by Chris Hechtl
“Hopefully, the disease will have run its course by the next time a ship arrives,” Cynthia said, looking at the doctor. He spread his hands to indicate he didn't know. She grimaced.
“We can't count on that. It might have a long incubation rate, it could remain in the survivor's systems forever,” Doctor Taylor warned. That made a few around the room hiss in distress over that revelation.
“Not a pleasant thought to help us sleep at night, Doc,” Shelby said carefully.
“We have to be realists. I don't even know what we're dealing with. For all I know it could be Xeno in origin!” the doctor said, throwing his hands up in the air. That got everyone to sit up straight. He nodded grimly as they stared at him. “Exactly. I have no samples,” he said firmly. “So I can't rule out a Xeno nanite infestation like what happened to Epsilon Triangula. Everything is on the table,” he said.
“Lovely,” Shelby sighed. “So, you are saying we can't protect our people if we go somewhere and it's there and we don't know it? Somewhere that has a long incubation period?” she asked.
“I don't know. That's the frustrating thing,” the doctor said in despair.
“Okay. I seem to recall picking up some medics on ET. Get with them, Doc, see how they solved it and what they might think is the cause,” Shelby ordered.
“I've done that. They are drawing a blank too. They suggested the Xeno plague angle to be honest,” Doctor Taylor said. “It actually fits since this is multispecies. Most viruses are species specific or hit only a family group.”
“Such as?” Shelby asked, leaning on her right elbow as she quirked an eyebrow up to draw the doctor out.
“I'm referring to mammals or reptiles or what have you,” the doctor said.
“And that still leaves the ship out there who is spreading the damn thing,” the Naga hissed. The others nodded.
“Ah,” Shelby replied with a nod. “Okay.” She frowned thoughtfully. Her previous unvoiced answer suggested itself to her once again, but it didn't sound right. “I was just thinking,” she parsed out slowly.
“Ma'am?”
“Once, twice, coincidence maybe but …”
Cynthia grimaced. “You could be right there. After all, ET was their game,” she said, looking at the doctor.
Doctor Taylor frowned but then after a moment his face cleared. He must have looked the files up Shelby reasoned. “You are referring to the Horathians?”
“Yes. ONI said they delivered the virus,” Shelby said, looking over to Ensign Slatterly. The woman nodded grimly. “So it is possible,” she said, turning to the doctor.
“Why? I mean, their Fourth Fleet was after water dwellers, right?” Fred Muggs asked, looking around the room. “Wouldn't they be defeating their own purpose by exterminating the population they seek to co-opt?”
“It is possible they have separate agendas. Or, they look, don't see a water dweller population, so they spread the virus. It's a cheap method of taking over the territory in their eyes. No need to send in the troops, just let their little pathogens do most of the work for them,” Shelby said, feeling her stomach flutter a bit at the idea.
“I … yes, that is sick but a distinct possibility,” the Naga tactical officer said slowly as he turned the problem over and viewed it from the enemy's perspective. “Strategically very efficient. If no one knows they did it, they could continue on doing it. And shipping will spread it further. Panic will also be a factor, tearing communities apart.”
“A ship low on fuel might chance a landing,” Portia warned. “They won't have a choice, watch the air go out or try to survive. Try to go down where no one is at and hope it isn't airborne.”
“We can't stop them. But at least we can warn them,” Shelby said.
“What if the pirates come around and destroy the beacon, ma'am?” Lieutenant Z'k'th'ss'Th asked, coiling and uncoiling his tail slightly in distress.
Shelby spread her hands, then clasped them together. She breathed for a moment, collecting herself and then when she was ready she looked up. “We can't stop that either. All we can do is try to get the warning out and try to get the doc something to go on so he can whip up a cure.”
“If there is one,” the doctor said darkly. “I know everyone thinks we're magicians, but medical science can only take us so far, only rebuild so much. And broad spectrum fixes aren't easy. We might come up with a patch, a vaccine or …,” he shrugged helplessly.
“Don't give up just yet, Doc, we're just getting started,” Shelby said firmly. She turned to the engineer and XO. “Get that beacon set up.” Both officers nodded. She turned to the A.I. and doctor. “I want as much detail as possible in its database, but keep the initial warning short and sweet.”
“What if someone picks the beacon up for salvage, ma'am?” Lieutenant Z'k'th'ss'Th asked.
“We can't stop that either,” Shelby sighed. “Just do what we can with what we have,” she said. The officers nodded or signaled assent glumly.
“I think we need to take another step, ma'am,” Doctor Taylor said. All eyes turned to him. “I'm not up to this, nor is Mahoney. This is way above what we can treat. We should send a courier to the Federation. Let them know the situation and get them in motion to send a relief expedition made up of hospital ships,” he said.
The staff paused to consider that. Shelby watched heads begin to nod as they turned to her. She slowly nodded. “Doc, get everything you've got on the virus. We'll upload our logs as well, everything up to this point. That will take a couple hours or so,” she said turning to Lieutenant Jardin.
“About that, ma'am. You want the engineering logs as well?” he asked. She nodded. “Send them everything, aye, ma’am,” he said, pulling his tablet out and typing on it to get his staff moving.
“Which ship?” Cynthia asked.
“One of the Sojourner's,” Shelby said. “Dancer has the most experienced crew,” she said right off the top of her head. Cynthia nodded.
“I'll upload everything to Dancer, ma'am,” Lieutenant Jardin said.
“Good,” Shelby rose. The others followed suit. “Even with Dancer en route it's going to take them over 30 weeks in delta to get to the Federation from here, then even longer for support to be rallied and sent our way. So, we're it. Let's see what we can do to help and keep this from spreading,” she said simply. The others nodded or signaled assent grimly.
]][#]]]{OO}===}==>
“Ma'am, about the spread,” Lieutenant Z'k'th'ss'th said after the meeting had concluded.
“Yes, Lieutenant?” Shelby asked, turning to the Naga.
“I had several thoughts just now. First, we have a general timeline now, though it is far from detailed. We know it started in this cluster at Alpha and then spread to Beta. We don't know if it is confined here or not. We don't know if it came from Rho or not. It could even be headed to Rho now,” the Naga said patiently.
Shelby winced. “Point. Good point. I'm glad you brought that up; we'll have to make that clear and pass on orders to interdict all shipping in Airea 3 and make sure they don't spread it.”
“That ship that recently went to Airea 3 comes to mind,” the Naga said.
“You are full of nasty thoughts today,” Shelby said, shaking her head as she made another note. “And we were on Airea 3. I'll have doc check everyone,” she said, passing on an order.
“I recommend we leave ships here to interdict anything attempting to go to Rho, ma'am,” the Naga stated.
Shelby pursed her lips and leaned back against the table as she considered that carefully. He was right … but she was extremely limited on ships as it was. She grimaced as she ran the scenario through her head. “I'm sorry, I can't do that,” she said quietly after a long moment.
“With all due respect, ma'am, can I ask why?”
“We have too few, and if I leave a ship here, it will be without support. It can't go to the planets for support or fuel. We don't know how long we'll be out of contact, and I don't like leaving a ship out on its own without s
upport. If a pirate comes by, they would be alone.”
“Defeat in detail. A lot about that has been discussed as of late,” the Naga replied in agreement.
“Yes. We also may need them,” Shelby said.
“Yes, ma’am.” The Naga started to slither to the door.
“Lieutenant,” Shelby said, bringing him up short. He paused and turned to her. “As commanding officer I'm not obligated to explain myself or my orders,” she said.
“I didn't mean to sound as if I was questioning your orders, ma'am. I just wished to … you are correct,” the Naga said. “My apologies, ma'am,” he said.
“Understood. Try to keep a lid on it,” she said.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“I don't mind a well-reasoned argument though. If you have information or a different perspective, by all means bring it up. But right or wrong, I'm going to do things my way.”
“Yes, ma’am,” the Naga replied.
“Dismissed,” Shelby said with a nod to the door. He nodded once and then slithered out.
]][#]]]{OO}===}==>
The crew of Dancer were not happy about being shipped off without any shore leave, but they understood the gravity of the situation. Once all of the ships in the convoy had uploaded their logs, the small antimatter powered courier craft took off for Trajin Alpha space and from there the long jump home.
“Please wait for the trade minister,” a polite secretary said over the radio.
“I'm glad you are okay,” Lieutenant Jardin said as he spoke with the local on the phone.
“What do you mean?” the woman asked, clearly confused and suspicious.
“Oh, sorry, I meant the planet, not just you personally. The population.”
“Why?”
“Well, it's just there is a plague hitting some of the other planets in the cluster,” the lieutenant said. “You are sure there is no illness there?” he asked.
“Plague? Did you say plague?” she demanded, voice rising with fear and loathing.
The lieutenant frowned and looked around the radio room. He'd taken the call there instead of on the bridge. “Yes,” he said. “It is pretty widespread. We tried to help them but they refused our offers to help …”
“I'm sorry, one moment,” the woman said. There were some sounds of shuffling and soft voices. The lieutenant bent his head and pressed his earphones to his ears before he reached out and turned a knob to turn the gain up. That just introduced too much noise into the channel so he backed it back down to where he'd set it before with a grimace.
He hated conversing through audio without a digital translation. There were too many things that could go wrong with the signal, too many ways to get it garbled.
“What is this about a plague?” a stern male voice demanded, shocking him out of his thought process.
“Excuse me? Who is this?”
“This is Minister V'k'rr. What is this about a plague? You've got poor Mona moaning and scared out of her wits!”
“I'm sorry, sir,” the lieutenant said as he sat up straight. “That wasn't my intent at all. I wanted to confirm that you didn't have it before we made planet fall.”
“Well … damn it, where …?” the Veraxin stopped. “She's left. Now you've done it. Undoubtedly she'll tell everyone in the office. That will set off a panic,” the Veraxin said.
The lieutenant swore under his breath. The ratings in the room turned to him. He waved them impatiently away and back to their duties. He inhaled and then exhaled a moment, settling himself. “I'm sorry, sir,” he transmitted. “That wasn't my intent.”
“So what was your intent?”
“I wanted to verify that your world didn't have the plague. It has infected two of the other planets in your cluster, Alpha and Beta, with terrible consequences for the population. We attempted to offer the services of our hospital ship and medics, but they refused. I was charged to see if you have the illness and if we could help if you did,” the lieutenant said patiently.
“This illness, what is it?”
“We don't know. It is hitting all species that we know of. Thousands are dying on the other planets. They have instituted quarantine on both worlds,” he said.
“Then we will do the same here,” the minister stated.
“Sir?”
“You heard me. We refuse you the right to land.”
“Sir, we aren't infected. We're here in part to help contain and destroy whatever is causing this,” the lieutenant said, almost desperate as he realized he'd put his foot in his mouth.
“I don't care. People will panic when they hear of this virus, and will panic further if they heard you landed. Panic can kill just as easily as the virus itself. You cannot land here,” the minister said and then cut the channel.
The lieutenant closed his eyes, hung his head and rubbed his temple. “Frack,” he muttered.
]][#]]]{OO}===}==>
“So, we're not welcome here either, Lieutenant?” the commodore asked, eying him. He nodded. “If this were baseball, that would be strike three,” Shelby said, looking over to the XO.
“Fortunately, it isn't. There are two other planets in this system,” Cynthia drawled from her seat in the commodore's office. “We need to get to the next one before they hear about it and then do what we can to handle the problem of panic.”
Lieutenant Jardin had been feeling miserable about his part he'd played in the drama. He'd listened to the panic spread over the radio network across the planet. There were demonstrations; some of them armed demonstrations against their landing. He looked up to her and then nodded. “Yes, ma’am,” he said. Cynthia patted him on the shoulder.
“It isn't your fault, Lieutenant; you were just the messenger. At least it was triggered before instead of after we landed. Keep up the faith. We'll get through this,” she said.
“Let's be a bit more careful about how we word things with the next planets we visit however,” Shelby said.
The lieutenant nodded miserably.
“In the meantime, we can't land but we can transmit to the local authorities what we learned from Alpha and Beta. Perhaps they can be on the lookout.”
“It might cause some hysteria, ma'am. More than what is actually going on,” the XO warned.
“Better some hypochondria than overlooking something thinking it is a common cold,” Shelby said. The XO nodded at that point. The commodore turned to the lieutenant. “Get with Doctor Taylor, have him give you the run down and then let them know.”
“Yes, ma’am. Ma'am, they don't use data systems; it is all audio. They have primitive recording methods too, most of it paper or the like. I don't know how much will get through to them and how much might be lost,” he warned.
“Just do your best,” Shelby ordered. He nodded and left. Cynthia looked at the commodore. Shelby just inhaled and then heaved a sigh and shrug. Cynthia nodded and rose out of the chair. “Well, I'll let the others know,” She said.
“Right,” Shelby drawled. “Let me handle that. You let Portia know we need to get to Delta.”
The blond woman paused in the doorway and then nodded once. “Aye aye, ma’am,” Cynthia replied quietly before she departed.
]][#]]]{OO}===}==>
Ensign Slattery shook her head as she worked her way through what they knew about the five inhabited planets of the Trajin cluster. Some of the planets like Delta and Echo were more sparsely populated than others.
She'd also been asked to look into why there was no flight or air traffic locally. It was indeed odd, the natives seemed to prefer ground or water transport almost exclusively. Of course, they didn't have the same problems of geology as the people on Protodon did, but still, none?
For the moment, all she could think of for a reason was that the natives didn't know about or disdained cruder alternatives to modern air transport. They wanted counter-grav or nothing, she thought, tapping a stylus against her chin and lips thoughtfully before she flicked it like a metronome between her fingers.
Once
the old counter-grav equipment broke down, most likely due to reaching their impedance and shutting down … hopefully not while in use, she thought, they couldn't repair them or make new ones. Did anyone know about the older methods, she wondered. She frowned thoughtfully.
Some planets had reinvented steam locomotion. She'd seen some of the images on Gamma, but was it local or propagated through interstellar trade? She shook her head. She just didn't know, she thought, making a soft puttering sound as she looked up to the top of her rack.
She filed the report, then swung her legs out and got out of her rack. She checked herself in the mirror as one of the other ensigns snored away softly. She went to the bathroom and had just finished up when the reminder she'd set beeped.
“Yup,” she murmured, shutting it off as she grabbed an energy bar and her tablet. She ate the bar quickly, then drank a cup of water to wash it down before she checked for crumbs, then walked out with her tablet under one arm.
She wasn't certain she would be called on about the aircraft question; she doubted it given the other things on everyone's mind but had what she had ready just in case. That was better than the ongoing questions about the damn plague she thought as she walked to the wardroom.
]][#]]]{OO}===}==>
Shelby called for a senior staff meeting the following morning. They needed to discuss the situation and find a better solution.
“Concern is mounting in the other ships, ma'am. I believe several of the captains would like to be in on these discussions,” Lieutenant Jardin reported.
“I know. Filling them in is an issue. We're going to have to do something about that. Find a way to bring all the captains in so they can be in on the discussion. I'm just not thrilled about having dozens of people involved in the process, each with their own opinion,” she said shaking her head.