Foreign Tech, Attack During the Ferengi Mission

Posted on Sun Oct 22nd, 2023 @ 9:32am by Commander Chalan Kendri & Commander Jason Elliot
Edited on on Sun Oct 22nd, 2023 @ 10:11pm

1,093 words; about a 5 minute read

Mission: Mission 1: Campor III - Resupply
Location: Intelligence Lab
Timeline: MD C12 1330 hours

Kendri walked in to see Commander Elliot running initial scans on one of the gold disk-like drones that had attacked the team at the stream near the Grabok settlement. Lieutenant J.G. Ligan from security/tactical was watching the two work and on standby in case they needed assistance.

"Good, I'm glad you've started already. It doesn't look like any tech I've seen, at least on the surface. But, I was hoping it may offer some clues as to what is going on down on the planet. If it is all related," Kendri stated.

Jason looked up, "The outer shell is a strange poly composite that if it wasn't sitting here I'd say it didn't exist, I've forwarded my scan too Starbase eighty-eight for review, the electronics are a mix of designs with a few improvements, who was using this?"

"I was hoping you could tell me," Kendri responded. She took a deep breath. "We didn't see anyone on the ground. When we got back to the shuttle our sensors didn't pick up anything, but the Columbia caught some recent traffic out of some caves about nine miles out," Kendri explained.

"Here's the strange thing. As we were leaving, four Romulan shuttles decloaked and flew off. I can't imagine it was them. Why would they use drones, if they were behind it, we would have been outgunned easily." Kendri looked at the Chief Intelligence Officer. "Any thoughts?"

Jason sat back looking around the room, "These were not manufactured anywhere I know of within the federation, too much finesse for anything Klignon or Ferengi, the targeting has an A-I component which eliminates the Romulans, so we have a mystery." Jason held up the power cell he'd removed before anyone had arrived, "I don't recognize the power source signature either, I've got the computer crunching some numbers."

"AI? That explains why they were getting harder to take down." Kendri walked over and took a closer looked at the done. "Tomm shot the first one down pretty easily, but then the next one was a lot more difficult. Right before the rest of the team got back with the shuttle, we had to use two phasers in tandem to get anywhere with them."

"And the material is foreign too. It would be easy for someone to pit these societies against one another," Kendri pondered. "But to leave something behind that couldn't be traced to any of them seems kind of sloppy."

The Computer began to chatter as the results scrolled across the screen, he felt the blood drain from his face, "Breen."

"Are you certain?" Kendri asked. "That seems a little subtle for them. If they wanted to take us out they could."

"Even if they aren't involved directly this is similar too their power signatures, it's of concern." Jason said rolling the lab chair over too the opposite bench "I'll need to recheck numbers and we'll need the material study results back but this is where it's going," he said picking up a coffee.

"I guess we better tell the Captain," Kendri responded. "I have a lot of questions. He will too. We need to start working on theories."

Jason added in one final detail, "Someone who knows how to make an extremely good quality carbide composite did this, the middle layer is some form of mesh that acts like a magnet for the carbide is why you guys had a hard time taking these things out." Pausing to sip at his coffee "The lower layer is like a Nano-carbon fiber I've never seen either, it's maybe a millimeter thick."

"And it may be the Breen. Or someone who has had dealings with the Breen." Kendri paused to think for a moment. "The Ferengi are business dealers. Could they have a motive for tampering with their own water supply? The wealthy are largely unaffected. Those that make their own water from replicators don't contract the virus."

Jason paused shaking his head "Let the material lab rats do their job first, there are too many moving parts in what's going on down there, if we start pointing fingers at the wrong parties its gonna start shit we don't want to happen."

"Well something is going on down there, and we need theories to work from. They are going to start blaming one another before too long, and if that's not the case, we're going to be the ones to figure it out," Kendri stated.

"We know the Romulan ship was likely sabotage. Based on Ensign th'Kaasnik's observations, and what he overheard a Romulan say it was likely something planted on the ship and not the engine at all," Kendri stated. "Then when I was at the Klingon settlement with Commander Razka there was enormous fire, that almost took out a storage facility of explosive weaponry. They promised to send their full investigative reports, but there was deliberate damage done to the fuselage of their shuttlecraft causing an explosion."

"Now this Ferengi virus, which appears to be genetically engineered." Kendri paced the room. "If it's the Breen, why don't they just take the planet? That's been there MO before? I don't expect answers today, but we'll have a senior staff briefing soon, and we need to have some working theories to at least follow up on."

Jason let the cynical side out "I think that is a distraction to keep us from defusing the bigger plot, and one in poor taste personally."

"What do you think is the bigger plot, Lieutenant?"

Jason looked over to the XO, "If I wanted everyone off this planet, I'd cause as much chaos as possible, by any means, there's a couple of wildcard elements that I don't think whom ever is pulling everyone's strings counted on."

"This is why we keep you around," Kendri responded. "What are the wildcards?"

Jason snickered, "The list is just long enough that we could be here for months, Ex Starfleet types who don't want the Romulans here, The Romulans who want to be left alone, I'm sure the Ferengi who are here wouldn't mind to make a profit, the list is fairly long." he said taking a drink of the coffee "Hell... Richard Memphis is here, along with some of his former officers."

"I know your team has been running down leads. Once you know for sure about that thing, get us your report," Kendri said. "I'll give the Captain a heads up as to where you think this is going."

Jason threw a cover over the drone, "I'll keep you posted."

END

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