= SB Unity, TF Science Section - Communications Lab 1 =
The lab was empty as Bren sat in front of Outpost R-12's
communications beacon and studied the archive of logs and communique's
he'd pulled from it. As soon he was back on Unity, he'd taken the
device to the lab and cordoned it off, allowing no access to any
unauthorized personnel, which was basically anyone but himself.
An active relay transmitting encrypted messages that was supposed to
be deactivated on a derelict station had rang a few alarm bells in
Bren's head, and if his suspicions were correct, those encrypted
messages were being sent from Unity. If there was indeed a mole on the
station, there was no telling who it was and he didn't want any one
else to have access to a communications relay that would've been
destroyed along with the rest of R-12.
It was highly likely that the spy learned about the Tarangor mission
and then sent word that the relay and the rest of the station be
destroyed immediately. Bren had little evidence to back up his theory
so far, since he was having trouble decrypting some of the
information, but the telemetry data suggested that there were three
signals of origin; one originating from the Epsilon 11 Comms Relay,
which was a main communications carrier for Unity, and two originating
from non-Federation relays which could not be identified.
The encryption codes were like nothing Bren had seen before and he
didn't think it even resembled any Romulan encryption patterns. What
intrigued him was the amount of "noise" and radio echoes that were
received by the R-12 relay. At first he didn't think anything of it
because all subspace beacons pick up sensor ghosts and echoes, but
then he had an idea and ran it through an identifier algorithm and
realised that their was a patter to the information. It was just
random echoes that were being received, but specific ones that were
repeated over and over.
Even more intriguing was what these were. They were specific public
news broadcasts that could be intercepted by anyone, but they were
bounced from a non-Federation source, which was quite unlikely. Very
well hidden, anyone looking at them would just think they were
Federation broadcasts, but they were more than that. There was a
series of 17 broadcasts that were repeated exactly 17 times, all
reporting on certain events that happened throughout the Federation.
The first was of an educational program discussing the origins of the
Spinward Marsh and the myriad anomalies contained therein. The second
was a report of the murder of a group of well-respected scientists
that were supposedly working on a classified project for Starfleet
Intelligence R&D. Then a report about the destruction of the USS
Hyperion, the cause of which was not mentioned. Another was about the
construction of a monument on New Geneva in order to comemmorate the
turn of the 24th Century, dating back to 2399, and a report about the
crash of the USS Enterprise-D on Veridian III. Then there was a report
of an Admiral's wife that had been abducted along with their two
children by a group of Orion pirates in the 23rd century plus a number
of other news reports.
It didn't make any sense. There had to be a connection somewhere, but
where? Glancing at the chronometer, Bren decided to call it a night.
He had a dinner date with Liev, Rangi and Shane and knew he had to
take some time to let the information sift through his head. Maybe an
idea would come to him in the middle of the night.
= End Log =
Commander Bren Ohmsford
Science & Act. Engineering Advisor
1st Task Force, SSF
