JMJ

Chapter Twenty-Nine

A Contract is a Contract is a Contract

Despite the fact that the Meegs Quark had last interviewed and now in custody was not the same person as the one who stood before him, he knew this could be no other.

He was young, slimmer than Bennar, and with a squeaky snickering sort of laugh. His vivid blue eyes were larger than most with darkened bruise-colored allergy-lined sockets that accentuated them a little like Quark's, but thankfully that ended any similarity. He might have been handsome in a nerd sort of way, but his demeanor was that of a worm, and not simply in a subordinate Ferengi manner. That was seen as virtue, anyway. This was truly the look of an insecure creep pretending to be something more than he was. His eyes lolled in his rapture of the moment with clear insanity besides.

His teeth were long and sharp, and his nails more bluish than most. He did not wear a suit jacket like the fake Meegs, but wore a simple Ferengi chest-length short-sleeved mantel shirt brilliantly patterned like a rich suit jacket of a very successful businessman. In dazzling yellow and azure blue, it was covered in variously sized, overlapping circles, spirals, and medallion patters. His globular buckle was golden, his throat-clasp like a tiny planet winkling on the dim lights around it like a living thing. His shirt was about the same colors as his mantel but the patterns were somewhat muted, and his pants were midnight blue. He wore no ob-lappet, but then considering the fact that he killed his family elders that did not surprise Quark in the least— perhaps he had never wore one considering the fact that he was raised to have zero respect for anyone, except maybe the Keeoopii.

Bennar was frozen, still seated beside Quark, unable to do anything but blink with hands tightly clutching the table just as Quark had been doing, but Quark stood up.

"Where are the others?" he said.

"Safe," remarked Meegs snidely shrugging. "For now."

They looked like they were alone still, but Quark sincerely doubted that at first, except that a few seconds later they were being beamed away. Then they were on a real ship. Real guards were equipped with real guns from which one simple shot could blast a person into stardust. Quark knew the make more than he wished to.

Bennar shook as panic and rage began building to the surface noisily. Those two emotions culminated, ready to explode. Quark was beyond that. He simply glared at Meegs calmly, and Meegs looked right back at Quark with a smug little smile. He wrapped his arms behind his back with an impish cock of his head and just a slight playful stoop towards his adversary as a cheeky child might before a beast in a cage.

"Quark!"

Sharlezeed.

Cringing, Quark turned towards her voice.

Sharzee and Nog were behind a shield barrier in a corner of the atmospherically dark chamber. Bennar was quickly shoved into this makeshift cell by the hand of a very rough alien guard, and the fact that Nog did not try to escape it during the time offered, proved enough that they were in deep sludge, and not the type found to one's comfort in the swamps of Ferenginar.

"Why?" Quark asked as he returned to Meegs.

"Why 'what', exactly?"

Quark smiled. He didn't know why. He stifled a slight snicker as he turned away, paced a little, and then turned back to Meegs before he laughed in full.

"Just make this quick," he said grinning a little crazily himself. "After conflicts of Klingons, Cardassians, Humans and Changelings, it's funny that it's just gunna end like this. Whatever ridiculous thing you're doing. But there is one thing I guess I'd like to know before you do whatever it is you're going to do. You're just a kid. How are you doing this? I don't care so much why or what, just how."

"You're right, I am just a kid, aren't I?" Meegs said cheerfully. "You're an experienced businessman, right? And like any old wise entrepreneur in the line of thousands of generations of proud Ferengi history, you want to know the particulars of the exchange, but anything I could tell you could be a lie so what does it matter? 'Hear all, trust nothing,' but what's the point of listening? I could tell you anything and at this point you would either believe it or disbelieve it, but there would be no proof either way. I could tell you that the person you saw as Meegs before truly believed he was Meegs, but does that mean I have the means to brainwash someone to such a capacity?

"But I am glad I got the opportunity to speak with my enigmatic cousin-in-law. Quark who outwitted Vulcans and Klingons, empires of ideals and moguls through someone he actually respected, though." He looked almost humbly bashful about it, but Quark heard what he truly thought of him easily enough.

"I'm sure you did," Quark nodded. "Now, if that's the way you're gunna be, just put me with the others. I don't have to take this kind of lunacy."

"Why? Are you too much of a traditional Ferengi?" Meegs asked. "Oh, no wait. You aren't. You're a Hidden Profiter. A slanderer among Ferengi. The honest type."

Quark rolled his eyes. "Just put me with the others."

"If you're sure that's what you wish," said Meegs pacing slowly like a predator deciding when to pounce upon his prey.

His huge blue eyes rolled and shifted around Quark's body as though he was pondering where the best place would be to bite. It was a deeply lustful sort of look.

"But if I do that, someone will have to take your place," Meegs said.

"My place as what?" demanded Quark.

"As the Hidden Profiter," said Meegs as though it explained everything, and he stepped back cheerfully and eagerly as though he was truly showing off to someone he admired as he went on, "I'll have everyone watching. All the Keeoopii. All the Hew-mons in my employ. All the Alliance capitals. All I have to do is push a button and everyone will see. All the communications of Ferenginar are now all connected, and as they fight down below the beginnings of a civil war— the first civil war of blood upon Ferenginar— sometimes only bloodshed is the means of getting results, especially in a revolution… well! What I mean is I'll be able to show everyone the strength of their petty enemy."

"You?"

"You," said Meegs simply.

Quark sniffed. "What have I ever done to Ferenginar?"

"Hold us back just like all your Hidden Profiters more than any traditional Ferengi could ever do. You like hierarchy? Do my clothes offend your sense of propriety?"

"Not nearly as much as your mental instability."

"Ah, there you go, being a businessman, putting down the competition in that way you do, that unfeeling, cold, and inexorable way like latinum, but now that you're a Hidden Profiter, your business isn't just money. It's souls. You're the biggest hypocrite. You say that what you hate more than anything are those like the Keeoopii who aren't just satisfied with taking people's material wealth, but that they want you body and soul. You say it sickens you beyond all other things and always has, but a Hidden Profiter does the same thing. You believe that your soul and the souls of all those around you are worth more than latinum. You would have me converted if you had your way more than kill me. Killing me would be the sane thing to do. It would just put me out of my misery, but that's too good for me. You want me."

"A little presumptuous," Quark remarked, "that anyone would want you for anything."

But Meegs went on more delighted than before, "There is no difference between those who believe in the Blessed Exchequer or the Dayitela, except that the Dayitela demands more in the name of love than the Exchequer ever demands in the name of holy greed. At least the Blessed Exchequer just accepts the money at the door no matter how you get it."

"That's not true," said Quark with far more seriousness now. "You can't talk about a belief that you don't understand. Either one of them. Even according to the commentaries of the most standard Rules of Acquisition there are small points that people often overlook that explain how one gets latinum is worth more or less. There is a morality to it. Like vengeance isn't to be taken."

"Why did you convert if you defend your original beliefs so strongly? Is it all just for show just as they say on Ferenginar? To make a martyr of yourself?"

"Stop arguing with him, Uncle. It's not worth it," snapped Nog suddenly.

Neither Quark nor Meegs even turned that way, but Meegs smiled upon hearing it nonetheless.

"Ah, yes!" said Meegs. "Old man, I call upon you to prove your selflessness. You can't have it both ways. Do you want to be the Hidden Profiter or should one of them?"

"I'm making no choices based on your emotional drool."

Meegs laughed again. "Okay!"

He rubbed his hands with anticipation.

"It is said," Meegs said as though quoting from an ancient text hovering above his head, "that besides souls, pain is also worth more than latinum. Pain can save others and cleanse yourself. So, if you can offer me enough pain, then I will set the other three free. What is it that Hew-mons say…? Ah, yes, 'no pain, no gain.'"

Quark pulled his lips over his teeth, and his eyes narrowed dangerously.

"You know why a Hidden Profiter wears a gree lily pad?" asked Meegs. "Because they believed themselves willing to die by being ripped apart by gree-worms while lying flat on one's back. There they'll be ripping your flesh inside and out until death. The way for truth and love and other things that Ferengi are supposed to laugh at or at least shrink away from, but from what I heard, my dear, dear cousin has always been risking his neck for unorthodox profit. But Ferengi as a whole have far outgrown such infantile thought that you dare burden us with again, Quark. In those ancient days, the pirate captors would say to the Hidden Profiter prisoners, 'Hidden Profiter, make your profit, your blood or theirs. One shout, one cry, one complaint, even a sniffle in any way and the pain will end and another will take your place.'"

"And they did it!" snapped Bennar. "To the death!"

"Shhh!" hissed Nog.

Brutally, he and Sharzee grabbed Bennar back by the shoulders, and although Bennar staggered and choked in frustration, his stubborn eyes remained deadly fixed upon Meegs.

"Alright," said Meegs carelessly. "If this old businessman is a man of contract, then this is what it shall be. The feisty Bennar will take Quark's place if he fails. Lady's next and then the Starfleet officer Nog, since he's not really part of this game anyway."

"Just because I'm not a Hidden Profiter doesn't mean I won't fight if I have to," warned Nog very dangerously as well.

"Starfleet's on my side," Meegs said with a shrug. "And you know it. This archaic, dangerous way of thinking will only plunge the universe into what I know Hew-mons call the Dark Ages. Darkness and backwards chaos forever. Makers and fathers and kings and servants… are we not all one? Right? That's where our poor cousin Krax lost his nerve…"

"And that's why you killed him?" asked Nog.

"He killed himself," said Meegs.

"He hardly seemed to me the suicidal type," Quark remarked.

"Neither do you," remarked Meegs back. "But it is amazing what some people will do when forced with a tough decision."

"What you said earlier sounds more believable!" shot Bennar. "That you had an eliminator do him in."

"I did," said Meegs. "To put him out of his misery, but let's get back on track. If Quark succeeds, you go free."

"I'm not making that kind of bargain; it's ludicrous," Quark said. "Let's talk like sane people for a change and—"

"You don't have a choice," said Meegs. "I'll begin the payment exchange in a few minutes whether you've voiced your acceptance or not with you first, Brother*."

Even some of the guards exchanged glances a little. At least it proved that they were alive, anyway.

"Then it's not a real contract!" Quark declared, his heart pounding harder, and he began to feel hot as his breath became shorter.

Meegs was not going to back down. There was no reason why he should when everything seemed to be going Meegs' way, and he knew that bloodlust in Meegs' eyes.

Quark had a sneaking suspicion that Meegs' bloodlust was pure and unadulterated by any other mood or pettiness. It was the bloodlust of the Keeoopii. Even more than the spark of revenge, the pure and authentic love of torture was Meegs', whether physical or mental, for torture's sake.

He almost reached out his hands towards the little dweeb to shove him against the nearest wall, but the hands of the guards were equally as fast. Quark lowered his arms stiffly to his sides, and the guards did likewise.

"It's a contract," said Meegs unperturbed, or rather perpetually perturbed. "When you vowed to uphold the truths of the Hidden Profiters you made your contract with the Dayitela, which is of far more importance than any contract you may have with me. 'A contract is a contract is a contract'!"

Quark rolled his eyes again, and tried not to look at the three pairs of eyes in holding.

"Remember, not a sound of pain or agony. You take it like a Hidden Profiter. Sing if you like— with pleasure, if you like."

"This is crazy!" snapped Nog. "How is anyone expected to not make a sound? It's only a natural response?"

Although pain was something Quark could take if he had to, he had never been known to be silent about it. Quark could not help the feeling that Meegs knew this about Quark full well, except, of course, that most Ferengi were pretty free with their exclamations more than other races were to begin with. In a society where violence was feared even if it was dished out more than Ferengi would admit, it was only natural for that same race to scream the louder when it did happen if even in protest more than actual pain.

Nog was speaking in a general sense, but Quark recalled and with quite heartfelt admittance, that there were some Human Starfleet officers he knew who could take pain silently and far better than any Ferengi he knew.

Don't make me do this, he thought— he prayed, and he paused. He means it, and it's not possible for me to go through it, to the death or not, without failing.

"If you make people watch this," Nog added simply. "They're just going to know what kind of person you are, Meegs, and then they will find a true enemy. You. You'll be making a martyr out of him yourself!"

"I'm going to 'die' in this situation," Meegs retorted. "No one knows who I am. I capture you. I kill you. Then I get supposedly killed by a lovely pair of Hew-mons who'll come bursting through the door to kill me and 'rescue' who's left including the poor child I've kidnapped from poor miserable Meegs. To everyone else, I will simply be a Keeoopii-controlled scum with whom Quark could not negotiate. The people will then fear the Keeoopii more giving into more safety measures against the Keeoopii, which will only serve to make them more easily controlled by the Keeoopii. The Hidden Profiters will be seen as a joke at best and traitors at worst, and the Old Acquisitioners will be seen as the greedy grubs they are. There will be no other option but to go forward with the New Course, which the Federation will encourage for our good." He smiled hazily a moment. "The New Course, which leads to the Keeoopii. Then the Keeoopii will be merged with the Ferengi before anyone in the universe knows what's happened, because the Keeoopii will seem to be defeated. The merged will please the Federation by giving into certain terms that are to be kept off record, and eventually? Who knows. Maybe Hew-mons are next?"

"Aren't you merged?" Sharzee demanded, her voice trembling, but how strong she tried to be made Quark feel uncomfortable about it instead of giving him courage himself.

Fake Lek was not the only person to say Sharzee was not trustworthy, but regardless of what her position had originally been in all this, she hated Meegs and she was at least trying to stall and not just for herself. The way her eyes met his and the way her whole body sounded like it wanted to collapse itself upon his, she truly did love him, and it made Quark glower harder despite the swell of emotion towards her. He turned to Meegs. Maybe the discomfort was the fact that if he had to die, he did not want to die in front of her and make her watch his defeat.

"I am part of the full-merging process," said Meegs. "But I don't need to be merged, because I am a trial of the Keeoopii. I am the doting father of the first of the true-merged, and we will merge far better than the Aavara."

"Father?" demanded Sharzee with disgust.

"The Aavara were destroyed by the emotional draining and psychological slavery imposed upon them!" Nog declared.

"Ah, but Ferengi are more willing," said Meegs. "'Too much of one and not enough of the other' must be solved by the soul of every Ferengi. The Keeoopii will quell that otherwise impossible goal groaning within their souls. There will be no hording, no division. We will evolve."

"Then maybe it will just drive us all insane," suggested Bennar.

"Some. Of course. Evolution is a violent and terrible power. It's my own brilliance that made this merge more stable for the sake of all Ferengi. Deep down everyone is one, so we will be one. The catalyst, the goddess of new life and of the future, the Daishka*!" He put his wrists together for a pause of respect.

"You have your own religion then?" demanded Nog.

"Everyone has a religion," said Meegs. "Only fools think otherwise, but the Daishka is real. Very real. I will introduce her to you all before we get started. They're going to rescue her, of course. My daughter who morphed from Netil to the Daishka she is. She will be more than she, she will be all, and all will be everything and everyone at once. The almighty All will be the balancing of too much of one and not enough of the other, because we will be All."

"Sounds like the collective consciousness of the Borg to me," said Quark. "That's not so profound. Just with organic means rather than cyber-genetics."

"No, more like the Dominion," said Meegs gravely. "But better, because it includes everyone, because everyone is a Ferengi whereas the Dominion dominated those who could not physically be one of the changelings, but only like the Borg in the sense that everyone can become them. It's like… well, a better version of the Hew-mon's Federation. Everyone is a Ferengi and the Keeoopii have joined us, and once everyone knows this and becomes All then All will realize freedom. Freedom from worry, freedom from want, freedom from envy, and…"

"Yes, yes, and freedom from the consequences of free will and thinking for oneself and making one's own decisions," muttered Quark. "These are not profound or new ideas, just failed ideas repurposed into something more salable for the market who in this case happen to be the people of the Ferengi Alliance."

But Meegs paid him no heed, he turned suddenly, and his voice became startlingly sweet and sickly-so: "Come, bedbug!"

He called as if calling a puppy, but from one of the darker corners of the chamber and behind an especially large and cruel-looking guard came a very small Ferengi child. Nothing about her appeared abnormal physically; though, by her little slip of a figure she was either older than her size implied or she carried a deceitfully mature look about her. Her eyes were bright blue, and she came up curious but guardedly behind her monstrous bodyguard as she surveyed the prisoners and especially Quark who was not bound. She looked even smaller and slighter in her silvery jumpsuit topped with a tiny version of an elaborate businessman's coat. Her coattails trailed behind her like a pair of long slithering tails. A set of earlaces made of gold-pressed latinum beads looked nearly too heavy for her small ears.

As Quark's eyes met hers there was something more disturbing about her than her father calling her a goddess and dressing her up so pretentiously. He was staring at the eyes of an old and timeless being, or at least that was the feeling given off in the dim lighting. It could have been a trick. She sounded ambiguous as to feeling, but she did sound like a little girl. She also looked a little like a trained animal that appeared tame at the moment but would lunge in savagely to tear out a jugular if need be. She was no doubt overtaken by a Keeoopii. He thought he could actually hear it through her skull squiggling with anticipation, but he could not be sure. Whatever the case Quark guessed this Keeoopii was a special one, or at least one specially trained.

"Go ahead, bow to the goddess if you dare," said Meegs.

"What have you done to her?" demanded Sharzee.

Netil threw a curious look at Sharzee, and her young brow puckered; her lower lip pouted.

Meegs was the only one who bowed to her at first but the guards soon also copied their teacher. Quark was even more certain that Meegs had put Krax's spoils to much abuse to get these people to follow in his madness.

"You may be seated, O Daishka!" said Meegs throwing an arm towards a cushioned bench near at hand.

As she did as bidden, Meegs lifted himself upright and looked smugly at Quark. "She has seen to the demise of our cousin Krax."

"You made a child witness to a murder?" demanded Sharzee.

Meegs shook his head. "You murdered a few children yourself, Sharzee, by lying to them that the Rules of Acquisition were something to be proud of."

Sharzee flushed bright yellow. "How dare you compah—!"

"Don't!" Quark snapped.

"Right!" exclaimed Meegs. "Let's be selfish, shall we? This is about you."

"Is that supposed to impress me?" asked Quark dryly.

"It will before the end," Meegs assured him. "Now let's get started. Dr. Zof will join us now."

Taking his cue, one of the few Ferengi in the mess of people patiently dealing with the psychopath came forward. Dr. Zof sounded more uncomfortable than he looked. He carried himself with professional poise and glanced arrogantly at Quark as though looking down upon a dying slug.

Quark sighed as Dr. Zof pointed to a table behind them, and Quark knew without asking that this low round slab was his intended lily pad.

"We'll begin the infomercial," said Meegs pushing a screen along the wall that apparently started the premier of Quark's torture for the viewers in the Ferengi Alliance— if there truly were any viewers.

Quark's legs felt heavy and a bit like worms more than solid appendages. They probably would be less than stewed worms before the end, and he tried not to tremble as Zof bade him to lie down. He closed his eyes.

He almost refused, but just as it was on the tip of his tongue, he bit it back. If he said anything in protest Meegs would replace him with Bennar. Bennar was already yelling at Meegs to replace Quark with himself in between calling him names, and his voice was becoming already hoarse. Sharzee too begged to replace Quark, but Meegs would not heed their cries unless Quark gave the word. Nog was yelling something too, but Quark was no longer paying attention.

As one diving into a swamp, Quark took a deep breath and forced himself— painfully forced himself— to climb upon the metal slab. He was only halfway on his back before some pressure forced him down flat and hard against his spine. He almost let out a cry from the surprise of it, and the gasp was in no way something he could suppress. He looked fearfully at Meeg's back, but either he did not notice, or Meegs did not count a gasp as a negative response enough.

He sighed in relief.

Why am I sighing in relief? he demanded himself narrowing his vision on the ceiling. There's nothing relieving about this!

Please… he thought, he begged, he prayed squeezing his eyes shut again. Let me get through this. Let me get through this. Please, please… don't let Meegs go through with this plan…

*Daishka: Loosely translates to "goddess" with typical feminine flourishes.

With "Dai/Day" meaning "All" in the sense of "everything at once (and more)" or "omnipresent" or "omnipotent" depending on context. It is used in the title DaiMon (captain of a D'Kora with another long and complicated background meaning) and in the occupation of Dayitela which has already been stated as a person who makes, sells, fixes, etc his product. It is also a word used to describe many things in the Ferengi spiritual world. It can at times be very loosely translated as how some cultures use the word "holy", although Ferengi also do have a word for "sacred" though this word is used more for objects and "Dai" has more to do with people and doers.

*Brother: "Eeooga" is used more as a title more than the word for a biological brother, and is the word Rom is usually using when speaking to Quark when addressing him. Although literally meaning "Older Brother", it is generally used to denote anyone who is head of the family who is not one's direct father or grandfather thus can be used by cousins and nephews, nieces etc if the family unit extends that far with a single family head.