The Star Beagle Adventures
Episode 1: Eye of the Beholder
Scene 16: Brains!

1.16
Brains!

A large holomatrix was built into the middle of the conference table. Control panels for this device were distributed around the table in recessed panels with transparent covers. This cover was flipped open in front of the Assistant Director of Planetary Science Systems from the Denobulan Planetary Society, Risl Phynyx. She brought up holographic images of the D. Red South 179 star system as her older sister and director was explaining.

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"D. Red South 179 is a red dwarf and its planets are all in close orbit." Terri Phynyx had a high, gravely voice. "There are no gas giants. All 18 planets are small, rocky and with the exception of the 6 inner planets, covered with large amounts of ice. Icy asteroids have delivered water to the inner planets, most of which boiled off with the exception of the 6th planet. We have divided planetary studies across our department with our Planetary Systems Team Leader, Phillip Gorman, taking the lead on the 6th planet. Phillip?"

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Gorman was a very dark-skinned human with a pronounced West African accent. "The home planet for our alien eyeball is tidally locked, with a pronounced wobble in its orbit. Like most planets, it is not exactly spherical. In fact, it's far less spherical than average, which may account for the orbital wobble. This causes the weather pattern in the thin habitable strip that borders the day side from the night side."

Sakura Nakamura Holland interrupted. "What did you learn about the electrical grid on the day edge of this twilight zone?"

Risl Phynyx responded by zooming in on a section of the planet where the day side and the night side met. A ring of clouds seemed to provide a perpetual storm with rain and lightning.

Phillip Gorman gestured toward the hologram in the center of the table. "Considering how regular and steady the generation of electricity is across the entire dayside edge of the twilight zone, it was very tempting to assume this was evidence of an artificial electrical network. However, this perpetual storm front would dissipate without its biological component."

The holographic representation continued to zoom in to the ground at the base of the storm. The lightning was striking something that looked like a very large jellyfish that seemed to extend seamlessly along the edge of twilight zone.

"This plant has adapted to attract lightning and continually recycles water back and forth into the storm front, which has stabilized the climate across the twilight zone, apparently for centuries," Gorman said.

"And that's where your little brain fungi live," Norkaond Vef piped up. "They swim all around the planet inside that jellyfish toenail. The water inside is highly saline and filled with electricity, so it is possible, from their behavior likely, that they're functioning as a collective intelligence even though they are distinct organisms." Vef seemed much more restrained than she had been earlier. She was still quite excited. The pink tellarite flipped up the transparent cover over the holographic control pad embedded in the table in front of her. "You've got to see this…"

Risl Phynyx slowly closed the cover over her own control pad and placed her hands on top of it as Vef took control of the holomatrix. The image zoomed in further - right into the innards of the lightning rod jellyfish to look at the lightning bolts striking the outside of the jellyfish diffusing into tiny tongues of electricity. Little knots of fungi were swimming through the creature they lived inside. Energized and connected by tiny forks of lightning.

The image continued to zoom in, providing a chemical, molecular analysis of the electric jellyfish and its fungal denizens.

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The U.S.S. Mako's science officer, Lt. Cmdr. Gregg Clark, spoke up for the first time. "Just how close did that probe get to that planet?" His captain put her hand on his arm.

"And that would be classified," responded Sakura Nakamura Holland.

"Quite a bit further off than your probes would have to be," added Captain Skip Howard.

"Do these fungi constitute an intelligence?" asked Pel.

"Clearly," Howard responded. "That doesn't mean they're conscious - or at least that they were before the trill showed up. They're biological, so they will take advantage of any opportunity to occupy a new niche. So what just recently arrived near their environment that provides an environment of saline fluid excited by small electrical charges?"

All three tellarites responded at once, accentuated with the snarling, growling sound typical of their accent, creating a rather creepy sound reminiscent of 20th Century zombie movies:

"Brains!"

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