Kiran Nivar stood in the courtyard where they all had beamed down to the colony on Pieris IV.  They had been greeted by the colony’s director, an older man named Bradley Nigels, who was now leading Captain Dart and the command crew deeper into the settlement.  Nivar watched them disappear into the lush greenery of the park surrounding the beam-down coordinates.  Now standing alone in front of the stone obelisk fountain that served as the centerpiece to this park, the chief engineer experienced a sense of tranquility as he listened to its trickling water.  There was also an unsettling aspect to it that he was having trouble pinning down.  It took him a moment to recognize that there was an eerie silence stemming from the absence of wildlife.  Despite the vibrant but transplanted plant life, the usual chorus of animals one might expect in such an environment was nowhere to be heard.  It gave the place a dead, almost hollow stillness.  Nivar wasn’t familiar with the fauna of Pieris IV.  Aside from Terraphius Solivorus, the worm species central to the colony’s research, this was a mostly barren world of dust and dirt. The only plant life he’d seen were strange, bright purple cactus-like growths, marking the places where the worms had once surfaced to feed on the sun’s radiation. Beyond that, this world seemed lifeless.  He supposed that was rather the point.  The fact that any life was to be found on Pieris IV at all was a miracle.  This had been a natural crucible for any kind of growth to somehow flourish on an otherwise dead world.  The Federation was here to unravel its secrets, and see if this could be applied to other dead worlds all across the galaxy.

The sound of his engineering crew materializing brought Kiran Nivar out of his thoughts.  The forms of seven officers shimmered into existence where just moments ago, he and the initial landing party had been doing the same.  At their head stood the experienced man that Nivar had come to regard as his second in command of the Engineering Bay. Chief Petty Officer Flynn Hanson was a human Kiran Nivar had grown to respect over the years as a colorful character with a presence that commanded attention. His green eyes reflected a quiet, unyielding resolve that discouraged anyone from crossing him. He wore a modified engineering uniform, its sleeves shortened to keep them out of the way when he worked, elbows deep in machinery and instrumentation. A small pocket on his left breast held an assortment of smaller tools, always within easy reach. Tattoos peeked from the edges of his left sleeve and collar, their intricate designs etched against his pale skin hinting at a checkered past that Nivar had always sensed but never felt right asking about.  The man glanced about, taking in the scenery around them as he ran a hand over short, black spiked hair to scratch at some unseen irritant.  His gaze finally rest on the chief engineer that had been waiting on them.  “Where to, sir?”  Direct, and ready to throw himself into the task at hand.  That was why Nivar got along so well with him.

The senior engineering officer pointed his team towards the building that Director Nigels had indicated earlier before he, the captain, and the others had headed away from the courtyard.  “Whatever reactor they use to provide their power is that way.  Inside of that structure.”  As the cluster of eight gold-uniformed officers made their way along the paved pathway, the eerie silence of their surroundings once again struck the Bajoran chief engineer.  If he’d have had a hand in designing the place, he would have opted to at least install some hidden speaker devices that played an ambiance of nature sounds.  Perhaps a recording of birds and other creatures doing what they did, played on a randomized loop.  It was something any ship’s computer could whip up in a second.  Alright, a colony’s computer in this case.  It was insight into the mind of a researcher, he supposed.  The environment that he and his team walked through may have been dressed up to a small degree.  The obelisk looking fountain was ornate enough to look at, and sourced the flow of water that worked its way systematically through the park.  There were cobblestone looking trenches that spiraled their way from the fountain and its pool, dressed up and quaint looking as they shot out like spokes on a wheel to deliver the water further out to reach the perimeter of the park.  Beyond that, a simple and succinct system of pipes dipped into these cobblestoned trenches to collect the water and distribute it to all of the grass, trees, and bushes throughout the park.  There was no mistaking the intent behind all of this construction; the researchers were mainly concerned with seeing whether or not they even could get such a park to grow at all under the influence of the enzyme.  While someone had clearly thought to put just a little pleasant looking detail behind the entire arrangement Kiran Nivar could see that as a whole it was mostly just an experiment built with function in mind over form.

He supposed he could respect that, given his own direct and succinct nature.  But to overcome such an awkward quietness this place possessed, he found himself talking with Chief Petty Officer Hanson and the rest of his team mostly in order to fill their environment with some kind of sound to drown out the eerie silence.  They discussed their tasks and concerns at length.  How what they knew of the Pieris system’s sun and its low radiation had turned up no leads, and how its level of intensity was so low that it should have almost no effect at all on any equipment that had been brought in for the colony.  They discussed how an uncalibrated reactor could potentially overload the systems and equipment, yet how peculiar it was that only their soil sensors specifically were the systems that were being affected.  If the reactor truly was uncalibrated to such a degree, it wouldn’t only simply speak to the general incompetence of the engineering team the researchers had deployed to the Pieris IV colony, but everything that they operated here on the colony would be unstable and overloading.  It wouldn’t be isolated to just soil sensors.  It was all topics of discussion that had been discussed over and over again, but it was good to go over it one more time now that they were here, in order to focus their efforts once they set themselves to the task.  And it had succeeded in filling the creepy silence of the place.

Within moments, the group was walking up to a set of bay doors that were large enough to allow the passage of utility vehicles.  To their left was a smaller doorway, presumably intended for personnel.  It slid open for the group of officers as they drew closer.  Once inside, they were greeted by a low and steady hum.  The large interior was immaculate.  New, finely tuned equipment gleamed under industrial lighting.  A state of the art fusion reactor stood prominently in the center at the rear of the large bay, encased in a polished alloy.  Sleek and efficient.  Cooling systems and control panels were neatly organized, their diagnostic displays indicating a smooth and uninterrupted flow of power.  Nivar found himself nodding in approval, any doubts he may have had about the competence of the engineers here on the colony world were beginning to evaporate.  It all possessed a quality of tidy precision, worthy of any Starfleet engineering bay.

The air crackled with a stern voice that barked orders to the team of colonists inside.  “Quit draggin’ your feet, Don!  Get that damn relay installed before I do it myself!  Jess, those connectors best be spotless, else you’ll scrub em’ clean by hand!”  At the center of all the hustle and bustle stood a man that looked every bit the part of some old Earth Western cowboy.  As he was turning, he seemed to finally notice the new arrivals.  A wide-brimmed, sun-bleached hat sat low on his brow.  It cast a shadow over sharp eyes that sized up the Fresno’s team.  He wore a leather vest over a clean, well-fitted work shirt whose sleeves were rolled up to reveal calloused forearms that implied years of hands on experience.  A few smudges marred his clothing, and his jeans and boots bore similar marks that carried the wear of long days spent working on the colony’s equipment.  “Well, now.  Seems we got ourselves some visitors.” he said, his voice gruff but edged with an unmistakable drawl.  “Montana Colburn.  But you can call me Monty.  Chief Engineer ’round here.”  He gave Kiran Nivar a quick, no-nonsense nod.  “You’re the folks from Starfleet, I take it?”

Nivar nodded in acknowledgement, his tone respectful but just as direct.  “Kiran Nivar, Chief Engineer of the Fresno.  This is my team.  We’re here to help with your soil sensor issues.”

Colburn grunted, already half turning back to his work.  “Good timing.  We literally just got another set of the damn things that overloaded.  Sending the boys out to replace em’ now.”  He jabbed a thumb back over his shoulder to the technicians he had just been barking at.  They were in the midst of preparing equipment and loading it into the bed of a four wheeled utility vehicle.  “You lot are welcome to come take a look and see what we’re dealin’ with.”

The Starfleet chief regarded the colonist crew as they bustled along their task, then glanced towards the pristine reactor humming away at the far wall.  “I wouldn’t mind that.” the Bajoran said.  “Although I’d also like to get a sense of the power system you’re working with first.”

Montana followed Kiran Nivar’s gaze and scratched his chin.  “That ‘beaut over there is a Menkara-type fusion reactor.  Finest tech in the field, plenty of power to handle our needs.”  He paused for a moment, seeming proud of the equipment.  “If we’re seein’ surges, sure as hell ain’t the reactor’s fault.  Everything’s runnin’ smooth on this end.  She’s brand new and finely tuned.”

Nivar eyed the reactor’s spotless casing and flawless readouts.  On the surface, everything appeared perfect.  But something clearly wasn’t right with the way they were burning through sensors.  He glanced over towards Chief Petty Officer Hanson.  “I want to get a look at these sensors for myself, Flynn.  You think you and the rest of the team can handle going over the reactor?  Take readings to compare against the output displayed on the screens?”  His air of control and authority faltered for just a brief moment as he realized for once he wasn’t the one totally calling all of the shots in an engineering bay.  He gave an apologetic grin towards the colony chief.  “As long as you’re fine with my team poking around your innards while we step out, of course.”

The other chief gave a hearty chuckle.  “Of course, I trust you Starfleet boys to know their way around a reactor.  Make yourselves at home.”

“We’ll cover things on this end, Chief.” Flynn confirmed.

Kiran Nivar watched his crew for a moment as they set to task, tricorders trilling in a few hands as they took readings of the fusion reactor.  Others were unlatching the engineering kits that held the more specialized equipment.  Flynn Hanson made his way to the main readout display of the reactor, tapping through the console to dig deeper into the diagnostic readings it was constantly running on its self.  Satisfied that things were well in hand, he finally turned towards the civilian Chief Engineer.  His two men had already finished loading up the replacement sensors and whatever else they meant to bring out to the site where this latest batch of soil sensors had fried.  It seemed they were waiting on him.

Montana Colburn was already driving the utility vehicle through the larger bay doors as Nivar was still buckling up.  The Starfleet engineer was seated next to him, the two other colonist engineers had elected to sit behind them in order to let the two senior chiefs discuss things.  Montana frequently glanced to the Bajoran as he spoke, his eyes now unreadable under a pair of large opaque aviator glasses that shielded them from the bright sun.  The brim of his hat rest against the top of the giant tinted spectacles, and at the speeds in which their vehicle flew across the desertscape Nivar was oddly fascinated that the thing didn’t just fly right off of the colonist’s head.  He was shouting to be heard over the wind and dust as he spoke of the logistics of their task at hand.  Each sensor could cover a few miles of radius as they monitored for worm and enzyme activity.  Having to constantly travel out to each one was exhausting and was eating up time that Montana would rather be spending towards all the other technical issues the colony faced on a day to day basis.  Furthermore, he and his crew were growing increasingly frustrated by the priority being pushed on them to continually treat the symptom.  They were expected to get the sensors working or replaced as fast as possible, limiting any interruption to the researchers’ progress in finding more sites with freshly laid enzyme.  The pressure was on to begin the second phase of finding a suitable place to plant and grow actual crops to see how they would fair against Pieris IV’s harsh climate.  “I’m sure glad you boys showed up to finally root out the cause of all of this, because we sure as shit ain’t going to be allowed the time of day to just stop everything and do it ourselves.” Montana was saying.  Clearly, the morale of he and his team was beginning to be taxed.  “I mean aw, hell!  Why fix the ship’s deflector array when you can just put a goddamn shuttle on permanent tractor beam duty, am I right?”

The Bajoran engineering chief found himself smirking as the other man drawled out the sarcastic analogy.  “Well, hopefully we can be of some help.  That’s the Fresno’s mission, we go where we’re needed and fix what needs fixing.”

“First sensor’s up ahead, right here.” Montana said as they approached a short, steel framed tower structure.  It stood perhaps fifteen feet tall, but only a few feet wide.  The framework was clearly only intended to elevate the transmitter and receiver array.  The actual sensor would be embedded into the ground.  The colony chief was pointing to the array at the top. “We weren’t about to run conduit all over this damn rock.  So that there’s more than just a comm array.  The reactor broadcasts, and it receives the energy it needs remotely.  Ain’t near as focused or efficient, but our fusion reactor back there’s got the juice to handle it.  We got us only a handful of sensors we gotta move from time to time, too.  Broadcastin’ the power makes it easier to shuffle ’em around when they ask for it.”

Kiran Nivar took it all in as he considered.  “Well, could help explain any surges then.  Those receivers would accept more than just what your reactor is sending, right?  Anything else flaring up that could give off the same kind of energy would be picked up too and fed in to the receiver.”

Montana Colburn removed his sunglasses and gave the Bajoran a look.  “Think I hadn’t considered?  Thing is, we’ve scanned for that.  Ain’t nothin’ out here putting out squat!  It’s quieter than a cat on a hot tin roof.”

The Bajoran Starfleet officer shook his head at the curious euphemism.  “What about installing a shunt on each sensor?  Route the extra energy off into something that would draw off and absorb the excessive bursts.”

The other nodded.  “Could work, and something else I’d considered.  Trick is, I can’t get my hands on whatever the resonance is of these bursts.  Gotta have the right frequency dialed in to be shuntin’ off.  Can’t check the logs, nothin’ there.  Like it never even happened.”  He was crouching down at the base of the sensor tower, now.  Between all of the legs of the tower frame was a panel he opened up.  With a twist, he pulled out a sensor core that was scorched and blackened.  “This is the only thing that shows to the damned contrary.”  He offered it with an outstretched hand.

Nivar took the sensor and examined it.  The most scorching was at the contact points where the power leads fed into it.  But the marks ran further into it.  The sensor was made up of two components.  One was designed to read seismic activity, which would clearly indicate when the worms were burrowing.  Another needle-like component jutted out at an odd angle.  This was spiked into the soil and meant to detect the presence of any of the enzyme the worms secreted off during their feeding cycle.  His thoughts wandered off as he considered how they might be able to fashion up some sort of shunt that could be more generalized, one that wouldn’t require knowing exactly what resonance was the culprit.  Could be done, but it would be a more complicated concoction that might possibly present its own instabilities to identify and deal with.  Before he could voice any of these thoughts, his communicator at his chest was chirping.  He tapped it expectantly.  “Kiran here.”

“Lad, thought you should know.” Security Chief Vorak’s accent could be heard by them all.  The Lieutenant Commander continued.  “Another surge happened just as the Director was settin’ me up at their security consoles out in their Ops.”

“I know, Chief Colburn and his men were just gearing up to respond to it with another round of sensor replacements when I met up with him.” Nivar acknowledged.  “We’re out here now, at the first site.”

“Yeah well here’s the thing, mate.” Vorak went on.  “I watched the whole thing go down on my screen.  We’ve a saboteur on our hands.”

Montana and his men were crouched down by the panel, inserting the replacement sensor core.  His head snapped up at hearing the news, his eyes ablaze.  “The hell did he just say?  Someone doing this on purpose!?”

Nivar held up a hand to pause the inquiries.  “What do you mean, Vorak?  What exactly did you see?”

“Well,” the explanation came through the communicator, “I have my own proprietary security software of a sort.  Wrote it me’self.  Helps me get into logs, recover any corrupted data, spot any red flags.  That sorta thing.”

“Sure.” Nivar nodded, even though he knew Vorak couldn’t see him.  “What did it turn up?”

“Well, it was all over before ye knew it!” the Tellarite security chief explained.  “Too bloody fast for anyone to be doin’ manually, that’s for sure.  Gotta be a virus, or an AI.  Something.  I’ll be diggin’ around for the wee bugger, you can be sure of that!”  Vorak went on to explain that his intention had been to hook into the colony’s computer systems to access user logs and see all of the credentials that had been accessing the systems.  He wanted to make sure they all pointed to actual personnel.  If any other credentials couldn’t point back towards anybody actively present the colony, it would indicate an outside user getting in and accessing things.  That had come up blank.  Vorak had known that the fusion reactor would be Kiran Nivar’s first focus, so he thought to see if he could pull up any signs of tampering with the reactor’s own logs.  As he pointed his algorithms towards those systems, he happened to see the reactor suddenly spike in the frequency of its output.  It happened fast.  And then just as fast, any logs recording the spike were instantly erased and supplanted with a falsified log that indicated normal output.  “You’d miss it if you weren’t looking.  Hell, lad.  I nearly doubted my own eyes.  But my own software generates a log of its own.  I have it record everything it sees.  I was able to pull up me own log and have a look.”

The chief engineer was beginning to comprehend.  “Doesn’t matter if this was a virus, person, or what.  Your program isn’t a standard Federation issued software.  That’s the whole point of it.  So its presence, or even how and where its own logs are stored wouldn’t be known to an intruder or a virus alike.  It wouldn’t have known to delete your own logs.”

“Aye lad.  Bingo!” the smug response came back.

“Hey there, can he hear me?” Montana Colburn was speaking up.  “Reckon he can tell us the frequency of that burst?  That shunt we were just jawin’ about…  If he knows the frequency, we can whip up a shunt to block whatever that pesky devil of a virus is throwin’ out.  Then we’ll boot it out like a goddamn raccoon caught in the trash!”

“Aye, I can hear ye.” Vorak responded.  “Give me a second and I’ll pull that bloody command up.  Should say it in there.”

“Thanks, Vorak.”  Nivar said.  He gave Montana a grin.  “Well, at least we now know how these things keep getting fried.”

Montana was just closing up the panel and dusting off his hands.  He stood, removing his hat to wipe at his brow with the hem of his shirt.  “Sure thing, but who in their right mind would wanna muck up our operation to start with?  And what in the hell’d be their reason?”

The Bajoran shook his head.  “I couldn’t even begin to guess.  That’ll be for Captain Dart and Director Nigels to figure out.  Maybe Vorak can dig that up after he sends us this frequency.  I’ll have my guys start whipping together some shunts once Vorak gets back to us.  They can start putting together some shunts by the time we get back to your bay, and then we can all divide and conquer to install them on all your different sensors and replace the fried cores.”