“You’re safe now.  You’re aboard a Starfleet ship.”  Lieutenant Oswald Mika stood on the other side of the thick quarantine glass, softly speaking through the open channel.  The two parents crouched, eyes wide.  They’d been rescued from the civilian ship moments ago and transported aboard. Between them, they clutched their five-year-old daughter, who warily stared at the Chief Medical Officer.

“Why are we behind this glass?” the mom asked, her voice trembling. Oswald explained quarantine as gently as he could. The mom and dad turned and whispered to each other before turning back to face the glass. Mom said, “I’m Maddie Harrison. This is my husband, Lawrence Harrison. This is Jessie.”

Oswald knelt so Jessie could see him without craning her neck up, “It’s good to meet you.  Since we’re meeting for the first time, I will need to do some tests and scans for a regular check-up.  Are you hungry?”  He felt some warmth as the young girl nodded shyly.  “There’s a replicator on the wall there – can you help your mom and dad decide what to order?”  Another shy nod as she eyed the glittering wall unit.  He returned to the console at the door to the room and started the battery of scans.

“They suspected they were part of some kind of sacrifice.”  Oswald highlighted elements of his report as he sat at his office desk while Captain Peter Crawford sat opposite.  “Leanna Dorl conducted plenty of tests on them and had been preparing them for something – they weren’t sure.  They were loaded with plenty – some made sense, like vitamins,s but some of this looks more like she was preparing a body for burial or something. I’ve got my staff taking a closer look.”

Peter gaped at the report, “She was injecting them?  Since the Harrisons are Federation citizens, that gives us room to involve Starfleet Security.”

“Leanna Dorl’s methods are part of my concern.  We’ve got teams working their way through the other two ships – I’ve got preliminary reports of malnutrition and disease.  There are also reports on mental and emotional well-being – counseling is working to understand better what these people have been through.”  With a dark sigh, Oswald tossed the PADD back onto his desk, “We’re still not entirely sure what her motives were…or are.  There are still thirty of them holed up on the bridge.”

Crawford grumbled, “They still haven’t answered our hails.”  He stopped and focused on Mika’s last few words, “You worried about the other two crews?”

The pregnant pause before Lieutenant Mika’s reply had the CO leaning forward in the chair.  “I’m not worried about the family – we’ve got plenty more tests to run, but they’re not the bad actors in this bizarre play.  I am worried about the rest of them.  The first question they asked our teams was about Leanna Dorl’s condition and inner circle’s status.  They may be thankful for our food and medicine, but they still believe in her mission – whatever the hell it is.”  He put a hand up in apology, “Sorry, captain.  Everything on station medical was generally so orderly and straightforward.  This is anything but.”

Peter sat back in the chair.  What started as finding some errant colonists was beginning to feel like they were chasing a shuttle cloaking in and out as they tried to run it down.  “Let’s keep the crews on their ships.  Shuttles can tractor them here.”  He looked through the office windows to the family in the quarantine suite, “I want to know what she was going to do with them.  And why she was so desperate to get to the Sheliak Corporate.”  Crawford stood but was stopped by a quiet gasp across the desk.  He asked, “You think you know?”

“What if she wasn’t going to the Sheliak Corporate?”  The medical doctor tapped at his console, “Four weeks plus to the border.  They must have thought we’d just let them go and die.”

The CO chuckled dryly, “They haven’t met our Fleet Captain, medical doctor and all.”

Mika’s face reddened a little, “Fontana’s on my list of docs to meet.  The point is…what if they were dropping this family off to someone?  The reports said that the original colony was a setup or something – made to push them off into the path of Leanna Dorl and her cult.”  He sat straight up, “Captain – what if this was a plot to get all of them?”  He answered Crawford’s frown, “Old Earth cults were either a delusion of the leader or intentional murder.  She’s been working with this group for a long time, building them up towards something big.”

Peter glanced back at the family, “And they were the last ingredient?”

“It sounds a little much saying it loud,” Oswald lamented.

“We don’t have anything better at the moment.  Start chasing it down, Doctor Mika.”

“It would explain plenty.”  Lieutenant Albright stood, staring out the windows of the ready room.  Crawford sat at his desk, poring over intelligence data and sensory sweeps over the last few months.  She held a PADD with the same data, scrolling through as she sipped at her sparking tea, “You worried about the uptick in genetic operations out here in the rimward?”

Peter paused the data.  He wasn’t sure what to believe.  “Who is to say that it was already here?  We just happened to be kicking over the right rocks and finding the worst the universe offers.”  He returned to the console, scrolling and contemplating how much trouble lay ahead for them.  If Leanna Dorl was supposed to deliver to someone, that someone might come looking for their tardy shipment.  “I can imagine a lot of terrible things the Orion Syndicate would involve themselves in, but this seems a bit out of their scope and sequence.”

Grace turned to face him, “An independent operator?  Tougun hasn’t been up and running long enough to get this dirty.”  She mused, “His experience with the Borg equipment would keep him away from playing at that end of the pool.”  She scoffed, “He is a crazy Orion, to be fair.”

Peter wondered where on the spectrum of madness they would land with suspects in this situation.  He was starting to wonder if they could use a bigger gun in their own hands.  “Signal Captain Pantuso – see if she’ll hang out in our backyard.”

The XO frowned but headed for the door and the bridge, “You think we’re going to have some trouble, captain?”

“We’ve already had some trouble, Lieutenant Albright…I think we’re going to find out how deep it is in the deep end of the pool.”

Albright cracked, “Glad I know how to swim, sir.”

Crawford didn’t even look up, “Points for the attempt, Lieutenant Albright, but none for style or substance.  Don’t make jokes with Captain Pantuso – she’s a harder grader than I am.”

Grace felt a quiet smile on her lips as she replied on her way to the bridge, “Aye, sir.”