The habitat ring was empty as Quark staggered back to his quarters. It had been another long, tedious day, with some of the most difficult customers he'd had in years. Why would anyone ever come to his bar knowing full well they were allergic to both synthohol and regular alcohol, not tell the bartender or any other employees about their condition, and then threaten to sue the bartender when their face swelled up? The moment he'd made it into his quarters, Quark headed straight for the couch, where he flopped down facefirst into a flower-printed pillow and let out a frustrated groan.
He lay on the couch for several minutes, silently fuming about his life, until thirst began to claw at his throat and the sweat that lined his heavy clothes became unbearable. Moaning, he rolled off the couch onto the floor, squirming out of his jacket and half-heartedly tossing it into the corner of the room, where a pile of dirty laundry had been accumulating for the past week or so.
It was no secret that Quark had hit a rough patch in his life. Everybody was stressed out about the war, his whole family was betraying long-time Ferengi ideals left and right, and his financial situation wasn't improving whatsoever as time went on. At this rate, he'd be running that stupid bar for the rest of his miserable life. Even the one person who usually kept his life fresh and exciting hadn't been paying much attention to him recently; Odo hadn't dropped by to check in on Quark today. He'd waited all day for the shape-shifting constable to stroll into his bar and make some ridiculous accusation, but he never had. The only people who'd come in were customers- irritating, ungrateful customers who never even bothered to tip him.
After lying on the floor for a few more minutes, Quark finally gathered up the willpower to crawl to his feet and waddle over to the replicator, where he ordered a slug juice. The familiar replicator sound soothed him somewhat; it reminded him a bit of a certain type of rain that he'd always liked listening to back home. But it did little to calm his stressed nerves today, and neither did the slug juice. It just didn't have the same slimy feel that it usually did going down, and the taste was blander than it ever had been. Quark sighed, and then stripped off the rest of his clothes, hoping he'd feel better after a nice, long sonic shower.
Quark closed his eyes and let the waves roll over him. Since nobody was watching, he stroked his ears as he showered, indulging himself in an act that nobody had bothered to offer him in quite a while. He closed his eyes and imagined that somebody else was doing it- somebody like…
With a low whirr that became a drone, the sonic shower shut off. Quark let out a surprised yelp. Must be another systems failure, he thought. I just hope it's not a computer virus this time.
Grumbling, Quark wrapped a bathrobe around himself and trudged out of the shower. Even as abruptly cut off as it had been, the sonic shower had helped rejuvenate him, if only somewhat. Now, as Quark looked around his untidy living room, he noticed something that he hadn't noticed before. On his coffee table, next to an array of PADDs, a tooth sharpener, and a box of Q-tips, was a small black box.
That wasn't there this morning, Quark thought. He crouched down next to the coffee table apprehensively, afraid to look inside the box- what if it was an explosive device sent by one of his enemies that was designed to explode when the box was opened?! Or what if there was some kind of killer insect or fungus or bacteria for a deadly disease inside of it?! It wasn't likely, but just to be safe, Quark pressed his ear to the box and listened for any sort of ticking, hissing, buzzing, or any other dangerous noise. After about a solid minute of pressing his ear to the box and not hearing anything, he decided that it was probably safe to open, so he undid the clasp and gingerly opened the top of the box, wondering what could possibly be inside.
Nothing exploded or jumped out at him when he opened the box, which Quark took as a good sign. The inside of the box was lined with red velvet; Quark ran his fingers over it and was amazed by how soft it was to the touch. Nestled cozily in the centre was a plain silver band- a ring.
Quark tapped on the band, bringing his ear close to listen to the sound it made; it sounded like real silver. He would have been flattered by somebody giving this ring to him, if it hadn't been so boring (for the Exchequer's sake, it didn't even have any gems on it!), but he was very confused as to how it had gotten there. Rings in boxes didn't just appear out of nowhere. Somebody must have snuck into his quarters while he was at work and placed the ring on his coffee table! But why?!
Upon taking a closer look at the ring, Quark remembered something that he'd heard hew-mons and a few other species talk about from time to time- a tradition involving giving a ring to someone you wanted to marry. It was extremely unlikely, but Quark couldn't help but daydream- what if this was an engagement ring?
Whoever had given this to him must have been very shy, or ashamed to be seen giving it to him, to have just left it in his quarters instead of presenting it to him in person- maybe it was from Pel or Grilka? Or maybe they'd been on the run- Natima? Quark's mind ran wild, cooking up fantasies about whatever beautiful fe-male could have left this ring for him. Could it have been one of his Dabo girls?
"Maybe it was Commander Dax," Quark mused aloud, although he knew it was incredibly unlikely. But a Ferengi could dream, right? "I always thought she liked me more than she let on."
To his surprise, a faint rustle followed by a quiet but all-too-familiar grumble came from the box in Quark's hands. Quark knew what was happening the moment he heard those goo noises, but he wished he didn't; his heart sank as the box- and the engagement ring inside it- jumped out of his hands, becoming a translucent shimmer and hanging in the air for a moment before morphing into the familiar shape of Odo.
There was a wide smirk on the Changeling's face as he leaned in to Quark, who took a step back, shaken by the unexpected transformation. "Surprised?" he drawled.
"O-Odo…" was all Quark could say at first. Then something slid into place into his brain and it occurred to him that the engagement ring had been a trick. "Hold on… it's you?!"
"The one and only," Odo said smugly, still wearing that infuriating smirk. Quark wanted to smack that expression off his stupid gelatinous face. "I must say, Quark, you certainly are a wishful thinker," he added more contemptuously than Quark would have expected. "Somebody like Dax wanting to marry you? Hah! Not very likely."
Rage burned in Quark's chest, spreading up into his throat and almost choking him as he opened his mouth to speak. He jabbed his finger angrily at Odo, who simply formed a little hole in his body where Quark tried to land his finger, leaving him jabbing at air. The casual action only served to infuriate Quark even further.
"How could you, Odo?!" he demanded, hot tears springing up in his eyes. "How dare you play a trick like that on me? And after all we've been through together!" he added, even though it was a silly statement- it was their façade of mutual hatred that kept things interesting between them. But this was taking their games too far.
"What's upsetting you so much about this, Quark?" Odo asked, surprisingly gentle. He reached out his hand to touch Quark's face, but Quark slapped it away.
"Don't you get it, you stupid Changeling?" Quark snarled, baring his pointed teeth and standing up on his toes in an effort to be intimidating. "I thought that ring was real!" He paused for a moment, his conviction wavering as he took another look at Odo, trying to comprehend why he would ever play such a cruel prank. But his face revealed nothing- probably because it wasn't even a real face. Despite Quark having known this since they'd first met, reminding himself of this fact now drove his fury even higher. So he continued: "I thought that somebody actually wanted to marry me!"
"Quark," Odo said quietly, raising his hand as though trying to console him.
But Quark wasn't going to be calmed down that easily. "I don't want to hear it, Odo!" he snapped. "I guess it was stupid of me to think that, but you actually tricked me into thinking that anybody would ever want that kind of relationship with me- that somebody would actually love me enough for-"
He broke off, struggling to express just how angry he was at this deceit. All the while, Odo watched him, looking a strange combination of confused, guilty, and almost amused. "Quark-" he began again, but Quark cut him off.
"I said I don't want to hear it!" he yelled, and Odo flinched. He opened his mouth to speak again, but Quark silenced him with a harsh glare and his hands fell to his sides, defeated.
Quark could tell that he felt genuinely sorry for playing this trick on him, but it wasn't enough to make up for doing it in the first place. Even so, he took a few deep breaths, wiped some of the tears off his face (it was a good thing he'd just had a shower and was now wearing an old bathrobe, because he wouldn't have wanted to get the sleeve of one of his good suits stained by tears and the eye makeup that was now running down his face), and used a gentler tone this time to address Odo, although rage still bubbled beneath his words.
"This may be difficult for a Changeling like you to understand, Odo, but to a solid like me, certain things are very important," Quark began, his voice already beginning to tremble after the first few words. That's not good, he thought to himself. I need to show Odo that I'm sturdy enough to stand up for myself when he steps out of line like this! He cleared his throat and continued. "A typical Ferengi marriage may not be built on the same things as some species, but the prospect of receiving a respectable dowry is exciting to me," he said, even though profit had been the last thing on his mind when he'd realized what the ring was- mostly because it was clearly not from another Ferengi. But he didn't want Odo (or anyone) to know about his foolish sentimentalities. "It would have been especially beneficial considering my current financial situation. But no," he added, making sure his voice dripped with more bitterness than the oil from a beetle. "It was all just some infantile prank that you played on me."
At least Odo had the decency to remain silent while Quark explained the reason behind his frustrations - even if it wasn't all entirely true. But now that Quark had explained all he felt the need to explain, the constable spoke up again.
"I'm sorry, Quark," he murmured, the tenderness in his gravelly voice catching Quark off-guard. He moved his hands up to lightly touch Quark's arm, and to his own surprise he didn't move away. Maybe it would be good to give Odo the benefit of the doubt. Besides, the contact felt kind of reassuring… "I didn't realize this meant so much to you," Odo continued, true emotion showing in his non-organic eyes. "If I had known, I would have gone about this some other way."
"Gone about what?" Quark sniffled reproachfully. "Spying on me? Trying to give me a heart attack?"
To his puzzlement, Odo actually chuckled a bit. Quark didn't see what was so funny, and he was about one second away from getting mad again when Odo reached out to gently wipe the half-dried tears lingering in the corners of Quark's eyes. He momentarily changed the surface of his thumb into something more clothlike to soak up the tears, but Quark would have preferred if he'd just used his regular hands, even if the method was less effective. It would have been nice to feel the touch of Odo's thumb upon his cheek. Still, he appreciated the gesture, even if the chuckling did seem a bit unfounded.
"Quark, I'm afraid there's been a misunderstanding," Odo muttered, his voice still rumbling with laughter. "You see, it wasn't a trick at all."
Not a trick? The sentence seemed so out-of-place to Quark that he wasn't sure how to respond at first. In fact, he didn't even understand what it meant at first until the glimmer in Odo's eyes triggered something in his brain and it dawned on him. But no! It seemed so impossible- so incomprehensible- that Quark couldn't even begin to believe it at first. There was no way…
But there was a way, and it was true. "The box may have been me, but the ring never was," Odo explained. And then, for the first time, Quark noticed the other man's left hand. There, hanging at Odo's side, was a faint sparkle. Odo lifted it up for Quark to see and it became immediately clear that it was the same ring- the same boring, bland, entirely unappealing ring- that had been inside the Odo-box. Quark had never even noticed it.
Emotion suddenly overwhelmed Quark, and he took a step back, dizzy. "Odo, I… I'm sorry I lashed out at you like that," he muttered. "I didn't even see the ring in your hand… I just saw the box turn into you and I thought…"
"I know exactly what you thought, Quark. What I want you to know is what I think- or rather, what I feel about you." Odo grabbed Quark's hand in a motion that was more awkward and stiff than Quark had come to expect from a man who was literally fluid in his natural state. It reminded him of the way he behaved around Nerys sometimes. But there was no time to think about that now, because Odo slid the ring onto Quark's trembling finger and looked up at him with an almost foreign amount of affection on his face, and even more in his voice when said, "I want you to marry me, Quark. Will you?"
To say that Quark was stunned would be an understatement. Odo wanted to marry him? Him, out of an entire galaxy's worth of more successful, talented, and attractive people? Why him? What did he have to offer to somebody so frustratingly wonderful?
Odo didn't take kindly to Quark's hesitation. "Comply," he ordered, a completely serious expression on his face, "or I'll escort you to the brig."
Quark blinked, trying to figure out if Odo was joking or not.
Well, it doesn't matter, he thought, a slow but wide smile spreading across his face. Either way, I already know the answer.
"Yes, you dumb Changeling," he muttered, fresh tears springing up in his eyes to replace the ones Odo had wiped away- but rather than tears of anger, these were tears of joy. "Of course I'll marry you!"
"Good," Odo whispered, his own unnatural face twisting into a genuine smile- not a condescending smirk, like most of the smiles he directed at Quark were. "This way you'll be a lot easier to keep an eye on."
"Oh, if you think I'm going to make this easy for you, you're mistaken," Quark murmured, pulling Odo in close in an embrace and leaning the side of his head against his chest. "I'm a very difficult man, you know."
"I know it all too well," Odo rumbled. "After all, I've had to put up with you for this long." If he'd been a solid, Quark would have been able to hear his heartbeat, and feel the vibrations as the sound travelled up his throat. But as it was, he was greeted with the familiar goo sounds that somehow felt better than any of that.
After a while, Odo tried to move away, but Quark clung on more tightly to him, not ready to let go just yet. "Don't think you can get away from me that easily," he muttered fondly. "After all, if you really want to marry me, you'll have to get used to this."
They held each other- well, Quark held Odo, anyway; it seemed that the constable wasn't very good at returning hugs- for a while longer before finally breaking away. Then Quark remembered the ring that was now on his finger and pulled him in again.
He'd really been caught off guard that time, but he wouldn't have had it any other way.