Wrongs Not Forgotten Part 1

Author Penny Proctor

The Virtual Season 7.5 contact information: season 7_5

Act 1: The Signal

Kathryn Janeway looked as stunned as Chakotay felt. "Let's have it, Mr. Kim."

"I need to boost the gain, the signal's very weak." His brows knit together in concentration, and then he relaxed. "There."

The viewscreen came to life. Although some interference remained, the image was unmistakable. An elderly Cardassian spoke in a rasping voice.

"To any passing ships. We are the surviving crew of the Malik Ohn, a ship of the Cardassian Union. We are in immediate need of medical assistance and food supplies. Basic ship functions will fail in 48 hours. Our situation is desperate. Please respond."

Without thinking, Chakotay rose to his feet as a jumble of images raced through his mind: Seska, smiling as she betrayed him…Gul Evek demanding the surrender of the Liberty right before the Caretaker pulled them into the Delta quadrant… the glinn whose name he never knew, asking questions that had no answers… walking through the devastation of his village after it was destroyed.

The continued silence on the bridge meant he was not the only one unsettled by the message. After a moment, Kathryn spoke. "I want to know where that signal came from. I'll be in my ready room."

She left the bridge quickly, but no one else seemed capable of moving. Dozens of questioning eyes turned to Chakotay. "You heard the Captain," he said, trying to sort out his thoughts without revealing the turmoil he felt.

The first thing he focused on was that any contact with the Malik Ohn was likely to be hostile. Then he had to shake his head to clear his thinking. For a moment, he had been acting on the assumptions that guided him in the Maquis. Voyager had been in the Delta quadrant for almost seven years; he was no longer Maquis, and the old assumptions were invalid.

He just finished the weapons status report when Kathryn asked that he join her in the ready room. She was waiting at her desk, and turned her computer around to face him as he sat.

"The Malik Ohn." She stood and began pacing while he read the entry on the screen. "It's quite an extensive report, considering how little Starfleet Intelligence was been able to gather about Cardassian ships in the early years."

"It was at the First Nyakkan Conference," he read aloud. "And expected at the Second Conference but it never arrived."

"That's one of the reasons the Second Conference failed. The Cardassians suspected the Federation had captured or destroyed the ship, but keeping it secret. As a result, diplomatic overtures ended and we began our slow progression toward the first war."

He leaned back and looked at her in disbelief. "That was more than thirty years ago."

Janeway stopped mid-circle and nodded. "What if the Caretaker began searching for compatible species when he desiccated the Ocampan homeworld? Kes said that 500 generations of Ocampa had passed since then."

"A new generation every five years…" Chakotay let the thought trail off. The Caretaker could have been pulling ships to the Delta Quadrant for more than two thousand years.

She poured herself a cup of coffee. "All this time, I've been considering the effect of the Caretaker's action only on this ship and crew. Now I wonder…he may have changed the whole history of Federation-Cardassian relations." She gestured with the pot in hand, offering him a cup, but he shook his head. "My father was one of the Starfleet representatives at both conferences. He once told me that after the first, he had great hopes for a peaceful, if not friendly, relationship but after the second he became convinced that war was inevitable. Can you imagine how different it might have been if the Malik Ohn had reported as expected?"

Chakotay shook his head slowly. "Maybe the timing would have been different, but the outcome would have been the same. The Cardassians are too arrogant, too greedy for territory."

"They were." She sighed, and sat down again. "That doesn't seem the case now. According to the last datastream report, Cardassia Prime was nearly destroyed in the final assault of the War. It will be decades before the Union can even begin to think about expansion again. That threat is over."

"It will never be over."

"What?"

He looked up, startled and a little embarrassed. "I didn't mean to say that out loud."

"But you did." She looked at him closely. "It doesn't sound like you."

"I'm sorry." He took a deep breath, and walked across the room to look out at the stars. "I thought I had put it behind me, but seeing that image on the viewscreen…it all came back. For a moment, I didn't see him at all. What I saw was my village, after the Cardassians finished with it."

He rarely thought about it any more, and never talked about it, but now he wanted her to understand. "When I walked through the wreckage, it was unrecognizable. The buildings were melted into the rock, and there was a layer of dust over everything. I remember, I looked down and saw my footprint, and I wondered if I had just walked through the ashes of my mother's body." He turned back to her. "There are some wrongs that can't be forgiven, or forgotten."

She studied him for a moment, then set down her cup and went to him. There was sympathy in her voice and in the touch of her hand on his arm. "I won't pretend that I know how you feel. But there has to be an end, Chakotay, or nothing will ever change."

It had been a long time since she touched him that way, and it felt good. It felt as natural as breathing and somehow right. He had almost forgotten how that simple touch felt.

"Seven of Nine to Captain Janeway. I have identified the location of the Cardassian ship."

"Good. Come to the briefing room to report." She looked at Chakotay. "Assemble the senior staff. Maybe it's a false alarm, and we can forget the whole thing."