[snip]

”..Please come in Captain Glen, and feel free to sit where you wish, we do not exactly have a formal ceremony for function when these sort of meetings happen. We prefer they be based on a pleasant exchange of inquiry and information and pacing. If you wish feel free to sample any of the food or drinks provided. Once everyone is seated and provided you do not mind Captain Glen, I would like to have this meeting recorded and broadcast later on our local news outlets, and if you wish you can also choose to have you or your staff interviewed by any or all of the Media outlets during or after our exchange..” Dol said.

“I’d rather we talked without being broadcast to begin with,” Glen answered. “Later, we can discuss interviews and broadcasts.”

”..Of course, as you wish Captain Glen..” Dol said nodding, turning to the media crews. “..For now no recordings or interviews have been requested by our guests. You may all pack up and retire back to your normal routines, sorry for disrupting your day on such short notice!” he said politely.

A few of the major media members were obviously disappointed but seemed to understand, and all three teams began to pack up the cameras and such.

Cross heard Dol’s wife telling the Captain how the media was excited about recording them since it was a ‘rarity of outsiders to interview,’ for the doctor the word ‘Rarity’ meant that they did meet or made contact with other species, so who were they? Cross hoped Glen had caught the phrase even it was just a brief declaration on the wife’s side.
The list was growing long for Joe. He was unsettled to say the least. Antique projectile weapons, people wearing tin foil, Cross acting strange, and now a buffet which smelled too good and would at the very least only poison him a little bit. Joe recognized then the true cause of his grumpiness. He hadn’t eaten yet today and as if to punctuate the fact his stomach growled. He moved over toward Cross and said to her, “Is there way to know if this food will poison us if we don’t have scanners?”

‘’There is a way actually .eat the food and if nothing happens I would know that it wasn’t poisoned , and if it is they sure would find out about our emergency transporter ‘’ she giggled ‘’Anyway I’m sticking to just a glass of water while keeping my fingers crossed ‘’.

Cross pulled him closer ‘’Joe, em I mean Cmdr maybe they are being so nice that we are finding it hard to trust them, also I’m wondering why they keep living here instead on their planet, seeing it from the shuttle it appear to be very much like Earth’‘. The doctor poured herself a glass of water ‘’Well here goes ‘’ .

Cross drank the water and.............nothing happened? It tasted like more or less normal water, just like she would have on the Merrimack. It was cool to the palette indicating refrigeration obviously. There was a slight tang to it, probably due to more primitive methods of water processing and filtering methods used on the Merrimack. But all in all it was safe to drink. Of course it would also occur to Cross she could have gotten the same answers and probably far more safely simply by using her medical tricorder, if she had brought one. Again while this culture was more primitive then the Merrimack and Federation, they obviously we’re no strangers to space based visitations.

As Cross pulled him close Joe was confused and happy at the same time then maybe mor confused. “If you eat it and you quit breathing that’s a good sign you shouldn’t eat it. Got you. Sound scientific thought there.” Joe said with a goofy grin. “But Miri you have to wonder. They’re living on a station. Where you think they’re getting the water?”

Cross’s eyes widened ,she instinctively put a hand over her throat.

Again Cross could answer this for the XO, they aliens here probably just had setup their station long ago with the original water supplies on their ships, then used reprocessing tech to keep cycling it over and over for use. No different then how the Merrimack would recycle and reuse waste and liquids on the Merrimack. So just as on the Merrimack they were basically drinking recycled water that had been drunk and processed for hundreds of years in this case. Also given they had seen various gardens and such, it wouldn’t be a stretch to assume that they used simple common sense methods to created moisture in hot houses which also then got filtered into their habitat system. In turn they probably also collected stellar ice that would pass by and filter that too. Again all things the Merrimack crew could do and did do, just with more advanced methods compared to what probably was done on this habitat.

‘’Oh no what if its not recycled properly ....don’t tell me it could have traces of em em you know ‘’Cross told an amusing Cmdr.

Joe smiled and looked at Cross and said, “Wow smart and cute you have it all Miri!” He then turned to try his luck. Other than being a minder for the junior officers he really didn’t see himself doing much while the captain was doing all the diplomatic things. He walked over to one of the tables got a plate and some silverware and said to one of the servers. “Let me try just a bit of the red stuff there, and a small portion off the green. No, no blue please. I will take that jelly looking brown though. I think that will do me for starters .”

As Joe left Cross looked around, she had no desire to sample any of the food but was getting rather bored and wondered how the Captain would react if she went exploring a bit.

Meanwhile, Glen attempted to speak to the the Dol, and tried to appear very serious in the middle of what was fast becoming quite a circus, “Dol, we appreciated that you have entertained visitors from space before, and that your people are always very interested in learning about them, and that the news organisations are merely doing their usual job of getting that information… but, we have these rules that are our guiding lights, and I have made an oath never to break them, even to lay down my life rather than to break them. What that means, in essence, is that we cannot interfere in the internal politics of your world or to intervene in your world’s natural development. We cannot be put in a position where we are seen to favour one broadcaster over another, especially when you have local elections, as this could be seen as favouring particular candidates, and that just cannot happen. When our talks have concluded, then I would be happy to hold a news conference with all the broadcasters in attendance, and to which any could ask questions. Then they would all be on an equal footing. Do you think they would they agree to that instead?”

-Glen, CO