« Reply #36 on: September 21, 2006, 09:05:26 am »
Hi Guys, its time for another installment, looking into the mnd of the central character of my STU: namely, myself!
This Chronicle is a bit controvertial. My Beta readers liked it on its own merits, but some thought that it definitely wasn't Trek, where as others couldn't believe the character would do what is done here.
Now, I haven't looked at this one in a few weeks (months?), but I want it out there. I'm not sure if it'll actually be included into my "canon", but I want more opinions on it, so comment as loudly and passsionately as you like on it. I'm out for reactions on this one, and on every and any bearing you wish to make a comment or point on.
This short piece is set amost 20 years into my character's future, with no intervening backstory, and I think that is why it is so jarring. You know the Introvert, but you may not know this guy. Anyway, enough with the babbling from me. Here it is, and let me have it.
March 2287
I glare into the hate-filled eyes of my opponent and ruthlessly smash him down for the final time. Kneeling on his back, I twist the arm of my defeated enemy below me and made sure that the crawling slime who sullies everything by his mere regard has no chance to escape while I consider my options.
Commander Andrew Brown, Captain of the Federation starship Drake. The title sounds impressive for someone who’s worked so hard to achieve that goal, but pales in comparison to the power wielded by my opponent, and so I now find myself in a quandary. Jamal had once again managed to come crawling out of the woodwork at the worst possible moment, and now that I myself have thwarted his petty, vicious scheme of inflicting pain and humiliation for his so-called “revenge”, I knew that my own life had just taken a turn for the worse.
Quite possibly the worst turn it could take.
The “man” I’ve just whipped the tar out of is the heir to one of the oldest and most powerful families of the Federation, brought up in such a world of privilege and wealth as to outclass any of the monarchies of Old Earth. Their every whim is tended to by legions of servants, their voice carries immense influence in Federation bureaucracy, and they own their own planet in the spinward side of the Core Sectors—the most protected part of the Federation.
The Al Fadir family has been a trading power for Earth since the development of warp drive over two hundred years ago, and—as in so many cases—the hard work of the first four generations had lead the outlook of the later ones to come to expect such wealth and deference to follow them wherever they went, into whatever field they chose to follow.
Unfortunately, even in the enlightened Federation of the 23rd century such things still happen, though they are fortunately, microscopically rare. However, this is one of those rare times, and I’m in it up to my eyeballs.
People who’d gotten in the way of this family in the past have had their careers wrecked, their lives ruined, and in some instances, had simply vanished.
Oh, whoever had actually done the deed was usually found and convicted, and a patsy was always in place for the motive so that, even though the Al Fadir family had a compelling reason, such was the prestige and power of their name that their protestations of innocence were always—officially—believed. They were also very careful that no link was ever found connecting them to the actual deed, or any part of its implementation or planning.
I’d never encountered such a thing before this event, but on coming up against it for the first time, it sickens me to my core. Only during this incident have I discovered that one of my crewmates on the Cortez had had the misfortune to incur the wrath of Jamal—and I saw that young officer’s life ruined by a charge of industrial espionage: passing Starfleet technological secrets to a rival defence contractor for material gain. At the time, I knew nothing about the Al Fadir family, and I was shocked and disgusted along with the rest of the crew to find such a base individual amongst us, and glad to see them gone and properly punished.
I’ll have to search out the former Ensign Radin and apologise for having believed it. I should have known better, but the evidence was just too strong. I felt personally betrayed by her “betrayal”, and now I find I turned my back—as did we all—on an innocent woman. I have to make it right, however long it takes.
My own shame threatens to overwhelm me, but a wriggle from beneath me brings back my fury at the worm responsible for this. No, it’s more than just fury now, I realise. I hate this bastard. I hate this bastard more than the Klingons who took my arm. Admittedly, that hatred has been dulled by my constant exposure to it, but I can count the beings I’ve actively hated all through my life on one hand.
This slime is now the top of that list.
I’ve defeated him. His scheme to wreck another life has been thwarted—but has it been stopped? I ponder this, feeling the blood trickle down my arm from his knife slash. If I hand him over to the authorities, I have enough evidence to see him jailed, but will he be jailed? Will this even get to trial? Will he wriggle out of this and get off with a slap on the wrists? Scot-free?
I know that even if he does miraculously go to jail, his family will see to it my life is a living hell afterwards. I’ll be taken down much the same way as Radin was, and I’ll be disgraced and reviled before the entire Federation. Because of my own spotty past it’ll be child’s play to set me up with a motive so believable no one will care even as much as I did for Radin at the time.
I cannot go through that, I just can’t! I know I’m not strong enough to bear that burden, and it’ll snap me far more easily than I snapped Jamal’s other arm.
Then your choice is simple. You cannot let him go, my Voice, previously silent, speaks up.
My eyes snap back into focus out of reflex on hearing my captain’s voice, even though I know there’s no one else within ten kilometres of this warehouse. The contemptuous tone it frequently sports is absent this time, but it voices the option I dare not confront.
I shrink from the horror of that suggestion even as I analyse the practicalities of the deed in the current situation.
This warehouse was another of Jamal’s set-ups, trying to bait Lieutenant Kayla Truasima into falling into his clutches for some “revenge”. What is it with these people and their desire to not just control other people, but to dominate and rule them, and—when their petty will is flouted—to utterly crush and humiliate that which would not bend to their desires?
Jamal himself saw to it that there was nobody about. He wasn’t expecting a twenty-five-year Starfleet veteran to show up, armed with the experience of fighting Klingons in hand-to-hand combat. He was expecting some sweet, fresh-faced kid straight from the Academy, trying to prevent her hopes and dreams, and her position in life with her crewmates’ respect and friendship, from being tossed down a disposal chute.
Fortunately, her behaviour on board had become so erratic that I just had to intervene, and the whole sorry story spilled out of her as soon as I confronted her alone.
How I held myself together I still do not know. Had this bastard been there in that room with me I’d have butchered him. I wouldn’t have beaten him. I wouldn’t have vaporised him with a phaser. I would have literally ripped off one of his arms and bludgeoned him to death with it, and revelled in the spray of his blood on my skin.
The haze over my eyes from imagining this horrific scene had cleared just in time to stop Kayla from running from the room, convinced I was disgusted and enraged at her for daring to impugn such a lofty and high-profile name. I thank the Gods for such small mercies. Once I’d managed to control myself and reassure her, I got the full details of what was expected from her and had her follow them to the letter. Her meeting was secret, and she had decided to take a few days leave at a starbase while we were docked for resupply. Coincidentally—and just after being told this—I arranged an in-person meeting with my squadron commander which would necessitate both me and Captain Karen McCafferty boarding the starbase for a full day in a classified environment.
I now owe Karen big for keeping this little diversion a secret, as she is presumably still comforting Kayla on the base even as I took the lieutenant’s place in her privately-rented base flitter. As far as anyone knows, Kayla is off on a lone sight-seeing tour on the daylight side of planet Gamma-231-III, and the commanders of the cruiser Kingfisher and the destroyer Drake are in a secret strategy & tactics conference on Starbase 22.
So now, here I am in a long-deserted mining warehouse far behind the night side terminator, where only three people know where I am—and one of them is lying under me with serious injuries. The flitter’s sensors told me there was no one else around, and that the place didn’t even have its security cameras active. This was just to be a meeting place before he took the terrified girl back to a more secure location—most likely drugged—and he was expecting no trouble. As a result, my contempt for him knows no bounds, thinking himself safe because of his family’s influence even if something did go wrong. He’s inept, a bully, and quite likely Kayla herself could have easily beat the snot out of him if she’d seriously entertained the possibility.
However, even I feel that influence. Jamal is totally in my power right now. What happens as soon as I let him go? I arrest him—at the very least for assaulting a Starfleet officer, as the inept fool flew into a fury and thought he could beat me up with impunity, that my fear at his family’s influence would stop me from fighting back—and throw him in the brig to have him tried immediately at this front-line starbase. Even the warp 20 transmission speed of communications would be too slow for any family influence to make its presence felt before a verdict was given.
But what then? He would have to be shipped to a penal facility, and that was after all appeals. The very fact that it was a hush-hush trial would weigh against it, and quite likely the family’s legions of slick lawyers would get him a reduced sentence, if not sprung completely.
He would then be free to pursue a vendetta against me.
The only way this slime is leaving this warehouse is on the wind, and you know it. Now stop being a weak fool and get it over with!
The contempt is back. McCafferty is making her full presence felt again, and as usual, it goads me into the logical action.
But what happens to me, to my soul? I’m contemplating murder, cold—well, lukewarm—blooded, calculated murder. What happens to my principles, my morals? How can I call myself a power for good if I do this? How can I continue to wear this uniform that I spilled much of my blood and sweat to gain? How will I look myself in the mirror each morning, knowing what I’ve done, knowing I’ve made a lie of my Oath?
How will I live with myself?
The slime beneath me is yelling, cursing me, threatening my career, my life, my family, my friends and my friends’ friends. He’s probably wondering why I’ve not moved in minutes, one way or the other.
He’s trying to intimidate me into letting him go, but I know it’s now the worst thing I could do. All it does is disgust me even further, and with forced nonchalance, I ignore him and twist his arm again. His curses and threats dry up as a shriek of pain escapes his lips.
If it were anyone else, I’d let justice take its course. If I had faith in the system to punish him and protect me, I’d let justice take its course.
If I wasn’t so terrified of the consequences to literally everything and everyone I hold dear if I do, I’d let justice take its course.
I know that if I hand him over to the authorities, from that moment on I will be watching over my shoulder, waiting for the other shoe to drop. Waiting on my life to be ruined.
If I don’t, no one else will bear the burden. Kayla will be free. My family, friends, comrades, shipmates—all will be free of the vendetta Jamal will bring down upon me for bringing him so low. He won’t care they had nothing to do with it, had no knowledge of it. All he’ll see is another way to hurt me—and he’ll take it. There is no doubt in my mind.
If I don’t, I alone will have to live with the consequences of this “night”. No one else will ever know. Not even Kayla and Karen, I’ll make sure of that. I must protect them from the ensuing investigation the Al Fadir family will launch into his demise.
My eyes focus sharply again, suddenly aware that the decision has already been made. In the midst of one thought, almost subconsciously, I’ve decided murdering a man—yes, even one such as he—is the only correct choice. I’m not strong enough to bear the consequences of letting him live, so he must die.
If I were to tell them, I’m sure Karen and Kayla would agree—and also be every bit as thankful that they hadn’t done it.
The moralists among us—and the Federation is full of them—would be horrified. “How can you justify taking a life for this? Let ‘The System’ deal with him. ‘The System’ works!” they’d cry.
Normally, they’d be right.
But ‘The System’ is for ordinary mortals like me and them. How well does ‘The System’ work for the few outside of it who can ignore it?
I’d like to see them explain this to Jessica Radin. Her unjustified disgrace ruined her family’s standing on her conservative home planet and pushed them to the bottom of the social pile. The last data updates I saw had them destitute and struggling for survival. I don’t even know if Jessica is still alive. It’s been almost thirteen years.
I must find her.
