That Which Lurks In The Shadows

Posted on 10 Feb 2016 @ 10:26am by Captain Jonathan Holliday

684 words; about a 3 minute read

Mission: Episode 10 - Symposium
Location: Jupiter Station - Maintenance Bays
Timeline: MD82 - 1115hrs

[ON]

Jonathan breathed a sigh of relief as the doors of the symposium hall slammed shut behind him. He had spent long enough in there surrounded by academics and scientists that he would at least avoid raising too muh in the way of suspicion. Had he simply avoided attending the event all together, then perhaps more questions might have been left afterwards.

Heading towards the nearest turbolift, the Captain stopped to access an equipment locker, removing a single tricorder before continuing. Cutting in and out between the various other individuals milling around in the corridors, the Martian eventually reached his destination.

As the turbolift doors opened to receive him, John was relieved to see that for this journey at least, he would be alone, and gratefully stepped inside. Waiting for the doors to close, he opened the tricorder and established a secure datalink back to his personal database on the Galileo, making sure to cover his tracks as he did so. After a few moments the tricorder flashed to confirm the connection was successful, and the download began.

"Maintenance Bay 21". He called out to the turbolift, conscious that if he sat still for too long, someone else would come to use the elevator and he would no longer have the temporary sanctum he currently enjoyed.

The computer beeped in acknowledgement before moving off, taking only a few seconds to traverse the enormous station before depositing him outside his desired destination.
Closing the tricorder down again he stepped out into the corridor. The engineering levels of Jupiter Station were a little different to the more confrerence-orientated levels above, much more rugged and functional than the ornate surroundings he had come from. As he stopped to get his bearings, a technician, visibly surprised to see an officer, let alone a Captain down here, snapped to attention as he approached.

"Can I help you sir?" The young-faced Crewman asked. Holliday realised he had to give an answer of some sort, but nothing too descript.

"Thank you Crewman but no. That won't be necessary - you are dismissed." He replied curtly with a wave of his hand. The young man, obviously glad to no longer be in view of a CO, quickly scurried off back down the corridor he had just arrived from.

Another sigh of relief left Holliday's lips before he too made his journey to his final destination. A generally unimportant sideroom was his objective, unoccupied according to the tricorder, but with the critical element of a console networked into the station's repair database. Stepping through the doors and making sure that he tapped the 'lock' button behind him, Holliday approached the terminal.

Checking the tricorder was ready, he lowered the small handheld onto the surface of the console, sufficient for the two devices to network to each other, and the program he had just downloaded went to work. Teraquads of data were quickly sifted through, looking for very specific code elements before deleting and replacing them in mere seconds. It didn't take long before the tricorder flashed to say that the deed was done.

Holliday took a moment - he had just betrayed everything that he stood for as a Starfleet Captain, he had just broken into a facilty's main database, exploited the authority that came with his rank, and decieved anyone who would ever examine this data.

With a heavy heart the Captain picked up his tricorder, wiped the data storage device, and tossed it into the nearby recycling unit to be disintegrated and returned as raw materials to the replicator system, and as quickly as he had arrived, it was time to leave.

There was time enough for him to get back to his ship and complete some paperwork with enough detail to give a reasonable alibi that he had been aboard ship the whole time if anything were to somehow come to light that might indicate what had been done, but beyond that, he could only trust his new acquaintances that they would hold up their end of the bargain......



[OFF]


CAPT Jonathan Holliday
Commanding Officer
USS Galileo

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