Ensign Elor Letek - One theory follows another.
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Ensign Elor Letek
Jul 16, 2025, 10:18:03 AM7/16/25
to USS Eagle
((SOS Lab, Deck 10))
It was a small group of people who had gathered in the SOS Lab on deck 10 and were working on solving the great unknown from their last mission: how and why had the nebula been able to affect them? Elor had found no peace after what he had experienced and wanted an answer. He needed to know what had happened to his crew and how they could prevent something like this from happening in the future again.
When he arrived at the SOS Lab, Drex and Noemi were already at work and he was really pleased not to be the only one looking for an explanation. Together, the likelihood of finding an answer increased many times over and the fact that they didn't all come from the same specialist field was an enrichment for this endeavor.
He himself had spent the morning reading the data from the spacesuits they had been wearing when they had crossed over to the Ifir. Even though the external sensors had recorded less, he hoped that the medical records could help them.
The isolinear chip on which he had extracted the data was plugged into the console and filled the screens with the recorded data. Now they just had to put the puzzle together. Hopefully there were enough pieces.
Lim: Huh, the suits were picking up increased infrasound while on the Ifir. Might explain some of the irritation and anger issues?
Drex: Alora reported the ships were into an intersection of multiple quantum fields :: He typed fast on his console :: Can that actually be the cause of the increasing infrasound frequencies?
Elor had also sat down at one of the seats and looked at the data displayed by the computer.
Letek: Infrasound can cause severe symptoms in the body. From physical complaints such as nausea, vomiting and headaches, to impaired consciousness. I can't say for sure whether it's enough to play a suitable hallucinatory scenario in a person's head, like when the captain spoke to a Romulan.
In fact, he doubted it. They were fully formed hallucinations. He hadn't heard of any study that had attributed such an effect to infrasound.
Lim: When Commander Adea had his event of explosive anger, he later stated it was like something had taken over him and his event of extreme.
Her tone was flat and mechanical in its recitation, as to keep the emotions out of her voice. Definitely the mission had exacted a toll from her, too.
Drex: He went easy on him… maybe because he is Betazoid… :: He did not look at her as he said it. :: Others… were pushed to kill.
Letek: As far as we know now about what happened, it has nothing to do with the species. Some people of one species were affected, while others of the same species were not affected at all.
That was actually quite a shame, because it would have been a very interesting clue.
Lim: We’d also experienced a shadowy figure rush and yell at us in an attempt at attacking before disappearing like it had never been. ::She shivered slightly at that memory:: Shared hallucinations or contagion behavior are a thing but neither of them work like that. Nor could Betazoid abilities create that kind of effect.
Drex tapped the side of his console, jaw tight.
Drex: Shadow figures were likely your brain’s response to the stress. My hallucination was… my sister. She's always been my way of coping. But this time, she changed. Turned into an evil counselor. My mind couldn’t resist her push to kill. Then she was gone, a more demoniac voice taking her place.
Elor avoided giving Drex a pitying look. That wouldn't help him either, and even though he felt sorry for what Drex had just been through, he stood by his position that Drex had done nothing. It was his body that had been used, yes, but for Elor it hadn't been Drex who had killed the Romulan.
Letek: It was not you, Drex. Even if your body carried out the act, nothing of what makes you you, started this act.
Drex: I was lucky Williams was there. I was ready to hunt all of you down if he hadn’t stopped me. :: He looked at Lim :: I… I know I haven’t exactly been kind to you from the start, but please believe me, whatever I said or done to you on the Ifir, I didn’t mean it.
He turned back to the monitor, reading the highlighted segments from the analysis. Elor didn't know what had happened between Noemi and Drex, but based on his experiences with the captain, he could imagine a few things.
Drex: So what we’re saying is… infrasound affects different species’ brains in different ways.
Lim: Response?
Letek: Yes, but even if we take into account that two people of the same species react differently... The Captain was afflicted with hallucinations of Romulans, she even spoke Romulan at one point. That can't be caused by infrasound. Aggression? Yes. Even to a bad degree, but not full-blown hallucinations.
Drex: When Engineering powered up the shields, the infrasound effect was cut off both on the ship and the people… On the Ifir I wasn’t wearing my helmet, though…:: He paused briefly :: Do you have the readings from my suit? On the Ifir, and when our shuttle landed back on the Eagle? Someone had stunned me. :: He raised an eyebrow at Lim. :: I don’t remember if I felt any different afterward.
Lim: Response?
Elor called up the data from Drex's spacesuit. At first glance, there was nothing unusual: fluctuations in blood pressure and heart rate, an increase in stress hormones. But what caught his attention was the recording of brain activity. They were not as accurate as the scans in sickbay, but still enough to detect anything unusual.
Letek: Here! ::points to an entry in the data:: At this point, the frequency at which your brain sends signals through the synapses has changed and... wait... ::calls up another window with data:: Here they return to the old frequency. According to the logbook, this is exactly when the modified shields began to take effect.
Elor leaned back in his chair and ran his hand thoughtfully through his hair.
Lim: Response?
Drex: My guess is the quantum field intersections acted as natural amplifiers for subharmonic infrasound. Shift our path three hundred meters and we might not have noticed anything. We need to share this data with Kettick and his people.
Elor didn't believe in the theory that it was a problem with the infrasound.
Letek: It's more, at least from a medical point of view, as if... an alien consciousness is taking control. The infrasound... could serve as a control medium. I'm even willing to say that it's the influence of an alien life form. But what exactly... It wouldn't be the first nebula to be a life form. I remember a lecture on space phenomena. The USS Voyager had entered a nebula that attacked them. Only to realize afterwards that they had flown into a LIVING nebula.
Lim / Drex: Response?
He knew he was going out on a limb with this theory and that they didn't have enough data to prove it. But it was at least plausible.
Letek: I know it sounds far-fetched, but it would be within the realms of possibility. Of course, there could just as easily have been some experiments on the Ifir that went horribly wrong... Has anyone actually searched the ship more thoroughly?
Lim / Drex: Response?
It was a small group of people who had gathered in the SOS Lab on deck 10 and were working on solving the great unknown from their last mission: how and why had the nebula been able to affect them? Elor had found no peace after what he had experienced and wanted an answer. He needed to know what had happened to his crew and how they could prevent something like this from happening in the future again.
When he arrived at the SOS Lab, Drex and Noemi were already at work and he was really pleased not to be the only one looking for an explanation. Together, the likelihood of finding an answer increased many times over and the fact that they didn't all come from the same specialist field was an enrichment for this endeavor.
He himself had spent the morning reading the data from the spacesuits they had been wearing when they had crossed over to the Ifir. Even though the external sensors had recorded less, he hoped that the medical records could help them.
The isolinear chip on which he had extracted the data was plugged into the console and filled the screens with the recorded data. Now they just had to put the puzzle together. Hopefully there were enough pieces.
Lim: Huh, the suits were picking up increased infrasound while on the Ifir. Might explain some of the irritation and anger issues?
Drex: Alora reported the ships were into an intersection of multiple quantum fields :: He typed fast on his console :: Can that actually be the cause of the increasing infrasound frequencies?
Elor had also sat down at one of the seats and looked at the data displayed by the computer.
Letek: Infrasound can cause severe symptoms in the body. From physical complaints such as nausea, vomiting and headaches, to impaired consciousness. I can't say for sure whether it's enough to play a suitable hallucinatory scenario in a person's head, like when the captain spoke to a Romulan.
In fact, he doubted it. They were fully formed hallucinations. He hadn't heard of any study that had attributed such an effect to infrasound.
Lim: When Commander Adea had his event of explosive anger, he later stated it was like something had taken over him and his event of extreme.
Her tone was flat and mechanical in its recitation, as to keep the emotions out of her voice. Definitely the mission had exacted a toll from her, too.
Drex: He went easy on him… maybe because he is Betazoid… :: He did not look at her as he said it. :: Others… were pushed to kill.
Letek: As far as we know now about what happened, it has nothing to do with the species. Some people of one species were affected, while others of the same species were not affected at all.
That was actually quite a shame, because it would have been a very interesting clue.
Lim: We’d also experienced a shadowy figure rush and yell at us in an attempt at attacking before disappearing like it had never been. ::She shivered slightly at that memory:: Shared hallucinations or contagion behavior are a thing but neither of them work like that. Nor could Betazoid abilities create that kind of effect.
Drex tapped the side of his console, jaw tight.
Drex: Shadow figures were likely your brain’s response to the stress. My hallucination was… my sister. She's always been my way of coping. But this time, she changed. Turned into an evil counselor. My mind couldn’t resist her push to kill. Then she was gone, a more demoniac voice taking her place.
Elor avoided giving Drex a pitying look. That wouldn't help him either, and even though he felt sorry for what Drex had just been through, he stood by his position that Drex had done nothing. It was his body that had been used, yes, but for Elor it hadn't been Drex who had killed the Romulan.
Letek: It was not you, Drex. Even if your body carried out the act, nothing of what makes you you, started this act.
Drex: I was lucky Williams was there. I was ready to hunt all of you down if he hadn’t stopped me. :: He looked at Lim :: I… I know I haven’t exactly been kind to you from the start, but please believe me, whatever I said or done to you on the Ifir, I didn’t mean it.
He turned back to the monitor, reading the highlighted segments from the analysis. Elor didn't know what had happened between Noemi and Drex, but based on his experiences with the captain, he could imagine a few things.
Drex: So what we’re saying is… infrasound affects different species’ brains in different ways.
Lim: Response?
Letek: Yes, but even if we take into account that two people of the same species react differently... The Captain was afflicted with hallucinations of Romulans, she even spoke Romulan at one point. That can't be caused by infrasound. Aggression? Yes. Even to a bad degree, but not full-blown hallucinations.
Drex: When Engineering powered up the shields, the infrasound effect was cut off both on the ship and the people… On the Ifir I wasn’t wearing my helmet, though…:: He paused briefly :: Do you have the readings from my suit? On the Ifir, and when our shuttle landed back on the Eagle? Someone had stunned me. :: He raised an eyebrow at Lim. :: I don’t remember if I felt any different afterward.
Lim: Response?
Elor called up the data from Drex's spacesuit. At first glance, there was nothing unusual: fluctuations in blood pressure and heart rate, an increase in stress hormones. But what caught his attention was the recording of brain activity. They were not as accurate as the scans in sickbay, but still enough to detect anything unusual.
Letek: Here! ::points to an entry in the data:: At this point, the frequency at which your brain sends signals through the synapses has changed and... wait... ::calls up another window with data:: Here they return to the old frequency. According to the logbook, this is exactly when the modified shields began to take effect.
Elor leaned back in his chair and ran his hand thoughtfully through his hair.
Lim: Response?
Drex: My guess is the quantum field intersections acted as natural amplifiers for subharmonic infrasound. Shift our path three hundred meters and we might not have noticed anything. We need to share this data with Kettick and his people.
Elor didn't believe in the theory that it was a problem with the infrasound.
Letek: It's more, at least from a medical point of view, as if... an alien consciousness is taking control. The infrasound... could serve as a control medium. I'm even willing to say that it's the influence of an alien life form. But what exactly... It wouldn't be the first nebula to be a life form. I remember a lecture on space phenomena. The USS Voyager had entered a nebula that attacked them. Only to realize afterwards that they had flown into a LIVING nebula.
Lim / Drex: Response?
He knew he was going out on a limb with this theory and that they didn't have enough data to prove it. But it was at least plausible.
Letek: I know it sounds far-fetched, but it would be within the realms of possibility. Of course, there could just as easily have been some experiments on the Ifir that went horribly wrong... Has anyone actually searched the ship more thoroughly?
Lim / Drex: Response?
Anyone: Response?
TAG / TBC
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Ensign Elor Letek
Medical Officer
USS Eagle
E240201EL2
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