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"Dabo!"

Quark looked up at the baritone cry that indicated that someone had just won at Hetik's dabo table. Again.

What was I thinking when I let Treir talk me into hiring him? The honest answer, of course, was that he wasn't thinking, at least not with his brain, but rather the appendages on either side of it. It was difficult to be reasonable or to think things through when you were talking with a two-meter-tall Orion woman bred for sex appeal and wearing one of the skimpy outfits that Quark himself insisted his dabo girls wear.

Not to be confused with the sleeveless V-neck tunic and tight shorts that his dabo boy was clad in as he handed over a considerable pile of winnings to a Boslic woman. It was, in fact, the third time the woman had won, and if she kept up at this rate, Quark would be bankrupt.

With a brief hand signal to Frool to keep an eye on the bar, Quark navigated among the tables, which were fairly crowded. Three Starfleet ships were in dock at Deep Space 9—one about to head into the wormhole to the Gamma Quadrant, one on its way to deliver supplies to the ongoing Cardassian relief effort, and one simply stopping over for shore leave after a patrol of the sector—so the bar was full to bursting with gray-and-black-uniformed personnel, along with the usual collection of traders, cargo carriers, and travelers of all kinds that paraded through DS9 every day. Plus, of course, the regulars.

If Quark had his way, there'd be fewer Starfleet; they weren't the biggest spenders in the galaxy, and they didn't imbibe nearly enough to suit him. There wasn't a lot he missed about the days when the Cardassians ran the station, but one was that you could always count on members of the Cardassian military to be heavy drinkers.

Still, it was a decent day for business. So I'm not about to let that Bajoran simian ruin it by giving all my latinum to that Boslic!

As he drew closer, he noticed that the Boslic woman wasn't looking at the winnings that were piling up next to her arms, which were folded neatly at the edge of the dabo table. She wasn't looking at the other players—a Lurian freighter captain, a human Starfleet officer, and a Tellarite civilian—who were looking at her winnings, and rather dolefully at that.

She was looking at Hetik. More to the point, she was staring at Hetik.

Quark knew that stare very well. It was one that was all too often etched on his own face whenever Ro Laren was in the room. Or Kira Nerys. Or Natima Lang. Or Treir. Or Ezri Dax. Or pretty much any other beautiful woman.

In a gentle voice that sounded like honey over hasperat, Hetik told the Boslic woman to put all her winnings on double down.

Without even hesitating, she did so, barely looking at the latinum strips she moved across the table.

Quark, who knew his dabo table, relaxed and stopped in his tracks.

The human and the Lurian both bet triple under, and the Tellarite, spitting and cursing to a degree that irritated Quark—not so much the cursing as the spitting on the table, which he made a mental note to tell Broik to polish later—put what little money he had remaining on double down as well.

To Quark's lack of surprise, triple under won, and both the Tellarite and the Boslic were cleaned out. The Tellarite immediately got up and stormed out, which suited Quark fine, as he had bought only one drink, finished it hours ago, and refused every offer of a fresh one.

However, the Boslic woman simply stood up, ran a hand over Hetik's cheek, said, "Thank you for a divine evening," and slowly exited, making sure to give Hetik several backward glances as she departed.

Okay, so maybe a dabo boy wasn't such a bad idea.

Quark worked his way back to the bar. On the way, he was intercepted by Treir. The Orion woman towered over him and favored him with a seductive smile. "You didn't trust Hetik, did you?"

"I just wanted to keep an ear on things." Quark spoke defensively, which caused him to wonder why he felt so defensive. "Rule of Acquisition Number One-Ninety: 'Hear all, trust nothing.' "

As they got to the bar, Quark took his place behind it. Treir draped herself over the bar so that she was at eye level with the much shorter Quark, and also gave him a very good look at her very generous cleavage, most of which was visible in her very skimpy outfit. Quark knew she did it on purpose, since she was as aware of the Fifty-Third Rule as he was—"Never trust anybody taller than you"—and also knew the deleterious effect her cleavage had on his higher brain functions.

"You know," she said in her sultriest voice, "you never gave me proper compensation."

"For what?"

"Hiring Hetik. You didn't think hiring a dabo boy would be a good idea, but he's drawn in a huge number of customers. I think I deserve some kind of reward for that."

Copyright © 2005 by Paramount Pictures