[snip]

After reading things over, though they came to the important matter of their own arrival to the unknown system which seemed the origin point for their alien child and had been originally planned to be a location for the Alstarians to establish a colony. Dropping out of warp sensors immediately went to work getting a read on their destination. The solar body was a massive O-type sun, bright white-bluish in color it was a truly massive sight. The sensors also picked up 6 planetary bodies, the first three in the system were all rocky bodies, lifeless, and lacking any real atmosphere. All were made up of various minerals and ores which to a colony or even civilization of limited space faring capability would be prime targets for mining efforts. The fourth planet in the system was a large gas giant with a deep brown-red ring system made up of gas, ice, and tiny rocks. Around this gas giant were a multitude of various sized moons again all rich in ore and minerals. Also picked up on one of the larger moons were deposits of likely dilithium! The last planet though was of interest, it was within the system’s ‘habitable’ zone, and was class-m. It was about 1.5 times as big as Earth though, the planet was a almost 50/50 mix of land and water, initial scans picked up signs of both land and sea based life forms. As well as a quite rich biosphere. In orbit of the planet was a large single lunar body, it held a very thin atmosphere of helium, and itself was made up of various rocky minerals, ores, and deposits of ice. On both the planet and moon no signs of intelligent life were present or of a civilization. That was until as they came closer and into the system they picked up a large orbital structure coming around the dark side of the planet. It was roughly 30km wide, by 6km thick. It was shaped like a massive thick plate. Scans picked up it was powered by several fission based reactant systems. Life signs showed about 900 thousand inhabitants all of which at a glance matched the child they had picked up. Interestingly surrounding this massive orbital structure, linked to it by tiny energy threads which seemed like primitive tractor beams were billions of the tiny metal balls like had been included with the sleeper pod! Each of the energy tethered balls seemed to be absorbing the radiation and solar light from the O-type star nearby and converting it into usable energy back on the orbital platform. It also was providing a dampening effect that almost acted as a ‘cloak’ on sensor scans for the platform, except it didn’t deflect visual scans. No obvious signs of weapons or shielding was present, at least none they could discern as being known.

On approaching the system, Captain Glen had returned to the Bridge. The large M class planet looked the most promising as the origin of the child in the stasis pod. While scans showed no weapons or shielding, Captain Glen didn’t want to spook the residents by suddenly turning up.

“Inola” Glen told the communications officer, “Open hailing frequencies. Any channels open, any hails?”

Joe had come onto the bridge quietly and had been looking at the results of the scans in silence. He looked across at the captain after a few moments of rereading all the data collected thus far. All reviewed of course with such a scowl of concentration that it seemed as if it might surely cause a severe headache to Joe. Finally, after a moment longer he turned to the captain and said, “Sir correct me if I’m wrong but from what I’m seeing from the type of star, it’s size, and with the minerals couldn’t this system be part of that dissipating nebula that we passed? Or perhaps the dissipating nebula be a piece torn away from this star system?”

“I’m a pilot, not an astrophysicist!” Glen said, “If you say it’s possible, then I’ll believe you. Haven’t the Science Department come back with some ideas yet?”

Joe tried to do something he wasn’t at all known for. Diplomacy. He covered his mouth with his hand to cover the smile that slipped across his face unbidden. Then trying to speak in a humdrum tone of voice he said to the CO, “I’m not aware that they were doing any work concerning the astrophysics of our surroundings yet sir. And well I’m just an old red shirt. I was always told by every pilot I met that they were vastly superior to us. Are you now sir telling me that I have been misinformed all these years?” Joe surrendered then as he dropped his hand, and the large grin came into plain view. “As for science I think that they are still experimenting with their …I mean um yes they are looking at those spheres. Which leads me to another question sir. We have this child. Now we what planet he came from. Now we arrive at said planet. I have to confess this is pretty sharp thus far. But how do we figure out who on the planet that the child belongs to?”

“Don’t get me wrong, I’m not scientifically uneducated,” said Glen. “I studied optics in my Academy days and I have a personal interest in archaeology, but I know next to nothing about biochemistry, geochemistry and astrophysics, so I leave that to those who do. But I enlisted as a pilot, before I quickly moved into Command training. Those first few weeks out of the simulator and flying by the seat of my pants in dogfights are still my best Starfleet experiences. I do know what you mean about pilots thinking they are superior. It must come with the job!”

“I did ask the Science department to look into the reasons for the fast rate of decay, but, yes, they have been very tied up with investigating the silver spheres,” Glen replied.

“As for the child’s ‘parents’, your guess is as good as mine,” Glen said. “In any culture, sending away your offspring without protection would seem a pretty desperate thing to do, so they may have been in desperate circumstances themselves, but then we also have the problem of additional time that has passed, which means it’s likely they could have died of old age anyway.”

Joe’s eyebrows arched as he put himself into the position of the kid. Go to sleep one day and then wake up a few days later to find out that everyone you knew is now gone and that you’re the oldest person on your planet! It was not a place he would want to be in! “Poor little guy.” Joe murmured as he shook his head.
“The science part isn’t hard in this case.” Joe said. “I used my grandmothers broken teacup theorem. That being if you drop a blue teacup on the floor and most of it breaks away from the handle area then the handle area remains the largest portion intact, but all the small pieces are still blue and can therefore be put back together by an errant grandson. Same goes in this case. The nebula, this star and the surrounding area all seem to be made of the same material. It’s just a broken teacup.” Joe chuckled and said, “No genius here sir. Just the memory of my grandmother’s fine China .”

Lt. Cmdr. Joe Milligan XO

“They called that the theory of Occam’s razor at the Academy,” Glen added. “There is also a saying on Andoria, that if it ‘Voffs’ like a Redbat, then it is a Redbat!”

-Glen, CO

William arrived on the bridge, PaDD in hand reading over the latest reports from both his department and his representative on the bridge before taking his place at his station and checking the data, focusing on the decaying nebula for now.

CSO

It seems as they continued to talk someone or something did actually have a channel they could receive and send on. Thankfully with their earlier translations of the alien child’s language from their last mission. The UT had an easier time locking in on the audible terms. So when words became clear they were in the middle of a sentence. “..dock, we have observed your approach, please signal on this frequency and identify yourself..” it said.

GM CockRoach