Spock... "Captain! We've got a distress signal coming from a small planet in the Rockford Nebula."
Captain..."Scotty, establish standard orbit at the coordinates shown above and prepare the shuttle for a rescue...too much sub space interference to beam down."
Soon, your team arrives at the mysterious location. Looks like some kind of memorial.
Scotty..."Sir, the radiation from that signal is putting a big strain on the dilithium crystals on the ship...we better hurry."
Spock..."Captain! Look at all these big rocks! There are _______ of them here. That has to mean something. And Captain, they are pure neutronium. That explains all the sub space interference in this sector."
Bones..."Captain...the position of these stones is peculiar. The arrangement and the fact that they are partially covered with brush indicates that whoever lived here must have been marooned for 23 years. I think they were searching for something....but I guess they just ran out of energy before they found it."
Spock..."Captain...I'm getting a strong signal from that structure over there. I think that it is the source of the distress signal."
Captain..."Lets check it out....phasers on stun....blend in, try to look..... casual!!"
Spock... "Captain....sensors indicate that a frustrated geotrekker set up the signal. Whatever he was looking for, he couldn't find it so he embedded a signal device in the structure to lure other geotrekkers to the area."
Bones..."What is this thing anyway?"
Spock..."If my memory serves me correctly, it is a 2004 model Geosynchromatic calculator, cleverly disguised."
Scotty..."Look at this piece of junk! I've only read about these in history books...never thought I'd actually see one! I wonder if it still works?"
Spock... "Lets see....I will dial in the numbers for this quadrant and sector on this old radial calculator, allowing for gravitatiional deviation from Alpha Quagmire. Scottie, you go up around back and write down the correct data that appears on the back side."
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SUM >>>
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Scotty..."Ok, Spock, I've got the numbers and I wrote them down from left to right and added them up. This is really crude!!"
Bones..."What are we in, the dark ages. The Klingons could be closing in on us and you guys are playing around with ancient toys."
Chekov..."Capteen....look at thees. I thenk its an alpha dinometer. They used it to monitor de life forms on de planet. If we write down all de letters on each roller in three columns we can determine how many life forms there are left on this planet. There are 4 letters per roller and it reads only from left to right"
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Total number of Life Forms Left >>>
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Bones..."What! We could be in grave danger from the radiation here and you are studying zoology on a alpha abacus! Lets get out of here before someone sees us."
Captain..."Spock! Look at this. If you stand on the first rung of this old chain ladder, to the right there is a structure that looks like a barred window. It has got to be positioned like that for some reason. I think whoever set this up was trying to tell us something. Look how it is constructed. There are _____ horizontal holotubes, one of them has vertical anti gravity compensators rising from it. Punch that number into your tri-corder."
Spock... "Captain, I believe all this is beginning to make sense to me now. All the sectors in this quadrant look the same except for the last 3 digits of each coordinate. If you divide the answer from the Geosynchromatic calculator by the number of holotubes and add to it the number of lifeforms you get a coordinate that seems logical."
Bones... "Right! And my grandmother aced calculus too!"
Spock..."Doing the math...hmmm....I come up with N45.47.______ for the first coordinate."
Captain..."Very good Spock...but what about the other coordinate...without that we are still lost."
Spock..."Logic tells me that the other coordinate can be obtained in similiar fashion. Look at the top number on the back side of Geosynchromatic calculator. Subtract from it the number of Neutronium Rocks and the number of life forms. This gives us W122.33.______."
Bones... "Well thank lucky stars and pointed ears....punch it in and lets get out of here. This place gives me the willies."
Spock..."If I am correct, it should take us to the beginning of an ion trail that will lead us to another clue. It could be just a number on a shiny disc, sort of a microbeacon."
Chekov..."How can you know all dees fur sure, Spock?"
Spock..."Simple logic, Chekov. I entered the coordinates into my Tri-corder and immediately got a weak signal from the microbeacon. If logic serves me right, it should be located precisely 170 Nikemarks from the origin of the ion trail."
Captain..."What are we waiting for, lets get going!!"
Scotty..."Captain! Sensors indicate that the dilithium crystals on the ship are deteriorating rapidly due to the strange signal from this contraption. This thing we are looking for better have some crystals in it or we are doomed."
The shuttle bearing the team arrives at the designated coordinates and they begin their trek down the ion trail toward a stand of cedars. After pacing the 170 nikemarks they arrive at an area of increased radiation.
Chekov..."You were right Meester Spock, the increased radiation siems to be coming from dee treees near dee trail. And theese ion trail was obwiously made by an alien wessel mene years ago.
Soon, they find the shiny microbeacon attached to an alien lifeform.
Spock... "Hmmmm? Only a number. I think this is the number of nikemarks that it is to the crystals.....but which way do we go?"
Bones..."No! You'll never find it with logic Spock. I feel like we have to add to this number, the number of years that the other crew was marooned. Its the human thing to do."
Captain..."OK...lets try all three directions. Bones, you go south _____ nikemarks. Chekov, you go west. Spock and I will go North. Stay on the trail and count your nikemarks from where we found the beacon. We are looking for a small cylinder about 3" long constructed of pure bisonium. Subtracting the number of holotubes from the number of neutronium rocks, it should be about ____ nikemarks from where you end up....it could be anywhere. Stay sharp. Watch for aliens! If you find the container, stay quiet and signal the others cautiously. You may need a Bisonium Extractor to retrieve the container. One of McCoy's old fashioned paperclips will do. We'll meet up at a location away from the hiding spot to open it. When we are done, we will replace it carefully so that THE NEXT GENERATION can find it."
Does the crew find the cylinder with the crystals in time to save the ship??? There is only one way to find out.