Ketrel, Delegation Room
Riker stood at the end of the long table opposite Lwaxana, who stood at the head of the table. As all the delegates sat in their respective spots, Ken on Lwaxana's right and T'Pic on the left, the Fruma on the right, the Cadda on the left, and the Nilaains opposite each other at the end.
When they were all sitting, Lwaxana began by announcing, "After reviewing all of the information we collected from our investigation of your cities and culture, we have found that not enough information presented itself to make an accurate depiction of what happened.
The knowledge needed, being from when your races arrived on the planet, seems to be almost nonexistent except for what you have heard threw stories. With that-" Lwaxana stopped dead and looked over to the right side of the table.
Riker went to look and see what it was she seemed so shocked and scared of, but it was too late. The room exploded in a brilliant flash of light.
Sickbay
Deanna ran into the room, her breathing harsh and showed how fast she had been running to make it there. Beverly caught Deanna just before she had been able to get inside. Deanna had heard about the bombing and that there were three they hadn't been able to find but had been told no details.
"Will?"
"We don't know yet, Deanna," Beverly told her friend.
Deanna struggled against Beverly for a few minutes before she finally accepted her embarrass. After a few minutes, she asked, "And my mother?"
Beverly pointed to her mother lying on a near by biobed. "She's fine but she hasn't woken up yet. I thought it best to let her sleep for a little while."
Deanna nodded and continued on, noticing that T'Pic, Derik, Scartin, and Teah were all sitting on biobeds being inspected by the doctors. Trinia, Fakhr, and Riegla were all unconscious on their own biobeds.
She also noted that Ken and Worf weren't there. When she inquired about them, Beverly answered, "They are the other two that we can't find."
Deanna was saddened about Worf but barely felt anything for Ken. Though she never truly wished death on him, it still didn't seem to bother her as much as it should have.
Unknown
Riker slowly regained consciousness. His leg was throbbing and his head was cloudy. The last thing he remembered was being on Ketrel in a meeting when… When what? The place exploded. That's right.
As Riker's senses returned, he reached down to see how bad his leg was. It was bleeding a little but not that badly. Then he took the time to look around at his surroundings: it was a dark and looked familiar. His eyes searched along the walls but he found no doors or openings.
A moan indicated that there was someone else there. He looked to his right. Ken was there, slumped against the wall, barely on the verge of waking. He looked like crap and had a large scar along his cheek.
"Smith. Smith! Ken! Are you all right?" It took the third call before Ken had given Riker his attention. His eyes were clouded over and half opened.
"Commander Riker?"
"Yeah? Are you alright?"
"My head hurts, but I'm fine. You?" Ken said, no more alert than he seemed.
"My leg's bleeding; I don't think it's that bad," Riker responded, shifting to find a more comfortable position. "Where do you think we are?"
"I don't know. And I don't care. I just want to get out of here!" The man said in a rush, moaning quietly when he moved.
A small laugh came from Riker's lips as he muttered, "Have you ever noticed all of your sentences have "I" in them?"
Observation Lounge
"What is it?" Picard asked the three delegates- Derik, Scartin, and Teah- that could make it. As he said this, he tossed down a deformed piece of metal- the only thing that they had been able to find. As far as Geordie or Data could understand, is that it was a bomb.
Teah sat up straight and looked up at the Captain. "It is a ketic bomb. Designed to harm, not kill. The Ellasar use it."
"The Ellasar?" Picard asked.
"They are a… small section that believes the only way to win the battles we've fought is to use violence in some respect but they only kill when absolutely necessary," Teah explained.
"You mean both you and the Nilaains have a rebellious sect?" Picard asked.
"No, all three of us. Ours is similar to both of theirs only the Gomorrah believes that we could do more in different ways. They are a lot more secretive and attack unannounced, unnamed, and unknown," Derik corrected him.
Picard shook his head and continued with the topic at hand. "Then how would they have planted this?" Everyone looked at Teah as Picard continued, "We found the bomb in the area you and Fakhr were sitting."
"That is absurd. Neither Riegla nor I am part of the Ellasar!"
"Can you really speak for Riegla? One of my better friends was a Monita. I would never have expected it of him but he was one," Scartin stated.
Teah just glared back at him, almost in disbelief of his words. "Then we can ask her as soon as she awakens."
"One other thing. The Ellasar? Do they practice kidnapping? Would that give them the motive to hurt all these people, to get to some of my crew?" Picard asked.
"They have been known to kidnap on occasion, but only in certain cases."
"Which are?"
"I'm not completely sure."
"Could they have taken Commander Riker, Commander Worf, and Mr. Smith?" Picard said, more directly.
"Possibly."
"Where would they have taken them?"
"We don't know. All the kidnap victims have always been returned in a healthy condition to the same place they were taken from. In a day or so, your people will be returned to you," Teah answered, her calm only minutely affected.
"Are you sure?" Teah didn't answer, but instead, she starred at him, silent.
Unknown
In four hours, Riker and Ken had accomplished nothing. They had hardly moved, nor had they spoken. Finally, Riker sighed, forcing his mind to clear some.
"Ken, when did you get that scar?" he asked out of nowhere.
"What scar?"
"The one on your cheek."
"I don't have one there."
"You do now," Riker stated, not at all clear-minded enough to ponder the scar.
Just then, the wall opened and a limp Worf was dragged in by two Cadda. With one on each side, they hauled him in, a Nilaain walking in behind them. Riker watched in stunned disbelief, mostly confused as to where the door had come from.
Once Worf had been placed against the opposite wall, the two Cadda approached Riker, grabbing him by the arms and pulling him up. Will winced as he was forced to put some pressure on his bad leg but avoided groaning or making any sound. The weakness of his body, combined with the pain in his leg, kept him from struggling but also made it harder to walk with them.
Ken tried to move in an attempt to help him as Riker dragged out of the room, but was far too tired and weak to be of any good.
Sickbay
Beverly ran the small cylinder over the Cadda in front of her, looking down at the readings on the tricorder in her hand. She smiled slightly, pleased with the results she was given. Her head moved in a slight nod as she walked away from the unconscious patient.
Next she looked to the Fruma woman, seeing Riegla lie still on her biobed. Slowly, she ran the cylinder over the unconscious Fruma, watching as the readings appeared before her. But, unlike before, she frowned, rerunning her scans.
Something wasn't right. She had a hunch but she wasn't sure. Walking around to the next diplomat, Trinia, Crusher took a few readings, starring down at them as she walked over to the computer.
Crusher's brows knitter together as she entered the data into the medical computer. It was odd. Too odd. The DNA patterns were so similar that she would have sworn that they were the same species.
With that thought, she experimented with the idea. The DNA changes were so insignificant that it would account for the subtle changes, like the skin color and hair color. She looked back at them, her mind reeling with her discovery.
Everything fit. From the medical facts to their histories. It was possible that they had all been one species that came to Ketrel. They might have just disagreed on where to live or how to live and split apart. Or they could have merely been in three separate crafts that landed in three different places. The information surrounding why they were there may just have been lost in a crash, from either no time to collect it, or from not wanting to.
Unknown
Will had been brought to a large medical room. It was darker than he liked but he was able to see well enough. Enough to realize that the room resembled Enterprise's Sickbay but with different technology. Alien technology.
He was strapped down to a medical table, titled afterwards to a one hundred and eighty degree angle. Above him he could see a shinny, metal object, one that looked a lot like a large needle. People in the room walked about and around him- busying themselves with work that they needed to accomplish.
A sense of deja voo overcame him, chilling him, as he recalled a dream of some sort he had had a while ago.
He was trapped; strapped to a small surgical table. A large needle was coming closer to his stomach. A scream escaped his throat. He tried to move his stomach away from the needle, but it continued closer and closer until it made contact with his bare flesh.
A burning sensation went throughout his abdomen as the needle dug into his abdomen. Quickly, though, it moved into reverse and pulled itself out of his stomach. A healed cut was all it left behind…
The dream alone scared him; the thought that it was playing out now scarred him even more. Which was made even worse when the needle started to move. His eyes focused on it with an owl's gaze, burning into the device as it moved down toward his injured leg.
It seemed to reposition itself until it was just above the wound. Riker gulped, watching it as it began to move lower and closer to the gash. A burning sensation streamed through his leg as the needle dug into it, sending waves upon waves of pain to his hip and chest.
Then, just as quickly, it pulled itself out, leaving only the echo of pain rippling through his leg. The commander's eyes were closed, afraid to look down and see what was left. Slowly, though, he opened them, looking in amazement at his healed wound.
Captain's Ready Room
"Are you saying that all three of them are the same species?"
Picard, Deanna, and the two remaining Federation diplomats were all sitting in Picard's ready room, listening as Beverly explained her findings.
"Medically specking, that's what it looks like. If you look at the small things that have changed, their skin color and culture for instance, it is all constant to their believes and environment," Beverly answered.
"Which makes this entire meeting pointless. They all arrived first and therefore they all 'own' the planet," T'Pic stated in his monotone Vulcan voice.
"True, but it also presents a much bigger situation. Telling them would affect them deeply. Telling them…"
"Telling them would turn their world upside down," Beverly finished for him, Deanna nodding her silent agreement.
The Doctor looked around for a moment, gauging the reactions of the others. T'Pic appeared to be the only one not reeling in the newfound information. "If you don't mind, Captain, I'd like to be the one to tell them."
"Of course," Picard nodded, only half realizing what he had agreed to, so lost in thought. "Once you've finished, tell me. In the meantime, I'll have Commander Data organize a search party for our three missing members. Dismissed."
