't get any more profit that day. It was more expedient to just let her sit.

"Thank you."

"What brings you to Andoria?" he asked. "Redbat! Getcher Andorian redbat here!" If Gina didn't know any better, she'd've sworn he was a vendor at a baseball game.

"The memorial service."

"Oh. That was unfortunate."

The understatement of the decade.

"Right. Um," she was suddenly hungry. The whole pregnancy had been like that. Barfing and then binge eating, binge eating and then barfing. Of course, sometimes the binge eating led to the barfing, but she didn't want to think about that. The redbat didn't seem to have eyeballs still on it. That could work. "How much for one redbat?"

"Thirty-five latinum slips."

"That seems rather excessive," she said.

"Are you suggesting we should bargain?" asked the Ferengi.

"I'm suggesting that that's a bit high," Gina replied, "I'll give you twenty."

"Thirty."

"Twenty, uh, two."

"Hmm," a crowd had gathered, humans, Andorians and Vulcans from the memorial service. "Customers!" he smiled, teeth sharp and menacing.

"You know," she said loudly, "I'm just a poor pregnant widow. How can you overcharge me for a damned redbat?"

An Andorian security officer overheard her. "Is he bothering you?"

"I'm just hungry, and my husband is gone, and ...."

"Give her the damned redbat."

"But –"

"Do you have a license for this cart?" asked the security officer.

The Ferengi hissed through his teeth. "Twenty-six, and that's my final offer."

"These are being sold for fourteen slips not three hundred and fifty meters down that tunnel over there," said the security officer, "Pay him fourteen," he said to Gina. She did so.

Reluctantly, the Ferengi handed over the redbat, which was on a stick. "I'll never make a profit this way," he grumbled.

"Thank you," she said to the security officer.

"I think they just like to bargain," said the Andorian.

"Yes, it's like, it makes you wonder what they would give up if something truly valuable were at stake. How do – well, what can you give – when it's really important?" she asked.

"You're here for the service, right?"

"Yes, I am. And it makes me wonder, if I were a better person, or if Michael had been, or if we hadn't done those little selfish things that everyone does, would he still be alive?"

"I don't think it's a tradeoff," said the Andorian.

"Sure it is," said the Ferengi. They were still fairly close to his stall, and he could hear their exchange. "The afterlife requires a price to be paid. If you don't have enough, you can't go."

"That's not exactly what I'm talking about," Gina said. "It's more, what would have happened, I mean, can I retroactively work hard, and be unselfish and all of that, and have it all taken back?" She looked up at the tunnel's ceiling, for you could not look up at the sky from in there. "God, what is it that you wanted from us? What can I do? What can I pay? I will be good. I will be charitable. I will hold my tongue when all I want to do is tell people off. I will serve you in any way you deem fit."

"I don't think –" said the Andorian.

"And I will do all of that," Gina said, "I offer you this, God, and I even offer you my life if I must. But will you," her voice began to quaver, "will you let Michael live?"