Greetings from Thuln

Chief Engineer’s Personal Log
Stardate 837.7

I should not have fired. It has deprived us of crucial information and destroyed any chance we have of understanding how that item came to be aboard the Onik.

But in that moment, all I could think of the face of that Earth First terrorist, of what I did to him, and whether it could happen again.

“Greetings from Thuln”, it had engraved upon it. That much I do remember. Wood and glass, filled with vegetation and the slug oscillating through rainbow colours, and a presence in my head trying to take over.

Did the crewman we found outside the bridge die from fighting against the slug’s control? Or did he succumb and die unaware? Did the one who turned off all the internal systems do it of his own accord?

We will go to Thuln, perhaps not immediately but we will go. The mystery and the potential threat to the Federation demands it.

But I would rather cross the Fire Plains alone at midsummer than venture within 5 light years of that planet.