Distorted distress call lures the USS Thor deeper into Gamma Quadrant

NEBULA BOUNDARY, GAMMA QUADRANT — After answering a cry for help, the USS Thor (NCC-82607) has found itself embroiled in a deep-space rescue with a previously undiscovered, technologically advanced species known as the Zet.
This highly unusual species developed within the dense layers of an energetic nebula, effectively isolating their system of planets from the larger galaxy until now. Their vessel, the ‘Endless Golden Penetrator,’ found itself trapped within the nebula’s edge as it tried and failed to explore beyond known Zet space.
Fortunately for the Zet, the USS Thor was completing a relief operation in the nearby New Bajor system and quickly responded. Over four kilometres long, covered in statues and decorated in what some described as ‘grotesque excess,’ the Penetrator has made quite the impression on the Thor’s crew.
Newly posted Intelligence officer Ensign Saja Jehe, one of the first to beam aboard, had this to say about the Penetrator.
“The ship was something to admire, in some ways.” Jehe continued, diplomatically. “There was a room in which it seemed like they made the entire wall of nothing but faces. Eerie, to be sure, but there was a certain beauty to it that had nothing to do with function. The longer we were among the Zet, the more of it we saw. They have great artisans among their people, though as a whole, they seemed to value the letter of a contract more than the art they created.”
Reports of the highly mercantile and litigious nature of the Zet has been a popular topic of discussion among the Thor’s crew, who had several days to get to know those they’d rescued on the brief journey back to the Zet homeworld. Shipboard security made special arrangements after several incidents involving the Zet, and Ensign Dar Elandra has been heading up those efforts.
“The Zet are an interesting race, but they function by a different standard of morality,” said Dar regarding security arrangements aboard the ship and for the away teams while observing this different standard. “It makes it difficult for us to predict or maintain a close security check on them.”
With everyone aboard the Thor excited by the prospect of this incipient First Contact, early dialogue between delegations from the Thor and representatives of the ‘Saldanian Corporate Hegemony,’ in the person of President Pitorian Tolo’Sal’Lat’Ut’Kel’Tras Anroc, has been contentious.
Rumours of wide-scale sentient forced labour practices & predatory commercial exploitation have been persistent since the Thor arrived in orbit, but the Saldanian Corporate Hegemony has not yet released an official statement.
 
Written by Geoffrey Teller