Chapter 2 – Dinner And A Mystery

Three hours later, the Chamberlain was back to warp again and headed for Yed Post IV. Jack and Melissa hosted Marie Alanni to dinner in their quarters. All of them wore comfortable civilian clothes.

“When did that happen?” Jack asked, surprised he hadn’t heard about it.

“A month ago,” Marie said as she finished the wine in her glass. “Admiral James retired and was immediately appointed by the president to be Secretary of Starfleet.”

“Damn,” Melissa said. “I guess we really are out of the loop when we’re in the Kel-j’na Region.”

“Morris, M’Zellos, and Turgidson all retired a few days after that,” Marie said.

“Who’s the CinC now?” Jack asked.

“Nord Tal,” Maire replied. “He had been in charge of the First Fleet for the last five years, patrolling the Romulan Neutral Zone.”

“You know him?”

“I served under him in what now seems forever ago,” Marie said. “He had given me several commendations for my tactical skills over the years. Based on that, and other things, he asked me to take the position with Strategic Planning.”

“That’s great,” Jack said with a smile.

Melissa stood. “I’ll clear all this away. Why don’t the two of you go into the living room?”

“Thanks,” Jack said.

Marie smiled as they walked into the other room. “She’s nice.”

“Yeah,” Jack said as they sat down on the couch. “Melissa’s great.”

Marie sat silently for several moments. “So, what’s this resistance about a promotion with you?”

“Actually, I was looking forward to it,” Jack said. “It’s Melissa who isn’t sure about her end of it.”

“Her end?”

“They were going to send me to Kel-j’na, and as part of the deal, Melissa was going to be named Admiral Simmons’s chief of staff.”

“That sounds wonderful! You’d be together.”

“Yeah, but Melissa still hasn’t decided whether or not she wants to make that move,” Jack said. “And there’s another matter.”

He peered toward the dining area for a moment, then back to Marie.

“Several weeks ago, I was ordered to the Kel-j’na Region to investigate a possible Omega situation.”

Marie’s eyes widened a moment. “Damn. I had one of those two years ago. Fortunately, it turned out to be nothing.”

“Not in this case,” Jack said, looking down.

“What happened?”

“It’s complicated, but the short version is another species was using us to get at an enemy,” Jack replied. “I determined the world we went to wasn’t a threat. Commodore Dameron didn’t see it that way.”

“Dameron of the Virginia?”

Jack nodded. “He ordered me to turn Chamberlain’s primary weapon system on the planet. I refused.”

Marie leaned back in the couch. “God.”

“I wasn’t going to murder two billion people.”

She took a long breath. “Did they have Omega?”

“Yes,” Jack said. “But they have used it peacefully and without any destructive incident for five hundred years.”

“You know someone else will be sent to finish it.”

“Not likely,” Jack said with a grin. “They’re using Omega to create a null subspace field around their system. It would take years at impulse to cross the distance, and it is mined. There were remnants of Borg ships which had tried.”

Marie shook her head. “But we can’t leave Omega technology simply sitting around.”

“We don’t have much choice.”

“You did,” Marie said, finally looking at him. “I’m not saying you should have killed two billion, but the technology has to be disabled.”

“Doing that would be the same as murdering them,” Jack said. “The Zeparans would move in to slaughter them the moment that null field was down.”

Marie nodded, but looked away. “Have you heard anything from Starfleet yet?”

“No.”

“You will,” Marie said. “I know you thought you were doing the right thing…”

“I did do the right thing,” Jack interrupted. “Dameron gave me a direct order to kill all those people. Directive or no directive, that’s an illegal order.”

“You know how Omega is worded.”

“Are you actually suggesting I should have obeyed his order?”

“No, of course not,” Marie said, taking Jack’s hand. “Only a monster would have.”

“I’m glad to hear I’m not completely alone on this.”

Marie looked at him. “They’ll do something. What, I don’t know.”

“What can they do?” Jack asked. “The damage is done. They won’t get another chance to go to that world for a couple of hundred years. Busting me won’t change anything, and it would expose the Omega Directive for the evil it is. Their best option is to sweep it under the rug so the next captain isn’t aware of what I did.”

“I hope you’re right.” Marie forced a smile. “Do you have an attorney?”

“No. Why would I need one?”

“In case there is an inquiry.”

Jack frowned. “I doubt that will…”

“Best to be prepared.”

“You know of someone?” he asked.

“I do.”

Melissa hurried into the living room area, fastening her uniform.

“What’s going on?” Jack asked.

“Nothing for you to worry about,” Melissa said. “Loftus and I can handle it.”

Jack stood. “You know I can’t do that if it’s something serious. What’s going on?”

Melissa let out a long breath. “We received a distress signal from the Zhukov. No clear information yet, but Loftus has already altered course.”

Jack fought the urge to run to the bridge. He knew Melissa was right. She and Loftus could handle it. But his instincts told him to throw on a uniform and take charge.

He smiled. “Let me know if you get more information.”

Melissa nodded and headed out the door. “I will.”

Jack turned back to Marie. “I guess we’ve got more time to talk.”

“How about you show me around your ship?” Marie asked with a grin.

“You ever seen an Oceana class before?”

She shook her head. “Since I’m going to be the Director of Strategic Planning, I should know a little bit about these ships.”

***

Two hours later, Jack and Marie stopped outside her quarters.

“Damn this thing is big,” Marie said.

Jack let a smile cross his face. “You get used to it after a while.”

He looked into her dark brown eyes, remembering how they’d mesmerized him back at the Academy.

She smiled. “You’re doing that thing again.”

“What thing?”

“Losing yourself in my eyes,” she said. “I haven’t had a man do that in more than twenty years.”

“Sorry,” he said, looking down.

“I’ve missed it… and a lot of other things about you.”

“You ever wonder…”

She looked away. “I spent years pining away over you, Jack.”

“But you were the one who suggested we break up.”

“Because I could tell where things were headed,” Marie said. “You were too distracting. I had a lot I wanted to accomplish.”

“But…”

“My heart had another agenda,” she said. “By the time I realized it was a mistake to ignore my heart, you and Larissa James were deeply in love, so I did my best to move on.”

“You hear what happened to her?”

Marie nodded. “I almost contacted you after that, but I figured the timing would have been horrible if I had.”

“Probably,” he said. “I was a mess for years after.”

She took his hand. “Are you happy now?”

Jack thought a moment. “Yeah. It took a lot to get to this place, but despite the ups and downs of command, and that Dameron mess I mentioned, I’m very happy with where my life is at this point.”

“Good,” she said, smiling wide. “I’m glad.” She looked away a moment. “I should get some rest.”

“How about breakfast?”

Marie looked at him. “Sure.”

She turned to go into her quarters, but stopped a moment. Marie turned back to Jack and gave him a quick kiss on the cheek. “Good night.”

She went into her quarters.

Jack walked slowly down the corridor, remembering the good times he and Marie had had back at the Academy, wondering if they could have made it work long term. Jack still very much liked Marie, and could see how he might have fallen in love with her.

***

Mei-Wan checked her scanner again. “Damn it.”

She and her team had come to Igalas IV after a Federation starship had reported the planet likely contained Ancient Progenitor artifacts beneath its surface. Mei-Wan had been reluctant to leave Kel-j’na as their paper on the Ancient Progenitor data cores was so near completion. But the size of the reported installation was too good to pass up.

However, nothing in the report had turned out to be accurate.

Oh, there had been an ancient structure on the surface. Mei-Wan and her team now stood in what was left of it. And it did appear to have humanoid origins which was strange for Igalas IV given the indigenous lifeforms on the planet were closer to Earth’s insect species than anything remotely humanoid.

“Not a damn thing,” Nick Robinson said as he walked up to Mei-Wan. “None of the alloys we’ve seen at the other sites.”

Neelan, the team’s geologist joined them. “I’ve scanned down to five hundred meters, and there is nothing of Ancient Progenitor origin here.”

“I think the science department on the USS Princeton was drunk,” Nick said.

“I can’t imagine how they could have been this wrong,” Neelan said.

“Do you think…” Nick stopped and looked beyond Mei-Wan. “Our host is back.”

Mei-Wan turned and saw the large insect, Hrrlacin, as big as a shuttlecraft, approach on his six legs.

“I’ll go talk to him,” she said.

A minute later, Mei-Wan stood on the open sand. Hrrlacin’s people wouldn’t come near to what was left of the stone structure.

“Hello,” she said.

“Do you need more time with this location?” Hrrlacin’s translator unit asked in a mechanical cadence.

“No,” Mei-Wan replied.

“Then you have already found what you are looking for?”

“Just the opposite,” she said. “Evidently the starship which passed by your world made an error with its scans.”

The creature’s head turned from one side to the other a moment. “Then you are not going to take away that structure?”

“No.”

“We had hoped you would.”

“Why?” Mei-Wan asked. “Whatever civilization built it is long gone. We estimate it to be seven thousand years old.”

“It… troubles us.”

“Troubles?”

“Unsettles us,” Hrrlacin said, correcting himself.

“I’m sorry, but I will ask that another Federation team come later and examine the site more closely.” Mei-Wan looked into Hrrlacin’s eyes, but couldn’t get any sense of what he was thinking. “I will let them know it is urgent they do so.”

“Then you are leaving?”

“Yes,” Mei-Wan said. “Within the hour.”

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