First Log

Ensign Chu Barker's Personal Log: Stardate 2460176.

Since I've been aboard the Leviathan things have got very busy. Everyone has been working double and sometimes triple shifts to get the ship back on into space.

We've been underway and heading towards that Beta quadrant for a week now. Five years exploring ahead of us, with no real back-up. Most of my duty time I've spent in the stellar cartography department. If we 're to explore the far side of the Beta quadrant, then being able to accurately map our way is going to be important. Stellar cartography isn't really my area of expertise, but whilst we were in space dock, we had a visit from Lieutenant Harry Kim of *USS Voyager*. Much of the S-C equipment and mapping technologies on the Leviathan are based on those that were developed aboard Voyager, by Lieutenant Kim and Annika Hansen. With his help, we finally managed to get to grips with the technology and the department is running like clockwork.

Just before we left spacedock the Captain invited me to attend the senior staff meeting. This was because the Chief Science Officer wasn't aboard yet and I've heard various rumours about where he is. Some say that as soon as he heard where we were heading, he'd requested reassignment. Other's say that he'd been killed whilst testing a new energy collection system that had blown up, taking the moon that it was sited on with it.

The most plausible rumour going around is that he's been acting as a liaison officer between the Klingon's that we're suppose be meeting and that he'll transfer across when out little 'fleet' joins up.

Until then, I've been volunteered to 'act up', in a ship full of inexperienced Ensign's I'm 'Chief' Ensign. I've got the experience of being the head of a team, but being responsible for the entire Science team aboard the ship was really frightening at first. Once you get the hang of the ordering people around, things start to get easier. As for my 'off duty' activities, I've been splitting my time between resting up and assisting with the installation and configuration of the new Refractive Shielding emitters.

I'm surprised that Starfleet had even read my original report, let alone started to develop my idea. I say my idea, but in fact it had come from a set of log reports that I found one day from the *Enterprise-D*.

The logs detailed their encounter with a Chodac vessel and their chameleon field generator. The Chodac Empire covered much of the Beta quadrant, but eventually collapsed around 30,000 years ago. Starfleet Intelligence had intercepted Romulan and Klingon reports about attacked by strange vessels that sensors could not accurately identify.

The chameleon field relayed back false readings to the sensors. Therefore, although you could be looking straight at a Chodac vessel, the sensors would report that you were looking at harmless lump of rock or a cloud of inert gases.

Many in the scientific community believed that the Romulans developed their first cloaking device using ancient Chodac technology that they had found.

After reading about this encounter, I started to think how such a system would work, the results of all this was the Refractive shielding system. Not as sophisticated as the Chodac chameleon field and most definitely not a cloaking device (Which of course would be illegal as set out in the Treaty of Algeron).

However, I soon realized that Starfleet computer technology wasn't capable of processing the vast amounts of data that the system required and left the idea unfinished. It's only since the introduction of the biogel computer systems that the processing problems were resolvable. What was that ? ..

Ensign Barker stopped dictating his log entry and looked up. The ship had suddenly picked up speed, a LOT of speed. The inertial dampers had compensated for most of the acceleration, but the jump in speed had been enough to overload the damper for a brief second and cause the whole ship to 'jerk'.

[Intruder alert ! Security to the bridge !] The Captain's voice announced over the intraship communications.

*An intruder, How did they get onboard ?, Were they responsible for the increase in speed ?*

"Computer, access internal sensors on the bridge and identify all crew members and filter their readings out"

[Complete]

"Identify any anomalies in the remaining data"

[There is an unidentified energy concentration on the Bridge.]

"Computer, Identify and clarify the energy concentration"

[Complete. The energy field would appear to be operating in a similar manner to the ship's EMH. The energy within the containment field is of a higher frequency to that of the EMH. The 'intruder' would appear to be of humanoid form and be a combination of Talaxian, Vulcan or Romulan, Andorian and Borg origin.]

*Quite a mix there. Wait a minute, the EMH is still off-line*

"Computer, what is the status of the EMH systems"

[The Emergency medical hologram is currently on-line]

Running out of his room, Ensign Barker headed for the turbolift.

"Sickbay"

Location: Sickbay

Looking around the sickbay, no one was around.

"Computer, activate EMH"

[The EMH is already active. Command canceled]

"Computer, Where is the EMH currently located ?"

[The EMH is currently located on deck one, the Bridge attending a medical emergency.]

"Computer, deactivate the EMH"

[Command canceled. The EMH is currently attending a medical emergency on the bridge.]

Chu rushed over to the EMH control console and tried to deactivate the EMH from there, but to no avail.

"Computer, deactivate all holographic systems"

[All holographic systems are off-line, except the EMH, which is dealing with a medical emergency on the Bridge]

*So what now, we've got an intruder who seems to have not only a great deal of knowledge about the EMH, but has effectively possessed it. There is no way to shutdown the program as the computer thinks that it's dealing with a medical emergency. And in addition, the ship is going at breakneck speed.*

"Wait, that might work" Chu said out loud, although no one was around to hear him.

"Ensign Barker to Doctor Clairidge."

<How can I help you Ensign I'm rather busy dealing with the casualties in Engineering.>

"Sir, I need you to go to the Bridge and relieve the EMH program of his duty."

<I thought the EMH was still off-line awaiting repairs to the sickbay holoemmiters.>

"That is true Doctor, but there are holo-emitters in most of the key areas of the ship, including the Bridge and Engineering. Doctor, I believe that someone or something is using the EMH program to gain access to the Bridge systems. They are probably responsible for our increase in speed. None of the overrides are working because the computer thinks that the EMH is attending to a medical emergency. I think our only chance is for you to 'relieve' the EMH of his medical responsibilities."

<Ensign, I have injured here, I can't just leave them>

"Doctor, how many casualties do you have and are any of them serious"

<About a dozen, nothing serious, but I've got medical teams all over the ship, I can't spare any to relieve me and I really can't leave these people.>

"Doctor, I'm trained as a field medic, I'll come down to Engineering and take over. I really need you to get the Bridge and try my plan. The ship is still accelerating and you don't need to be a structural engineer to know that sooner or later the stresses on the hull will break her apart. Once we get everyone back in shape in Engineering, maybe they can find a way to shutdown the SS drive."

<I'm not entirely sure what it will achieve, but if it will stop all the crew being injured, I'll give it a try. Doctor out.>

Leaving Sickbay, Ensign Chu ran back to the turbolift.

"Engineering"