Biofilter analysis

Posted on 02 May 2016 @ 10:00pm by Lieutenant Commander Temerant Bast

634 words; about a 3 minute read

Mission: Outbreak
Location: Operations Office
Timeline: MD 7 || 1430 Hours

Bast was hunched over his console, his eyes feeling dry and itching from so many hours spent reading endless sets of logs. Over three hundred people had used the transporters since they had arrived at New Risa, and some had transported more than once - he had over a thousand transport logs to analyze.

Since the idea was to analyze the logs from when people had transported back to the ship, that cut the job by half - instead of one thousand logs, he had five hundred. He had written a parsing subroutine to weed out unneeded data from the logs, but that still left him with a lot of data to sift through.

His goal was to determine if the transporter's biofilters had detected anything related to the current outbreak. But so far, nothing. All he had to show for the previous few hours was a headache, and a host of bad memories beginning to float to the surface. Memories that he was trying to block, of the last time he'd had to go over this many logs. Remembering the time aboard the O'Carroll, searching through the ship's logs for evidence of contraband weapons making their way to the Consortium, and erasing the evidence so Starfleet wouldn't discover it. Back when he'd been under the influence of the Consortium.

But at the same time, he could feel the symbiont's presence, reassuring him, telling him to embrace the memories, and make them his own, so he could move past them. Accept them, get over the guilt, and move on.

Temerant, the host, was resisting the memories. He still couldn't bring himself to accept the fact that he'd been manipulated by the Consortium's telepaths, and convinced to turn his back on Starfleet, and everything else that he'd sworn to protect and defend. Searching and altering the O'Carroll's logs had led him to board the T'Pring, and ultimately open fire on his friends.

On Camila...

He tried to push the thought out of his mind, and focus on the task at hand. Over seventy percent of the ship's crew was affected by this virus, and he needed to concentrate on finding every bit of information he could on this thing. If the ship's biofilters had detected anything, they needed to know. And if not, they needed to determine why it had failed.

The image of Camila imposed itself in his mind. She was standing in the T'Pring's darkened corridor. Phaser fire erupted around him. The T'Pring's transporters were humming, beaming crates of weapons into space. He could feel the acrid smoke that filled the air, and the ionization from the transporter and the phaser fire. The high-pitched whine of the phasers filled his ears.

The freighter's crewmen were firing, trying to prevent the Black Hawk's security team from entering the cargo bay.

He could see himself raising his phaser, and taking aim.

He hurled the phaser at the nearest wall, snapping out of the memory. His half-filled coffee mug fell to the floor, spilling coffee on the once-neat nondescript grey carpet. His face was covered in sweat, he was panting for breath, and he could feel his pulse racing.

He could feel the symbiont, projecting calm, and reassuring images. He sought comfort in the symbiont's presence, and in the memories it held. Memories of Lamorra's life, of Wilem's. Holding his wife's hands, holding his newborn son in his arms. And of his own life since those events.

He reminded himself that he hadn't harmed Camila when that had happened. And that she was now a dear and trusted presence in his life, one that filled him with joy, and happiness. He embraced that memory, and used it to focus his mind.

He turned his attention back to the biofilter logs, and carried on with his work.

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