[snip]

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 it’s 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 .”

Joe’s food was put onto his plate, the ‘red stuff’ turned out to be some kind of lightly glazed meat product, it had the taste of something like bbq beef, the ‘green stuff’ turned out to be a steamed vegetable which tasted a lot like a mix of an apple with asparagus, the ‘brown jelly’ turned out to be a dessert most likely, it was obviously jello like and wiggled a bit, its taste was quite similar to a light sweet chocolate but inside the jello were tiny brown dots which when tasted had a burst of unexpected minty like flavor and were somewhat crunchy. All in all he had no problem eating it nor would he feel any problems now or later.

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.

If Cross was going to go wandering it would probably be best to get permission, and get accompanied by someone on the habitat, after all she wouldn’t want to cause an incident like their former vulcan CSO had caused with their First Contact with the militaristic Bolay Military District?.....

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

Dol smiled nodding, “..Of course Captain Glen! It is quite fine. Your beliefs are of course your beliefs as are they your guiding doctrine. We just got so excited to finally have more outside visitors that I neglected in my own internal excitement to inform you of this till the last minute. I hope this will not effect our future chat to come?” he said.

By this point the various media crews had filed out, as did their interviewers. This left Glen and company only with the five food/drink serving staff by the tables, Dol, his wife, and four other advisors at the table, plus a pair of helpers who seemed to assist in the care of drinks on the table or serving any requested food or any other task requested.

GM CockRoach