The USS Placid has been ordered to investigate an alarming pattern of disappearances at the research station on Psi Secundus. Our Chief of Security, Chief Engineer, and I have beamed down with a small security team to speak to the director, as we have been unable to establish contact with the station from the ship.
[ANDORIAN FEMALE] You mean Lieutenant Sylek failed to establish contact. I'm telling you, commander: he's not cut out to be a communications officer.
[HUMAN FEMALE] Lenny! That's a horrible thing to say!
Ignore her, Logan. Len's just trying to get Sylek to lead one of her security teams.
[HUMAN FEMALE] That's no excuse for putting him down. You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.
[ANDORIAN FEMALE] I'm not trying to catch flies, I'm trying to persuade a Vulcan to use his talents to best advantage. –Commander, you've seen him in action. Isn't it a waste to have him sit at a console all day?
I told you, I'm not getting involved in your recruitment plans.
[ANDORIAN FEMALE] But we'll need someone after Tanar transfers.
[HUMAN FEMALE] Shameless. –Is that the station there?
I hope so. My knees are starting to hurt.
[ANDORIAN FEMALE] It's strange that they built the station so far from the supply drop site.
[HUMAN FEMALE] Probably something to do with their research. –Looks like the door's open.
[ANDORIAN FEMALE] Let me take point, commander. I don't like the look of this.
Good idea. –Phasers out, heavy stun. Hold your fire until you can clearly see what you'll hit.
[HUMAN FEMALE] Is your log still recording?
Oh, don't get me started.
[ANDORIAN FEMALE] This is Lieutenant Commander Lennos of the starship Placid, responding to a request for assistance received by Starfleet on 2827.9 from this facility. If you are able to respond, do so immediately!
[UNIDENTIFIED] Help us! Oh my god they're everywhere–
[HUMAN FEMALE] I did! It was a cry for help! –We're coming!
[ANDORIAN FEMALE] I didn't hear anything like that.
I heard a voice, but not what it was saying. –Logan, what did you hear, exactly?
[HUMAN FEMALE] I heard "Help us" and "They're everywhere".
[ANDORIAN FEMALE] Could be a trap targeting humans.
Could be a penguin playing a banjo, for all we know. Let's go in and find out.
[ANDORIAN FEMALE] Fine—but stay behind me.
((Lennos tosses an emergency light through the research station door into the darkness beyond - how much of the room is lit up? rolled 15, x5 = 75%; can they see equipment? Highly Probable - 15 (yes); can they see the McGuffin? 50/50 - 8 (yes) ))
There's nobody here... just these little chunks of crystal lying around.
[HUMAN FEMALE] The tricorder is picking up silicon and oxygen with various impurities. It's natural quartz.
No harmful radiation? No toxic chemicals?
[HUMAN FEMALE] Nothing detectable. You should be able to pick one up.
[ANDORIAN FEMALE] I heard the voice this time. What did it say?
[HUMAN FEMALE] I didn't hear it.
I heard "Don't touch it", and I'm inclined to obey. We still have no idea what caused the disappearances here.
[HUMAN FEMALE] How could a few chunks of quartz crystal make people disappear? It's more likely they're just geological samples left behind when the researchers left—or were taken, or whatever happened.
Logan, don't–
[HUMAN FEMALE] It's fine, Bec. Just a pretty little crystal. Go on, pick one up.
Whoever said that, come out in the open and explain! Are you talking about the researchers, or about someone else?
[HUMAN FEMALE] Who's she talking to?
[ANDORIAN FEMALE] Somebody said something. Don't worry about it. Let's grab some more cystals.
I am ordering you both to put down those crystals and help me search the building.
[ANDORIAN FEMALE] Why? There's nobody here.
[HUMAN FEMALE] Take a crystal, Bec.
Becker to Kerrigan: I need backup immediately.
[HUMAN FEMALE (2)] What for? You should see all these gorgeous crystals out here.
There weren't any– Oh, god. –Becker to Placid. Do not beam up anybody from the landing party. We need to quarantine this planet.
[EDOSIAN FEMALE] You sound stressed, commander. Why don't you just sit down and grab a nice crystal?
...Fuck.
First Officer's Log, Supplemental:
I realized too late that the crystals in and around the research station have some sort of mesmeric power. Every member of the crew who has touched one is in its thrall, no longer interested in performing their duties.
I only managed to warn a handful of people not to touch the crystals. We have convened in the conference room to discuss the situation and to determine next steps.
[ORION NONBINARY] Why are you recording your log now?
You were running late. I figured starting a log would make you turn up. –Computer, prepare to record and transcribe on my mark, and end log.
[[THE FOLLOWING IS FROM A COMPUTER TRANSCRIPTION. THE RECORDED PARTIES' NAMES HAVE BEEN ADDED AS ATTRIBUTIONS AFTER THE FACT.]]
CMDR BECKER: Officers present for this meeting are Captain T'Pin, CMO D'naar, Lieutenant Sylek, and Ensign Sharpe. –and Commander Becker. ...Is this really it?
LT SYLEK: Yes, sir.
CMDR BECKER: Yikes. We'd better get to work, then. –Captain, if I may?
CPT T'PIN: Proceed.
CMDR BECKER: Doc, what's your team found out so far?
LT CMDR D'NAAR: Thanks to Nurse Sharpe, we now know that it's safe to handle the crystals with medical gloves.
LT SYLEK: I commend your courage, Mr. Sharpe.
ENS SHARPE: You do? –I mean, thank you, sir.
CMDR BECKER: If you two are done flirting...
LT SYLEK: I beg your pardon?
ENS SHARPE: A joke, lieutenant, sir... Just a joke.
CMDR BECKER: Mmhmm... –What about the mesmerized crew members?
LT CMDR D'NAAR: All their life signs seem normal, apart from a slight decrease in respiratory rate and lowered blood pressure. They're completely calm as long as you don't try to take their crystal.
CMDR BECKER: And, if you take away the crystal...?
LT CMDR D'NAAR: They try to get it back—not violently, but relentlessly, like a sleepwalker trying to pass through a closed door. If it weren't such a serious issue, it'd be hilarious.
CMDR BECKER: And you still can't find out how the crystals are affecting them?
LT CMDR D'NAAR: I'm afraid not. All we know for certain is that it requires physical contact.
CMDR BECKER: Have you tried anything on them?
LT CMDR D'NAAR: You mean, have I administered anything to them? I don't even know where to begin. I can form a hypothesis, but I'm not going to start randomly experimenting on living people.
CMDR BECKER: ...Let's set that matter aside for a moment. –Lieutenant, were you able to contact anyone nearby?
LT SYLEK: I made contact with a freighter on its way to make a scheduled supply drop for the research station. They do not seem to have been affected.
CPT T'PIN: Then the prevalence of the crystals must be a very recent development. Otherwise the freighter crew would have encountered them.
LT SYLEK: I have also launched a quarantine beacon to broadcast a warning to anyone entering the system.
LT CMDR D'NAAR: Hopefully they listen better than Logan and Len did. When we get this sorted out, I'm scheduling a mandatory remedial training on landing-party safety protocols.
CPT T'PIN: I will approve the training. Even in the event that we resolve this situation unscathed, we will have wasted a fair amount of time. It would be preferable to avoid such incidents going forward.
LT CMDR D'NAAR: You'll get no argument from me. I'm tired of dodging crewmen trying to hand me crystals.
CMDR BECKER: If I end up with a crystal, I give my consent for you to experiment on me to find a cure.
LT CMDR D'NAAR: I don't want to drug anybody if they're not in distress.
ENS SHARPE: ...Was that knocking?
CMDR BECKER: WE DON'T WANT ANY ROCKS.
YN LOPEZ: Commander... is the doctor there?
LT CMDR D'NAAR: Who wants to know?
YN LOPEZ: I went to Sickbay, but everybody seems to be busy. I'm not feeling very well.
ENS SHARPE: It's Didy—I mean, Yeoman Lopez. Didn't he have a crystal?
LT SYLEK: It may be a ruse to force us to touch the crystals. I advise caution.
YN LOPEZ: My hands are numb, and... I'm so tired...
LT CMDR D'NAAR: I need to check on him. Let me–
CMDR BECKER: I'll get the door. Stay back behind the table. –Hold on, yeoman.
YN LOPEZ: Oh... Hi, commander. Sorry, I... I think I'd better... sit down...
ENS SHARPE: Look out! He's got a rock!
CMDR BECKER: Lopez–!
LT SYLEK: Don't touch him, sir.
CMDR BECKER: Easy does it, Lopez. Lie down and let the doctor check you over.
YN LOPEZ: Thanks... here, take this.
LT CMDR D'NAAR: Bec–!
CMDR BECKER: What's tha– Oh. Oh, wow.
CPT T'PIN: Mr. Sylek, incapacitate Commander Becker.
CMDR BECKER: Wait– wait, don't–
LT SYLEK: Captain...
CPT T'PIN: Wait for five seconds.
CMDR BECKER: Thank you, captain. I'm fine.
CPT T'PIN: Doctor, confirm.
LT CMDR D'NAAR: Hmm... Her vital signs aren't showing the kind of changes we've observed in the others.
CMDR BECKER: For just a moment... Well, I guess it didn't like the taste of me. The important thing is that I know what the crystals are doing. –You'd better give Didy something to help him get his strength back.
CPT T'PIN: Explain what you have learned.
CMDR BECKER: The crystals themselves are harmless, but they're being used to channel energy to a focal point on the ship. –We need to scan for unusual energy readings.
LT SYLEK: I'll do that now, sir.
LT CMDR D'NAAR: What about the victims of the crystals?
CMDR BECKER: Luckily, whatever's gathering the energy seems to stop draining them before they're weakened beyond help. They'll need a boost of some kind.
LT CMDR D'NAAR: Nurse Sharpe, run ahead and start lining up hyposprays.
ENS SHARPE: Yes, sir. Do you need help carrying Didy? –er, the yeoman?
LT CMDR D'NAAR: Who's carrying anybody? He's asleep—he won't mind if we let him be until we're ready to treat him.
CMDR BECKER: Your medical ethics are beyond reproach, but I can't say the same for your bedside manner.
LT CMDR D'NAAR: Shut up, Bec. –Sir.
CMDR BECKER: Byeee. –Captain, I recommend you and I target the entity as soon as Sylek has it pinpointed.
CPT T'PIN: Recommendation accepted. –Mr. Sylek?
LT SYLEK: Massive energy conglomeration on the bridge, sir.
CPT T'PIN: Energy weapons are unlikely to have the desired effect on the entity. We should secure a portable stasis field of the type used to transport antimatter.
CMDR BECKER: That should do the trick. Let's go and evict the unauthorized personnel from the bridge.
First Officer's Log, Supplemental:
When Yeoman Lopez pressed the crystal into my hand, I knew at once why every person who touched one had stopped caring about anything else.
The crystal was warm, thrumming with energy, but soothing as a cat's purr. I could feel it drawing energy out of my body, but I didn't mind. The sensation was very like the one you get from lying down on a soft bed at the end of a hard day.
Just as I started to think I ought to let the others touch the crystal—not because it was compelling me, but because I wanted to share the euphoric experience with my friends—it suddenly grew still, and the energy it had pulled from me seeped back in.
When I said "Wait," the captain assumed that I was speaking to her and the other officers... but I wasn't. I was begging the entity not to sever our connection.
I can't explain how or in what sense I reached after it, but I did. I caught it by the tail, felt it slide from my grasp, and at once knew that it was only a thin stream flowing into a greater whole gathering itself nearby.
[HUMAN FEMALE] Skip to the part where you saved the day.
Logan? Why are you in my quarters? ...How are you in my quarters?
[HUMAN FEMALE] I wanted to thank you. Also, your bed is softer than mine.
That doesn't explain... oh, forget it. Why can't I record a log without being interrupted, do you reckon? Are my logs magnetic? Is there some kind of conspiracy on this ship?
[HUMAN FEMALE] I have no idea, that's highly unlikely, and not that I've heard about, respectively.
Cute.
[HUMAN FEMALE] Correct!
Fine. Settle down so I can finish the log.
Once we located the energy creature, it was surprisingly easy to subdue. It wasn't malevolent, but it hadn't encountered life forms like us before, so—rather without meaning to—it just drank up the researchers, one at a time, until it realized that what it had consumed, to the last atomic bond, were sapient creatures.
[HUMAN FEMALE] How absurd was it that it didn't figure that out until after it ate them?
I have a better question: how absurd were our chiefs of engineering and security that they disobeyed their commanding officer and left her to deal with the energy creature without their help?
[HUMAN FEMALE] Booooo.
You can dish it out, but you can't take it.
[HUMAN FEMALE] Truuuuue.
If I may continue... The creature, desperate for more energy but not wishing to continue destroying sapient creatures, used the abundance of natural quartz crystals as conduits to draw energy at a slower rate from many sources at once.
We were able to communicate with the creature via Science Officer Phiz, whose Edosian stamina allowed her to remain conscious longer than the other crew members being drained by the crystals. By telling Phiz, we told the creature that the situation was intolerable to us. The entity was more than a little embarrassed to learn that it had effectively paralyzed an entire starship, and it submitted to our request to enter the stasis field without any objections.
Since the entity was repentant, and none of our people sustained any real physical or mental damage, the captain decided we ought to help it find a non-destructive source of energy.
[HUMAN FEMALE] And that's how I ended up with a new friend and engineering diagnostic specialist!
Yes. Somehow, despite being the first crew member of record to fall prey to the creature, Chief Engineer Logan McLaughlin has been rewarded for her error in judgment by gaining an underling.
[HUMAN FEMALE] You're just jealous that Crys likes me better than you.
I am the opposite of jealous about that. Now that I've told the whole story, would you kindly shove off? Unlike you, I didn't take a crystal nap.
[HUMAN FEMALE] Okay—but only because I like you.
You like everybody.
[HUMAN FEMALE] I can't hear you! I've already left!
Doesn't count until the door closes, Logan.
Continuing: I did ask the entity why it cut off its contact with me so quickly, but it didn't seem to understand the question. Dr. D'naar declined my request for an energy scan because, and I quote, "you shouldn't obsess about this." Maybe they were a little testy after administering hyposprays to nearly the whole crew. I might ask again later.
I have a theory... but it's probably wrong, and I don't want to get into it right now.
None of us asked where the voices we heard on the planet came from, or why we could only hear them some of the time. I keep thinking that they must have been echoes of the scientists who were killed before the creature realized its error... but that's not very scientific, is it?
Maybe there are some places in the universe where ghosts are real.
Maybe my energy is just... spicy. I don't know.
All I know for sure is that there are quartz crystals all over the engine room, and... everyone seems to be okay with that.
Well... I guess we're all okay now.
I also know that I'm bushed. Time for bed, finally. –Hopefully Logan won't turn up under it.
