Cr’oa sat in his room board his ship. It wasn’t large but it was his. The others had their quarters and were just as luxurious. He had a set of stringed instruments on his wall. They were special to him as they were his brother’s nincoolia. A seventeen stringed instrument that incorporated the use of the Caitian tail to play correctly. A large bed spread out across the length of the wall covered in the softest material that could be found anywhere within the galaxy. He did not require it, but his, guests did. Candles from seven different sectors lay unlit but gave the room décor to be admired.

  A mental message came across to him while he was going over the backgrounds of several other candidates who could take over for Doctor Veren. “Step one complete” he could hear Teb tell him. His fist clenched thinking only of one thing. Victory. His demeanor changed from tense to elation. He reached up and lit one candle its stem resembled a twisting thick spider web, holes you could see through but as strong as titanium. Its top was the same design but shaped like a bowl with a short pit for the wax to lay in. Once lit the candlestick glowed a dark blue and gave off an audible pulse the changed pitch with the flicker of the candle.

  Cr’oa closed his eyes and listened the hum of the flame, it soothed him and it gave him focus and a small reminder of J’Tal singing. His thoughts do not usually take him back to Cait. He left long ago with the intentions that he would never go back. He still blamed S’Grirr for what happened and had not let those feelings go. He opened his eyes and regarded the other six candles. They were all aligned and unlit. He did not have any thoughts of lighting them. They were sitting there waiting for their reason for being in the room to be complete. Six more he thought

  With a resigned release of breath he turned to the door, he had to see this for himself. As he left his room, the corridor temperature was lower than his room by quite a few degrees. The door when opened gave a small rush of air across his fur. His movements were subtle and soundless, the ship itself made more sound than he did even when on low power mode.

  He stepped outside to cross the landing pad to the main building. The sun has just risen it was peaking over the horizon just then. His Caitian eyes soaked it all in looking for signs of life or movement. Not that he needed to, Fraaza had their sensors so finely tuned they could detect any movement on the planet. The link with the satellites gave them more detail than they needed but it was necessary to keep from being found out.

  Taking one last breath, he entered the building. The laboratory had a flurry of activity. Beeps, hums, and clicking from different instruments sounded off. He glanced at the pod containing Joru. “Did we verify that this has not been altered or opened since we were last here?” the tone of his voice remained serious. He did not intend to let any detail slip past him. “Juco?” his impatience came through loud and clear. Juco stood up with a security scanner in hand his blackened uniform that is embedded into his Borg body creaks as he adjusted. “No one has touched the chamber since our last visit.” A concerning follow up “however there was a transmission to a supply ship. I am still going through the data”. This was not a large problem; he knew that Veren needed supplies for their experiment. However, he knew that Juco had things well in hand to bother mentioning to triple check everything including the backup logs for any abnormalities.

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  “Teb, is our test ready?” his toothy grin showed he was more than ready to see the success they had of reading the mind of a Ferengi. Mirgo was dragged from another room and almost thrown into the chair. Otuv and Fraaza stood next to him daring him to move. A PADD was laid before Mirgo with a sequence of numbers and symbols. Teb and Kotu sat across from Mirgo watching his eyes. They were going back and forth frantically to the Klingon this hulking Caitian and the pair across from him at the table. He wanted to speak but could not. Teb offered up a few words. “We know” gestering with her head toward Kotu “that you do not know whom we are, why you are here, and what we want.” Her soft voice was calming but not enough to remove all of his fear. “We have met many times before this, know we are friends and we do not wish you harm.”

  Mirgo was still afraid but not as much as he was. Her white eyes pierced through him and gave him a shiver down his spine. They have only talked to him and no threats have been made against him. He wondered where Weg was. “She is not here right now” a shocked and surprised look came from Mirgo when Kotu spoke. Cr’oa considered the exchange and wanted more proof. The PADD was shoved into the belly of Mirgo. Teb said quietly “My companion would like you to read some information on the PADD, and transfer it to this PADD, do not speak, do not show us what you are looking at or give away any information to what you are doing.”

  Mirgo looked over the PADD, it was changing five shapes, and they looked like they were always different. Some letters, numbers, words and pictures from many species showed themselves. He looked at the screen and chose the first icon thinking he needed to do this in order. The number six he chose first and slid it from one corner of the screen to the left the icons on both PADDs changed. The symbols he saw on the first PADD were centered in the screen, the second PADD had smaller versions of the same exact symbols, as he dragged the first symbol again to the center of the screen. Teb playfully said “Mirgo, you can do better than that, its not always the first symbol, you can choose any of them on the screen, and by all means skip to the next screen if you wish.” A laugh came from Kotu “Can you quicken the pace up? We have a bet that we need to settle on who can get the most correct and we need to know the challenge was tough enough.”

A puzzled Mirgo stopped looking at the PADDs wondering what they were trying to do. He had no idea they were trying to read his mind