Cardassian Dance Party

A few crew members depart to take care of some prior engagements:


The Cardassians aren't too eager to depart with the Orb:


Tactical action by the away team allows a swift departure from the asteroid:

Stick-stem Shock 2

Things start to go wrong:



A member of the team takes home a souvenir of a successful mission:

Stick-stem Shock

The crew discovers a new verb:


A fight has rather messy results:


Also, this:

Re: System Shock 2 Homage

Mothma Review: Unknown Alien Ship

The Dominion.

A vast empire grown up on the far side of the galaxy, a huge new group of alien races, creating technology and ships the likes of which we've never seen.

Of course, right now we don't know much about them. They won't let us test fly their ships, and any attempt to maneuver side by side with them seems to end in phaser fire.

So what, then, are their capabilities? Are they fast? Slow? Maneuverable? Comfortable?

To find out, there was only one place to go: The Gamma Quadrant. That hot bed of Dominion activity. If I was going to see one of those Dominion ships for myself, it would be there.

We got there the same way any proper Starfleet ship would: we followed a distreses beacon. At the beacon we found, well, a Dominion Ship.

It wasn't at all what I had hoped. Its life support systems were rubbish, it had a top speed of zero, and it had the hull integrity of swiss cheese.

To be fair, it was also crashed into the side of an asteroid.

Now you might think that this would be the worst Dominion ship we would see on that trip, but you'd be wrong. That award goes to this thing! (Insert picture here.)

This hideous, blocky thing can reach a top speed of a mind bending warp 4. It has the turning capacity of a fully loaded Bolean freighter with one engine out in a gravity well. It has comfortable seating for a vast crew of zero, and then only if they don't mind phasing out of reality every now and then.

Alright, so its big, slow, and you can't get into it. But what about weapons systems? If it isn't a cargo ship, it must have some of those, right?

Wrong. This stunning vessels weapon load-out is... nothing! It's like a ship a Ferengi would have built for a Klingon on a low bid, if the Romulans were paying him better under the table.

Now at this point, I imagine you're thinking "This can't possibly get any worse, can it?" or perhaps "If you can't get in, how do you steer the thing?"

Now if you've been paying any attention to our reviews, you probably have a pretty good idea by now that we have a bit of irritation with modern steering programs. Ships computers try to take over every bloody part of flying the ship, telling you when you aren't supposed to go faster, don't turn at that velocity, the G-force is too strong and what if someone in the ship has a pet cricket, all that sort of nonsense. There's all this rubbish between you and the ship when, really, all you need is a couple of warp nacelles and a decent pilot.

So you can imagine our delight to learn that this particular ship is flown by... an artificial intelligence!

That's right! There's not a person on board that ship at all!

And it gets better! You might think that the only possible reason to have an artificial intelligence for a pilot would be to get them to follow orders, to stop whining and fly the damn ship sort of thing. But you'd be wrong. Because this designer, this Dominion designer, must have decided that the trouble with human pilots is that they get all this confidence and skill, and that they don't spend nearly enough time whining and panicking.

Let me tell you, they have that problem solved.

So if you want a ship that can't go anywhere, couldn't get you there if it could, and will complain at you the whole way, then the Dominion has the ship for you.

If you want a ship that does something useful, you'd be better off, and I can't honestly believe I'm about to say this, in a Federation ship.

Transporter stick-block

The crew makes a surprising discovery:


ALTERNATE ENDING:


After the away team transports, things go wrong:


The crew considers contacting New Bajor:

Personal Log of Lt. Praxi

This is probably the happiest I’ve ever been to lose a liver. Wait, that’s not fair to say, I’ve never lost a liver before this. Well, except for that time I bet on squamish at the academy and we used spare body parts from the Medical department as currency; but that wasn’t really mine to begin with, and also I think I lost a Tellurian squiddle then as well. So if that one counts, then this is definitely the happiest I’ve ever been to lose a liver, and if it doesn’t then it’s also the worst.

So! We have just opened up First Contact relations, well okay no that’s too much. We’re not diplomats, and there- Right. We have just established the foundation for a First Con- well that’s too far in the other direction, hmm. We met some aliens! Yes. They’re very nice, except for when they think you’re not sentient, then they are kind of dissection-happy. They exist outside of our known model of space, currently. They live in a… plane, adjacent to our own and accessible through a subspace pocket. They built an ambassador for us, out of bits, bits of... local life. People. She’s where my liver went. Mind you she needs it, and I usually don’t need both unless I’ve eaten a lot of syrup, oh but then I have a new one now! Yes it’s even got a swappable filter built in it, so if I take up a drinking habit I can beam it- right, yes. Some people died when they harvested the parts for their ambassador, so there's going to be repercussions about that. Good news is, they’re sorry about what they did, and they have a legal system, so justice can be pursued.

Oh hells, I still have to write my official report. The diplomatic corps are frothing giddy about all of this. They want all the details they can squeeze out of us: what color were they, how many eyes did they have, how many facets per eye, did they seem shocked at any point, did they have breathing apparatus, it’s very overwhelming. Doctor Kay, he’s the fellow behind the portal technology that brought us to them, and them to us, sort of. I haven’t seen him since we first reported what happened to the captain. The diplomatic corps just swallowed him up, like a thing… that drops on another thing from a tree… and then eats it. There’s even a bartender who’s advocating for the establishment of a permanent trans-subspace diplomatic and commercial waypoint on the station! The Bajorans will probably have something to say about that, I think.

Apparently, there was a previous encounter with these aliens, and it didn’t go as well as it did now, and it was with the crew of the… Federation flagship. That is, hum. I don’t, I don’t know how petty they are, on the flagship, and they might not take well to a lesser ship getting the First Contact that they, sort of, may have but really probably-didn’t-given-the-circumstances, botch. And my name is going to be on that report, and well, hm. They can’t be that bad, can they? No. No I’m being silly. Silly in a personal log, that’s a demerit. Haha. Okay! I need to collect my tricorder from that subspace pocket, which means I’ll have to get clearance from diplomatics, and SCE, which means I should leave soon, and then I can use that information in my official report. And then maybe if Quag isn’t busy with that Ferengi trader’s market, we can go watch a Betelgeusan comedy. I don’t think I really like Ferengarian comedies, they’re sort of… xenophobic.

Nano-stick-nology

The crew comes into contact with a strange man:



The extent of the crew's infection is discovered:



The infected members (heh) are taken to a strange place:



Hypnosis is used to recover repressed memories:

Personal Log of Lt. Praxi

Where to begin, where to… oh! The Vulcan Science Academy sent a representative with us to negotiate with the planet Denebole. Her name was T’parr, and she was very polite. Um, yes. So our negotiations were for a rare sort of crystal which was reputed to have special mind-altering properties, and T’parr figured they were worth investigating. As it, uh, turned out, the crystals were useless, some sort of ruse by the locals to get access to our shield generator technology. Still, they were- oh yes, and they grow their technology! With plants! And they sing at their plants! I knew it was something worth doing! Ha! So, right, they were, well are, fighting a, the, whatever they are, Dominion. And since they’re all very uptight about interference with their planets, or maybe it’s because we’ve fought them before, hmm, but they wanted us to, not give the Denebolians shield technology. I wonder if it would be creepy to have a plant-grown tricorder. Would it be meaty, or chitinous? Would I have to water it? Would it… gurgle? Hm.

So the plan was, the Aperture was to draw away the Dominion ships while a Ferengi ship, there were Ferengi there as well, they wanted the crystals for… whatever, doesn’t matter. And me and Ensign, well he was still ensign then, Ensign Quog and I would be on the Ferengi ship, with the Ferengi, since it’s their ship, and we would sneak past them and get back to the wormhole. Except that Quog thought it might be more useful to fight the remaining ship around the planet, and it seemed like a good idea, but then he wouldn’t stick to the plan, and… there must have been some impact to the ship, and they say he stabbed me over a misunderstanding, or… then I hit my head on a bulkhead. It’s very fuzzy, what happened. But yes, the trial was held on the station recently, Quog and I were pulled from active duty on the Aperture, and after a lot of hush-hush questioning, he was demoted to a noncom rank, which was not something I thought you could do, actually.

Apparently it was all due to a cultural misunderstanding, so I’ve decided to bridge this gap and cheer him up with the classic Ferenginaran comedy, “Shlork the Stuttering Vulcan Meets the Tax Man”. The ship’s holodeck is out of commission because of art moles, or something, so I got a holosuite on the station where we can watch it. I’m even bringing a box of popped corn to eat, which apparently requires milk to eat properly, and doesn’t actually take well to heat, but it seems to be alright on its own. I just hope Quog doesn’t hold any grudges against me about all this.

Captain's Log: The Par'Mahk Defense

The trial has ended.

Ensign Quog has been found to be guilty of assaulting a superior officer. Due to... cultural considerations, the penalty has been reduced to demotion. He is still serving aboard this vessel, but I will have to keep a careful eye on him in the future.

The circumstances of his crime still bother me. It seems to me that the Vorta fought hard to stop us from leaving that system. At the time, I had thought it was because of the value of our cargo. But if our cargo was worthless, then... what? Were they trying to convince us of the value of our crystals? Were there crystals that had value, and they gave us counterfeit crystals instead?

Or perhaps it was only what we've seen. What if the most valuable thing on the planet was not the crystals, but its chanting population?

They're all possibilities. But all of those possibilities point to one thing: we've been played by a civilization that we're only just learning about.

And I damn well want to know why.

Sticks on Trial

Preparations are made to safely handle the strange crystals:


Pre-trial interviews don't go quite as planned:

Mothma: The Nova Class Starship

This last week, I've had a chance to fly the new Star Fleet Nova Class Starship.

First, let's have a look at the outside, shall we?

It's... a Federation starship. A couple of warp nacelles, a sort of disk shaped thing on the front, and some decks holding the whole thing together. This is pretty much standard stuff. Obviously they told the engineers involved that they were getting "creative freedom" by stretching out the disk a little and adding a few awkward knobby bits, but they're not really messing with the design, are they?

I mean, the bloody Ferengi can make a nicer looking ship than this.

But let's have a look at the interior, shall we?

Oh my! It's beige and blue! Clearly those crazy Federation officers stayed up all night designing this one!

And of course, this being a Federation ship, there's all the extras you could expect: science bays, schools, a holodeck (not standard, but the regular version has an exercise room. So if you don't have the holodeck, you get to carry around extra weights!), and all that extra rubbish that Star Fleet swears it needs for its "missions."

But of course, all this extra weight has traditionally been a problem for Star Fleet ships. Sure, it's theoretically possible that in the vacuum of space, a single engine can push an enormous mass at ever increasing speed. But that's just not very fun. And besides, if it's ever in a combat situation it's all about acceleration.

Its like this: the engines only give you so much force, right? And Force = Mass x Acceleration. So the less mass you have, the more acceleration you get. And that's how the Klingons still manage to get such great speed out a dilithium sequencer. They've thrown every bloody thing out of the bird of prey but phasers and guns, and they've got the acceleration to show for it.

So with all the added Star Fleet bulk to it, just how fast is the Nova Class?

Under ideal conditions, it turns out the answer is: quite fast.

It's a maneuverable little ship, in spite of the unnecessary mass. It can run circles around a Galaxy Class starship, and it can do Warp 8 in a pinch.

It handles well, too, if you can get the bloody auto-navigation turned off. Let me tell you, that system is another great piece of Federation engineering, all "that turn is not within safe limits" and "more power required from the engines." It's rubbish! But turn it off, and it's actually not bad.

Though that's where the other problem with flying a Federation Starship comes in: the rules.

And by gods, the rules.

Sticks in Space!

When underway, the ship's systems start to have problems:


The mastermind is revealed:

Quog: Incompetence and Dishonor

Dearest Cousin Skeeg,

It is with the greatest pleasure that I report to you that we have returned to Deep Space Nine with our entire cargo of crystals intact. If there was anyone who might have been plotting to scoop up any of them in the event that, say, the shuttle suffered engine failure, it seems that they were foiled by the quick reflexes of our Bajoran Attache. Good work for her.

Now, there is only the fear that Quark, a rather dishonorable Ferengi on board the station, might gain access to the crystals and make use of them. If he were to do so, it would at least soften the blow if a member of our family should at least collect the percentage that our family would deserve if, in some mirror universe, we had sunk to the level of participating in such a heist. I am sure Quark could be convinced to agree.

Should Quark be convinced to part with some of those crystals, it would be even more unfortunate if some unscrupulous mercenary were to get their hands on them and use them to erase key witnesses in an ongoing investigation. The Federation would consider that quite uncalled for, so of course I would never dream of doing such a thing, especially not to a medical officer.

In other news, I have heard that the new employees I told you about have been taken into custody as part of some sort of trial against me. I am uncertain of their loyalty, and feel that their employment ought to be terminated post haste. I feel that they would find adequate employment in the bustling field of extra-vessel zero-gravity exploration. Perhaps our old friend Mr. Airlock would provide them passage to their new employment.

In case business looks slow with my current employer, it might be advisable to prepare transport to different climates. One never knows when such a thing might be required.

Drawings, continued

Local scans reveal hostile avian life forms:


The away team is tested by the natives:


A surprising revelation about the inhabited planet:


Nothing is more exciting than space combat:

Personal Log of Lt. Praxi

Personal log, stardate… well, hm. I should note that I have been hit by an energy field of little-known methodology at least twice today, so please excuse my, um, lack of temporal… graspiness. We received a distress call from a colony on a gas giant today, which apparently made Ensign Smith in Astrometrics dance with joy, with even a song and a tap routine on the central display emitter. Shame I missed it, hm. The call was due to an outbreak of a strange disease within the colony, which made the youth rebellious; ah, as in they were actively leading a revolt against their elders, not in the normal growth-stage way. It was surprisingly civil, well, for a revolution. Still very violent, mind you. Hopefully that will change soon.

Oh, but the dome! The dome they used to keep back the gaseous atmosphere and the intense pressures was generated by a gigantic shimmering gold tower, which was also worshipped by the locals and also, um, alive. My guess would be that the founder of the colony built the tower with some manner of organic technology, and the tales surrounding him were somehow conveyed as the doings of the tower. Or perhaps he transferred his consciousness into it. I really wish I’d had more time to scan it. Oh, it was also the source of the aforementioned energy field that zapped me, or at least it was what channeled natural electrical energies into me. I suppose using it as a lightning rod would help with the power requirements for an energy shield of that magnitude. It was really quite amazing, all around.

Oh yes, the plague. Dr. Z was in charge of the away team; as far as I can gather, she managed to work out a number of treatment options for them and she left it to them to choose. Hopefully they’ll all settle down once they’re cured, and their revolution can be resolved peacefully. There were also some larger… governmental or military politics involved, I don’t know. Why anyone would want to shoot at a Federation science vessel on a rescue mission of all things is… well except they don’t know about the Federation out here, do they. Guess this was as good an introduction as any. Well, unless they’ve met us already and didn’t like it. Humm. I’m going to sit in Two Starboard and drink a bucket of Calufraxian yak milk until I get sleepy. Yes, that is a good plan.

Captain's Log; Castles in the Sky

In Star Fleet history, there have always been certain ships that never manage to have what's known as a "Routine Mission." The best known examples are the Enterprises, but there have been others that suffer from the peculiar curse that every mission, no matter how dull or routine it ought to be, will end in some sort of unfortunate adventure or moral dilemma.

I fear that the Aperture may be one of those ships that suffer from the 7 year curse.

At least it's useful to Star Fleet.

Today, while on a routine mapping mission, we heard a medical distress signal. We followed up on that distress signal, and found a colony floating inside of a gas giant. There was a ship outside of the colony, apparently running a blockade and ignoring the distress signal entirely.

Needless to say, I ordered Dr. Z with an away team to gather more information and act as she felt appropriate. She did so, and I am appending her log for the events that occurred on the surface.

While her away team was dealing with the locals on the colony, the USS Aperture came into contact with the blockade ship.

The ship was run by an alien whose species I am unfamiliar with. I believe, based on how events played out, that this individual is part of some larger organization.

When we first approached, he (I believe it was a he) contacted us and made thinly veiled threats that we should leave. Rather than do so, we found a spot between several moon where we could beam the away team to the surface without detection. We then pulled away to a distance that I would have been out of range of Star Fleet sensors.

Lesson Learned: whatever kind of ship this is, they have excellent sensors.

Having discovered us, however, the ship contacted us, warned us off again, made some reference our being the creatures that came through the worm whole, and then... they sat. For a long time.

They were communicating with someone. It is my belief that the captain of that vessel intended to attack us but was, perhaps, waiting for orders. Which was good for us, as we had promised to pick Dr. Z back up in 72 hours.

We must have been the source of some confusion in the ship's superiors. It took hours for them to work out what to do with us. We spent that time trying to scan the enemy ship, and having only spotty luck.

When the other ship got their orders, it must have been to shoot us down. They tried.

Lesson Learned: That class of ship is definitely a war ship, and can outgun the USS Aperture in a straight fight.

Luckily, we didn't try to fight them in a straight fight. I ordered our ship not to return fire unless absolutely necessary, since I still had not heard from Dr. Z and had no desire to enter the Federation into a war without adequate information. Instead, we were forced to work our way back into the solar system and pick up Dr. Z early, after which we left the system as quickly as we could.

Whoever the other ship belonged to, they are remarkable war machines, and I can only hope that, whatever power commands them, that we can reach a peaceful accord with them before we have to see them in battle.

Personal Logs of Lt. Praxi

[personal log] yet and it’s completely… Wait, okay, so maybe I can just fit this bit back in lengthways and then, maybe… there. Okay then. Computer, begin new personal log, stardate 46-[/log]

[personal log]… ? Stardate 46401.7. I have finally joined the crew of the Aperture on her maiden voyage. I can already tell that there are many nice people in Engineering who are willing to help, um, those that drop their personal terminals and then step on them, and then kick the important bits under a chair, by accident. There are also… less nice people aboard, such as the ensign in charge of impulse engineering, but I’m sure I’ll get to know him better. Maybe he will even return my allotment of latinum that I gave him for the, um, meal in the, hmm. Well, maybe not.

Oh yes! The launch went without concern, and the wormhole was surprising larger than expected. I always assumed that the Aperture was assigned to it due to its small size, as something that could transport ships that far away must require a tradeoff in capacity, but no. Speaking of the ship, it has an incredible sensor suite! State of the art spectral induction plates, tight-band material analysers over the ramscoops, and some sort of new buffering grid to compensate for the, uh, the… oh karf it, what’s that effect that’s based on… Doppler Effect! Yes. It allows for better scan resolution while in flight. I should include some of the images that Astrometrics has been capturing, they’re beautiful. I’ll figure out how to do that, later, yes. And my quarters! I have a window! All to myself! And it’s down the hall from the officer mess! Well they’re all down the hall from that, but still!

Currently we’re working on a simple shakedown mission to find a missing probe, with Lt. Mellok, he’s the Chief Engineer, working on the case. I’ve submitted an initial crew roster for the science department to the captain, based on their career profiles. I’m pretty sure they’ll be accepted, I did some extra footwork on their backgrounds. Oh, but then I mentioned that yesterday, didn’t I… hm. Well then, I’m repeating myself.[/log]


[personal log], supplemental. Where to begin, ah. We’ve encountered, well we met it really, a living sun! It’s a G2V with a magnitude of… well that doesn’t rightly matter, it was alive! It may even be a new subtype of cosmozoic life! And we met with natives on a local planet that worshipped it! Well, sort of. Also, the sun tends to attack things in space that it considers hostile, which is… everything. Well not the planet, it doesn’t attack the planet I don’t think… Oh this is rubbish. Let’s start over.

It started when we rendezvoused with the U.S.S. Equinox in the Gamma Quadrant, where we were given the task of finding a missing survey probe. Lt. Mellok tracks it down to an M-class with a pre-warp society orbiting a living star. Well, we didn’t know that at the time, or that it apparently knocked the probe down. But I’m getting ahead of myself again, yes. So then! We pick up lifeforms approaching the crash site, and well, you know, the Prime Directive dictates that we have to stop them, so we get a visual scan of their clothes and anatomy, and Dr. Zelth… Zlethel… Dr. Zee and her personnel alter our appearance so we can blend in. Also, having a nose is weird. I’m glad I didn’t have to eat with it.

Then, and this was a neat part, we take the Aperture’s atmospheric shuttle, the Black Forest, down to the surface. I even managed to use the ionic interference in the atmosphere to mask our approach, um, once or twice. We had to stall the locals that made it to the wreckage, but we managed to recover it without their notice or too much trouble. Lt. Eketha, the Chief of Security, seemed very keen on violence, and Ensign Quag was dangerously close to, well, doing something awful. Really though, hmm. I make to deride them, and the only real hitch in the operation was my fault. That’s not what… oh right, yes. As we were leaving, I couldn’t quite find an ionic ‘pocket’ to tuck the shuttle into, and we… we spooked the locals, I suppose. We had to go back and stun them, then Dr. Z had to wipe their memories.

After we returned to the Aperture, we found that the sun was attacking the ship, as it was alive, as I mentioned. So we had to hide the ship behind the planet and work out it was alive, which was easy when Ensign Ls’uzz, a Betazed, picked up on its thoughts; and that it was sentient, which was easy when Lt. Mellok worked out that it was fluctuating the temperature of its core as a form of language. Strange way to communicate, but then I suppose the flapping about of organic bits is just as strange. Oh yes, and we set up a beacon probe to warn ships away from the area. Can’t have a zealous sun blasting everything without warning, oh no.

So! That was my day today. Humm, wow. It certainly kicks nebula surveys into a vert nest. Almost sorry we didn’t get to stay and study it, but then it was a very overprotective sort of sun.[/log]

Personal Log Lt. Zletha zh' Vetra

The U.S.S. Aperture picked up a medical distress signal in the Gamma quadrant. The colony was being orbited by a ship. We were hailed by the member of a race I have never encountered before, but that's not really a surprise, since we are exploring a new quadrant. This person told us to disregard the distress signal, which of course, we did not do.

I assembled a team consisting of our science officer Lt. Praxi, engineer Lt M, our Bajoran liasion officer and security personnel chief Lt. Eketha th' and Ensign Chris as well as Nurse Shiloh, in full hazmat gear and we beamed down to the planet.
We beamed into a small colony on a gas giant.
The colony had a large golden pillar in the center that seemed to project a shield made of lightning over the colony. We were met by a trio of natives, Decoon and his parents. The natives looked very much like the alien that told us not to respond, but perhaps less evolved, their facial ridges were more pronounced.

The natives who described an illness that had no analogy to anything I had seen before. The pathogen infects the young, progressing from disorientation to extreme violence where the children killed their parents, then listlessness and death.  The violent portion of the population had been fenced off toward the center of the colony, and the listless had been moved to the hospital.  Most of the team went to the hospital, while Lt. Eketha th' and Lt. Praxi went to explore the colony.

We set up in the medical office and went through the records of their doctor, who was one of the first casualities. We found wedding records that suggested a marriage custom in which the parents were the witnesses until three months ago, then the witnesses drop down to two and no longer have the same family name.

After scanning Decoon and his family and the infected natives at the hospital, I found a fungus blocking a gland at the base of their brain. The gland apparently distributes a chemical through the body, and the fungus was growing all along those pathways.

I found two different cures for the fungus, one that would kill the fungus and one that would negate the need for the gland and the chemical it secretes.

However, I didn't feel I understood enough about the function of the gland to give the people a cure that would change them to that extent. And I didn't understand where the people were being infected with the spores, so I was reluctant to give them what I felt would be a temporary cure without finding the source of the spores.

While my team was gathering information, Lt. Eketha th' and Lt. Praxi reached the fenced off part of the colony, where they contacted the young people behind the barricade. Their version of the illness was very different; they described the fungus as "freeing them from parental oppression".

We found a moderately infected young female, named Muldress, who was helping relieve the suffering of the patients in the hospital. Our Bajoran liasion officer tried to speak to her, but given the difficulty of the questions being asked(most cultures are not open about maritial or sexual matters) she was unsuccessful. But I was impressed with her effort.

After some study, I discovered that the gland was related to the part of the Betazoid brain that controls telepathy, and scanning Decoon and his parents, discovered that the gland was activated when the parents communicated with Decoon, leading me to believe there is a telepathic connection between the parents and children.

At dusk, the hospital was overrun by the young people that were behind the barricade; they came to free their "captured" comrades.

I stepped between the two groups, followed by Ensign Chris, who showed great bravery in the face of two angry mobs,  and tried to explain the cures and how they could help. Lt. Eketha then told me the view of the young people toward their parents.

Through questioning, we discovered that the young people were being infected by "The Founder", their god, whose temple(or self, my understanding was unclear) we travelled to so to settle the question of whether or not the Founder infected the young people.

As we stood in front of the Founder, lightning shot out from the golden pillar, and infected everyone in the crowd except for our landing party. We then got a call from the Aperture saying they needed to pick us up now. I then left both cures and the explanation for their use and we beamed out.

I was impressed with the conduct of my team. Nurse Shiloh, our Bajoran liasion officer, Ensign Chris and Lt. M were especially helpful during this mission.

However, I feel as if I failed this mission. It was a complicated situation that I was not flexible enough in thought and theory to solve before we had to leave. I should have found a way to cure the fungal infection without interfering with the culture.

Star Trek, in crude drawings

The medical team encounters a grave threat during the mission:


Meanwhile, the more science-minded members make a discovery:

Quog: Profit is the Sun of Invention

Dearest Cousin Skeeg,


I have secured a position on board the USS Aperture. We are tasked with mapping out new territories for the Federation. Allow me to tell you of such a planet, of value only to an individual who would be so bold as to completely flaunt the rules of the Federation. The sort of thing which I, being honorable, would never do.

To date, we have only visited a single planet. The coordinates are attached. It is not as promising as you might like: they are a primitive culture, protected from Federation meddling by the Prime Directive. It could be that these barbarians could, however, be brought up with an understanding of the honor of profit by someone who, for instance, followed some other set of rules.

Should an individual such as that attempt to open trade with the planet, though, for instance for their rustic craftworks (I have attached scans of examples. The real thing could be quite valuable to the right collector, particularly those idiots who still insist that handmade is "better"), there are certain things which they should know. Things which could be even more advantageous.

Their sun, it seems, is intelligent. And quite keen on defending the population of the planet, which is seems to regard as its children.

Just think, if some individual could somehow take control of the population, it could be possible to use them as leverage to trade with the sun itself! Such a person, unhindered by the unethical laws of the Federation, could make a glorious profit from goods made in the belly of a star itself!

As a member of the Federation I would, of course, be forced to report any such nefarious doings to my superiors. I trust that I would never find any evidence that any member of my family would so foolishly pursue any goal related to such a thing.

For honor and profit,
Quog