Captain's Log, Stardate 68132.5

Posted on Fri Nov 28th, 2014 @ 2:52pm by Captain Tim Williams

Captain's Log, Stardate 68132.5.

We began construction of the colony site on Dreyas Four two days ago, after our initial survey found no issues with with the primary site indicated by the reports of our science department.

Progress had been going well until this morning. At around eight-fourty-five hours standard shipboard time, a badly wounded colonist stumbled out of the woodland and into the edge of the allocated site, and died from their injuries. At around oh-nine-hundred, a second body was discovered by Lieutenant McIntyre in the woodland.

Both of the bodies showed signs of being attacked by some sort of creature with large claws. The second body had also had its arm removed by the creature's teeth. As troubling as such an attack would be on any number of planets around the Federation, it is all the more worrisome here; the terraforming matrix of Dreyas Four did not provision for any form of animal life at all; any such organisms were to be transplanted by the Highlander upon arrival, and none of those specimens were predators of the size necessary for this attack to have taken place.

I have ordered all colonists and non-essential personnel to be immediately recalled to the ship, and a stop to all construction on the surface. Lieutenant McIntyre has beamed down additional security personnel to secure the perimeter of the site, and we have put extra protocols in place to ensure that no officer can be attacked by the creature without being in visible range of backup.

To add to our problems, I have just spoken with Doctor Talm, who was conducting the autopsy of both victims. He has informed me that the DNA left behind by the creature does not match any known profiles we have in the database. It has elements of DNA from multiple species, as well as a number of unknown strands, and all are combined in a way which suggests it was done artificially; either by the effects of the terraforming process or by some other means. I have uploaded the doctor's findings to this log entry.

I cannot in good conscience allow the settling of the colonists to continue with this creature in the vicinity. It may be possible to relocate them to another landmass, but before we can do that, we need to find out more about these creatures, and just how many of them there are; and critically, how they came to be.

End Log.