More Questions than Answers

Posted on Mon Nov 11th, 2024 @ 2:11pm by Captain Rylan Gray & Lieutenant Stormy Knight
Edited on on Tue Nov 12th, 2024 @ 3:57pm

902 words; about a 5 minute read

Mission: A Silence of Friends
Location: Captain's Ready Room
Timeline: MD001 - 1500

It took Stormy more time than she expected to get answers for the captain. Or some answers, anyway. She ended up with more questions than answers, but it was information and that was the best place to begin.

She copied everything she had onto a PADD, verified that the captain was in his ready room, and headed for the bridge. She wanted to keep digging, but she didn't want to get in trouble and she didn't want to flagrantly violate the treaty. Any next steps would be up to the captain. Checking that everything was still on the PADD, she rang the chime.

With the one-day banishment by his yeoman lifted, he was back in his office, going through reports, and plotting his next move when the chime drew him out of a particularly interesting report on Cardassian politics. "Enter," Rylan he called out and rose, out of long habit, to meet his visitor.

Stormy walked in, holding up the PADD. "I found some information you might find interesting. It raises a lot of questions." She set the device on the captain's desk. "Do you want to read it or get the summary first?"

"Please, have a seat Lieutenant," Rylan said as he gestured to the seats across from his desk. He waited until she was seated before he resumed his own. "Let's start with the summary, shall we?"

"I called in some favors and got the initial planetary report. The planet has nothing of significance. All the minerals listed are of little to moderate value. Chief among them, brizene nitrate, amethyst, and iron."

She paused for a moment to let that sink in. "Before you bring up the treaty, this is from the initial survey done before the Cardassians chose to establish a mining installation. They claim that, on further inspection, these minerals were found deeper in the planet's core. I don't have access to that report, but they claim to have mined magnesite, Viridium, and Gallicite."

She took a deep breath and continued. "I still had questions, so I looked at the data from the relay buoys. Now that the Cardassians are gone, I didn't think it would be a problem. Besides, it's not classified information. Sir…the frequency and type of ships coming and going from the mining planet are insufficient for the quantities of raw materials that supposedly came from the facility. There were regular supply ships, but where there should have been large ore transports, there were none. They were transporting something, but it wasn't minerals. In addition, I did some scans when we were on the planet. I found no trace of the elements they were supposed to be mining. Even if they loaded the minerals from an indoor bay, there would have been some trace, but I found none. I didn't realize that at the time because I wasn't looking for anything in particular. I was just gathering data."

"Of course you did nothing wrong," Rylan said. "You were pursuing an answer to a question I asked." He accepted the PADD and looked through the longer form results, nodding to himself as he did so. "This is the first step in confirming a suspicion I had. I appreciate the effort you put into this."

"You're welcome. I admit, after going down to the planet, I was still curious, so I appreciate the opportunity to satisfy that curiosity--at least in part. I don't know why the Bajorans were there. That may be something you can find out." She had her suspicions, but there was nothing to support them as yet.

"I do have my suspicions," Rylan said quietly. "And this is the first piece in putting it all together."

"I hope you do find answers. I have contacts in the scientific community, but that information only goes so far." The answers here were probably rooted in the conflict between the Cardassian and Bajoran people and that was not one of her areas of expertise. "Is there anything else you need of me?"

"That's it for now, I think," Rylan answered. "Enjoy the rest of your shore leave, Lieutenant."

"Thank you, sir." Stormy stood, gave the captain a polite nod, and headed back to her office. She was still curious, but the matter was out of her hands, and right now, she had plans for her shore leave.

[Later]

Alone in his ready room, Rylan went over the Lieutenant's report more thoroughly and then had the computer append it to his own after-action report. Once that was saved, he swiveled so that he sat facing a particularly complex painting, letting his gaze follow the intricate lines, while his thoughts focused on the problem at hand. It was never about mining, he thought. There was no laboratory setup and as a listening post, it had no value whatsoever to the Tal Shiar. When you came right down to it, the only other thing that facility had, other than privacy, was ... prisoners. Rylan leaned forward in his seat as though physically moving toward a goal. Bajorans who couldn't be quietly moved because the Federation discovered they were there.

The next step then would be talking to the Chief of Security who could gather information on leaders in the Bajoran Resistance and on the prisoners held at Quasinon III.

A Post By:

Lieutenant Stormy Knight
Chief Science Officer
USS Thunderbird

and

Captain Rylan Gray
Commanding Officer
USS Thunderbird

 

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