Chapter 10

USS Stargazer 2343

"The cloud is of unknown origin and composition." Captain Gabriela Sarna gestured toward the view screen from her seat at the head of the conference table. "But Command believes the cloud...or fog for lack of a better word, is the same substance our training team encountered on Namib One. Just days ago, this cloud killed the entire colony of 200 on Gallo, which is only a few parsecs away from where our people saw a similar entity on the Namib moon. All of you will comprise a second away team to the Namib moon in an attempt to prevent further deaths. The three officers we are scheduled to pick up at Vulcan will also accompany you. I may join you as well, but that is a decision I'll make later."

Picard glanced at Zev, who tipped her left antenna at him from down the table. Hanson sat directly across from him, and Lieutenant Marx, from the Namib away team, as well as the ship's chief doctor, Amelia Gavin.

Hanson cleared his throat. "As the captain noted, the ultimate goal is to prevent this being from causing further violence. While we intend to discover its intent, we also need to be prepared to destroy it." I want everyone working together on this. Marx, Zev, you'll be working with me to find a way to neutralize the entity if communication fails." He clasped his hands in front of him, turning to Picard. "Picard, you'll begin working with Lieutenant Eneko immediately-"

Jean-Luc leaned forward. This was the first he had heard that Amanda Eneko was out of quarantine, let alone well enough to work on a project. "Has Lieutenant Eneko been cleared for duty, sir?"

Commander Hanson bristled at being questioned. "Picard..as we've discussed, Lieutenant Eneko is an expert linguist, and we need her skills on this one. Far more than we need her at the helm," he added with a tilt of his head.

The dig was so blatant that Picard could not resist pressing Hanson. "Excuse me sir, but do you intend to answer my question?"

The silence in the room was heavy and awkward. While it lasted. "You'll work with her from her hospital bed if you have to," Hanson nearly shouted.

"Then she has not been cleared for duty...Commander when I ordered her emergency transport to sickbay, Eneko was convulsing, and completely incapacitated-"

Captain Sarna held up her hand, a simple but effective gesture which caused him to stop in mid-sentence. "That's enough," she said quietly. "Picard, your concern for your comrade is duly noted. But we need you both to develop a system of communicating with the fog. Eneko because of her multilingual expertise, and you because you managed to communicate with the entity before."

Picard wanted to shout to the whole room that anything he had done down in those caves had been pure luck, but he knew better. Pushing it with Hanson was one thing, but he had no intention of disrespecting Sarna.

"Together with the contingent from Vulcan, I am counting on you to find a way." Sarna glanced down the table looking for her CMO. "Doctor Gavin, could you enlighten us all as to Lieutenant Eneko's condition and the cause of her illness?"

Doctor Gavin, a statuesque, no-nonsense woman in her forties nodded curtly. "Lieutenant Eneko suffered a neurological incident caused by significant lack of blood flow to her brain. The short answer is that she suffered a stroke. The long answer is that I believe she has been suffering from a brain infection for some time now. And judging by the new scans I've run, I think she'd experienced similar episodes previously."

The Captain was incredulous. "Doctor, my understanding was that you cleared all members of the Namib away team after the training mission. So are you saying Eneko became infected on board the Stargazer?"

"It is highly likely that I missed something, Captain... if that's what you're implying."

Sarna folded her hands in front of her with practiced patience. Tension between Sarna and Gavin was typical of the two officers and had become somewhat of a mainstay at meetings like this, and everyone else knew to keep quiet. The Captain smiled tightly. "Doctor, why imply, when I can just come right out and say it; you made a mistake. Rare, but apparently possible. Now, I have to ask, how you propose to correct the situation?"

Gavin glanced around the table as if getting a head count. "For starters, I'll need to run scans on all the away team members again, but I ran a ship-wide decontamination sweep last night and found nothing suspicious."

Picard sighed inwardly. I am going to be spending so much time in sickbay.

"Fine," said Sarna, but she hardly appeared satisfied with that argument. "Do you believe that Eneko could have contracted this infection from the fog?"

Doctor Gavin crossed her arms. "Yes, it's certainly possible, although without further study of this...fog entity we may not be able to pinpoint the source of her illness. She had reported coughing, and each of the 200 colonists showed signs of a bacterial respiratory infection, so of course I've been scouring the autopsy reports from the colonies. The strangest part about this so far is the immense variety of bacterial strains present among the colonists."

"You mean they all died from something different?" Hanson asked.

"It is possible, but it will take some additional time to review the records."

"Well if they died, does that mean Amanda's going to die too?"

Everyone turned to look at Lieutenant Marx who had been quiet until now.

Gavin frowned. "Not if I can help her, Lieutenant. I can assure you, we are doing everything we can."

Marx nodded, and to Picard the man seemed legitimately concerned for Eneko's welfare. Perhaps he and Eneko were friends; perhaps more. He realized that he had been absently staring at Marx while thinking about this, and that Marx was staring back at him. The man's hostility was clear. Picard averted his gaze, more concerned about their upcoming mission than this man's emotional weakness.

"Who exactly are we picking up from Vulcan, Captain?" Zev asked, breaking the silence.

"Lieutenant Leland Mackenzie, a linguist who has been stationed on Vulcan for the last two years, Lieutenant Commander T'Pel of Starfleet's science division, and Tanek, a Vulcan exo-biologist affiliated with the Vulcan Science Academy. Mackenzie and Tanek are special assignments for this mission only...T'Pel will be joining us more permanently on the Stargazer as our new science officer."

Picard saw Zev's antennae flatten very briefly against the top of her head before springing back to normal. She's worried about her career track again. Worried she will be bypassed by a Vulcan. As he considered it, he realized he too was worried about losing the race to be the Stargazer's second officer. This T'Pel person might present additional competition, but he tried to shake the thought from his mind. He felt Commander Hanson's gaze on him, and immediately regretted that he turned his head to meet the first officer's calculating smile.

"We're due to arrive at Vulcan in a few minutes," the captain was saying. "You all have your assignments. Carry on," she said, getting up from her seat.

Picard and Zev exited the conference room together, both concerned about the same topic. They carefully avoided Captain Sarna and Doctor Gavin, who were continuing to argue quietly near the doorway.

"Are you telling the truth that you have never heard of T'Pel," Zev was pressing him.

"Yes! I've never heard of her."

"Well perhaps because she is not a human, any news about her was outside your sphere of interest."

Picard sighed. "Please, enlighten me..."

"T'Pel graduated at the top of her class from the Vulcan Science Academy just three cycles ago. She has advanced in rank faster than anyone in the recorded history of Starfleet. She is by all accounts a genius, but Starfleet was only her second choice."

"Oh?"

"It is well known that she three times attempted and failed the Kolinahr."

"I've heard of Kolinahr, it's some kind of Vulcan test."

"Oh, Picard, you are going to need to learn all you can about Vulcans. You have to know your opponent."

"T'Pel isn't my opponent, and she's not yours either. We haven't even met her."

"The Kolinahr is a series of rituals during which a few Vulcans, by embracing pure logic, renounce all emotion and live a monastic life. T'Pel was unable to do this...therefore she has a weakness to be exploited."

"Keep your voice down," he muttered as Hanson walked by. "Look Zev, I'll admit I am impressed how well you've done your research, but I don't see why you are so worried about T'Pel."

Zev flushed dark blue. "Worried? I am not worried-"

"Excuse me," Picard and Zev suspended their argument and turned to find Lieutenant Marx standing there with an intense expression on his face.

"Yes Lieutenant?"

Marx crossed his arms. "Can we drop our ranks for just a minute? I need to talk to you, man to man."

Picard glanced at Zev, hardly believing that this man was posturing in such an archaic way. "Yes," he said.

"That whole exchange in there between you and Commander Hanson-what was that?"

Picard frowned in confusion. "A disagreement?"

"You were acting like you were concerned about Amanda, but it seemed like it was more about preserving your ego."

"My ego...listen Marx, I don't know you any better than you know me, but I'll have you know that I am concerned about Lieutenant Eneko."

"Not concerned enough to visit her in the hospital."

"I'm on my way there now," he said guardedly.

"Only because you were assigned to work with her. You should have seen the look on your face when Hanson gave you the news."

Picard glanced at Zev, feeling himself becoming angry. Then mercifully a reliable coolness saved him. "I see what this about, Marx. Your emotions have gotten the better of you. I've heard that can happen. However, I am not so easily provoked. I think we're done here," he said moving past the man.

"Where are you going?" Zev called after him.

"Sickbay. I have work to do."

Orpheus Base 2328

"One second Ari was walking and talking normally, and then he just...aged 100 years in a matter of seconds. I had us beamed back here, and then I-I looked inside his suit, and it was empty." Walker Keel sat on a bench in the med bay, still holding onto his helmet tightly as he recounted the incident leading to his partner's death.

Standing next to Walker, the doctor held the empty space suit in his hands and extended it toward Finnegan. "You said you wanted this...? It's nothing but an empty suit. No trace of Ensign Ramos at all."

Finnegan took the suit in his gloved hands and shoved it wordlessly into a large bag. He turned to walk away, but Walker jumped up and grabbed his elbow. "Hey where are you going with that? This is evidence!"

"Evidence of what, Ensign?"

Walker shook his helmet in Finnegan's face. "A man just died out there and it wasn't any damn accident. Something killed him."

"An unfortunate event," said Finnegan, now headed for the door, but he slowed when Commander Sarna walked into the room.

"What's going on in here? I was just accosted by a five year-old girl who told me I was needed in sickbay." She absorbed Keel's harried expression, and tensed, surveying the room with her gaze. "Where's Ensign Ramos?"

"Dead," Walker said, his lips now trembling with anger.

"What?" She looked at the doctor. "Is this true?"

The doctor was hesitant. "I can't confirm that. Keel says he disappeared-"

"No, no no, that's not what I said," Walker shouted in frustration. "Something out there killed Ari, and he's trying to cover it up!" This time he nearly flung his helmet at the intelligence officer.

"Stand down, Keel," Sarna ordered firmly. "Before you do something you'll regret. Now...what happened? And why didn't you contact me sooner?"

Walker took a step back, still watching Finnegan, who was completely calm. In fact, there was a bizarrely satisfied expression on his face. "Sir, the channel was secured when I contacted sickbay for the beam over. I had no idea you couldn't hear me."

Sarna stepped assertively toward Finnegan. "Did you tamper with our communications array? You do realize that what you just did is a violation of Starfleet regulations?" Finnegan just stared back at her smugly. "I think you have forgotten that I am the officer in charge of securing this project, Finnegan."

"Not anymore," said Finnegan as he fished a data pad out of his pocket. It had an Intel insignia, and some very fine print that neither Walker nor Sarna was inclined to read at that moment. "As of ten minutes ago this project and station were taken over by Starfleet Intelligence, which, as far as you're concerned, means me."

Making a decision, Walker quickly started to explain what had happened, but Finnegan now held a phaser in his hand. "Stop right there, Keel. You are not authorized to tell her what happened any more than she is authorized to listen to your story."

"Put that weapon away," snapped Commander Sarna. "Or I promise you, that you will come to soon regret it."

"Is that a threat?"

"Yes."

Finnegan slowly lowered the phaser, and put it back in his pocket. "Threats won't work against me, Gabriela. Don't forget, I know your history, and therefore I have the leverage. Listen carefully, both of you: In two weeks we will move all personnel and equipment off of this station and close down the Orpheus project."

"What?" Doctor Howard stood in the doorway, looking more furious than surprised at the scene before her. "Finnegan, we had a deal."

"You're making deals with civilians now, Finnegan?" Sarna questioned. She turned to Doctor Howard. "Isabel, I don't know what you agreed to with him, but he can't be trusted."

"Look who's talking," Finnegan laughed. "Anyway, Doctor, the decision's already been made."

"You said the project would be relocated in one month. You can't just shut us down!" Howard tried to push past Sarna, who grabbed hold of her protectively. "He's armed," she whispered. Isabel gradually stopped her forward motion, but was still livid.

"I can," Finnegan replied. He pointed at Walker. "Now...you are going up to the administrative office and write an official report of what happened out there on the moon's surface. Except in this version, you went alone. In fact all records of Ari Ramos are being erased from our records as we speak." He handed Sarna the data pad. She stood there for a few moments reading the same line over and over. Orpheus Project a success. Wrap up in two weeks or immediately following positive specimen identification/retrieval. J.S.

Walker stood very still, waiting for direction from Sarna. She finished reading and slowly looked up at him. "Do as he says, Ensign."

Hi! Thanks for reading this story...-PP