The Continuing Story of Deep Space 2: Page 57
"OK Jan Roel…We're here…What's up ?" Geert asked immediately when the door slid open.Then they both stopped immediately.Joost and Geert looked around the room, at each other and again around the room.
"This is Sciencelab 2A ? Is it ? Or did we take a wrong turn ?" Joost asked amused, provoking a broad smile on Geerts' face." What a mess, look at this place ! Jan Roel, what have you done here ?"
The sciencelab - a part of the astrometrics section of the station - looked as if there waged a battle.Filled with parts, tools, pieces of metal, shrapnel, paintstanes on the floor, graffity on the door and windows…
The consoles in the middle of the room - usually used to store the large amounts of data gathered by the sensor-array at the top of the station, before beeing processed and analysed - were broken out of their henges and where placed somewhere in a corner of the room. In the middle of the rubbish stood a sphere, about two and a half meters wide.It was connected in four ways with a cilindrical-shape tube at the north and south-side and in the front and back.The tubes themselves connected to a pair of rings surrounding the sphere crosswise.They themselves where connected to an anti-grav device.Which made the device hovering a few centimeters above ground.
"Yes, yes, let's get the pleasanteries over with.It's been enough as it is right now ! !" Jan Roel joined the two officers." Isn't it like poetry ?" His strangely shaking, nervous, voice continued" Order in complete chaos." For a few seconds he looked down, closed his eyes, then looked Geert and Joost right into their eyes, and, whitout a blink he swiftly, almost in a theatrical way, turned around pointing his arm to the device…" Behold…My doomesday-device ! ! ! !"
"Wim started working on that screening device, but he got complete lost and I put him on the right track. In fact, why another screening device, why all the waste of time and materials on a stupid hobby ! ? I took it upon me to improve some things, here and there, actually, everywhere…hihihi…Now (with a dead calm voice) I am certain that we don't have to fear the Elder anymore, because the sphere will spell certain doom for them."
Geert and Joost looked, somewhat releaved because he didn't find out their real status on DS2, at each-other and thought exactly the same thing" He's lost it, too much stress."
"The 'Elder' are coming and this is the only way how we can stop them.I know that it is only a matter of hours before they enter our space-time continuum.So we can't waste a second. All the calculations are made and I ran a computersimulation four times with all the variables checked and rechecked. The result was allways the same.The singularity opened a stable rift catching them in a continuous loop for no shorter than tousands of years.Peace and quiet in our days.Doesn't that sound great ? let the Vorlons handle their own mess in the future."
"How about the massive ammounts of power needed to activate the singularity, let alone keeping it stable ? What can generate the almost infinite amounts of raw energy just to initiate that black hole? How do we constraint these awful powers released by it ? How do we get the device in the Vega-sector in time and how can we be certain that they will actually arrive in that sector ?" Geert and Joost fired each at a time those questions to Jan Roel.
"Questions, questions, questions…There is no time for all of this. I say we use the workerdroids to manually transport the device on board the Ajax.They can connect it to the main engine. We get the cadets to monitor and control the transwarp-conduits from the engineering section.The Ajax FTL drive doesn't have enough power, not even the DS2 powergenerators have enough, but the combination of the gravity-well, reported near Vega, and the use of the FTL drive of the Ajax as a trigger, should be enough to activate the sphere. Plus the fact that the Ajax is the fastest ship in this part of space and the only one that can get there in time. I am certain that the 'Elder' will use that gravity-well as a means of entry in our space and THAT is when I will block them out….Yes yes ..I Will block them…yes…" and Jan Roel turned his back to the men and examined the small, but sturdy, anti-grav device, making sure that no accidents would happen while the workerdroids transported it.
"Jan Roel, why do you think that 'the Elder' have evil plans on their mind ? Why send them to damnation ? Perhaps they just want to say hello and then be back on their way ?" Joost asked, knowing that he wouldn't be given a serious answer.In fact, there was no reaction at all. Geert looked quite disturbed and didn't know how to react.He wasn't expecting a complete lunatic in here."How did he get so far over the edge ? Why was he so convinced that the Elder had evil on their mind ? After all, to them we must seem nothing more than a microbe compared to an elephant.What would be the gain for them ? No, there must be more going on.But what…"
" Are you two with me or not ?" Jan Roel asked with a decisive tone." I must know now !"
Joost and Geert stood there, not knowing what to do or to expect. He seemed so fanatical, but then, what crazy man isn't ? "Nope" They said and left the room.When the door shut after them Geert secured it." Anne-Leen and Thomas, report to sciencelab 2A (or what's left of it) and gard the door. No one is to enter or leave the room.Understood ! !" Geert yelled in his comm badge.
" Very well Sir" came the first reply of Thomas and Anne-leen followed.
In the mean time Ensign Joeri Verschaeve, chief of security, followed the events on that deck in his quarters, which are located a few decks higher A holographic, optical, connection, integrated in the controlsystem of the life-support allowed him to watch and evaluate everything on sight. It was a system that came handy on this under-staffed, over-sized and complicated, station. After some tinkering and aligning, he proudly called it:
"Big brother"
Ensign Verschaeve thought the analogy was appropriate.
These discussions in the sciencelab were disturbing, at the least. Not only did Jan Roel, amazingly, found out about the Elder, but, even worse, he seemed to have created a horrible Doomesday Device.
What could have happened ? What makes a man go through such a change ? Why would he try to involve Geert and Joost ? Why them ? How the hell did he find out about the Elder ? I myself just found out from Arthur. "Joeri became more troubled by the minute. It wouldn't be long now before the USS Elltuhs reached the perimeter of the gravity-well at Vega.
Personal log - Joeri Verschaeve - Chief of Security DS2 - stardate 150274
It won't be long now before we find out what these Elder are about, and why they have come here, and, more importantly, what they will do after their insertion in our space. Actually, for me it rather be sooner than late, and then, at least, that awful waiting will be over.The Eltuhs has almost reached the perimeter, just a matter of hours.I also wonder what Adm Van Rhee and adm Necheyev are debating ? Will Starfleet send help ? Can and will they pull forces away from the Cardassian front ? This sector is quite secure know and that could be a reason to let us on our own.Lt Jan Roel van Rhee seems well contained with his device in the sciencelab. The Akira-class starship, the USS Nemesis, is at a stationary orbit and, exept adm Necheyev, nobody left the ship, they even kept tight radiosilence. Perhaps we should take the Ajax out on a spin ? To Vega ? Well, I am going to have a chat with Lt Van Nieuwenhove and ensign Dierckx, and will then, with them, join Wim and Jan Theys in engineering.End…log entry.
End Log