Three days of empty space, alone with himself and a bunch of old movies had turned Jonas brain into mash, or at least it felt that way. Life as a starfleet ensign was not always fun or interesting, he knew that when he signed in. Still, this was the most boring assignment possible to imagine. He had gotten unlucky, it was as simple as that. Right now he was lying in bed, stretching out after breakfast and shower. It had been little sleep the night before, the movie he had turned on was longer than he had expected. Never the less it was important to maintain the daily rhythm, and besides Nibulus 7 was not so many hours away.

This area of the neutral zone was uncharted territory for the federation, and with no map to follow he had to make course adjustments every now and then. Light was affected by gravity, and the light from Nibulus was bent by many other stars before it reached his eyes. For this reason one could not only aim in at a distant star and fly in a straight line towards it, expecting to drop out of warp at the right place. Adjustments had to be made, and sometimes unexpected bodies of mass might appear. Such unexpected bodies could be dark stars, small black holes, loose planets, asteroid-fields, or clouds of frozen gas - those were all Jonas could think of, anyway. Still, it was not enough work to make the days pass. So far in the journey Jonas had spent only about five percent of his waking hours in front of the console. The rest was boredom, food, movies, studies, a few push-ups and sit-ups whenever he got restless.

At full warp the ship was moving a hundred times faster than the speed of light. This was way too much to travel safely within the heliosphere of a star, so Jonas decelerated down to warp 4 when he was half a light-year away, dropping further down to warp 3 as he passed the heliopause. The console beeped when the first planet came within reach of the sensors. It was small, rocky and covered in frozen gas. Jonas compared its position with the expected position of the planet they had looked at from the outpost, getting a perfect match. This meant that he had arrived at his destination spot-on, which was very good indeed. It was only fifty million kilometers away when. Jonas turned of the warp-drive and instructed the computer to enter into low orbit around it. The console accepted his order with a short enthusiastic beep. Donatello was turned 180 degrees around so that the impulse-engines faced the sun that he had used as his point of navigational reference up to now. A long burst stopped the vessel in it's fall inwards, matching it's speed with that of the star. Then the computer turned Donatello 90 degrees clockwise and gave another burst, this time a bit shorter. A series of very short bursts followed, most of them made by the guidance-rockets built into the corners of the hull.

Donatello had gone from half the speed of light down to full stop, and then accelerated back up to one quarter light speed in another direction, all taking place within the time-frame of half a minute. Had it not been for technological innovations such as the inertial dampeners and the structural integrity field, Donatello would have been torn apart by the massive push of the impulse engine. Jonas would have been nothing more than a red stain scattered across a piece of deformed debris drifting through space. Twenty third century technology was impressive, much more impressive then what earlier generations had thought possible. The Human race had made several huge leaps forward since the destructive wars of the twentieth and twenty-first century. The rapid advancement caused concern among other space-faring species and superpowers in the galaxy, but so far Human technology was not in any way superseding that of it's competitors.

Nibulus 7 appeared at the screen. First as a little dot, then as a tennis ball, and then as a football. The size increased so rapidly that Jonas was gripped by a instinctive fear of diving head-first into the frozen surface. His jaw tightened and he suppressed a sudden urge to put his arm up in a protective position in front of his head - as if it was a approaching snowball that he could block with his forearm. The F-class shuttles seemed incapable of making gradual decelerations while in space. Their computers were wired so that they moved in jumps and leaps instead, a erratic behavior that seemed scary to pilots and passengers alike - at least during when landing. Jonas should be used to this after hundreds of test-drives and exercises at the academy, but neither simulations nor exercises in real shuttles had cured him completely from his fear of rapidly approaching celestial bodies. When the computer finally decided to do something, the planet was already filling the whole screen with its massive, dark and ominous presence. Jonas had his finger on the button that restored manual control and his heart was pounding against his chest. It was only about ten thousand kilometers from the surface when Donatello made a sudden 180-degree rotation, turning it's butt towards the frozen surface below. The distance was rapidly declining, so Jonas was relieved when he heard the sound of the impulse-engines firing again. The burst ended when Donatello's speed matched that of the planet, maintaining a stable position a few hundred kilometers above the surface. Upon observing that the planet had stopped moving, Jonas sighed in relief. When he leaned back in his chair he had complete faith in the computer's ability to finish the job without his involvement. First it leveled out Donatello so that the floor was aligned with the planet surface, then a gentle push accelerated it into geostationary orbit around the equatorial region of the planet.

What waited below was a frozen sea of nitrogen mixed with smaller amounts of carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide. Mountains and piles or rock were scattered around the inhospitable and unforgiving surface like islands sticking out of the sea. Below it lay a compact layer of stone that covered the occasional veins of useful minerals. The spectroscopic analysis taken from Outpost 32 had found several large ones containing iron, and Jonas was going for the one closest to the surface. Nibulus 7 had no atmosphere, but the ground itself had a temperature of minus 260 Celsius, that was only thirteen Celsius away from absolute zero - the point were the electrons stopped rotating around their nucleus. Intimate contact between the ground and Donatello for more then a few minutes would be foolish because the coldness of the ground would spread through the hull, making it crispy while perhaps also gluing it to the surface.

Jonas sent Donatello into a rapidly declining orbit that ended a few meters above the ground. He pressed the button that started the countdown, and then he opened the shuttle-door. It was supplied with a force field similar to that of the shuttlebay, hindering the atmosphere from escaping through the open door. The spacesuit was on, and he had already pushed out the box with the mining-gear. The next step was to walk through the field himself, allowing gravity to pull him down to the surface. The four meter drop went slowly in 0,3 Gs, more then enough time to loose balance and turn upside-down. Touchdown was gentle despite landing on his hands, a bit cold though. His boots were thick and had efficient heat-elements installed. The gloves on the other hand, were much thinner, and the grid of fine heating-threads weaved into its fabric could not compensate for such a immediate temperature drop. The result was increasingly painful, comparable to the sensation one would get by clutching your hand around a metal pole with your bare hands at a cold winters day. Jonas pushed himself back up, retracted his legs so that his knees met his belly, and flipped around. The plan was to end up on his legs this time, but it didn't work. The momentum got too big to stop, and he was well into his second rotation when he hit the ground head-first. The acrobatic stunt ended with him lying flat down against the ground, studying the texture of frozen gas at close range. It was pretty white, with a vague hint of pink in it. The hard substance immediately started to send cold vibrations through his suit, so he got back up as fast as possible. The intimate contact with the hostile ground had been brief, but long enough to make him feel as cold as a chunk of ice. Never the less he remained happy and exited about having a chance to visit such a unspoiled world - way too many starfleet employees went through their careers without ever exploring new, unchartered planets and regions of space.

The energy-cell started humming, working hard to push electricity into the heating-elements between his feet and the ground, as well as the thread-grid in the suit and gloves. Jonas was thawing fast, it would only take a few minutes to loosen up again, regaining normal temperature within his suit and body. He rubbed his hands together while taking a superficial glance at the flat, monotone surface that surrounded him, trying hard to suppress the pain. Then he spotted the box with the mining equipment. It had landed a few meters away, upside-down so that its heating-element was facing space rather then the cold ground from which it was supposed to protect its cargo. In gravity such as this, normal gait was not possible. At the academy back on Earth, they had taken several trips to the moon where they had learned to "moon-walk" - a method of traversing low gravity terrain by moving in gentle jumps rather then steps. The technique worked as well at Nibulus 7 as it had done one the moon, bringing him up to the box without further incidents.

He flipped it over so that the side with the heating-element faced the ground, and then he opened the top lid. He wanted to work fast, extracting the metal and get back up as soon as possible. The iron vein was right under his feet, so all he had to do was to melt his way down with the phaser-drill. This versatile piece of technology could be set to spread its beam rather than focusing it on a single spot, evaporating ice over a larger area. He quickly assembled the tripod frame and attached the drill to it's ball-head. When he had typed in the right setting he tilted it downwards so that the beam would hit the ground in front of him. A final sweep with the tricorder reassured him that the metal vein was waiting below him, and then he pushed the button that activated the beam. A funnel-like beam of yellow light spread out from the short barrel, causing a instant reaction with the ground. The ice quickly evaporated, skipping its liquid form and going straight from ice to gas. Both the nitrogen and carbon gases were colorless, it could only be seen as a visual disturbance, a slight blur that propelled itself towards the sharp night-sky. In a few hours it would turn into snow and fall down again, unless it escaped the gravitational pull completely, that was. Jonas was not sure if a planet with such modest mass and gravity could hold on to gases as light as these when freed from the layer of ice that kept them down.

The hole increased in size and depth as he watched the beam at work. It took only a few minutes to uncover the stone below. In temperatures as low as this it would be crispy, and therefore easy to break apart with the disruptor-gun. He took the heavy and thick barrel out from the box and aimed towards the big cylinder-shaped hole that he had created.

"Bazum!"

The crude tool actually recoiled, just like a projectile weapon would do. This was quite unusual for a twenty-third century weapon, and Jonas was not prepared for it. The gun jumped up in his face so that the hind-end collided against the glass of his helmet. It was a hard blow, but the translucent aluminum of his visor got no visual scratch or bump - twenty-third century spacesuits were made for rough use. He tightened his grip around the handle before he fired another bolt. Same sound, same effect - only difference being that he managed to control the recoil this time. The stone was breaking into large chunks that could be removed either manually or by using the tractor-beam emitter. Jonas opted for the latter, as it was safer. He did not want the low surface-temperature to get another chance to spread to his suit, and neither did he want to risk having it torn or scratched by the sharp edges of the hole. At this stage he had no more use for the phaser drill, so he removed it from the tripod and put it back in the box, replacing it with the tractor-beam. The disruptor-gun was much smaller, so it fit nicely into the holster were he usually kept the tricorder.

Jonas shifted between the tractor-beam and the disruptor-gun, removing the layers of loose stone as he created them. He gathered them all in a pile at the left side of the hole, a pile that got bigger as the hole deepened. The tractor-beam could be widened out just like the phaser-drill, so with the funnel at maximum width he could keep a lot of stones floating at the same time.

It was great fun to fire the disruptor-gun, not only due to the powerful recoil, but also the slow moving bolts. Their short ride from barrel to target could actually be seen with the naked eye, even though it only took half a second or so. The bolts consisted of a forcefield that enveloped some sort of exotic and volatile energy-cluster. Upon colliding with the stone, the force-field ruptured, unleashing its content in a flash of light. Some species such as the Klingons and the Romulans used disruptors as military weapons, but those were faster and more powerful than the ones used by Humans. Unfortunately, the federation had still not managed to develop disruptors that were of any military value. The stony ground that he fired against was almost pitch black, but lines of red and dark-brown ran through it. Absence of oxygen meant absence of oxidization, so the iron layer below was silver-gray, untouched and uncorrupted by the elements. - Top quality in other words. Once the vein was uncovered, Jonas walked up to the edge of the hole and studied it closer, happy with his work so far.

Now was the time to get started with the actual extraction. He went back to the box to fetch the particle-teleporter that would split the iron into microscopic lumps and teleport the pellets into the cargo bay of his ship. The teleporter had roughly the same bazooka-like shape as the disruptor-gun, main difference being that the touch-sensitive folded outwards when he turned it on. He had gone through the menu a couple of times on his way over, so he knew exactly were to push in order to get a positive lock on Donatello's storage-room. It was a wonderful peace of machinery that carved through the iron as if it was made of molten butter. The mass of gray disappeared instantly when he swept the teleporter over it, reappearing as fine powder up in Donatello who orbited a few hundred kilometers over his head. Ton after ton went in, making the gray hole deeper and steeper.

With the first floor of Donatello filled to the brink with iron pellets, it was time to call it back down and climb in. Upon receiving his message it dived down from orbit and positioned itself a few meters above the flimsy ground that steamed away when exposed to the heat of its belly-thrusters. Jonas used his communicator to make the computer open the door above the inverted storage-bay entrance that now was blocked by iron ore. The equipment box was too large and heavy to take with him in the leap, so he used the tractor-beam to push it up and in. When it was safely parked on the floor of the well-lit room, he himself followed. He shoved his legs as hard as he could against the ground, a action that sent him flying through the flimsy haze of gas that surrounded the shuttle. He was coming in fast and hard, but the soft membrane of the forcefield slowed him down to a perfect landing.

"Job well done" He thought as the door closed behind him.

It was not until he removed his gloves - exposing his bare hands - that he noticed how the exterior bulk of his suit radiated intense coldness. The grid of heating-threads were only woven into the inner suit, the hard, protective shells that went across the chest, thighs, belly and lower legs were exposed to the elements without receiving artificial heating. These plates were now gathering moist from the room, rapidly turning it into a layer of frost around them while simultaneously causing room-temperature to drop dramatically. Jonas watched as it happened, considering what to do. He could put them in the freezer in order to block them out of the interior climate, but that place was supposed to hold a temperature of minus twenty, not minus a hundred and twenty. Exaggerated coldness might damage the various liquids used by the food synthesizer, and... Well, the interior ovens would just have to work hard to compensate. He took the space-gloves back on and pushed the rest of the suit over to the oven in the corner. Then he got down on all four and started puffing so that air cooled down by the suit-plates blew over the sensor beside the oven. Upon detecting the problem it set of a alarm at the pilots console while simultaneously diverting maximum yield to the ovens. Jonas walked over to the console to turn of the alarm. Everything was under control, so it happened in a relaxed manner, without stress or drama.

While at it he discovered that the service-minded computer had not only taken him back into orbit on its own, it also had stored a automatic scanner-report that it believed he might find interesting. If one was willing to overlook their scary dive-and-sudden-break maneuvers into orbit, the F-class computers shared a very friendly and considerate personality. What it wanted to show him was that something had exploded a few light-hours inwards in the system. All the planets were still there, so it had to have been something small. The blast-area was very concentrated, only a few meters big to begin with, expanding to a diameter of no more than a few kilometers before it dissolved completely. The computer calculated the explosion to have produced 1,3 megatons of energy, about the same as the nuclear warhead dropped on Hiroshima during the second world war. Exploring the report took Jonas mind away from the coldness of the cabin. The life-support system seemed vulnerable to sources of temperature-fluctuations originating from the interior rather than the exterior of the ship, a design-weakness that he had not been made aware of during his training-sessions at the academy. When it became impossible to ignore he went over to his bag and fetched a warm sweater in order to get a extra layer of insulation outside the light-brown pullover that was his everyday uniform. Those garments worked well in the temperated interior of starships, but whenever the temperature dropped below normal, it was good to keep something extra around.

The available data was not enough to determine what it was that had caused the explosion. The boring alternative was that two asteroids had collided at great speed, the exiting one was that it was related to one or more starships - either battle or accident. According to the logs there were no other ships in the area except the Enterprise, and that one was investigating a asteroid-field several light-years away, at the other side of the Nibulus star. Jonas started with the boring alternative, and he got a positive result when he scanned for dust and gravel in the area. It was a lot of it, it was hot, and it was moving away from the blast-zone. This finding supported his colliding-asteroids theory, but it was not enough to form a conclusion. The next step was to search for trails of a impulse-engine. Since it had happened far away from the planets it was improbable that any starships would be accelerating or decelerating within the area of question. For this reason Jonas expected a negative result, and the computer used only a few seconds to confirm his hunch. The Final test was for subspace distortions, a waste-product made by warp engines.

After some seconds of work, the computer came up with a result of sorts: Uncertainty. Knowing that it was unacceptable it requested permission to do another scan, this time more thorough and with increased sensibility. Jonas drew his breath in excitement before granting the wish. The computer would never have asked for this this unless it thought it might be on to something. A faint distortion meant very low warp, perhaps a primitive design made by a species that were taking their first steps into space. First-contact was the wet dream of any starfleet employee, and such adventures often started with faint warp-trails. In fact is was forbidden to establish open relations with civilizations that had not evolved warp-technology. They were considered immature, not ready for the huge dilemmas, dangers and opportunities that came with intergalactic relations. Jonas waiting eagerly for the result. Every square kilometer of the target area was bombarded with sub-space waves, waves that would bend and twist if they went through a distortion, sending a fraction of its energy back to the transmitter in the process. Scannings as exhaustive as this one had become was enough to drain considerable amounts of electricity, so Jonas was relieved when the scan finally ended. A text-message appeared on the screen, telling him to stand by while the computer prepared a visual presentation of its findings.

More seconds passed in passive excitement, watching and waiting as the computer worked. And then... Bingo! He had hit gold. A small vessel had recently plowed its way through this part of space, creating a tiny tunnel of expanded space in its wake. Such gaps could use as much as a full standard-day to close completely, and with the correct equipment they could be discovered no matter how small. The distortion followed a straight line, and it got stronger as it moved away from the sun, meaning that the craft was traveling outwards. Jonas was eager to find out were they were heading, so he extracted the angle of the warp-tunnel and turned it into a line that he pasted on to his star-chart. Without the exact speed of the vessel it was difficult to know its origins, but by looking at the line in correlation with the planets and its orbits one could see that it would pass pretty close to planet number four and that it was on a almost direct collision course with planet number six further out. Jonas smiled broadly as he zoomed in on the area with the exploded asteroid, the place were the trail had been detected. If the craft was as slow as he thought it would be, then it would still be present within the next grid of space. He started a new scan, this time looking for physical objects. Again he struck gold. Unfortunately it was too far away to get a proper visual through the second-hand hull-cameras he was equipped with, so a small warp-jump was needed in order to satisfy his curiosity.

Eager to get going, Jonas typed in a set of coordinates that would bring him into range. Then he broke out of orbit and accelerated up to quarter impulse. Acceleration was much slower with so many tons of iron ore below his feet, it took almost five minutes before the craft had achieved the requested velocity. The frozen surface of Nibulus 7 shrunk into nothingness behind him, and then he turned on the warp drive. The computer had worked the numbers even before he got started, so he knew that the jump would last about fifteen minutes, taking him a few billion kilometers inwards in the system. The plan was to enter orbit around the gas-giant that was midway between the seventh planet and the sun. Jonas found it unlikely that such a slow ship had the sensor-technology needed to detect him through the vast millions of kilometers that still would separate them, but caution was always wise, and the radiation emitted by the gas-giant would make him difficult to spot even by federation-level scanners. While he had been working the console, the interior life-support system and its ovens had won the battle against the cold spacesuit. Ordinary room-temperature had been restored, making it too hot for the thick sweater. Jonas took it of and threw it into a corner, then he rose from the chair in order to take a peak through the narrow front window above the console.

The gas giant appeared as a small dot of light-yellow at first, barely distinguishable from some of the less brilliant stars. As it grew larger - something that happened quite fast - the surface split into lines of yellow and white. Streams of orange appeared within the yellow lines, shades of gray within the white ones. When it got as big as a tennis-ball one could see the dark storm-center that ravaged its broad equatorial belt. It seemed to suck gray and brightly red mass out from it's deeper layers, spreading it out on the surface like water through a rotating sprinkler. It's slow growth on the screen indicated that this was a huge planet. The computer made its first analysis, guessing that its size was approximately twice as large as Jupiter's, but with less density and therefore similar gravitational pull. By the time Jonas sat down at the pilots-seat again, it already had two-page report ready for him. Jonas scrolled down to the conclusion, where it said that mass, shape, temperature and the rest was stable and that radiation-levels were within the limits that could be blocked by the hull - even at low orbit.

The universe was filled with gas-giants. Since it was the most common type of celestial bodies - and also the second easiest ones to spot after stars - they were considered quite boring. This did not mean however, that there were no life to be found here. Indeed, many gas giants hosted lifeforms that looked like jellyfish or balloons, creatures that floated around in the hospitable layer of gas that could usually be found between the exposed stratosphere on top, and the pressurized layers of fluids below. Unfortunately the surface temperature within the rightly pressurized gas-layer of this specimen was less than optimal, minus 50 Celsius and below. In addition, its rapid rotating created constant storms that turned the climate even harsher. Life however, could be surprisingly stubborn, so a theoretical possibility still existed.

As soon as the right sensor-systems came within range, Jonas closed the initial report and ordered the computer to perform a bio-scann. It turned out that the planet had a impressive density of bacteria within the equatorial belt and the two yellow lines below and above. Pretty monotone though, only a dozen different types. Such discoveries were pretty usual in starfleet, hardly worth raising an eyebrow over. Protocol never the less obligated him to put it in the records, and send it to the nearest research-facility. That would be the outpost he had arrived from, so he should transfer the data during his next chat with Ioannis... Or maybe not. He had no official business this deep into the system, not without Ioannis permission. Should he dare to publish his findings here, it might even have a negative effect on his career.

The superficial data recorder on the bacterias were stored in the computer-bank for the time being, and then it was time for Jonas to turn his attention towards what hopefully would prove to be more interesting lifeforms to explore. To begin with Jonas had found the solitude of individual space-exploration a bit lonely and boring, but now that his primary goal had been achieved and he was heading inwards in a star-system filled with celestial bodies and at least one intelligent life-form, it had in fact become quite fulfilling.

Low orbit had been achieved, and now it was finally time to take a closer look at the craft with the warp-drive. The camera zoomed in on it, establishing proper focus and image after a few seconds of fumbling. "Shape unknown" the computer informed in red, blinking letters - more and more exiting. Since the silhouette of the ship did not match any of the shapes registered in the computer-bank, the chances of a first-contact situation increased drastically. The slim shape looked very similar to some of the first big ships used for manned missions within the solar system of Earth during the second half of the twenty-first century. Its front part was big and boxy. A long and thin row of modules followed behind it, connecting it to the huge ball-shaped engine at far back.

Jonas started a combined technical and biological scan that deprived the unknown vessel and its inhabitants of its secrets in a matter of seconds. Crew of twelve, six at the big box in front, six in the foremost module behind it. The propulsion system was quite primitive, the computer guessed at pressure-based fission created by a artificial energy shield. Its main weapon was of exotic in its crude simplicity, the ship lacked gravity-plating, and? Huh? Jonas did not understand it... No warp-drive? Other essential things were missing as well, making this ship quite a mystery. Jonas followed it's slow progress for a few minutes before he felt ready to call Ioannis back home. A sub-space link was established, causing the workstation back at Ioannis office to start beeping. Outpost 32 was many light-years away, but at the star-chart it was quite close compared to key-planets such as Vulcan and Earth. Direct communication was still possible, even though there would be a slight lag in their dialog.

While waiting for the Ioannis to accept his call, Jonas decided to be completely honest about his detour. If he was lucky his boss would get so exited about the discovery that he would forget all about protocol, and besides: Scientists had a healthy tendency to ignore it whenever it suited them. Jonas didn't get a visual on him, instead the call was transferred from his workstation to his communicator. Those elegant little things could transmit image as well, but only if you linked it up to a headset and put it on a stable surface with the camera facing your general direction. At the sound of it, Ioannis was walking through one of the corridors of the station, Jonas could hear his shoes pound against the metal floor as well as the gentle hum emitted by the atmospheric recyclers that were scattered around the ship.

"Wow, that it excellent news!" Ioannis said after Jonas had told him about the detour and his discovery.

Jonas sighed in relief, happy because his boss was happy.

"Agreed. Listen, I would like to get back home with the iron you requested, but it would also be fun to follow these guys around. Any suggestions?"

A slight pause followed before the message reached Ioannis at the other end, and then a new one followed while his response traveled the other way around.

"I didn't give you a subspace beacon before your left, did I?" Ioannis wondered.

"Not that I am aware of"

"You might have one never the less, according to safety-regulations, a small one is supposed to be attached to the belly of the ship. If you can put it on theirs instead we can keep track and return later"

"Roger that, Jonas out"

Jonas searched the inventory and found the beacon right where Ioannis said it would be. This finding committed him to proceed with Ioannis plan, but he was uncertain on how to do it. The alien vessel had a radar, and the F-class shuttles were not in any way stealthed. - or did they? Upon closer scrutiny it seemed a bit twisted... As if someone had taken a shot at it with a phaser. Jonas was tired of doing scans, so he chose not to follow up on this observation, and instead assume that their radar worked, and that he would flash up as a Christmas-candle on their screens if he came to close. Such a scenario might lead to the next one - that they would take a shoot at him with that nuclear cannon of theirs. His defensive hull-shield would undoubtedly be able to handle a few hits without collapsing, but it would never the less be bad. This was dirty space, and the aliens might need their ammunition to carve a path through the dense fields of asteroids and gravel that waited further out, rather than wasting it on him. Not to mention all the stress and anxiety he would cause. If he could attach the beacon to a missile and shoot it in that might work, but it was crucial that he could make it stick without hurting the hull-plating - not that he had any missiles in store. Aaaaargh! Jonas hated that kind of problems. The tests at the academy had been filled with them, and now he was out here, doing the exact same kind of dry, theoretical puzzle-solving as he had been forced to do in class.

Jonas had spent about an hour in close orbit around the gas giant before he came up with a idea that might work. It was so simple and straight forward that he was kind of embarrassed about not having thought it up right away. He would bring his shuttle into pursuit behind the alien vessel, far enough away to stay clear of their radar. At first he would match their speed, but before releasing the beacon he would give himself a gentle push with the hind-thrusters. When the beacon was released it would continue straight ahead, colliding and sticking with the vessel after one hour and thirty-five minutes of flight. While he had been eating lunch, the computer had worked out the details, polishing the plan and its numbers. The food-synthesizer was good with tomato-soup. It tasted just like the freeze-dried variety one mixed with hot water back home. He had to wonder though, if this observation was to be interpreted as a compliment to the synthesizer, or a insult against the freeze-dried powder variety. Or maybe the other way around? Neither varieties were original tomato-soup made from natural ingredients, so... Damn! His head started hurting again. Moving over to something completely different, he had left the empty bowl and glass was at the table, a direct violation against at least five starfleet protocol-rules. "Avoid loose objects in shuttles" "Always clean up after your self", something about recycling organic materials, not to postpone that which could be done immediately, and... Hmm, he failed to remember the two last ones. - Bottom line was that starfleet regulations were as strict and unforgiving as space itself.

Jonas would much rather start working with the computer again, but by the time he got over to the pilots chair he had already developed bad conscience about the leftovers at the table. His desire to be dutiful was so strong that it left him no choice but to go back and put it into the washing-machine beside the food-synthesizer. After the boiling water had flushed them clean, a filter gathered all the organic material and sent it over to another machine that separated it into the same basic build-blocks that the food-synthesizer used to make new food. A lot of things in starships went in a circle of eternal recycling that minimized the necessity for new supplies. Without such solutions it would be impossible for big ships like the Enterprise to go for years without returning the core-worlds of federation space for fresh supplies. Many years of space exploration had lead to a perfection of recycling-technology, a technology that had been gradually introduced to civilian life at the surface as well. - It was in fact, the wet dream of the environmentalist extremists of the twentieth and twenty-first century.

With the dirty cutlery in its right place, he could finally get back to work. Jonas sat down before the console in order to look through the plan that the computer had hatched out for him. It looked pretty good, he had no second thoughts about pushing the button that turned the dry, two-dimensional lines, symbols and numbers on his screen into real-world action. Donatello lifted gradually out of orbit while continuing his spin around the planet for a few more rotations. Back out in proper space it floated inwards into the system at quarter impulse, engines off. The alien vessel was currently midway between the gas-giant, and a medium-sized rocky planet further in. Everything was taken care of, so Jonas used the idle time to make a rudimentary scan of the planet ahead. It was pretty cold, but it's moderate pressure and a breathable atmosphere never the less caused the computer to categorize it as a M-class planet. It would surprise Jonas if it turned out this place didn't host advanced lifeforms, it might even be the homeworld of the aliens with the primitive warp-drive. He felt a strong desire to learn more, but unfortunately he was still too far away to scan for biological life when Donatello suddenly turned around and made a full stop.

The alien vessel was passing him a few hundred thousand kilometers to the right, so a series of gentle maneuvers were implemented in order to match speed and direction with the target. A final push from the hind-thrusters brought it up to a speed slightly above the target it was pursuing. The beacon was released, Donatello pushed out and away shortly thereafter. The aliens continued steadily on it's course, unaware of the beacon that was creeping up on it from behind. These solid little boxes were not big enough to be detected by their crude radar, but chances were that they would hear the sound it made as it stuck to the hull. Sub-space beacons were normally used in emergency situations, ships in distress activated them so that other spacecrafts in the region could come looking for them. Speaking of which... Since Enterprise was nearby he would have to call them and tell about his work here, making sure that they did not interfere with his research-object. Jonas went back to full stop and opened a channel to the Enterprise bridge. From his current position he was actually closer to this ship than he was to his new home at Outpost 32. Enterprise was just a few hours away at full warp, exploring a asteroid-field between Nibulus and it's closest star - if he remembered correctly.

"Good afternoon, how can I help you?" Captain Kirk said.

He seemed as comfortable and confident as he had been during their last meeting. His captain's chair suited him, and when surrounded by hard-working officers - the elite of starfleet - it strengthened the already authoritarian aura of the bridge. It never ceased to amaze Jonas how much button-pushing and screen-gazing it took to run a starship. Computers took care of a lot, but the need for a human element seemed to remain constant no matter how complex they got. Kirk's officers where all completely mesmerized by their consoles and whatever it was that was going on their screens. The only ones who were paying attention to Jonas were Kirk himself, and his communication officer, a slender black woman. Other than Kirk, he only knew one of the people on the bridge by name - Spock. The cold and logical Vulcan was sitting at his right side, facing the console built into the curved wall. His eyes were fixed at a unstable graph that jumped and dived as it ran across his screen. From what he could make out of the console, Jonas figured that it was some kind of violently fluctuating space-radiation.

"In a few hours you will receive sub-space emergency-signal" Jonas said, going straight to the point. Since everyone seemed so busy he figured it would be best not to take up their precious time with small-talk.

"Any trouble ahead?" Kirk wondered. He straightened up in his chair, preparing himself for bad news.

"Not at all, that's why I'm calling. I'm doing some research for Outpost 32, but I ran out of standard-probes"

Jonas explained. To say that he had brought none at all would just make him look sloppy, and he wasn't in the mood to explain the hole story about the mining-operation that had been his original assignment .

"Marking wild beasts sir?" Kirk said smiling.

"Kind of. Found a primitive vessels heading outwards in the Nibulus system, my boss wants me to keep an eye on it"

At this point in the dialog, Spock turned towards the main-screen that Jonas was currently filling.

"Permission to speak sir?" He asked Kirk.

"Please do" Kirk answered in a friendly manner, keeping his eyes fixed on Jonas.

"Sub-space emergency beacons can be set to use all non-emergency channels. It shouldn't be to difficult to reconfigure"

"I'll look into it" Jonas promised.

"Do that, let us know if it doesn't work out, Kirk out"

"Will do"

Jonas turned of his camera again. Spock had given him a second task to fulfill, but while doing so he would also have to keep an eye on the subspace-beacon currently drifting through space, as well as the target it was heading for. Should the alien vessel suddenly change direction he would have to sneak in and pick it again. This was a lot for one person to handle, so it was important to remain calm and focused. Right now that beacon was about to enter into the range of the alien radar. Hopefully it would pass through undetected, but if not... Bang! - Mission failed. Jonas zoomed in on their nuclear cannon and opened it as a fifth image on the screen. It remained still, pointing in some random direction up and rightwards. This was most probably the weapon that had set of the explosion that had lead him to them, a test-fire that had blown up an asteroid nearby.

Minutes passed without any sign of movement. The cannon remained in the same position, and the ship itself made not attempt at a evasive maneuver. Everything seemed to be going according to plan, a brief smile passed over his lips. Then he got started on the job Spock had given him - to reconfiguring the beacon so that it transmitted on a non-emergency frequented. The menu was pretty straight forward, it didn't take a lot of work to prove that Spock was right about the transmitter and its flexibility. Jonas uttered a depressed sigh while choosing a idle frequency. He would have liked it much, much better if Spock was wrong - people as smart as him were just annoying.

Jonas turned on the beacon and put it up on the speaker. "Beep-beep-beep" - A nice artificial sound that would get weaker the further he moved away from it. So far so good, now it was only one step left in the process of "marking the wild beast" as Kirk had put it. Jonas rewired the console so that he could use it to manually maneuver the beacon rather than the shuttle itself. In order to avoid damage to their hull he would have to turn it a 180 degrees around and empty its hind-thrusters. The difference in speed between the two objects were minimal in space-terms, but he had to keep in mind that this was a primitive vessel. If they used a weak and basic alloy such as steel or aluminum it might break through even on very low impact-velocity. All starfleet shuttles and ships used duranium as their main hull-material, but this was a artificial material that had not been evolved on Earth before the early twenty-second century. Jonas didn't bother to dig up his earlier scan of the ship to get more intell on their hull, he would see to it that his beacon landed so soft and gently that it would not make a mark, not even if it was made out of butter.

Jonas turned it around and started the deceleration about fifty kilometers away from impact. The numbers of horsepowers carried inside its rocket engine was quite humble, making deceleration sluggish. When the tank had emptied, the beacon had reduced its speed so that it was only sixty kilometers an hour faster than that of the alien vessel, crawling slowly towards it. His safety-margin had been big, so there was still a lot of space between them. Things were getting boring, Jonas felt that his eyelids grew heavy and that he was getting sleepy. The consoles seemed monotone and uninteresting, and his soul screamed for coffee.

It felt like he had been sitting in the pilot's chair for a eternity, and he was completely fed up with the console, the computer and everything about them. The final seconds before landing-and-attachment became downright torture, so when it was finally done with, he rose abruptly from the pilot's chair, almost throwing himself over to the food-synthesizer.

Break at last.