Posted July 20, 2019, 2:39 p.m. by Lieutenant Commander Amari Brooks (Executive Officer) (H Levi Smiley)
Posted by Civilian Melaia Reez (Scientist) in Science Labs
Posted by Lieutenant Commander Amari Brooks (Executive Officer) in Science Labs
Posted by Civilian Melaia Reez (Scientist) in Science Labs
(snip)
Mel realized it was going to be an oft repeated cringe for awhile, at least until people got to know her better. “Please, it’s Melaia or Mel. Not Mrs. Reez,” she said seriously, though she tried not to seem too offended. She once again felt that strange nostalgia and desire to be i uniform. It was just… easier. You had a rank and a position and there was not fussing about with how you fit into anything.”
She turned slightly at the hips and gestured to the enclosure. “Come, pull up a chair and sit with me,” Reez said, moving to sit back in the chair she had just vacated.
The two larger gastropods were huddling in close proximity, but not touching and the three young ones were partly hidden underneath the fronds of a ferny looking plant. she had simulated to be close to what was on their native environment. She had gotten the info from the research team’s notes and done her best to add to the enclosure anything that had been at the lake where the gastropods were from.
“So, these are a gastropod-like family. We didn’t know they were aboard fro quite awhile, but then several of us who are psi-positive began picking up on emotions. Distress, panic, even anger. The female and a clutch of three eggs were found in a jeffries tube, nesting amongst a plasma manifold. That attributed to some our odd power issue. The distressed feelings came from both the female, who was getting weaker by the second, and from the male who was in Primary Sickbay looking for his mate.” She looked at Amari and smiled. “When we reunited them and got the environmental conditions right, their physical status improved and then we witnessed an electrical exchange when they touched. They are, in the very least empathic projectors and that means a level of sentience. But I suspect that they might actually be touch telepaths. I have a hypothesis that they might in fact be communicative outside their species, since we were able to pick up their emotions.” She smiled deeper. “Right now they are content. Happy.”
~Melaia Reez
“Fascinating,” Amari remarked as she peered into the habitat with a found respect of the creatures. “So what would be the risks associated with simply reaching in and offering the creatures the choice of whether or not to make contact? Isn’t that sort of what we do in a first contact situation? We let them know they are not alone, then we offer them a choice. If they are indeed sentient, then this is, essentially, a first contact mission. And you, as far as I am concerned, are commanding this one.” Amari smiled.
-Lt. Cmdr. Brooks, XO
Mel couldn’t help the half-amused smirk from slipping onto her face. She reached her hand out and pointed out the spiky looking exterior on the adults. “We’ve been referring to them as gastropods, but their exoskeleton isn’t one they are born with and the females bore eggs, which them hatched, or more accurately, the shells dissolved when the young secrete a substance at a certain age of development. So classifying them is currently tricky. I have thought about just reaching out and touching them, but it makes sense that contact needs to be on with the fleshier part of their bodies. Which is right in front and on the underside.”
Her black eyes shifted from the creatures to Brooks. “They’ve been through a great trauma. They were accidentally removed from their planet during a survey mission, and then ended up on the Ogawa through a cargo mishap. Now they are stuck in an artificial environment where we are simulating their hydrogen-rich feeding grounds, but they’ve already shown signs of some intelligence and I know it’s not quite good enough. Maybe it’s just sentiment, but my gut tells me they understand that they are stuck here and I’m loathe to cause them further distress. If I create an opening in the enclosure and place my hand nearby, am I really offering them a choice? They can ignore me sure, but they know we’re here. I’m keenly aware of that fact. I’m doing my best not to treat them like animals on display at some zoo, but the unanswered questions I have could change how we handle their care. It is going to be awhile before we can return them to Galorndon Core.”
~Melaia Reez, Scientist
Something Reez had said triggered a spark of a memory… something she had read. “Ah, I read a report from a group of cadets on the USS Apollo. They had inadvertently picked up an orphaned Horta. They managed to fashion a device that the Horta could interact with. Eventually they were able to communicate with him as the device analysed the varying chemical levels of the Horta’s secretions. Turns out, he had been trying to communicate with them all along. Amicus was his name… but I digress.” She found the thought of befriending a Horta and having him trailing along behind quite amusing. “Maybe we could do something similar. We could modify a neurocortical monitor which could then transmit the data to the computer for analysis. It would be sort of like trying to put together a million piece jigsaw puzzle with no edge pieces and no idea what the image is… while blindfolded, but theoretically it could work.”
“As for their habitat, they might be happier with more space. It’s not unheard of to assign guest quarters to a holosuite in the event a particular species needs a more natural environment. We could replicate their natural habitat and observe them.”
-Lt. Cmdr. Brooks, XO
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