DISCLAIMER: Star Trek and all related characters are the property of Paramount Pictures, Inc. No copyright infringement is intended. This work of fiction is for entertainment purposes only and no money has changed hands. The original characters and events are the sole property of the author and may not be used without permission.

STAR TREK:

THE GOD MACHINE

by Darrin Colbourne

"What am I even doing here if the entire mission will be conducted based on what you sense when you lick your finger and stick it up in the air?" Montoya asked Number One. They were in McDonald's quarters. McDonald was sitting on her bunk while Montoya paced around what free floor space was available.

"You're the Science Officer." McDonald said. "You're here to set the agenda for our survey. The only reason I had to 'stick my finger in the air' was because you failed to fulfill that function when the Captain called on you to do so."

"I had nothing to give him!" Montoya said, stopping to face McDonald. "The available data was miniscule at best. Certainly not enough to come to any definitive conclusion."

"It didn't have to be definitive. The Captain just needed enough information to make a decision. The information didn't need to be perfect, just enough to help him choose a course of action."

"I can't believe he'd want to make such a decision with so few hard facts."

"Oh, please. Intelligence is such a dodgy business, Captains have had to make even more important decisions based on even less empirical knowledge. It happens all the time in war."

"We're not at war!"

"And we're damned lucky we're not if this is the type of Officer you're going to be."

Montoya was insulted. "I have done everything you've asked of me since I first met you! I have let you order me up and down these corridors like a robot for the past two weeks…"

"And yet you haven't learned a thing." McDonald said as she stood.

Montoya crossed her arms. "Well, what am I missing?"

McDonald crossed her arms. "For one thing, you should have learned that it is not your place to argue with the Captain about our course of action, and you damned well don't do it in Control! If you have a problem, you come to me with it - privately and respectfully - and I discuss it with him. Until then, your job is to tell him what he needs to know when he asks you to."

"And what if my problem is that I think he's acting on horrendously flimsy information from his Executive Officer?"

"Well, I'll be sure to pass that on to him, but I think it all turned out rather well…and he seemed to agree."

"Yes of course he did," Montoya muttered. "It was a chance to put yet another feather in the cap of his favorite officer, the Great and Powerful Number One."

McDonald cocked her head. "Are you asking for a hands-on demonstration of how we deal with insubordinate officers, Leftenant Commander Montoya?"

Montoya suddenly winced and came to her senses. She shook her head to calm herself and dropped her arms. "I'm sorry!" She said, then looked at McDonald. "I'm sorry. It's just…I'm used to being able to experiment, make observations, gather new information at a reasonable pace and make a complete report when I've come to a conclusion I can back up."

"I understand that," McDonald said, "but you must understand that you won't always have that luxury here. There will be times that the Captain must know what you know - whatever it is - so he can do his job. So if he asks you for a guess, give him a guess."

"I understand." Montoya said.

McDonald nodded and softened her stance. As she turned back to her bunk, she said: "And you haven't done everything I asked."

Montoya's hands went to her hips. "Of course I have!"

"Oh really? Because I could have sworn I asked you to choose watchstanders and relievers from your department for the Science Station."

"I barely know how to operate that console myself, and it took most of the two weeks we were in port for me to figure it out! And anyway, you obviously have others in your crew who are capable of standing watch on it."

"That I do. There are several technicians proficient in operating the console, but only you know what you want done with it on a regular basis, so it is up to you to choose people from your department with the relevant experience and train them to take your place when you're not at the station…which reminds me: I could also swear to asking you to pick a Department First Officer."

"I haven't decided yet! I didn't think you needed me to pick one before we left spacedock!"

"I believe I used the word 'immediately' when I said it, which one would think would be a clear indication that I meant before we left spacedock!"

"Why the rush? We have five years!"

"And you could die tomorrow. If we're going to complete the mission once you're dead, we have to have someone to take your place, either permanently or until another qualified person can be called up from Earth. Pick Someone."

"Very Well." Montoya said with a sigh. "Can I at least go back to the Control Room and return to my station? I want to look at the sensor data some more and see if I can confirm some of what you suspect."

McDonald pinched the bridge of her nose in frustration. "Pick Science Station watchstanders, tell them what you want done and assign them watches! You only take that station when you're called to. I remember explaining that to you when I…"

"I know, I know…" Montoya said. "I'll pick watchstanders."

"After the conference in the Wardroom. And then get some rest. Falling asleep in The Chair during your first Midwatch is frowned upon."

"I'll do my best to stay alert. Anything else?"

"That'll be all. You're dismissed, Commander."

Montoya nodded and walked straight through the Head to her quarters, where she threw herself into her bunk. After a moment staring up at the ceiling, she grabbed her pillow, put it over her head and screamed into it as loudly as she could.

Montoya had seen the Wardroom several times since she reported aboard, but this would be the first time she'd be seeing all the Senior Officers in the room at once. She went in with Number One. Pike and Adams were already in there, along with an older officer in Work Blues and a lab coat that Montoya didn't recognize. Fast on Montoya and McDonald's heels were two more officers. One was Major Wayne Song, Commander of the ship's Landing Force contingent. Montoya was glad to see him. Aside from Commander Adams, Major Song had done the most of all the Senior Staff to make her feel welcome. He explained it as his duty as a fellow traveler. After all, they were both in the position of having to rely on the flyboys of Starfleet to give them a ride to places where they might do real work.

The other officer was another stranger, but she was in Work Black, so Montoya assumed she was the senior Tactical pilot she'd been told would come aboard. She was a few inches shorter than Montoya, and she had blonde hair which she wore cut short, a style which didn't require pinning up, as Montoya's and McDonald's long locks did. She had California-girl looks and a Take-on-the-World manner, something Montoya figured came with the small set of wings all Tactical pilots wore above their Service Patches.

When Pike saw the pilot walk in he asked everyone to sit down. Montoya had learned that there was a pecking order to the seating around the table. Captain Pike's usual place was under the ship's Unit Emblem. Number One sat to his right, ChEng to his left. Montoya, as Second Officer, sat at Number One's right. The older gentleman sat next to Adams and across from her. That left Song and the pilot, who chose their seats by gender, leaving the pilot sitting to the Science Officer's right. The last seat, on the opposite end of the table from Pike, was left open.

"Okay," Pike started, "first some introductions are in order. Montoya, you didn't get to meet our Chief Medical Officer before we left. That would be the silver-haired rogue sitting across from you. Lieutenant Commander Isabel Montoya, Dr. Philip Boyce."

Both Officers smiled and nodded as they shook hands. "It's a pleasure to meet you." Montoya said.

"Likewise." Boyce said. "Look forward to working with you." As he said it, he thought Rob was right. Number One will have to work overtime to defend her title.

Pike resumed the introductions when they broke. "And I'd like everyone to meet Lieutenant Commander Brigid Silas of the 59th Tactical Support Squadron, The Outriders. She will be serving with us as the Smallcraft Group Commander. Montoya, that means she'll have administrative control over everything that flies off the ship, including the Offboard Sensor Probes you'll be using. Silas, Welcome Aboard. You've met Montoya and Dr. Boyce, and this is Commander McDonald, Lieutenant Commander Adams and Major Song."

Everyone offered Silas a "Welcome Aboard", which Silas answered with "Thank You All. It's a pleasure to be aboard."

"Now let's get down to business. You already know why we're here, so this will just be a brief review. We've been given a unique survey mission, one that will take several years and cover a fair portion of the galaxy. Our purpose is to search out planets with the potential for life and investigate them for signs of a connection with the known worlds, including Earth. We're starting our search with a series of star systems observed at long range with instruments in orbit back home. They're all what the scientists call 'Goldilocks Systems' - most everything in them is just right to breed the kind of life we're looking for. When we've exhausted the current list, we'll use our own sensors to search for more Goldilocks Systems that are beyond the range of Earth's scopes. We'll keep seeking out new worlds until we're relieved of our station - or until we run out of galaxy, whichever comes first."

Everyone chuckled a little at that. "Wow," Silas said. "Just 'Second Star to the right, and Straight On Till Morning.'"

"Essentially." Pike said. "And just to prove that this mission won't be a total Milk Run, old Mister Murphy handed us a significant glitch on the way to the first system, so we're underway to it now on Impulse Power. As you can imagine that means we'll have a decent amount of time on our hands, so we'll spend it getting settled into a routine and learning how to work with our new crew members. Once we get there, it'll be Montoya's show to run. Commander, why don't you give everyone an idea of what to expect?"

All eyes were on Montoya again, but at least she was ready this time. "The star Indira is similar to our own Sun, about the same size and mass, it's a yellow star, and nearly as bright. Since we began planet-finding observations we've discovered five major bodies, all of them Gas Giants, one of which appears to be a Brown Dwarf - a star that didn't quite get going. On further observation, we discovered some smaller bodies, including one in particular that seems to be in the system's Goldilocks Zone. It's the right size and mass, it's just close enough to the star to be temperate, there's an atmosphere, there's plenty of water…it's everything we might expect from a life-bearing world, one that might produce sentient beings. That's the world we're going to focus on when we reach Indira. We'll confirm everything we've seen from long-range, we'll look for signs of intelligent life and - maybe - we'll try to make contact."

"Will you have to go down to the surface?" Silas asked her.

"I'd like to, personally, but there are a few things we need to determine before making that decision. One is the precise amount of oxygen in the atmosphere. We need to know just how temperate the climate is, things like that. Those are things we can only determine once we're in the system."

"Until then, we'll watch the system as we approach." Pike said. "We'll look for other bodies the astronomers on Earth missed, plus any early signs of intelligent life. Otherwise, it will be Business As Usual aboard. Get your departments squared away for the long haul. That's all, people."

With that Pike stood, prompting everyone else to follow suit. The officers filed out of the space in order and went their separate ways. As she made her way back to her quarters, Montoya noticed that someone else was tagging along. It was Commander Silas. "So it's you." The pilot said.

"'It's me', what?" Montoya said.

"You're the reason my Squadron Commander warned me I might be spending my next few birthdays deployed."

Montoya sighed. "I only volunteered for The Project, Commander. The current circumstances weren't my idea, but if it makes you feel better to hate me…"

"I don't hate you. I don't even know you. I'd like to, though. As we were being briefed back at the air station, I remember wondering what kind of people rated this kind of commitment from the Fleet."

"My boss, Dr. Narain, rated the commitment. I'm only Human."

"So I see. Which means that, since you're not a god or anything, I'll just have to get to know you the hard way: by being your friend."

Montoya turned to Silas and smiled at that. Silas returned the smile.

"So what do I call you?" Montoya said. "All the important officers seem to have nicknames."

"Well, you can call me 'Group Commander,'" Silas said, "or 'Wing Commander', 'Air Boss', 'CAG', or any of a dozen other anachronisms. Or, Brigid's fine."

"What about your Call Sign? I thought all pilots had one."

"You might as well call me Brigid. My Call Sign's 'Frigid'."

"'Frigid'?"

"Hey, you walk into Space Warfare School with a name like 'Brigid' and turn down a fellow student when he asks you out…" She shrugged.

"That's so harsh." Montoya said.

"But not surprising." Silas said.

"I'll call you 'Brigid', then, and you can call me 'Isabel'."

"This is good. We're already making progress. What do your friends call you?"

"My best friend calls me 'Belle'."

"Then my goal is to earn the right to call you 'Belle'."

Montoya smiled again. She'd take as many allies as she could get. "I'll tell you what." She said. "Help me keep Number One off my back and you can call me whatever you like."

"It's a deal…Smart Girl." Silas said. "Now…what's your trouble with Number One?"

"Me?" Flores said. "Why Me?"

She and Montoya were in the Ops Officers' Stateroom. Montoya had selected her to be the department's Second-In-Command. "Because you know the program agenda as well as I do and no one knows the way I think better than you. If something happens to me there's nobody I'd rather have take my place."

"But I don't know anything about running a department on a starship!"

"Neither do I. You'd be amazed how little that fact matters to Commander McDonald."

"Oh, her again!" Flores groaned. "Well, what about Ben? He's actually been in Starfleet before! Why not give him the job?"

The door to the stateroom opened as Montoya answered. "I thought about asking Ben, but I got some advice on the way here…"

"You thought about asking me what?" Goren interrupted.

"To be the Science Department First Officer."

Goren laughed. "Yeah, right…why don't you ask Wendy?"

"I just did."

"Perfect! Congratulations, Wendy. You'll be great."

Flores was stunned. "But I don't want the job!"

"Neither do I. I want to stay as far down the totem pole as possible for as long as possible."

"And yet it has to be one of you." Montoya said. "The advice I got was that I should choose someone that will be an extension of Me, whose will would be an extension of My Will. I have to have a second that I can trust to carry out my wishes. That's how it's done at every level. It's how McDonald got her job."

"Well then, it's gotta be you, Wendy." Goren said. "You two have been Best Friends since long before I met you. You'd be a much better extension of Isabel than I would."

He'd said the last with a smirk, which Montoya and Flores returned, then Flores said: "What do I have to do?"

"I'll have to show you how to work the Science Station in the Control Room." Montoya said. "There's a manual, but to really understand the controls you have to use them. You may have to share some Midwatches with me so I can show you."

"Oh, great." Flores said. "Midnight Watch. Institutionalized insomnia." Goren chuckled.

"And we have to set up a proper watch schedule for the entire department, especially for the Science Station."

Flores grinned at Goren. "I vote we give Ben the Dawn Watch!"

"Now let's not be petty!" Goren said, making Flores and Montoya laugh.

When they settled down, Flores said: "Seriously, Belle. I understand that all this military stuff is important to our friends in Starfleet, but when are we going to get to do what we came out here to do?"

Montoya sighed. "When we get to the planets we're looking for. Then we can be scientists…but until then, we're Starfleet, and I guess we'll just have to act the part."

"Yes, Sir." Goren said.

"Yes, Sir." Flores sighed. "Okay…so what happens if we both kick the bucket? Do they get someone else from Earth to be Science Officer?"

"Of Course not." Montoya said. "If we're both gone, Ben takes over."

"Excuse me?" Goren said.

Montoya smiled. "More advice from my new friend. 'The First Officer is only the First Link in a proper Chain of Command.' First Link, which implies that there should be more links in the chain."

"Hah! Welcome to the Chain, bro!" Flores said with a grin.

Goren just mimicked her sullenly as he went into the bathroom.

The following three weeks didn't exactly fly by, but as she got settled into a routine of sleeping in the morning, doing administrative work in the evening and then standing her watch, Montoya found that the passing of time was at least tolerable. She'd even managed to satisfy Number One. She'd presented Commander McDonald with a report detailing her intentions as to the chain of command in the Science Department and a schedule for training her people to stand watch in control. McDonald approved everything, asking only that once everyone was properly trained in, the most proficient watchstander be assigned the Forenoon watch to work with the Captain. As the days unfolded, Goren took to the Science Station the quickest, so Montoya ended up assigning him to the watch, thwarting Flores's revenge. The Science Officer tried to console her friend by giving her the Evening Watch, but since it meant being in Control with McDonald for six hours, Flores didn't find it very consoling.

For her part, Montoya was surprised how quickly she'd adapted to standing Midwatch. She hadn't fallen asleep that first night - at least not in the center seat. She'd caught 40 winks while she took a meal break in the Watch Officer's Ready Room, which was little more than a large closet with a cot, a small, folding table and a sink and toilet hidden in recesses in the walls. After a week she found she didn't need to nap at all. She'd become accustomed to staying awake and alert the whole time. There were consequences to this, however, as being Watch Officer when nothing was going on left one with too much time to think, and Montoya's thoughts kept drifting to the Indira system and their problems trying to get there at Warp. It wasn't long before the Enterprise passed the hypothetical boundary where it had been shunted beyond the system. When nothing happened, confirming another of Number One's assumptions, it just made Montoya more curious about what they'd find. She was tempted to spend her watches at the Science Station trying to find some way to work out what happened, but McDonald had made it clear: The whole Control Room was a Watch Officer's responsibility when on watch, not just her favorite station.

And so it was that, three weeks later, Montoya found herself sitting in the center seat, staring blankly at the main viewscreen and glancing every now and then at the repeater screen above the Science Station, hoping to find a revelation in the image that the ensign manning the console might have missed.

She was surprised when it came from another station. "Conn, Sensors." The Sensor Officer said. "New Contact, bearing 020 mark 015, estimate range 2.3 A.U."

Montoya turned to his station. "What kind of contact?" She said.

"Too regularly shaped for a natural object." He said. "Looks like some sort of small spacecraft."

She was so stunned she just stared at him for a minute. Then she was out of the center seat and looking over his shoulder before she remembered that she could see what he was looking at just as easily on the repeater screen. Deciding to worry about propriety later, she asked: "Can you tell me what kind of spacecraft? Is it manned?"

"No. Not by humanoids, anyway." The Officer said. "The core's too small. No room to move around and no sign of working life-support. It's gotta be some kind of probe."

"Is it approaching?"

"No, Sir. Receding. Looks like it's following a ballistic course out of the system. I'm not getting any indication of powered flight."

"Is it radiating at all?"

"No, Sir. It looks stone cold."

And then the big question: "Can you get an image?"

"Sure. Give me one to tie-in the Electro-Optical sensor." The Officer took a moment to reposition the Optical sensor mounted on the underside of the Support Section. Soon, he'd taken an image of the space around the object, selected it, then enlarged and enhanced it.

The result was startling to Montoya. A small, blocky gray-white spacecraft hung on the screen. It had a simple rocket engine and there were several old-fashioned antennae and an umbrella-style dish attached.

"Can you backtrack its course?" Montoya whispered.

"I can only give you an estimate based on its current track. Without an active propulsion source…"

"That's okay…I just need a general idea of where it came from."

"Yes, Sir. Give me one to work the track."

"Good." Montoya said, then she had a thought. "Call the Captain to the Control Room." She told the Communications Officer.

To his credit, the Communications Officer managed not to look at her strangely as he said: "Aye, Sir." and carried out the order.

"Attention on Deck!" The Communications Officer called out. Captain Pike had come into Control via the starboard passage and the ensign caught sight of him first.

"As you were." Pike said gruffly.

Until the "Attention on Deck" call Montoya had been pacing around the center seat, lost in thought. When she turned toward the Communications Station and spotted Pike she was surprised and a little insulted. The Captain hadn't even bothered to dress. He was in pajamas and a blue bathrobe, his hair was disheveled and he was sporting a considerable Five O'clock Shadow.

He walked right over to the center seat. "Well, Commander?" He said to Montoya.

She cleared her throat unobtrusively. "We've found something." She said.

Neither said anything else for a few seconds, then Pike said: "And?"

"And it answers some questions." She turned to the Sensor Officer. "Put the image up on the repeater."

"Aye, Sir." The Officer said as he complied. When the image was on the screen, both Pike and Montoya looked up at the repeater, The Science Officer with a smile on her face.

"It looks like an old-style space probe." Pike said.

"That's what I suspect it is," Montoya said, "but I'd want Ben - Lieutenant Goren - to have a look at it."

"Okay…so what does an old probe tell us?"

"That the system is inhabited by intelligent beings…or, at least, it was at some point. Display the projected course track."

The Sensor Officer complied again. This time the repeater showed a possible orbital track for the probe.

"The object has become a long-period satellite." Montoya said. "It will leave the system, but it won't go quite far enough to reach the nearest star. Instead, in a few centuries its orbit will bring it back within the vicinity of the inner planets."

"So you think the probe originated from within the system?"

"Its engine wasn't built for interstellar travel, and the course track has it originating from the vicinity of the fourth planet."

"The one we're going to."

"Yes, Sir. We estimate that it would have taken about sixty Earth years for it to have reached this position, and during those decades at least two of the outer planets would have been in an ideal position for the probe to have done a flyby."

"So…you think that sixty years ago there was a space program on Indira Four and it launched a mission to the outer planets?"

"It fits the information we have."

"Not all of it. I doubt people who only started launching deep space probes six decades ago could have graduated to futzing with our Warp Jumps."

"I agree, but maybe - just maybe - there's a pre-Warp civilization on Indira Four that the person or persons doing the 'futzing' are trying to protect against incursions by Warp-Capable civilizations."

That made Pike look at her. "That just brings us back to my original question: Are you sure you want to continue into this system?"

"Definitely, Sir. Now more than ever. I mean, it's why we're out here. We have to see these people and see if they have a connection to us. We also need to know if there's a connection to the Warp-Futzers…or, whatever you call them…Sorry…"

"No, that's fine. Okay, maintain course and speed and keep an eye out for any more of these probes as we move further in." With that, Pike started to leave.

"Yes, Sir." Montoya said, smiling at his back. She was duly pleased with herself.

It was a short-lived moment. "And Montoya," Pike said, turning to her just inside the starboard entrance, "unless the next spacecraft you come across has a really big fusion warhead attached and is headed right for us, don't wake me up again."

Her smile melted as he turned to leave for real. "Yes, Sir." She sighed. She'd thought he would want to know immediately. "He's never satisfied." She muttered as she went back to the center seat.

The next morning, Montoya was awakened from a sound sleep by the intercom alarm. She pulled herself out of her bunk and walked in a daze over to the intercom panel. She pressed the "Talk" button. "Montoya." She said.

A female voice said: "Commander, Captain's Compliments, and your presence is required in the Control Room."

She looked incredulously at the intercom panel, as if she were waiting to wake up from a dream. Ultimately, she realized that she really was already awake. "I'm on my way." She said and closed the link. Then she took a moment to wonder whether she should get dressed, then decided her punishment for being out of uniform couldn't possibly be more torturous than actually wearing it. With that happy thought, she was on her way to Control.

She arrived about a minute later, drawing glances from a few of the watch officers and a genuine double-take from Goren. She was wearing nothing but a pair of loose sweat pants and a Hawking Science Institute halter top.

Pike smiled when he turned his chair to look at her. "I thought I'd return the favor for last night." He said. "We found a few other things that should interest you. Science?"

Goren tore his gaze away from Montoya and cleared his throat. "Yes, Sir." He said, then to Montoya: "First off, you were right about the probe. We did some more detailed scans and confirmed that it's been in space for about sixty-two years. We also double-checked the positions of the planets at that time and reworked the projected course track to account for possible course corrections. We think your idea was on the money. It looks like the thing was launched from Indira Four."

"Well, that's wonderful," Montoya said, "but hardly something that couldn't have waited until the daily department briefing." She was speaking to Goren, but she hoped she'd said it clearly enough for Pike to hear…and that he would take the hint.

No such luck. "There's more, Commander." Pike said.

"Right." Goren said. "After we made those observations we adjusted the forward communications antenna to pick up standard radio frequencies on the off chance that we'd catch something interesting. Check this out." He turned back to the Science Station and called up a signal recorded by the Communications Officer earlier and played it over the Control Room loudspeaker.

The recording lasted just over a minute and was dominated by static, but there was something more interesting in the background, musical notes in some strange arrangement played by instruments no one recognized. The alien melody stopped near the end of the recording and was followed briefly by shrill squeals and what sounded like pounding fists before the signal gave way completely to static.

"I call it 'Alien Overture in B Flat'." Goren said. "We recorded a few other broadcasts, but that's the only one we recognized as anything humanlike - a concert. And none of the recordings is very clear. We could only clean up so much of the static, and the signal strength is marginal at best."

"And this is recent?" Montoya said.

"Near as we can tell, the signal's been traveling for a month or so. We ought to be able to pick up better stuff as we get in close…including traffic between the surface and any other spacecraft."

"That ought to make for a better daily brief, don't you think?" Pike said.

"Yes, Sir." Montoya said. "It certainly will."

"Then you should get back to your quarters and get some more rest, because when you wake up I want you to start thinking about how we're going to deal with these people when we get to Indira Four."

"Yes, Sir." She said, knowing that Pike knew full well she'd never get back to sleep with the possibility of First Contact drawing ever nearer. She took it philosophically. "Good Work, Ben." She said to Goren with a smile, then left the Control Room.

The Intercraft speakers came alive with three siren blasts, followed by an announcement from the Communications Officer on duty: "Now hear this: All Hands to Arrival Stations! All Hands to Arrival Stations! This is not a drill!"

Flores waited at the Science Station until Montoya arrived about two minutes after the announcement. "'Departure Stations', 'Arrival Stations', 'Battle Stations'…" she muttered, "…they're all the same thing! Why don't they just use one name for all of them?"

"They used to." Montoya said. "Ben told me they're all 'General Quarters'."

"So why don't they just say 'General Quarters'?"

Number One had overheard the conversation from the center seat. "Because if we did that, the less experienced among us wouldn't know whether they were coming or going." She called out. "And speaking of 'going'…"

"I'm gone, I'm gone!" Flores said as she threw up her hands in surrender and made her way to the port passage. Montoya gave her a sympathetic look as she took over the Science Station.

Pike and Adams arrived a few seconds later from the starboard passage. "Attention on Deck!" Adams called out.

"As you were!" Pike called out. "What's our status?"

Number One stood and made her report. "Sir, we're nearing Final Approach to the planet."

"Very Well." Pike said as he took the center seat. "Prepare to enter orbit."

"Aye." Number One said, then she took over the helm.

"Orbit plotted and laid in." The Navigator said.

"Helm, engage at your discretion." Pike said.

"Sub-light Engines Back Full," Number One called out, "slowing to Ahead Creep. Making corrections for orbital injection…entering orbit, slowing to orbit speed…we're captured. Engines All Stop."

Montoya stayed silent as Number One announced the procedures she was following. It had been almost a week since the ship had intercepted the alien radio signals. As Goren had predicted, they managed to pick up even more recent stray signals as they approached Indira Four. None were as easy to interpret as the Alien Overture, however. In fact, each new transmission seemed more and more like a rushed news report. It was that assessment that helped Montoya to make up her mind. She wanted to go down to the planet's surface and see the people there first-hand. Whether she'd be able to do that or not was up to the Captain, but she would do her best to persuade him. It would depend on the results of the close-up survey of the atmosphere and surface, which would be done from a Very High Altitude orbit, one calculated to allow Enterprise to avoid the smaller orbital craft the ship had begun picking up on its sensors.

"Turn us bow-on to the planet." Pike said.

"Turning the ship bow-on." Number One said as she gave the ship ninety degrees of yaw to port. Soon Enterprise was staring down on Indira Four from 20,000 miles up. It also had the effect of exposing the least possible amount of the ship's surface area to direct sunlight.

"All right, people," Pike said, "let's get the lay of the land. Communicator, tell Flight Ops to launch the 'Alert' probes and begin SIGINT operations. Sensors, begin STC tracking and report all inbound and launch contacts. Countermeasures, bring up the wave-canceling system and switch the active jammers to 'Standby'. And we're at EMCON One as of right now, everybody. Let's not startle the natives."

Pike's orders set off a flurry of activity in and around the ship. The Flight Operations station - located in the Flight Bay - launched the two off-board sensor probes already loaded in the probe launch tubes mounted in the underside of the Support Section. One of the probes was a tactical one equipped with smaller versions of the sensors aboard Enterprise. It would take up an opposite orbit and cover the areas of space obscured to the ship's sensors by the bulk of the planet. The other probe was a weather satellite. This one would take up a pole-to-pole orbit and sample the planet's atmosphere and climate and also act as a communications relay between the ship and the tactical probe. Meanwhile, the Communications Officer switched from searching for random transmissions to conducting Signals Intelligence - SIGINT - a dedicated search for military-style transmissions, such as short-duration, line-of-sight bursts of information. The Sensor Officer began a detailed chart of the orbits of all the objects in near space for Space Traffic Control purposes. And the Countermeasures Officer activated the Sensor Wave-Canceling System. Mounted in strips on several of the broad areas of the ship, these devices were designed to detect scanner energy frequencies and transmit them back toward their source out-of-phase, negating any return energy before it reached the source's sensors. Finally, the entire Control Room was now operating under Emissions Control Setting One, which meant that there would be no active scanning or jamming and all external communications would be handled via line-of-sight, tight-beam burst transmissions. Pike wanted the ship to be as invisible as possible.

It took a few minutes for the two probes to get into their respective orbits and begin their work. Once they started sending data the Sensor Officer was first to report. "Captain, we're getting details on the atmosphere. Mostly Nitrogen and Oxygen, temperate climate, background radiation within tolerable norms, three major and two minor land masses. Getting updated size and mass estimates…we've confirmed everything that was observed from Earth."

"That's a good sign." Pike said.

The Communications Officer was next. "Sir, I'm picking up very heavy comm traffic between the surface and several satellites in close orbit. All burst traffic. Can't tell if it's coded or not without a translation, but I think a few are remote commands."

"That's confirmed." The Sensor Officer said. "Two contacts are making course corrections. They're probably transiting to new orbits."

"Sir, they're really alert down there." The Countermeasures Officer said. "As soon as the weather sat started sampling the atmosphere everything on the planet pointed toward space was amped up. They're not getting anything solid off us yet, but they're looking hard."

"Uh-oh." Pike said. "Sensors, either of those satellites gaining altitude?"

"Wait one…no, Sir, just speed. There's nothing inbound either us or…whoa! Spoke too soon! Multiple Launch Contacts! There are flashes all over the land mass bearing dead ahead!"

"Main viewer!" Pike said. Soon the view on the main screen was magnified enough so that points of white-orange light could be made out rising into the sky. Further magnification revealed areas that could only be bases with missile silos. Empty, smoking missile silos.

"There's more, Sir." The officer said. "Now the tactical probe is picking up similar launches from the other side of the planet."

"Are we the target?" Pike said.

"Can't be, Sir. All the missiles are headed for near orbit. They won't reach us…but if they continue on these tracks…" His voice trailed off.

He didn't have to finish. "Science Officer," Pike said, "just for the record, I'll ask one last time: Do you still want to visit these people?"

Montoya, who'd been staring open-mouthed at the main viewer, turned to him. "I…up until this moment, I'd been trying to figure out how to convince you to let me go down there."

"Well, I hate to disappoint you, Montoya," Pike said, "but unless everybody down there gets whatever they call 'Religion' real quick, all you'll be visiting will be a giant cinder."

Both of them turned back to the screen and watched as the missiles made their inexorable way to their targets.