Saboteur Uncovered

Captain Taybar was on the Bridge making final preparations for the ship to leave Starbase 901 and put her plan to defeat the Karled into action. Most of the crew had left the ship on her orders and only twenty officers and crew, mainly the Bridge crew and senior Engineering staff. Suddenly there was a message for the Captain, which informed her that Stefen Moss, the acting Security chief had discovered the identity of the saboteur and wanted to speak with her in the Brig.

Bemused by the request, she headed off the Bridge and headed for the Brig, where she found a young Ensign looking confused.

Brig

“Where’s Lieutenant Moss ?” Aki enquired.

“Cell one Captain.” The Ensign replied. “He asked me to pass this on to you when you arrived.”

Walking over to the cell door, Aki looked inside and saw Stefen just sitting, calmly.

“Mister Moss, Stefen, what’s going on ?” She asked.

“I would have thought that was obvious.” Stefen replied. “The Padd in your hand contains a visual record of the person who planted the bomb and that person was me.”

Aki activated the Padd and watching in horror as she saw Stefen plant the bomb, just as he said.

“But why ?” Aki asked. “Why did you plant the bomb ?”

“Captain, I have no recollection of planting the bomb in the Intelligence office, but logic would suggest that I am the saboteur.” Stefen stated calmly. “I have already deleted all my Security and Intelligence codes from the main computer core.”

“Lieutenant, I can’t believe this.” Aki said. “The data must have been altered somehow to look as if it was you who planted the bomb, a hologram perhaps.”

“That is no hologram Captain.” Stefen said. “There is bio-metric data which corresponds to the video images. I was in the Intelligence office at the time of the recording and I was alone.”

“There must be some explanation for this.” Aki exclaimed. “I can’t believe that you would plant a bomb and then intentionally attempt to kill yourself.”

“Neither can I Captain, but the facts do speak for themselves.” Stefen stated. “There is more information on the Padd, a complete record of all the data we downloaded on the Romulan war and any links to the Karled or Axeline.”

“But you said all the data had been tampered with.” Aki suggested. “We may have the data you downloaded, but it is worthless to us.”

“Not so Captain.” Stefen replied. “The data on the Padd is the original data before it was altered.”

“Just how did you come upon this data ?” Aki asked.

“I discovered a covert device hidden in the wall of the Intel office, it must have been placed there to observe the room.” Stefen reported. “I believe it was installed during the repairs that were made to the Leviathan at Spacedock. The device was connected into the ODN network and monitored all the data coming in and out of the Intel office, recording the information for later retrieval.”

“By whom ?” Aki enquired.

“I have no idea.” Stefen lied. “But they must have known that we would start to investigate the Romulan war and look for links with the Karled.”

“I’ll take a look at this data.” Aki stated. “Maybe there’s something in here which could explain everything. I will get to the bottom of this mystery, but we have more pressing matters to deal with first.”

“I’m not going anywhere.” Stefen replied.

With that Captain Taybar left the Brig and headed back to the Bridge.

Elsewhere on the ship, a lone figure sat watching their console in the dark. The images showed the Brig and the exchange between Captain Taybar and Lieutenant Moss.

*This could be a problem.* The mysterious figure thought to themselves. *Klang will not be pleased. There is no way I can release the Lieutenant with raising further suspicions. As for the data the Captain now has, I doubt she will have much time to use it.*