“Yes, why did you do as Cadet Moll Enor suggested? Was she in command of your mission?”

“No, Mantegna was.”

“Starfleet Cadet Mantegna is on record that he was against the attempt,” the interrogator intoned, noting the sequence number of the testimony for the Commission members to access.

Wukee opened his mouth to reply, but he was replaced in a burst of static by Campbell. Campbell looked as if he was at attention, stiff and self‑conscious.

“Starfleet Cadet Ho Campbell,” the voice announced. “You were also a member of the research team on the Sagittariusscience pod.”

“Yes, sir!” Campbell snapped to attention. “I believe Cadet Moll conducted herself with bravery befitting a Starfleet officer, sir!”

The voice didn’t respond to Campbell’s declaration. “Was it part of your duties to retrieve asteroids?”

“Duty?” Campbell asked, shifting slightly, his voice lowering. “No, we tag asteroids with subspace beacons. It’s the science teams who retrieve them.”

“So the attempt to retrieve the asteroid was outside the normal bounds of your duties as you understood them, is that correct?”

“Yes.”

Campbell’s proud, pained face turned into static as his holo‑image was replaced by one of Mantegna. He was settling the sleeve of his shirt, tugging lightly on the cuff, feigning nonchalance at the interrogation.

“Starfleet Cadet Yllian Mantegna,” the voice announced. “Commander of the Sagittariusresearch mission. Why did you attempt to destroy the magnetic field with a focused particle beam, the procedure suggested by Cadet Moll Enor?”

“She said it would work. I trusted her judgment.” He continued to examine his shirt. “She’s supposed to be brilliant, isn’t she?”

“Do you believe Cadet Moll Enor misrepresented the risk?” the interrogator asked.

Grudgingly, Mantegna admitted, “No. But she said she could do it.”

Moll winced at his condescension. But she had seen him panic when their main power array was blown apart by the feedback from the particle beam. As emergency life support came on line with the distinctive ruddy lights, he had let out a frightened squeak like he was two years old. Mantegna knew she would never forget–and succeeding generations of hosts would never forget–the way he had nearly levitated out of his seat when the hatch to the lifeboat automatically cycled open. He was the first one inside the lifeboat, even though he had to push Wukee aside at the hatch to get in.

Smoothly the voice asked, “Did you order Cadet Moll Enor to remain behind in the science pod?”

Mantegna sat forward, his eyes narrowing. “No, Cadet Enor volunteered–insisted, actually. She said someone had to stay with the asteroid to try to stop the spin. I told her she’d never get the pod’s systems powered up before it crossed into the inner phases, but she thought she could.”

Moll crossed her arms protectively over her stomach and the symbiont. The way she remembered it, Mantegna didn’t say three words when she had explained that she would stay with the asteroid until they returned with a rescue team. He had cycled the hatch closed so fast they almost didn’t hear her advice on how to best use the lifeboat thrusters to get out of the vortex. How could she describe her feelings as the vacuum broke between the pod and the lifeboat, when she desperately wanted to call after them to wait for her? It had been her idea to stay, but she felt abandoned.

“Did you agree with Moll Enor’s analysis?”

“No. That’s why I ordered the evacuation,” Mantegna replied.

“At that time, did you believe the asteroid was worth the risk of staying behind?” the interrogator pressed.

“No, I did not.”

“Did you believe Cadet Moll Enor was endangering her life?”

“No. She could have left in the other lifeboat at any time.”

“Do you believe Moll Enor made the correct decision to stay with the asteroid?”

Moll held her breath, hoping Mantegna’s arrogance would finally help her out. If he believed that what she had done involved no danger and was basically of little importance, the Commission might believe that, too.

But Mantegna stunned her by admitting, “I have to say, she did it. She stopped the spin and slowed the vortex, giving the rescue team time to reach both her and the asteroid before they entered the inner phases. She deserves the Starfleet commendation she was awarded.”

Moll could have groaned at his unexpected accolades. Just when she least needed it, Mantegna finally gave her his approval. The problem was, she wasn’t in trouble with Starfleet! It was the Trill who had her on trial.

Next, the investigators for the Symbiosis Commission played the internal log from the science pod, thoughtfully provided by Starfleet. Moll had to force herself to sit still as those desperate hours unfolded again. She couldn’t watch her own face, knowing the doubts that drove her, with the fear that she had made a terrible mistake staying in the science pod. The lifepod was even less shielded than the Sagittarius,and while it may have saved her life, the symbiont would have been harmed–and the Commission had those facts right in front of them.

As the log played out, the interrogator counted the rising radiation rate within the pod, well over the acceptable tolerance levels for the symbiont. Then there was the final burst of activity as she finally created a link and filtered enough energy through her tricorder to create an arc between the pod and the relay buoy, shorting out the magnetic vortex. The asteroids spun away, finally released to rejoin the chaotic helix motion, while the buoy and the panspermia asteroid slowed, spinning around each other as they were jostled from the jet stream.

In the recording, Moll bowed her head to her arms. There was silence as the image continued, then the interrogator cut in, saying, “A rescue team arrived within the hour. Cadet Moll Enor was treated on board the rescue ship for fifth degree radiation burns.”

Moll couldn’t watch the holo‑image. Nothing could convey the gut‑wrenching pain of synchrotron radiation exposure. Or her dread that she had made a mistake that would cost her everything.

“Were you aware you were endangering your symbiont?”

“Yes,” Moll admitted, raising her chin. “But I believed it was an acceptable risk.”

“Why do you consider your actions acceptable?”

“Because saving the asteroid with the panspermia fossil was of paramount importance.”

“Importance to whom?” the voice inquired.

Moll tightened her lips. “To everyone! There’s nothing more important than evidence of a fundamental connection between all humanoid life‑forms. Especially now, when we have to work together to fight the Borg!”

Her voice rang out, but with no faces to judge reactions, she couldn’t know if they understood. “Don’t you see, this panspermia fossil supports Galen’s discovery that humanoid species in our galaxy have a common genetic heritage. We were “seeded” in the primordial oceans of many worlds. It’s proof of a biological imperative that we should work together.”

“What is your primary concern, your duty to Starfleet or the safety of your symbiont?”

Moll shook her head, unable to answer either way. “All I know is that I have to stay true to myself.”

The cross‑questioning continued for another hour, until the merciless voice relented and dismissed the Symbiosis Commission until the next day, when additional witnesses would be called. Moll had seen the list of Starfleet officials, exobiologists, and even more Trill psychologists and medical specialists. Everything she had ever done or thought would be questioned.

Already, under the expert grilling she felt as if she was being pounded while trying to maintain that she had done the only thing her conscience would allow her to do. But they had found out plenty about her, things she had tried to hide for years–her frustration at being a first host, her longing to be something other than herself, to belong to something.