Troubled murmurs echoed through the Senate Chamber at the mention of the empire’s longtime enemy. Though there had been no direct hostilities with the Klingons in many years, Vrax had known at the time of the Bloodied Talon’s departure for the distant Taurus Reach that the possibility existed for the vessel to encounter battleships in service to the Romulan people’s storied foe. Indeed, the report he had read of the ship’s earlier close call with a Klingon warship was still fresh in his memory.
By Vrax’s recollection, it had been decades since the last known encounter with the Klingon Empire. There had been a brief conflict in the years following the protracted war against Earth and her allies, as Romulus attempted to expand away from the region of space claimed by the then-fledgling United Federation of Planets. The Klingons, always on the hunt for new worlds to conquer owing to their ceaseless need for resources that were unavailable within their own territorial borders, had attempted to establish footholds within Romulan space, perhaps thinking Romulan forces depleted in the aftermath of the protracted conflict with the humans.
And our forces, weak though they may have been, certainly showed our enemies the errors of such thinking.
“It seems,” Vrax said after a moment, “that we are not the only ones with thoughts of expansion. In addition to the humans, our old adversaries from the Klingon Empire seem to have been gripped by a similar desire.” He knew also that hostilities would almost certainly be an inevitable consequence of this action, particularly in instances of newly claimed territory being disputed.
“All things being equal, Praetor, I would agree,” replied D’tran, the chamber’s subdued illumination reflecting off his thinning silver hair. “From what we know of the Federation, they would seek peaceful coexistence rather than enter into a dispute over territory. Why, then, would they seek to expand their borders into a region of space that is flanked by two potentially fierce enemies? Surely they know the risks they run by angering the Klingons, and the Tholians are little more than xenophobic reactionaries. The humans and their allies would seem to be asking for war.”
Senator Anitra, a woman far younger than most of her companions on the dais but as comfortable with her position as those who had served far longer, rose from her seat and stepped onto the main floor. “According to our intelligence reports, the Federation seems preoccupied with their usual glut of pursuits and would appear all but oblivious to the political maelstrom they’ve helped to engineer. They have established settlements on dozens of worlds. A handful of those are large, permanent colonies. A network of trade vectors has already been enacted, to say nothing of regular patrol routes for several Starfleet ships assigned to the sector.”
When Anitra paused and held up her hand, her dark, calculating eyes locking with his own, Vrax almost surrendered to the urge to smile. What the young senator lacked in age, she more than compensated for with her passion and flair for the dramatic.
Here it comes.
“However,” Anitra continued, “as my esteemed colleague has already pointed out, much of this could have been accomplished elsewhere in the quadrant, almost anywhere, in fact, without the risk of angering interstellar neighbors. Indeed, the space station constructed in the region would seem to serve no other purpose except to arouse suspicion and apprehension, if not outright fear of protracted military action.”
Stroking his chin, Vrax conceded that the young senator had a valid point. The presence of the starbase, far outside Federation borders, was an unprecedented act. While it could be argued that its deployment was so that it could better oversee military and civilian shipping operations supporting the growing network of colonies in the Taurus Reach, to the Praetor it seemed like too large of a tool for the job.
“Perhaps their mind-set has changed,” he said, “and the Federation no longer fears conflict, even if it stands between them and whatever goals they pursue? They might even welcome such confrontation. After all, a few of us have seen the humans acclimate to the needs of a given situation with surprising alacrity.”
As he spoke the words, he glanced to his longtime friend D’tran, who nodded in agreement. Even more so than Vrax himself, the aged senator possessed a long and unique familiarity with the humans. Over a century ago, while still a subcommander in the space fleet, D’tran had served aboard one of the vessels that had made the first recorded contact with a ship from Earth. Very little information was gathered during that initial meeting, practically nothing, in fact, and despite several efforts in the years that followed—some of which Vrax oversaw personally—much about the humans had remained a mystery even after Romulus found itself at war with the humans and learned firsthand of the tenacity and adaptability that belied any perceived physiological, mental, or cultural inferiorities they might possess.
In the years that had passed since that bitter, costly conflict—which Vrax had also witnessed firsthand and which had caused far more devastating and lasting damage to the empire than was generally acknowledged—precious little new information had been collected regarding the humans’ expansion into the galaxy.
Much of that drought was caused by the shortsightedness of the Praetor in office at that time, who had chosen a path of isolation for the Romulan people, ostensibly for the purpose of rebuilding and reprioritizing their outlook toward internal affairs, rather than pursuing a rigorous program of reaffirming the role of the Romulan Empire as the dominant force in the galaxy. By opting to focus time and energy inward, the Praetor in effect had conceded much of the territory beyond the empire’s current borders to the upstart Federation and, to a lesser extent, the Klingons.
Which is why he eventually was “retired” from office,Vrax reminded himself. Should you fail to chart the best possible course for the empire, you surely will suffer a similar fate.
Knowing this, in the decades that had passed since Vrax had stepped into the role of Praetor he had overseen an unprecedented series of intelligence-gathering activities. Deep-cover operatives and long-range sensor probes had provided some measure of clarity into the activities of their onetime enemy, which had grown—far beyond the fledgling interstellar coalition it had once spearheaded—into the United Federation of Planets. Much had been learned about the political and communal inroads the humans had forged with civilizations as they moved ever farther into the galaxy, as well as the trials they faced when confronted with new adversaries. Working from the information that had been obtained, it was feared by many political and military experts within the Romulan government that the Federation was on the verge of an unprecedented expansion with the potential to threaten the empire’s interests in this quadrant.
The Taurus Reach would at first seem to be but the latest manifestation of that fear, but that theory quickly collapsed when confronted with Sarith’s invaluable report of what she and her crew had experienced in the Palgrenax system.
As if reading his thoughts, Senator Anitra clasped her hands before her and bowed her head in his direction. “Based on what we already know of the humans, Praetor, particularly their penchant for adaptability and even their willingness to engage in deception to protect their interests, isn’t it logical to assume there is some other motive in play here? Should we not act now, rather than repeat the mistakes of our past leaders?”
Though he was certain she meant no disrespect, it was easy for Vrax to understand the collective murmurings of the other senators in the wake of Anitra’s words. Many of the comments being uttered around him were low enough in volume that he was unable to discern their content, but he comprehended their meaning just the same. It was a rare occurrence for a member of the Senate even to present the appearance of calling into question the decision of the Praetor—any Praetor—in a public forum. For someone as relatively new to the chamber as Anitra, who in all likelihood was younger than D’tran’s favored senatorial robe, the action bordered on blasphemous.