Lieutenant Shrin entered one of the Raven-class’ labs with an achievement artifact.  The Andorian woman’s antennae flicked the air sensing her surroundings. 

“Aww, Lieutenant,” she said approaching Gionna carrying an artifact in the shape of a decahedon.  It had markings on the face and at the top a recessed panel that glowed in a soft blue. “I… we have a bit of a puzzle and since you were here I thought a fresh mind might help us solve a rather large problem.”

Gionna examined the artifact. It was definitely unique and she had never seen anything quite like it before. On Cardassia Prime she’d had access to all manner of objet d’art which had been collected from the various worlds that belonged to the Cardassian Union. Her eyes keenly fixed to the object, studying its design and surface profile in great detail. She had what the humans called an eidetic memory. 30 seconds of staring at the object and she would never forget it.

“Intriguing.” Gionna said, “Where did you find it?”

“At a dig on Je’lon IV.  We estimate it to be nearly 2,000 years old.  We have determined most of the markings are star charts for Earth, and the inscription is in ancient Welsh.” She checked the PADD and read from it,  “Beyond the gateway in Avalon, reigns Aurthur, King of the Britons and his Knights of the Round Table.  With Merlin’s staff, lightning of time, bridges the distance between time and space.”

Shrin let that sink in before continuing,  “It uh… Well, it made our Captain and XO dissappear.   Starfleet has declared them dead and said the device desentigrated them, but I find no evidence of that. We were initially able to activate it with a tachyon pulse,  but nothing since.”

Gionna’s very first thought was that it might be a micro-transporter of some sort. Taking a tricorder from a nearby workstation she began to scan for the presence of tachyons or other quantum variables that might have an association with subspace fissures, natural wormhole phenomena, or teleportation of any kind. The inscription written in an ancient Earth language also fascinated her.

She was not an expert in Earth mythological stories, and yet even she had heard the legends of Avalon, Merlin or Myrddin as he was known in its derivative Earth language. Gionna began to wonder now if perhaps legends of fantasy were now somehow based in fact.

“In its dormant state, I am not detecting any emissions of any kind. Has it been exposed to various stimuli radiation forms? I would be curious how it might react if introduced to a neutrino field.”

“Just the tachyon pulse.   When we found it it was emitting low levels of gamma rays.  Now it’s… well this.” Shrin replied.

“I would recommend scanning it with a coherent tetryon beam.” Gionna suggested. “It is only a hunch, of course… but since the device, as you say, made your Captain and first officer disappear, it suggests to me that the device may be designed to activate when in proximity of life-signs. A coherent tetryon beam could be rigged to send a false bio-signature, which would then possibly activate the device, but without the risk of life. But as I said, that’s just a hunch.”

The Andorian’s antennae started to twitch in excitement,  “I had not thought of that.  None of us have.  You’re right that might be the case.  Does the Feuos have a tetryon emitter, or do we need to return to the Crazy Horse?”

Gionna gave a small indication of a smile. Like many Cardassians, she was excellent at concealing her true feelings. However, after a quick walk to her personal storage locker, she returned with a medium sized scanner of Cardassian design. It appeared to be heavy, requiring two hands to hold.

“This is not standard Starfleet issue; rather a multifaceted emitter array, similar to the MIDAS design. This however, requires no Mutara gasses to operate. It’s miniaturized tech that we Cardassians… appropriated from Starfleet and improved upon. It should be capable of reproducing a coherent tetryon beam.”

Shrin grinned with excitement.   After almost a year of nothing and banging her head against the wall she was excited to have a new option.  Taping her combadge, “Lt. Shrin, to Lt. Washington.”

“Go ahead,” a disembodied male voice came back.

“Marcus could you beam the tachyon emitter to my location?”

There was a pause,  “Yeah, it’s on its way.”

A moment later a tachyon emitter was beamed less than a meter from her.  “Okay,” Shrin started as she set the artifact on a table. “Put your tetryon thing over there about 1.5 meters,” She instructed excitedly as she started to set up her own device pointing at the artifact.

Gionna took only a few moments to properly calibrate the device, set it up at the instructed distance and make sure that everyone, including herself was safely out of the way. With a nod, she indicated that the device was fully functional and ready.

“Ready?” Shrin asked.

“On your mark.” Gionna replied with a coordinated raised finger.

With tricorder in hand she flipped the switch on the tachyon emitter.   For a second the artifact started to power up, but then just as suddenly as it did it returned to a dormant state.

Disappointed Shrin’s fingers danced over rhe tricorder, “I thought it was going to work.”

Gionna cocked her head to one side, in obvious defeat.

“As was I.” She said.

“Wait… what if?  Your emitter is just emitting general life signs.  Can you adjust it to read human?”

Gionna smiled and became suddenly proud of her Cardassian technical achievement.

“I can mimic the life signs of a Rectyne monopod, if so required….” She said with a humorous expression on her face, “Human life signs will be simple by comparison.”

Gionna accessed the baseline bio-data held by Starfleet medical computers aboard the ship. It required only a minor adjustment to the tetryon beam to allow it reproduce those lifesigns without flaw.

The tetryon beam altered its hue slightly, turning to a deep purple emission light beam. A moment of strange energy fluctuation occurred; the lights in the room dimmed for a moment, probably from interference created from the device’s activation. Before anyone could comment, or even move reflexively, the purple tetryon beam ricocheted, fed-back on itself, and struck the tachyon emitter.

A quiet deafness filled the room; everyone’s eardrums felt an adjustment of pressure, and the tachyon emitter disappeared in an instant.

“It would seem…” Gionna said, “We have achieved some small measure of success…”

“It seems so,” Shrin replied meditatively. “To what end I cannot say.  Is there anything useful on thr lab sensors?”

Gionna went a nearby monitor and read the active sensor data that was collected by the ships internal sensors.

“Though I cannot tell you exactly where the tachyon emitter went to, I can definitely say it was not vaporized. Sensors also seem to indicate that a directional vortex was opened. It’s exit vector is set, and can only flow in one direction, but I can definitely tell you, that this machine does not disintegrate anything. Rather it sends it… away.”

“Like a one way wormhole,” Shrin said thinking.

“Exactly,” Gionna confirmed with a quick nod of her head.

“Can you send the sensor data to the Crazy Horse.   Thank you,  this has been most productive. We have been staring at this problem for months.”

Gionna wasn’t used to sharing information open and freely. That was the first obvious change between her time in the Obsidian Order and her service to Starfleet. She wasn’t sure how she felt about it. It felt strange, but it felt good. A cooperative effort had been made, and perhaps positive things would be the result. If this is what Gionna had to look forward to by continuing to serve Starfleet, then that was something she could be proud of.