Lost and Found
My next stop was the security/control room for the station's docking ring. Normally, only half of the stations in this room were manned, but today almost every seat was occupied.
“Storvik!” called out a technician known as ‘Lasso’ John (for reasons which I had never determined). “Have you come to help? We're pretty bogged down here retrofitting the station defense subroutines. I don't know what Maddie is expecting to happen, but she wants it done yesterday.”
“Yesterday?” I raised an eyebrow. “Ah yes, a figure of speech meaning ‘as soon as possible, if not sooner.’” I chose not to ask questions about the security upgrades, to allow them to assume that I was on official business and know what was happening; but it made me wonder whether the crossovers' arrival was expected … or was there something else due to happen, for which these precautions were deemed necessary? “I am actually investigating recent arrivals to the station-”
Lasso John tossed me a PADD. “We've done full sweeps of all the ships' identities, arrivals, points of origin, and so forth,” he shouted over the many other conversations and sounds in the crowded room (forgetting about my Vulcan hearing), “And we haven't found anything suspicious about any of 'em yet.”
I scanned over the listings. It seemed as thorough as any search that I would have done, and covered all of the ships currently docked to the station (with another tab for all of the recent departures). I did not see any that were flagged as suspicious, nor did any raise my suspicions - all of the vessels were known quantities, either regular transports from the surface of Bajor or starships which had been here before.
All of the ships currently docked to the station … Or at least, all of the ships that they knew of. I quickly broadcast a copy of the file to the PADD on my belt before returning John's PADD. “I am actually performing a separate security check,” I explained to John, “but perhaps I shall be able to return and assist you here after my task is completed.”
“We'd really appreciate it,” he replied, before climbing back under a workstation.
I found a terminal in the corner which was currently unused, and accessed the external sensors. From what I could see, the security team was currently relying entirely upon the data in the computers, under the assumption that the computer records were complete and correct. I did a visual survey of Terok Nor's docking pylons, and compared what I saw to what the computer was telling me.
I found an anomaly - a small, runabout-sized vessel docked at a disused maintenance port on the outer surface of the upper arm of the second pylon. It was not listed in the computer.