OOC: I am sorry for my frequent and lengthy absences as the GM of the Sentinel. However, the SIM was practically at its conclusion, so I can wrap up things before letting someone else take over as GM.

IC:
Several hours after Security caught Nevor…
Following a lengthy interview process, it turned out that NE Piccolo was not, in fact, specifically targeted. Nevor was completely unaware that anyone related to what he called the Dissident Protection Relocation Couriers (it was more poetically named in Romulan, but universal translators could only go so far) was even on board the Sentinel, and certainly not NE Piccolo. Nevor was indeed a Romulan spy, but he was not infiltrating the Sentinel on behalf of the Star Empire. Instead, he was working on behalf of those who the Empire had marked as enemies of the state, and who were slated for various fates between constant surveillance and summary execution. The origins of the movement started back when Vulcans first discovered Earth and began observing human civilization; the Romulans had spies in various Vulcan colonies, and kept apprised whenever the Vulcans encountered a habitable planet. Since then, he and his group, whose founders were appalled at the brutality with which practically every Romulan government treated dissidents, developed ways to send those dissidents to worlds outside of the Star Empire’s reach.

As it turned out, what Nevor was doing was determining patrol routes for Federation vessels near the Neutral Zone based on a triangulation between stellar scans and vessel duty rosters. Nevor had originally had a contact within Starfleet’s Logistics department that had helped him obtain that data, which he then forwarded to various couriers throughout the Star Empire. Regrettably, that contact had to accept a promotion and reassignment in order to not arouse suspicion, and they had not managed to find a replacement. He refused to name the contact, and the matter was deemed relatively inconsequential. The way that the DPRC (at least that was how it was abbreviated in Federation Standard) operated was to find untraveled space routes, sneak cloaked vessels into territory outside of the Star Empire (which was more and more frequently Federation territory), and deposit the fleeing Romulan families in areas with limited inhabitants. Those Romulans would disguise themselves as locals, and live the rest of their lives in peace.

NE Piccolo’s family, as she had previously established, was deeply embedded in the process, as one set of ancestors from the 20th century had been a Romulan couple who had assumed identities in Thailand. Several other Romulan refugees had integrated into her bloodline throughout the centuries, leading to her irregular physical and genetic makeup, even though she had done everything she could to pass as human. As it turned out, roughly five percent of the crew had some distant relative who had, in fact, been Romulan - both humans and Vulcans were in that makeup. For those who were informed, only two were aware of their ancestral situation. While the existence of the DPRC suddenly made the Romulan terrorist attacks on Earth that were originally credited, in retrospect, as attempts to stymie human development seem to have the added intent of killing escaped Star Empire dissidents, the situation itself needed to be contained.

Admiral Brayden, upon being informed of the situation, told Captain Asam not to act on the information, and to tell the medical teams that had performed the scans that there was a computer anomaly that the intruder had introduced into their systems as malware. Brayden took custody of Nevor - technically as a Federation prisoner, but in reality in order to assist with his efforts. As Nevor had been captured just after he had sent his stolen and compiled data to his main contact in Romulan space, keeping Nevor imprisoned would likely doom dozens, or even hundreds, of refugees needing a guide in Federation space once they successfully escaped the Star Empire.

Admiral Brayden said he would consider his options about how to handle such a massive and clandestine operation, but officially released the Sentinel to their next mission - once the computer in Stellar Cartography was repaired.

END SIM

Pelican, GM
USS Sentinel