Stockholm Syndrome

He got a chance to see his restraints, when they untied him: Simple ties, of woven material which could have been animal skin or peelings from the bark of a tree, or both.

The first day, Rampart struggled at his bonds, willing his nanites to dissolve them, but after half an hour – more than enough time – they remained securely fastened.  His nanomods weren't exactly helping much, inside.  He tried sending a distress signal again, but got no response.  It was as if his complant wasn't there.  A tingle behind his right ear made him wonder if they had removed his cochlear implant, or disabled it... if they had that skill, and the tools.

He was in a hut – the interior dark and dim, between walls and roof constructed from thatched vegetation and wooden poles, woven together.  Decidedly primitive.  How could these throwbacks sneak up and overpower an entire Federation excavation team?... if that was in fact what happened.  How could they be holding him?  The backwardsness of the situation... It made him want to laugh.  In the middle of the Federation, capable of reaching other galaxies, of traveling through time, of turning the universe inside out and reshaping the nature of existence... and here he was, tied up, inside a hut... possibly, he was guessing, in a village full of similar structures, populated by these Pleknareth primitives.

But he wouldn't laugh until he was out of this.  They had one up on him: Whatever they did, however they did it... They had captured him.  Primitive, maybe, but not powerless.

He sighed, recalling a similar situation in the days before nanomods and complants... trapped and captive inside an asteroid base with an Andorian.  Avi na-Ki'tiki, his old friend and former Cadre companion, came to their rescue.  He doubted she'd be showing up to rescue him today – but it would have been a pleasant surprise.

The jungle, where they found the runabout, was not remote – a hundred-and-fourteen kilometers west of Cardassia City.  In the middle of everything, practically right out in the open.  How did it withstand the march of time and "progress"?  Cardassians wiped out much of their natural environment, centuries ago, in the course of depleting their world's resources... forcing them to turn to other planets, like Bajor.  But someone spared this area.  Because of the Pleknareth?  Not a decision easily expected of the Cardassian military, back when they ran the show.  Rampart couldn't imagine them having much respect for "primitives" on their own world.  But everyone could pull off a surprise now and then.  The risk with calling someone "predictable" was when they stopped being predictable.  Maybe because it was their own world, was why they spared them.

In any case, Vor'ana, April, Rutlik... Someone would realize he was missing.  If the Federation sensor grid could find a Vulcan on Romulus, they would be able to find Rampart, a human, amidst all of these non-humans.  It was just a matter of time, and a short time, he figured.  Vor'ana knew how to pull strings.  He only had to wait it out.  They would search for him.

The thing that concerned him was how they disabled his complant.  It was inside his skull, wired into his brain, as most complants were.  The Pleknareth rejected technology; they would have no skill in knowing how to disable it, and should not have even known that it was there.  They should not have had the tools.  What worried him more was why they did it: He was a captive.  Had he trespassed on their land?  Judging by their multi-ethnic lineup, they obviously knew about aliens – it would have been practically impossible not to know about aliens, for any planet with as much interspecies contact as Cardassia.  They had to know, if not that he was human, that he was at least not one of them, not Cardassian, just by looking at him.  Taking and holding a foreign national prisoner broke some major rules.

He wished he'd worn his comtacts.  How many times did Admiral April comment on their usefulness?  That might have given him some idea of what was going on here, letting him see outside of the hut, detect bodies, make a map, get his bearings.  But it relied on the functionality of his complant and armpadd – which he lacked.  A subspace disruption field.  That could have been the culprit.  A lot of Starfleet amenities relied on subspace transduction.  Take it out, cut it off, and it could knock out everything.

Since the technology wasn't proving helpful, he had to find another way out of this... and maybe, along the way, find out why they killed the team, and were now holding him.  But he would settle for getting out of this.

Something was wrong.  By now, someone should have found him.  The fact that they hadn't suggested various possibilities... none of which Rampart liked, or wanted to consider.

At least they weren't torturing him.  Cardassians were renowned for torturing prisoners.  These weren't ordinary Cardassians, and not just Cardassians.  Once, one of the Jem'Hadar and one of the Klingons came in with the group.  As time passed, Rampart got less and less of an impression that he was actually a prisoner.  He reminded himself that it was Stockholm syndrome: a psychological response when hostages feel a connection, loyalty, even friendship, with their captors.  He had to keep reminding himself of that.  It seemed like they didn't know what else to do with him.  None of them made overtly hostile moves; they even tried to make him comfortable.  A prison was a prison, no matter how gilded the bars... but he could think of no explanation for being here, still, after several days – no reason for them keeping him alive, when... if... they had slaughtered the excavation team.  Maybe they were acting on orders.

The jungle had bugs.  They came in through the floorboards, and were fierce at night.  He continually blew them away with his lips, or swatted at them (and itched where they bit him) when his limbs were free.

He did not know what happened, but it boiled down to two explanations: Starfleet could not find him... or wasn't going to.  Why the latter, he had no idea.  He had to believe it was the former.  Maybe they thought he was dead.  Without a body, they would keep looking... unless they thought there wasn't a body to be found.

It was a downcast afternoon, beneath Cardassia's umber sky.  Seated at a wooden table, beside the hut where they kept him – where he lived, now – Rampart and a row of young Cardassians, boys and girls, adolescents to late teens, beat nuts into pulp with soft wooden mallets.  It had become a cathartic experience for him.  He couldn't strike at his captors, and found the violence of the idea repugnant, so he took it out on the nuts.  The girls giggled and played jokes on each other, or flirted with the boys, who, enjoying the attention, returned it.  Running around, they didn't get half as much work done as Rampart, whom they ignored as if he wasn't there.  If not for the fact that he wasn't allowed to leave – and he still had no idea why they kept him here – he might have enjoyed it.

After a while, he realized he was enjoying it.  It was a simple life, and he had plenty to keep him busy.  It made the time go by.

The last friend he expected to make was the Jem'Hadar.  His name was Kal'iklak.

The so-called changelings, shapeshifters who founded the Dominion – aptly titled "Founders" by those in the Dominion – had genetically engineered the Jem'Hadar from simpler lifeforms.  That was common knowledge, for the most part, in Starfleet; something they taught at the Academy nowadays.  The Jem'Hadar were once garden variety humanoids.  The Founders remade them to be the Dominion's military – a savage, aggressive military at that.  They controlled that military with drugs.  Specifically, a drug called ketracel-white.  The Jem'Hadar needed it to survive.  They were addicted to it.  They depended on regular injections.  Deprived of ketracel, they went mad, and died.

Kal'iklak resembled the Jem'Hadar scientist, Umat'iglan, assigned to Arcadia the year before – resembled him in that he lacked the "feeding tube" in his neck through which the drug would be administered.  He had the same yellow eyes... predator's eyes, like a wild cat's, baleful and shrewd.  But he was not one of the "new breed" of Jem'Hadar, bred in recent years for more peaceful purposes.  He had the full array of cranial spikes, and from his physique, was clearly built to be a fighter.  This Jem'Hadar was one of those from twelve years ago, who occupied Cardassia.

He had to ask the obvious question.

"The Founders abandoned us," Kal'iklak said.  "They left us to die, without the white.  We fled the cities, came out to the jungles, to die alone.  But the Pleknareth found us, and freed us from our addiction."

"How?"

The Jem'Hadar nodded to a man nearby – an old Cardassian, preparing a dish in a bowl, on a fire.  Wooden poles were erected about, interconnected into racks.  Dead animals hung from the poles, bristling with spiky fur.  They looked like porcupines.  They were called chikrapat.  The Pleknareth skinned them, plucked the needle-like bristles and used them for a variety of purposes – threading sutures, body-piercing, tying satchels and more.

"It is in the makaide," Kal'iklak said.  "The properties are unknown to us, but it satisfied our cravings, even as it weaned us off the white.  Now we realize that the Founders are not gods.  We do not need them or live to serve them."

"But you are warriors, aren't you?  Soldiers, bred for combat?  How do you manage to live in peace?"

"There are not many of us.  Some of us live with different tribes.  We have tribal wars, occasionally."

"So you kill each other."

"No," was Kal'iklak's reply, to Rampart's surprise.  "Ketracel white was responsible for much of our aggression.  Without it, we feel no need to spill blood more than any other man."

"Did you kill my people?" Rampart said.  "When you captured me?"

Kal'iklak hesitated, looking down.  "It was not my decision."

"Whose was it?"

Kal'iklak stared at him.

"Why are you holding me here?"

"The tribal wars are rituals," Kal'iklak continued, avoiding him.  "Long ago, the Pleknareth fought and killed for land, women, slaves and harvests, but when the Central Command tried to wipe them out, they resolved never to kill each other again.  Now they observe the custom only as a reminder of their beginnings, and why they must not revert to that one, old way."

"Well, that's interesting," Rampart said.  "So you and these Cardassians found peace with each other.  That's great."  He slapped his hands on his thighs and stood up.  "I appreciate the hospitality, but I have to get out of here.  I don't suppose you can point the way to the nearest town...?"

Rampart registered the tense reactions – tribespeople straightening, clenching their weapons, wary eyes on him from every direction.  The man at the fire stopped what he was doing and turned to look at him.

"We cannot let you leave," Kal'iklak had informed him.

"And why not...?"

His name was Osipyan.  Cardassian, and in another setting, Rampart could have easily pictured him as some sort of statesman or leader.  He had that shroud of dignity and charisma, and carried himself well.

On the platform, he stood, the bowl Rampart saw him prepare, regularly, over a fire, held high.  "We perform this ritual not for our Hebitian forefathers, but for ourselves – for what we are.  The Halj'rai enslaved us.  But we are free."

"Free," the assembly echoed, and bowed.  Rampart saw the outsiders murmur and lean as well.  Who were the Halj'rai?

The bowl went around, and everyone partook of it.  Everyone but Rampart.  They did not offer it to him.  Makaide.  He wondered what was in it.

It took him a few days to understand that Kal'iklak and the rest accepted the ceremony as a symbol, for their own break from the bonds of their respective societies, and what those societies had made of them.  Kal'iklak, the Klingons, even the Tellarite... and they were not the only non-natives... had come from other lives.  He learned that about them.  But they never said why they gave up those lives.  Had they been captured?  Did they come by choice?  It was evident why, more or less, with Kal'iklak.  But the others?  Every explanation which tried to occur to Rampart fell short of sensible.  Everything seemed just slightly out of sync and off-base, so that nothing fell into place.

It started with a pissing contest – literally.  The men would get together on a bank over a gully and see who could whiz the farthest, the target being a narrow stream down below.  Once, they teased Rampart into the competition.  He beat the Klingon.

It ended with two fractured ribs.  As he lay recovering, Rampart stressed over Pleknareth medicine, at its effectiveness and efficiency in healing.  If only he had a Starfleet medkit.  Fortunately, it could have been worse, and they knew something about analgesics.

When he was almost fully healed, Osipyan came to see him.

Osipyan brought a small leather bag, fastened with fur-needles, held it up, rattled it, and gave it to Rampart, who looked at it without opening it.  "What is it?"

"It's a gift."

"What's inside?"

"Teeth."

Every now and then they had bonfires.

They gathered around, after dark, in a clearing, surrounded by tall trees; they talked, laughed, and played.  They smoked ornate pipes resembling ancient Earth musical instruments called French horns.  They drank fermented animal milk from canoe-shaped pitchers, mixed with herbs, spices and mysterious other ingredients – makaide, or something like it.  It had a cooked, greasy smell.  Then some of them stripped naked and moved around the flames, chanting, males and females both.

A young woman was there.  Rampart knew her.  She had been one of the first to feed and bathe him, before they let him do it himself.

He had never seen a Cardassian woman in the nude.  She danced, gray skin flickering like serpent's scales in the firelight.  She was scrawny, flat-breasted, figureless; her shoulders too large and square; her legs resembled a chicken's, thick in the thighs, tapering to bony calves.  Beads were braided into her black Cardassian hair.  Anklets glistened above her feet, made of more of the techno-jewelry.  Her bare gray feet kicked up spurts of sand.  She twirled, bent, stretched, turned, limbs weaving up and down, circling the fire.  Her dark eyes roamed, lazy, intoxicated... ignorant to her audience.  The tribesmen sat watching, and talked.

It had been a while since he'd seen Vor'ana.  A long time since he had been with her.  He made drawings of her, in his hut, so that he would not forget her face, and relieved himself in her presence when it became too much to bear... but it was not the same.  He missed her.  Her cool warmth, her touch, just the sight of her... He missed the life he was missing.  Rampart wasn't the sentimental type, but he missed his wife.

Osipyan suddenly sat beside him.  He didn't say a word.  Had he been watching?  He looked at Rampart with that old, bemused expression, dark eyes like pokers in the flickering orange of the fire.  He looked at the girl, then at Rampart.

Rampart studied him, then shook his head.  "I have a wife."  Osipyan knew this.

"Nature cares not about such things."  He smiled.  If anyone could arrange it, around here, Rampart knew it was Osipyan.  He wondered if this old priest, and pimp of a sort, had bedded her, like he bedded some of the other women.

"What's her name?" Rampart said, then held up a hand.  "Strike that.  Thanks... but no thanks."

Osipyan made a show of looking around.  "Where is your wife?"

Rampart wished like hell he knew.

"Your wife... she wronged you, did she not?"

He must have overheard.  Rampart nearly broke down once, practically begging to be set free.  He had a wife, he told them.  Children? they asked.  If lying would have made a difference, he would have lied.  He told them, honestly: No.  Later, in casual conversation, he mentioned that Vor'ana had been pregnant but had an abortion, against his wishes, without his knowledge.  He was furious with her for that... but couldn't hate her.  He loved her.  He forgave her.  Some women had that effect on men: They could wrap them around their fingers.  Vor'ana had him around hers.  He didn't know if there was anything she could do, no matter how awful, for which he would not forgive her.

Where was she?  What was she doing at that moment?  Had she taken part in the search for him?  Had she written him off as well?

Rampart did not know the lay of the land, but he knew constellations.  Every Starfleet officer was supposed to; it was in their training.  He looked up, only idly – living a life among the stars made them less than special, for some.  The stars were murky blotches in the cloudy night sky, difficult to make out through the smoke from the fire.  And he noticed, without expecting: They hadn't changed.  After months, they should have changed position, as Cardassia orbited its sun.  They didn't.  But the sun came up; days and nights went by.  What did that mean?

Later that night, in the dark of his hut, the door opened as he laid half-asleep, with ever-vigilant tribespeople outside.  He did not know if it was her.  They traded no words.  She was Cardassian.  He'd heard Cardassian women were forceful lovemakers, but she was gentle.

He awoke alone – the woman had left in the night, afterwards.  At the door of his hut, he went to step out, and a gang of the tribe flailed their arms, yelling at him.  Rampart got the unspoken message: Stay put.  He took a step back into the hut, but did not close the door.  Maybe it was a raid, of the kind Kal'iklak talked about.  They usually went out to battle in the jungle, but occasionally threw in twists on the tactic.