“With or without sugar?” Jamal al-Jabar asked once more as he held the tongs over the sugar bowl, having already dropped a single cube into his own tea cup.

Formerly the chief steward to The Last Pirate King, his right-hand man, her accomplice in deposing him, heir to his fortunes and standing, victim to Starfleet’s rather well-informed and targeted anti-piracy campaign around the Paulson Nebula and most presently a man on the run, host to the boarding party from the Vondem Rose and prisoner held at the end of a disruptor was, Sidda had to admit, a consummate host.

The teapot was glass, exposing its simple workings to the world at large. No poisoner’s pot was this. Just like Revin had taught her to watch out for. The sugar could have been anything, but if it was Vondem rose tea as he’d said, she’d rather stab herself than sully it with sugar. So, while still threatening him with her weapon, her elbow resting on the table after she sat down, she shook her head gently.

“No, thank you,” she answered finally, letting her own voice drip with cultured training. Grandmother would have been so proud of how she had managed to sound polite and disgusted all at the same time. Just as she’d taught her.

“You must allow me to apologise for adding sugar to my own cup, but I have quite the sweet tooth and rose tea from your homeworld is a rather refined taste.” He set the sugar bowl down, waved at the plate of biscuits as a way of saying ‘help yourself’ then picked up his cup after a brief stir. “I see we’re rather incessant on getting to the point Kingslayer.”

“I didn’t kill him,” she retorted, “but I do like the nickname. Please, do tell, have you been spreading it far?”

“No, thought I’d wait for your return. I figured that T’Rev had other helpers set up his final acts of revenge and that I’d be the target of one of them. But that you’re asking me questions instead of merely shooting me tells me that you haven’t been sent after me specifically.” He sipped at his tea, as if this was just a happy little conversation, as if she wasn’t armed.

It was, she reflected, starting to get to her.

“Brett Gavalore. Where is he? Now.” She waved the disruptor a little. “Before I decide to simply start rummaging through your computers without you.”

“I would advise against that,” he said. “They’re set to wipe upon my untimely demise. Or my departure from this facility. You can’t expect me to sit down with you without making some minor arrangements to ensure my safety, can you?” He sighed. “I want reassurances from you, that when you have the information you desire, you’ll depart this place without harming me, leave this system without harming this facility and be on your way.”

She glared at him as he did a passable impression of his former master. Keeping emotion from his face – a poker face as Gaeda had educated her. He had the information she wanted and had set the terms for the trade. But more importantly, was willing the rely on her very well-established reputation for keeping her word.

“I promise, not a shot fired,” she answered after nearly half a minute of drawn-out silence. The charge stud was released, the pistol whined as capacitors were discharged back into the power cell. She waited for the indicator light to change colour before flicking another control with her thumb, then holstering the weapon with just a bit of flourish to show off.

“I’m so glad we can be civil about this,” al-Jabar said as he set his cup of tea down. “Now, Brett Gavalore and T’Halla Shreln. Two very interesting names to be asked about. Ms Shreln I can only advise about who might know where she is at this time. Mass murdering bio-terrorists after all like to keep their heads down. Especially after negatively impacting my predecessor’s business interests as she did.”

“Get to the point,” she growled, the mask of civility and trained politeness slipping as he beseeched the Dr Shreln’s name before her. “I don’t have all day.”

“Surely you do,” al-Jabar continued. “T’Rev after all wanted all of his acts of revenge from beyond the grave to succeed without the limits of time and space. Unless…oh, I take it he’s arranged for some sort of retribution to fall upon you for deposing him and handing him over to the Federation?”

“Something like that.”

“I wonder who it could be? Tomaz? Plek? The K’chalna Sisters?” He was watching her, eyes narrowing as he was looking for tells on her face.

“Manfred,” she answered and saw his own mask slip instead.

“Manfred?” he asked. She nodded in confirmation. “He promised me we would never brook with that…thing again.” al-Jabar actually looked shaken at the mention of the name. “You weren’t followed here, were you?”

“I have a cloaking device and two Romulan engineers who nurse it like a favoured pet, what do you think?”

He glared at her for a moment. “Dr Shreln, last I heard, had slipped back into the Federation. Smuggled herself in really. The Romulan states were becoming too hot for her after she’d started her campaign against the upper classes. And her former accomplices had grown disillusioned with her ‘acceptable collateral damages’ when she released a plague that killed two hundred thousand people. You’ll want to speak with a trader named Merrac on Qualor II. He’s the only Merrac operating in the trade business there, so shouldn’t be too hard to find.”

“You keep talking like she’s a criminal. I know her, she wouldn’t do anything of the sort,” she said, softly, controlled.

“You know her?” al-Jabar asked, shaking his head. “Why am I not more surprised? Of course, you’d know someone as psychotic and paranoid as T’Halla Shreln.” He shook his head. “Brett Gavalore however is much, much easier to find. He’s been hiding under your nose for some time.”

“Where?” she growled.

“Ayer’s Rock,” al-Jabar answered. “Three days ride out of Landing. Sheriff Jacobs knows exactly where.”

“You’re kidding me,” she said, earning a shrug and a shake of his head from al-Jabar. “How long?”

“About five years now,” he answered her. “About the same time that you started to make quite the name for yourself. From what I learned he cashed in everything he had and left the association of fellow entrepreneurs such as ourselves, retiring to a cattle farm on a backwater on the Klingon border. So far from any major settlements even Klingon raiders would leave him alone. I never asked T’Rev why he wanted me to locate the man, but I guess it was related to you in some shape or form. Or something he did to T’Rev before my employment.”

“How do I know you’re not lying to me?” she asked him.

“I have never lied to you,” he replied. “I take pleasure in being an honest businessman. It is after all so rare to be a person of their word, that those such as you and myself stand out in this profession.”

“He who runs an operation that brooks in slavery, murder, extortion and wanton piracy.”

“Says the pirate,” he answered back. “I understand you have your limits and moral standings Sidda, but others don’t. Would you prefer chaos without restraint, or at least some form of regulation and limitation to ease the worst excesses of our fellows?”

“Merrac, Qualor. Ayer’s Rock, speak with Sheriff Jacobs.” He nodded in confirmation of her repetition of the essential facts. “Since I have no desire to discuss the morality of piracy with you then, I guess I should be on my way.”

“Preferably without doing something to alert Manfred to this location? At least until my associates return to finish evacuations.” He stood as she did, having set his tea down. At least he didn’t comment about her not even trying it. “I trust we won’t be speaking again, yes? Ever.”

“That is certainly true,” she said, offering him a smile. Another trained smile, one she had to practise in the mirror. The polite smile before revealing something to another party. “I will hold to my word,” she continued, reaching into her jacket and removing her old-fashioned and distinctly out-of-style folding communicator, giving it a practised flick to open. “Send over the ambassador,” she said after the device chirped happily at her.

As al-Jabar glared at her the sound of a transporter could be heard right behind him. He turned and found a single photon torpedo on a set of stands waiting for him. “You promised,” he hissed as he spun back to face her. “You wouldn’t harm me or this facility.”

“No,” she countered. “I said not a shot fired. That,” she pointed past him at the torpedo, “was transported.”

“Semantics!” he yelled.

“A trick both my mother and grandmother taught me will get me far.” She reached for the cup he’d poured for her on the table, lifting it from its saucer before speaking into her communicator. “Now please.”

“You duplicitous, traitorous – “ al-Jabar’s words were cut off by the whine of the transporter, redoubled as she rematerialized on the Vondem Rose and was surrounded by her people once more.

And that’s when she sipped at the cup of tea finally, just as the ship was rocked by a dull thump that was barely perceptible. Even across the vacuum of space, the detonation of a torpedo at maximum yield inside of an asteroid would produce a shock wave. Debris and plasma carried forth and at the distance the Rose was at, would gently caress the ship.

“Huh, not a bad cup of tea,” she quipped as she stepped off the transporter pad. “Not bad at all.”