Curious that you happened to mention that, Larry...
Chapter Four
“Commander, we’ve found something!” “What might that something be, Mr. Kim?” Lathena responded over her communicator to the excited geologist.
“Our radar sweep has located a large cave 600 metres at bearing 347 from our current location. Shunting the details to your tricorder now,” the Korean scientist elaborated.
Examining the data, Lathena responded, “It’s a kilometre from where we are now, but we’ve detected nothing yet. Make your way to it and we’ll meet you there. Investigate as much as you can but do
not go into the cave until we arrive. Understood, Mr. Kim?”
“Aye, Commander, we’ll be careful,” Grace responded with a hint of long-suffering in her tone.
“You’re not that far behind us anyway.” “This is true – but do
not go in thinking we’ll get there within a certain timeframe, Lieutenant! We will be there shortly.” Lathena flipped her communicator shut and turned to Specialist 3rd Class Michael Greene after consulting her tricorder again. “That way, Mr. Greene, about one kilometre,” she informed him, pointing in the appropriate direction.
“Aye, Sir,” the tall, wiry blonde answered crisply, moving in the direction she indicated. While not a humourless man, the recently-graduated security specialist was totally professional in this setting and offered no companionable banter to the second highest ranking officer of his ship. In the absence of a direct or acknowledged threat in the area, Greene’s Type-II phaser pistol was on his hip and not in his hand. Instead, a standard tricorder ran continuous rotating sweeps for life-forms and artificial objects. The frowns Lathena caught on his face indicated the mountains were still interfering too much with those scans for the young ensign to be completely happy with the situation.
“Commander… I’m detecting several animal life forms in the area; they seem to be in several groups of around five each, and…” He fiddled with the settings on his tricorder some more before continuing. “…and they seem to be at an elevation of eighty metres.”
“They’re in the lower branches of the trees?” she asked, looking up to try and see them.
“Bearings… 273, 290, 305, and 321. Just come into range and approaching quickly.” At this he drew his phaser but kept his eyes on this tricorder screen.
Lathena drew her own Type-I as well and scanned the massive trees in the direction Greene had read off. A cacophony of hooting and screaming became audible over the rest of the forest noises and it was indeed approaching quickly. A massive buzzing also became audible, like a whole armada of bees, and Greene called out, “Reading very strong insect-like life forces!”
Just then, several of the animal life forms literally swung into view; some very long-limbed primates tore through the lower branches at remarkable speed, far faster than Lathena could have sprinted. It was difficult to assess their size because of the distance, their movement and speed, but it appeared to Lathena as if they were about two metres tall. The hooting and screaming passed over them, the sloth-like primates not even acknowledging the presence of the two Starfleet officers. The buzzing was more enigmatic; it too passed over them without slowing, but neither of them saw what actually caused it.
After the furore had died down, Greene stared at his X.O. wide eyed. “Did a swarm of bees just chase a group of apes through the jungle?”
Lathena was less affected with awe, but she stowed her sudden alarm to answer her crewmember reassuringly. “It would appear so. Remember, animals our size are not likely to be the dominant life form on this planet. However, we have our advanced tools and weapons and our intellects to see us through. Good job in detecting all that before it got to us.”
“Aye Sir.” He acknowledged her praise but still looked apprehensive.
Looks like he’s having trouble believing that. He’ll just have to deal with it, Lathena thought philosophically, and they continued on their way through the forest.
“Commander!” Grace all but shouted many minutes later as they emerged into a clearing at the foot of the dark granite coloured mountains. She looked like she was really desperate to start exploring and Lathena suppressed a smile any parent of a small child would have recognised.
“Lieutenant. Have your investigations revealed anything significant?” she asked the geologist.
Kim shook her head, causing her brunette fringe to swing merrily. “The mineralogical analysis is still underway, Sir, but we expect to have an answer shortly from the ship. I also took the liberty of informing the captain of our situation, Commander,” the willowy Korean woman stated, a touch apologetically.
Lathena gave an approving nod. “Very good, Lieutenant. Anything else?”
Her slight uncertainty immediately banished, Grace went on more naturally. “We’ve fixed our position, informed the ship, and set up a beacon so that all are informed of the entrance’s location. Standard scans have given us nothing but a hash of interference, and even radar is being heavily affected. From what we can determine, there are no other caves in the rock of this area, but this is one fair-sized cavern. However, as you can see, the entrance is not evident at all.”
“I was about to ask, Lieutenant. Where is this cave and your beacon?”
“Follow me, Sir,” was her answer, and all four strode eagerly towards a rocky overhang liberally festooned with vines, creepers, moss, and other vegetation. It looked absolutely no different from any other section of the escarpment they were near.
The party halted ten metres closer to the rock face from where they started but Lathena still could not see the entrance or the beacon.
Seeing the X.O. about to speak, Lieutenant Kim raised a hand and said, “Now watch this.”
She faced the vegetation-saturated rock face at a roughly 45° angle, took two steps forward…
…and promptly vanished before the startled eyes of the XO.
*****
“Lieutenant Cha’Doth, could you come take a look at this? “Where are you, Ensign?” the Ur’uth’uul replied somewhat sardonically, a gentle chiding about proper comm protocol.
“Oh, my apologies, Sir,” the distinctive, furry contralto of the Daenaii biologist replied abashedly.
“Ah, it’s Ensign Okeild here, Lieutenant, and I’m at bearing… 217 from the subspace relay, range… two hundred and thirty-nine metres. I have a fascinating creature I’d really like you to see for yourself, Lieutenant.” Cha’Doth grinned into her communicator. She’d had several calls of this exact nature over the last hour, but after responding to the first there was no way she was settling for an image over a tricorder screen.
“I’m on the far side of the relay from you, Ensign, looking at someone else’s new pet. I’ll be with you in about ten minutes.”
“Understood, Sir.” Flipping her communicator shut she looked back to her current companion, Petty Officer 3rd-Class Na-Foreteii, and motioned for him to continue.
“So even though this is definitely vegetable matter, its tensile strength is close to that of steel. It seems to be fairly flexible despite that; we can see it moving easily, almost as if the whole plant is breathing.”
“Yes, I had noticed that,” Cha’Doth commented, taking in the three-metre height and huge tangled mass of trunks as thick as her torso taper at the top down to stalks barely wider than her wrist. “It’s slightly unnerving to see a plant move against or independent of the air currents.”
“Really, Sir?” the lab researcher asked, surprise evident in his gravelly voice.
“To me, at least, P.O. What else can you tell me about it?” she asked, slightly uncomfortable with a personal question and diverting the Efrosian’s attention back to his plant.
“Only that it was quite hard to get a sample from it to analyse. It would be more accurate to state that I took a scraping rather than excised a sample. Also that doing so elicited only a minor reaction from the plant itself.”
“It reacted to you then?” she asked sharply.
“Yes, Lieutenant,” the Efrosian confirmed. “In fact, it moved towards me, though in a slow, almost questing manner. It was easily avoidable.”
Cha’Doth regarded the tangled dark green mass of stalks, leaves and tendrils that softened the appearance of the main bulk of the alien plant with narrowed eyes. Her home planet of Ur’uth had plants capable of independent motion – indeed, some were actually able to uproot themselves and ambulate to more nutrient-rich soil. Such plants had been the focus of endless horror vids in her society in much the same way as insects and spiders had been on Earth. As such, Cha`Doth had an instinctive, base level revulsion of them.
She let none of this show, though, and merely nodded to Na-Foreteii. “Carry on then, Na-Foreteii. Be sure to upload all your data as soon as you complete your scanning. Ensign Okeild now requests my attention on the other side of the camp.”
“Aye Sir,” the Efrosian lab researcher acknowledged and once again focused intently on the object of his investigation.
I think I’ll check the electronic perimeter of the camp, just to make sure nothing can creep up on us unexpectedly if we’re staying a while, she resolved on her way to see Skora.
*****
Lathena looked at the spot where Grace Kim had vanished and hurriedly moved to get a better vantage point as she called, “Mr. Kim, can we safely assume you meant to disappear like that?”
“Yes Commander, I did,” Grace’s muffled voice came back from reassuringly close at hand.
Lathena homed in on where the sound was coming from and positioned herself accordingly. Sure enough, the geologist’s deep red uniform jacket and black skirt were visible in the fissure through which she’d walked, and her Andorian superior’s slight alarm abated. “Come back out, Lieutenant,” she ordered.
She watched Grace wind her way back out, noting that the passage itself seemed quite large, easily accommodating the tall Korean’s frame, but that it was a very crooked path.
Lathena looked over at the science equipment set up beside the fissure. “How long before we get the results of the mineralogical analysis?” she asked an emerging Lieutenant Kim.
“The analysis is still running through the ship’s computers, Commander; I had hoped— ah, there we go,” she interrupted herself as the equipment bleeped satisfyingly. Taking in the results, Grace’s face fell slightly.
“It is kelbonite, then,” Lathena intuited.
“I’m afraid so, Commander,” she agreed, adding, “but not only that. Its molecular structure indicates it’s a more densely formed mineral. These mountains are composed primarily of standard kelbonite but there are vast areas where the material displays twice and even three times the usual sensor interference properties.”
“Fantastic,” Specialist Greene muttered disgustedly.
Lathena couldn’t help but agree. “Why is it that, whenever we develop new and improved sensors, the universe always manages to show us new and improved ways to thwart those sensors?” she asked rhetorically.
“To keep us humble, Sir,” Joao Na Tchuto spoke up. “To remind us that we are not gods and never will be, by showing us there will always be mysteries to investigate, challenges to meet, and obstacles to overcome.”
The security specialist from the United African State of Guinea-Bissau then ducked his head slightly as he became the focus of the rest of the landing party’s eyes.
Lathena broke the short silence. “That’s… a very good answer, Joao. I’d never really considered that question seriously before. Thank you.”
The sincerity in his commander’s voice seemed to embarrass the normally taciturn security man, but he met her eyes and acknowledged her words with a brief nod and a more characteristically short, “Aye Sir.”
Changing gears, Lathena stated, “Let’s begin then, shall we? Joao, keep your tricorder on the standard subspace sensing bands. You’re on rear guard. Mr. Greene, you are our echo ranger at the head. I will run the radar sweeps and place the comm relays to maintain our link to the ship through the beacon. Lieutenant Kim, you are our signal hunter. Our combined mapping efforts should create a half-decent picture of our routes ahead and available options.”
Heads nodded and tricorders were adjusted accordingly as Lathena made a final call to the ship to relay their plan and intentions.
“Very good, Commander. Be aware that if your exploration takes too long without yielding results we will dispatch another team to search for other cave systems in the areas you did not reach. Since we are quite likely to lose contact with you despite your precautions, that other team will have orders to come looking for you if you are out of contact for more than three hours. Understood?” “Aye, Captain. We’ll be careful. Lathena out.” She closed her communicator and addressed her team. “Let’s go exploring.”
Topic: Falklands: Episode One - Quarantine (Read 26077 times)