Shockwave I and II
A.N. I decided to put the two episodes together even if the log has gotten quite longer than usual this way.
I would like to thank Hummingbird2, James Birdsong and Lupinesence for their reviews along with everyone who has taken time to read my fiction
Starlog 57, February 23, 2152
We're going to visit a colony tomorrow. It's called Paragaan II and it was settled 20 years ago. It seems the Paragaans who live there have adapted very quickly; they started as thirty and they are about three thousand now. The Captain, T'Pol, Trip and I are going to land with the shuttlepod.
"Apparently they're a matriarchal society. We'll better be very careful" Trip commented.
"Don't flirt with them or you'll get pregnant again. Sir." I joked.
"Don't flirt with them or they'll tie you half-naked on a cellar floor!" he retorted with a smile.
We're expecting to receive their landing protocols; we'll need them since their atmosphere is quite peculiar.
As for me, my fellows will probably kill me someday because I decided that we need to have training sessions twice a week instead than just once. Combat skills and especially phase pistol shooting skills are not up to the standards. I'm fairly sure some of the crewmen and fellow officer think they're just not up to my standards and that I'm being my usual fussy self but I know what I'm doing.
OOO
Starlog 58, February 24, 2152
Bloody hell. I'm afraid those training sessions won't be necessary after all.
This morning I received the landing protocols by the Paragaans and proceeded to land with the Captain, Trip and T'Pol. I locked the plasma ducts at seventy five kilometers instead of the fifty kilometers they had requested in order to avoid igniting their atmosphere: I locked them, I bloody locked them. But at some point we heard a really loud explosion, the shuttlepod started tumbling until I could feel my guts in my very throat and, most of all, the atmosphere burned.
We got back on the Enterprise even if I still don't know how we made it; thankfully we were all well apart from Trip, who suffered a light concussion.
"Have you tried hailing the colony? There has to be someone down there" the Captain asked Hoshi. From the look on her face, I imagined the worst.
"Sir, I tried to explain. There's nothing left. No buildings, no trees, no people"
Thirty six hundred colonists, all of them dead, an entire colony destroyed. And apparently, because of us.
The Captain asked me if a malfunction could've occurred.
"I closed both ducts. Any kind of malfunction would have triggered an alarm. Two alarms. There are backups to prevent these kinds of accidents. The ducts were closed." I answered. One of my security teams always checks the shuttlepods before the take-off; as for the maintenance, Trip is as fussy as I am about weapons and his staff always checks the pods.
Anyway T'Pol, Trip and I checked the shuttlepod again. T'Pol analyzed the pod's sensor logs – and according to them the bloody plasma conducts were locked. Trip checked Enterprise's sensor logs – and according to them the tetrazine levels were far lower than expected and there hadn't been plasma leaks. I obviously searched for the point of ignition together with Ensign Balosz.
"It originated at the starboard plasma duct" I told her "but it was most certainly locked. Let's check again."
"The flash point was beneath the shuttle" she said "but, according to the logs the plasma duct was closed, sir." She answered.
We also checked the alarm system and it set off just as it would've done in case of malfunctioning. After multiple checks I grew convinced that either the logs were wrong or someone had sabotaged the pod.
"Let's wait for the atmospheric analysis of the probe, in the meantime check again the logs, Ensign" I told Balosz before heading to the Bridge.
On the Bridge I found a very worried and bewildered Trip and discovered that the atmosphere next to the surface was filled with boro-carbons, which are produced, as Trip himself pointed out, when tetrazine is ignited with plasma exhaust.
"I don't care whether that probe picked up traces of bread pudding. Both our plasma ducts were locked down, and there were no leaks in the system. Not unless they miraculously mended themselves afterwards." I pointed out. That very moment the Captain emerged from the turbo-lift and summoned T'Pol and Trip in his ready room. He had just spoken with Admiral Forest and, as Trip later informed me, our mission has been cancelled.
Cancelled. Because of something we aren't even guilty of. Because the bloody Vulcans want to get rid of us. Egoistic as it may be, the Enterprise has been my only true home so far and here I've found friends and he who will probably be my life's best friend, Trip. I don't want to loose all of this. It wouldn't be a problem for me to find another work on Earth or another assignment on a starship but it won't be quite like this.
"The strange thing is" Trip added while we were heading to the Launch Bay "that he didn't even fight against this decision. He seems – helpless."
"I hope he doesn't actually believe it's been our fault!" I replied, shocked. The Captain is not one to accept so readily such a decision.
"No. But unless we find an explanation it's unlikely that they'll change their mind anyway" he sighed. "I'll get a quick snack and go back to work" he added "care to join me?"
"No, I'll go back to the launch bay. I have something on my mind".
Once there I told Balosz to begin another diagnostic looking for every possible anomaly, not just plasma leaks and log errors. I was growing more and more convinced that someone had sabotaged the pod.
After some time I actually found an EM signature just below the starboard plasma duct.
"Maybe it's been caused by the boro-carbons" Balosz pointed out. We checked but there weren't boro-carbons on that signature – in fact there wasn't anything familiar on that signature. I felt it wasn't timely to approach the Captain so I went to inform T'Pol.
I didn't hear any news from the Captain so I'm going to have a quick dinner. It's almost 8 PM and I haven't eaten since breakfast.
OOO
Starlog 59, February 25, 2152
Well, I have plenty of spare time to write my log since I'm locked in my very quarters. But let's start from the beginning.
Yesterday, late in the evening, I was still working on the shuttlepod when the Captain summoned me to his quarters. I almost ran there.
"T'Pol informed me that you found an EM signature on the pod" he told me.
"Yes, sir."
"Point a phase discriminator where you found the signature" he ordered.
I looked at him, bewildered, not knowing where could that idea come from, then I hurried back to the launch bay and complied. And all of a sudden a small, eight-sided object, absolutely unknown, appeared from nowhere. Too stunned to think, I hurried to the Situation Room where the Captain and the senior staff were already waiting for me. The Captain took the object from my hands and gave it to T'Pol, explaining that it had been designed to create a plasma stream.
"Put a team together, Trip. I'll need two quantum beacons. They'll have to be positron-based and have an output of two hundred gigawatts apiece." He told Trip as if it was the most natural thing in the world.
"Positron-based, sir?" Trip asked, bewildered.
"Just get started. I'll bring you the specs in a few minutes." The Captain answered dismissively. Then he told me to put the Armory on full alert – the Armory is always on full alert, by the way – and asked Hoshi to inactivate our comm. frequencies for a while. Eventually we reversed our course and we're getting back to Paragaan II.
Heading to the Armory, I couldn't help but remember that the last time something so weird happened to us, crewman Daniels was involved. And actually, after some thirty minutes, the Captain himself went to pick me up in the Armory and we headed to room E14, Daniels' room. The Captain informed me that he had just spoken with Daniels and I knew better than asking where and why.
I just asked whether our current situation had something to do with the Sulibans.
"Yes, it has" the Captain almost smiled at me "A Suliban cruiser caused the whole incident. It wasn't our fault"
"Last time Daniels left his database here" he added.
"Database, Sir?"
"Yes. It contains information about future events, schematics and most of all what Daniels wants us to get now."
"And what is that, Sir?"
"The schematics for the Suliban Stealth Cruiser"
Wow.
"Why did Daniels leave it in his quarters?"
"I don't recall him having much time to pack before he left" he answered. That made sense.
"No. Well, if it is there and it contains what he said it does, it could be invaluable to Starfleet." I pointed out, thinking about the many times we had been surprised and endangered by unknown alien technologies.
"I gave Daniels my word, Malcolm. We download the schematics for the Suliban Stealth Cruiser, nothing else." He answered immediately.
According to the Captain the Sulibans won't come after us even if we do find the Cruiser because it's not written in history. I just hope he's right. I removed the magnetic lock I had settled on Daniels' door and we got in; the Captain found immediately what he was looking for.
He evidently knew how to use the database and I could see that it contained everything. I was especially tempted by Klingon vessel's schematics but the Captain was adamant about downloading only what we needed at the moment.
I think Daniels has been quite lucky to find a man as loyal as Captain Archer; I myself would've been tempted by the database had I been alone. Eventually we found what we were searching for, downloaded it and left Daniels' room, closing it again with the magnetic lock.
"We will localize the Suliban cruiser with the quantum beacons and fire it. Before we reach it, I need you to plot all of their targets; we don't have to destroy the cruiser because I have to get something from there"
"And do you know where this thing is located, Sir?"
"Yes. It's in the schematics. We'll find tons of Sulibans. We will need appropriate weapons to bring down."
"I'll study the situation and settle a plan, Sir".
In the Armory I selected the more appropriate targets: cloaking generator, weapon banks, port and starboard engines. I studied a way to seal off the two lower levels of the ship, where I knew most of the crew resided, I selected some stun grenades that would've worked pretty well against the Sulibans.
"I'll monitor your situation continuously in case something unexpected happens, Captain" I told him later, when we met to discuss the plan.
At first everything went as the Captain had planned; we found the cruiser, we fired it and the Captain, Trip and T'Pol landed. The Captain got what he needed – three small discs. They made it back to the shuttlepod and I was already half sighing with relief when the Sulibans arrived and tried to force themselves into the pod. Trip had to ignite the thrusters in order to leave because he couldn't release the docking clamps. Once the pod was back in the launch bay we reversed our course.
Hoshi found out that the Stealth Cruiser was in orbit while we descended and that they even docked with the shuttlepod to set the device we had discovered. At this point I thought the worst part was over, how silly of me.
I was in charge on the bridge when I noticed that our readings were anomalous, as if we had trouble balancing the warp fields. I immediately called the Captain, fearing a Suliban attack.
"Reed to Commander Tucker" I added, knowing that Trip would've killed me had I not told him of such a problem.
"Go ahead"
"The warp field seems to go out of alignment, Commander. Please report to the Bridge"
The Captain and Trip arrived in no time. Trip said the computer had found nothing wrong with the warp field but still the problem was there. For good measure, the Captain told me to load weapons. And then, using the quantum beacons, we could see twelve blobs following us; even the quickest analysis revealed that they were charged with high-yield particle weapons. And it shouldn't have happened because it wasn't written, yes, of course.
I was just telling the Captain that there was nothing I could've done against them when they hailed us.
The Suliban who spoke with us, Silik, wanted to take the Captain with him, otherwise he would've destroyed the ship. The Captain obediently left T'Pol in charge, entered the turbo-lift –and disappeared. Trip couldn't read his biosigns anymore; I supposed he could be somehow with Daniels and the Suliban later relieved a temporal signature in the turbolift.
All of the Suliban "blobs" targeted our warp core at once and for a second I thought we would've died. But the Sulibans didn't fire us; they made sure the Captain was not on the ship, then told us to prepare to be boarded.
Then I made a fool of myself: I wanted to send my security teams to the docking ports but T'Pol stopped me, saying that after all they were still targeting our warp core. Of course, Trip protested fiercely but T'Pol was right, and this reminds me how very useful can be a Vulcan among a crew of emotional humans.
The Sulibans boarded us, searched all over the ship for the Captain and for the three discs (that they found). They ordered Trip to shut down everything but Engineering and the Bridge and then confined us in our quarters, threatening to kill us in case of resistance. I must say that T'Pol was incredible and she handled the situation with a calmness that no human would've had.
If my log is so long and detailed today it's because I'm still locked up in here. If the Captain is with Daniels then he's probably alive or I hope so, on the other hand there's absolutely no way to contact my fellows. Maybe the Federation will notice that we haven't come back in time and will send someone to search for us but I fear it will be too late. I'm also very worried because, according to the Captain, this shouldn't have happened and as a Security Officer I should have asked for more information, instead I failed.
I just hope the rest of the crew is fine.
Addition: Thankfully we've got a bloody good Chief Engineer on this ship! Trip managed to contact me.
"I thought the comm. was offline" I pointed out.
"It is. I'm routing the signal through the EPS grid. I can talk to any doorbell on B deck" he answered. I swear I wanted to hug him.
"Are you all right?" I asked worriedly.
"Same as you, I guess. Locked in tight"
"And the others?"
"I can't get in contact with T'Pol for some reason and Hoshi and Travis are on C deck"
"Any thoughts about how we're going to get rid of these Suliban?" Nothing came to my mind at the moment and even if we can communicate I'm not sure we'll be able to get out of our rooms.
"One step at a time. The first thing I need to do is figure out how to tap into the door comms on C-deck. I'll get back to you. Sit tight"
"I wasn't planning on going anywhere" I answered, helpless.
Now I'm waiting for Trip to contact the others.
Addition 2 – Now I'm waiting for Hoshi to come here.
Eventually Trip was able to contact Travis, Hoshi and T'Pol.
"We have to trick Silik into using Daniels' device" T'Pol informed us "This way we should bring the Captain back".
"And how do you know?" Trip asked in the comm., bewildered.
"The Captain himself told me some moments ago." She replied. Apparently the Captain had actually been with Daniels all the time.
"With all due respect, T'Pol, are you sure that you…"
"I spoke with the Captain, Commander Tucker. Now I think we should concentrate on how to comply."
"First of all we need to get out of here" Trip said.
Travis suggested that we could've used the shafts of the EPS conduits but the only one small enough to get into them is Hoshi. At first she was quite reluctant because of her claustrophobia but eventually Trip gently managed to persuade her. I admire her quite a lot, I don't know if I would've been able to do the same thing with water.
"Once we are free, I will fake delirium in order to attract the Sulibans and you will stun them" T'Pol added. I didn't understand the point but I didn't ask questions.
"As for the device I could get into Daniels' quarters and take it" I said.
"We must trick Silik into using it" T'Pol pointed out.
"Daniels' quarters are certainly guarded by the Sulibans. As I get in or out they will attack me and take the device" I explained, knowing in advance that it wouldn't have been pleasurable "Then I'll have to trick them into using it."
"And how?" Travis asked worriedly.
"I will say the Captain told me to destroy it in order to prevent the Sulibans from contacting him. They will immediately use it to get at the Captain."
"There's a problem" Trip pointed out. He had been silent so far.
"What problem?"
"They won't let you go away unharmed, Malcolm" he said softly.
I sighed: "I know, but we have to get the Captain back. How do we get rid of the other Sulibans?"
"We could fake a warp core breach. I can see about that" Trip proposed.
Now we're waiting for Hoshi to free us.
OOO
Starlog 60, February 27, 2152
Ouch.
Well, the plan worked but I'm still hurting from the beatings.
Soon after I had stopped registering my log Hoshi appeared – shirtless. She had lost her shirt while getting out from the shaft. T'Pol faked a very convincing delirium and we stunned the Sulibans with two of Phlox' jolly hiposprays, locking them in my quarters with Hoshi.
Trip asked me again if I really wanted to do it and I confirmed, even if he seemed worried.
I easily entered Daniels' quarters and took the device; when I went out they were waiting for me. They took the device from me and beat me quite literally to a pulp to get information; I could count two broken ribs, a swollen lip, a black eye and countless blows. Eventually I was able to persuade them that they had to use the device – and Silik involuntarily got the Captain back! The warp core breach trick worked and the Sulibans immediately freed us, so that we went at warp and flew, pursued by the Sulibans.
As for me, as soon as they ended the "interrogation" one of them took me back to my quarters – where Hoshi stunned him and called Phlox. I was hurting like hell.
Then I don't remember much because the Doctor's painkillers made me quite dizzy. All of a sudden, I wakened to find the Captain next to my bed.
"Sir!" I said straightening. But I had to lay down again because the pain was still there.
"Take it easy, Malcolm. They gave you quite a beat" he urged.
"Where are they, Sir?"
"Well, let's say that I persuaded Silik to call his ships back. We've resumed our course"
I sighed with relief – at least.
"I came to thank you. You did a great job" he said appreciatively "Now I'll let you rest."
I'm so very glad that we have the Captain back.
We have reached the Vulcan ship D'Kir and it seems we're actually going home this time. Obviously the incident hasn't been our fault and we can prove it, so there's no reason why they should cancel the mission. Or at least I hope so.
Phlox told me Trip came here earlier but I was asleep and he didn't want to wake me.
Addition: adorable Trip.
A hour ago I heard him entering sickbay and having a quiet word with the Doctor. Then he opened the courtains of my biobed and looked at me, a small box in his hands.
"Hi, Trip" I began, noticing that he appeared quite shocked.
"Malcolm, I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have let you do that" he whispered.
"Trip, I chose to do it. We had to do it. Don't blame yourself" I soothed. He seemed very saddened.
"Moreover, I am better than I appear. I didn't even pass out…" I added. It was meant to be reassuring but he seemed even more horrified.
"Don't look at me like that. I'm fine, all's well what ends well" I said matter-of-factly. Actually I was about to wince with pain but I didn't want him to feel guilty.
"Anyway I thought you deserved a reward" he said gently, opening the box. It was filled with ice-cream.
"It's pineapple ice-cream. The Doc says it's fine as long as you eat it slowly."
I smiled widely, forgetting for a moment about my injuries, and I grimaced.
"Thank you so much Trip. It's been very kind of you, you shouldn't have…"
"Don't. Even. Start. That. Eat your ice-cream so you'll be silent for once, Loo-tenant" he answered grinning.
Despite the blows, I'm happy. I've eaten the whole box of ice-cream.
OOO
Starlog 61, February 29, 2152 (Author's Note: I calculated that 2152 will be a leap year :D )
The mission hasn't been cancelled!
We spoke with Ambassador Forest and Soval, the latter being his usual bloody insufferable self. He all but accused us to be a bunch of idiots when surprisingly T'Pol stood for us and almost reprimanded Soval. I wanted so badly to laugh on that moment!
Anyway, this morning the Captain summoned the Senior Staff in his ready room and informed us that we've been allowed to resume our mission.
I'm back on duty – as I said to Trip, the injuries were actually better than they appeared. Now I hope I'll enjoy at least some time without getting almost killed…