Sportsmanship
By Laura Schiller
Based on: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Copyright: Paramount
The lack of privacy in the station's brig had never bothered Captain Sisko before. He'd simple shrugged it off as another unpleasant result of Deep Space Nine being built by Cardassians, who played mind games with everything, including architecture.
But seeing Kasidy in one of those tiny, open, brightly lit cells, with nothing but a force field to shield her, exposed like a lab animal in a cage, was almost too much for him.
She sat on the bed with one leg drawn up, her back against the wall, her eyes half closed as if trying to daydream her way out. But as soon as she heard his Starfleet boots click across the polished floor, her eyes snapped open.
"Hey, Ben."
She sounded pleased to see him, even now, which he found deeply confusing. But the warmth in her eyes and voice was tempered by wariness. That made sense coming from a prisoner, but was all wrong for a woman who had eaten his food, watched baseball with his son and slept in his arms.
"I … wanted to talk to you," he said, coming to an awkward stop in front of her with both hands behind his back. "Before … "
"Before having me shipped off to New Zealand? Sure. I'm not exactly busy at the moment." She swept one hand in a circle to indicate the cell walls, smiling crookedly.
That touch of irony got on his nerves. He found nothing funny about this situation. Anger gave him the energy to say what he'd been planning to say in the first place.
"I have just one question, Captain Yates." He approached the force field as closely as he dared, looking squarely at her face, refusing to be distracted by the beauty of her deep brown eyes, or the visible shadows around them.
"You've known me for over a year. You know I'm loyal to Starfleet, the Federation and everything they stand for. The Maquis have rejected all that – and you're one of them. If your feelings for me are real - " She looked up with fire in her eyes, about to interrupt him, but he silenced her by holding up one hand. "What I want to know is, how do you reconcile that in your mind? How can we reconcile that?"
He hadn't meant to add that last question. It just slipped out, with a crack in his voice that was not at all suitable for a Starfleet captain addressing a smuggler.
Kasidy heard it and softened, ever so slightly, while she considered her answer.
"You know," she said, after a long silence, "One of the things I've always loved about baseball is the idea of good sportsmanship. Just because someone's on the other team, that doesn't make them the enemy."
"This isn't a game, Kasidy!" He smacked the wall next to the forcefield with his flat palm.
"D'you think I don't know that?" she snapped, jumping to her feet so that their faces were only inches apart. If not for the force field, she could have punched him – or kissed him.
"Ever since I started working in the DMZ, I've seen things that give me nightmares. Did you hear how the Cardassians bombed Dorvan V?"
He nodded brusquely. That was one of many grim new items that passed over his desk.
"I saw it, Ben." Her dark eyes became even darker as they took on the haunted look of someone who had seen war. That look was becoming all too familiar for him, and he hated to see it in Kasidy, who was one of the most joyful people he knew.
"One of my supply runs took me there just after it happened. I saw my friend Chakotay digging through the rubble where his house used to be, looking for his parents' bodies. The food and medicine I brought was like a drop in the ocean, they needed so much more. And the Federation wasn't doing anything to help."
"Because of the treaty."
"I know." She waved her hand impatiently. "I've heard it explained a hundred times. I know how important it is to keep the peace with Cardassia. But I believe in Federation values as much as you do, and I believe they'd help those colonists if they could. So I do it for them."
She held her head high as she spoke, her voice ringing with strength and conviction, the same strength that kept her flying through long, hostile areas of space because someone needed her on the other side. Here was the Kasidy he knew, who came and went as she pleased, who loved him but didn't depend on him, unlike anyone else on DS9. The qualities in her that had led to her breaking the law were the same qualities he loved.
She was nothing like Eddington, who had kept up the persona of a dutiful Starfleet officer for an entire year, secretly despising the people he swore to protect. She might have kept secrets from Ben for strategic reasons, but she had never pretended to be someone else.
Now he knew what question he had really wanted answered when he walked into the brig. Are you still my Kasidy Yates?
She was. And by God, he still loved her.
"You'd have made a damn fine Starfleet officer, you know," he said.
"I like my freedom too much."
The irony of that statement struck them both at the same time, and they laughed, the sound bouncing forlornly off the metal walls.
"Does Jake know?" she asked.
"Yes, and he looks up to you more than ever. He's proud to have a stepmother who's a modern Robin Hood."
In fact, Jake was currently giving his father the cold shoulder for arresting her, even though they both knew that his duty wouldn't allow him to do anything else. Ben knew that his son would forgive him, but meanwhile, he rather dreaded coming home to a frosty silence.
He was going to miss the sound of Kasidy's laughter inside his quarters, her scent on a pillow, her jumpsuits and off-duty dresses in the closet. He hadn't realized how, one slow step at a time, she had become such an important part of his world.
"Stepmother?" Kasidy's golden brown skin darkened in a surprised blush and she lowered her eyes, which she hadn't done all the time they were discussing her crimes. "Is that really what I am – part of your family? Even now?"
"Only if you want to be."
"Can we talk about it once I'm free? It doesn't feel right, discussing these things from opposite sides of a force field."
She held her palm up as close to the buzzing electricity as she dared.
"Once you're free," he repeated, like a promise, as he held up his hand parallel to hers. "Come and find me."
"I will." She smiled bravely. "Don't watch my brother's championship game without me."
"Wouldn't dream of it."
They lowered their hands in the same instant and he turned away, briskly, like a Starfleet officer. He was afraid that if he didn't go quickly, he might not go at all.
He had a wild impulse to take the force field down, free her, run away with her to Risa or anywhere else she wanted to go. Leave all his responsibilities behind. But he wasn't that kind of person, and neither was she.
That was why they loved each other.
And that was why they had to say goodbye.