Ahote Personal Log Stardate 3703.11
PERSONAL LOG
QALATAQA AHOTE
STARDATE 3703.11
I was nearly killed today. While escorting some scientists surveying the planet Nightmare, our shuttle went down. One of the scientists went missing, so the new guy and I went out to find him. While outside, our vacc suits were damaged by Nightmare’s acid rain. Then I got myself impaled by a vicious killer vine.
Luckily the new guy is no washout. His name is Benedict Hruska and he’s a Starfleet baby, Mom and Dad in the diplomatic corps. He’s slight and a little high-strung but proved himself more than capable in the field. I’ve recommended to Cmdr Scott that Hruska be given a commendation. It seems the honorable thing to do when someone saves your life.
There’s not much for me to say about this most recent away mission. I spent at least half of it either unconscious (vacc suit malfunction) or near death (from the killer plants). Maybe I was distracted by the death of Atmosk. I’m still unsure how to handle it. Duty compels me to stay aboard the Merlin and continue my service – and of course that’s what I will do. But a part of me wants to get away from Starfleet for a while, a long while maybe.
We’ll arrive at Aurora in a few weeks. After that, I may feel differently about the service. So far all this planet-hopping from human colony to human colony has been less than inspiring. All I’ve really seen for the most part is the underside of human behavior, the strong dominating the weak. In the colonies it’s often like the last 400 years of history never happened. The recent events on Carstairs reminded me of a 20th-century Western movie; the criminal syndicates and smugglers resemble the very social problems of that era. I never thought that 20th-century history class I took at the Academy would come in handy, but it has given me a solid frame of reference.
I think once we’re transferred to Aurora and begin to explore unknown, uninhabited (by humans) worlds things may pick up for us. Then again, I hear things are getting tense near the Klingon and Kzinti borders – perhaps after a few more months of service I can get transferred there and see a little action.