Divided Loyalties

Posted on Fri Jan 29, 2016 @ 9:43am by Lieutenant JG Rhe'la Daughter of the Forty-ninth House

592 words; about a 3 minute read

Mission: Pangaea (Wrap up)
Location: Promenade
Timeline: MD 11 1530 hours

The PADD turned over and over again in her hands. The glass of orange juice on the table had long since gone tepid; the pulp settling into a clump at the bottom.

Ever since her realization a few days earlier, she had been torn between two suddenly conflicting loyalties - to her house, and to Starfleet.

Despite the remaining communications instabilities, Pangaea would make an ideal home world for her people. It was relatively isolated from the major powers of the Alpha Quadrant, it had the proper climate (though it was a bit humid for her taste), there was abundant plant and animal life, Deep Space 5 was right there to ward off any attacks by the Zarnac Empire, and most importantly - it didn't belong to anyone.

But, there were just as many cons. Because the planet didn't belong to anyone, that meant that every one of the major powers (and most of the minor one) was clambering for control. So far she had seen rather official looking Romulans, Cardassians, Klingons, Ferengi, Lyrians, Gorn, Kzinti, and a few she didn't recognize. This was in addition to the normal diplomatic personnel that most of these species kept as embassy staff aboard the station. Pangaea was a potential treasure trove of rare minerals and ore - nobody was going to sit back and blithely acquiesce to the Federation taking over just because the planet popped out on top of one of their starbases. And, even if the Federation came out on top of all this diplomatic wheeling and dealing, they would most likely want to establish one of their own colonies. Handing it over to a few thousand Zarnac refugees wouldn't be at the top of their to do list.

None the less, she had been spending her off duty time drafting a pair of proposals. The first was standard - allow the Forty-ninth House to establish a colony near the equatorial region. There they would be out of the way, and any future settlement by any of the myriad rival powers could either work with them or ignore them - whichever they so choose.

The other was a tad more radical. It called for her grandfather or his representative to make planetfall and claim the planet in the name of their house. Simultaneously they would declare sovereignty as an independent state, which would enter into negotiations with all of the major powers over mining rights. Personally, she would want this hypothetical new state to become a Federation protectorate (with the goal of membership in the near future), but such obvious bias would torpedo any chances of the Klingons and Romulans not responding with boots on the ground to eject them, which would probably spark an interstellar war.

Yes, the safer first proposal was definitely the way to go. But who to give it to? The Captain still hadn't been restored to active duty, and she doubted Commander Aldrex would go along with it (not that she thought the Captain would, either...). Perhaps Lieutenant Reynolds, the diplomatic officer? That would probably be the best option, but she still wasn't certain she shouldn't just forward this to her grandfather and let him deal with it. He had been haggling with the Federation and the other major powers for a decade, so he was a far more seasoned negotiator than Rhe'la would ever be.

"Spirits of Emperor's Past be damned..." she muttered, chugging the lukewarm juice down in a single noxious swig and stomping off.

Ens. Rhe'la, Daughter of the Forty-ninth House
Chief Engineering Officer
DS5

 

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