Work Text:
Credits
Original Story Writer: BookGirlFan
Producer: Cait_does_Podfics
Cast:
- Kirk: Cait_does_Podfics
- Scotty: wilfriede0815
- McCoy: Ravin
- Spock: sisi_rambles
- Miner: wjgravity
- Daeyo: J0305
- Ugan: the voice of the radish (I_D_Clare)
- Bug 1: AppleSapling
- Bug 2: olive2read
Free Sound Effects from Pixabay and Music from Archive.org.
Script
Captain’s Log, stardate 2314.2. Delta IV, a dilithium mining planet with a small researcher population, contacted us two days ago requesting immediate assistance, but would give no further details. They have now stopped responding to our hails. Myself, Mr Spock, and Dr McCoy are beaming down to investigate.
Kirk: Ready, Mr Scott?
Scott: Aye, Captain. Energising now.
[transporter sound]
McCoy: Who turned out the lights?
Spock: It may be a power failure. That could explain their emergency message.
Kirk: Then why not just say so?
[communicator sound]
Kirk: Enterprise, this is Kirk. We’ve beamed down, but there’s no lights and no sign of anyone around. Have the sensors picked up anything yet?
Scott: No, sir. Something’s still interfering with the sensors. I could try rerouting through the hyper-relay, but that may overload them entirely.
Kirk: Hold on that, Mr Scott. We’ll see what we can find down here first. Kirk out.
[communicator clicks shut]
Kirk: Well, gentlemen. Let’s wander down the rabbit hole.
[skittering sounds]
McCoy: What was that? Wasn’t this planet uninhabited?
Spock: To be precise, doctor, Starfleet has found no evidence of intelligent life. There is, however, abundant evidence of a thriving insectoid ecosystem.
McCoy: So you’re saying this place is full of creepy-crawlies.
Spock: The ‘creepy-crawlies’, as you call them, appear to be essential to maintaining the nutrient rich earth of this planet, a relationship the Federation researchers on this planet are still seeking to understand.
[louder skittering sounds]
McCoy: Then let’s find those researchers so they can get back to it, and we can get out of here!
Kirk: Come on, Bones, a few bugs won’t do you any harm.
Bug I: Your friend is correct. We do not want to harm you.
~dramatic Star Trek music~
Kirk: Who are you?
Bug I: We? We are the keepers of this planet. Who are you?
Kirk: We’re Starfleet officers, here to investigate the disappearance of the miners and researchers on this planet.
Bug I: Those who are like you. We can take you to them.
Kirk: Alright, we’ll go with you.
[walking/skittering sounds]
Kirk: You say we - who else is with you? I can only see one of you.
Bug I: See? What is see? You cannot sense the ties?
Kirk: To see is to take in visual input, to know colour, distance, expression. [pause] This is not familiar to you?
Bug I: Your words are strange, as are those like you. We know our home through the ties.
[faint humming of forcefield]
McCoy: Jim!
Miner: Starfleet! Hey look, the ‘fleet’s arrived!
Kirk: I’m Captain Kirk, Starship Enterprise. Is anyone injured?
Daeyo: A few bumps and bruises between us, nothing serious. I’m Daeyo, mining operations supervisor. This here’s Ugan, she’s in charge of the researchers. She sent out the emergency message. We’re sure glad to see you, Captain!
Kirk [to Bug I]: Thank you for your help. Will you show us the way back through the tunnels?
Bug I: You cannot go back, strange ones. You must stay here.
Ugan: They won’t help you, Captain. They think there’s something wrong with us.
Kirk: Then we’ll find another way. [communicator sound] Scotty, beam us - Scotty?
Spock: We have travelled deep into the planet, Captain, and the soil of this planet is unusually dense. In all probability, we will not be able to contact the ship until we are closer to the surface.
Kirk: Alright. [communicator clicks shut] In that case, we’ll find our way up on our own. [phaser fires] We don’t want to hurt you, but we aren’t staying down here.
[multiple skittering sounds]
Bug 1: We cannot let you do that, strange one. You will stay with those who are like you.
McCoy: There’s too many of them, Jim.
Bug 1: We will take your weapons. We do not want you to be hurt. That is why you must stay.
~dramatic Star Trek music~
Kirk: Spock, what’s this barrier made of?
Spock: It’s unlike anything we’ve seen before, Captain. It seems to use electricity, but there is no obvious source for it.
Kirk: Is there a way to destroy it?
Spock: The aliens have left our tricorders and communicators with us. If I wore them together, I may be able to induce a short in the system.
Kirk: Alright. Everyone, hand your devices to Spock. I’ll keep one communicator to contact Scotty once we’re back in range. Ugan, Daeyo, the rest of you, anything you can tell us about what these creatures want with us?
Daeyo: They just don’t want us on their planet.
Ugan: It’s more than that. They think we’re in danger, or are a danger.
Kirk: What kind of danger?
Ugan: I don’t know. One of them said something about soulties, but they wouldn’t answer any questions about it.
Kirk: Hmm.
Kirk: Hey, you.
[chittering sound]
Kirk: Yes, you. Why are you keeping us here? What did your friend mean, that you don’t want us to be hurt?
Bug II: You are not safe.
Kirk: Why not? What’s not safe? [pause] Is it about these soul ties?
Bug II: You have no ties.
Kirk: What are they?
[chittering]
Kirk: Come on, if you’re keeping us here, the least you can do is tell us why.
Bug II: They are connection. Soulties are life, from each one to another. We know our people, our home, by our ties.
Kirk: We have people. We have a home. We have connections, and you’re keeping us from them.
Bug II: You have no ties. You cannot have connection.
Kirk: We do have connection. We have a people, we have connection!
McCoy: It’s not listening, Jim. It doesn’t believe we can have connections without these soulties. With how much it cares about them, it might not even think we have souls.
Kirk: I don’t care if it thinks we have souls or not. We’re not staying here. Spock, how are you going with shorting the system?
Spock: Almost done, Captain.
[sparking electricity, followed by a loud crash]
[sounds of fighting, chittering]
Kirk: Everyone, with me! Back up to the mine!
[footsteps moving fast]
[footsteps fade out, then fade back in again]
[communicator sound]
Kirk: Kirk to Enterprise.
Scott: Scott here, Captain. Where have you been?
Kirk: It appears this planet is more inhabited than we thought. Stand by to beam up.
Scott: Aye, Captain.
[communicator clicks shut]
Ugan: Captain, we can’t beam out now. There’s a species here we’ve never met before, with technology like we’ve never seen! We have to know more.
Kirk: This new species used their never before seen technology to keep us captive, and could still find us.
Daeyo: Then we find them first, and destroy them! The Federation still needs the dilithium here, we can’t just leave. Your ship has phasers, we can blast them off the planet!
Kirk: Starfleet is not in the business of destroying civilisations! We are the ones who invaded their planet. It’s too late for the Prime Directive, but we will not be attacking a people who have only been defending themselves.
Daeyo: My apologies, captain. Of course, we shouldn’t destroy them. But I still can’t agree to abandoning the mines.
[chittering sounds in the distance, growing louder]
Spock: Captain, Mr Daeyo has a point. The Federation needs the dilithium from these mines. If we can reach an agreement with the creatures for the miners to remain, that would be the most beneficial course of action.
Kirk: You don’t ask much, do you Spock?
[chittering reaches peak]
Bug I: Strange ones. You must return with us.
Kirk: We won’t go with you.
Bug I: You must.
Kirk: Why must we? Because we don’t have soulties? Because you can’t see our connections?
Bug II: You cannot have connection.
Kirk: We don’t have soulties the way you do, but we still connect. We connect through an act or a word - reaching out to another, without knowing whether they will feel the same. We don’t have the certainty of a soultie. When we reach out, we don’t know if we will connect. Every act of reaching out is an act of hope, that we are not alone in our universe. That in reaching out to another, we find a part of ourselves. And it’s that reaching out, that hope for connection, that has taken us to the stars, searching for others who will feel that connection too.
Bug II: You…connect.
Bug I: …You do not connect like us.
Kirk: But we do connect.
Bug I: We want to know more of your connections.
Ugan: I’d be happy to tell you more.
~uplifting Star Trek music~
[Enterprise bridge sounds]
McCoy: All’s well that ends well, I suppose. Daeyo’s got their mines back, Ugan and the aliens have a cultural exchange to get started on, and we finally get to get away from those creepy crawlies. All respect to them, but it’ll take me a while to get used to giant centipedes!
Kirk: Mmm…
McCoy: What’s the matter, Jim? You’re looking mighty contemplative.
Kirk: I’m just thinking, Bones, those creatures down there, they can see the connections between every living thing on their planet. Every one of them, part of one greater whole.
McCoy: And?
Kirk: What we had that ability, to see the ties between us? How different would human history be?
McCoy: I don’t know, Jim. It’s hard to imagine.
Kirk: Hmm… [pause] Warp factor one, Mr Sulu.
The End