Star Trek: Starbase 777 - astrometrics-lab

Starbase 777, given it's impressive size, position, and needs, was the proud host of many advanced research facilities. Astrometics laboratory, hub of stellar cartography and all matters related to advanced maths and multidimensional thinking, was one of the many - and usually, no matter which shift was in progress, the vast room was chock full of people working on their computers, building ghostly pale maps of space and guiding imaginary ships and celestial bodies through their predicted courses. Not today, though. Today, a section of this laboratory was reserved for something else. His attempt of clearing his throat echoed in his ears with a subtle metallic note. In hindsight, no one could've guessed that a jumbled file, downloaded hastily from his computer by some Starfleet officer, would've suddenly become such a large point of interest. Karrim, despite being dutifully trained to do exactly that, sure wouldn't - at least, not like this. Not while standing on a Starfleet property, two of his own officers there with him just as a general precaution, Romulan Republic uniforms star contrast against comparatively minimalistic uniforms of their allies. the calming background buzz in his head was the only thing preventing Karrim from fidgeting a little bit, as he kept on waiting for officers to come in and bring the data with them - one that they were now supposed to put on a map, and see what would happen...

13

Having expected today's shift to go normally, it was in fact going quite abnormally as part of the Astromatics Lab had been taken for for a rather specific project. Sat at a console like every other day of the week, the Vulcan Expeditionary Group exchange officer, wearing its uniform instead of Starfleet's, waited patiently for the data to be provided so he had something to work with, contemplating how easy it would be to work with said data, or if there would be any complications. He hoped for none.

Being the one who decrypted the sensitive files in the first place, naturally, Vovvi was the one to deliver. Cradling her PADD under her arm, the Intelligence officer moved swiftly, yellow gaze sweeping briefly across the lab before she entered. Old habits die hard, she supposed. "Apologies for the wait, I hit a bit of foot traffic on my way. Thank you for your time, Arrain," she addressed Karrim directly with a polite inclination of her head, already working on sending the files off to the designated station, "And your cooperation. I look forward to 777 and Kinaen's, ah.. partnership in this endeavor."

Upon hearing someone refer to him, the tall Head of Security of RRW Kinaen turned his attention towards Vovvi, greeting her with a nod: "It's fine, there is no need to worry, officer," she seemed to be familiar with the Republic ranks, but Karrim still had much to learn about the meanings of the little pips on the Starfleet collars. "I - we - are also looking forward to this. Let's hope that these coordinates, when we put them on the map, will be able to tell us something meaningful. "

Fashionably late as usual Aoife strolled into the astrometrics lab, she had been a few moments behind Vovvi finishing the latest rounds of reports on different field operations and strategic readiness reports for her bosses in starfleet intelligence. Aoife wore a neat and meticulously looked after purple uniform with her fiery hair tied up into its trademark bun. She nodded to Vovvi as she entered giving her a brief smile, she glanced in the direction of the officer she knew as T'Kastrir from her time on the station and gave them a brief nod of acknowledgement and then turned her gaze to the Romulan officer whom she had yet to meet, her trained eye looked him up and down noting his demoner and body language in an eye moment that took about half a second. "Apologies for being a little bit late I was held up with paperwork." Aoife said as she joined the group.

"That should be those sent to your station, Lieutenant. Let's see what we can figure out what's going on with these coordinates." Vovvi addressed T'Kastrir, folding her hands neatly in front of her. Aoife's entrance was met with a little half-smile.

The influx of people was frankly rather expected, but it was nevertheless quite different to see so many people not from Science in the lab. Giving Aoife a slight nod in response to her own, it was as the upload was completed that with only so much as a slight bow of the head that the Vulcan-raised Human began checking the data to confirm it was stable, of which only took a second, before moving on to starting to export it over to the holographic three-dimensional map located next to the console. Sliding his chair left and right between the console and the hologram to confirm the data was being imported properly, he turned back to look at the others after a fair few seconds of not saying a word. "The data is compatible and the process is thus far going smoothly."

The Romulan nodded his head slightly once again, now standing still while waiting for the data to compute...

At some point while T'Kastrir was working on mapping the data onto the map, Evoras had slipped into the room, nodding in greeting at the people whose eyes she met but not saying anything as to not destroy the suspense. She stood next to some of the other people in the room and kept her eyes on the map.

The young Cadet was silently observing. He didn't want to disturb the important officers from doing their important jobs, but he was very interested in what they were doing. Maybe this would give him some good experience for when he graduates the academy. Nonetheless, Jakob was here.

6

While the import of the data was happening, another face had made his appearance - Saren had come in to oversee the process, and also, admittedly, to satisfy some of his curiosity. He wasn't there for the Kinaen transplant, but heard bits and pieces of what had transpired (thanks to Allan), and now that the head of Security was here on the station, he was curious to see what was happening and, perhaps, be able to lend a hand. "Arrain," he uttered, looking at the very tall man with a neutral expression. Then, the smallest of smiles appeared on his lips: "How have you been?"

3

He didn't understand what was happening at first, but after a good second or two of looking at Saren's face, the memory of attacking him on Kinaen suddenly returned to him - and painted the imposing man's face an embarrassed shade of green: "Lieutenant Junior Grade," he scratched the back of his neck, eyebrows furrowed. "I am fine, ah-- once again, I want to apologize for, um. Punching you in your nose."

"No, it's-- it's fine, really," Saren shook his head, raising his hand in a placating and reassuring gesture. "I have forgiven you a long time ago. No hard feelings left, sir."

As the data was transferred across to the map in full T'Kastrir looked back towards the console, and then slid his chair over to the char itself, holographic and three-dimensional. "We have a chart." He stated plainly, raising an eyebrow as the data before him seemed admittedly a tad perplexing. Glancing back at the others, and then back at the chart, he didn't want to admit he didn't understand what he was seeing, but it certainly wasn't what he was expecting.

T'Kastrir's confusion was understandable - while the map had generated just fine, the points displayed on it seemed to be... random, at best. Most of these dots were concentrated around the Romulan space, both the old and new one, while some of them were thrown around other sectors as well. Upon inspecting further, the people present in the room could see that all of these points had one thing in common - they seemed to be located on planets, moons, and asteroids.

Vovvi leant forward to get a better look, one hand on a free spot on the console. "These coordinates..." She frowned, brows furrowing a little. "Well, they're all in Romulan space, that much is clear. As for just why they've been selected..." She shrugged, sideways glancing to Karrim, as if he could shed light on the situation.

"These look like romulan space? Can you cross reference it with known bases of naval forces? Bases major stations that kind of stuff." Aoife said thinking out loud, trying to find a link between the dots and what they knew about the Romulans.

One of the stellar cartographers working side by side with T'Kastrir nodded their head at Aoife's suggestion. A few minutes later, a ghostly cross-reference of known naval forces had appeared on top of the map. None of the dots seemed to match - even more peculiar, the longer you looked at them, it almost felt like they were... avoiding the bases?..

Brow furrowed, no matter what T'Kastrir tried to think his mind ultimately came up blank, unable to, at least by himself, determine what was going on with the data. It just didn't make logical sense, at least for what he expected it to be. "Intriguing." He muttered as he looked over the data with the other cartographers present.

Evoras' eyebrow had been slowly but surely rising higher as she looked at the map. "Indeed. Is there anything else these places have in common? Resources perhaps?" The fact that it almost seemed like the coordinates were avoiding bases was curious too. Jumping to conclusions was not a god thing, especially in situations such as this, but a small voice in her thoughts wondered if someone was trying to hide something.

"They're nowhere near the naval bases.." Her brows furrowed as she looked at the pinpointed spots, then to the bases. "Curious. Are all of these places even inhabitable?"

Interesting! Upon hearing suggestions from Evoras and Vovvi, the officers were quick to pull out according maps to compare with their coordinates. There were varying levels of resource diversity and richness, but all of the dots appeared to be in places where those resources were just enough to sustain a community for a long time. As for the habitability, the planets were of varying classes - mainly, D, G, H, K, and M. In short, planets that were suitable for colonization, but some of them might need terraforming for that to happen.

Saren had fallen awfully silent, looking at the map.

5

Vovvi glanced sideways to the young Lieutenant. "Is everything alright?"

As more information was brought up by himself and his colleagues the exchange officer began reeling off information as it came to light. "The coordinates all appear to be associated with planetary bodies compatible with habitability. D, G, H, K, and M class planets, primarily. The majority are suitable for colonisation, although some may require terraforming for that to be applicable. The resources known to be on those planetary bodies would be considered enough to sustain a colony for an extensive period of time."

"How many of the data points are on the colonial record?" Aoife asked following T'Kastrir's logic. "If there's resources and habitable planets there should be a colony of some sort on some of them at least."

Was it? Saren swallowed down his reply. Instead he kept staring at the upper corner of the map. At one of the lone dots there... "I am unsure that colonial records will be of use, but we can try," he stated. He then turned his head to look at Karrim: "Where were these coordinates pulled out from, sir?.."

"Intercepted Tal Shiar transmissions," came the reply. Karrim furrowed his brows then, giving Saren a careful sort of look, "Do you want us to build a timeline of the order these interceptions were done in?.."

3

As suggested by the others, T'Kastrir slid back over to his console to bring up an overlay of known colonies onto the star chart. "A timeline would be logical." The Human replied, sounding entirely Vulcan in tone as he spoke.

Upon receiving an agreement from both T'Kastrir and Saren, Karrim came up to one of the consoles to sort the data out, before it could be built into a comprehensive timeline. It took the man a minute or so to do that, but after the Romulan hit whatever was the futuristic Starfleet equal of the "Enter" key, the updated coordinate map had appeared before them - now with routes, going from the oldest to the newest mentions. Like constellations, the dots became connected via lines, suddenly giving purpose to their seemingly chaotic arrangement. They were connected in near circular clusters, similar to how patrol ships would move. And, as T'Kastrir overlayed the coordinate map with known colonies, the team would discover some matches. These colonies were named... and listed as destroyed or defunct.

7

Vovvi frowned, cogs turning. "All of them from Tal Shiar transmissions, and all of them destroyed or defunct... That can't be good."

Evoras narrowed her eyes, quickly glancing over at Saren to check whether he was alright, before focusing on the map again. "Is there anything at the centre of these clusters?"

2

3

"It isn't good," came a somewhat hollow comment from the junior assistant of the Science division, his eyes trained on that same old dot, now marked "Llaiir Prime, 2403, destroyed". "I think these are all colonies..."

7

Glancing briefly at the CSO, deciding to focus on work rather than the apparent emotions in the room, his attention soon turned to the charts, sliding over to them once again and using his hand to zoom the hologram in on the centre of one of the clusters of dots. "Negative. There is nothing in the centre of them." He stated plainly before zooming out again, as if using a touch screen but without touching anything.

"I don't think there needs to be anything in the center. If these are all colonies, destroyed presumably by Tal Shiar, then why?" Vovvi scowled, a violently sick feeling curdling in her stomach. "Damn it.. What are they after?"

The crease between his slanted eyebrows only seemed to deepen, because suddenly... this was becoming personal. "Only one good way to figure that out really," he extended his hand, pointing at some of the scattered colonies that were comparatively near the Xarantine sector. "Going out there and seeing for yourself, no?"

5

1

She perked up at the mention, thinking it over briefly. "... Someone'll have to contact the Captain, so we can arrange an away team and borrow the Eventide, but I don't see why that wouldn't be possible."

1

"There does not need to be anything at the centre, I was merely considering the possibility that they were attempting to keep people away from something." Evoras turned to look at at Vovvi and nodded, before reaching for her comm.

"Ah- I misunderstood, then. My apologies..." She trailed off, rubbing the back of her wrist sheepishly. "In the meantime, we should dig deeper. See if we can't find specifics as to when and how these attacks happened?"

"Well, we seem to have the "when" part covered. Unsure how precise these dates are, but at least it's something to go by," Karrim stated, his hand resting on the metallic part of his neck. "As for "how"... any ideas?.."

"There was a list of Free State ships in the data I decrypted... Maybe there's some way to tie something back to these. As for how, we'll find out from the away team. I would go, as I was a Security officer in my youth, but I may be of better use here..." You can't spell cybersecurity without... security. "Best of luck to you all." (edited)

1

"I will also join the away mission." T'Kastrir stated as he stood, knowing his colleagues could handle the cartography side of things while he was gone. Heading briefly over to a locker in the lab, he pulled out a small satchel colour-matched to his uniform robes, before heading out towards the turbolift.

Now that the Captain approved of the newfound mission, the cartographers quickly noted down the few points of interest that were feasebly close to Starbase 777. This information was then sent further to whoever was in charge of sorting out the away teams.

"We are going to help you by checking one of the colonies as well," Karrim offered after a brief pause. Perhaps it was there because he had to think about it, but those who knew about Kinaen may have assumed something different. "And... I know these dates are all more than a decade old at this point, but we still encourage you to be cautious."

"I am joining as well," Saren announced, voice soft yet with a tone that indicated that he was not going to take to rejection or advices to stay kindly. "I... know about these things more than an average person, and I want to help." With that, he was off to get prepared, swiftly moving away from the ghostly-lit map before Karrim's sympatethic gaze could linger on him for too long.

"Intel will want one of their own on the ground for this." Aoife said as she took a copy of the map and downloaded it to a tricorder before bidding Vovvs farewell and heading toward the airlock.