by Jane Seaton and Teegar Taylor

Chekov landed face first on the floor of his cell with a skidding thud. His head cracked against the far wall hard enough to make his eyes water. By the time he rolled painfully over and up onto his elbows, the tiny room's only door was shut and electronically sealed. He pressed the back of his hand against his lip to check if it was bleeding.

"Dammit," he swore, not at the tiny smear of blood he found, but at the heavy manacle that encircled his wrist. "How did I get into this?"

Chapter 1

It had begun innocently enough. The Enterprise had put in for two weeks leave on Bidoah, a moderately developed planet with a Federation base. He and Mister Scott had arranged to visit the local branch of the Cochran Institute to witness a series of experiments demonstrating a new design for an inertial damping system... not exactly a weekend on Wrigley's Planet, Chekov had to admit, but certainly a career-enhancing experience that he'd not have been able to gain admission to without Mister Scott's patronage.

The engineer had been scheduled to go on leave a few hours earlier than Chekov, so they agreed to meet at a local bar. Looking back on it all now, Chekov knew that he should have known he was heading into trouble as soon as he stepped out of the fresh, orderly atmosphere of Bidoah's main square and into the fetid dark of that seedy den of iniquity masquerading as a legitimate place of business.

"Here, lad!" Scott hailed him, just as he was preparing to take a giant step backwards. The engineer was surrounded by a table full of strangers whose appearance was forbiddingly odd, to say the least. "Come meet me mates!"

From the sound of Scott's voice and the expansiveness of his gesture, Chekov could tell the engineer had not wasted a second of his leave thus far on dry pondering of damping fields. Putting a polite smile on his face and crossing his hands behind his back, Chekov stepped forward, resigning himself to the fact that they'd probably not get to the Cochran Institute tonight.

"This is Pivel... Povel... Puve..." Scott sighed heavily as the initial vowel of Chekov's first name eluded him completely. "Ach, lad, what's your name?"

"Chekov," Chekov supplied parsimoniously, deciding he'd prefer not to have his given name bandied about by this motley crew.

"Aye, this is Mister Chekov." Scott didn't seem to take note of his stand-offishness as he draped an arm across the shoulders of the thin, rat-faced man beside him. "And this, this is me old mate, Bardon Goudchaux, the scurviest mother's son to ever wield a laser wrench."

"Hello, Chekov." Goudchaux's grip when he reached out to shake his hand was as thin and icy as his smile. "I see you're Starfleet, but I'm afraid I can't read your rank."

"Not much rank to read, for he's an ensign!" Scott announced with a bellow of laughter. "But one of our best, one of our best. Lad, Goudchaux and I shipped out together as engineer's mates in the Merchant Marines when we were no older than you are now. Our ship was the Lideo Low... Lodia Lie..."

"Lydia Lee," Goudchaux supplied.

Scott raised his glass in a solemn toast. "And a fine ship she was."

Chekov could already see the sort of evening this promised to be and decided to exercise the better part of valour. "Mister Scott, I think I'll meet you at the Institute."

"You're not going to have a drink with us?" the tall blonde woman at the end of the table asked. A metallic patch covered one of her eyes, but the other was an arresting shade of blue. "I think I'm insulted."

"Ach, we've got plenty of time to get to the experiments," Scott argued, pouring him a drink. "And I know you, Chekov. You're not one to refuse a drink... or insult a lady."

Normally this was true, even of lovely, one-eyed pirate ladies, but Chekov's instincts were screaming at him that this was not wise company for him to keep. "Thank you, but there is an opening lecture at eighteen hundred..."

"Eighteen hundred?" Goudchaux laughed, and nodded to the huge Asian man sitting at his side, who rose to his full six feet and four inches of height and moved to take a position behind Chekov. "Why, it's only sixteen hundred now."

"Aye, lad, we've plenty of time," Scott scolded. "I've got me chronimiter... chronanater... chronoo... I know what time it is."

"Mister Chen, show Mister Chekov to a seat," Goudchaux directed and a grip of iron descended onto Chekov's shoulders. "I think there's a place free next to Moray Morgain."

"If you insist," Chekov said, trying to look like he was retaining some discretion over his destination as Mister Chen guided him firmly to a seat that materialized next to the blonde woman.

He barely had time to recover before the blonde grabbed him by the chin. She tilted his head from side to side as if inspecting him. "Nice set of eyes you got there, Brownie."

Chekov carefully pulled free of her grip, cleared his throat and straightened his tunic. "Thank you," he said, calculating that it would be wisest not to comment on her remaining eye.

The black man with slanting green eyes sitting opposite him grabbed a handful of Chekov's shirt front.

"I'm Khwaja," he growled, pulling Chekov roughly towards him.

"Pleased to meet you," the ensign replied diplomatically.

"Sir!" Khwaja grabbed him with both hands and shook him roughly. "You will call me 'sir'! I am Zakaria Munfaz Khwaja, prince of Riordan, heir to the house of Zovfasta!"

Chekov smiled grimly. "Actually, Riordan is an oligarchy, not a monarchy. A member of the ruling class is called a vastafah, not a prince. I believe the Vashadons are the ruling clan family, not the Zovfasta. And you, sir, should take your hands off me... now."

Scott exploded with laughter. "He's got you there, Mister Khwaja!"

"Yes..." Goudchaux smiled as Khwaja roughly released Chekov. "You have to work very hard to fool an Academy boy like this one."

"Where's his drink?" Scott demanded. "I know I poured one."

"I've got it." A wrinkled woman with coal black hair passed a glass to the blonde woman. "We're drinking black forests, Mister Chekov."

"Black forests?" Chekov eyed the murky liquid suspiciously as the blonde woman held it out tantalisingly.

"Aye, it's got vodka in it," Scott informed him enthusiastically. "I know ye'll not turn that down."

"Silurian vodka," Chekov qualified, finally recognising the drink from its liquorice bouquet.

"With a touch of anasinsel." The blonde woman's full red lips curved into a smile. "They say you should never drink it with a stranger."

Chekov's eyes followed the drink as if hypnotised by it. "Because the distinctive smell, taste and appearance of the drink will hide the presence of almost any drug someone would care to add to it."

"Well, there's only one cure for this situation." The blonde woman put her hand behind his head and drew him into a long, deep and quite unexpected kiss. She winked with her one remaining eye as she released him. "Now we're not exactly strangers, are we?"

In the background, Chekov could hear Scott laughing. "I didnae think he wanted to go."

"What did you say your name was?" Chekov asked as she pressed the glass of black liquor into his unresisting hand.

The pirate lady picked up her own drink, downed it in a single gulp, then threw the empty glass over her shoulder. "Moray Morgain," she answered, offering a hand for him to shake as the glass shattered on the bar room floor.

Chekov took a deep breath before surrendering to the inevitable. He then downed his drink and sent his glass crashing after hers. "Pleased to meet you, Miss Morgain," he said, taking her hand and giving it a courtly kiss instead.

The table roared with laughter at this. Even the surly Khwaja guffawed and slapped him jovially on the back.

"But he's so sweet!" Morgain reached out and tousled his hair delightedly. "What d'ya say, Goudchaux? If I promise to feed him, can I keep him?"

"Wha'd ya do with the man we threw you last week?" Goudchaux returned with a leer.

As Chekov tried to brush his hair back into place, he decided that he simply must find some way to get something to eat. Just that one small drink had made him very lightheaded. "Miss Morgain..."

"Don'cha love the way he says that?" She grinned as she slipped her hand behind his neck and pulled him into another unforeseen kiss.

When she finally pulled away, Chekov opened his eyes and found something had gone terribly wrong with his vision. He couldn't quite put his finger on how or why, but nothing looked exactly as it should. Suddenly Moray Morgain, who had at first seemed a little deficient in the eye department, seemed to have developed several.

"Two... Three... Four..." Chekov counted her extra eyes aloud as they appeared. "Five... Six... Seven..."

"Eight!" Morgain exclaimed as he fell forward senselessly into her arms. "I believe that's a new record."

***

"Hello, stranger."

Chekov felt as though there were lead weights sitting all over his body. When the ones on his eyes grew light enough for him to open them, he found himself staring at the ceiling of a room that was definitely not his quarters on the Enterprise. After an instant, it also dawned on him that the blonde haired lady with a patch over one eye was sitting very near. This realisation brought his brain to sudden waking attention. His body, however, was not able to follow suit. He was quickly able to discern that the difficulty with his head was a pounding, throbbing, hung-over headache. It was not until he looked that he was able to come to the heart-stopping conclusion that he couldn't move because he was tied down. Metal manacles encircled his wrists and ankles, securing him to what looked to be a diagnostic bed in the sickbay of some strange ship.

"Remember me?" the blonde woman asked at what seemed to be an unkind volume.

He found he couldn't answer her, or voice any of the more important statements and questions crowding in his mind. Someone had taped his mouth securely shut. All he could do to vent his frustration was to make a peculiar grunting noise through his nose.

"Relax, angel eyes." She reached out and tousled his hair, laughing at his ineffectual efforts to wriggle out of her reach. "You should've run when you could, but it's too late now. Just lay back..." Chekov held his breath as she walked her fingers down the front of his body. "...and enjoy it."

"Morgain," a voice over the com system drawled, "I thought I told you to call me when he woke up."

"The woman rolled her eyes and hit the button on the comm unit behind her. "He's awake, Goudchaux."

"I'll be there in a minute."

"I can hardly wait," she replied sarcastically, then turned her attention back to Chekov. "Listen to Goudchaux, angel. He never got to go to the Academy, so he's going to make your life a living hell unless you're very careful. Promise me you'll try to be a very, very good boy."

Such a promise was one of the very last things Chekov would have verbalised if he'd been able to at that moment. Instead he furiously shook her hand away from his head.

"So, my little sweetheart has a temper," she said, in the maddening sort of voice one uses to talk to a three-year-old. "I can see you're going to be lots of fun."

She leaned in so close he couldn't flinch away. "You know, after all I've been through, it would seem like I would have a lot of sympathy for someone who's going to go through what you're in for..." For a moment, he thought he saw a real touch of regret in her hard face. As quickly as it had appeared, it was gone. "Funny how it doesn't work out that way."

"If you want him, Morgain," Goudchaux drawled from the doorway, "you're going to have to earn him."

"You're a slave driver, Captain," the woman complained, turning back to give Chekov an affectionate pinch on the cheek. "See you later, angel eyes."

"Questions, right?" Goudchaux entered the room flanked by the formidable Mister Chen and the dark haired older lady he remembered from the bar. "I bet you've got plenty of questions, right? The problem is, I really hate to be asked questions. Most people in my profession do. I suggest you avoid asking any questions the whole time you're here. In fact, don't talk at all unless we tell you to."

Chekov tried to turn his head to follow the black haired woman as she walked to the other side of the table he was lying on, but Goudchaux turned his head roughly back to face him.

"But to be fair," he continued genially, "I'll answer some of your questions. First, yes, we have abducted you. You're no longer anywhere near Bidoah. You're on our ship. And yes, we know this is illegal and that you think your shipmates can find you and what will happen to us if we're caught, but we don't really care. So don't bring any of that up again."

The black haired woman pressed a hypo against Chekov's arm. "There," she said, giving him a reassuring pat. "That'll take care of your headache."

It did, almost immediately, but even if he hadn't been gagged, Chekov was in no mood to thank her.

"What are we going to do with you?" Goudchaux asked for him. "Well, that depends on what the going rate for snot-nosed Starfleet ensigns is when we get to Olivan VI. Sometimes there's a Klingon buyer there who'll take little lost Academy boys like you off our hands for a good price. The Klingons pay top dollar. Either they think they'll have a use for the measly scraps of information they can sweat out of you or they just want someone to practise their interrogation techniques on. You'll probably never know the difference. We might have to alter you a little if we sell you to someone else -- make you a little less identifiable and probably erase some useless parts of your memory. If we do that, we might even keep you. Or then again, we might just kill you."

Chekov swallowed hard, realising that the last might be his best option.

"What will we do with you in the meantime?" Goudchaux continued casually. "We could let you just lay here or lock you up, but on this ship everybody works. Esme, who I don't think you've been introduced to yet, takes care of our medical needs. Mister Chen is in charge of weapons. Your friend Moray Morgain is our pilot. Khwaja sees to the sensors and I..." Goudchaux smiled. "I am the humble captain of this vessel. While you were sleeping, we spent some time thinking about what role you should fulfil in our little family. I mean, we must put a former Starfleet officer to good use, right? So we decided that you'll serve as our cabin boy -- serve our meals, polish our boots, generally keep things tidy. All that Academy training should have you well prepared to take orders and kiss ass, shouldn't it?"

Goudchaux laughed at the way Chekov's eyes narrowed at this.

"Oh, you'll do it," he assured his captive confidently. "You'll do anything we say. I see you've noticed the lovely jewellery we've given you." Goudchaux lightly tapped the metal cuff around Chekov's wrist. "This is to keep you out of trouble while you're adjusting to the idea of cooperating with us. They will sound an alarm any time you come in contact with anything or anyone you're not supposed to touch, or any place you're not supposed to be. As you've probably noticed, they can also be magnetised so that you can be fastened to whatever metal surface you may be near. And as you can see, this ship has no shortage of exposed metal surfaces."

Looking around, Chekov decided that the pirate ship must be a reconditioned Gundalian vessel of some sort, probably a scout. They were long on speed but short on amenities.

Goudchaux nodded to Esme, who peeled the adhesive off Chekov's mouth.

"What have you done with Mister Scott?" Chekov demanded immediately, although it felt like part of his lips had come off as well.

The gag was unceremoniously re-applied.

"You asked a question." Goudchaux shook his head and clicked his tongue. "I told you not to ask questions. This irritates me. This makes me feel like you're not listening to me. It was a good question, though. Very pertinent, very timely. It gives me an opportunity to show you what's going to happen every time you do something we tell you not to do, or irritate us in any way."

Goudchaux signalled to the woman, who activated a viewing screen on the wall beyond Chekov's feet. To his horror, but not surprise, Chekov found that the image on the screen was the Enterprise's chief engineer. He seemed also to be bound to a table or bed. Only Scott's head and chest were visible. The engineer didn't seem to have regained consciousness.

"This is what we've done to my old pal," the pirate informed him remorselessly "We're not going to tell you where he is, of course. But this is what's going to happen to him every time you misbehave..."

Goudchaux took out what looked like a communicator and pressed a button. Scott's body jerked unnaturally and he cried out in pain.

"Does that make things a little clearer?" Goudchaux asked with a smile.

Chekov's eyes were still glued to the screen. He couldn't believe that any of this was actually happening.

"That's another thing you're going to have to learn," Goudchaux informed him. "When I ask you a question, you answer and you answer immediately. For now you can nod. Do you understand."

Chekov's head remained stubbornly motionless.

The shock to Mister Scott's body seemed to be more intense this time and his scream louder.

"Just good old electricity, really," Goudchaux explained heartlessly. "But the old boy's system can only take so much, you know. Do you understand?"

Chekov closed his eyes and nodded.

"Good." The adhesive was once more ripped from Chekov's lips. Goudchaux smiled in a cruel parody of compassion. "I bet that hurts, doesn't it?"

Not wishing to take the chance that the last was only a rhetorical question, Chekov nodded again.

"Out loud, please."

Not being able to bear looking at this vile creature or the sight of Mister Scott heaving agonised breaths, Chekov looked at the ceiling. "Yes."

"Yes, Captain," Goudchaux corrected.

Chekov drew in a deep breath. When he finally turned his head and made eye contact with Goudchaux, the pirate's finger made contact with that particular button.

"Yes, Captain!" Chekov shouted over Mister Scott's cries.

"I think you do understand now." Goudchaux smiled with satisfaction. "And you're going to do everything we say, aren't you?"

Chekov's eyes squeezed closed on the bitter pain of defeat. "Yes, Captain."

"I know you will." Goudchaux motioned to his henchman. "Mister Chen, show our new cabin boy to his quarters."

****