From Shadow Comes a Blinding Light

[Chirakis 1]

“From Shadow Comes a Blinding Light”

Lt Cdr Kallah Ramson, Captain, NX 97000

 

For the size of the NX-97000 starship the Captain's quarters were quite spacious. When it is realized the area also doubled as the Captain's ready room and senior officer's conference room the trade offs become more apparent. At the moment Kallah Ramson was the sole occupant of the room. Spread across her desk's image processing surface were different files and scans taken from the Breen computer core. With a tap, one file or another would rise to a free floating holographic display above the desktop. Then, Kallah would begin rearranging the files on the desktop to see if they made anymore sense in some new configuration. So far she had made no breakthroughs and the number of important looking but otherwise disconnected bits of data floating above the desk had become a jumbled cloud. The files looked down upon her like statistical gargoyles.

 

The sound of an incoming comm was a pleasant interruption. Ramson tapped the edge of her desk and spoke, "Save and close." All the displays faded, returning a more manageable control interface to the right of her desk. The comm signal's carrier tags appeared above the comm activation button. It was a Romulan signal originating from Romii Orbital, the primary starport for Romii and the NX's last stop before the final jump to Romulus. There were two possible faces on the other end of this call, a Romulan bureaucrat with a new list of inspection and safety requirements they would have to complete before being cleared on to Romulus, or....

 

As Kallah opened the channel the image of SubCommander Jorahl appeared. "Commander," he said with a slight nod. "Are you still on your original arrival schedule?"

 

"Yes, we have increased speed to make up for that little.... detour we experienced."

 

"Good. I need to inform you of something. Shortly there will be a public announcement made by the Romulan Senate. Our scientists have detected and confirmed a possible nova reaction of a star within the Romulan Empire."

 

"Have they estimated the magnitude of the eruption?"

 

"Not as of yet, which is one of the reasons an announcement is being made. The star is three light years from Romulus. That gives us plenty of time to deploy gamma ray shielding if the explosion is small in scale. If it is large, however, the whole sector will be flooded for years. With that possibility the Senate has begun planning for the," Jorahl paused briefly from the distaste of the words he was about to expel, "the evacuation of Romulus."

 

Concern spread across Kallah's face. "That seems a big step without having more information."

 

Jorahl gave a gruff grunt. "Our readings have not fit any known nova profiles so far. The star isn't even a typical nova candidate. Gravitational abnormalities have hinted that the star may have intersected a quantum filament, leading to the instability."

 

"Do you have access to subspace scans of that system?"

 

"Sending to you now." Beside Jorahl's image over Ramson's desk appeared the multi-layered scans of the subspace regions in and around the target star.

 

"Local wave patterns seem stable. If it’s a filament it's probably still lodged inside the star, which would be bad." She looked the scans over again. Leaning slightly to her right, Kallah's hand came gently up to her mouth in thought. "Have there been a number of ships in that area lately? This is showing a lot of latent field readings in the 10^6 to 10^8 Cochran band."

 

Looking to the side for a moment, "No, that sector has been put off limits for the last three days. The only warp fields would have been from probes sent into the system."

 

Kallah's head began to hurt slightly, too many puzzles recently. But, something of this looked familiar. She paged through the memories her father shared with her of the Canar star's nova eruption. Those memories mostly centered around his first kiss with her mother but the data she did know didn't quite match. Ramson went through the Voyager files she had access to, but this didn't seem to even match the novas created by the Q war.

 

"We have all but turned the star inside out trying to solve this. We should..." Jorahl got nothing more out before Ramson interrupted him.

 

"Inside out! That's what looks familiar. I've seen these scans before, but from the other side. I'm sending you a subspace scan now."

 

Jorahl leaned back, visibly looking at a side console. "Where did this come from?"

 

"The Breen data we collected. This was a scan of what we believe was one of their attempts to break out of their subspace prison. They directed a large graviton field into the subspace boundary layers. It looked like they almost broke through but stopped within the layers usually associated with warp travel."

 

"That would explain the readings but not the nova."

 

"We may not know how they're doing it, but it might be a good guess that they are doing it."

 

Jorahl grew silent in thought. "I have an associate here who might have a quick answer given this new data."

 

"I can have Coleridge look this over too. He can..."

 

"No. Do not discuss this with anyone. The Senate has only just now sent the announcement. If an answer comes this quickly from a Federation source their wounded pride will ignore it no matter the cost. I will contact you in a few moments." The comm quickly blinked to a close.

 

Just as quickly, a comm chirped calling her to the bridge. Ramson sat still, taking in a slow measured breath as she waited. The few moments Jorahl promised seemed longer and longer as the now frantic calls from her XO came. She knew word was now spreading through the crew and she could feel the tension rising. Kallah had to force herself to remember that given the worst case scenario, they would still have three years before the first effects would reach Romulus. Years more for the rest of the quadrant to prepare. The feeling of the crew was that of imminent doom and she wavered in being swept up and away by their thoughts and fears.

 

Finally, the comm signaled again from Romii. As Jorahl's face returned to the screen the look he held seemed to reinforce the fears coming from the crew. He spoke low and slowly. "My associate has confirmed these readings. She has also told me that given this data if a nova eruption occurs under these conditions, a bulk of the projected energies could be forced into the subspace warpfields forming in the area. The shockwave could reach a velocity of warp 9."

 

"There's no way you could shield against that. And you wouldn't even have time to evacuate Romulus, as if there was anyplace safe to run to. This could destroy most of the galaxy. It would take a black hole tuned perfectly to the subspace regions involved to counteract."

 

"For now, we are proceeding with the plans for evacuating Romulus. This is to remain confidential for now. We have to make plans but we can not risk the panic this can cause."

 

"I will have to report this to Starfleet."

 

Nodding slowly, Jorahl continued, "I understand, and we will relay what we have to them as well. But you must not say anything to your crew, especially the Romulans on board. We will brief you when you arrive here." Jorahl's face was strong but still expressed a deep concern. "We will have a plan by then. Jorahl out."

 

Kallah let the weight of the moment sink into her soul. The fears of the crew were now more real than any of them could have imagined. And, she would have to keep that truth from them so they could focus on what little could be done. She could only hope they had the time before it was too late.

 

__________________

Lt Cdr Kallah Ramson

310th Air Group

Assigned to Starfleet R&D

Test Pilot, Captain, NX 97000