Posted by Captain John Tiberius Glen (Captain) in Main Sim - Planet Surface - Landing party -
[snip]

The girl looked between Pashi then Glen, once freed, she said nothing and ran off up over the hill nimbly avoiding the worse of the trash and other junk around them before vanishing back down the hill. For the two security folks watching at her descent they saw her soon reach the bottom of the hill. She seemed then to wave her hands wildly above her head, shouting something they couldn’t hear or make out from this spot. A few of the natives looked up from their lively work and soon one woman came rushing out of one of the ramshackle huts leaning on several rusty barrels and a mining cart. The girl moved over to her seeming to speak quickly before pointing to the sky then making more hand gestures and speech before pointing up to the top of the hill.

Lance watch from his hiding area “sir if this gos south what you want us to do” Lance was thinking if anyone is going to come they might gather Warriors before checking the area they were in out.

“If they come with energy weapons then we beam back up like you did last time,” Glen replied. “Then I admit defeat, and I tell the Admiral to find some other canon-fodder. However, I somehow doubt that the Klingons left them any weapons of value… they didn’t leave them anything of value at all…” Glen demonstrated with hand gestures, the trash and junk that surrounded them. “If they come at us with knives and spears, then you deal with it as you see fit. I’m hoping that they will see sense, see that we aren’t demons, and we can eventually negotiate. That might take some time though.”

Pashi tilted her antennae forward toward where the girl was talking to the adult, she could barely make out what was being said. She shushed the group as she strained to hear the conversation. The polluted air of the planet assailed her nostrils, but she continued to listen, so she could inform the captain of what was being said.

Unfortunately even with her more sensitive hearing Pashi couldn’t make out much of what was saying other then a faint passing word or two about ‘Demons’ or something similar.

After a bit observing many of the natives seemed to break off into two groups. Most of the men seemed to be gathering up various pointy metal sticks, random tools or manual mining equipment with hooks or the like. Many stronger women also did the same, while younger or very older folks of both sexes shooed children hurriedly into metal or wooden slanted lean toos. It seems they were working up the nerve to come back up the hill to deal with the ‘demons’ that the girl had mentioned possibly.

Lance looked at the CO with a smile “I don’t know about you captain but trash can be a dangerous weapon” he then continue to watch through his binoculars “Echo team use low stun only use force if your life is threatened” he said over the com to his team

Glen nodded his agreement, but wondered why Lance kept talking about his ‘team’ and about ‘small perimeters’, when there were only eight in the landing party, and only two of those were security, but he was glad that Lance was keeping them on a tight leash anyway.

Glen watched to see what the native villagers would do next.

Lt Mullins was watching all the activity going on. He almost felt in the way. He thought it would be good to go ahead and scan the area to see if he could determine any information about the bacteria. It might be out of his realm a little but from an engineering standpoint, he might be able to find something in the soil to help or something which would be constructed to help extract the bacteria. He waited to see what his scanner provided.

Hunter approached the CE ‘’I need to get some samples from the soil as well and I can hear water probably a river nearby ,I’ll hope to take samples from that as well if we are able to get in that region ,this place is a real mess ‘’ he took out what he needed from his medical kit and carefully started to fill a container with some of the soil .Hunter still stayed in the vicinity he had no intention of wondering off anytime soon.

The ‘river’ put into the nicest terms was hardly drinkable without a lot of filtering and boiling, even then it likely had junk in it that would not make it the cleanest or safest to drink or use. The same could be said for the top bits of soil and such.

No one was going to be wandering off this time. Captain Glen would see to that, but he was happy for Mullins and Hunter to take air, soil and water samples, and for Lance to have his men situated one either side.

“What do you hope to learn from the samples you are collecting?” Verity asked Hunter. Her goal was to study some of the inhabitants of the planet who had long term exposure to the bacteria.

“Is it feasible that we attempt to make contact with the inhabitants?” She asked the CO, “I would like the opportunity to evaluate someone older. I think we can learn a lot about the evolution of the bacteria from studying someone who has been infected much longer than the girl.”

“Our mission is to make contact with these people and to show them we are not the Devils they have been taught to believe,” Glen replied. “You ask if that is feasible? …Star Fleet Command have given me missions before that were totally unfeasible. What I don’t want to do is to lose any men in the pursuit of science, but if it is possible then we will try to do exactly that… and if not, we’ll go home and I won’t feel that we have failed. No one mentioned this micro-organism…”

Lieutenant Pashi strained to hear the natives and did her best to ignore the conversations of those with her. She edged forward a little bit more to catch the fragmented conversation going on. The talk of the bacteria concerned her some, after all she had no desire to pick up some alien disease, but she was positive the doctor had things under control.

Hunter stood up having taken some soil sample ‘’I agree with you Lt ,the only thing we know is that it made the inhabitants stronger and the Klingon’s took advantage of that’‘ he told the CSO ‘’ But we have nothing yet on this bacteria and we do need to study it further once we’re back on the ship ,remember there are already two crew members infected ‘’ he was about to say something else when he realized Lt Pashi was trying to listen intently to the ongoing conversation and paying attention to their speech, so now the doctor stood relatively quiet letting her concentrate without any interruption from his part.

By now down the hill the group of about 30 odd natives were moving up the hill cautiously looking around every big hunk of scrap, dirt, or junk poking at it as if expecting ‘demons’ to jump out and attack them. They were at the current pace about 100 or so yards out down slope.

”…well we know that it isn’t a bacteria, but has evolved from that,” Captain Glen continued in a whisper, “So, I think we should stop using that term as people start worrying about debilitating illnesses and their own mortality. It only appears to function as a bacteria, but it’s actually a symbiotic micro-cellular biogenesis. No one has died from it, no one has become ill, and the effects on the sensory and muscular systems of people who came into contact with it, was to give them almost comic book superhuman abilities… That isn’t to say we shouldn’t be wary of it. As Lieutenant Aphelion just said, we know nothing about the long-term effects.”

Hunter nodded without saying a word,it seemed that with this bacteria who ever gave them the information had omitted some important facts and he made a mental note to tell Cross, that is if they ever managed to get out of there alive .He was not so enthusiastic about what he was hearing ....it seemed the inhabitants were approaching closer .

“Yes, they are getting rather closer now…” Glen said. “Lt. Del Wolf, can you suggest anything non-lethal that will scare them off? Apart from stunning the first couple that appear…like heating up the concrete ground surface so it’s too hot to stand on? We need just enough room that they can’t throw things at us, but they can still hear us. Otherwise, it’s Plan B.”

Lance started to check his gear “I have 2 flash bangs And 3 smokes. we can use the flash bangs sir” he said get it ready.

Glen thought and replied, “this is a lot harder than I expected. I want to talk to them without them thinking we are Demons. Your flash bangs and smokes, or stunning them with phasers, either of those will appear to be magic, re-inforcing the idea we are evil spirits that I want to avoid.”

’‘ Through and through in every detail ‘’ Hunter muttered under his breath ‘’How did the Klingon’s manage to convince them that they were gods, taking into consideration their looks as a species !’‘ .

Overheat in the ground will make them think we are demons. Flash bang and smoke will make them think we are demons. Stunning them will make them think we are demons. “ Captain I have a theory, the Klingons they value fighting, honor in battle. Maybe if we offer them a challenge for honor maybe they will see us as gods also”

’‘ What a great idea Lt !’‘ the doctor exclaimed as he looked from Lance to Glen, wondering which one of them would volunteer. That is if the Captain planned such a scheme .

Glen thought that Dr. Hunter seemed a little over-enthusiastic about this idea, but it didn’t look like he wanted to volunteer himself.

“I wanted to avoid cowboy diplomacy to resolve this if possible,” Glen said. “But tell me a little more about how your plan might work before I dismiss it outright. Do you really think they would have taken part in gladiatorial battles with the Klingons during their stay here?”

• Glen, CO

“I believe so sir the first time we were here we saw a ring for training and I saw a few wooden Klingons weapons. So I think with the battle ring and the wooden weapons I thing there culture is based around fighting and honor” he said to the captain “ as the COS I will volunteer to fight”

Lt. Lance Del Wolf (COS)