And The Band Played On...

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I sometimes get the feeling that the Federation no longer cares about exploring the universe, meeting new cultures, finding ways to better the quality of life or bringing justice and fairness to all. For all appearances, the Federation seems to want nothing more but to survive and we will do anything in order to do so. From life to life, I have watched history unfold, almost like an El-Aurian scholar and I fear that perhaps we have not got much time left.

 

To use my current situation as a cogent paradigm, here I am, on a Defiant-class ship, a vessel designed purely for war, as part of a fleet heading towards an unknown battle, being aided by people who caused widespread genocide less than a decade ago with a bartender who quit Starfleet at our helm. The times are a-changing as the earth saying goes and most likely not in our favour.

 

If the query “will we win this conflict we’re spiraling towards?” was to be solicited, the answer would most likely be yes. With the combined weapon-power of the fleet and our Alpha-Quadrant style bravado, a victory, though bloody would probably be the end result. However that is not the real question to be asked is it? It is not even “will the Federation thrive for quite a few years more afterwards”, to which the answer would also be yes. The real problem, which should be on all our minds, is “What exactly are we trying to save?”

 

The Federation once had a record you could eat your dinner off. We followed the prime directive to the letter and we didn’t fire the first shot no matter how nasty the other side was. When it did come to blows we never used deception and always flew the federation colours high for all to see. Battles were fought at marked lines. Friends were friends, foes were foes and we were the good guys because of it. A beacon of civilized thought one might say.

 

Now I am not the first who would say that things have changed since those golden days, many have voiced such an opinion. However, unlike the majority of these people who stand firmly by the belief that the Dominion war was the Federation’s great fall from the pedestal. I think our principles were beginning to tumble a bit earlier, at a time when the need to be free outweighed everything else. In my mind’s eye, the apple core began to rot when we first heard those words that still send a chill down the sturdiest of spines.

 

"We are the Borg. Lower your shields and power down your weapons. We will add your biological and technological distinctiveness to our own. Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated."

 

Oh we we’re afraid, for we had finally met a species who unlike any other, did not want our land, our lives, our women, or our riches. They simply wanted us. More succinctly, they wanted us to become them, which simply would not do.

 

We had to fight. Fight to be free like we never had before. We’d worked too damn hard and too damn long to become who we are, only to be wiped away like a dirty stain. Our “distinctiveness” was our own and like hell we’d let it be lost. So we did indeed fight indeed we won. As the history books say, our enemy was to never be heard of again and if they ever were, they would be met with the barrel of a phaser rifle. We would not sacrifice our way of thinking for anyone nor would we join with evil at any cost. We had bought that right with our own blood.

 

But we didn’t really keep to our promise of sticking to who we were, oh no. Pandoras’ Box had already been peaked into. The galaxy was now a scary place. We were terrified about what was round the next previously safe corner and so to prepare ourselves we continued development on a new kind of vessel, the Defiant class. A ship design that ignored Cochrane’s ideals and was meant purely for offensive capabality. No labs, no specimen rooms or cargo bays, just phasers and torpedoes. Our innocence was lost.

 

After that, the dominion popped in to the quadrant and the box was flung wide open, we conveniently forgot our belief in being a fleet with no interest in stealth technology and instead fitted a cloak to said vessel. Following that we worked with underground terrorist groups, stole enemy ships and piloted them back like ancient pirates, subjected our citizens to almost absurd blood screenings and in the end, after all that, allowed our enemy, an empire that had murdered millions of people to go virtually unpunished and to retain its military strength in order to preserve stability. If walls could speak, the Lokharian city on Cardassia would be screaming.

 

Its easy enough to excuse ourselves for falling from grace since we were against such powerful odds but now its too late and we can’t stop ourselves. We’ve got greedy for the forbidden fruits and now we’re openly using cloaks, producing warship after warship and working side by side with a people who were intent on making us slaves all because there’s always gonna be someone “worse” out there to be afraid of. Oh and I didn’t mention that the USS Voyager made friends with the borg a few years ago for a short while for the exact same reason as this but we forget about that because they’re the bad guys again and are probably all dead.

 

I guess the point of my cynical rant is this, I will wear this uniform and serve my duty to Starfleet like I swore to do. I will fight to make sure that people back home can keep their lives so they can actually keep what values the federation has left. But I just feel so dirty. We’re making a deal with the devil helping the Dominion like this I can feel it. Since when has it been Starfleet policy to join forces in a coalition fleet against an enemy we haven’t even spoken to? If we attack the Scorpiads, we’re the aggressors, not them. They may be vicious bastards from what we’ve seen and they killed two of my security team but we haven’t even attempted talks or negotiations of any kind. That’s probably a previous host of mine, Layor, speaking but it’s still the truth. We need to pull back and just stop to think about what we’re doing!

 

::Sigh::

 

Alright, I’m going for some food. I’m fed up of giving myself a headache. If survival’s our main reason for all this I will have to find solace in that there are worse motives. The situation stinks but I’m just a grunt.

 

 

…

 

Oh and I only mentioned “Kroells the bartender helmsman” because I thought it was odd. Especially when I found out that he outranks me. At least he can mix me a warp core breach when the Scorpiads breach our core.

Edited May 24, 2006 by Images