Star Trek: Starbase 777

Having been ‘paged’ to prepare the Eventide for launch, Xaran had been one of the first officers to arrive on the bridge to go through the various procedures and associated paperwork. It was like launching a boat crossed with a plane, really. You needed clearance to undock, a course to be plotted, clearance to fly your course within Federation space to as to avoid interfering with any high priority convoys, and to top it all off you had to make sure all systems were actually working properly, because as much as there were redundancies in place, any failure of key systems would result in delays or grounding. Sat in the First Officer’s chair, PADD in their hands, the hybrid looked around eagerly as the bridge crew reported in on one thing or another, be that approved clearances or system updated. It was all going smoothly, just as they always expected. And why wouldn’t it? Everything was perfectly maintained, and everything was precisely rehearsed. That is what training is for, people.

The lieutenant commander swiftly stepped in off of the lift and towards the tactical station. “Good morning commander! How are we today?” She said looking towards the first officer as she sat down in the tactical chair, ah this was good! She missed a ships weapons systems.

Rai arrived on the bridge and took the captain's chair. He was nervous, but also hopeful that the team would be able to help the Republic and thoroughly investigate the colonies. He couldn't help but feel a pang of guilt in the form of a pit in his stomach. He held back on asking about the list, although the curiosity was still there. He didn't want to think about those colonies that he had once visited... in conquest.

Glancing over at the Tactical Officer as she arrived on the bridge, they gave her a friendly smile and a nod. “Good morning. I’m doing good, yourself?” They asked, only to immediately turn their attention to Rai as he arrived, Standing up quickly, moving their PADD behind their back, they spoke, louder this time. “Captain on the bridge.” They declared, giving their CO and friend a smile before sitting down as he himself sat. “Good morning, Riov. How’re you?” They greeted in their usual friendly yet work-correct way. They were friends both on and off duty, but when on duty he was their superior, so they always showed him the respect he deserved. It was also a good thing to set an example for the rest of the crew. “Almost all systems have reported in green. We’re just waiting for a few stragglers and undocking clearance.” They reported.

“I’m doing all right.” She said quickly before the first officer moved to speak with the captain, she didn’t want to disturb their conversation.

Aoife walked onto the bridge a moment behind Rai. "Riov, Commander, Lieutenant Commander. You lot ready to find us some ghosts." Aoife said somewhat nonchalantly, she carried herself with a calm only earned by officers who had seen horrors and lived. She walked toward one of the secondary tactical consoles near the middle of the bridge and began assisting with pre-flight checks. "Shields, and torpedos are showing green, emergency and secondary systems are online too sirs." Aoife said rattling off her pre-flight checks with the efficiency of someone who had them down to a fine art.

Rai did not smile at Xaran nor Kya, but he did give them an acknowledging nod. Consindering 777's proximity to Romulan space, he should have anticipated that they would be working closely with the Republic on various tasks. It was no different than when he was with the Republic, he told himself. "Good morning," Rai responded simply, his mind still wandering a bit. "Green.. Oh, that is a good thing, yes," He still mixed up green and red from time to time as it was opposite in Romulan space due to their green blood. His eyes turned to the intelligence officer who was also present and he gave her a nod. "I was unaware we were ghost hunting," Rai took the phrase at face value, unaware that the commander was making a joke and not talking about actual ghostbusting.

Stepping foot onto the bridge, Dagis gave a polite nod to the more senior officers in the ‘room’ before heading over to an Ops console to take a seat, checking over various systems once she was sat.

Vara'l stepped out of the turbolift onto the bridge. Once there, having noticed that a tactical officer had already assumed the tactical position,the ACTO slipped over to stand near the console for now.

Kya hummed as she followed off of Aoifes pre flight checks from her console. “Phasers are green, we are loaded up on munitions. All tactical systems are green.”

With people coming in and taking their positions, the Eventide was beginning her preparations for an undocking sequence.

He entered the bridge with a gentle nod of his head towards the Eventide's head officers: "Hello. I brought you a diplomat and an engineer."

4

Vara'l idly checked the readout himself before he headed to a secondary tactical console. As he did so and noted the fact the tactical officer at the main station happened to not be someone he was fully familiar with, Vara'l made a mental note to remedy that as best he could. He was the ACTO after all, it paid to be familiar as to who was who in the department who's chief officer you assisted.

"Yeah! And said diplomat and engineer have brought you a scientist!" Allan said with a silly grin as he idly swung their hands together, knowing he'd have to let go soon, but hey, they'd all still be on the same bridge and all that.

He also swung their hands together playfully. "And we've all brought you our dazzling good looks, too!" Certainly useful if they encounter any horrible things.

3

Bellona was next to exit the turbolift after them. She averted her eyes from the three as she found an empty station and sat in silence. The three looked so childish, swinging their arms together like a cute throuple, in her opinion. This was a starship bridge, not some fancy date night where they were all about to eat and make merry. This was serious, for the Gods' sake. She would've been lying if she didn't also feel a pang of longing arc through her heart, though.

“Mhm well, dazzling good looks are quite useful on away missions.” She joked lightly.

1

Glancing behind themself as Saran, Eshen, and Allan arrived, deciding to keep their raised eyebrow internalised rather than actually raise said eyebrow, the XO's attention quickly turned back to the reports flooding in across the bridge and onto their PADD. "Operations, inform me when everyone is aboard." They called out.

Having been monitoring all things Ops, Dagis was quick to respond when the Commander called out to her station. "All persons aboard, Sir." She replied, her old bridge training kicking right back in.

"Splendid. Comms, contact 777's traffic control and request undocking clearance." They instructed. Once undocking clearance was given, the next instruction was given. "Helm, commence undocking procedures on your mark and move us out at low impulse. Once clear of the station plot the designated course sent to your console and stand by to jump to warp."

Resisting the urge to state some of his own opinions loud and clear to the Lieutenant's face that turned away as soon as they appeared as if witnessing a sin, Saren just chuckled at the two men antics, before casting his glance towards the science console: "I will be taking care of that, if that is alright with you sirs. I do have the training."

4

Following the Commander's orders, the helm made sure of making quick and swift job in guiding the Eventide to a safe enough distance away from the station, before performing the jump.

Utilizing the magical time-space continuum breaking skills of the game masters, a time skip occurs. Upon exiting her warp, the Eventide and her crew found themselves staring at the surface of a M-class planet and her moon, orbiting around a white star in tandem with three other planets in this relatively small solar system. The surface of Ishai V was composed of different tones of blue. "We've arrived sir," one of the helmsman announced. No, unfortunately it was not Syrax, not this time.

9

Kya hummed as she quickly took scans of the area for any other ships or weapons signatures, anywhere in the system. “Scanning for other ships or energy signatures,.” She said with a sigh, this would not be fun.

Kya could sigh again, with relief this time, because no recent signatures have been detected by her scan. It seemed that the space was safe... or was it?

6

“We’re clear as far as I can tell, no immediate dangers to the ship.” She said.

"All stations report." Xaran called out, eyes now affixed to the view screen in preparation for any potential eventuality. Hearing that there were no immediate dangers was good, but they also didn't trust first glances. "Tactical, remain vigilant. Looks can always be deceptive."

"All systems green and on standby, Sir." Dagis called out from the Ops console.

“Of course sir.” She nodded to the commander.

"Everyone looks pretty good over here, sir, systems clear and good to go," Allan said, looking directly at the engineering console as he confirmed that information, not noticing his little slip of words there. Surely his point got across regardless.

"All systems green on my end as well, surface scans are ready to be performed," he supplied, lifting his gaze up at Xaran.

'Everyone'? Must've been a slip of the tongue. Hearing that surface scans were ready to be performed Xaran looked over at the Lieutenant at the Science console to give him a nod. "Proceed with the scans, Lieutenant. I want to see what we're dealing with as soon as possible."

From his position on the bridge, Vara'l mulled over what they'd been informed about regarding the destruction of colonies. Rapidly arriving at the thought that among the myriad things that could do what had been indicated was.. well, people coming along and doing the destroying, Vara'l tapped out several commands on the console he was currently sat at. Once he'd called up the tactical interface, Vara'l looked over the scan result himself. The Romulan careful as he looked over the scan for anything that might have suggested a ship trying to avoid being detected. Something he did for his own piece of mind that. He'd already resolved to if his read over of the scan turned up nothing, potentially go sort out some other stuff. While he was the ACTO, he'd not yet noted anything that'd have concerned him. They'd scanned as would be expected and the like and..given the fact the colony had been destroyed.. it rather seemed like there were preparations that needed to be seen to regarding the away teams security. That is..if this colony hadn't just fallen afoul of some natural disaster. Vara'ls jaw worked a bit at that as he called up a list of tactical officers and considered things while he continued to monitor the console as well.

He nodded and let the console do it's work, setting off multiple scans, performed one after another. After getting a reply back from the system, Saren proceeded to read what it had discovered: "Adequate oxygen levels and chemical composition of air comparable to Earth, low radiation levels, existing ozone layer. All indications of a planet that is habitable and safe to land on. Rich floral makeup of the planet is blue due to the white star it is orbiting. Strong evidence of diverse animal kingdom, mostly composed of invertebrates and avian lifeforms," he read off, his gaze sliding over the readings swiftly. Saren paused, briefly, before continuing: "Ah... strong evidence of humanoid activity found, but no sentient lifeforms were detected. Shall I send the coordinates of this evidence to the helm, so that the away team can be beamed down near it?.." (edited)

4

Listening as the information was reeled off by the Science officer, it was only as 'strong evidence of humanoid activity' was mentioned that they perked up, antennae moving as their mind started whirring away. "Yes. Helm, take Science's coordinates and get us as close as possible. Tactical, maintain scans. If anything changes let me know immediately. I'll inform the away team to prepare to beam down." They stated, before pressing a button on the arm of their chair. (edited)

4

"Yes sir," and he did just that. Now with coordinates at hand, the ship could be navigated closer to the planet - where allegedly, a colony was once born...

Aoife stood and walked toward the Armoury, surely she could be counted as tactical considering she was a tactical officer long before becoming an intelligence officer...

Kya stood from her station as she headed to the lift, nodding to another officer to take her post as she stepped in.

There were many things that could have caused the destruction of a colony. At least, he reckoned he could think of..many things that could do so. While alot of those were natural things, not his concern given he was the ACTO, a bunch of those things weren't natural. Attacks of varying sorts, abductions or other efforts, a list of things that worked their way through his head by its own volition. His mind wired for such things, to analyse, to consider potentialities. Once a tactical drone, now a tactician, a ACTO. All things that had firmly forged a certain sort of mind. A mind that mulled over these possibilities with a certain enforced calm and determined there wasn't much that could be done now by him here. Not much..past one thing. With a series of tapped commands Vara'l then tasked the Tactical console to analyse the tactical scans that had been taken and continued with the commanders orders. He specifically asked the console to look for evidence of historical weapons signatures or evidence of weapons fire in the scans. Once he'd tasked the console to do that, Vara'l waited to see what that turned up.

3

Of course Alyssa had been here the whole time. She just was rather quiet and reserved. Certainly a shift in behavior everyone likely appreciated from her. Alyssa stood beside Vara'l, awaiting further instruction from Vara'l. But until then, she kept herself quiet and simply observed. If she were to make the most of this mission it would be to acclimate herself to her new cybernetic eye -- and the behavioral shift away from acting like a drill sergeant -- when on a mission. So for now, she stayed close to Vara'l, watching. Given Kya had left, Alyssa stayed to help fill in her post if needed. (edited)

"Asking for permission to leave with the away team, sir," he requested, looking at Xaran with calm intent in his eyes. "I want to help with sample gathering."

As the Eventide began her approach, the quiet pings of the tactical console weren't sounding too promising... at first. Nearing the planet to the point that the landing site of the away team was mere kilometers away, the readings had changed. The console was reporting evidence of plasma beam and torpedo damage.

5

Upon seeing the console's readings of plasma beam and torpedo damage, Alyssa leaned in to look alongside Vara'l. "Whooooa, hello," Alyssa uttered mostly to herself. "Sir, are you seeing this?" She said to Vara'l.

"I'd also like to leave! I think I'd be of more use out there." It was true. A diplomat wasn't much use sitting pretty in here. There might be people to talk to! Probably not, considering the scans, but you never know. Besides, he was tough enough to double as security if needed.

Vara'l's jaw hardened as he saw that. "I am." He confirmed before he looked up to the Commander. "Tactical scans indicate evidence of space to surface weapons fire, plasma beam and torpedo damage." He reported calmly as he looked to Commander Hayes and indicated they should assume the other tactical console. "Its a few kilometres away from the away teams landing site."

Alyssa nodded and promptly assumed the other tactical console, firing it up and scanning for anything else the ship could be scanning for. "It isn't a fluke, I'm getting the same reading," Alyssa confirmed. "I'll see if I can find anything else." (edited)

Assuming he was just Part of The Away Team that had just gotten permission to go to the transporter room, he got up, a hand running through his curls to straighten them out a little, as they were still a little wet from his shower not long before he had to report the bridge. Still, he just slowwwly made his way over to the turbolift anyways, waiting for his boys™️ as he fiddled around with his bag, making sure most tools and other such things were in there.

Assuming he was given permission, as one of the boys™, he slowwwly followed Allan toward the turbolift, ruffling Allan's hair.

2

Oh well that wasn't good, was it. "Is there any atmospheric or surface contamination in that region that they need to be aware of?" The Commander queried, looking over at the Tactical and Science consoles as they asked their question. (edited)

Vara'l directed his console to analyse the damage detected as he left the active scan to Hayes. He was a tactician so..right now he looked for any recognisable pattern to the damage. While he could never have identified a ship or group by doing that..the result was something he hoped would at least suggest..what the target fired upon had been. That or if they'd just fired upon the colony in general. With the computer tasked to check for this,Vara'l used his time to help Alyssa. The commander had just asked a question after all. One that needed answering.

The replies to Xaran's questions came back as negatives; it seemed that the damage happened too long ago for it to continue being dangerous to the point of there being contamination. The ACTO's inquiries revealed the closeness of that damage to the coordinates, where humanoid activity was reported.

Assuming someone came in to replace him and he was given permission as well, he left for #etd-corridors and #etd-turbolift.

Switching her scan to check for that, Alyssa peered at the console, getting an answer. "Scans are returning negative, sir," Alyssa confirmed. "Maybe if there was contamination it all settled out or dissipated."

Switching out with another Operations officer, Dagis headed off to do what she had come on this mission to do: Be on the away team. Touch grass, if you will. Off to the turbolift she went, not at all dreading the fact she was about to walk into the site of what seemed to be a bombing.

Vara'l's jaw worked a bit as he checked the scans and then checked before he then double checked the computers results for the analysis he'd tasked it to undertake on the previous scan. Once he happened to be..sure what it was telling him, though he'd wished he'd been wrong initially, Vara'l proceeded to speak up. "Confirmed." After a moment, Vara'l then added. "Further to my previous report sir, tactical analysis of the scans indicate no specific target of bombardment within the colony, the colony itself appears to have been the target of the weapons fire." Vara'l reported calmly before he looked up at the commander as he moved to ask to join the away team..and then reconsidered for a moment. Could he be better used up here..or with the team. He.. wasn't sure. Then he looked to Alyssa, looked to them and decided before he looked back to the Commander. "Sir, request permission to go join the away team on the surface to help coordinate the tactical augment to the teams security deployment."

Upon hearing Vara'l volunteer himself, Alyssa realized his post would be left unoccupied. Alyssa hadn't spent much time up on any sort of bridge before these last couple days, so this experience couldn't hurt. "I'll assume his post, sir," Alyssa told Xaran regarding Vara'l. "I'll stay here to assist you directly."

Well that rather removed his need to ask them to assume his post if his request was granted. The fact they were willing to do that, offered before he asked and how they'd conducted themselves so far had already been noted by Vara'l. It'd made him feel even more comfortable to step back, go help on the away team while someone else helped out on the bridge. Not that he intended to fight mind you if the Commander responded to his request for permission to join the away team in the negative. That would have not been professional. Once he received the permission he'd asked for, Vara'l turned to Lieutenant commander Hayes and said. "You've got tactical, Lieutenant Commander Hayes." Before he smiled very briefly at them and then headed to the #etd-turbolift . (edited)

1

'You've got tactical, Lieutenant Commander Hayes.' Those words rung inside of Alyssa's mind like a bell tolling in the distance. The brightest, most brilliant bell. Vara'l... he trusted Alyssa! For a brief period of time, she legitimately didn't know if he trusted her or not. But it turns out, her volunterring to step in and take initiative paid off. Vara'l was extremely generous with that. Alyssa gave Vara'l the biggest smile in weeks, with a slight chuckle - a chuckle of relief. Followed by standing at attention and saluting Vara'l. "Aye, sir, thank you, sir," Alyssa responded, before returning at ease once Vara'l left. Alyssa assumed Vara'ls post, switching to the tactical console he previously used, and looked up at Xaran. "Acting ACTO Alyssa Hayes, reporting, sir," Alyssa said to Xaran. "Ready for further orders." (edited)

At some point Maggie had taken up the science consul on the bridge. “Oh boy..”

A message popped up from 777!

Eventide, After further investigating the information given, we've all but confirmed the Tal Shiar are behind the destruction of the colonies. While we emphasized this was likely the case, and it should have been already mentioned in the mission debriefing, please relay this information to the away team ASAP. — Lt. Cdr. Vovvi t'Rei'nak, Starbase 777 Intelligence

Having been forwarded the message from the Starbase's Intelligence officer, Xaran quickly started putting the pieces together when the Arrain had highlighed a specific Bolian officer. Looking through some data on their PADD, they responded to Lama, and then to Vara'l as they each came over comms. The Bolian would have to be investigated once more Security officers were available, and they didn't want to alert the officer should they be suspect, so they decided to not comment on the matter at this time. They did, however, work on the other matter at hand. "Tactical, perform analysis of the orbital scans of the colony and surrounding area. See if there's any specific patterns or anything that stands out as noteworthy." The XO instructed, brow now furrowed at the concept of someone potentially being some type of spy aboard their own ship. Why couldn't missions go smoothly without traitors trying to ruin it for you?

"Aye, sir, right away, sir," Alyssa replied, as she turned around to the console and opened up the scans of the colony and the surrounding area. The console would give her the answer to pass along to Xaran soon enough. Meanwhile, Alyssa received a console message from Vara'l on the away team - one which she passed onto Xaran. "Sir, the away team has found some sort of transmitter device that can communicate with the satellite. They're going to try to send something through."

Beep boop. Scan in progress... The message from the away team was never received by the satellite, by the looks of it. (edited)

With the scan complete, Alyssa turned to Xaran. "Away team's transmission was unsuccessful, sir. They weren't able to reach the satellite."

The scan completed, and the results weren't pretty. The attack patterns were solely locked in on the colony itself, almost all from above. They would've been almost entirely defenseless; a rat caught in a trap they were never meant to survive. (edited)

7

Alyssa was about to continue to Xaran when more results popped up on the scanner. Her eyes popped open, and she turned to Xaran immediately. "Sir, they've dropped an aerial-strike from above-- what looks like around a decade or two ago." (edited)

"Was the attack only centered on the colony or was it spread across the entire surface?" Xaran enquired. The more they thought about what happened, the more they started to hate thinking about it. These people were seemingly exterminated out of nowhere, for doing nothing wrong except existing. The Tal Shiar really were bastards.

Alyssa looked back, confirming what the scan had told her. "Centered on the colony itself, sir."

Kya entered the bridge and took up a tactical station. “Away team is present and accounted for, mission complete.”

Vara'l entered and walked to the secondary tactical console. Once there,having noted an additional Tactical officer had entered and taken up a post on their own volition,he took out a PADD. He then called up the data from his tricorder on it and started to add it to the tactical analysis and the orbital tactical scans. As he did so, he added to the report. "Away team confirmed the cause of the destruction of the colony, Tal Shiar assault." He commenced. "We confirmed that the strikes carried out were targeted in a bombardment pattern intended to destroy the colony." He swallowed then as some emotion surprised him,anger. "Some signs of a combat team being deployed as well,disruptor blasts,concentrated in a specific area." A long pause followed."Its my considered opinion as ACTO that the colony was likely caught off guard, any defence mounted was likely uncoordinated and utterly futile." He paused then. "Significant evidence was collected." (edited)

"The colony was most likely still being built up. Trees were in the process of being cut down for wood, and the colony was far less extensive than one might expect of a more established one. It is likely that even if they had wanted to defend themselves, they would not have been able to." It had taken fucking ages for Timi to type that one out, but it needed to be said. With the information from the satellite, it wasn't necessarily the case that they were caught off-guard, since they may have been expecting something. You just never knew. But what could be said definitively is that they didn't have the capacity for defense, even if they had wanted to.

3

Kya nodded. “We found the corpse of a Tal Shiar agent and gave them a burial. I would suspect stolen weapon, very minor resistance movement, nothing but a few deaths after a genocide of a population.” She said sombrely. (edited)

Vara'l nodded slightly at what Timi said. They had a point, one he had not accounted for in what he’d said. When Kya then mentioned the body, Vara’l then added. "..Either that or a ground assault that encountered brief resistance,though I'd raise the question as to why the body was left as a question that potentially may speak against that possibility." (edited)

Listening to the reports as they were given, Xaran's brow entirely furrowed as what they thought to be the case turned out to be true. Why anyone would go around killing people, civilians, they would never understand. They couldn't comprehend the thought behind such actions. It was horrific. Time to file this one under T for terrorism, they thought. Turning their chair to face the three Commanders, they spoke. "I don't think I need to tell you what your duties entail, but I want a full report and copy of all the collated data sent to myself, the Riov, the Captains, as well as Command and Intelligence. The sooner we can begin a full investigation the better."

Kya nodded. “Yes of course, I will write up a report when we get home.” She hummed.

Alrighty, boys on the bridge. Probably a famous band from the 23rd century or something. "Heyy, uh, so do we have a satellite out there or what?" He looked ahead at the viewscreen as if it would be right in front of them before he looked back over at Xaran, "Sir. Sorry. Uh- I'm the one who sent the message to it and it came back with an error, so it's probably damaged to some degree, but I was thinking we could try getting data off of it..?"

"Understood sir, I'll have a full report filed and copied to each indicated party as soon as possible, sir." Vara'l initially said before, as Allan entered, he looked to them and listened as they spoke. So the message sending thing hadn't worked. That.. interested him somewhat. He looked to Alyssa, who was currently at the primary tactical station, something like that might come up on current tactical scans..or ones already taken. The last part of that thought something Vara'l turned to the Secondary tactical console in response to. With swift movements, Vara'l called up one of the more recent orbital scans carried out by tactical. Once he did so he directed the computer to analyse it for any Romulan satellite detected on it. That or the debris from one that might not have been highlighted on previous scans.

There was a satellite detected nearby— or, rather, what was left of one. The satellite in question had been nearly obliterated, only a few pieces still holding together.

Antennae twitching upward slightly at the rather informal mention of a satellite, the hybrid glanced over at the Lieutenant as he and two others entered the bridge, listening to what else he had to say. Turning back to face the viewscreen, they spoke. "Science, Tactical, do we have a satellite out there? And if so, what condition is it in?" The Commander enquired.

"One satellite detected by tactical scans, almost completely destroyed sir." Vara'l indicated in response to the inquiry "Some pieces of are it still holding together but not much at all." He added after a moment in which he double checked the information he was presented with, conscious he'd missed something earlier. The Romulan speaking only once he was satisfied he'd not missed anything, something he was glad about. *He'd missed something earlier and... all that had occurred and the like had affected his functionality, not something he much..liked. Such..horror reminded him of too many things. Things that marred his ability to look at this rationally and analytically. Things that weren't relevant to his duties, things he tried once again to push down and surpress his feelings about. These things could be addressed later, why couldn't that part of his mind these things came from see that? it impaired his function, he.. disliked that immensely. * (edited)

Allan's green eyes actually lit up when the ACTO mentioned there being a few parts still holding together. That was something! "Oh! In that case, then we should take the - sorry- if I - um.. may I have permission to speak, sir..?" It had been way too long since he'd been in bridge training, okay? At least 4 years.

Listening to the Commander's response, it was as Allan suddenly spoke again and in the manner he did that their antennae twitched again, a sideways glance given towards the ACEO as he corrected himself and asked for permission to speak. Had he not, they would've really rather quickly cut him off and reminded him just who's bridge this was. "Feel free, Lieutenant. This satellite is your domain so I'd like to hear what you have to say on the matter." They said, their tone sounding genuine yet formal, not an ounce of judgement to be heard despite the side-eye given mere moments prior.

5

4

The side eye was Felt, but the young engineer was rather glad to have gotten the permission anyways to launch into his engineering yappery. "Alriiight yeah, thanks, so, uh- basically, we need to find out what parts we've actually got left! So like, the actual data is probably in a few parts of the thing, but like.. so if the dish is blown up, that doesn't really matter, like, we don't need that shit, 'cause it won't really have anything in there, but the uh, big boxy thing, if part of that's gone that's okay, really? Because you know, like we can kind of just have the data sort of like all up in there, like, if we don't have the you know, the energy or the power banks or any of that shit, like, that's okay, same thing with the communications relays and the GNC, GPS, whatever else is in there, 'cause like, that's for the satellite to live, and well, she sure isn't living right now, right? Whatever's in there, we can bring it back to our stuff to read it which does have power, so... part of the big boxy thing is what we need, that's gonna have a whole bunch of stuff, your avionics, your receivers, your software.." he was motioning with his hands as he usually did, typically making a box with them when he said 'boxy thing', he was trying to make it easy to understand! "And there's also gonna be the bus, right? And if we want to find the bus, that'll be right in between a bunch of really thick metal between the avionics and the payload data handling units, and it'll have the data repository, and we'll probably have to use a subspace frequency remodulator to stabilize any erratic data streams, but I can do that, so like, hoping that survived? If it did, then that's gonna have all our juicy data in it! Sir." A smile and a quick nod to end it all off. (edited)

Listening as the ACEO began talking, or rather rambling, Xaran, despite their lack of engineering knowledge, tried to keep up with what the man was saying as best as possible. With very few long pauses, and instead frequent shorter ones, it was quite hard even for someone trained to listen to keep track of everything he was saying. Despite their temptation to tell him not to swear, the XO admittedly couldn't give two shits about his choice of language. What were they, a preschool teacher? The answer was no, for anyone playing along at home. Despite their attempt at keeping up feeling like an attempt at running after a dog doing calculous, the Commander couldn't help but appreciate Allan's enthusiasm about the subject, and clearly his job as a whole. "Well, I think we all know what we need to do." Xaran deadpanned, glancing over at the Lieutenant, before looking over at the Operations console. "Operations, see if you can lock the tractor beam onto the bus,-" What a strange thing to ask someone to lock onto. Well, without context it was, anyway. "-or frankly any part of the central mass of what remains of that satellite, and bring it into the shuttlebay if it fits. Comms, alert shuttlebay of our plan to borrow, well, the shuttlebay, and get a worker bee on standby to assist."

3

The bridge went to work like a well-oiled mechanism - the shuttlebay waited, while the Operations located the bus. Upon beaming it closer though, one of the officers perked up to voice their concern: "Sir, it seems that the bus has a hole in it's center... Should we still proceed?"

Rai, who was there just chilling, turned to the ACEO. "The bus has a hole in the center, do you think we should proceed with your plan? I am unsure how that will complicate matters for us in terms of data," Rai inquired, looking at his friend with his typical Romulan stoic expression.

Allan took in a breath and let it out, thinking for a moment before asking, "how big's the hole..?"

Kya hummed as she watched the more engineering and operations minded officers do their work, if they needed the guns she would be there! She did let out a little snort at the “how bigs the hole” comment.

"Plasma blast sized hole, sir," came the reply.

"Plasma blast size, I suppose large?" Rai had no idea how big that was, he probably should have considering he had been a tactical officer.

Alyssa also couldn't help but smirk at the "how big's the hole" comment as well. Goodness, having a girlfriend really made things much clearer for her in that regard, didn't it? Oh well. She kept herself somewhat composed and went back to what she was doing. (edited)

Vara'ls grey eyes flicked first to Kya and then to Alyssa as the two reacted to the hole comment. He..wasn't at all sure why that had managed to draw a snort from one of the officers, the query about how big the blast hole was. He honestly discovered he was fine with that.

"Plasma torpedos are pretty large so I would estimate the hole would be nearly the size of the bus itself? At least, that's what I have seen on Romulan ships," Rai gave his best estimate and then replied to shuttlebay. "How much of the bus and satalite remain is the question."

"Yeah, if you do a scan and there's nothing that's like.. a circuit board or anything, it's.. probably gone, yeah. It'd be really tiny if there was one, so maybe it missed, but.. yeah, if it's too big, it's cooked, which kinda blows," not even kinda. It was.. odd that it was thought to shoot right through this thing.

Vara'l frowned a bit at that. It sounded a bit like the system had been targeted. He glanced to the tactical scans again and observed the pieces of it that had been detected in the previous scan the computer had analysed. After a moment of thought, he then looked up. "A center mass strike like that sounds more targeted than I'd expect sir, if you'd permit me to say so."

Five had taken a quick break to grab some water, and so had scooted up to the bridge a little bit later than everyone, but was present long enough to hear everything about the satellite with a big hole in it. She frowned at that. "Well, yeah, that probably checks out. They'd want all the data to be destroyed. But could you do a scan 'n check, maybe?" (edited)

Vara'l looked thoughtful for a moment at that before he then proceeded to say. "Thats something that a strike package would already in theory achieve simply through the initial engagement against the satellite" His look one that suggested he didn't quite get why someone would go through the time and effort to hit something like..that. "A spread of torpedo's or strikes with torpedo's and beams targeted in a standard pattern would render its structural integrity nill and at least in a tactical point of view, achieve the assumable objective of rendering its ability to store or gather further data nil." His jaw worked a bit as he considered the scan he'd previously analysed. "A further scan to check might tell us more about how the satellite was destroyed yes, if the data would be useful Riov, sir." He paused a moment. "My apologies for..chipping in like that." (edited)

"That sounds logical," Rai nodded to the tactical officer. "Yeah, can we get a scan and see what is in tact? If it's salvagable I would like to see if we can get some data if any at all."

"Scanning now." Vara'l responded as he started another scan to see what of the satellite remained intact parts wise and the like. If anything happened to be salvageable at all. Any bits they could get of it, Vara'l reckoned, would be quite helpful.

Unfortunately, the results of the scan denied any possibility of salvage. A lucky hit. Or, perhaps, a deliberate statement...

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"Oof." Five frowned a little at that, patting Allan's shoulder in a small comforting gesture. "I guess we'd better prepare to get going, then."

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"Scan returns indicate that past the semi-intact remains of the satellite, which we've already discovered isn't viable for data retrieval." Vara'l commenced as he looked down and reviewed the scan anaysis. "There isn't anything anything else intact enough to be salvageable for indicated purposes."

With a sight, subtle sigh, Xaran's mind quickly shifted to the next task at hand. "Understood. We tried. Operations, terminate your attempt at retrieval. Comms, stand down shuttlebay and that worker bee. Helm, lay in a course for home and stand by. All stations, prepare for jump to warp."

On this bittersweet note, the Eventide zipped away into the cold darkness of space, leaving Ishai V and her ruined colony behind - taking pieces of the untold tragedy with them. Who knows what will happen when such darkness is brought to light... (edited)

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