Episode 39: "A small problem"

Captain McMillan was a man who learned from his mistakes. The last few times, he had his team beam down to a planet or space station without ordering some extensive scans, to make sure it was safe. His crew nearly paid for that mistake with their lives. Yes, Slade's surprise attacks were not forgotten by the Gibraltar CO. She was still out there, he knew. And while he also realised that the Gibraltar wasn't her primary target, she wouldn't hesitate to lure them into a trap again, like she had done so many times before.

So now, as the Gibraltar arrived at the USS Burbank, a Nova class science vessel which had been sending out a distress signal, McMillan felt he shouldn't throw caution into the wind. "Run an extensive scan of the entire ship," McMillan ordered his science officers, Mr. Visage and Ms. Deia. . . whatever her full name was. "And tell me if we can beam over safely."

The reason why he didn't ask his usual Chief of Science, Lt.Cmdr. Braveheart, was of course because he had just promoted the man. No longer a Lieutenant Commander, nor Chief of Science, Commander Kieran Braveheart sat next to McMillan, in the XO's chair. McMillan's new executive officer seemed to itch to want to do the scans himself though, as McMillan could understand. He too was a scientist at heart... but he'd been a Captain longer than that. Being in command, he knew, meant trusting your life to your crew, while they trusted their lives to the Captain. It was quite a responsibility, as Braveheart would learn.

"The Burbank is damaged, Sir." came Mr. Visage's report. "I am detecting various energy emissions throughout the ship, specifically in their main science lab." Starfleet had told the Gibraltar crew that the Burbank was missing after initiating a classified experiment, so this didn't surprise McMillan in the least.

"Is it safe to beam over, Mr. Visage?" The Gibraltar's Captain asked.

"As long as we don't stay there too long. . . yes Sir." came the response.

A couple of minutes later, McMillan wished he hadn't beamed over.

 

He had decided to beam directly to the science lab, to find the cause of these energy emissions, and possibly to bring those to a halt, so that the ship was out of danger. It seemed like a good decision at the time, but as the crew rematerialised on the transporterplatform inside the Burbank's main science lab, McMillan quickly doubted whether it actually was good to beam over here. After all, instead of being greeted by a science lab like those on the Gibraltar, this one was at least ten times larger.

As it turned out though, the lab wasn't larger at all. It was exactly the same dimensions as it should be. No. . . the Gibraltar crew had shrunk.

 

After recovering from the shock, the crew split up in smaller teams, only to find out that being ten centimeters or about four inches tall, didn't only pose problems while getting around, but it was also quite dangerous. The Burbank's science lab had taken quite a beating, it seemed, which caused beams to have fallen down. Luckily, the crew could walk on top of those beams to get around the room. However, some of the experiments were also out in the open now: a fact that became clear when one of the Gibraltar's crew almost became electrified because of a small current crawling across the floor.

 

McMillan knew that his priorities had changed now. Instead of coming here to save the Burbank and its crew, he first needed his own crew to save themselves. But how? Luckily, Ms. Deia found several canisters filled with some sort of fluid. It gave off an interesting reading, which told McMillan that it was worth to examine further. As part of the crew tried to jump from one light on the console to another, in order to get more information about those vials, the rest did their best to find out what had actually happened here.

 

As it turned out, the Burbank crew had been experimenting with shrinking and growing objects, done with substances which came from a man-made anomaly - which explained the unusual energy readings - and they had intended to try this on living people as well. However, something went wrong, and the crew itself was exposed to this substance - via the transporterbeam, probably, since that was how the Gibraltar crew got infected with it - and they too were now small, and cut off from the science lab. The vials at the other side of the lab were indeed the antidote: the key to making both crews bigger again.

 

McMillan shook his small head, as he crossed the fallen beam one last time, towards the vials with the antidote. "Can you reverse the effects?" he asked Commander Braveheart's team, who had been working on that.

The newly promoted XO gave a nod. "I believe so, Sir." the man said with a smile. "We'll be big again in no-time."


A few hours later, the Gibaltar and Burbank crew were once again back to normal. McMillan sat in his Captain's Chair again, on the Bridge, staring at the viewscreen. Even though Slade didn't have anything to do with this, the Gibraltar crew walked into a trap of some sorts, despite McMillan being overly cautious. It dawned on him that this wasn't something that only happened to him and his crew. Slade or no Slade, theirs was a dangerous job. Being in Starfleet was dangerous. However, it also brought them to places where no one had gone before.

 Captain RoBobby McMillan smiled to himself. Despite all that happened in the last couple of months... his wasn't a bad job at all.