The Genesis Directive (Part 2 of 6)

Posted on 30 Apr 2019 @ 6:12pm by Rear Admiral Lirha Saalm & Commander Allyndra illm Warraquim & Lieutenant Amaranai Franklin & Lieutenant Lake ir-Llantrisant & Lieutenant JG Matthew Plumeri & Ensign Mimi & Lieutenant Commander Ryan Alexander & Ensign Callin Mastrel & Lieutenant JG Sofie Ullswater
Edited on on 30 Apr 2019 @ 6:17pm

2,903 words; about a 15 minute read

Mission: Episode 17 - Crystal of Life
Location: USS Galileo-A - Conference Room
Timeline: MD 01, 0416 hrs

Previously, on The Genesis Directive (Part 1 of 6)...

With her officer corps' compliance, Lirha then pulled the PADD from her hip and synched it to the large widescreen monitor installed into the wall. After a couple taps on the small device, the mysterious double-helix symbol reappeared on the briefing room's screen. Saalm looked to everyone in the room. "By now you have all seen this icon. What do you know about Project Genesis?"

And Now, the Continuation...

[ON]

Plumeri looked at the image and now realized that this was no 'computer glitch'. There was more to the symbol than 'just' a pretty picture. He tried to understand why it was being called 'Project Genesis' but he did not see a correlation between two strands of DNA and the icon of the United Federation of Planets. He took a long swig of coffee and deciding that a jest would be unwelcome at this time simply said, "I've not heard of it before."

Lake kept his eyes on the Captain, and no others, when he said, "I have." From there, he didn't elaborate if that knowledge had come through his days of research for Starfleet Science, his days as a trauma counselor with a search and rescue team, the Command officers he'd known in his time, or somewhere else entirely. "More as a legend than anything else," Lake admitted; "I didn't know if it was really real."

"You will have to explain captain," Allyndra replied listening to the rest. She had come to learn that the Federation had secrets as deep as her own world's. The secrecy and the way the captain acted meant that this was something from the past, well hopefully the past, that had something bad connected to it. Her mind could not help but wonder if it was something bad, a weapon, or something else how it had come to be here. Of course, like her own people, a lot of things had been put away, not destroyed, just stored. Well perhaps the answer might be more forthcoming.

Given some of her superiors had never even heard of it Ullswater was pretty sure that this was something she wasn't meant or expected to know about and she didn't so taking a moment to drink some tea she just followed up the Doctor's comment with a blank expression and a shake of the head.

Despite Amaranai's years in security, and even with her recent promotion, the officer still didn't have level ten clearance. Her brain tried to come up with something that would make sense, but the tiredness and her worry were not coming up with a clear interpretation.

"I've never heard of it," Amaranai offered.

Mimi shook her head a little, she knew the word and a little about it's human religious meaning but she'd never heard of any Starfleet project with that name.

Ryan furrowed his brow in thought. He had spent his early years in service to the Federation working with parts of Starfleet Intelligence which was why he was racking his brain for any information. "That sounds familiar." He said closing his eyes for a moment trying to recall what he had seen. "Yes, vaguely." He said as he opened his eyes and glanced around at the rest of the staff.

At first, Callin had been about to reference a group of Earth religions he had studied some that used this term - Genesis. Was that what some of the others seemed to recognize? He started to speak, but then though better of it when he looked at the captain. There was something so deadly earnest about all of this... Callin took a breath and tried again admitting his ignorance and some of his concern at once, "I suspect this is something more dangerous than legendary accounts on the creation of life by a god?"

Matthew listened to the others as the table and what they were saying. He tried to remember any reference he had seen to a 'creation story' and only knew of the Terran one related to that word. So again, he drew a blank and kept his mouth shut.

Allyndra cocked her head slightly as she listened as the rest seemed to offer not much other than the word genesis seemed to be tied to some legend or other from Earth. Only the Romulan officer seemed to know something more than that and that piqued her interest. She turned her attention to him.

The Orion captain almost rolled her eyes when Lake -- the sole Romulan out of all them -- was one of the only two to display initial knowledge of the project. She looked to both he and Ryan with a discreet gaze then nodded to both to reveal their secrets. "What does this legend say?" she asked in front of everyone, promoting them to speak publicly about their knowledge.

"They say Project Genesis was what they called a method of terraforming far faster than any technology known in the quadrant," Lake remarked. He looked to the gathered officers briefly, and then he returned his eyes to Lirha. He looked for any hint of confirmation in her eyes. "Build a world in a week, so to speak. Don't ask me if the method is biological, mechanical or metaphysical, because I wouldn't know what to tell you."

"I had heard something similar to the Lieutenant. The only other bit of information that I can add is that it also had something to do with one of the previous Enterprises years ago." Ryan added, knowing that he didn't really know that much about the project.

The captain allowed a moment of silence to pass before she spoke in reply. "Yes. You are both correct. Project Genesis is a classified and failed Starfleet experiment conceived in the 2250s." Saalm tapped her PADD to link it to the main screen in the room which now displayed the image of an attractive, middle-aged blonde Human female with blue eyes.

"This is Doctor Carol Marcus, head scientist of the project. She postulated that through subatomic transformation, the process of planetary terraforming could be achieved almost instantly." Lirha looked to Lake, "Within weeks, as your legend tells."

Lirha then touched her PADD to change the screen to a new display, this one of a man-sized silver object in the shape of a canister -- much like early-Earth's nuclear payload delivery devices. "Doctor Marcus and her team created this device called Genesis...a simple torpedo payload designed to be launched to the surface of an uninhabitable world." On the main viewscreen, the image of the Genesis device now changed to show several different scientific projections detailing the launch and atmospheric entry sequence.

"Upon detonation at 500 meters above the surface," she added in coordination with the animations, "the surrounding target area would be reduced to subatomic particles then reassembled according to whatever matrix was pre-programmed into the device."

Craning his neck, Lake stared intently at the LCARS display of the Genesis device's atmospheric entry to a hypothetical uninhabited world. His mouth agape, Lake made no effort to hide his own surprise. "An entire world," Lake said, "terraformed by one lonely torpedo?"

Allyndra did not say anything but watched but the term going around in her mind was A'ksu. The humans had theirs as well. People with the ability to think ahead but not plan or foresee the consequences of their actions. Too focused to think and sometimes then willing to take shortcuts that resulted in disasters.

Callin began to frown, his eyes grew troubled. "If this wasn't so serious I would almost think it a joke. What sort of catalyst did they think to use to cover such a massive area?" For the moment it was scientific curiosity that drove his question, but there was a little part of him that felt uncomfortable. More than a little part maybe by the hardness of his face.

The captain continued her presentation. "The Genesis Project, as it is known, was tested in three phases. First aboard the space station Regula One then within an underground bunker on the planetoid the station orbited. Both initial tests were successful and the project was approved by Starfleet for wide-scale planetary implementation. This was to be phase three." Images of lush vegetation scenery contained within a lifeless rocky cavern flashed across the monitor.

"To test Genesis, Starfleet needed to find a suitable uninhabited world meeting very exact criteria. USS Reliant was given the assignment but was commandeered by a warlord named Khan Noonien Singh...the leader of the Human augment survivors and a relic of Earth's Eugenics Wars." Now on the display was an image of the notorious brown-skinned, long-haired man in all of his mystery. His dark eyes displayed extreme knowledge, cunning, deviousness, and psychopathy all at the same time.

"Khan infiltrated the Regula One station and stole the Genesis device for himself, killing most of the project's scientists in the process. USS Enterprise, under the command of Captain Kirk, was dispatched to investigate and the famous Battle of the Mutara Nebula ensued. The Enterprise and Kirk defeated Khan, forcing him to die with his vessel after an attempted suicide maneuver."

More historical images on the screen blinked by in sequence to show the assembled officers a visual perspective of the people, places and events that were being discussed.

"Following Khan's destruction of the prototype, scans of the test site on the planetoid, called the 'Genesis World', revealed the truth of the experiment." Lirha looked to all of them in silence before showing the horrors of the aftermath months after Reliant had been destroyed.

On the screen were now images of mutated flora and fauna, unstable storm systems across the atmosphere, and severe geological activity on the surface. "In an attempt to expedite the project, both Doctor Marcus and her son, David Marcus, had used protomatter as one of the critical compounds necessary to complete the device. It was unfortunately this very same dangerous element which ultimately flawed the project. Instead of life, the protomatter was unstable and created devastation and destruction. The Genesis world literally consumed itself as a result of the experiment."

"The Federation tried to create a planet?" Mimi asked a little astounded, she had heard of terraforming but never in a way like this.

There was a momentary pause, it felt like the weight of this 'secret' sunk in. Ensign Mimi had a good point and the word itself seemed repugnant to Plumeri, terraforming. The human-centric nature of Starfleet raised its 'human-is-best' head again. Matt made a face at the idea and sat forward. There was one terrifying prospect which seemed to be hovering over the conference table albeit unsaid. Matthew asked, "Yeah, but..." his mouth stuck on forming the 'W' part of his question, "...what if the target planet isn't barren and has life already on it?"

"Exactly!" Callin had held his tongue for a while, but that was what had been troubling him. He nodded at Matt and added his support, "Something that can cause such a radical shift in the chemical makeup of a world...that's gotta be dangerous, right?"

Amaranai listened. She had studied the Eugenics War and had a passing knowledge of Khan and his followers. She didn't understand their beliefs but it had been a different time. The security officer had also studied the Battle of the Mutara Nebula as it was near genius level of tactics, especially when sensors were down and manual targeting was tricky, at best. She still couldn't believe what she had heard, though. When Amaranai heard the question, she turned to the lieutenant.

"From the little I've seen, lieutenant," she started. "It would most likely wipe out any life that happened to be on the planet when the device was activated." She paused to consider her own statement. "A weapon that destructive in the wrong hands would be the end of free civilization. I hope there is no more data on the project." Another pause. "But you're telling us about it, so there must still be something?"

"Indeed," Allyndra replied. She knew that she needed to expand on that simple word. "There was a small section in medical dealing with effects of protomatter on organisms. It was something new to me and I looked into it to further my own knowledge. Protomatter is comprised of a high amount of positroniums. For those that are not familiar positroniums is a particle consisting of an electron in orbit around its antimatter equivalent. As you can imagine a very highly unstable pairing. There are some indications that the early universe was composed of such pairings and the degradation of the particle results in both high energy levels but the creation of various subatomic particles such as protons, neutrons and so forth. No wonder such a device would have a very dangerous potential."

The officers' questions and comments, especially from Franklin and Warraquim, were at the very heart of the new mission they now faced. "The Genesis device has never been employed on a habitable world but you are right, Amaranai," said Lirha. "All scientific simulations predicted that Genesis integration into a world with organic life would essentially unravel the planet until its core eventually broke apart and the world shattered. As you say, in the wrong hands this technology could devastate entire quadrants if used maliciously. That is why Starfleet created the Genesis Directive."

Lirha tapped her PADD again to cycle the presentation to a new page with a simple list of contingency plans. "At its very essence, Project Genesis was a non-viable experiment that yielded disastrous results. Starfleet's standing orders since 2288 have been to -- upon detection of any remnants of the experiment -- eliminate all signs of its technology and presence...at all costs."

Despite the captain's explanation of the project, it was hard to overstate the severity of the situation they all faced. It went beyond any captain's ego to explore new worlds and civilizations, and entered the realm of galactic self-preservation. "Our current mission to investigate the colonies is now superseded by the Genesis Protocol," she continued. "When we entered orbit of Latari A III, short-range sensors detected trace protomatter signatures consistent with Genesis use on the surface near the center of the geological event. This is why the computer lockout occurred," she explained.

Allyndra had a question that was burning in her head about the whole situation and she could not hold it back any longer. "Captain, while I now understand the device, and what potential it has and the harm it can do, as indicated by the briefing such technology was supposedly outlawed. Any speculation as to how and why this technology escaped and was used here? Have you had any contact with Fleet command as of yet? If the knowledge or a device has been stolen or gotten away from the Federation that would be of grave importance, if still within the Federation, then I cannot see that the use of the device is anything but crime and grave one at that."

Galileo's second officer had posed an essential question but unfortunately one which Saalm was unable to answer. Not just because she, herself, didn't have the immediate answers, but because even if she did, such information was outside the purview of dissemination required to complete their task at hand. Starfleet's orders were tight and even briefing all of her officers in such a current manner was pushing the limits of her authority.

Lirha shook her head in the negative while looking to the Akkadian commander. "The how and why of Genesis' presence on this world is unknown. I've analyzed our sensor readings over the past half-hour while corresponding the results to all known database entries. I cannot speculate in the absence of answers, but I can confirm there are no signs of a Genesis detonation on the planet." She paused to take a deep breath, "Which is why, I've requested two hours from Captain Hiroshi to allow us to investigate the source of the signatures before we destroy the remains. We are a science vessel and the reason behind Genesis' reappearance is arguably as important as eliminating it."

Now projecting a rare stoic face, Saalm looked again to all of those assembled. "I need two volunteers to lead a shuttle mission down to the surface," she requested. "The mission is to fly down to the signal source site and investigate the origin of the Genesis signatures, then return and report back. All within a 120 minute-window, alive and safe." It was perhaps the most perilous mission she could ever concoct in her dreams let alone her waking fantasies.

To Be Continued...

[OFF]

--

CAPT Lirha Saalm
Commanding Officer
USS Galileo-A

LTJG Matthew Plumeri
Science Officer
USS Galileo-A

CMDR Allyndra illm Warraquim
Chief Medical Officer
USS Galileo-A

ENS Mimi
Deputy Operations Manager
USS Galileo-A

ENS Ryan Alexander
Operations Manager
USS Galileo-A

ENS Sofie Ullswater
Science Officer
USS Galileo-A

LT Lake ir-Llantrisant
Chief Counselor
USS Galileo-A

LT Amaranai Franklin
Deputy Security Officer
USS Galileo-A

ENS Callin Mastrel
Science Officer
USS Galileo-A

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