18. "Drink this, you'll feel better." (Chakotay & Torres)

(Author's Note: This story takes place before the episode "Caretaker". Batiste is a character from Kirsten Beyer's Voyager Relaunch novels, "Full Circle" and "Unworthy". All you need to know about him is that he's a jerk.)

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"Here you go, sweetheart. Courtesy of the gentleman in the back."

"Call me sweetheart one more time," said B'Elanna, "And I'll hack off your lobes with a blunt knife."

The Ferengi bartender winced, put on an ingratiating smile, and slid a mug of raktajino across the counter. The brown drink was so strong, B'Elanna felt the beginnings of a caffeine buzz just from smelling it. It steamed and bubbled vigorously as she watched. She happened to like raktajino - it was one of the few Klingon things she did like - but it annoyed her that someone would assume she drank the stuff just from looking at her.

She followed the bartender's gaze toward the "gentleman in the back". He wasn't hard to find. This was a small, shabby bar on a small, shabby space station, where the floor was sticky underfoot and the Parrises Squares match playing on the screen overhead was at least a decade old. This gentleman was the only patron except for B'Elanna and a trio of Nausicaans playing cards. He was a large man, at least twice her age, with a leather jacket, a tattooed face and an inscrutable expression. He caught her eye, nodded gravely, and tilted his head to summon her over.

That was it. B'Elanna snapped into fight-or-flight mode. She wasn't going to have another stranger hit on her in a bar, especially one who looked old enough to be her father. She grabbed the raktajino, marched across the sticky floor, and plonked the cup down on the table right in front of her would-be benefactor. Since he'd paid for it, he could have it.

"Whatever you want from me," she said, "The answer is no."

"You haven't even heard what it is yet," he said in a low, even voice she could barely hear over the clattering racquets and cheering crowds on the screen, "Suppose I was looking for an engineer?"

She had already turned her back on him, but that last word made her stop in her tracks.

"How did you know?"

"Gruik told me how you fixed his holosuite." The tattooed man nodded at the bartender, who grinned and waved a dish towel at them both. "He said you strike a pretty good bargain for a Federation girl."

"Yeah, well, that thing was dangerous. Someone could've been trapped there. Most likely while Vulcan Love Slave was running."

"A terrible fate, to be sure."

That was actually the last paycheck she'd been able to earn. She wasn't quite desperate yet, but she was getting close. She'd been doing her hardest not to show it, but for Gruik it must have been obvious from the way she hung out in this bar every day. It was the unofficial hiring spot as well the social hub of this station, and she certainly didn't socialize.

There weren't many jobs available for someone like her, and even fewer of those were honest. The longer she stayed on this station, the sooner she'd run out of both money and options. She'd have to either run back to her mother on Kessik IV - unthinkable after all the horrible things they'd said to each other - or she'd have to take one of those less-than-honest jobs, and Kahless only knew what would happen to her then.

"Fair warning," she said, "I dropped out of Starfleet Academy, so i don't have a degree."

"I guessed as much," he said. "I saw the vid, you know. You called Admiral Batiste some very creative names."

She was never going to live that down, was she?

The reason she'd been … encouraged … to resign from the Academy was a recording of her standing up during a public lecture and challenging the speaker on his political views. She still didn't know who'd filmed r posted it - lucky for them. She may have raised her voice a little, but when she'd seen the recording on the subspace net later, she'd barely recognized the caricature of an angry Klingon woman she'd become. It didn't help that whoever was filming had zoomed in on her ridges and bared teeth, added bass effects to her voice, and ended the scene with three - three - security officers dragging her away.

"Yeah, well, most of the quadrant's seen that vid," she said, folding her arms and narrowing her eyes. "And it makes you want to hire me … why, exactly?"

"Because that man really is a rampaging bigot, and you were the only one brave enough to call him out."

The tattooed man's voice and manner were so calm that at first, B'Elanna didn't even feel the impact of what he'd said. Once she did, though, it knocked her off balance like a perfectly aimed punch. She sat down hard in the opposite chair.

"You were listening?" she squeaked.

No one else - not her smug classmates or her judgmental teachers, not her ex-boyfriend Max who'd found the whole thing wildly entertaining, and least of all her furious, disappointed mother - had ever seemed to listen to what Batiste had actually been saying. He'd sounded so measured and eloquent, it was easy to overlook the meaning behind the words.

"I was," said the tattooed man. "I especially noticed the part where he implied that being annexed by the Cardassians was the colonists' own fault for settling so far from Earth."

B'Elanna scowled, for once not caring whether she looked like the woman in the vid.

"I'm from Kessik IV," she said, by way of explanation. "One squiggle on a map drawn differently, and we'd have ended up in spoonhead territory ourselves."

"I'm from Dorvan V."

No explanation necessary. She'd seen the bombings on the news like everyone else. Having no patience for stock phrases, she bowed her head instead, then looked up at the man in front of her with new eyes.

His reddish-brown leather jacket was worn out; however he lived, he couldn't spare much power for a replicator. His tan skin looked as if he hadn't seen the sunlight in a while. His hair was turning gray. He might be big and strong and poker-faced, but she wasn't frightened anymore.

"So, uh … this job of yours," she said, "Is it on a ship?"

"Yes."

"What kind of ship?"

When he told her the year and model, she snorted. "Seriously? What should I do, tractor-beam it out of a junkyard?"

"Keep it flying, if possible. And not blowing up around our ears."

She grinned. "Sounds like fun."

"Fair warning," he repeated her phrase from earlier, "It could be dangerous. And not exactly legal."

"I figured, or you wouldn't be recruiting in a place like this." B'Elanna waved a sarcastic hand at their surroundings. The Parrises Squares match was over, and the screen was now showing three Orion dancers, wearing nothing but strategically placed glitter. "But if it's drugs or live cargo you're carrying, don't even think about it."

"I promise you, it's neither." The tattooed man frowned - he must be really disgusted by either of those, she thought, if it made him show an actual expression on his face - and folded back the labels of his jacket, quite casually, as if he'd simply gotten too warm.

He had a badge pinned to the inside lining, a red stylized symbol. She didn't know what it was meant to represent - a flower, a flame, a shield or maybe all three - but the shape was unmistakable. She'd seen it sprayed on buildings, printed on manifestos and painted on the sides of ships, usually just before they got destroyed.

Her would-be employer was with the Maquis.

Not exactly legal was an understatement. She could get arrested, or killed, or worse.

Then again, it wasn't as if Starfleet would have been the safest career either, and she didn't believe - especially after her run-in with Batiste - that either one had the moral high ground.

Self-control might not be her strong point, but she knew better than to react visibly in such a public place. She leaned back and stared into the raktajino, which still sat on the table between them and was probably getting tepid. The tattooed man didn't say a word as he waited for her to make up her mind. She realized, belatedly, how rude it must be for her to ignore him for so long.

"Sorry," she said gruffly. "Just … This is a lot to process."

"Drink this. You'll feel better." He nudged the raktajino in her direction.

She wrapped her hands around the still-warm mug and drank. The spicy, smoky scent of roasted beans did calm her a little.

"You know not all Klingons drink this, right?" she couldn't help saying.

"I know." He had dimples when he smiled. "I asked Gruik what you usually order."

"Oh." She hid her chastened expression behind the mug. She was the one who's made the baseless assumption this time, not him. "Um … thanks, anyway."

"I can come back tomorrow if you'd like," he said. "For your answer."

She ran a rapid set of calculations in her head. She had enough credits left for either three days' food and rent, or for a shuttle ticket to Kessik IV … but as the hot drink warmed her from the inside out, she knew already what her answer would be.

"Eh, I'm in," she said. "Why not? I've always wanted to work on an antique."

"You sound like our pilot." He showed his dimples again and reached out a hand across the table. "Welcome to my crew. I'm Chakotay."

"B'Elanna Torres."

For such a big man, he had a surprisingly gentle handshake, but he didn't bat an eye when she squeezed hard. She didn't ask why a human would go by only one name, and he didn't ask her how to spell hers.

She still didn't know if she could trust him. Trust was a dangerous thing in her experience. She did know that she could do a hell of a lot worse.