The klaxons ran for another minute before becoming silent, but the purple lights gave the lab and adjoining hallway an eerie and haunting feel.

Cezear looked over at O’Shea. “Pottinger is not going to be happy about that, but I did what I felt had to be done. I don’t think it’s going to be pleasant when she gets down here.”

Stifling a laugh, O’Shea nodded, “You could say that again. May have been best to speak to her first, but if there is a biohazard risk best to act fast. She was notified, and the procedure does state systems must be locked down. Speaking of which….” He turned and looked around the room and at the two bodies. “We will need to notify Mercy and Halsey on this but will wait for Pottinger as it should come from her.” With that, he began to download and record the computer files in duplicate.

“Yaa, about that, if the systems are normal star fleet issue, then the Mercy would have got a message as soon as I authenticated my codes. They will know something has gone wrong. I would expect that Pottinger should be getting a message from Captain Halsey any moment now.”

Cezear then tapped on his combadge. “Ensign, be advised Captain Pottinger is probably on her way. If she asks you anything, say what you are comfortable with, but if possible, hide any knowledge about her other mission for her team.”

“Yes, sir. Hmmmm wonder if I close the door if she would just walk right on by. ”

Cezear chuckles. “Worth a try; I’m pretty sure her mind will be on what we found in the lab and what I just did.”

O’Shea shook his head slightly, depressing a laugh, as he overheard Cezear’s discussion before turning back to the data download. “System backup is complete; we will need definitely need more eyes on this than we have here currently.”

“Not just eyes, We’re going to need more information on what is going on here. Why did Jacob leave or even want to leave the post? “ Cezear looked around the lab and shook his head. “Something else is going on here; what are we missing?”

“Possibly to escape the disease?” Aimee suggested as she approached from the biology lab. “This disease is rather nasty, and we are all infected.  We have twenty-four hours before we start showing symptoms, and death comes within the week. It’s as viral as small pox, and the symptoms mirror bubonic plague.   I’m still trying to figure out that one, whether it’s an example of convergent evolution or somehow a native retrovirus absorbed a bubonic bacteria and took on its traits.”

Cezear uses his thumb to point over his shoulder. “Well, I hate to be the one to say it. But we have two bodies, well three actually,” he shows Aimee his tricorder scan showing the pregnancy of the team member. “In here. We think that one is from the local population, and of course, we have her.” he pointed at the body sitting at the console. “maybe they can help us figure out which came first, the chicken or the egg?”

Aimee nodded and sighed. A quick scan confirmed that they, too, had died from the disease.  

He tapped on his combadge. “Linwood save all the data you can. I have a feeling that the meeting room is going to become our operations center and is going to get busy in there.”