Mission 4 - To Skin a Cat

[Amanda Rose]

This mission opens with O'Connor and Jessie Kirk being summoned to Admiral Kent's office. Neither knew why they were summoned. They were informed that America's XO would not be joining them on the next mission due to the stress of the soul switch with Stonewall Jackson. However, Jessie Kirk would not be appointed as the temporary XO. Kent wanted to use one of his own men to see if he was Captain material. He also informed the duo that he wanted Junior Grade Lieutenant Keth Soban to be promoted to Lieutenant and to at least Acting Chief of Science because the America was being sent to Lemmi, the first Huanni colony. Neither O'Connor or Jessie Kirk were thrilled with either proposition. However, Lemmi was the destination as the Huanni claimed that new materials for their base were being destroyed or being corrupted quickly and they had no explanation.

O'Connor then was invited to the Delaney family farm. During that conversation, O'Connor revealed the mysterious disappearance of her fiance, and previous Commander of America Roger Frankson at Delta Trianguli III. She also revealed to Tegau that she believed that she would ever be able to get close to anyone else again. Tegau encouraged O'Connor and they went to the farm together. There, O'Connor fixated on Tegau's eldest brother, Cian, referring to him as a lummox and as a color. They had a drinking contest which Cian halted claiming that O'Connor was drunk but the family called a draw. O'Connor tried to drag out Cian by his ear but was stopped by the Delaney family who claimed that she was drunk. Tegau then explained that they had drunk most of the family's liquor and O'Connor sent presents of replacements.

Jessie Kirk was offered the XO position on the Defiant by her brother, Jayme Kirk. It was docked, as well. However, after talking to O'Connor back on the ship, she refused the offer.

Commander James T. Buford introduced himself as the temporary XO in place of Chad Young. He was the estranged uncle of the helmsman, Junior Grade Lieutenant Ben Jamison. O'Connor was Commander Musselmann; however Buford told O'Connor that he was recovering from a bout of alcoholism and addiction to the hangover medication. Buford also told Admiral Kent in front of the bridge that he was responsible for the Huanni, which is why he came on the mission.

O'Connor informed Connel, as her guardian, that she could stay on the America on a trial run as she had not had the time to make adequate arrangement for her to be on Earth. Connel was delighted with this decision. Brian Pendragon was sent to Connel's quarters to fix some equipment and Connel started to learn about electricity and perhaps developed a crush on him. Delaney also supplied Connel with art supplies from her family upon her return to America.

Ridika Meyers left America to seek further career advancement. Therefore, O'Connor, with some doubt appointed Lieutenant Laura Wells as the new Chief Engineer.

Brian Pendragon started experiencing issues with the door to his quarters and ended up spending a great deal of time talking to crew while he worked on it. Somehow, this door never was completely fixed, as if the very thing was created to vex Brian Pendragon.

During the briefing en route to Lemmi, O'Connor introduced Keth as the Acting Chief of Science and explained the problem. Keth stated he did not want to go back to Lemmi because he brought no gifts and all three of his wives were located on the planet. Doubts by other crew members were expressed regarding whether the materials were truly defective. Soban explained that was not possible because the Culture always had a representative by the Huanni's side and they took care of problems. Buford revealed that the Culture claimed to have superior technology but it always seemed to be a hodge podge of technology, coming from not one culture.

Huanni representative, General Mrow Tat had called the Federation in violation of the Huanni's agreement with the Culture to not seek outside help. He hoped that the Federation might be able to solve the issue and scare away the Culture. When on board America, Tat was offended by D'Val Sinclair who was leading him to O'Connor. Tat claimed that Sinclair treated the Huanni like dogs and Tat claimed that Sinclair lost his niece Clarabelle Cayt.

Sinclair noticed she wandered into engineering and Clarabelle became curious about what Pendragon was doing. He gave her some ball bearings which Clarabelle mistook for a proposal. When Brian objected, Clarabelle showed him her pedigree and stated she would bear many healthy kits. Brian objected, Clarabelle cried and Brian handed her a handkerchief, which she took as a second gift heading towards a proper proposal. She took Brian into a hug, nearly suffocating him. When Tat learned of this, he demanded that Pendragon be brought before a Board of Inquiry both because of the proposal to his niece and Soban's claim of insult which either would result in a dual to the death or the bondsmanship of Pendragon. Further inciting the Ticker Tape, Sinclair claimed to Clarabelle that he and Pendragon were previously engaged. Jade Drak'nah witnessed this, causing her to walk off upset and Pendragon to chase her. Pendragon apparently did not want to close the doors on relationship opportunities with Jade. When confronted, Jade responded that she had work to do and not everyone could take time for romance.

In the meantime, Jessie Kirk was not feeling well. She went to sickbay and found out from the medical technician, Crewman Goking, that despite being a virgin, Jessie was pregnant. Jessie swore Goking to secrecy about the pregnancy.

On reaching Lemmi, O'Connor, Delaney, Soban, Sinclair and Wells beamed down to the planet. They heard a quiet, musical humming on the planet's surface that changed to a slight buzzing sound. The Huanni base was destroyed. What was odd, though was that some parts of the base were shiny, new looking metal and at others, the metal appeared as if it had been corroded over several thousands of years. Wells and Soban had an encounter with a Culture representative, resulting in Wells being frightened and Soban worshipping it.

Meanwhile, Clarabelle was assigned to work with Pendragon as the overseer of Culture technology. Pendragon sneezed and apologized that he was allergic to felines. Clarabelle took offense claiming she was no more feline than Pendragon was a hairless ape. She accused him of being cruel and insensitive. She left but came back as T'Pruk came to join Pendragon to find the cause of the corrosion of the Huanni metal. Clarabelle came to "supervise" and T'Pruk told Clarabelle to remain silent, endearing herself to Pendragon. They exchanged various theories as to what was occurring but could settle on none and decided to consult with the away team to formulate new theories. Also, Clarabelle brought up discussions regarding mating rituals and T'Pruk failed to make Clarabelle understand Pon Farr, which T'Pruk stated was just over 5 months away for her.

O'Connor then decided to beam Connel down to the planet, figuring Connel might like to see a planet with two suns. She also figured that Lemmi could not truly be harmful as it was run by Huanni. O'Connor then interrogated the Culture rep, asking if they were so superior why they had not solved the Huanni's issue with the base.

During that time, Connel wandered off, having followed a pretty insect. She snipped some leaves off of some plants. After she did so, buzzing sounded in her vicinity. She continued into a circular clearing and found what she thought was a rug but turned out to be a Huanni that was devoid of any internal structure or organs. O'Connor found Connel and they beamed up with the Huanni remains.

Delaney and Sinclair continued to investigate the planet and they found something quite unusual. There was something that looked Huanni. It was standing straight up. However, its eyes were not moving. It did not seem to be breathing. Green sprouts came from its ears and arms and it hummed. They tried talking to it and had limited success. After a few phrases, however, the sprouts and branches started to decay and die. They then returned to the ship to report their findings.

A briefing was held with all individuals, including Connel, that had any contact with the Huanni or Lemmi. Unfortunately, the briefing led to more questions than answers. Keth insisted that he bled blood rather than chlorophyll. And when there was a suggestion that the Huanni were guinea pigs or being eaten, Keth suggested firing photon torpedos at everything alien on the planet to eradicate them. Delaney politely chided Keth for his lack of curiosity. O'Connor ordered Jamison and Jessie to the bridge to delay the Culture while the rest of the briefing room tried to sort out the mystery of Lemmi.

Meanwhile the briefing continued. Soban suggested the plants were like Invasion of the Body Snatchers while Pendragon suggested perhaps it was the plants' costume/disguise to observe the Huanni. T'Pruk suggested that perhaps the plants had carnivorous tastes, like a Terran Venus Flytrap. T'Pruk then hypothesized that the plants might be doing damage to the base as they might see the base as harmful to their existence. Delaney agreed that this seemed the most logical theory with the information that they currently had.

O'Connor then sent back down Delaney, T'Pruk, Soban and Sinclair to Lemmi. As they beamed down, the Culture arrived and throughout America boomed the voice, "YOU WILL LEAVE!" Commodore Buford declared he was now the ranking officer and was taking command of America and wanted O'Connor cited for insubordination. Kirk suggested that Buford was inciting mutiny, to which he responded that Kirk clearly did not understand chain of command and it was now she inciting mutiny. O'Connor requested that Jessie stop so she did not ruin her career but Jessie continued and Laura Wells backed Jessie and the Captain. She and Chief Security Officer Rusty Hemd escorted him to the brig.

On the planet, the musical humming had returned until Soban threatened, at which point the angry buzzing returned. When he became silent, the buzzing left. T'Pruk agreed with Delaney's theory that the plants perceived the Huanni as threats. Delaney suggested that they test the theory by having Soban get closer to the plants. Soban refused but Delaney took a rare commanding tone and reminded Soban he was still a science officer on America. He moved forward and a plant grabbed his leg and ensnared it. T'Pruk shot her phaser at the plant that ensnared Keth and told Delaney that her hypothesis had been confirmed.

Delaney asked the plants why they acted that way and they explained that because Huanni killed them, they would kill Huanni. New vines sprung out of the ground and wrapped around Keth and T'Pruk's ankles. A Huanni-like head grew out of one of the plants and faced Delaney stating that both Soban and T'Pruk needed to be punished. Another vine grabbed Sinclair and started turning him green. A human head then appeared. The plants had incorporated Huanni and Human DNA.

The plants further explained that they tried to warn the Huanni about the base and how it was hurting them. Yet, the Huanni did not listen to them, so they decided to hurt the Huanni and destroy their base because the Huanni hurt them. Pendragon suggested that the Huanni could apologize and make reparations. Upon hearing that, all of the away team except for Soban were released from their bondage. T'Pruk was able to determine that the base eliminated the nutrients under the Huanni base. T'Pruk suggested that the Huanni sterilized the area prior to building their base. Pendragon suggested accelerated substrata molecularization to re-nutritionize the soil. T'Pruk stated it would take approximately 2.3439 minutes to accomplish.

In space, the Culture told America that they had five minutes to leave or would be destroyed. They also stated that they solely spoke for the Huanni and never requested Federation aid. O'Connor asked for Tat to help her with the Culture but the Culture told Tat that he broke the contract and therefore, they had no use for him and he could die with the rest of the crew on America. O'Connor powered up weapons and the Culture stated that O'Connor violated the terms of their "discussion." They fired a bolt and it started causing America's shields to compress the America, itself. Given this attack, O'Connor ordered that America fire at the Culture.

While America was battling, Delaney, Sinclair and T'Pruk started clearing, as best they could, the area where the Huanni base laid in shambles. O'Connor called down to the away team looking for any information. O'Connor reasoned that the Culture could not control the Lemmi plants and thus they were using the Huanni to do their dirty work of cleansing them from the planet, giving the Culture plausible deniability regarding the responsible party. O'Connor confronted the Culture with this information. In the face of this, the Culture stated that they deemed the Huanni contract fulfilled and left Lemmi. The compression weapon stopped its effectiveness, as well.

O'Connor beamed nutrients into the soil and instructed Pendragon to report to her to deal with the diplomatic issues he caused. When he got to O'Connor's quarters, O'Connor asked his intentions towards Clarabelle. He said he had none. So, O'Connor showed him a copy of the Ticker Tape. Pendragon replied, "If you believe that then you are sleeping with half the crew." O'Connor gave him a crooked smile and asked who's to say that she was not. O'Connor purposely flirted with Pendragon to tease him. She then asked Pendragon to explain what happened with Clarabelle and he did so. O'Connor wondered why Pendragon had not studied First Contact and Huanni Culture relations. He also explained that Soban wanted him as a bondsman because Pendragon had hidden Keth as a woman during the Civil War mission, a great insult to Soban. O'Connor then told Pendragon that she was betrothed and she was teasing him about sex. Further that she did not know whether to make him go through with the marriage to Clarabelle or bust him down to Ensign. She concluded that she would get him out of both problems to Pendragon's great relief.

O'Connor then called Wells to her quarters to thank her for her behavior on the bridge. Wells was surprised and said that she did not think that O'Connor liked her. O'Connor explained she promoted wells to CEO because she was the only one that she perceived as competent enough for the position and she did not initially like Wells because she missed Ridika Meyers greatly. O'Connor admitted that after this mission, her intention was to replace Wells as CEO. She did not think Wells had what it took to potentially command but after she showed that she was not submissive and was willing to think for herself, O'Connor decided Wells was suitable. Wells told that Captain that she wished the Captain was less condescending and rude. The Captain replied to look at the Ticker Tape. Wells found them rude but O'Connor explained that she found them to be a way to allow the crew to let off steam. She encouraged Wells to see things from a different point of view in the future.

She then met with Soban. O'Connor convinced Soban to marry Clarabelle to release his claim of bondsman on Pendragon. Soban responded that Clarabelle would have to renounce her hold on Pendragon. And even then, he had no idea what to gift her. O'Connor suggested "hypoallergenic platinum" so Clarabelle would have no adverse reactions to a gift. Clarabelle admitted that Pendragon was scrawny but she liked him but when presented with Soban as a possibility as a mate, she was ecstatic. Tat insisted that Soban would have to stay in Huanni territory and thus, Soban retired from America, a hero to his people.

O'Connor called Pendragon back to her quarters. She informed him of the release of the bondsman claim and that Soban would not be returning. O'Connor was going to assign Pendragon to scrub the manifolds and microscopically search for any hull integrity issues on America's decks A through E by hand. Pendragon reached for a tissue due to his feline allergies and O'Connor decided to keep him in her quarters for some more time. She learned that Pendragon could do some minor magic tricks. When he was on the verge of not being able to breathe, O'Connor announced that his punishment was complete and let him go as she instructed the computer to cleanse her quarters of feline dander.