No Idea If They Have A Plan

Posted on Sun Mar 22nd, 2020 @ 12:26am by Admiral Paka Larem & Captain Solin Edral & Lieutenant Abby Mullins & Lieutenant T'Nara & Commander Kreitenne R'tanya & Lieutenant Colonel William Christensen-Wright SFMC & Lieutenant Commander Trovic Anon & Lieutenant Daniel Ryci

2,545 words; about a 13 minute read

Mission: [OS] A New Dawn
Location: Ourea Station; Conference Room; Deck 2
Timeline: MD02 || 0825

"You will have operational control of the task group. Good luck Captain Avant, though I sincerely hope you don't need it."

"Thank you Admiral, Makarov out."

Admiral Paka Larem stood up and gestured to Captain Edral to remain seated. "It's your station, Captain, your briefing. You have everything you need. Pequod might be area coordinator, but that's only until the station is completed. I'll be back on the colony within the hour, spending such fun times with the Governor."

"I'm so jealous of you, Paka. I really wish we could trade places." A smile flashed over both of their faces.

"You know, I'm the Admiral, I could make that happen. But then I would be charged with a war crime or something." He let out a healthy guffaw.

"Will you be back on the station tomorrow?" Captain Edral asked.

"No, I'm heading out to SH-Two-Two. I'll be back by the end of the week. Until then, Captain." He nodded, as Edral stood up to attention, and nodded in return.

He studied his PADD for a few more minutes and then tapped his combadge. "Edral to senior staff, please report to the conference room on Deck 2. Edral out." Now he waited while the staff appeared.

Lieutenant Colonel Christensen-Wright was the first to arrive, striding into the room a few minutes later with a PADD in hand. He'd been on duty in Ops when the Captain's summons came. "Good morning, sir," William said, adding a nod. The Marine selected a seat a few down from the Captain, who sat at the head of the table and review the data on his PADD.

The station's Executive Officer, Commander Kreitenne R'tanya, was the next to arrive. She had remained on the planet below until halfway through the graveyard shift in order to finish setting up the several dozen forcefield generators around the colony. She'd only slept for a couple of hours, and whenever this threat had subsided, she could catch up on her own sleep. "Captain." She glanced at the Marine, barely recalling his sudden reassignment. Kreitenne approached him and extended a hand, "Colonel," she greeted. "Commander Kreitenne R'tanya, station XO."

The Marine stood and immediately their difference in height was apparent. He topped out at 6'2" while the XO couldn't have been much taller than 5'5", 5'6 at a push. She came up as far as his chin. William grasped the offered hand firmly. "Good to meet you," he gave a curt nod, "Lieutenant Colonel William Christensen-Wright, Stat Ops."

Kreitenne wasn't prepared for the Marine to clearly share his height, though she supposed she should have expected. "Welcome aboard, Colonel," she said, shaking his head. "Though, as I understand it, the circumstances for your reassignment could have been better. If you or your department need anything, be sure to let me know."

Will nodded curtly again. "I appreciate that." He sat back down as the XO moved on and returned to the data on his PADD.

Lt.Cdr. Trovic had quickly gathered up the stack of PADs to hand out after the briefing. Entering the conference room, Trovic set the stack down a bit haphazardly on a table, but quickly restacked them nicely. With construction still ongoing, there was so much to coordinate. He nodded his head politely to the others in the room before sitting down.

"Keeping busy today, Commander?" Kreitenne asked the newly arrived Chief of Operations.

Trovic looked up slightly nervous and replied, "Yes Commander". He tried to smile and look more professional for the XO, but so many upcoming tasks had overwhelmed him just a bit. Placing his hand on the stack of PADs, "I have all the revised construction and production details to pass out, following this meeting." Trovic swallowed hard then added, "It has been a bit difficult for the teams with the changing priorities... but they are dealing with it and meeting the expected timelines."

"Hopefully this meeting doesn't force you to revise them again," Kreitenne observed. Yesterday had changed the name of the game enough. Hopefully, the Captain wouldn't be delivering any more bad news.

"That would definitely be my hope as well," Anon reciprocated.

Daniel had a padd in hand ready for the staff meeting when he entered the conference room on deck 2. He said, "Good morning Captain".

Solin nodded to the officer, as he looked around at the assembled staff. Lieutenants T'Nara and Mullins entered last, taking seats at the opposite end of the table. They weren't technically senior officers, but with the heads of Medical and Engineering still not assigned, they were the highest-ranking officers in their departments.

"Thanks for coming everyone." Though they had no choice in the matter, he still felt it polite to thank them. "Firstly, I want to thank Lieutenant T'Nara and Lieutenant Mullins for keeping their respective departments operational." T'Nara merely nodded as thanks, while Mullins smiled and said thank you. "Engineering especially is having a hard time, with so many areas of the station still incomplete, but we are going to rotate extra engineers in from various ships in the task group, so you won't be shorthanded. They will answer to you. As of now, you are in charge of the construction effort."

Looking around the room, there was a sense of uncertainty in the room. Which was hardly surprising considering what exactly had happened. "Now that the fun stuff is out of the way, on to business. At zero-eight-thirty yesterday, a subspace rift opened just on the aperture of the gateway. Following the opening, several ships emerged, which were identified as Vaadwaur. They proceeded to direct a resonance field toward the gateway aperture which has, we believe temporarily at least, rendered the gateway inoperable." He paused to allow that to sink in for a few seconds.

Krietenne didn't display any surprise, after all, she'd already been aware of that fact. Ever since the incident had occurred, she'd been actively preparing for the inevitable, which didn't seem to be coming. What she didn't know, however, was what they could expect next.

The Marine Colonel also remained impassive. Having already studied the reports, this wasn't news to him.

"This means we no longer have access to the gateway and communications with Command are now impossible. A subspace signal using our current technology would take about 20 months to get there, and it would have degraded to nothingness within 3 months. This leaves us with only one option. The Vesta class ships. Using their QSD's a trip back to the Alpha quadrant would take around fifty days one way, which for the time being is the only way to get either equipment, personnel or communicate with Command." The Captain said with a hint of frustration in his voice.

Kreitenne frowned. As station XO, she'd become rather familiar with the limited assets they had in the Delta Quadrant. Such knowledge was supposed to be a benefit, but in this case, it was now a burden. "But there's only four Vestas out here," she countered. "The Admiral can't possibly have them on ferry duty for the unforeseeable future. We need someone around to provide a first response should situations go south out here."

"I agree with the XO. We can't relegate all of our Vesta-class ships to ferry duty for god knows how long." Colonel Christensen-Wright concurred before continuing with a question of his own. "What about the hyper-subspace technology used to keep in touch with Voyager when she was out here? I understand it has limitations, but it would allow us to keep in touch with Command without the need to dispatch one of the Vesta's for two months."

Captain Edral took on board what was said. "The hyper-subspace technology doesn't work this far out. We would need to be about 20,000 lightyears closer, and even then it still suffers from signal degradation. As for us only having four Vesta class ships, we wouldn't utilise all four. At any given time, there would be one ship in transit either to or from the quadrant. They will be rotated, so it isn't the same ships making the journeys, so there would always be at a minimum two in range for first response, but most likely three."

Lt.Cdr. Trovic had not replied or commented, but was very concerned, rubbing his chin in thought. His speciality wasn't in communications, but he knew he could do some research that might provide a better choice. With all the necessary construction taking place, having the supply-line cut this way could certainly place them at a disadvantage.

"How soon will the first Vesta be dispatched?" Kreitenne asked, then inhaled from her breathing apparatus. "And what of the Vaadwaur?"

"Not till the end of the week, in case we need to evacuate SH-twenty two. The Vaadwaur haven't made any other appearances but there were some ships picked up on extreme long-range sensors outside of SH-twenty two, which is why we won't be sending the Maggiore yet. We don't know if they are planning something, but they went to a lot of effort to shut us off, so I don't see them packing up and going home now."

William wasn't convinced that the Vaadwaur's actions thus far were part of a long term plan and he put voice to that thought. "Are we sure that this is part of a wider plan?" He asked, leaning forward. "When they collapsed the gateway and destroyed our Starbase, they said that we were encroaching on their territory. In the short term, they may leave us alone as long as we steer clear of their territory. That said, it would be madness for us not to be prepared for further attacks in the coming days and weeks."

"I couldn't agree more," Krietenne said to the Colonel. "Our position is vulnerable, and it will become more vulnerable as time goes on. With no regular access to the Alpha Quadrant and the many assets we have out here, our resources will stretch thin very quickly."

The Captain thought for a few seconds before speaking. His officers made very good points. "Honestly we have no idea if they have a plan, or if they just wanted to cut us off. But yes, we will be stretched thin, if they decide for us to be. That's why if we have to pull everything back, we need to keep both the colony and SH-Twenty-Two secure. With Twenty-Two, there are enough resources on the moons and the planets to keep us running for decades. The planets in the Ourea system have some resources, but not in the quantities of those in Twenty-Two. Either way, the Admiral has ordered us to fortify both locations and ensure the station is as operational as we can make it. Defensive systems obviously take priority." Even if they were overwhelmed, Starfleet wasn't going down without putting up the best defence they could. They had to hold out long enough to attempt to evacuate at least some of the population on the colony below.

Krietenne nodded. "So, basically, we're to maintain our status and continue focus on construction." She looked over to Commander Trovic. "I know you brought up the most up-to-date construction schedules. How quickly can we pivot the engineering details to focus on our phasers, shields, and other defensive systems?

Trovic had also been considering this very situation and had been looking at his Pad, listing the schedules. Without looking up, the Commander reported, "We will need to finish what has been started, but other than repair work," the Operations Officer looked at his superiors and further stated, "We can shift construction to new priorities within two days. Part of this even today."

"From the reports I have read, phaser arrays five, six, thirteen, fourteen and seventeen to twenty are all non-operational. As are torpedo launchers nine to twelve. This leaves us a blind spot directly under the station. I can arrange for some starships to maintain a position to cover the spot, but the priority must be to get at least some of the ventral defensive systems operational. Can it be done by the end of the week?" The Captain asked Commander Trovic.

"Yes Captain," Trovic responded promptly, but then explained, "Installation of the ventral defences will begin tomorrow, based on my updated construction listing. I am currently estimating 85% completion of phaser installation by the end of the week." The Commander's eyes shifted about the room to the listeners and added, "but I think we can do better than that."

Kreitenne blinked, surprised at the Chief Engineer. The Vaadwaur had just eliminated their only link to the Alpha Quadrant. Their supply lines had been swiftly interrupted, and they were all lucky that the Vaadwaur weren't knocking down their door. And Commander Trovic wasn't going to get a jump on getting those defensive systems with this looming threat? She wanted to say something, but she instead bit her tongue and looked to her Captain for comment.

"Forgive me, Commander, when I say by the end of the week, I mean sooner than that. Can we please prioritise the defence systems as of now. This isn't something we can just wait until tomorrow to begin."

Anon bit his tongue, thinking 'apparently these guys don't understand installation. Actual work and movement has to take place, not to mention testing before they can be considered complete and reliable.' Trovic replied, "Yes Captain. We will begin today. But, I will be completely honest when I say that these installations can not be rushed past certain points of installation if you want the reliability one expects."

Captain Edral looked to the officer. "I know they can't be rushed, but I am also aware that we are currently under a heightened security status, and are waiting for a potential attack. I know you will need to prep the areas and replicate the materials, but I also know every available officer with relevant training has been reassigned to getting our defensive systems online. This is the top priority."

"Absolutely Sir," Trovic replied confidently. Anon had heard many times before about the adage of being between a rock and a hard place, but this is the first time he felt that he himself was in that situation. Trying to sound as confident as he could, Trovic committed, "We will stay on task. I will press the men to waste no time during the installations, and installation status will be updated every 2 hours." Anon stopped to breathe and look at the many faces looking his direction, he knew they expected more than he was willing to admit or commit to. "If there are no complications, we will have everything ready in the time needed."

"Exactly what I was looking for Commander Trovic." He looked around the table. "Is there anything else that needs my attention?" He asked in his usual approachable manner, a smile passing over his blue face.

Kreitenne didn't have anything to add at this point. The directives to her were pretty clear, especially to make sure all departments had what they needed, not to mention making sure the colony below would be reassured following the events from yesterday.

William remained quiet too. He had nothing new to add at that moment.

"Very well. You have your various orders. Dismissed."

 

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