"Now to your rrrRight!"

Chekov rolled his eyes as he obediently changed direction to move through an archway. After a few hours with only fluorcarbon ratios for company, he'd begun to look forward to his upcoming mealtime servitude as a welcome change of pace. He now knew he was very wrong. Hours of boredom were preferable to this sort of humiliation.

Since as a slave he was too unreliable and untrustworthy to be allowed to simply follow his nose to the station's kitchens, the Kibree had provided an escort. Gebain was a tall, blue-skinned, lower mid-caste major domo who would have made an excellent drill sergeant.

"Step liiiveleee," he barked in rhythm to the pace he was maintaining, just as he had every time he felt Chekov was letting the prescribed four paces between them narrow.

Chekov tried to lengthen his strides to match the sound of the long-legged Kibree's footfalls. It was preferable to being stopped and bawled out yet again. Although the ensign couldn't understand more than half of what was being said to him, Gebain unfailingly chose to chastise him in places where audiences of his former co-workers — who could understand all that was being said — could listen in as they lounged in the cool corridors taking a mid-afternoon break. Chekov was quite sure that that if anyone on the station was unaware that he had become a slave — and not a particularly good or even promising one at that — they now knew.

"Aaand come tooo a HALT!"

"Oh, God," Chekov groaned to himself in Standard as he halted in front of a large black door. "What have I done now?"

"What was that?" the major domo fairly shouted in his left ear.

"Nothing, Mister Gebain," he replied very respectfully in Kibrian, reminding himself once more that he was under strict orders not to argue or in any way give offence to anyone — no matter the provocation. An even more persuasive argument for holding his tongue was his knowledge that now as a member of the lowest caste he could be punished (within certain parameters) virtually at will. He'd only seen the kiani scold their servants. However Sulu had informed him this was because they considered themselves of too delicate a nature to dirty their hands with anything more severe. For any sort of heavy duty correction, the kiani called in someone of a caste with less refined sensibilities — someone probably very like the redoubtable Mister Gebain.

"I'll thank you not to mutter," the Kibree said, moving in front of him.

Chekov raised his eyebrows. This promised to be a new twist on being yelled at. Up until this point, Gebain had made quite a point of screaming at the ensign's back while he remained facing forwards. Two or three of the first few times Chekov had been stopped to be shouted at he'd also been shouted at for turning around to listen to what was being said to him.

"This…" The tall Kibree tapped the door frame. "is the entrance to the kitchens that you will use from now on."

Chekov almost sighed in relief. At least the long journey from his quarters was over. However trepidation about what awaited him on the other side of that door began to set in. He considered somewhat ruefully that he had ignored the lower castes pretty thoroughly himself. If he'd paid more attention, he'd have had a better idea of what to expect now. From what he knew of the caste system, behind this door would be the slow, the untrainable, the physically disadvantaged and the criminal. There might also, of course, be others like himself, mere victims of injustice. He took some comfort in this mental picture of himself as leaven in an unpromising dough.

"You will meet me here at precisely five minutes BEFORE the blue hour of each meal to receive any instructions I may care to give you," Gebain was saying.

Chekov had wondered why the Kibree used both numbers and colours to label hours of the day. As a free person, he'd only been aware of the use of numbers to designate time. Now as a servant, he'd learned that the colour system designated a schedule of work periods. Knowing when breakfast's blue hour, or preparation period, fell was now more important than knowing what time that meal was scheduled to be served had ever been.

"I don't care how tired you are, or what fancy work your master has you doing," Gebain said. "If you are so much as one second late, I'll come looking for you. And you know by now you don't want that to happen, don't you?"

Chekov smiled ruefully. "Indeed, sir."

"Don't try to be clever!" The Kibree pointed a menacing finger in his face. "And don't smile at me! Now you're to go in there and peel shork until you're told to quit. I will be back for you when it's time for you to serve in the main hall. Understood?"

"Understood," Chekov replied, then, considering that this might also be seen as attempted cleverness, he changed his answer to, "I mean… yes, sir!"

"I've got an eye on you," Gebain warned, taking the doorknob to the kitchen in one hand and Chekov's upper arm in the other. Music hit them like a solid wall as he opened the heavy door. It was rhythmic, raucous and peppered with the ringing metallic percussion of a kitchen in full swing. As Gebain thrust Chekov forward into the room, he bawled out over the din, "New slave in the hall! New slave in the hall!"

As the door slammed behind him, a Kibrian woman swathed in meters of tropical colour dived forward and swept a small child away from under his feet. The terror in her face startled him. That wasn't the usual reaction among the Kibree of any caste to offworlders. Contempt was frequently enough directed at people who were casteless by natives for whom caste defined their whole existence, but never before had he seen dread. Chekov attempted to make a friendly gesture towards mother and child, but was roughly pushed back against the door. On one side of him was an exceptionally tall Kibree with skin as dark as any Chekov had seen. On the other side was a dwarfish man with terracotta skin and a face that was twisted into a permanent leer. Both blocked his further entrance into the room.

"Gall's balls, it's a Feddie!" the tall man exclaimed in a booming voice.

"Damned if it's not the lookly one, too," the dwarf said, curiously reaching out and fingering the material of Chekov's tunic.

At least that's what Chekov thought they said. Sulu's crash course in the language had prepared him for the polite accents of the scientific community, not the rough slang of the servants' quarters.

"Hey, Feddie." The tall man thumped him on the chest. "You the one that took a bop to Tunnas?"

Chekov blinked at him. "What?"

"You sapped down the kiriar," the dwarf explained, miming a powerful uppercut. "Took a chomp at his nood, hey?"

"Oh… oh, yes," Chekov replied, helped more by the pantomime than the linguistic alternatives presented. "I hit a magistrate, but it was all a terrible mistake."

"Take ease, Nula," the tall man called to the woman who was still clutching her child. "This one won't give harm to your wee nammie."

"Any slag who'll give licks to a kirrie can take ease with me," a one-eyed servant taking a break from scrubbing the floor said approvingly.

"Aeyo, slags!" a hawk-faced Kibree in a low-caste cook's uniform called out from a doorway leading into one of the inner kitchens. "Hop to, or you'll all take licks from me!"

"Copped a chore yet, Feddie?" the tall man asked Chekov as the one-eyed man made what looked like an obscene gesture at the cook's back.

"Su!" exclaimed a young female Kibree from across the room. "I scan him a stirrer!"

She was standing with three other women over a cooking pit. They were all employed stirring large kettles of an unknown substance with long wooden paddles. After making her incomprehensible announcement, she started removing the splattered cloth over her garments as if making preparations for him to take her place.

"Actually," Chekov protested as it became quickly apparent that that was precisely what everyone expected him to do, "I was told to peel…"

"Give quiet, Feddie," the dwarf admonished him gruffly, leading him forward by the elbow. "You've been scanned a stirrer

"But…" Not knowing what the mysterious process of having been "scanned" something was, Chekov was quite at a loss as to how to get out of it.

The Kibree woman who had 'scanned' him eagerly met him halfway. "Take watch careful, Feddie," she advised, wrapping her food splattered cloth under his arms like an apron as the dwarf guided him firmly towards the tall blue pots. "Don't give a burn."

"Take ease, mort," the dwarf said, tapping one of the women. "I'm taking sight of Feddie."

Chekov was still puzzling over what 'giving a burn' might entail as the Kibree woman wound a kerchief-sized cloth round each of his hands and placed them on the handle of a wooden paddle still stuck in the bubbling, gooey, gray slime inside the blue kettle in front of him.

"Take ease, Feddie!" she said, apparently wishing him well as she abandoned him for cooler parts of the kitchen.

The dwarfish man, now similarly attired, stepped up to take a place at the kettle beside his.

"I'm taking sight of you, Feddie," he said, in a tone so solemn it was almost threatening. Moving slowly and exaggerating his movements, the dwarf demonstrated the proper grip and technique for stirring. "Give stir," he encouraged Chekov at the end of his presentation. "Give stir."

"Oh," Chekov said as comprehension dawned on him. Still not understanding exactly why the dwarf was 'taking sight' of him — whatever that meant — he moved to mimic the Kibree's actions. In response the dwarf gave an ambivalent grunt that Chekov took as provisional approval.

Looking around the kitchen, he saw that everyone was occupied. Even the smallest children were working at sorting beans. The music that could be heard over the burble of conversation and the clang of pots Chekov could now see was issuing from a playback device mounted on one wall. Somehow that spoiled his original impression of aboriginal abandon. The finer points of the preparation of specific dishes were carried out in the inner kitchens. From his vantage point he could see low-caste cooks in one of the rooms branching off from this one busy at tasks that the lowest caste was considered incompetent to perform — like seasoning dishes or handling bladed utensils. The absence of automation in this sub-kitchen was striking. Despite the number of slaves engaged in scrubbing something, the lack of basic hygiene was also notable. For instance, on the opposite side of the room young boys scraped food off crockery, then after giving them a quick dunking in a tub of water, wiped them off and stacked them as if they were clean. The table of people busy doing what he believed to be peeling shork — a shrimp-like crustacean — did so with their bare hands, often, he noted, wiping their mouths or noses without significantly interrupting their task.

Peeling shork seemed to him to be one of the better jobs. Although perhaps faster paced than stirring, it did involve sitting at a table in a cool part of the kitchen rather than standing over a hot cooking pit.

The dwarf's elbow made contact with Chekov's ribs. "Take watch, Feddie!" the Kibree warned him, nodding towards the kettle in front of him.

"Oh, yes," he said, turning his attention back to his task. He realised another use for the cloths around his palms as he watched one of the two women stirring the pots directly across from him swipe perspiration off her forehead with her hand cloth, deftly managing not to break the rhythm of her stir. The two women had the advantage of having their hair tied up in head wraps. His own was already hanging damply below his eyebrows. As he paused to mop it out of his face, he caught his fellow stirrers taking covert glances at him. They were exceedingly plain women of indeterminate age who looked very alike except one had blue skin and the other green.

"I've taken sight of you previous, Feddie," the green one said boldly after he'd made eye contact.

"I also," the blue one chimed in with a nervous giggle that revealed she had several teeth missing.

"Oh, really?" Chekov said pleasantly. There was little else he could think of to say. It was entirely possible that he'd encountered both of them before and paid more attention to the furniture in the room at the time.

"I took sweet of your sight," the green one said with unmistakable friendliness.

"I too," her friend confessed. "You being so lookly and shiny-toothed."

Chekov could somehow tell that these were meant to be compliments from their manner of delivery. He had to smile at the only nice things that had been said to him all afternoon. "Thank you."

"I now take sweet to be taking sight of you in slag hall, but I don't take understanding of a lookly Feddie taking a bop at a kirrie," the green woman said with a concerned look on her face.

"Su," her companion agreed, apparently sharing her concern. "What came past? Did you take a temper at him?"

"I seem to have taken leave of my senses," Chekov answered, assuming that they were referring to his fateful encounter with the magistrate. "If that's what you mean."

This seemed to be a witticism of some sort, for both women burst into laughter and even the dwarf had to smile.

"Su, would you take a hearing of how slidely he gives speech!" the blue one exclaimed

"Slidely enough," green agreed. "I take it sweet though."

"Comes the cook," the dwarf warned tersely as a low-caste carrying a small pot moved across the room in their direction. Without looking around to confirm, the women quickly sobered and returned their focus to their work. Chekov decided it was wisest to follow their example.

"Don't let the bottom burn, slags," the cook advised as he reached over their shoulders to add spices from the pot in turn to each kettle. He came to a sudden halt when he reached Chekov. Chekov forced himself to not meet the Kibree's eyes as the cook gave him a leisurely version of the now-familiar disbelieving first look he'd received from a variety of Kibree today. The low-caste even pushed the cloth up his hand to check for the presence of a brand. "Got you working for your food now, hey, Feddie?"

Chekov bit his tongue on the reply that came to mind. Instead he concentrated on folding the purple flakes of spice into the gray pudding with very even strokes of his own paddle.

"Work hard, Feddie," the cook advised him, giving him a cheerfully patronising slap on the shoulder. "We'll teach you how to sweat."

"Su," the blue woman giggled, nudging her companion as they watched Chekov observe the cook's departure through narrowed eyes. "Give sight to how quick he takes temper."

Chekov felt the dwarf's elbow touch his ribs again.

"Give bop to cook and you'll take the worst, Feddie," the Kibree advised him weightily.

"Why does everyone call me 'feddie'," Chekov demanded, his supply of patience running dangerously low.

His companions looked at each other, seemingly surprised at the question.

"You are Feddie," the green woman said, as if this should be self-evident.

"I don't understand 'feddie'," he burst out. "Show me what is 'feddie'."

His companions looked at him blankly, then all pointed at him.

"No, no…" This linguistic barrier seemed to be insurmountable. "What else… or who else is 'feddie'?"

"Here?" the green woman asked, and Chekov thought he saw a faint gleam of understanding spark in her eyes.

"Yes!"

She shook her head. "None."

"Oh, God," he said to himself in Standard.

"He's so Feddie, he doesn't take understanding of what is Feddie," the dwarf said to the women, jerking his head towards Chekov.

"Su." This seemed to clear things up for the green woman. "You are Feddie," she told Chekov, speaking as slowly and clearly as her dialect would allow. "We are Kibbie. You come of the Feddie place."

Chekov could tell that this was as good an explanation as he was going to get. 'Feddie place' seemed to make a kind of sense to him. "Feddie… Federation?" he said experimentally. "Is that what you mean? I'm of the Federation — a Feddie — and you're Kibbie — or Kibree?" The moment he'd said it aloud it was embarrassingly obvious.

"In slidely speech," the green woman agreed with a nod. "Don't take temper at slaggish talk, Feddie."

"Take watch," the dwarf warned, reminding him of his forgotten kettle.

"I'm sorry," Chekov apologised, resuming his task. "I didn't understand. I thought it was something bad, an insult."

"Perhaps Feddie's copped a name," the blue woman suggested, as if that could explain his ill-humour. "You copped a name yet, Feddie?"

Chekov still hadn't fathomed the process of "copping" quite yet. "My name is Chekov."

The women nodded as if they thought this was a fine name.

"Take ease, brother Chekov," the green woman said, as if that were a sort of greeting. "I copped Dollu as name."

'Take ease' seemed to be the most useful phrase in the slave dialect. He'd already heard it used to mean hello, goodbye, I'm relieving you, and don't worry.

"I'm pleased to know you, Dollu," he said politely. "And you're called..?"

When the blue woman lowered her eyes, Dollu answered for her, "She's copped no name."

The blue woman shamefacedly pushed the cloth on her hand out of the way so he could see her brand. "I take call Property of Mahtab."

Dollu copied her gesture, with a sympathetic look for her friend who was not fortunate enough to have her own name. "Property of Sitag."

"Property of Sulu," Chekov said, baring his hand in a gesture of proletarian solidarity with them.

They all looked at the dwarf, who stubbornly revealed neither his name, nor the name of his owner. "I'll take more sight of Feddie before I give aught," he said curtly.

"Su," Dollu chided him. "Don't take a temper."

"Sulu…" The blue woman pronounced the name as if she was trying to place it. "Kibbie?"

"No, Feddie," Chekov answered before he caught himself. "I mean, no, he's of the Federation like me."

Dollu's eyes lit up as if she'd figured it out. "Kibbie-eyed though?"

"You could say that Mister Sulu has eyes like the Kibree," Chekov agreed tentatively.

"Ah." This seemed to satisfy her. She turned and explained to her friend, "Sulu, the Kibbie-eyed Feddie, took property of this lookly Feddie."

Chekov wasn't sure if he like the tenor of this clarification.

"Half-Kibbie," the dwarf asserted confidently as Chekov tried to think of a way to voice his objections.

"No, Sulu's not a half-Kibbie," he said. "He's all Feddie… I mean…"

"Hey! Pay attention to what you're doing there!" The low-caste cook in charge of whatever it was they were cooking entered with more ingredients for his brew. "Just because you two morts have a pretty boy Feddie to look at don't mean you can slack off on your work," he scolded the women as he dumped aromatic slices of something into their pots. "I'd better not find the bottom burnt on any of these."

Again, the cook managed to wind up beside Chekov. Satisfaction radiated off the Kibree as he stood overseeing his work crew with hands on hips. Apparently, having a Federation officer as one of his stirrers was just making his day. "How're your arms holding out, Feddie?"

The dwarf's elbow in his ribs told Chekov this was not a rhetorical question.

"Fine." His own military training allowed him to recognise the sound of a superior awaiting an honorific. "…Sir."

The cook dipped a wooden stick into the brew then brought it gingerly to his tongue. "We'll give it five or ten more minutes," he judged expertly. "And don't let me catch you lot slacking off again."

"Cossack," Chekov muttered after him when he was sure the Kibree was out of range.

"Give quiet, Feddie," the dwarf said irritably.

"Su…"

"You also, morts," the little man cut off the women's protests abruptly.

Dollu made a little noise that communicated that she didn't approve of such ill-temper but lapsed into silence none the less.

-o- -o-o-o- -o-

Chekov wiped the sweat off his face as best he could. Despite what he'd said to the cook, his arms were beginning to complain. His hair was sticking to the back of his neck and his uniform was sticking to him all over. He pushed his sleeves up and cast an envious glance at the table of shork peelers. They too were in the middle of receiving a visit from their inner kitchen supervisor. The cook was nodding approvingly at their efforts. Under her direction, preparations began to be made for the transfer of the peeled shork into the inner kitchens and the disposal of the discarded shells and remains.

It was not the most efficient operation Chekov had ever observed. The most bumbling group of midshipmen could have done the job more quickly and neatly. The slaves put a calculated minimum of care and effort into each move. Small children and other workers constantly got in the way. Even the shouting low-caste cook became just another obstacle to help slow down the process. When one of the slaves tripped and spilled a bucket of freshly peeled shork, the meat was simply swept off the floor and back into its container. A few bits of meat, Chekov noted, were calmly retrieved from a scrubber's mop water and added back to the pile.

The goo in his kettle was gradually beginning to thicken and get harder to stir as the peelers finally got rid of the last bag of shork debris and began to scrub down the long table.

"Su, but it's taking heavy, hey?" Dollu said to him sympathetically. Although obviously more practised at the fine art of stirring, she also seemed to be encountering increased resistance to the firm strokes from her wooden paddle. "Almost done."

"Perhaps Feddie will take meal by us," the blue woman suggested shyly to her companion instead of directly to Chekov.

"Yes, Feddie, you take meal by us morts," Dollu informed him enthusiastically.

"I'm taking sight of Feddie," the dwarf protested cantankerously.

"Our cook is coming," Chekov warned his companions, as the low caste approached, flanked by a group of slave assistants.

"All right, slags. Let's see the damage," he said, taking the paddle from the blue woman. The cook gave a final stir to the porridge, apparently testing its texture. He then removed the paddle, checked its tip for telltale signs of burned lumps of grey goo, then dipped his tasting stick into the brew. "This goes," he said, stepping out of the way for two of the men accompanying him to carry the big kettle away between two slabs of wood.

As the low caste repeated the process with Dollu and the dwarf's kettles, Chekov began to imagine that he could detect a faint burning odour mingling with the smell of the grey stuff before him. The way his luck was running today, it seemed almost inevitable that it would be burned. All he could do as the cook took his paddle in hand was stand back and wonder how large a crime he'd committed this time.

The dregs clinging to the long wooden paddle were markedly lumpier than the previous three. There was also a noticeable darkening of the grey mess stuck to its tip.

"You know what this is, Feddie?" the cook asked, sticking it under his nose. "This is almost burned. That means this is almost very big trouble for you."

Chekov didn't know whether or not he should be happy simply to be in big rather than very big trouble.

"But… I'll let you get away with it this time," the cook said magnanimously. "I suppose we can't be too hard on you on your first day in slag hall. All you need is a lot of practice. And believe me, you're going to get it. I'll see to it that you get as good as these morts at this job."

The cook seemed to be waiting for something as he signalled the last two remaining assistants to carry away the kettle. "Well?" he prompted.

Chekov could think of a great many things he'd like to say, but none that he was required to say. "Sir?"

The low-caste gave him a menacing grin. "You'd better thank me for letting you off so easy."

Chekov cleared his throat, fixed his gaze properly on the floor and vowed to take a long slow revenge for this some day. "Thank you."

After the cook departed into the inner kitchen, Chekov speculated on his probable parentage and sexual proclivities using a Russian phrase so vile he doubted it could ever be properly translated into any other language.

"Don't take such temper, Feddie," Dollu advised as she untied his apron for him. "Cook gave you ease on that."

"I've taken raps for less," the blue woman assured him, unwrapping the cloths around her hands and discarding them into a waiting basket.

"Well, I have given raps for much less," Chekov informed her, as he angrily stripped the cloths off his hands and tossed them after hers with a vigour he thought would be better employed on a certain low-caste cook.

"Aye." The dwarf laughed at him. "All good that's give you."

The two women giggled at this, and although Chekov couldn't smile about it, he did have to admit to himself that today his fate did seem to be a particularly good argument for non-violence.

He followed them to the table. After some manoeuvring on the part of his escorts he ended up seated on the low bench on one side of the table with Dollu on his right and the dwarf on his left. Although she made a good effort, the blue woman was too shy to sit next to him in the end.

Deep dish-like pie pans made of crockery were passed down the table. The one that finally ended up in front of Chekov was filled with an identical variety of sizzling, steaming, unrecognisable food to the plates on either side of him. None of it bore any resemblance to anything he'd ever eaten in the dining hall. The kiani's diet was largely vegetarian, consisting largely of fruits, grain breads and moderate amounts of fermented milks that varied in form from rock-hard cheeses to rancidly sour yoghurts. A few animal species showed up on the menu as much for visual interest as nutrition. They ate nothing that looked remotely like any of this.

"What is this stuff?" he asked Dollu warily.

"Peppered krivat," she answered, pointing it out with her eating stick and giving him a Kibree name that told him nothing. "Pickled nuts, schoor — that gives a hot mouth, pale sauce, sharp sauce, sweet sauce."

"Oh." He watched her dig into her own portion with gusto. She ate by stabbing one of the yellowish things with her utensil and dunking it in the greenish goop and popping it quickly into her mouth. Chekov picked up his own stick and moved it experimentally through the lumpy mixture. Whatever was in the sauce raised its head and stared at him.

"What's that," he demanded, pulling quickly away.

"Vegetables," the Kibree woman answered calmly.

A small child shouldered between Chekov and the dwarf and stole a fist of something from the smaller man's plate.

The dwarf made to go after the child but Chekov stopped him. "No, no. Here, have mine."

The dwarf grunted and speared some of the lively elements off Chekov's plate. "What do you want?" he asked suspiciously as if Chekov was going to demand something in return.

What Chekov wanted was a roast beef sandwich, a cold glass of vodka, a shower and his cabin back on the Enterprise. "Is there any bread?" he asked instead.

The dwarf grunted, speared a few more delicacies and went back to his eating.

Chekov had just gotten up enough nerve to taste one of the yellow things when a fight broke out somewhere at the head of the table. There were over thirty people eating at this time so it was very hard to tell what had happened. The dwarf and several others rushed to join in the fray. Dollu and her friend didn't even look up.

Chekov decided to exercise his new philosophy of non-violence and concentrate on his eating. Once in his mouth the yellow thing had the consistency of a marshmallow and a taste somewhat like liver. After he dipped it in one of the sauces it tasted like liver dipped in mashed peas.

The dwarf returned with booty. "Bread," he said triumphantly, splitting the half-eaten loaf with Chekov. It looked like something salvaged from the kianis' lunch and its recent liberation had clearly involved a trip to the floor.

"Thank you," Chekov said, tearing off part of the crust that had someone's footprint on it. Almost as soon as he'd put the discarded piece aside it was speared away. He turned to see it disappear inside Dollu's mouth. Chivalrously, he subdivided his portion and handed some to her. He then tore off a bit and handed it to the blue woman. He reached across Dollu to do this, thinking that passing food might be too delicate a concept for slag hall manners.

They both seemed to find this very charming, smiling and giggling as much as they could while vigorously stuffing their faces.

There wasn't nearly as much food left in his bowl as Chekov remembered when he turned back to it. There was a however a group of three children munching happily behind him and a respectable pile left on the dwarf's plate. Chekov shrugged. The stale bread with a little sauce on it was about all he could stand anyway.

A renewed clatter of dishes signalled the end of the meal, as the slaves began to gather up empty dishes for cleaning.

"Done?" Dollu asked, offering with a gesture to take Chekov's plate away for him.

His mouth full of bread, Chekov nodded.

The dwarf pushed his plate away and swung his legs over the bench to sit astride it. From out of a pocket in his robe, he pulled an oddly shaped clay pipe.

As if on cue, the tall dark-skinned man Chekov had encountered upon entering the hall approached with a lighted taper.

"Still taking sight of Feddie, hey, Mras?" the tall man said, sitting down comfortably on his heels on the floor beside the table.

Chekov turned around to sit facing him as the dwarf solemnly nodded and lit his pipe. A most malodorous cloud of smoke immediately issued forth. As Chekov almost choked on it, the dwarf offered him a puff.

"Feddie's too wee for pipe," the dark man said, laughing. "Give him chew."

The dwarf grunted and passed his pipe to his companion. From out of the front of his robe he pulled a handful of black, tarry lumps the size of thumbnails. He rubbed the dust off one and offered it to Chekov. "Will give aid to stomach," he encouraged him in a voice much huskier than it had been before he'd taken his pipe. "Don't give swallow though. Take chew."

One of the children pushed in and held its mouth open, silently begging for one of the black lumps. When the dwarf popped one in without giving the matter a second thought, Chekov began to believe whatever these things were they couldn't be harmful in any way. He accepted a lump and put it carefully in his mouth, biting down on it hard just in case it might be prone to retaliate. His mouth went numb.

The dark man laughed and took one himself. "Take ease, Feddie. Take ease."

Although Chekov made no conscious effort to do so, taking ease seemed to take over him. The noise of the room receded. The aching muscles of his neck, shoulders and back loosened comfortably. The whole benighted world of Kibria seemed to slow to a manageable pace. He was suddenly quite content to sit there on the low bench beside the dwarf and his stinking pipe looking at his hands dangling between his knees, unconcerned even by the fact that Lieutenant Sulu's name was written upside down on one of them.

He had no idea how long he remained that way before a rudely familiar voice bawled out, "Property of Sulu, report to me immediately!"

The dwarf slapped at his shoulder as the summons was repeated. "Give answer, Feddie."

"Yes, that's me," Chekov answered, not knowing to whom. It was very difficult to pull himself out of his sudden lethargy. "That's me."

"Has something gone wrong with your hearing, slave?" someone boomed out at brutal volume.

Chekov looked up to find his old acquaintance Gebain looming over him. "Oh, God," he said in Standard. "Is it you again already?"

"Yes," the major domo replied in Kibree, as he lifted Chekov to his feet by his shirtfront. "It's me. You remember me, don't you?"

"Yes, sir," Chekov said, as the larger man spun him around by the shoulders and gave him a push in the direction of the door.

"Step lively."

"Take ease, brother Chekov," the dwarf wished him as he took off in the direction of the door at as brisk a pace as he could manage.

"Take ease," Chekov repeated as he exited, simply because he'd learned to love the phrase.

"To your rrrRight!" the Kibree behind him bellowed as they passed through the opened black door.

Chekov pleasantly discovered he could feel relaxed even as he quickly moved to an unknown destination.

"To your lllLeft!"

The clinking noises of the dining room could be heard from this corridor.

"Come toooo a HALT!" The major domo crossed in front of him, opened a blue door and pulled him through by taking a hold on his upper arm. They entered an antechamber connected to the main dining room. It was a long room with a table running down one wall. At one end, servants brought trays of food and drink from the kitchens and at the other servants brought empty trays from the dining room.

"You're wet!" Gebain exclaimed, hastily removing his hand from contact with Chekov's still sweaty tunic. "What have you been doing?"

"I was scanned a stirrer," Chekov explained, although polysyllabic responses were getting to be a little too strenuous for him.

The major domo gave him a sharp rap on the top of his head. "Don't let me hear that kitchen slang coming out of your mouth," he warned, then began to search for something to wipe his hands on. "Take off that shirt."

Chekov obeyed him without pausing to think. The major domo took his tunic between two fingers and carefully discarded it with the soiled linen. He sprinkled liquid from one of the glasses from an earlier course onto an unused looking napkin. Chekov stood unresisting and uncaring while Gebain gave him a brisk wiping off with the dampened towel. The major domo took a red serving robe off a nearby hook. "Put this on."

It was predictably far too large since Chekov was significantly smaller than the average Kibree. Gebain whisked the robe back off and took down another which looked to be a child's size. This garment was too short but fitted well in the upper body. Looking down while Gebain tied the high neckpiece in place, Chekov decided that his Starfleet boots looked very nice peeking out the bottom of his borrowed robe.

"You'll stand behind your master and see to his needs," Gebain instructed him. "Since you're going that way, you can take these."

"Of course." Chekov stifled a yawn and obligingly accepted a tray of tall goblets filled with fizzing cold drinks. Each one was constructed out of a multi-chambered mollusc shell mounted on a silver stem.

"Of course," the major domo mimicked him, giving him a push towards the dining room door. "And don't go sampling any of it!"

Chekov hadn't thought of that. He was captivated by the unlikeliness of anything as clean and elegant as this trayful of sherbets emerging from the steamy sewer of a kitchen he'd just left behind.

-o- -o-o-o- -o-

The dining room was more beautiful than he'd remembered. It seemed very light, airy and clean to him. The kianis' conversation and the gentle clinking of their finely made eating utensils was almost musical. The dusk hours had now begun and lighted tapers augmented the misty light coming in the room's windows. Chekov scanned the room for Sulu. He reflected that the lieutenant couldn't be very hard to find since he and the other Enterprise officers were sure to be the only other Feddies in the room. The only problem was that his vision had narrowed down to an uncomplicated tunnel.

A nearby servant noticed his difficulty and discreetly left his post. He turned Chekov in the right direction and gave him a helpful shove.

Sulu and the others were seated facing away from him. One of the kianis seated nearby looked over at him, or perhaps more accurately, at his tray, and gestured him over. As Chekov drew near, he saw that this kiani was Uyal, the engineer they'd run into in the kideok. Since Uyal had seen him sold, he wasn't at all surprised to see Chekov in a servant's uniform. Chekov wasn't feeling very surprised or upset about anything himself at that moment.

"…could increase our transfer efficiency immeasurably," the kiani said continuing his conversation with his neighbour after receiving a sherbet and gesturing Chekov on without comment.

Obeying the kiani's unspoken command, Chekov began setting one of the delicate containers by each diner. Both Sulu and Johnson, the meteorologist, didn't seem to be aware of his presence. Only Angharad Davies, the computer specialist, noticed that the hand placing this particular confection on the table was white and had a very familiar signature on it. "Chekov?"

"Yes, sir?" Davies was only an ensign like himself, but it seemed a lot safer and simpler to Chekov just to call everyone 'sir' for the time being.

Sulu and Johnson's heads jerked around as if they were pulled by the same string. "Where have you been?" Sulu demanded as a mother would of a lost child.

Chekov paused. It was a great effort to think of an answer other than 'Yes, sir'. "In the kitchen."

Sulu took a quick check to see if they were drawing undue attention. As the mealtime had drawn nearer, Sulu had become increasingly anxious about this first public encounter between Chekov and his shipmates. Now that the time had arrived, however, all three ensigns seemed perfectly relaxed, yet he himself was nearly jumping out of his skin on Chekov's appearance. "Are you all right?"

"Yes, sir," Chekov answered, pleased to repeat what was rapidly becoming his favourite reply.

One of the kianis further down the table tapped his glass and gestured for Chekov's tray. "Over here."

"Yes, sir," Chekov repeated for the sheer joy of getting to say it again.

Sulu immediately knew that something was very wrong as he watched the ensign continue down the table unobtrusively delivering sherbets. This was not the joking 'Yes, gracious Master' act Chekov had been pulling earlier. Not was it Chekov being co-operative because he had been asked to be so. Missing was the ironically dramatic flair the ensign always added on such occasions to let you know that he didn't particularly like being compelled to be co-operative. There was something about the unnaturally calm look on the young man's face that made the hairs on the back of Sulu's neck stand straight up.

"Is there something the matter with him, Lieutenant?" Johnson asked softly. "He seems… kind of…"

"…Stoned," Davies finished, then hastily added, "Not that I would know anything about that sort of thing."

"To the gills," Sulu agreed. "Not that I'd know anything about that either."

"Is there something wrong?" Uyal asked.

"I'm not sure," Sulu said, as he watched Chekov unconcernedly deliver confections to the kianis on the other side of the table as if his shipmates had ceased to exist.

"Hmmm." The kiani followed Sulu's line of sight to his property. "You, come here."

There was a half-second delay before Chekov realised he might be the 'you' being addressed. "What?" he asked, looking for the person giving the summons.

"Good servants don't say 'what', Chekov," Uyal explained in the smarmy tones kianis frequently adopted when speaking to the lower castes. "They say, 'Yes, sir.'"

"Yes, sir," Chekov corrected himself, with nauseating readiness. That cinched it for Sulu. This was no act. He'd seen the ensign take on men twice his size for lesser offences. Gone was even the small rebellious tightening of the corners of his mouth that all Chekov's time in Starfleet had not yet taught him to repress. Somehow, someone had gotten to the ensign and done something to him that made him want to be truly docile and co-operative.

"I think I know what our problem is," Uyal assured Sulu as he transferred Chekov's tray to another servant and drew the ensign in close to the table with a bony hand. When the kiani held a candle closer to Chekov's face, Sulu could see that the pupils of the young man's brown eyes were so dilated his eyes looked almost black. "I see he's discovered peeva."

"Peeva?" Sulu repeated, as Chekov blinked and tried to shy away from a brightness that had to be painful.

"It's a drug the servants use," the kiani next to Uyal explained. "We've tried to discourage it by making it illegal, but what does legality mean to them? They smuggle it in, or grow it themselves. It's gotten quite out of control."

"Actually," Uyal confided, "it's quite useful."

"Oh, yes," his friend agreed. "You'll find it makes him quite compliant when you want to have sex with him."

"I don't want to have sex with him," Sulu objected, rather more angrily than he'd intended, into a room whose ambient noise level he suddenly discovered he'd misjudged.

"Well, that takes care of that rumour," Davies said as the kianis went back to their conversations with renewed vigour.

For some reason Chekov was looking confused and somewhat hurt — which did nothing to help Sulu regain his composure.

"Come here, Chekov." It made him feel more than a little queasy to see how happy the ensign seemed to be to obey him. Other than bloodshot, dilated eyes, there were no signs of physical distress. Carefully controlling his temper, he turned back to the kianis. "Is this drug dangerous? Addictive?"

Uyal shrugged diffidently. "I've never heard of any of them dying of it and I've no idea if it's addictive."

"It just deadens things a little for them," the other kiani explained. "They have such dreadful lives, you can't exactly blame them."

The three Enterprise officers looked at two members of the class they clearly felt they could blame for this state of affairs.

"Why would Chekov take it?" Johnson wondered aloud as if Chekov wasn't standing inches away.

"Perhaps it was given to him," the kiani said, beginning to lose interest and toy with his sherbet. "Someone may have wished to curb his natural aggressiveness."

The thought struck Sulu forcibly that if Chekov had been drugged, it might not be the first time that had occurred today. "How long before he comes out of it?" he asked, seeing his schedule slipping further and further behind.

"I don't know," Uyal answered, then laughed. "Some of them are always like that."

"Oh, there's really nothing to it," the other kiani said, as Sulu's opinion of Uyal dropped to a new low. "Three spoonfuls of kvurr in a cup of water, a cold bath and about half an hour of sleep will bring him around fairly well."

Sulu's apprehensions eased somewhat. If the effects could be overcome with what sounded like a simple hangover cure, then the drug couldn't be all that bad.

"If you're going to need him tonight, I could go take care of him now," the kiani offered. "I'm sure I could have him back on his feet by the time you three close down in the control room."

Sulu frowned at Chekov who seemed to be asleep on his feet with his eyes still open.

"No, thank you, but I think I'd better deal with this myself. Where can I…"

He stopped. Everyone seemed to be looking at him with a mixture of astonishment and disapproval.

"Perhaps I'm mistaken," Uyal said, "but aren't you scheduled to meet with the Director after the meal? It would be… unusual, to keep her waiting while you dealt with a problem involving a servant."

Sulu nodded carefully. He hadn't really bothered too much about mastering the etiquette of slave owning, not expecting to need to use it. He glanced at Johnson and Davies. Despite Johnson's optimism earlier, neither could really afford to lose time baby sitting. Still, he'd made the kiani aware of his disquiet over Kahsheel's earlier behaviour. Much as he hated to leave the ensign in the care of the Kibree, that looked like the best option available to him. The kiani who was offering to assist was one of the junior engineers, a youngster who always seemed to go out of his way to be helpful to the Federation visitors, or anyone else.

"All right," Sulu relented reluctantly. "I would appreciate it a great deal if you would do so. Here is the key to his room. Please leave him there. I'll come and check on him as soon as I can get away. Is that all right with you?"

"Of course." The kiani smiled at Sulu's caution as he accepted the key. "I remember when I had my first slave," he commented dryly to Uyal as he rose and took Chekov by the shoulders. "Don't worry, Mister Sulu. He'll be safe with me."

Chekov felt a fleeting moment of sadness at leaving his friends, but turned and obeyed the tap on his back that told him to start moving for the door.

"I assume you know the way back to your own quarters?" the kiani asked as they exited the dining room.

"Yes, sir."

"Good," the kiani said lazily. "I hate giving directions."

They hadn't gone far before they were stopped by a soft, feminine voice. "Where are you going with him?"

"Halt, slave," the kiani ordered, then turned to the woman. "Taking him to quarters for Sulu. Too much peeva too soon, apparently."

They both laughed knowingly. "I'll take him," the woman offered.

The kiani looked at her dubiously. "Sulu wants him sobered up, Kahsheel."

"Of course," she said innocently, holding out her hand for the key.

"Of course." The kiani smirked as he gave her the key. "Isn't it a strange coincidence that the Federation officer that you found attractive should be the same one who suddenly becomes a slave?"

"Absolutely remarkable," she replied. "Move on, slave."

It didn't really register on Chekov that he'd changed hands until they came to a branch in the corridor and the voice told him to go right when he knew he should be going left.

"We're not going to your quarters," the voice explained when he hesitated. "We're going to mine."

It made little difference to him, even then. He walked on as directed, eventually coming to a halt before a specific door.

"Very good." The woman touched him on the shoulder as she stepped past him to open it. "I see you've learned a great deal since I last saw you."

"Yes, sir," Chekov replied, following her in.

She smiled as she led him through a large reception room. "'Ma'am' would be a little more appropriate. Nard, bring me a jug of hot water. Then I don't wish to be disturbed, unless the visitor I warned you about arrives."

She guided Chekov through another door into a study. "Here we are."

"Yes, ma'am," he agreed contentedly.

She crossed to a shelf and took down a small jar, then pulled the chair out from her workstation and turned it out for him as she passed. "Sit there," she instructed him, carrying the jar over to a table by the window. She measured a portion out into a cup then filled the cup with liquid poured from a carafe brought in by a servant whom Chekov hardly registered. "So," she said, stirring the mixture, "you've decided you like being a slave?"

"Yes, ma'am," Chekov, who would have pleasantly agreed to being fed his own liver at this point, replied.

"I didn't think you would…" Kahsheel couldn't help smiling as she crossed to him with the mixture. "… the way you like to ask questions all the time. People don't let slaves ask a lot of questions, do they?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Here, drink this." She held the cup out. When he obediently reached for it, she pulled it slightly away from his grasp. "No 'Vat ees eet?' for me first?" she teased, mimicking him in Standard. "You are learning. Here, drink it all."

The liquid, as it entered Chekov's mouth, seemed to turn incredibly bitter.

"Drink it all," Kahsheel insisted, gently pushing the cup back toward his mouth when he tried to lower it.

After he'd drained it, Chekov began to decide that it wasn't the drink's taste but the way it was making him feel that was so bitter. Suddenly pain returned to his world. His head hurt, his eyes hurt and his back was killing him.

"It will make you feel more like yourself." Kahsheel took the cup from him and watched as he rubbed his eyes.

It felt like there was a hive of bees in his head and needles pricking him all over.

"Look at me." She lifted his chin. He didn't resist but squinted at her unhappily. "You probably feel tired, don't you?"

Chekov didn't contradict her, but he knew that what he felt was violently and unpleasantly stimulated by an alien drug. Looking around, it occurred to him that he was in a place where he didn't particularly want to be. "Why am I here?"

"See?" The kiani smiled. "You're sounding more like yourself already."

He tried to rise. "I…"

She gently pushed him back down by the shoulder. "Don't try to get up. You'll be very dizzy for several minutes. Close your eyes and try to relax while the kvurr goes to work. You'll be back to normal very soon, so don't worry. You're perfectly safe here. You'd probably like to take a bath, wouldn't you?"

Chekov didn't want to close his eyes, but it hurt to leave them open. "I…"

"Shhh. Don't try to talk yet. You're too tired. I'll have my servants run you a bath. In the meantime, just relax and don't worry. You're going to be perfectly fine."

Chekov wasn't at all sure that he believed her, but it was so much easier to sit there with his eyes closed and let himself drift away while the alien drug did its disagreeable work.

"In just a few minutes, you'll feel fine." The kiani's voice was soft and warm. "Just sit back, relax and wait for the kvurr to work. You can even go to sleep if you want."

Kahsheel snapped her fingers and Chekov's head dropped slowly forward until it rested on his chest.

"Oh, you really wanted to go to sleep, didn't you? Well, that's very, very good. Just relax, listen to me, and don't worry about anything," the kiani said reassuringly as she turned his chair back around to face the computer workstation. "Now, I want you to imagine that you're not on Kibria any more. You've left Kibria and are back on your ship. You'd like that, wouldn't you? I imagine that after today, you'd like that very much. Well, you're back on your ship now and very happy to be there." She activated her computer and called up a program. "You're going to take a test now — a test to determine whether or not you move up in rank. Concentrate only on this test. You're not on Kibria any more so ignore anything that you hear spoken in Kibree. It is not important. You won't hear it or remember it. Concentrate only on the test. If there are any questions that you don't know the answer to or don't want to give the answer to, skip them, forget they are there. Just concentrate on giving the answers you know. When you've finished, you will relax and go back to sleep knowing that you've done very well. When I snap my fingers, open your eyes and take the test."

Chekov heard a snap and opened his eyes. Surveying the questions on the computer screen, he decided the lieutenant's exam was very easy this time. The questions were mainly about the scientific basis of things like transporters, warp drive and computer technology.

There was a soft knock on the door. In accordance with Kahsheel's instructions, Chekov ignored both it and the man who entered a moment later. If he'd looked, he would have recognised him as Driant, the kiani who'd been at the centre of the disturbance at the marketplace.

"He seems to have a lot of knowledge for a junior officer," the Kibree said, watching Chekov work.

Kahsheel shrugged. "It's commonplace knowledge for them. They'd have no qualms about sharing it with us if their laws of non-interference didn't prevent them."

"And now, we will have access to their technology without having to join their little Federation." Driant beamed. "You're a true patriot, Kahsheel."

The kiani shook her head. "No congratulations yet. I didn't get very much out of him the first time. If the question is about something that has obvious military implications he becomes very agitated and won't answer. If he doesn't know the answer he makes up something ridiculous."

Driant watched as Chekov paused briefly then resumed answering with all his former speed. "Well, you've taken care of that this time."

"I hope so. I didn't expect the work crew so soon last time and was rushed."

"Datvin has a mind of his own. We informed you as soon as we could."

"I don't blame you. I lost my composure and did a sloppy job. From what's been overheard in the control room, he remembers being drugged and has a twenty minute gap in his memory he can't explain."

"Is that how you do this to him? Drugs?"

"No, the peeva is just to disorient him, break his resistance a little. It makes him too complaisant, unable to access the knowledge we want. That's why I had to give him a little kvurr before I started. What I'm using is zhavis — a technique of relaxation and suggestion. I can't make him do things against his will, like I could using peeva, but if we're clever enough zhavis will give us access to everything we want to know from him and leave no traces for their medical scanners to pick up."

"Just a great deal of peeva and kvurr."

She shrugged. "Such are the hazards of being an attractive but unruly servant in a large installation such as this one."

His task completed, Chekov's hands dropped limply to his sides and his head lolled forward. Kahsheel crossed to him.

"Very good," she said in Standard as she turned his chair back around. "You've done excellently. You should feel very pleased with yourself."

Chekov smiled in his sleep as she saved the file and deactivated the terminal.

"You've returned to Kibria now. You are in my room and I am taking very good care of you. Do you know why I am taking care of you? It's because I like you. Yes, I like you very much. I find you quite attractive. And you feel the same way about me, don't you? Oh, yes, that's true, isn't it? You find me very attractive, don't you?"

Chekov made a noise that sounded like a chuckle.

Kahsheel smiled. "I know you do. You find me very attractive. You're beginning to fall in love with me, aren't you? I'm falling in love with you. In fact we are so much in love with each other that you long to be near me. In future you are going to try to be with me at every possible opportunity. You love me and trust me implicitly. You know that because I love you I would never do anything to harm you."

While Chekov smiled in his sleep, the kiani turned around and pointed Driant to the door. "Leave now."

"Why?" he mouthed back silently, fearing to be heard by the sleeping but at the same time not sleeping Chekov.

"We can't give him another twenty minute memory lapse to worry about, now can we?" She smiled as she caressed Chekov's face. "So I'd like a little peace and quiet while this alien and I make a few memories."

-o- -o-o-o- -o-