Post #293: A Mystery Is Afoot

Posted on Wed Aug 13th, 2025 @ 8:40pm by Ensign Hannah Thrace & Captain Marius Pontmercy

1,453 words; about a 7 minute read

Mission: A New Beginning
Location: Ready Room
Timeline: current

On:

Hannah rode the turbolift up to the operations platform, she was a mixture of nerves and curiosity at this point, nervous because she rarely came up to see the Captain in these sorts of circumstances - which was likely much to the Captain's chagrin but plausible deniability and all that, she was curious because like all good scientists she was motivated by the thrill of the chase, the desire to accomplish something, she was also no stranger to running into walls but she'd never expected to run into the wall like this. Some said that Starfleet's security officers made the most dangerous of officers because they were the ones with the phasers but in truth the scientists and the engineers were far more scary than that, they had the knowledge to do things that no one else could, Hannah's service record was evidence enough of that, so it wasn't unheard of for scientists research to be classified by Starfleet Security but Hannah had never seen a classification this high before. Stepping from the turbolift she crossed the short distance to the Captain's ready room door and pressed the doorbell.

Marius had only just returned from a briefing with the Admiralty, and had almost taken a seat behind his desk when his doorchime rang. Glancing up, knowing that no meeting was scheduled, wondered who it was.

"Enter," he called.

Hannah stepped inside the ready room a nervy smile on her face. "Captain." she said "Can I run something past you that is a little bit potentially encouraging but also somewhat concerning?"

Marius' eyes narrowed as he took in the sight of the Ensign before him. While he had interacted with Thrace on a few occasions he had not known her to come to him directly, unless being called. He took in her expression, and he could tell she was sincere.

"Well you've certainly gotten me curious, Ensign. What do you have?"

"A bit of a mystery." Hannah said "I've been trying to figure out the terraforming conundrum. Normally we'd grab a comet made of a large enough quantity of ice and hurl it into the planet's atmosphere, the heat melts the ice and the atmosphere is seeded with water and that prompts the change, but it's a gradual change that doesn't happen overnight it takes years and decades, I don't think we've got that much time to waste, we've got a finite amount of room on the base and the more refugees we get from the alpha quadrant the less room we have." she took a deep breath "So I went looking through the science databases for terraforming research, looking for anything that might conceivably help us out with this, something that might be a way of doing it faster and to the expected standard. I think I've read through all of the data on the subject in the database and got nothing except for this." she handed a PADD over to the Captain "It's a set of coordinates and a stardate 8130.3, those coordinates pertain to an old Federation science facility, the stardate is from 2285. I looked it up, I can get some basics of the facility I know it was doing some sort of terraforming research, I know who was based there, I know the facility was raided and I know the raiders were subsequently chased and destroyed by the USS Enterprise, but I don't know the actual specifics of the research and I'll be honest I've never seen a Starfleet Security classification threshold as high as what's on this."

Hannah took a deep breath again looking directly at the Captain "I can count the number of people on this base who would have that high of a security clearance on one hand and I don't believe any of them would willingly or knowingly let it slip, there's obviously a reason it's classified. However." she indicated the PADD she'd handed Marius "That implies someone does know what it is and knew enough to give me precisely what I would need to know if I wanted to go and try to find out what. I might be overthinking this but I think we've got a leak onboard."

Marius grew serious, quickly. As he thought over what the Ensign had said, he ran the likely subjects through his mind, coming up empty.

"I agree that it seems likely," he said after a careful pause. "But anyone with clearance that high is most likely in a leadership role. Those I know wouldn't do something like that... Do you have an idea of who?"

"No I don't but I don't believe anyone in the leadership would do that either." Hannah said "Which raises the other implication sir - that there's someone else aboard base who knows what this is and/or has the ability to circumvent Starfleet Security to lead us on the breadcrumb trail so to speak."

"To what end- or rather, for what purpose? If we need the information that they are giving us, why the subterfuge?"

"Starfleet Security classification this high implies that there's a very good reason it's classified, it's therefore highly unlikely those that know are going to volunteer the information, better to set us on a treasure hunt and figure it out for ourselves than ask the Admirals to declassify it, because that too comes with a lot more questions than we may want to answer."

Marius sighed. He drummed the tips of his fingers on the edge of his desk while he thought.

"Have you looped Lieutenant V'Lar into this? I feel like she may have some insight that we do not have."

"Not yet." Hannah said "For all I know she's the one dispensing the information, but speculating isn't helping anyone." she sighed and looked up at the ceiling for a moment before back at Marius "I don't know what this research is but I'm prepared to guess that someone thinks that it's a solution to our present predicament. I may have a way of finding out the truth of that and we may be able to get two birds with one stone."

"What is it," Marius asked? At this point he was open to almost anything if it meant a quicker way of establishing a secure Operations center.

"We have the means of getting the answers we seek without having to worry about security clearances. We have the means of going straight to the source so to speak" Hannah said "They're leading us down a path and I doubt this is the end of it so we do what they presumably want us to do meanwhile have security, intelligence and everyone else who needs to start watching the science team, if it's the Admirals you're more likely to find out before anyone else, but if it's a third party then we set a trap and flush them out."

Marius didn't enjoy the cloak and dagger aspect to this, but they needed answers, and quickly.

"I'll wait to meet with Admiral Tabolt for now," he said finally. "Let's proceed in trying to ascertain the individual behind this. Have teams begin watching the Science division. Set the trap, and find out who it is. And Ensign, the quicker the better. Keep me updated on whatever you find."

Hannah nodded in agreement "I'll need you to take myself and a couple of others off duty for a day maybe more because I don't know how long this will actually take and I don't particularly like being at the whim of another being especially powerful ones." she said "If all goes to plan it's not going to take more than a few hours but I've never been one for wishful thinking. As for the other couple that's your call but I'd like someone who can be objective and they'll need some scientific and computing understanding."

Marius thought for a moment.

"Take Galaway from the Science Department, and McGregor from Engineering. Do you need more than those?"

"I shouldn't." Hannah said "I'm fairly certain a large party would cause a few complications as to the method."

"Alright then," Pontmercy said as he wrote something down on a padd before handing it to the Ensign. "This is a notice removing the three of you from active duty for three days. If you need longer, just let me know."

"Thank you sir." Hannah said "We'll see you when we get back."

"Sounds good," the Captain said, and nodded at her, indicating that their meeting was over. He knew that she had a lot of work to do, but was glad that she was on it.

Off:

Captain Marius G. Pontmercy
Commanding Officer
Starbase Obsidian

Ensign Hannah Thrace
Alien Archaeologist & Anthropologist/Intelligence Officer
Starbase Obsidian

 

RSS Feed