(Vessel: Pullman-Class Transport, Volante)
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First, I want to let my uncle, Michael Heeder, know I am fine. We all are. I had no intention of doing anything but spending a few hours alone on a real camping trip. With a real fire. No holodeck, no interruptions from Sick bay calling, just a guy camping out overnight.
Ensign Drexler was our shuttle pilot and the trip was uneventful until we started our final approach when all of a sudden alarms started going off and then we realized that the other shuttles suddenly disappeared. They're just gone -- no engine trails.... just gone. Vanished. Then we realized the Enterprise is also gone. Then someone yelled” there are people in the landing zone! They look like natives! I thought this planet was uninhabited?"
We land nearby and now we know we are not alone on the planet but, yet, alone, because everyone else from the Enterprise is missing. I suggested that our group be divided into four squads of eight, and given assignments to augment initial survival (water, shelter, security, food), because we have no idea what has happened, who these natives are, whether it is safe, or how long we may be on the surface.
We quickly developed a communications plan, a recon team and assignments for food and water because except for rations and snacks there was not any food to speak of. I brought my tent for camping but there’s no chance of getting 30+ people inside. Within a couple of hours we had fruit gathered, fires going, a mini kitchen / food prep area going and a lean to shelter. Things were actually going pretty good, until one of the recon teams failed to report or check in.
That’s when things started going sideways. We started searching for the missing crew and found a settlement, surrounded by a wooden pike wall, that was where the natives we saw when we were trying to land. There was about 2000 natives in the village, and we figured out that our missing persons were inside the village. I ended up being the one to make “first contact” and try to negotiate a release of our personnel.
I'm a doctor, not a diplomat... but the "elders", as it were, met with me and allowed interaction where the other crew members were housed. None of us ever felt threatened, in fact it was a very primitive culture except for one glaring difference - there was this ring. I am still not certain of the origin or action but it certainly appeared to be very similar to the Iconian Gateway the Enterprise encountered recently, when Senior PAO Sam Archer's experience, which he has previously documented.
Another piece that was bizarre, was that the "elders" showed me an emergency homing beacon that was clearly marked as coming from the Shuttle Aurora - but was 300 years old. I keep asking myself - I know where I was, but I wonder WHEN I was.... it seems like there was time travel involved...
Lieutenant (JG) Glenn Tollison
Medical Department
USS Enterprise-D
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March 4, 2365 -- (Original Devron Timeline)