The captain was in his ready room studying some charts when a call had come in from Starfleet Command. He had exited on to the bridge, only to be greeted by an ornery Admiral Kily, who wanted to know what the problem was; the Bristol was overdue.
"Surely you got my message Admiral; several of our officers are missing on the planet surface," the captain said to the admiral on the viewscreen.
"Still? That was days ago, Mark. If you haven't found them by now, they're surely dead," she responded brusquely.
The captain winced and explained to the admiral all the problems they were having due to the storms, in locating anything on the planet surface at all, let alone the Bristol's missing crew.
"Very well Captain, you have one more day, and then you must call off your search. I sympathize, but if there's no word for a week..." Kily let her voice trail off.
"As you say, Admiral," Freeman responded irritably. "Freeman out."
The captain sat, or rather collapsed, into his captain's chair and sighed. 'What more could I do to find my missing officers?' he thought to himself. He had scanners going twenty-four hours a day; he even had all of his shuttlecraft out, scanners peeled, orbiting the planet in various different areas. He had exhausted most of his shuttle fuel in the process.
The captain, as he was prone to do when he was moody, decided to pace about the ship. He stopped down to Engineering and checked on Jevor. "How are you feeling Jevor?" he asked.
"Fully recovered sir! No little scanning beam can kill an Andorian!" Jevor boasted, chuckling half-heartedly as he knew all too well how close he had been to death.
The captain patted him on the back and smiled, "Glad to hear it Commander."
Jevor grew somber, "Still no word sir?"
The captain shook his head, patted Jevor on the back again, and walked out of Engineering. Captain Mark Freeman had traversed about three more decks in a similar methodical pattern, when an urgent voice broke into his thoughts.
"Bridge to Captain!" said a male voice excitedly.
The captain recognized the voice of Lt. O'Shea, second in line at the tactical and security posts behind Lt. Ivanovna, and responded, "Go ahead O'Shea."
"Captain, the storms...they're clearing!"
"On my way!" the captain responded over the intercom, and ran to the nearest turbolift.
As the captain emerged on to the Bridge he called out, "Report!"
"Scanning intensively sir. So far no contact," Lt. Hathaway at the conn station reported.
The captain frowned, "Keep on it! They're there, I just know it!"
A few minutes past before Lt. O'Shea pronounced triumphantly, "Life signs Captain! But only four of them; it's our missing crew, but the others we detected before are gone," he finished, a puzzled expression on his face.
"We'll worry about that in a minute," the captain responded referring to the other missing life signs. "Gates, bring us to within transport range," he ordered; Ensign Gates complied. "Transporter Room One, this is the captain," Freeman called out over the intercom. "Lock on to our landing party and beam them aboard." He then called Sickbay and told them to send a medic to the transporter room to escort landing party to Sickbay when transport was complete.
"I'll be in Sickbay, you have the bridge O'Shea. Get us to our next assignment," the captain ordered, barely containing his elation at the possibility of having found Commander Yilaan and the others.
"Aye sir," O'Shea said, smiling. "Bristol to all shuttlecraft; the crew are being recovered, return to the ship immediately," he said over the comm channels as the captain left the Bridge.
The captain entered the Sickbay smiling and welcomed back each of his officers. Each seemed very distant and tired to him. "How are they Doctor?" the captain asked the assistant chief medical officer on duty.
"Just fine sir," he responded. "I've repaired Lt. Reiv's broken arm. The rest are worn out, somewhat nutritionally deficient and semi dehydrated," he responded succinctly, "They need rest, but they're basically fine."
The captain nodded. "Good to have you all back," he beamed at them.
"Good to be back sir!" Reiv said with enthusiasm, something that was clearly lacking in the others.
"At least WE'RE alive," Dr. Giovanni said, anger and irritation clear in her voice as she looked at Reiv, who refused to meet her gaze.
The captain's smile faded. "That reminds me Commander," he said to Yilaan. "When the storm broke, we only detected the four of you. The other life signs were gone. Do you know why?"
Yilaan looked at him with a pained expression on her face. "I'd rather not talk about it right now. Everything will be in my report," she said in a very tired voice.
Reiv started to say something, then stopped himself. He then spoke on a different subject than of the planet. "I'm ready to return to duty sir!" he said to the captain.
The captain shook his head, "I want the four of you off duty and to rest, starting right now."
"I'm sure some of us will be busy struggling with our conscience as well sir," the doctor threw out, her voice laced with anger and sarcasm.
Reiv sighed and rolled his eyes, "Keep it to yourself Doctor; I am ultimately responsible only to the Prophets. It is for them to judge me, not you."
The captain frowned, sensing the tension. "Perhaps some relaxation apart from each other is in order," he said, trying to ease things a little. He turned to leave and cocked his head to look at Commander Yilaan, "I look forward to reading your report, Commander."
Some time later, the captain and Commander Yilaan were sitting together in the starboard Deck 9 gathering place. "I read your report Commander," the captain said to her.
"And?" she responded.
"And it sounds like you handled things okay," the captain responded. "I might've done a few things differently, but I think you did fine. You managed to find some ground between morals and personal feelings. You were right not to order anyone not to help; to do so would've been imposing our moral standards on another people. At the same time, you were right not to order anyone to help; we had as much right to refuse them as to aid them."
"Was I right sir?" Yilaan asked, looking him in the eye. "It doesn't feel like it right now. I'm having second thoughts about not stopping Reiv." She got up and sighed, "Good night sir; I'm going to try and get some rest."
The captain stood and smiled, "Good night Commander; sleep well."
"Something tells me I won't sir," she said, then turned and walked out of Deck 9 Starboard.
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