Pathways - Jeri Taylor [29]
Chakotay, by now a lieutenant commander aboard the Gettysburg, found himself in an unaccustomed position: defending his people’s actions. He was serving under Captain Madolyn Gordon, an energetic, cheerful woman whose good nature belied her toughness, her tenacity, and her intimidating intelligence. She had curly brown hair that bobbed up and down in response to her habit of punctuating her arguments with short, sharp jerks of her head. She and Chakotay spent long hours engaged in debate on a wide-ranging number of subjects, the latest of which was the Cardassian treaty.
“It’s concessionism,” insisted Chakotay, as they drank coffee in her ready room. “The Federation shouldn’t be required to abandon its own colonists.”
“Those colonists were given every opportunity to resettle. They would have been moved by Starfleet to any of a number of planets that were virtually identical to the ones they left.”
“That’s easy to say when it’s not your homeworld. These settlers have made an investment in their colonies, with their labor and their energy. My people went through an exhaustive process of determining their spiritual affinity for the planet they finally decided to settle. It may sound easy to the bureaucrats to relocate everyone to ‘identical’ planets, but in fact it’s incredibly disruptive.”
“Your people have absolutely no protection against any Cardassian attacks. Doesn’t that concern you?”
“Of course it does. That’s why I think the idea of a demilitarized zone was fallacious in the first place. Cardassians won’t respect it—they’ll be in there in a minute, trying to force our settlers out. It would’ve been far better to draw a definitive border and then protect everyone within the confines of our territory.”
“Maybe you’re being unfair to the Cardassians. So far they’ve lived up to their word. The planet we’re headed for, Bajor, was occupied by them for over fifty years.” Gordon’s curls bounced heavily as she nodded her head heatedly. “They’ve withdrawn and given the Bajorans their autonomy once more.”
“After destroying their culture and their infrastructure, and decimating the population.”
“But they’re gone now, and Bajor is rebuilding.”
“Captain, mark my words. We’ll all come to regret this demilitarized zone. It’s bad politics and bad military tactics. Remember, you heard it here.” He smiled at her and she smiled back, gray eyes twinkling. They had a genuine affection for each other and enjoyed these jousting matches mostly as an intellectual diversion, and often switched sides just for fun.
But once he’d seen Bajor, Chakotay found his feelings calcifying. He had experienced brutal savagery during the war, and though that ordeal had certainly damaged him, he believed he had, over the years since, managed to recuperate. Visiting Bajor was like ripping open old scar tissue only to find that, underneath, the wound has never properly healed.
The Cardassians had followed a scorched-earth policy before they left. Cities that were once graceful and inviting had become vast ruins. Dwellings were ravaged, public buildings razed, temples burned. Nothing in this behavior had benefited the Cardassians; they could just as well have packed up and left the cities intact. Instead, in pointless savagery, they laid waste.
One thing that seemed to have proliferated and thrived on Bajor was the saloons. Built by the Cardassians, they found increasing popularity among the Bajorans who sought respite from the horrors of their existence. Depressed after his tour of the once-beautiful planet, Chakotay sought the same palliative. A dark, quaintly ornate room, festooned with garlands and banners that bore an air of faded elegance, was probably more depressing than uplifting, but the darkness obscured the desperate decorations. Chakotay went to the bar and ordered ale.
The bartender set a glass before him and then a frosty dark bottle that was beaded with condensation. It looked wonderfully