Lt JG Imril - How Do I Find The Place, Again?

[Chris Taylor]

((Ferenginar))

 

Imril deposited a number of half-slips into the hands of a happy Ferengi merchant who wore a big smile full of more than the usual number of crooked (yet artfully sharpened) teeth. A few words from and pointed directions were Imril’s hard-haggled reward. But they were enough to get them to the last leg of their journey.

They then paid for a small item and added it to a small shopping bag. Another acquisition purchased almost entirely as part of the wider quest of gathering data.

The rain had temporarily let up, and Imril wasted no time navigating the still-wet streets. Their course brought them closer to the Slug-nasium than they’d ever expected to go. Looking for a public stairway or lift that would lead down into lower and older levels of the city. Where a whole other selection of shops, museums, and curiosities awaited prospective tourists. The bottom layer of a double-decker sandwich of unfettered capitalism.

A familiar face rounded a corner, eating something that smelled vaguely Cardassian.

 

Cole: Imril! ::waving her arm high::

 

They waved back in return.

Imril: Hi!

 

Cole: What have you been doing on your visit?

 

Imril: Seeing as much of this planet as I can, in the time I have. You?

 

Cole: I did some shopping, mind if I joined you?

 

Imril: Sure. You can join me where I’m headed, too, if you’re interested.

Cole: Response.

Imril: An escape room. A building full of them, actually. Some place called Bryyk’s Boffles. I heard about it from someone at a spa I just beamed back from.

Cole: Response.

Imril: I figure with all of the effort that Ferengi put into hoarding and protecting their treasures, they probably make good ‘vaults’ that need breaking out of.

Said vaults came in a variety of themes, or so Imril had been told. “A wide selection of challenges for budding or practiced escapologists.” Words that in retrospect sounded suspiciously like a sales pitch…

Cole: Response.

Imril looked back towards the row of shops they had just been ‘brousing’ through. A section of town in which they had become thoroughly lost. Even with a padd full of street maps.

Imril: The only thing I’ve really been buying around here is directions. Apparently, finding the place is part of the challenge. Or the proprietor has a profit-sharing deal going with all the shopkeeps whose palms I had to grease to know which way to go. Or both. Not the way I’d expected to spend my bribery budget, but… ::shrug::... Cultural exploration takes different forms.

In hindsight, hiring the services of one of the many Ferengi youngsters who had come up to them to offer to act as guides may have been cheaper.

Cole: Response.

 

Tags/TBC

----------------------------------------------------

Lieutenant JG Imril

Engineering Officer

USS Artemis-A

A240110I12