“There are three things we cry for in life: things that are lost, things that are found, and things that are magnificent.”

Douglas Copeland, (1998)

We’ve all lost something.

Incidentally, from time to time and without really registering the fact in the moment – it’s a common conundrum & ubiquitous occurrence when something that we were convinced was squarely in our possession proves to be otherwise, much to our chagrin.

A set of keys, a favorite garment, the password to something important and (for reasons known only to the Universe itself) one of two socks.

The attendant frustration is scalar.

To lose a sock is annoying but given that they come in pairs this is a minor inconvenience.

To lose a password is frustrating, but there are ways and means to gain another and your day progresses with only a minor setback.

Losing a set of keys is more vexing, it’s true, and there can be more wide-ranging impacts stemming from such a loss from not being able to get into your house, to freezing to death because you can’t get into your car in a blizzard.

But what unifies these experiences is the typically temporary nature of that loss. All are ultimately resolvable. At worst, the most you will suffer is a profound feeling of frustration at being inconvenienced.

Not so when what you have lost is a Starship.

It was the seventh day since the USS Kirk had joined the effort to locate the lost Romulan Republic Science vessel Selquar. Overdue now for 18 days, concern over the fate of the Galas – class vessel had driven a widening net of searchers from the Federation/Empire/Republic combined forces to scour every part of the Hecate Binary Cluster, desperate for some clue as to what may have befallen Sub – Commander Thecal and his crew.

The thing about losing something as large and vital as an entire starship and her crew (especially when finding it becomes key and a focal symbol to a tenuous alliance) and not being able to locate it, is the pervading sense of frustration that grows unchecked from a feeling of  confounded helplessness the longer that this state of affairs persists.

And the longer the Selquar remained unaccounted for, the more fractious the relationships between the allies would become.

Which accounted (at least in part) for the abjectly – tense atmosphere within the relatively – small confines of the bridge of the USS Kirk.

With their allotted search – grid nearly complete, the crew of the Shran – class escort had been perplexingly – unable to locate their quarry, despite fielding some of the most advanced long range and planetary – scanners for a ship of her class.

For her CO, Lieutenant Commander Lane Hanley, each passing moment that their scans returned a negative search result hung like a mordant chapel – bell sounding it’s sonorous lament. From her position of command and perspective on the fleet – wide effort, it was evident that the stress of the last 18 days was starting to bear poorly on the attendant searchers.

From the communication’s logs transacting between different commands, it was evident that the seams of their uneasy alliance was beginning to fray at edges.

Romulan commanders were issuing increasingly terse communiques accusing their contemporaries of not trying hard enough. Predictably their Klingon counterparts were not responding well to this assessment and their replies were bordering on the belligerent. Amongst them all the responses from Starfleet CO’s for all involved to set aside animosity and come together to retain focus on the search came across as parsimonious at best.

In some ways, the absent Selquar had become a litmus test that was symbolic of the integrity of the entire alliance.

Which is why it was of some considerable relief to Hanley, when her Chief Science Officer suddenly reported.

“Captain, I think I may have something?”

Lane canted her command chair on its central dais, turning her attention to port and bringing it squarely to bear on the youthful Denobulan Ensign.

“What have you got, Mr Phorrel?” Lane demanded cautiously.

Orvid Phorrel was the newest member of her crew and the youngest officer aboard the Kirk. To look at the man, with his pale skin and slight frame, you’d be hard pressed to be convinced that he was qualified to hold the post of Chief Science Officer. The kid looked like he was still at the Academy. Yet Phorrel had returned superb grades as a generalist and his irrepressible curiosity routinely offset the indisputable fact that there was not typically a lot of hard – science to be done aboard an escort.

Orvid looked up from his instrumentation, a bland smile on his pale face as his fingers scrunched at his scalp with a characteristic lack of self – awareness.

“Well Ma’am.” Ensign Phorrel ventured cautiously. “To date we have been confining our search pattern to encompass routes and planetary bodies that the Selquar would most likely take, should her captain have decided to deviate from her assigned course, either to explore some new opportunity of interest or as the result of an unspecified emergency or some such calamity.”

Lane frowned, her delicate dark – blonde eyebrows furrowing her brow as she prompted, trying to keep a tinge of impatience from her voice.

“If there’s an explanation, I’m not hearing it. We know this Mr Phorrel. How about we just cut to the chase?”

Orvid’s smile wavered only a little and he keyed a command that brought up their route to date to life in a hovering holo-representation that sprang to life from one of the rails abounding the Command – chair. He took leave of his own seat and crossed the short distance to stand by the CO and his eager hands tease and manipulated the schematic until he had zoomed and panned the image to the correct resolution and aspect.

“Whilst this is a logical hypothesis, it has thus far failed to yield a positive result.” Ensign Phorrel explained rhetorically, ignoring Hanley’s warning glare as he pushed on. With so little opportunity to take centre – stage, it was typical of the scientist to warm to his moment in the spotlight and he continued methodically.

“Thus, we scrutinized the majority of planetary bodies or solar systems that held M – Class, K – Class and Class – D Planets. Obviously we looked into Class – J planetary bodies, but if the Selquar succumbed to the effects of a Gas – giant then there is nothing anyone could do for them. B – Class planets (of which there are three) are too close to their parent Binary – stars to warrant reasonable consideration.”

Lane did not say a word, but somehow the flatness of her glare convinced Orvid that it was time to hustle things along.

“Which leaves us with Hecate#7b. Which we previously discounted for obvious reasons.”

As he spoke the planet in question, strobed in red and Lane peered at the accompanying infographic that provided telemetry and data about the rocky world.

It was a Y – Class.

“That’s a Hell – world.” The CO commented flatly, her tone plainly unimpressed.

Ensign Phorrel shrugged easily, not letting this self-evident fact dissuade him.

A Y – Class Planet (also known as a Demon – class or more colloquially – a ‘Hell-world’) was the classification reserved for planetary body not merely unable to support organic life, but one whose environmental factors were evolved in such that they were considered extremely hazardous, if not antagonistically & vindictively fatal towards it.

“Which is why I initially discounted it from our original search parameters.” The scientist admitted reasonably. “Long distance scans confirm a highly toxic atmosphere rife with a cocktail of radiations of which thermionic is ironically the least extreme, with surface temperatures approaching Zero Kelvin (-273.15 C) at the poles and a veritable witches brew of worrisomely – exotic mutagens meandering what air there is in aerosol form – borne along upon some fascinatingly – violent ionic stormfront activity. All in all – an environment hardly conducive to supporting organic life.”

Lane regarded Orvid like she was giving serious consideration to putting him out of the airlock and commented dryly

“Then, Ensign, why am I looking at  this?”

Ensign Phorrel smiled a watery smile (the man seemed to have no guile at all) and the simulation suddenly showed a faint green – flare, tiny against the red – bulk of the planet.

“Because 19 days ago, an incident occurred in low – orbit there that correlates to an energy – signature that is consistent with that which you would expect to see accompany the total collapse of a quantum singularity field.”

The same technology that powered Romulan ships.

This elicited a palpable response across the bridge as the implication of this finding sank in. Even her Executive Officer, Bohrigm Nil took note.

Lane narrowed her eyes as she scrutinized the data behind the CSO’s findings.

“But we went through this area three days ago.” She demanded. “Why didn’t we pick this up before?”

Orvid blew out his cheeks and with typical good – natured Denobulan bonhomie he smiled, “Well partly because we weren’t actually looking in that direction, as I have explained, and partly because of the positioning of the planet in relation to main – sequence binary stars, Captain.”

He manipulated the display, which zoomed out to show the position of Hecate#7b in relation to the twinned Binary – stars of the Hecate system.

“As you know, the eclipsing binaries periodically obscure our line of sight to one of the other, dependent on our position relative to the orbital plane.  When edge on to our line of sight, the larger Hecate – Majoris obscures the smaller Hecate – Minoris with a period of approximately 2.9 standard days. It not only eclipses light on the observable spectrum, but on the electromagnetic spectrum also, flooding the sensor – band with an increase in cosmic radiation.”

He keyed in the previous course of the USS Kirk, three days previously, to demonstrate his theory.

“We were just in the wrong place at the right time, looking in the wrong direction.” Orvid smiled.

Lane sat back in her seat, weighing the implications.

“Could this be the result of a natural phenomenon?”

The scientist nodded reasonably.

“Most certainly. As I said, the planet and it’s surrounds are a veritable mélange of exotic particles and energies. It’s entirely possible that this could be so, given that we are dealing with data assumed from residual trace elements and not the supposed event itself.”

Lane nodded.

“But it could also be the Selquar.” She murmured, almost to herself.

“Whilst there’s always room for variation, Occam’s Razor asserts that we should seek for explanations constructed from the smallest possible set of elements.” Orvid nodded his auburn – haired head and postulated.

“To – whit – we are engaged in the fruitless search for a lost Romulan vessel and are presented with empirical evidence analogous with that of a Romulan vessel. The laws of Parsimony don’t get much more direct in their implications than that.”

Lane nodded. In lieu of any other positive lead, it would indeed be remiss not to look into this occurrence. It may turn out to be inconsequential. Then again it could provide the very key that they had been seeking to unlock the mystery behind the missing Romulan ship.

“Ensign Hunter, lay in a course for Hecate#7b, Warp 9.” Hanley ordered. Once she was determined towards a course of action, Lane was a woman who brokered no hesitation.

“Warp 9. Aye Ma’am. Laying in a course.” Ensign Jasmine Hunter nodded confidently, her slim hands flowing across the helm – controls as she plotted their route.

Lane turned to Orvid.

“Good work Ensign.” She congratulated the blinking Denobulan. “Give me a more detailed work – up on Hecate#9b and the general volume. I want to know what to expect before we go barreling in to save the day.”

A wan smile creased Orvid’s face  and he retook his seat at the science station, glowing with an inner pride.

Hanley nodded to Ensign Kutka at the Tactical – station.

“TAC – take us to Yellow – Alert. We don’t know if this is, in – fact,  the Selquar and if it is – what may have happened to her. But let’s assume whatever it was, it wasn’t good and work the assumption from there. Be ready to go to Red – alert if that’s what’s required when we make planetfall.”

The Saurian bowed his ridged pink – cranium and murmured calmly.

“Yellow Alert, Aye.”

As the yellow alert sounded throughout the ship, Lane caught the eye of her First Officer. To his credit, Bohrigm (who she knew harbored misgivings in most things where the Romulan’s were concerned) nodded his assent and Lane took this silent acquiescence to be a positive sign.

“Ensign Gaca, contact Framheim Fleet – Operations. Inform then that we are changing course to investigate a possible lead into the disappearance of the RRN Selquar and will report our findings at our next scheduled window. Signal the crew to prepare for warp.”

“Confirmed Captain, sending.” The diminutive Ferengi Ops Chief confirmed efficiently as she carried out Hanley’s orders.

Lieutenant – Commander Lane Hanley took a deep breath, took stock of herself and was please to find that she was relieved. After several days of searching in vain and the inevitable malaise that failure brought, she found herself enlivened by the prospect of action and invigorated that their mission – goal might finally be in reach, after all.

She turned to face the view of space slewing past the hull as the USS Kirk made way and wondered to herself what had really happened to the Selquar and whether the same uncertain fate lay waiting for them all too?

Still, like her old man was oft to say, “It’s better to do a thing, than live in fear of doing a thing.”

“Helm, take us to warp!” Hanley commanded in a smooth and sure voice that radiated confidence, before adding quietly to herself.

“Let’s see what the HELL is out there…”