“There was something about the way he said it,” Ensign Alessa Elara observed. “He knows we have the Teral brothers, and he must know they could implicate him in the attack, but he doesn’t seem the least bit concerned. It was his word choice too. Something soon, he said.”

Standing at the gates of the reactor, Lieutenant Commander Kehlani Koh, the Chief Security Officer of the USS Diligent now presiding over the security of the planetary reactor facility, considered what she was hearing. “So you think there’s a threat?”

“I’m not sure what else to make of it.”

Lieutenant Commander Koh looked over at Chief Geoff Morrey, the gregarious JAG investigator who’d gone with Ensign Elara to the tavern in the colony’s center.

“I have to agree,” the chief concurred. “Unless it’s just bravado, everything points to there being something more afoot, and that, whatever’s going to happen, Voral must feel it’s already far enough along that the capture of his co-conspirators won’t stop it.”

“There was his fixation on the reactor, too,” the ensign reminded them both as she glanced behind her at the large dome the Corps had just finished repairing after the containment failure had blown a hole in it. This facility, one that should have been celebrated as a life changing opportunity for the colony, had instead become a flashpoint of the resistance.

Before anything further could be said, they noted a figure approaching.

At first, she was just a dark silhouette, but as she drew closer, the perimeter floodlights washed over her face. It was Captain Kiara Feng, the lead for infrastructure systems within the Archanis detachment of the Fourth Fleet Corps of Engineers. This reactor was her baby, and she’d been a common fixture here ever since it’d come online. 

Still, at this moment, Lieutenant Commander Koh was a bit surprised to see her. “Evening, ma’am,” the security chief nodded as the captain approached.

“Evening,” Captain Feng nodded as she walked on by, offering nothing further.

“That woman’s a workhorse,” Lieutenant Commander Koh chuckled once the captain had passed and disappeared into the reactor. “She just went up to the Pacific Palisades for some rest, not even two hours ago, and already she’s down here, at it again.” And the captain wasn’t young either, as evidenced by the grey streaks running through her hair.

“Yeah, those Corps folks, they’re grinders. It must be odd aboard the Pacific Palisades, the collision between the Corps and the ship’s mostly mediocre crew,” Chief Morrey offered as he glanced over at the young intelligence chief. “Present company excluded, of course.” 

But then he saw it, a shadow across the Betazoid’s face. 

“What’s wrong, Elara?”

“I… I don’t know,” Ensign Elara stammered. “The Captain, she felt odd when she passed.” Although she didn’t work closely with the Corps team, she’d interacted with Captain Feng enough to have at least a passing sense of her mental fingerprint. 

“What do you mean?” Chief Morrey asked, knowing better by now than to shirk off her empathic senses. They’d used them to much success during their intelligence gathering planetside, and he was well acquainted with her gift, one she used far more freely and effectively than most Betazoids he’d interacted with.

“I’m not exactly sure,” Ensign Elara admitted. “It’s not something I’ve felt before… except… except… except when we spoke with Voral.” Suddenly, she recalled that feeling, the one she’d felt when she reached out and tried to touch his mind in the town square a few days prior, and again just a couple hours ago when they’d bumped into him at the tavern. Yes, that feeling was exactly the same she’d felt now as Captain Feng passed by. “A void, a deep, dark hole, an emotional sink of sorts. As a Betazoid, I can actively reach out and touch the minds of others, but even passively, I can always sort of feel something. Except with Voral earlier, and with Captain Feng, just now. Either I’m losing my marbles, or… actually, you two stay here. I’ll be right back.”

And with that, Ensign Elara raced off, leaving Morrey and Koh behind.

As she moved into the superstructure of the reactor, she focused her mind, following not the trail of emotion, but rather the void where there were none. That trail led her straight to the reactor’s control center.

Tiptoeing forward, Ensign Elara took cover behind a large crate. 

As she peered cautiously over it, she spied Captain Feng working furiously at the controls. What was she doing? By order of Duraxis’ governor after the explosion, the reactor was dormant, disconnected from the grid. But now, to the best the ensign could tell, the captain was warming the thing back up as she adjusted intermix ratios and injector flow. 

Had the governor reauthorized their work? Or was something else going on here? There was one way to find out. The ensign stepped out from behind the crate, making herself known.

“Forgive my curiosity, captain, but what are you…”

For a moment, Captain Feng looked startled by the sudden arrival of the young ensign, but then her demeanor shifted. With inhuman speed, her phaser, just moments ago at her side, was suddenly at the ready, and she squeezed the trigger without a moment’s hesitation.

It was all the ensign could do to dive back behind the crate, energized polarons lancing just millimeters over her head. What the fuck?! As she fumbled for her phaser, she tapped her combadge. “Elara to Koh. We have a problem…”

But that’s when she heard it, the clink of metal against the duranium floor. 

She glanced past the crate in the direction of the sound.

Just in time to see a grenade.

And then it went off.