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Cptn Corizon

Gazing into Oneself

He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself doesnot become a monster. And when you gaze long into an abyss the abyss also gazesinto you. - "Beyond Good and Evil", Aphorism 146 (1886)

 

He wasn't entirely sure how long he'd been in the Republic's brig. He'd been sitting in the same cell, largely undisturbed for several hours, at least, in a quasi-lotus position meditating. Though he'd never admit it, even perhaps on some level to himself, there was an indignity about the entire situation. He had, after all, dedicated his entire life to theservice of the Federation, given his blood for them even. And here he was, sitting in the brig like little more than a common criminal.

 

Of course, he wasn't a common criminal. He was, after all, a renegade Captain who'd taken matters into his own hands when he felt the regular chain of command no longer sufficient and in doing so he'd not only endangered the lives of his entire crew, but also put the Federation in an intensely delicateposition by breaking long established treaties with an often pricklyneighbor. In one defiant act, he'd likely thrown his entire career away; and for what? A few conspirators, a case of Romulan weapons, some data that Starfleet would have obtained anyway, and a half-decrypted computer core that might or might not contain the information needed to end the smuggling.

 

Perhaps it was failure, not pride that gnawed at him the most. He had done far more questionable acts in the past, and this wasn't the first time he'd played cowboy either – but he'd never, in his recollection, managed to fail in his gambits. They'd always worked out somehow, yet this time it just never fell into place and for that, he would now have to pay up.

 

What would the cost be, he wondered? He sighed considering his series of conversations with Rear Admiral Blurox. She'd chastised him for not trusting her enough to bring her in on his scheme.That particular line had struck him as rather odd. She'd lectured him at length about the merit of following the chain of command; but what she never seemed to grasp was that he was faced with a situation where the chain of command was broken. He'd filed report after report recommending action on the weapons smuggling, yet nothing had ever came of it. He'd learned from his actual superiors, both in ATAG and at Camelot, that they too werebeing stonewalled. So how else was this going to play out?

 

What was he supposed to do? Why hello there Admiral I've Never Met, did you know that there's a weapon smuggling ring bringing weapons into the Gamma Quadrant to further rebellions against the Dominion and not only are they likely operating with the approval or at least within the knowledge of our government, and likely the Romulans, but that our own people are helping it along and keeping a full investigation from being launched? And he couldonly imagine what the response would be to that, let alone when added Oh, and by the way, I have a cloaking device Semil gave me and I am planning on making a little stopover in the Neutral Zone to meet a Romulan Ambassador who has some information on the smuggling, want to come with?

 

Truthfully he couldn't blame her for lecturing him. Her opinion was going to be pretty much what everyone who questioned him was going to ask and say. Why didn't he try harder to find a solution that didn't violate treaties or cause him to go AWOL? They wanted to sit and act like that everything could be fixed by following the chain of command, because to do otherwise would open the conversation to the notion that the chain of command itself was broken.That would require recrimination on the parts of people who were either part of this whole mess willingly, or who know about it and refused to do anything about it because they were either too afraid, or were powerless to take action and he wasn't naïve enough to believe that would ever happen.

 

He frowned deeply. Perhaps they were right. Perhaps he should have tried harder to do everything by the book first, before he went off on a clandestine mission. He was certainly sure that his prosecutors would do everything in their power to prove he had other options. His thoughts lingered to a conversation he'd once had with a certain captain some years before, when he was then faced witha decision to break law in the name of protecting the Federation or to find analternate solution that would be perhaps less expedient.

 

Sorehl had told him he needed to learn to be less secretive and more trusting; he was right then, and in all probability he was right now too. As the memories of the conversation bounced about in his head, he considered his own conclusion at the end of thatparticular debate.

 

"What good is it to protect the Federation, if we destroy the values it stands for in the process?"

 

The thought lingered in his head longer than he would have liked, and when it finally did leave, he was left feeling much less comfortable with his own actions.

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