In reply to Relic GM (msg # 106):

Zed taps acknowledgement to beam everyone in the vicinity out.   One extra Klingon prisoner is not going to make the difference.   And in the event there is a delay he gets his levek ready to deal with the Klingon in the corridor.  Once he has the shoot he will shot the Klingon that stabbed Jon.

Zed can't get a free shot at the Klingon since he's lying under Jon, unconscious. Sonam energises the transporter and the room disappears in a sparkling haze...

...and the Thames's cockpit materialises around Zed, Jon and Vaughn. The Klingons are nowhere in sight. Sonam is on the hailing frequencies saying, "...der Talbot, prepare to receive three Klingon prisoners. A medical team is urgently required. Lt Sloane will brief you presently. Sonam out," he concludes and turns to Zed. "Welcome aboard, sir. Please clear the transporter pads."

Once Zed is clear, Sonam activates the transporter, saying as he does so, "Sorry sir, but Cdr K'Pok is in our stasis chamber awaiting medical aide. I judged that Cdr Vaughn is in immediate need of care and so, it seems, is Lt Clare."

Behind Zed, the transporter hums and two medics sparkle into existence. They politely but firmly push Zed aside and begin bombarding him with questions. "What happened to Lt Sloane? Ens Sonam briefed us briefly on Cdr Vaughn." One of them, a male Deltan Removes the knife from Jon's arm and begins scanning the blade. Blood spurts from the grotesquely swollen limb, now the size of his thigh, and the Deltan swears and drops the knife and tricorder, pulling out a protoplaser to seal the cut and snapping to Zed, "My medkit, quickly. Give me a hypospray with 20cc of lectrazine, stat!"

Meanwhile, the other medic, a female Vulcan, is applying a pair of cortical stimulators to Vaughn's temples.

[OOC: Lectrazine is used to stabilize the cardiac and renal systems of humanoids.]
This message was last edited by the GM at 03:34, Sat 08 Dec 2018.

While the med team works on Jon and Vaughn, Sonam administers a stimulant to Talja and Tony to revive them from the stun effects.  He runs a tricorder over their bodies and turns to Zed.

"Lt Sloane, the weapon used on these officers was not a century-old Klingon disruptor which, as you know, did not have a stun function. It was a disruptor, though. I'll have to run some simulations to determine more," he says.

"Seine to Thames, come in Lt Sloane," announces Zed's communicator. "Zed, George Talbot here. The captain's aborted your undercover mission, She's recalling the Thames back to the new station so your wounded can be treated and you can be debriefed. Proceed there at Warp One."

Meanwhile, the medical officers have managed to revive Jon. He has the mother of all headaches and his arm is completely numb. looking down, he sees that the medics have placed a restraint around the whole arm from shoulder to wrist, and his hand is still swollen and red. "Careful," says the Deltan doctor, "I've administered a muscle relaxant and a pain blocker to your arm, so you won't be able to feel it or move it for a while. The knife the Klingon used on you was a qut'luch, an assassin's dagger, and it was dosed with poison. You'll be out of commission for treatment and observation."

Jon struggles to process the information from the unfamiliar Vulcan in medical blues.

"Sir," asks Sonam of Zed, "Would you like me to take the helm or would you prefer to do so?"

In reply to LCdr. George Talbot (msg # 109):

Touching the comm panel by the transporter, “On our way back right away.”

OOC: until I get a comm badge I don’t think I have one since we were undercover concerned about our technology being detected.

He grabs his comm  badge and turns to whoever is on the transporters.  “Are the prisoners secure?”

Walking to fligh5 control Zed repliesto Sonam, “I’ll take helm, everyone prepare for warp.”As he quickly types in the coordinates and hits engage.

Once engaged, Talbot, “Once you can identify the type of disruptor let me know, we need to know what we are up against and make sure the rest of the teams are notified.”

About five minutes later, the Thames and the Seine arrive at Dyson Station. Jon, Vaughn and K'Pok are transported directly to the sickbay, while Zed, Sonam, Talja and Tony beam to the transporter room, where Talbot, Samson, Dr. Adonidas, LCdr Glaucus and an unfamiliar male Human Lieutenant junior grade in Sciences blue are waiting. Samson introduces the junior officer as Lt (jg) William Xelox, a surname Tony recognises as Iotian. Xelox is of medium height and mass with a muscular look to him. He has light olive skin, not unlike that of Earth's Mediterranean area, with dark hair slicked back and a pencil mustache.

"Mr. Xelox is a sociologist attached to the new First Contacts department. He has some expertise as regards Klingons and is fluent in Klingonaase, so he'll be joining your mission for now," says Samson. Idly, Zed notices that she has trimmed her hair since he last saw her. "Before we continue, I'd like to reassure you that Lt Clare, Cdr K'Pok and Cdr Vaughn are all in stable condition and will survive their wounds."

Adonidas's commbadge chirps and a voice says tersely, "Dr. Adonidas to Sickbay, stat!" She leaves the room in a hurry without a word.
This message was last edited by the GM at 21:42, Mon 10 Dec 2018.

Meanwhile, down in sickbay Jon swims slowly back to consciousness. The Deltan doctor flicks a light across each eye and says, "Welcome back, Lieutenant. You were dosed with a neurotoxin by your Klingon attacker. Luckily, his knife remained caught in your sleeve so we have a generous sample of the toxin and are currently analysing it. It is not like any Klingon poison in our databanks, so we are assuming that it in indigenous to the Sphere." A tone sounds from the console behind him and he turns to check the results. "Fascinating," he mutters, sounding almost like a Vulcan and taps his commbadge. "Dr. Adonidas to Sickbay, stat!" he snaps.

In reply to Relic GM (msg # 112):

Jon does not like the sounds of what he hears. "What is the problem?" he tries to ask. In his groggy state, however, it probably comes out as an incoherent mumble. He can hardly believe he's been almost killed on his first major field assignment. My parents are going to be really upset!, Jon thinks irreverently.

Jon tries to focus on something pleasant. Images of Lintilla come to his mind, and he murmurs her name.

Dr. Adonidas breezes into the sickbay. "What's up, Dovan?" she asks the Deltan.

Dovan looks up from adjusting Jon's neural stimulator. "Good news and bad, Doctor. We've isolated the specific neurotoxin. That's the good..." he states.

Adonidas glares at him. "And the bad?" she snaps.

"It's noroxazine," he blurts out.

"Noroxazine? That's impossible! Klingons of that era didn't have noroxazine and we've no reason to believe it is available to anyone on the Sphere. Unless..." she trails off. She taps her commbadge and says, "Security, I'm reporting a case of noroxazine poisoning. Yes, that's right, noroxazine—in BortaS City. No I don't know where it came from! Adonidas out!"

She turns to Dovan. "I want a full blood exchange, Human O pos, RH negative, 5 litres with 5 more on standby!" As Dovan hustles to follow her instructions, she turns to Jon. "Lieutenant, you're a very lucky man. It looks like we caught it in time, so we're going to pull you through."

Two of the new officers, Lt Arthur Avalon and Lt (jg) Gwynneth Lance step into the examining room. They are the new Security Chief and his second in command. They both have tricorders out and phasers at their waists. Avalon spits out, "I've alerted the captain. What were the circumstances and timing of the exposure?"

As Dovan attaches IV tubes to both Jon's arms, Adonidas begins briefing the security officers. Dovan holds up a hypospray and says to Jon, "I'm going to put you out for the procedure." Before Jon has a chance to protest, the room darkens and fades away.
This message was last edited by the player at 00:50, Wed 12 Dec 2018.

Mere minutes after Adonidas abruptly departs, Samson's commbadge chirps. "Captain, Avalon here. CMO reports a case of noroxazine poisoning. I've ordered a security alert!"

"Thanks, Art. Keep me apprised," replies Samson. "George, you heard?"


"Yes Ma'am! I'm on it!" As Talbot leaves the briefing room, a low hooting can be heard in the corridor and a tall Tellarite in security gold strides in and passes a phaser to Samson, who presses the backing of the holster to her waistband.

Cdr Claucus asks, "What, if I may ask, is noroxazine?" anticipating the question on Zed's lips.

In reply to Capt. Delilah Samson (msg # 115):

“Yes Captain, what is nororaxin, do I need to be quarantined, who is infected from my team.” He asks quickly before Samson can even start answering the first question. As he steps away from everyone else in case he is infected.

"Noroxazine is a neurotoxin which was administered to Lt Clare by way of a Klingon qut'luch, an assassin's dagger. He's the only one affected. Groën and Gazzo were stunned with a disruptor. This is suspicious because century-old Klingon disruptors didn't have stun settings. Compound that with the fact that noroxazine is a poison favoured by the Tal Shiar and Romulan disruptors do have a stun setting and you can see that we have a serious problem, which is why we're now on security lockdown. Ambassador Worf, Emissary Klaang and Dr. KeH'lef's security detail—Lts Merawdyr and Nivran—have  been notified and are taking appropriate measures." Samson pauses, then continues, "When you were listening to the Klingons, what did you overhear?"
This message was last edited by the player at 00:50, Thu 13 Dec 2018.

In reply to Capt. Delilah Samson (msg # 117):

“One of the males was wandering if Cdr. Vaughan was a spy from the citadel.  They discussed if they should kill her, but one of the male Klingons mentioned to the female Klingon that their superiors may want to do a more thorough interrogation.   And then there was some Klingon or similar language our translators could not understand.” Zed replied.

“And not to over step my bounds, but if the Tal Shiar are involved we need to do something, we can’t let them interfere, we need to find out how they got on the sphere, and why they are here?” He adds

"We are doing something. The first order of things is to secure the situation. We're in the process of doing that. The next step is to collate everything we know. Think hard. Do you remember anything about what you heard—anything at all?" asks Samson.

Zed concentrates hard, but the only thing he can remember is something along the lines of "Any how kill-something na something-unintelligible," spat out with a bit of a hissing accent and trilling the last syllable.

Samson's commbadge chirps. "Cap'n, Adonidas here. We're doing a complete blood flush on Lt Clare. He should be OK. There was another poison on the blade—a more traditional Klingon poison. That's what caused his arm to swell so dramatically. If it wasn't for that, he may have died before he showed any symptoms from the noroxazine. Luckily, Dr. Dovan's Deltan empathy noted the atypical mental changes and ran a scan in time. Five minutes longer and we'd've lost him. He'll be up and around in a couple of hours, but he'll have a nasty scar from the tissue damage caused by the Klingon toxin. We can fix that later with outpatient surgery."

In reply to Capt. Delilah Samson (msg # 119):

“Thank you for the update doctor.”

Zed keeps trying to rack his brain. “Commander the last word is just bouncing around my brain.   It started with imer, amer, emer, something like that.  It didn’t make any sense.”, after a moment, “Maybe it is someone’s name.”
This message was last edited by the player at 21:41, Fri 14 Dec 2018.

"So, what we have is something that sounded vaguely like 'Any how kill-something na imer-something'—is that right?" asks Samson.

"Would that be 'Eneh hwau' kllhwnia na imirrhlhhse' by any chance?" asks Lt Xelox. "It's a particularly obscene Romulan insult."
This message was last edited by the player at 06:35, Sat 15 Dec 2018.

A couple of hours later, Jon wakes up. His arm aches abominally and he feel's like he's in an ice-bath. Looking down, he sees that not only is he in bed, but there are a number of heavy, soft blankets covering him. Dr. Adonidas leans over him and says, "Cold? That'll pass. You've got a pretty impressive scar on your arm, but we can fix that later. The important thing is to get you up and moving as soon as possible. You've had a close call." She steps over to the replicator and says, "250cc hot chocolate with whipped cream." There is a brief humming noise and she hands Jon a steaming mug. "Here, drink this. It'll help raise your body temperature."

In reply to Relic GM (msg # 122):

Jon takes the hot chocolate with shaking hands and takes a tentative sip. It tastes wonderful. He tries to piece together what happened, but everything after being stabbed by the Klingon is fuzzy.

"What happened?" he asks. "I  remember getting stabbed in the arm. But that shouldn't be serious! Why am I in bed? And why am I so cold?"

He looks around to see if any of his team are there. "What happened to Tony, Talja, and the others? Is everybody OK?" Jon asks urgently. He makes a weak attempt at getting out of bed.

Dr. Adonidas gently places a hand on his good arm. "Slowly," she cautions. "You've had major medical treatments, so you're going to feel weak for a while. We want you up and about as soon as you're ready, but pushing yourself beyond your limits will just make your recovery slower. You may feel a little dizzy when you get up, and if you feel any pain, tell me immediately. Don't try to tough it out." She hold up a heavy robe for him to wear. It has large sleeves so the dressing on his arm would fit through.

Jon stands unsteadily and the room swims before his eyes, but it settles down quickly with a shake of his head. His head pounds like that damned 21st century ApocRock one of the other officers on Freeman's Island is so fond of. Adonidas gives him a hypospray of analgesic that dulls the pounding. He suddenly feels ravenous and she directs him to the replicator.
This message was last edited by the player at 15:52, Mon 17 Dec 2018.

As Jon wolfs down some food, Dr. Adonidas brings him up to speed. "Lts Groën and Gazzo are fine—they were merely stunned. Lt Sloane is  unharmed and got you all out. We have three Klingons in custody and LCdr Talbot is interrogating them." This is the first time Jon has heard anything about Talbot being promoted. He suddenly notices a new half-pip on Adonidas's collar and realises that she, too, had been elevated in rank. This, along with Samson's promotion to captain and the unexpected expansion of the Dyson Base infrastructure so soon after the rebuilding from the Kapecki attack leads him to the conclusion that Starfleet is finally taking the Dyson Sphere Exploration Mission seriously.

"So, everywhere we look, we smell Romulans. It's a working hypothesis, but we shouldn't jump to conclusions." She looks down at her PADD and says, "Computer, I want the full records of the medical scans of Groën and Gazzo copied to my PADD. Authorisation Samson Sigma Six Three."

The computer replies, "Authorisation acknowledged, transferring files."

"A salient point is that when the BortaS crashed, it was fleeing the Romulans after stealing the tor Fal, a Vulcan artifact dating back to the time of Surak before the Romulans left Vulcan. The tor Fal was a psionic weapon used by the orthodox Vulcans against the Romulan faction. The Romulans captured it but were unable to use it against the Vulcan orthodoxy, so when they fled Vulcan they took it with them. It was kept in a museum on Romii until 2250 when the IKS BortaS captured it and fled, chased by the 5th Squadron. The tor Fal is akin to the Stone of Gol, which was sought by a Vulcan faction known as the Isolationist Movement six years ago. Unlike the Stone of Gol, which was a psionic resonator, the tor Fal seems, based on our scans after LCdr M'Rel's crew in turn stole it from the BortaS, to be a temporal displacer capable of sending objects to an undetermined set of space/time co-ordinates. Ensign T'Zill, a Vulcan science officer, broke into the lab and stole it, trying to flee in a Romulan Theta class runabout. M'Rel and the USS Lena retrieved it from her and destroyed the Romulan runabout, killing T'Zill, who was later determined to be a Romulan deep-cover agent. Her body was never found. Starfleet returned the tor Fal to the Vulcans, where it is being studied by Dr. Sormok, whom some of you may have met when he was here last month. It appears that Lt. Dul was may have been right—Romulans may well be at work in the Dyson Sphere, though she was completely off-base when she suspected Lt Kurasa," Samson grimaces at the unpleasant memory.

[OOC: Lts Dul and Kurasa are former player characters in this game. Their conflict is a large part of the earlier posts in the game.]
This message was last edited by the player at 05:26, Tue 18 Dec 2018.

In reply to Capt. Delilah Samson (msg # 126):

To post 121.

“Yes, Lt. Xelox, yes it sounded something like that.” Zed replies.

To post 126.

“Captain, if the Romulans are involved that changes a lot.   It looks like they have infiltrated the BortaS or at least subsections of their culture.  Is it possible that T’Zill survived or perhaps someone working close with her is here?   What else do we know about her?”
This message was last edited by the GM at 18:06, Tue 18 Dec 2018.

[OOC: Edited your post—Zed, being a Starfleet officer wouldn't have forgotten the boss's promotion...]

"Yes, as noted, we never found a body. That's the nature of destroying a starship. Of course she could have beamed out at the last moment, which is why the book is still open on the incident. Needless to say, in a combat situation, transporters may well be overlooked, even with a thorough review of the sensor records. This is of course why we don't have a location on the ship—presumably cloaked—which beamed out your Klingon—or Romulan—kidnapper," Samson closes the file on her PADD, then changes the subject.  "Nightingale, our EMH, has surgically relieved the pressure on Cdr Vaughn's brain, by the way. I've also received word that Lt Swann is back from her TDY [Temporary Duty Yonder, a temporary posting] and will be rejoining the Thames in the morning. Once she does, you'll all be joining Ambassador Worf's security detail at veng BortaS."

She stands and says, "Go get something to eat. I'm aware that by your body clocks it's past midnight even though it's just 20:00 hours here, so I figure you're all pretty hungry. Stop by Sickbay afterwards to get your disguises removed and check up on Jon. Dismissed."

[OOC: By the time that the meal and disguise removal is done, Jon will be up and around, so unless there is something you want to add, we'll pick it up at that point.]
This message was last edited by the player at 18:37, Tue 18 Dec 2018.

The team grabs a quick meal, but with all that's been going on they barely notice what they're eating and chow down while discussing all the latest events. That done, they head for the sickbay where the EMH Mk III, Nightingale (named after and bearing the likeness of the legendary nurse Florence Nightingale), removes their Klingon disguises, leaving the mastoid implants in place for the time being.


Once that is completed, Dr. Adonidas comes out and says, "Lt Clare is up and around. He's still a bit fatigued, so take it easy on him guys, eh?"

Jon comes out wearing a heavy bathrobe and thick felt slippers. He looks a bit drawn with dark circles beneath his eyes. His Klingon disguise has been removed, so his red hair and freckles  are plainly visible.

[OOC: Have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Years, guys. I'm expecting everyone to be busy for the next few days, so I'll see you all after Christmas. Happy Yule, y'all!]
This message was last edited by the GM at 20:19, Sat 22 Dec 2018.

In reply to Relic GM (msg # 129):

OOC: Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all.

Wee fish a mare egrets mouse hippo gnu deer.
This message was last edited by the GM at 23:25, Fri 28 Dec 2018.