Chapter 4 – An Audacious Proposal

March 12, 2156 – 1432 hours – Enterprise, T'Pol's office, en route to Andoria (Procyon VIII)

T'Pol was working diligently at her desk. On the large screen in front of her she had current sensor readings displayed, a cumulative analysis showing the projected Cochrane factor along Enterprise's route along with the actual measured value, and the measured value within a quarter light year of Enterprise's course. This analysis would help improve the speed of starships along the Earth-Andoria corridor, which was promising to become more heavily traveled as Earth-Andoria trade expanded and faster freighters were produced. On a PADD in her hand were notes for her latest research paper, "On Subspace Vortices and Closed Time-like Curves." She was planning to submit it to the Vulcan Science Academy and the Starfleet Journal of Astrophysics. She would not admit to herself the enjoyment she took in submitting time travel papers to the Academy, but this was her fourth. They had grudgingly published the previous three. Another PADD held her message queue, and bonged softly as new messages arrived. On the corner of her desk was a stack of PADDs with TPS reports on them.

After the initial flurry, serious mission proposals had been arriving at the rate of two to three per day. Non-serious proposals had dropped off rapidly after she had starting refusing anonymous messages. She was considering cutting off all further messages from the MACOs, though there had been one intriguing proposal from Corporal Cole. The remainder of the MACO proposals had focused on exotic destinations like "Solar surfaces at night" and "Tu mai'h shashol".

T'Pol had discussed that one with Commander Tucker after dinner. "Why would Private Palmer want us to explore my mother's territory?

"That doesn't make a lot of sense," Trip said.

"The actual message used the Vulcan words, tu mai'h shashol."

Trip punched the phrase into his PADD. "Hmmm…that literally translates to "You mother land" doesn't it? Oh. I think he meant 'Yo momma land'. Who taught the MACOs how to use a dictionary?"

"Please explain 'yo momma land.'" The meal went downhill from there.

At this point, T'Pol had narrowed the final candidates down to five. A long term study of the after effects of the Spheres on the Expanse, a search for the builders of the automated repair station they had encountered, a survey to circumnavigate and determine the true outline of Klingon space and evaluate their military potential (Corporal Cole's suggestion, and while not scientific in nature, it was a mission that only an NX class vessel could handle), a charting of neutronic storms across Coalition space, and a mission to find the Bajoran system, which was rumored to have a wormhole to a distant part of the galaxy.

There was a knock on her doorframe. Ensign Jane Spector, an exo-biologist, poked her head into T'Pol's office.

"Hi, Commander. Do you have a minute?"

Ensign Spector had just joined the crew when they left for Andoria. T'Pol found her work so far to be quite acceptable. The ensign was delighted to work with non-Humans on a daily basis and spent a large amount of time with Dr. Phlox learning about his experiences with various species. She was planning to do field research on Andoria while the Enterprise waited for the politicians to complete their junket.

T'Pol looked up and answered, "Please, come in."

"It's about the mission proposals. I have an idea, but it's a little far out there, so I wanted to bring it by in person."

T'Pol put the PADD on the desk. "I am interested to hear it. As Commander Tucker might say, 'I am all ears.'" This earned her a quizzical look from the ensign, who then shook her head as though dismissing an odd thought.

She started hesitantly, obviously nervous, "Well, here's my idea. I reviewed Enterprise's reports while I was finishing my post-doc. Before the Xindi mission Enterprise was supposed to be doing exploration, and a lot of interesting discoveries were made, but it seemed to be a bit of a muddle. A little time in one place, back to Earth, off to somewhere else, and so forth. A first contact here, some astrophysics there, you get my drift?"

T'Pol nodded. "I believe so. Enterprise's original missions were planned in an ad hoc fashion. Starfleet's planners were not expecting to meet as many star faring species as were encountered. The results were something of a 'monkey's breakfast', as Lieutenant Reed observed at the time."

Jane got a gleam in her eye and continued more enthusiastically. "We're basically a mobile science lab, and we can take on multiple tasks at once. What we need, though, is an overarching structure for what we're doing. Now, in field biology we sometimes do what's called a "transect", where you go in a straight line and take samples and records as you go. It gives you a statistical profile of whatever you're sampling – in biology it's usually things like the species present, or the density of a particular species. You don't stop to dig into things, you just record and go. It lets you get a feel for the big picture before you start getting caught in the details. Usually a transect is small scale - you walk across a meadow or a forest - but back at the end of the twentieth century a man named Michael Fay walked across Africa on what he called a mega-transect, so I'm thinking we would do something similar."

"I am familiar with the concept. So, you are proposing that we make a transect of Coalition space?"

Jane took a deep breath. "We would start in Coalition space, but I think we should go straight out from Earth, two and a half years at warp five, surveying and sampling and then come back. A five-year mission. At the mid-point of our mission we'd be over 300 light years away from Earth, a true voyage of discovery."

T'Pol looked thoughtful. "Your proposal is indeed audacious, and I believe it has the potential to be scientifically significant as well. Furthermore, no species that we have been in contact with has made an expedition that far from the home worlds. I will add it to the list. Thank you for your suggestion, Ensign."

Ensign Spector left. T'Pol picked up the PADD with the suggestion list on it. She found the latest suggestion to be very logical, and knew it would appeal to the captain as well for its adventurousness. She bumped the search for Bajor off the top five and put "Giga-transect" in the number one position.