A Moment of Change

[Cptn Corizon 0]

It was early – or late – on Camelot Station. On the command deck, Lieutenant Ai’anie Soltos wiped the watering at his eyes as he looked down at the status monitor. This was not good. No, not good at all. Exhaling, he silently wondered exactly why these sorts of things had to happen on his watch. Couldn’t the universe have waited another couple hours before falling apart?

 

Looking over to the diminutive Romulan officer who was helping him man the graveyard shift at operations he gave a worn smile. “Well,” he said. “I guess we should wake the brass up.”

 

The Romulan nodded. To him this was just another example of why the Alpha Quadrant powers, especially the Romulan Empire should have sealed up the wormhole years ago and left the Gamma Quadrant to its own devices.

 

Soltos sighed and brought up the communications protocols to wake the senior staff including the admiral, and the support staff required to get the round table room ready for what was sure to be an interesting meeting.

 

An hour later, the once sleepy command center was buzzing with the grousing of alpha shifters who’d been roused in the middle of the night to deal with the latest crisis in the Gamma Quadrant. Half a deck below, the Round Table room had also begun to fill with Camelot’s senior staff and the various commanding officers of the ships stationed at Camelot.

 

Sitting side by side, the stations commander glanced over a cup of rich, black coffee to the senior officer in the room. “I didn’t invite any of the diplomats,” he said between drinks. “I figured that could wait.”

 

Misha Abronvonvich nodded. His wavy white hair and craggy features seemed unusually comported compared to various states of dishevelment found on the other officers in the room. “I took the liberty of asking Corizon to show up.”

 

Calypsos smirked. “Well, I am sure he appreciated it.”

 

“Oh I think he did,” Abronvonvich said with a grin. “I mean, he has been anxious to get back into the swing of things.”

 

“At 0330?”

 

“I didn’t say he wasn’t unhappy about being woke up in the middle of the night.”

 

“I see.”

 

A few minutes later, the room had filled with all of the required individuals, including a cranky canine. Of course, as one of his colleagues noted, that wasn’t very different from normal – though he did carry a cane now.

 

Standing, the admiral placed his weight on the table and cleared his throat. “Good morning. I am sure you’re all wondering why you’ve been drug out of bed.”

 

The assembled officers nodded and looked towards the Vice-Admiral. He glanced around the table then continued. “About an hour ago we intercepted a communication broadcast on the Dominion network. It was broadcast in the clear, so we assume they wanted us to know about it.

 

“As many of you know, they have been dealing with some tensions on several of their worlds. On a number of planets, the native populations have been pushing for more autonomy or outright independence. Till now, things have been fairly civil. The Alpha Quadrant governments have encouraged the Vorta Council to show restraint and remain patient.

 

“So far, they’ve at least given the appearance of heeding our collective advice.”

 

Sighing and nodding to a yeoman to hand out PADDs to the officers in the room, he started again. “As I said about an hour ago we intercepted a communication on the Dominion network. Apparently talks with locals on one of their planets in our general area have broken down. I don’t have all the details yet, but apparently the locals began an armed insurrection. The Dominion has moved troops into the system. They’ve given the natives twenty-four standard hours to stand down or else…”

 

One of the officers in the room interrupted. “Or else what?”

 

Before Abronvonvich could respond, the unmistakable baritone Ah-Windu Corizon chimed in. “Or else they’ll do what the Dominion has been doing for centuries when this comes up. The Jem’Hadar come in, they shoot anything that blinks wrong, and then they install a puppet government run by a Vorta to keep things in-line. Or if they population is particularly troublesome, they just kill them all… or experiment on them or….”

 

A sharp look from the admiral got Corizon’s attention and he stopped there. Exhaling, Abronvonvich started again. “As much as I’d like to think the Vorta Council has realized that these aren’t the ‘good old days,’ Mister Corizon there is likely correct. The Dominion has never been very tolerant of disorder among their holdings, let alone an actual insurrection.”

 

“Admiral,” one of the other Captains said, “If that’s true, then these people know that right? They know the Dominion isn’t going to let them just secede. Why are they resorting to violence?”

 

“You’d have to ask them,” he said glibly, before softening slightly. “Intelligence and the diplomatic wing thinks that they’re hoping we’ll intervene, if not militarily, then politically on their behalf before this gets ugly – given our humanitarian mission and position on the subject of autonomy and sovereignty.”

 

“And will we?”

 

The normally stoic Admiral hardened. It was obvious that he didn’t like the response he was about to give. “No. Not directly anyway. The Federation Council and the Office of the President views this, as we view the Scorpiad/Al-Ucard/Eratian conflict, as an internal affair and that we are bidden by the prime directive to remain neutral. Officially we will be strongly urging the Dominion to resolve the situation with minimal loss of life.”

 

There was a pervasive silence in the room as the faces in the room stared blankly in response.