Chapter 3

Forty metrics later, he was standing at the door of his dal's quarters. The dal opened, his hair dripping, with a towel around his neck and shoulders, wearing a sleeveless top and tracksuit trousers. "Come in, Gil, look at the replicator and choose something," he invited him informally. Hissar was quite embarrassed – he was not supposed to see the second in command semi-naked wearing flip-flops and a tracksuit. But since everything was wrong on this vessel, he concluded that this was the least problem.

Hissar ordered his meal while the dal was rubbing his hair with the towel in order to dry it more quickly. He seemed quite relaxed and moved around confidently opening and closing commodes and putting away clothes, armor and personal belongings, as though he owned the place. Well, he really owned it, he was at home, Hissar corrected himself. This place had been his home for 15 years. He bent his huge gaunt frame and picked up a bottle of kanar from a crate under the bunk. He obviously bought it large.

Still he was in an awfully good shape for a drunkard. No body fat, only muscles and sinews on long bones and impressive ridges. In fact, Hissar felt dwarfed and plump next to him. He had to be from the main continent like his father. Bathed and sober, he could be hired for a model in the recruitment clips that ran over the public screens. "Join the army, do your duty, serve and protect Cardassia, be one of us." And very tall and handsome soldiers proudly smiling and marching with their phaser rifles. He had this slow way of talking with a prominent "r" sound and Hissar expected him to be from the South East.

It would be inappropriate to start the conversation with a complaint or criticism, so the young officer ventured diplomatically, "Where are you from, Dal?"

Zabor answered quite readily, "I am from Lakarian city."

"Oh, that is interesting, I have always wanted to visit it," Hissar pointed out politely.

"Yes, you should. Cardassia city is just an administrative hub but Lakarian city has soul, character, and history," Zabor explained vividly. He obviously liked the topic and inquired, "What is Indar like? I haven't been there."

"Well, not as glamorous as on the main continent but we manage. It is calm and rural. The weather is quite unstable, we have rainstorms coming from the ocean and then heat waves," he stopped himself, he did not want to twitter trivialities.

The dal was listening carefully raising an eyeridge when Hissar mentioned the rainstorms and said, "Our weather is mostly dry, we have short rains and they evaporate very quickly." He added in a reverie while ordering his meal, "It is great when you go jogging in the outskirts very early and you see the dew and then the sun starts heating the plain, and you can smell the moist coming out of the soil and stones."

The senior officer kept the small talk rolling, "Tell me about your family, Gil. What do they do?"

"Well, my mother is a primary training inquisitor…" Hissar started and the dal laughed while filling the glasses. They looked at each other, nodded and took a sip.

The dal observed, "This sure takes a load off my mind, if you can survive living under a primary training inquisitor, then you will probably survive on this ship."

Hissar tried to smooth over the facts, "She is not that bad unless she catches you shrinking from duty."

The dal smiled at his attempt, "In my family it is the opposite. My father is a Militia man but he rose in the world and became an ordnance officer in the Lakarian Central Command Building. He was really fixated on that – to see both his sons in the Guard. What about your father, Gil?"

"He is a botanist and a genetic engineer, a dreamer obsessed with plants," the young tactician explained.

The dal nodded his understanding, "Yes, I know what you mean. My mother is an actress in a local theatre. Not very famous, but she likes it and she is very vain. She makes a great fuss when they don't cast her as a 20-year-old beauty."

Hissar got engulfed in the conversation, it was the most beloved topic – their families – and they would not see them soon. He asked, "What about your brother, Dal?" and then it suddenly dawned on him and he burst out, "Hey, your brother must be Igon Zabor, he was in my class!"

The dal beamed up proudly, "Yes, he is exactly your age, 24, and after his graduation he was stationed on Terok Nor as a pilot of shuttles and Hideki fighters. When I saw your name on the recruit list, I was curious whether you are that Hissar who beat him. He really hit the roof when he graduated second…"

The gil almost regretted graduating first, if the big brother decided to make his life difficult for overshadowing his little brother…The dal waved his hand depreciatingly, "I told him he placed too much importance on study, the really important lessons you learn the harder way, hit and trial."

"Bajor," Hissar spat, frowning, "My elder brother jointed the Militia and got killed on Bajor five years ago. I guess that was why I decided to join the Guard. For him."

The dal nodded sympathetically, "Yes, I see. The Militia troops always see a lot of action. The casualty rate there is the highest."

The young officer was curious about the dal, he stroke him as a cheeky troublemaker, "Are you married, dal?

The dal smiled dryly as though the answer was self-evident, "No, I am not. We don't get shore leave that often and it is two weeks at the best. But I like alien females…" He gave Hissar a wink, "You know – Farians, Kobliads, Boslics, Rigelians, different species, the bars near the main cargo routes are full of them. And the best part is that you don't have to marry them in order to …you know."

The younger Cardassian was shocked, "Alien females!"

The older guy shot him a knowing look, "Accept it, boy. You can't get laid on Cardassia unless you are married. And the girls and their parents expect you to be a gul at least in order to betroth them. So there are holosuites and alien females for you and me."

He was right but Hissar felt obliged to defend Cardassian women, "My brother got married…"

"To a humble girl who didn't expect too much," Zabor snorted finishing his sentence and griped, "But Lakarian beauties expect quite a lot." Then he laughed, "Hey, do you happen to have a sister?"

Hissar smiled back imagining Rivela wiping the floor with that dude, "In fact, I do, Dal, but I have to warn you she is everything but humble. In fact, she can eat you alive."

The dal squared his shoulders, his neck bulged with defiance and retorted cockily, "She will have to sweat for this. I am made of Cardassian steel." Both guffawed. The dal refilled the glasses and let out a sigh, "Now let me tell you about this ship."

He started haltingly, "Our gul is not a gul, technically speaking, he is a former Obsidian."

Hissar exclaimed, bewildered, "An Obsidian in the Guard?"

"Officially, he is not a member of the Obsidian Order but practically…They often send us on assignments for the Obsidians," the dal clarified dryly.

The gil could not grasp it and gave the dal an expecting look. Zabor shook his head while watching his reaction and continued, "It is not only that, it's quite complicated. His father and uncle were both high-ranking operatives in the order. He joined the Bamarren Institute and as a first-level student became part of a team developing a psychotropic drug causing euphoria, it was supposed to be given to the Militia before ground attacks. They experimented with several formulas and in order to keep it secret used students from the institute as test subjects. So he got hooked on it. In fact, I get shore leave to bring him the substance."

Hissar was staring blankly at Zabor, whatever he said, it would be inane, the facts were too shocking. The dal was quite satisfied with his reaction, he was listening and analyzing, without outbursts of indignation and rage. He resumed, "At some point his addiction became too much of a trouble for the institute so he was made to leave it, and he loitered around as a minor operative on military vessels. Fifteen years ago the Obsidians saw an opportunity to place him by coercing, threatening and blackmailing, he attended an advanced course for officers at the Academy, was transferred to the Guard and was given this ship."

Hissar deliberated the information and pointed out, "Why don't you file a complaint with the Central Command, he violates all regulations for behavior on military ships."

Zabor smirked mirthlessly, "There had been seven investigations on this vessel, there had been suicides, PTS cases, open insubordination. Several young gils like you filed complaints with the Central Command. It turned out that their military records had been so stained that their complaints never received credibility, they were discharged and then…disappeared. Besides, some strange things started happening to their relatives."

He looked Hissar straight in the eyes, gathered himself, and spat, "Practically, the gul owns us. He can arrange for each of us to disappear without a trace and our families will suffer, too. This is how he controls this ship."

"What about the Central Command? Can't they do something?" Hissar tried to probe into all aspects of the situation.

The dal took a sip and allowed, "Probably they can but they don't want to rock the boat and disturb the balance between both structures. Officially, the Obsidian Order does not have access to military equipment but they have the ways and means of bypassing it."

"In other words, the Central Command is ready to sacrifice us in order to keep the Obsidians happy," Hissar observed baffled at the intricacy of the circumstances.

"Indeed, and what is more, even if you leave this ship and the Obsidians don't kill you, your dossier will say that you are remiss, a poor professional, a sloppy drunkard." Then he smiled sadly and admitted, "Well, the last is true for me at least. With a dossier like this they won't take me even as a security guard at the Lakarian amusement park."

"But how do you manage to cope with that on an everyday basis?" the younger man could not imagine what was like enduring that every single day and not being able to do anything about it.

Zabor shrugged his shoulders and spelled it out, "As you probably has noticed, the gul doesn't know anything about navigation, warp factors, ETAs, tactics. Dalin Makar is in charge of the engineering – in fact, we envy him because the gul rarely goes to the engine room and the warp core. Glinn Reglan is our conn officer and gul's aide as well and together we manage the ship. Sartan's fits of euphoria are quite nasty, but usually I take the impact and he vents everything on me or poor Reglan. Tomorrow the dalin will give you emitters, you will install them in your quarters, and you will be fine."

"So he is addicted but how does he tolerate your…kanar?" Hissar could not understand why a gul should put up with someone's imperfection no matter how imperfect he might be.

"Oh, he adores my drinking and my scruffiness," Zabor giggled scornfully, "He feels a better man when he insults me and tells me what an excuse for an officer I am. Besides, it diverts him from tormenting someone else." Then he added with cold contempt, "On the other hand, he doesn't deserve anything better, so I don't polish my armor and boots deliberately and I don't cut and slick my hair very much."

"Have you thought of applying Proviso 37?" Hissar suddenly said.

Zabor laughed heartily, "I have been waiting for 15 years to apply Proviso 37 but recently I have lost hope." Proviso 37 allowed the ranking officers on a vessel to arrest and restrain their gul if he/she acted irrationally, was delusional, or his/her orders threatened the territorial integrity and the political stability of Cardassia.

"It seems to me that he presents you with all necessary conditions for applying it every day," the gil observed.

The dal grinned at him sardonically, "Sure, how perceptive of you, we will return to Cardassia with a raving Obsidian confined to his quarters and he will exterminate us and our families the moment he leaves his quarters. Other brilliant ideas?"

Hissar had to admit that he was right – seven investigations had not been enough to force the Central Command to take measures. He could not understand how Zabor had got a whiff of all these details about his gul. They were highly unflattering and private and people usually made everything possible to keep them secret. "I was wondering how you learnt all these things about the gul. This information is quite…sensitive."

The dal frowned while gulping what was left in his glass. He practically had not touched his meal and functioned on kanar and adrenaline. "Some of the things he told me himself, others I have put together during the investigations. When the euphoria phase of the drug wears off, he becomes dizzy and sleepy and feels like talking so he calls me on the carpet first and then he rambles in memories."

His expression saddened at the recollection and he remarked, "I don't know what disgusts me more – his arrogance on the bridge or the intimate pieces of his desolate life. He didn't become what he is now just like that, for overnight, it took him years."

"You said there were investigations," Hissar gently prodded him to continue, mulling over the depths of Sartan's misery was of no avail.

Zabor refilled the glasses again, Hissar had never drunk so much kanar but he could not turn it down, he had to continue the conversation. "When we were investigated, there was a guy on the investigation board, Gul Larvan. He used to be a Legate once but he opposed the Federation conflict, he believed that we had to seek a diplomatic solution because fighting the Federation was beyond our scope."

The gil bobbed his head in confirmation, "Yes, I know him, he was one of our inquisitors, he taught strategy and political studies."

Zabor resumed, "Exactly, the hawks in the Central Command arranged his fall from grace and he was sent to the Academy to keep him out of the way. When I spoke to him, I was left with the impression that he was likely to do something. So if the worst comes to the worst, bear that in mind." Hissar shivered at the last words, they sounded like a shri-tal confession, as though the dal expected to die soon and was giving him all the useful information he had.

The dal took a bite of food and invited the gil who had eaten his portion, "Do you want some more? Order something else, I have plenty of rations left. I never manage to finish them up."

Hissar had always had a good appetite and he ordered a Larish pie, feeling guilty because he had not done his exercise program this day. "Do you have holodecks, Dal? I would like to keep my shape," the young officer inquired lightly, the grim topic had drained him of all his prowess.

Zabor affirmed with a wry smirk, "Yes, we do. One of the perks of being an Obsidian vessel. Not all Galors have them. I like going there too but I am into swimming. A swimming pool with hot mineral water like those in Corvon." Then he took another bite and asked, "Do you know the new comm gil?"

"Yes, I know her but not very well, we were in different classes. I really felt sorry for her, then on the bridge," Hissar admitted.

Zabor raised his eyeridges and remarked matter-of-factly, "He treats everyone that way. What bothers me is that I haven't had a female officer and I don't know how the gul reacts to females. If he only insults her, everything will be fine but if he decides to check for himself whether she is barren or not…"

This thought had never crossed the gil's mind, sexual harassment on a military vessel was out of question. Still, having in mind this vessel, he quickly inferred what the dal was worrying about and offered, "I can keep an eye on her, I am the only familiar face for her here. I can tell her that if the gul makes advances to her, she is not alone."

Zabor fell in quickly with his suggestion, "Yes, this would be nice. I already told her that if someone tried something inappropriate, she had to report straight to me and I would take care."

The young officer took a bite of his Larish pie, he really didn't feel like talking about the gul, going in circles around the problem would not solve it. Still, he did not want to finish the conversation abruptly, the guy was a generous and polite host. So he decided to brighten it up somewhat. "You know, Dal, I was wondering about these bars on the main cargo routes? How did you go there?" Actually, he wanted to ask about the alien females but the topic was too embarrassing.

The older officer snorted derisively, his voice loaded with regret, "I used to serve on a freighter as a cadet, and for 4 service quartiles after that, they offered me to stay there but I wanted to be on a Galor. I was such an idealistic idiot, it was the dream job – no risks, 10 percent of each cargo run is for the gul and he shares it with the crew, off-world perks and goods, some small smuggling, home leave after each long cargo run. You see different places and species, it is interesting."

Curiosity took the better part of Hissar and he stuttered eagerly, "And what about these…species?

Zabor inferred what Hissar was trying to say and gave him a cunning knowing stare. "Well, after the third glass you don't care what species she is, as long as she has the basic female anatomy and after a whole bottle you even love her."

"Are they very different from us?" the gil asked, the unmentionable already mentioned.

"No, in fact, they aren't. You like some of them better than others, you hope to find your favorite next time when you go there. They don't have ridges and scales, at least not like ours, most mammalian females are soft and smooth like silk. And their skin is warm, their body temperature is higher than ours."

The gil kept fishing for information, he had always wondered what it was like, to be with a woman, "And what about Cardassian women?"

The dal shrugged his shoulders in dubiety, "There are several programs featuring Cardassian women, I really can't find much difference, still I prefer the real thing, doing it with a light bulb seems quite…unnatural."

Then the dal admonished the curious youngster mockingly, "Hey, what have you and my nerdy brother done at this Academy for five years? You, swotters, could have boarded some freighter now and then to visit the big spaceports in Arawath, Regulon or Chin'toka but you didn't even go to the holosuites. Do you think that life is only ETAs, target distances, and missile trajectories? Where is this youth of today going?"

Hissar looked away and smiled uneasily, the dal was right. He had rarely left the campus barracks, he had rarely made the time to do something else apart from his assignments, he had not mingled with the other cadets, he had expected they would snub him so he was resolved never to give them an inch.

"Well, I have to admit that I haven't thought of that," Hissar conceded, still feeling awkward.

Zabor just waved his hand and produced another drunken critical revelation, "I am sure you haven't. One day we will disappear as a species because of our social hypocrisy and decorum. The Feds and the Bajorans will kill all prim good boys like you and our dainty, picky women will keep pressing their thighs together waiting for Mr. Right."

Hissar could not keep a straight face at the last deep social insight – it was nasty and obscene but it was true. In fact, he perversely toyed with the idea of passing Garita to this indiscriminative, unscrupulous wastrel, after the guy had gulped a whole bottle, he would not notice the difference anyway. The little manipulative bitch really deserved someone who would treat her as an alien hooker if she could not appreciate his honest intentions.