The Forsaken
Posted on Sat Jul 20th, 2024 @ 11:32pm by Commodore Wilkan Targaryen & Lieutenant Commander Ash Randall & Lieutenant Chase Moore & Lieutenant Stacey Moore & Lieutenant Alexia Toryn & Commander Zhora zh'Roothi
2,660 words; about a 13 minute read
Mission:
Pilot
Location: Bridge, USS Enterprise
Timeline: 2439-03-09, 05:15
Captain's Log, Stardate 116184.2:
After several hours of travel at high warp, Enterprise is about to arrive at the Sisko-Dax 1171 system.
Exiting the turbolift after a brief trip to his quarters, Captain Wilkan Targaryen returned to the Bridge of the Enterprise struggling to stifle a yawn. He had gotten very little sleep during their mission so far and he had a feeling that sleep would elude his entire senior staff so long as they were in the Gamma Quadrant on assignment. No sooner did he arrive in his quarters that Commodore Veegg contacted him for an update as the mystery of the Dominion vessel was consuming them, and Starfleet Command was very curious about what would come of their investigation. When Wilkan shared that they had very little information at this point the Commodore was especially perturbed.
All the Captain of the Enterprise could do though was wonder if he was like Veegg before accepting grade reduction to Captain to command the Enterprise. He hoped that he hadn't been. Veegg, however, probably didn't see it that way. History did have a way of repeating itself and this could be the universe's form of a joke.
So far it wasn't very funny.
Approaching the center seat, the Captain asked, "Status?"
Lt. Randall looked up at Captain Targeryen, from the center seat as he asked for status. "We've reached Sisko-Dax 1171, Captain. All systems nominal. No contacts, so far, though there is just the barest, hint of a whisper, there may be evidence of an ion trail in the vicinity of the brown dwarf." The Chief Engineer responded, while vacating the center seat to take over Engineering I.
Lex set at Science 3 and there was a reason she chose this console, she was in eye-sight of the Captain should he have any questions. Also it was something similar to Federation history. Spock's science station on the Enterprise was close to the captain, she wanted to give the Captain as much sight of her as possible. She put her coffee down and began to scan the area. "Nothing in the system, or nothing that is not hidden, Captain."
"I have a feeling that could change quickly, or we're on a galactic snipe hunt," Wilkan joked as he took the center chair. "Let's make this good though. As far as the Dominion are to think we're on an exploration mission, so let's make it look like one. Take us out of warp. Begin planetary survey, active scans are approved. Let's see what we can see."
Lt. Randall monitored their transition to normal space from Engineering Workstation One and set the warp drive on 'hot stand by' for a quick exit if it should be required. "Warp at stand by, Captain." The Chief Engineer announced. "Given the duration of our transit to Sisko-Dax 1171, active scans on our part and the 'assertive' nature of the Dominion, I think we should expect contact within a few hours, if not sooner." Ash advised, quietly.
"A prudent idea, Chief," the Captain confirmed as he looked at the Enterprise's Chief Engineer. Turning his chair back toward the Science Officer, "Lay in a search grid that looks like a standard planetary survey, Lieutenant. Coordinate with the Helm to make it look as good as possible."
"Helm, Follow my instructions exactly. It will not be easy to deceive the Dominion, as the Founders are quite intelligent, but even they are prone to ego." Lex noted.
At the Helm, Ensign Taasah nodded in response to the Science Officer and processed the information that was transmitted to the Flight Controls. Loading the navigation point, the Zambean pilot executed the course.
Yawning, the Captain quickly realized that most of the Senior Staff had yet to come up to the Bridge. Tapping a control on his armrest, the Captain opened a channel throughout the ship, "Senior Staff to the Bridge."
The Chief Engineer coordinated with operations adjusting power distribution to accommodate the 'hot' stand-by of warp drive and while also utilizing impulse power. Primary power distribution was, more than, capable of absorbing the additional load but Ash thought it prudent to cycle a portion of the additional plasma through the secondary distribution system and its array of fusion reactors to avoid the appearance of running 'hot' in preparation for a fight-or-flight situation.
Chase was a the security station going through the normal motions as if this was a standard mission with no threat but he was ready on a seconds notice to react.
Behind him the door slide open as Commander zh'Roothi arrived. Glancing around the manned stations and view screen at the star system she crossed toward the central station and Targaryen. "No surprises thankfully I see," she observed.
"Do not get careless. The Vorta are anything but stupid. Likely we have, a dozen, Jem'hadar ships right behind us. Furthermore the Vorta in charge knows we are not on a mere survey mission. We know that they know we are not on a survey, so therefore we have to behave like we're on mere survey mission. Suffice to say, we are in a situation where our ulterior motives are quite transparent." Lex concluded.
Zhora's antennae rotated to show her displeasure of being spoken to like that by Lieutenant Toryn, her body too stiffen momentarily before she willed the moment to pass. This was not the time to place to hold such discussions.
The Captain of the Enterprise glanced at his Andorian Executive Officer before nodding to the Science Officer, "Part of why we need precise timing to make things look as 'real' as possible. Chase, keep scanning for any potential threats to the Enterprise while we're on this 'survey mission.' Report anything to myself and the XO immediately."
Retreating to the missions operations station on the port bulkhead Zhora begun reviewing the data already collected on the search grid.
"Any ideas on whether the Dominion were looking for anything out here or not yet?" Wilkan questioned as he looked at the LCARS display next to his command chair. On the panel the map of the system was displayed, identifying each of the planets and the stars. "I don't want to be out here any longer than we have to be."
"If the Dominion's looking for something, they will find it. This is their backyard." Lex noted.
"Ash," Targaryen called out to his Chief Engineer, "See if you can figure out a means of limiting our sensor profile while we're out here. I know that we're not exactly a small vessel, but see what you can do."
"This is a noisy neighborhood, Captain. I'll see what I can do to tune our navigational shields, active sensor arrays and impulse drive to disappear into the noise." Ash replied, quietly and looked to their Chief Science Officer. "Lieutenant Toryn, any modulations I implement for the sensor arrays will require a, short, recalibration of sensors and may lessen their range and sensitivity." The Chief Engineer advised.
"Marvelous. This reminds me of history lessons how American Submarines used to shadow Soviet Missile Submarines during Earth's twentieth century cold war. I'll try to compensate the best I can." Lex mentioned.
Watching the viewscreen, Captain Targaryen hoped that they found whatever it was that the Dominion found of interest before their big brothers decided to make an appearance.
Stacey navigated the ship into position smartly. She had to make a couple minor course corrections to avoid small space debris. For some reason the navigational deflector array wasn't able to adjust for all small debris. If you wondered if it has something to do with the item they were searching for. "So far I'm adjusting of course, the main deflector I believe is over taxed."
Wilkan looked at the navigation map on his keypad, carefully studying the information that was displayed on the screen. If they lost shields the Enterprise would most likely eventually lose structural integrity too. The scary part was the Enterprise had the most advanced shields in Starfleet.
"Alter course," Wilkan ordered, "take us closer to the gas giant and put us into orbit over their magnetic pole. It'll help us to be better hidden. Lieutenant, see what you can do to strengthen our shields in the meantime. If the Dominion shows we'll need them. Ash, look into these shield issues too. I want you and Lieutenant Moore to figure this one out."
Ash took a, cursory, look at the navigational shield load on the main deflector while she made some additional adjustments to impulse to reduce their sensor profile another 5% and then focused her full attention on the deflector readings. "There is an abundance of He3 to go with the, overabundance, of H2 in the vicinity we are in. The forward navigational field is pushing this combined cloud of He3 and H2 in front of us like a snow plow that doesn't shed snow to the side. The 'weight' of the snow pile is stressing the plow blade, so to speak." The chief Engineer stated, quietly.
“Yes Captain.” Chase replied as he turned to Ash. “Let’s figure this out.”
"XO," Targaryen turned toward the Mission Ops Console, "Move to one of the Science Stations and work with Lieutenant Toryn on scanning this system. I want a search grid executed before the Dominion finds us."
"Yes," the Andorian woman nodded crisply agreeing with his desire to complete the search before company arrived.
"Captain... Something there near the brown dwarf." Lex noted. "Something is causing a magnetic shift in the polar cyclone's rotation. I do not think it is natural, and it could only happen if someone was generating a sufficiently powerful navigational deflector field nearby the storm. I think someone is hiding in the poles." Lex looked at the brown dwarf's cyclone rotations, essentially it was a larger gas giant, but there was a lot happening in the atmosphere of these failed stars, or perhaps 'failed star' wasn't an accurate term, if the brown dwarf absorbed enough hydrogen, or other gasses, it could start a nuclear reaction and collapse into a star."
"For what purpose?" Zhora asked Lex as they studied the dwarf in more detail.
Wilkan himself was curious about that too. The brown dwarf was one of the most dangerous things that could be encountered, and their sensors had barely been able to penetrate the atmosphere to give any reliable information to help them form a plan. If someone was willing to travel into that maelstrom there would have to be something down there that was truly valuable to them. They were either very brave for going after it, or very foolish. Either way, the chances were high that they were in trouble. Even more likely the Dominion would be coming to find out about it too.
"Options?"
"Shields can be hardened to endure the abuse of the environment though we'll be blind, deaf and dumb within moments of entering. We won't be able to see out and we'll be able to see, damned, little around us, inside, unless we're on top of it." Ash observed, in a, somewhat, clinical tone.
"And why would we do that, Lieutenant? We're on a survey mission. That's according to the Vorta on the possible, and very cloaked ship behind us that is pondering why we are meddling in the Dominions affairs." Lex mentioned. "We could be leading that ship to someone that does not want to be found, and if they don't want to be found by the Dominion, I can hypothesize they will not trust us. Also, I might want to become the Devil's Advocate here. We do not want an incident that can be assumed as an act of war. So, the hypothesis is, someone is hiding. How does one contact one that is hiding without blowing their cover?"
Lt. Randall flicked her ears in response to Lt. Toryn and continued her work without further comment.
The Captain answered, "So, let's go through this with what we do know. We've seen that our sensors are unable to penetrate the atmosphere for us to confirm if there is a vessel and it's likely that a probe would be destroyed before it could transmit back any information of value." Wilkan paused a moment and looked around, "Starfleet sends away teams on assignments all the time. We could outfit a shuttle, send it down there, and move the Enterprise off to look like it's still performing a routine survey. Do you all think this could work?"
"Allow me to lead the shuttlecraft team, it makes the most sense that I would want to study this brown dwarf while the Enterprise moves on to the rest of this system." Lex noted.
Wilkan looked at the Science Officer, "I appreciate the initiative, Lieutenant, and I will assign you to the Away Team; however, Exec?" He turned toward the Andorian First Officer, "I'd like for you to lead this shuttle mission. Take a small team, four only, and I'll arrange a shuttle pilot for you."
zh'Roothi straightened at the order. It was the first chance he'd offered her something to prove her worth. "Yes sir," she stood. "Randall, Toryn, Chase, Ghul report to the shuttle bay."
“Yes sir.” Chase left his station and headed on his way. He was excited to be on the team.
Stacey just smiled, she tried to be happy for them. But it was kind of discouraging that she wasn't chosen for the team. But she also knew there would be times where she would not be chosen. For the moment she needed to focus on her duties, and she know there would always be another mission down the road, where she could be on the away team.
Ash acknowledged the order from zh'Roothi as she completed a, slight, adjustment to the navigational, shield array so it would shed the 'load' it was pushing and left her work station. "I'll see to the shuttle configuration." The small felinoid advised as she was exiting the bridge.
"While you're down there we're going to proceed to one of the moons to make it look like we're on a routine survey. Communications may be choppy, but we'll drop a Class 6 Probe in orbit that you can use to try to reach us in an emergency. Hopefully, if the Dominion comes along, they'll think it's just a survey satellite."
"A wise idea," The Andorian nodded. "Hopefully it won't be necessary, we're be careful and keep our eyes open."
The Captain had given a lot of inspirational speeches over his career, but this time he didn't think one was warranted. He simply answered, "Good hunting."
The XO nodded again before departing the bridge with the remainder of the party to prep the shuttle for the bumpy ride ahead.
Chase walked into the shuttle at, his gear in hand. He was ready for the mission and waited for the others to arrive.
Lt. Randall looked to Chase as he entered the shuttle and finished the integration of the turtle module, Galileo package and a 'Bam-Bam' unit into the configuration of the shuttle. "That brown dwarf isn't far from collapsing under its own mass." She mused, quietly, with a little sigh. "Hopefully, it'll do so after we've done our thing." She added.
"In the mean time we'll continue on as usual and make this look like a boring survey. Set course for the nearest moon, one quarter impulse." Wilkan ordered as he retook his chair, typing a request to the various departments for replacement officers to come in for those on the away mission.
"Aye captain, altering course for the moon." Moore said as she started plotting the navigation course to other station. She wished she was going on the mission, but for the time being she would stay on the ship. There would always be another mission, where she'd be able to go.
The Captain nodded in response, "Thank you. I'll be in Sickbay meeting with the Chief Medical Officer. You have the Bridge."
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