Chapter 6 - The Cycle Of Life's Symphony
The next evening Jack McCall walked into the Auditorium on Deck Seven, but unlike the night before, it was crowded with members of the crew who were looking forward to the musical performance he had sampled. He stood in front of the tenth row where seats for him, Admiral Simmons, and a few of the Admiral's Staff had been reserved. He turned and saw the reserved seat next to the one for him. He wondered if that seat would remain empty.
He hadn’t seen or spoken to Mei-Wan since their argument the day before. He was afraid if she didn't show up this evening, that it meant she had decided it would be too painful for her to be around him. His greatest fear was it would become the permanent state of their relationship.
Simmons and Tavak walked.
"These our seats, Captain?"
Jack nodded. "Yes, Admiral."
Simmons, Tavak, and the others with them took their seats while Jack remained standing. Hoping against hope.
"Was there someone else you were expecting, Captain?"
Jack looked at the now sitting Simmons as he pulled out a program. "My wife, sir."
The Admiral nodded. "I'm a bit surprised she isn't already here."
"She's been busy with her work a lot lately."
"I meant to speak to you about that."
Jack returned to looking for Mei-Wan. "I'm not sure I understand, Admiral."
"The Archaeology Council has requested I speak to her about turning down the expedition to Hel'yra. They really want her there."
"She made her decision, sir."
"She could change that decision."
He knew the admiral wanted him to convince Mei-Wan to transfer to the Ravenscroft. That was the last thing Jack wanted.
Behind him a figure walked up.
"This should be an interesting experience."
Jack turned and looked at Corsica who took the seat on Simmon's left.
"I think you will enjoy this, Mr. Corsica," the admiral said.
"I certainly hope so. I would hate to be stuck sitting here and not enjoy it."
Jack looked back up the aisle and saw Mei-Wan walking down with Melissa Vargas. The two of them appeared involved in a spirited conversation that came to an end when they saw him.
Mei-Wan walked up to him and turned to look at the stage instead of making eye contact with him. She took the seat on his right.
"These look like good seats," she said.
"I thought so." he said as he sat down between Mei-Wan and Admiral Simmons.
He leaned over to her. "I need to talk to you a little later."
She turned to him. Ten different emotions played across her face from joy to fear to dread. Her only response was to nod.
A moment later the members of the orchestra began to come on stage wearing black formal clothing to hearty applause.
***
In the Communication Offices on Deck Sixteen, Lieutenant Commander Arthur Conrad sat watching a series of displays. His Department Head, Cynthia Pederson had told him to watch for anything unusual the day before and to report anything out of the ordinary either to her or to Hank Evans. So far this had been the most boring duty he had ever done aboard a starship. The Computer was the one that was actually doing the work. He was just there to confirm what it found and to tell Pederson.
He had listened to the concert taking place on Deck Seven for an hour and a half partly because he enjoyed classical music, but also because he was becoming interested in Cynthia Pederson and was thinking of asking her to a late dinner when she came by to check on his work. She was a few years older than him and from Catulla, but he didn't hold that against her. He knew a lot of people from Catulla and some of them were nice.
The concert had ended twenty minutes ago and Conrad was becoming restless without anything to break the boredom of the task at hand.
A brief fluctuation appeared on one of the displays. Conrad leaned forward waiting for the computer to give him an explanation for it as it had five other times in the last six hours. Most of those had been due to variations in the warp signature of the ship as it passed through interstellar dust clouds.
He continued to wait for the computer, but there was nothing.
"Computer, there was a minor fluctuation in the subspace domain surrounding the ship a minute ago. Can you identify?" he asked.
After a moment, "I have no record of a fluctuation."
Conrad frowned. "It occurred at 1952, Computer."
"There is no indication of any subspace fluctuation at that time index."
The display showed another fluctuation, but this time much longer in duration.
"There! Did you see that?"
After a moment. "Negative. I have detected no subspace anomalies."
Conrad shook his head and tapped his Comm Badge. "Lieutenant Commander Pederson, this is Conrad. Could you come to the Communications Office?"
Pederson's voice sounded over the Comm. "I'll be right down."
He leaned back in his seat as several spikes appeared on the display in front of him.
Five minutes later Cynthia Pederson walked in still wearing her black formal dress.
"What is it?" she asked.
Conrad pointed at the displays. "There have been almost continuous subspace variations over the last ten minutes, but the Computer says I'm seeing things."
She watched the display as another, stronger burst of activity erupted.
"Hank Evans was worried this might happen. That's why I've had someone actually sitting here," Pederson said.
She touched several controls on the panel in front of the displays. A cutaway map of the Chamberlain replaced the images of subspace data. After a moment the view zoomed in to an area in the saucer section of the ship.
"Deck Twenty, section seven-A, Jefferies tube nine," she said.
Pederson picked up a Comm Badge off a shelf in the room. She quickly attached it to the upper left shoulder of her dress.
She turned and walked toward the door. "Contact the captain and no one else. Let him know where I'm headed and that I'll let him know what I find."
Pederson was gone before Conrad could get a word out. He shrugged his shoulders and sat down to contact their captain.
***
Hank Evans brought over a steaming bowl to the table and set it down in front of Kadan Loftus. She leaned down and smelled it for a moment.
"What is it?" she asked.
He smiled. "Can't you tell?"
"I'm Bajoran, remember? I don't know that much about human food."
"This isn't from Earth."
Loftus frowned. "Now I'm really worried."
He took the seat next to her where his own bowl released heat to the air.
"It's from Kel-j'na."
She smelled it again. "Some sort of meat?"
He nodded as he used his spoon to take a taste. "Not just any meat. This is a traditional meal from the Kel-j'na Southlands. The people there eat this meal twice a year in a religious ceremony to honor the powerful spirits that watch over them."
She picked up her spoon and slowly lowered it into her bowl.
"So why is this particular meal so important?" she asked as she tasted the stew-like concoction.
"Because this is from the Tragalic, a large grazing animal that lives on these huge rolling hills in the southern sections of the planet. Centuries ago the Tragalic was the major deity in that part of their world."
Loftus took another taste. "They worshiped an animal?"
Hank nodded as he poured them each a glass of wine. "A number of worlds have primitive religions like that. It's not the animal so much as what it represents."
"So this is a religion where the followers eat their god?" she asked with a frown.
"Not exactly. Killing the animal is a ritual act. It's not killing for killing's sake. They depend on the animal for their survival and the rituals surrounding its killing and eating are an acknowledgement of the spiritual reality they saw in their connection to the animal and their world," Hank said.
Loftus shook her head. "Very strange."
Hank grinned. "And believing in beings that operate a wormhole isn't strange?"
"That's completely different."
Hank handed her a glass of wine. "Only because it happens to be part of what you believe?"
She took the glass and drank from it. "No, because I can show actual evidence for those beings and the wormhole."
Hank took a sip of his own wine. "Those on Kel-j'na who worshiped the Tragalic could point to the animal, the sky, the wind, and claim they had evidence for what they believed."
She smiled at him. "You aren't going to ever let this drop, are you?"
"Of course not," he said as he ate more of his Tragalic stew.
She ate another spoonful of her own food. "I suppose it might have more spiritual meaning for me if I didn't know it was replicated."
"It's not."
Loftus stared at her spoon. "This is real animal flesh?"
"You don't think I'd replicate a meal like this do you? That would destroy all the spiritual significance of it."
She frowned at him. "Come on, Hank. Tell me the truth."
"I did. This meat is from a real Tragalic. I bought the meat on our way back to Federation space a couple of months ago."
Loftus raised her hand to her mouth.
Hank sighed. "Bajorans eat real meat sometimes."
"Not this Bajoran," she said.
Hank rolled his eyes. "You thought it was okay before."
"That was before I knew what it was."
She took another drink from her glass. "Now I wished we hadn't listened to the concert here in your quarters."
"Hey, I was just trying to expand your cultural horizons, sweetheart."
"Now when Cynthia asks why we didn't come to the concert, I won't have a good reason," Loftus said.
"I'm sure she'll understand."
The Comm Panel in Hank's quarters made a loud single tone noise. He took a deep breath.
"Evans here."
Jack's voice came over a speaker. "Hank, Pederson says she detected another signal."
Hank took a last sip of his wine. "I'm on my way."
"When will you get back?" Loftus asked.
"Probably won't be too long."
***
Cynthia Pederson crawled through the Chamberlain's maze of Jefferies Tubes on Deck Twenty, but found it difficult with her long formal dress.
"I should have changed out of this stupid thing," she said to herself.
She stopped at an intersection and pulled out a tricorder. She watched its display for a moment and proceeded down the tube to her left.
"Not much farther."
After another fifteen feet, Cynthia Pederson halted her progress at an access hatch. She glanced at the tricorder display again.
"This had better be it."
She pulled the hatch open and crawled through it into a much wider tunnel. She stood to her feet now that the ceiling was higher than before.
"Much better," she said as she adjusted the tricorder and walked down the pipe and circuit panel filled area. She paused before continuing and reached behind her to pull out a phaser. She adjusted the weapon and made her way down the passage.
She turned a corner and found an open panel that illuminated the wall opposite it with light from within. Cynthia slowly walked up to it and found attached to the isolinear circuitry an odd oval shaped dark object with twisted alien writing on it.
"What the hell is this?" she asked as she scanned the object with her tricorder.
After almost a full minute of scanning, she reached up to tap her Comm Badge to activate it as she heard a metal hatch slam.
The loud sound made her turn about with her phaser ready. She quickly adjusted her tricorder, but before she could put it to use a figure came around the corner.
"Lieutenant Commander Pederson, what are you doing here?"
Cynthia relaxed after a moment. "Mr. Zachary." She took a deep breath and lowered her weapon. She pointed at the alien object. "I found this thing attached to the Communications subsystem."
Zachary didn't bother to look at it. "Right. I was looking for it too." He forced a smile onto his face. "I suppose you discovered the odd communications."
She nodded. "Yes. Mr. Evans was afraid whoever was doing this might get into the computer system to prevent it from notifying us about any more signals, so I had someone watching all subspace radiation for the last couple of days."
Zachary shook his head and sighed. "Smart move."
"So how did you..." Cynthia stopped as she saw a PADD in Zachary's hand that displayed the same type of alien text that was on the outside of the device.
She quickly looked up at him. Her eyes widened.
"I probably better report this to the captain," she said trying to remain calm.
Zachary reached up and knocked the phaser out of her hand. Pederson tried to reach for it, but he blocked her and took the tricorder. "You had to come down here, didn't you?!" He tore the Comm Badge from her dress.
She took a step back as he pulled out another odd looking alien device that appeared to be made of the same dark metal as the object attached to the panel.
"What are you doing, Duncan?"
"Believe me, Cynthia, I didn't want to get you involved in this." He held up the device in his hand. "I was saving this little piece of technology for someone who richly deserved it."
He took a step nearer. "You couldn't stay at your stupid concert, could you, Cynthia? You had to play the good little soldier and come down here and foul everything up!"
