Captain's Log, USS Endurance, Stardate 26696 - Captain Abigail Taggart
This will be our last cruise back coreward through the Ferasa Sector before rendezvousing with Rear Admiral ka'Sharren's fleet at Collie. We may be making a bit of a detour into the Merfara-II asteroid belt on the way, though. Some caitian space miners say they've gotten erratic energy readings from some of the rocks that have them on edge.
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Captain's Log, USS Sarek, Stardate 26696.6 - Captain Samyr Kanil
The Tauni Space Gate Command has requested immediate support with what they are calling "an event of some significance." They have been unwilling to explain the details over subspace, but insist that it would be in Starfleet's best interest to send a representative immediately. As ours is the closest vessel to Kelowna, I have had a course laid in. We shall see what has SGC in such a frenzy.
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Captain's Log, USS Endurance, Stardate 26696.8
After a week of chasing those energy pulses halfway around the belt, we've finally put the thing in our sights. As best we can tell, we're looking at an energy-based cosmozoan that uses strong electromagnetic bubbles to contain its solid and liquid components, and it can dash between strongly polarized asteroids at speeds I wasn't quite willing to believe at first.
Happily, while the creature could potentially be dangerous if provoked, its proven itself nonaggressive. Better, its magnetic properties have a way of pulling mineral-rich micrometeors toward its hiding places in bulk, making its abandoned lairs hotspots for drilling. The caitian forewoman thinks she can boost productivity a good fifteen percent by tracking the cosmozoan, and she's let us scrape off some nice bits ourselves.
[Gain +30 br]
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Captain's Log, USS Sarek, Stardate 26697
We have arrived in Kelowna orbit to learn that Space Gate Command has encountered a humanoid life form on the far side of the Iconian gateway. The aliens, currently being housed at an SGC facility, claim to represent a highly advanced civilization that controls much of the Gamma Quadrant, and have hinted that they are prepared to exchange scientific and astrogational data.
I'm not sure I completely trust this yet. The alien dignitaries have been strangely evasive about the nature and history of their society, justifying their recalcitrance as unwillingness to divulge too much until they are certain we can be trusted. I cannot help the feeling that there is something amiss here.
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Captain's Log, USS Avandar, Stardate 26697.2 - Captain Hassan Aharani
We are en route to the planet Belos IV, from whence we have received a distress call from a group of honiani colonists. The contents of the distress call were disturbing, to say the least. The honiani claimed at first to be under attack by an unknown alien force, but then seemed to be speaking about internal strife, before finally suggesting that the planet itself was undergoing some form of tectonic catastrophe.
Suffice to say, I have ensured that our vessel will be prepared for anything.
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Captain's Log, USS Avandar, Stardate 26697.4
The colony at Belos IV is intact, but completely abandoned. There are no visible signs of any sort of tectonic event or orbital bombardment, and we've detected numerous honiani biosigns in the surrounding forest, but they are not responding to any hailing attempts, and due to an extreme weather event we cannot safely use the transporters. I am about to dispatch shuttlecraft to the surface to conduct a rescue.
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Captain's Log, USS Voshov, Stardate 26697.4 - Captain Demora Sulu
We were mapping the region just spin of Honiani space when we detected some novel warp signatures. There are quite a few of them, centered on a region just shy of the Interstellar Commonwealth's rimward border. We've all read up on the ISC's first contact history, we're going in cautiously, ready to bring shields up and phasers online at a moment's notice.
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Captain's Log, USS Avandar, Stardate 26697.5
While approaching a major campsite, one of the shuttles fell under phaser fire from the honiani, and has been forced to make an emergency landing as far from the source of the hostile fire as possible. The other shuttles are getting there as fast as they can, but the ongoing storm is still making things difficult.
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Captain's Log, USS Sarek, Stardate 26697.7
Truly, there are few problems a covert sensor scan can't solve, or at least help with.
The "representatives," try as they might, couldn't come up with a good reason to refuse an invitation to tour the Sarek. That gave us a chance to put our internal biosensors to good use, and reveal the cosmetic and epigenetic treatments that these tauni con artists had undergone to make themselves appear alien. It seems that a mid-ranking officer in Space Gate Command's security apparatus had been compromised by a local criminal organization, and smuggled members of the group through the Iconian device as part of a plot to trade fabricated junk data for Tauni and Federation secrets.
I gave their leader some old human spy novels to pass a little of his coming prison sentence. Maybe if he pays attention he'll be slightly better at this by the time he gets out. The Tauni government, for their own part, have made a point of investing in Federation biosensor technology, and are reevaluating SGC's security measures.
[Gain +25 relations with Tauni]
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Captain's Log, USS Avandar, Stardate 26697.8
The downed shuttle crew have managed to make repairs and return to the Avandar. In addition to injuries from the attack, several of the team members are suffering from tremors, hallucinations, and a variety of other neurological symptoms.
I have had the lot of them rushed to sickbay and kept under heavy sedation.
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Captain's Log, USS S'harien, Stardate 26698.1 - Captain T'Rinta
We were conducting our follow-up to the Atuin's initial survey in the Rajji cluster when we detected an unfamiliar warp signature from just spinward of the Ashidi. If our sensors are to be trusted, the alien ship is employing a very different warp field generation system from anything we've previously encountered, and it considerably outsizes an Excelsior. We have changed course andare expected to intercept in three days' time.
During our approach, we subsequently detected familiar Ashidi signatures in close proximity to the unknown contact. It is probable that the Ashidi are already in contact with the unknown power, but by no means certain.
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Captain's Log, USS Bull, Stardate 26698.1
We've detected massive energy readings from beneath the surface of a moon in the Dasha system, apparently synthetic in origin. Given the age and weathering of the surface above the energy source, any working technology would have had to be installed prior to the region's most recent geological deposition event over five thousand years ago. The possibility of discovering ancient technology, especially working technology, compels us to investigate.
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Captain's Log, USS Avandar, Stardate 26698.3
I remain eternally impressed with my CMO's familiarity with Federation medical history. The affected crew members all tested positive for a neurotoxic pollen protein phenotypically similar to one encountered by the Earth starship NX-01 Enterprise over one hundred years ago, though fortunately an order of magnitude less potent. This pollen was released by an indigenous plant species native to a region upwind from the colony, and blown over to it by the storm.
We have used the shuttlecraft to disperse the antidote across the region, using the winds of that same storm to our advantage. Within the hour, we began hearing from the colonists. While twenty-six honiani died of exposure or were killed by their fellows in fits of paranoid delusion, the remaining one hundred and twelve have made a full recovery.
My crew and I now, unfortunately, have our own demons to face further spinward. Once the honiani survivors have been returned to the nearest station, we will be rendezvousing with the rest of the reinforcement fleet on its way to the Gabriel Border Zone.
[Gain +10 pp]
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Captain's Log, USS Bull, Stardate 26698.4
Attempting to access the energy source by shuttlecraft may have been a mistake. We've lost contact with the shuttle, and the Bull has been seized by a tractor beam that our shields have proven useless against. If we cannot free ourselves, I will be forced to send out a distress call.
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Captain's Log, USS S'harien, Stardate 26698.5
We have met the species that calls itself Imelak. Unfortunately, they have refused to speak with us, citing the Treaty of Celos' prohibition against Federation contact with Ashalla Pact signatories. Based on third party intelligence from the Ashidi, the Imelak are a nomadic species that arrived in this region of space from further rimward several years ago, and became Cardassian clients almost immediately upon encountering them. What follows is a summary of what my crew and I have been able to infer about this species.
The Imelak have been engaging in limited trade with the Ashidi for slightly over two years. This trade has largely consisted of the exchange of Ashidi bulk resources for Imelak medical and terraforming technologies. These technologies all appear to be at least on par with the Federation's own cutting edge, and their genetic and ecological engineering technologies in particular are without a doubt superior.
The capital ship we encountered was of a three megaton displacement, making it one of the largest classes of starship currently active in known space. According to the Ashidi, the Imelak have at least one more ship of this class.
Our betazoid councilor informs me that the Ashidi have not taken yet another of their trading partners' refusal to engage with us as a point in the Federation's favor. I do not believe that our attempts to mollify them have been successful.
[New race encountered (Imelak), no relations score due to Treaty of Celos. Lose -10 relations with Ashidi]
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Captain's Log, USS Bull, Stardate 26698.6
We have been released from the tractor beam, courtesy of its controllers on the planet. They are of the same species encountered by the USS Courageous in the Tolinar system last year, and likewise were unhappy at having their adopted agrarian lifestyle interrupted by meddlers from the stars. It would seem that the entire region of space that currently houses the Ked Paddah, Laio, and Licori civilizations was once the domain of this ancient people. Their representative has admitted fault for allowing the stealth system for their lunar generator to fail and attract unwanted attention, and seemed more apologetic about the incident than anything else.
While trapped by the automated tractor beam defense, we were able to collect some interesting sensor readings of the alien technology that may be of some use.
[Gain +5 pp, +10 rp]
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Captain's Log, USS Voshov, Stardate 26698.8
That was surprisingly cordial, not to mention educational.
The Talarians are a humanoid species with somewhat klingon-like cranial ridges, whose homeworld of Jorona can be found near the tailward edge of subsector d-3 on the NIX mapping system. We were surprised to meet a peaceful, mercantile species in such an allegedly hostile region of space, but that mystery solved itself when we learned about the Interstellar Commonwealth's diktat.
It seems that the Talarian Empire was once quite a violent power, fighting often against the Sydraxians and Yrillians as it aggressively expanded. They might have conquered their way to Great Power status had they not run into the ISC twenty years ago, and been subsequently reduced to vassals after a long and bloody conflict. As best I can tell, the Padani have been making slow, but steady, progress toward the liberalization and democratization of Talarian society in the fifteen years since their surrender, though I must say their methods seem harsher than what the Federation would have done.
The Talarian Emperor is more a ceremonial ruler than anything else these days, but I think it still did a lot for the Federation's public image when he entertained my officers and I in the royal palace. The ISC's Committee for Interstellar Diplomacy has permitted a Talarian ambassador to be sent as an attache to their own embassy on Earth.
[New race encountered (Talarians), starting relations 75/100, gain +5 pp]