Part of the Star Trek Season Four project by Arcas, Drell-7, Ptrope, Wmwconnors, and Celticarchie.
“Son of Mudd”

Captain’s Log, Stardate 5664.23: The Enterprise is hours away from arrival at the colony world of Rupak’Nok, where we are to deliver needed supplies and personnel. Among the sentients being transferred are the members of the Grand Pollux Amalgamated Aroma Choir… or as some of my crew have come to call them behind closed doors: “the Stink Bugs”. The choir’s constant need for practice has created tension, straining the ship’s air purifiers and causing some crewmen to walk about the halls wearing their emergency breathing masks. This has led to some diplomatic challenges for me and the senior officers, so I’m pleased that we’ll soon be unloading our… “fragrant passengers”.

TEASER
As the Enterprise approaches the Rupak'Nok system, Lt. Uhura reports a powerful, tight beam subspace signal being directed at the Enterprise. Moments later the bridge lights flash to emergency lights, then back. Sulu suddenly reports that he’s lost helm control. Mr. Scott is unable to shut down the warp drive as the emergency interlocks have somehow been disabled. The Enterprise wildly veers from its course – at first in a jerking, random pattern, then coming about on a solid heading straight for a nearby F-class star. The ship plunges on a collision course with the star, the crew is unable to stop it.

EPISODE ACTS 1-3
The Enterprise continues to plunge towards the star. Kirk considers a saucer separation. Done at warp speeds, a saucer separation is incredibly risky, but they quickly discover the saucer-sep controls are locked out. They plunge towards the star, the shields straining to keep out the excess heat. At the last few seconds the ship alters course slightly, sending it streaking through the star’s corona and back out into space.

As the bridge crew wipes the sweat from their brows, the main viewer springs to life. A face slowly forms from the clouds of digital noise. A face too familiar. The visage of Harry Mudd bellows, “Wow! That was amazing! Shall we do it again, Kirk?”

Once the stunned, sweat-stained Kirk recovers, he demands the Mudd image for answers. He gets them… partly. And they aren’t what he wants to hear. Mudd tells the crew that he has taken over the main computer. For all intents and purposes he IS the Enterprise, and the ship has a new mission: the return to the android planet where the corporeal Mudd is stranded and use the power of this starship to free him.

As if that weren’t problem enough, Uhura starts getting reports from the crew decks saying that the unnerved “stink bugs” smell even worse when worrying than they do when they “sing”! The crew is struggling to go about the decks without retching.

The senior officers meet to discuss the situation. Spock and Uhura think they understand what happened. Apparently Mudd’s personality has been digitized and beamed as a subspace signal with an aggressively virulent header code. The header enabled the signal to break through the Enterprises security systems and open a “door” to the main computer, allowing the Mudd code to walk in and take over.
Kirk confronts Mudd with this theory, and the Mudd code reluctantly confirms their scenario. He fills in the blanks telling them about how he tricked the androids into creating the digital personality and sophisticated viral header by claiming that he wanted to explore options for becoming an android himself. He was able to launch the signal to a Federation relay station where it’s bounced about for many months trying to catch up with the Enterprise and unleash its mutinous payload.

Kirk and crew come up with the idea of trying to weaken the Mudd code by playing to Mudd’s vanity. They ask what will become of the Mudd code once the real Mudd is rescued, trying to weaken his resolve. Though the effort has made the Mudd code more paranoid, this effort does not succeed in having him surrender the ship.

Finally the ship arrives at the android planet, only to discover that the real Mudd had escaped many months earlier. The Mudd code had fulfilled its mission… for nothing. It decides that its new mission is to track down Harry Mudd and find a way to overwrite his personality with that of his digital would-be savior. To become Harry Mudd the same way it had managed to become the Enterprise.

Mudd’s fury and obsession about his original present an opening Spock and Scotty. They devise a plan to trick the Mudd code into downloading itself into a tracking probe, disguising the fact that he would be downloading his only copy. With the code transfer complete Mudd immediately realizes he’s been trapped, but the probe’s transmission abilities have been disabled in advance.

Mudd is now stuck in a disabled sensory probe, unable to move or transmit. But the Mudd personality is full aware and the probe’s instruments can emulate all human senses and more. Scotty takes that opportunity to load up the olfactory simulators to play the Grand Pollux Amalgamated Aroma Choir’s greatest hits on a repeating loop. They then set course for Starbase 16 where they’ll drop off the Mudd probe and let Starfleet figure out what to do with it.

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Model by Graywolf-Starkiller based on a design by DEG. Background stars by FrostBo. DAZ Studio 3 render.

For other entries in this Season Four series, see: