Ronin & Seyla Pull Some Strings

Posted on Sat Feb 6th, 2016 @ 2:08pm by Seyla & Admiral Lucius Hawke & IKS Ning'Tao

Mission: Further Challenges

The Cherry Pit *

It had taken all of thirty minutes for Security to review the video record from the turbolift and determine that despite the tense atmosphere, Linar had in fact attacked an unarmed Drekkar. He had accompanied Drekkar and Jarad back to Jarad’s quarters so Drekkar could be patched up. They were going down to meet the women but Ronin had other things to do. So it was that he was now standing outside Seyla’s door. Reaching out he rang the chime and waited.

After a moment, Seyla, dressed, barely, in only a diaphanous green gown, answered the door. “Ronin. Good to see you,” she smiled and stepped aside for him to enter. As he did, she ran a hand through her long red hair, carefully arranging it to rest over one shoulder and breast.

His eyes were drawn to her hair immediately and his eyebrows crept close together. “Has Kaeli been talking?”

“Kaeli, Isaura, Suresh, take your pick,” she smiled. Crossing to her bar, she offered, “Would you like a drink or do you have a taste for something else?” Her purr and glance at him made it obvious she was offering more than a drink.

“Drink first, then some information. We’ll see where that leads, shall we?” He followed her to the bar, stopping behind her and corralling her with his hands on the bar. This close, the faint whiff of her pheromones stirred him. Without a second thought, he leaned down to nip at her shoulder.

She chuckled. “I had the feeling you’d be that easy.”

“Are you surprised?” He waited till she’d poured both drinks, then gently turned her around and pinned her against the bar. “I’d intended to get here sooner but some things came up that couldn’t wait.”

“I can feel things coming up,” she smirked and kissed him. “It’s good that you’re here now. Tell me things and I’ll tell you things.”

“I’d better get to that before I lose my senses altogether,” Ro murmured. “And I do intend to lose them fully, now that one big issue is out of the way.” There was still the matter of Zikar but that wasn’t pressing, at least where Drekkar and Jarad were concerned. “Tell me about Isa.”

“Oh,” she frowned, “my favorite subject. Are you soft on her, too?” She passed him a drink and pushed past him to move to the couch. Nothing cooled her ardor quite like mentioning another woman.

“I”m not.” He settled beside her on the sofa and sipped his drink. “I am her first mate and friend and that’s as far as it goes. I have...other interests. Or did, before she left the crew.” He reached out to play his fingers in her long red hair. “So tell me.”

“What about her? She’s annoying at times, seems to always get her way, though, particularly if there’s a male involved. Tell me how she can afford so much now. When she left here, she didn’t have a trace of latinum to her name; now she can pay triple my girl’s fee.”

“It’s a long story but it’s due to some hard work and some very smart moves on her part. Trust me when I say that we charge a lot for our services but we deliver.” The thought of the pigs rose to mind and he touched Seyla’s cheek, passing the memory on to her.

Seyla’s face crumpled into a look of disgust, “Ew! Those were pigs? What, pigs from hell?” The image she’d gotten had looked vaguely like a pig, if pigs had tusks and porcupine quills. “Stealing that ship from Suresh was a good move on her part, apparently. When she was here, she took a turn or two on her back to earn some funds. She was good at it. Not that it’s a tough job.”

That didn’t surprise Ronin and he nodded. “Those days are far behind. She’s gotten quite attached to our chief engineer and he to her. Much to Drekkar’s annoyance.” Annoyance was putting it mildly, he knew.

“He came here, looking for her. I’m surprised he’s with you now, and that she’s still alive,” she laughed. “Isa has never struck me as being particularly loyal to any one person, except herself. Does she treat you and the crew well?”

That caught Ro’s attention. “Who came looking? Drekkar or the chief engineer?” He drained his drink, then gathered Seyla into his arms and relaxed back into the sofa. “She treats us fine and we are loyal to each other. Surprisingly so, given some of the undercurrents running on the ship.”

“Drekkar. I’m not sure who your chief engineer is. What undercurrents?”

“She and Drekkar have a long history, and relationship - a relationship the engineer has interrupted. Drekkar’s responsible, too, for the fact that we now have a doctor.” Ro’s voice had hardened at the mention of the doctor. “So he and Isa dance around each other while she entertains herself with the engineer. Does that make sense?” He buried his nose in her hair and inhaled deeply.

“The doctor that is now your sister’s lover? That is why you dislike him so? You know that familial disapproval is to a woman like catnip is to a cat?” She let her pheromones float on the air, intoxicating him faster than any liquor could.

“Do you know who he is?” Ro asked. The usual hearty dislike for Jarad rose, then floated away. He hadn’t come to talk about him.

“Does it matter what he was? Think of it: Isa was one of my girls; some would denigrate her for it. You don’t. Why do you hold his past against him even though your sister seems to love him?” She traced his hairline lightly.

Ro shrugged. “I want to know about Suresh too. Besides the fact that Isaura owes him big time.” He smiled for a moment. “We may be staying in the area for a while.”

“He seems to have forgiven her for stealing his ship and his cargo,” she said. “Granted, he might change his mind about that. He’s mellowed in his old age and is sometimes capricious in his whims. Lately, he’s been into a former Borg girl, Six. I think she’s melting his brain,” she added, bitterly.

Ronin laughed softly. “His old age? He’s about my age you know, and for our species, that’s still young.” Ro could understand having his brain melted. He was in that very process at the moment. “Good thing he has forgiven her since he’ll see quite a bit of us in the future. So will you.”

“Really? So Isa’s Cardy won’t be tangled up and in trouble because of this Legate that’s stirring up the Diplomats here? I understand he has Security on edge, too.” Seyla leaned in and kissed his neck, lightly nipping at his skin.

“He wants Jarad and Drekkar tied up and returned to Cardassia as criminals but he won’t succeed. Not on my watch.” Ronin sucked in a breath and leaned his head back to give her easier access. “You didn’t comment on the rest...about us….me...being on the station more.”

“Having Isaura here... could be more trouble than I want around my little stake in the universe. Having you here... well, you have tonight to prove to me whether that’s a good thing or not, Ronin.” She did something that made him moan.

“I’ve been saving up, Sey. It’s been what? Two months since my stay on Archadia? I know you were in that house with Will. I’d know your perfume anywhere,” he murmured.

“Often, yes.” His mention of Will made her back off. She reached for her drink and took a sip. “What you were protecting there is still there, isn’t it?”

“I am not at liberty to say.” He leaned forward to take the glass from her hand. “And tonight, it doesn’t matter.” He meant Will, not whatever they had been protecting.

“Of course not,” she kissed him before asking, “Is that all you wanted to know?”

“There may be more later….when was the last time you left this station?”

“I’ve been to Archadia several times this year,” she said, evading his question. “Are you eager to leave it so soon?”

“We have a new engineer coming on board. In a few days, he, Rafael, and I are taking the ship out for a short hop around this area of space...two days to show him the ropes. Come with me.”

“Go with you? Are you actually going somewhere or just out for a spin?” She opened his shirt, ran her claws down his chest, stopping just shy of his belt.

“Out for a spin, where we won’t be disturbed.” He shrugged out of his shirt and tossed it aside. “Say yes….” The scent of her pheromones was thick and heavy in the air now and Ronin was having a very hard time sitting back to let her do as she wished.

She tugged at his belt, unbuckling it. “Just us and Isa’s boy and a new crewman? That sounds like fun,” she purred, thinking about how she could get all sorts of information from Isa’s lover. And return him in a heightened state that Isa would likely thank her for. “When do we leave?”

“How’s tomorrow?” Ro murmured. He realized, even through the fog in his head, that Drekkar would be very grateful indeed.

“Fine,” she whispered and started doing something that made the fog in Ronin’s head draw close and thick around him. “Whenever you’re ready, dear.”

* Much Later *

Ronin’s mind had cleared enough to be rational and he stirred, settling Seyla in close. With his free hand, he reached for his comm badge and called Rafael.

“We will depart for the run with Falon at 1000 hours tomorrow. Have him ready and I’ll meet you on the ship.” He closed the channel, then grinned at Seyla. “Get a load of this.” He pressed the badge again to call Drekkar.

=^=Drekkar here,=^= came Drekkar’s voice. Behind him, the noise level was high; it was obvious he was in a bar somewhere. Isaura’s laugh came from somewhere close to Drekkar’s badge.

“It’s Ro. Tell Isa I’m taking Raf and the new engineer out for a short trip so Raf can show him the ship and all it’s idiosyncrasies. We’ll be gone two days and you all might as well stay at the house.”

=^=That’s exceptionally kind of you, Ro. I’ll be sure to let her know,=^= Drekkar answered. If Ronin had been beside him at that moment, he’d know that Drekkar wouldn’t tell Isa a damned thing. He’d let her think Rafe was sowing his oats elsewhere.

“Good. You all enjoy yourselves. Later.” Ronin closed the channel. “My work here is done. Does that make me a bad person?”

“Are you trying to put her back in Drekkar’s arms? A Cardassian is wrong for your sister but okay for Isa? Is there something wrong with this Rafael?”

“Drekkar’s relationship with Isa didn’t result in her being tossed in a sack, taken back to Romulus, tortured more and driven almost beyond saving when they tried to pull all her secrets out of her head,” Ronin grumbled. “There is a difference.”

“You’re right. There is. Isa wasn’t tortured, that we know of, but she lost everything and has been on the run ever since. Not that she helps herself - she tends to do stupid things like betraying Suresh. But she no longer has a family, nothing she can go back to. Maybe that’s why she turns to Drekkar: he knows her from her old life. She liked her old life; from what she told me, it was comfortable.” While Isaura had been on SB900 years ago, she and Seyla had had a number of conversations.

“I could have other motives too.” Ronin smiled for a moment. “Maybe spending two days with him non-stop will open her eyes to what he truly is. They share bits of time here and there but nothing extended. This could be the way for her to see that some of those little ‘accidents’ aren’t the exception for him.”

“Accidents?” She shifted to look at him. “What accidents?”

Ronin shared briefly the incidents on the Ning’Tao that had resulted in the need for Jarad to do some patching up on Isaura. “Frankly, I was all for leaving his ass on the Krenim homeworld without a second thought.”

Seyla’s ire rose up; men who loved their women didn’t hit them. Ever. For any reason. “But she makes excuses for him, doesn’t she? I just called her stupid, but I didn’t realize how damned dumb she was - is!”

Ro frowned for a moment, then shook his head. “It’s a complicated situation. I’m not so sure it’s dumbness as opposed to blindness.”

“Either way.” She growled suddenly. “So we will take her good choice away, leaving her with the man who would beat on her, given enough time with her. Devious. I like your plan,” she smiled and kissed him. “Make love to me again - we have plenty of time.”

“So we do…” Ronin murmured.

***************
Seyla
Ronin