Star Trek: Starbase 777 - etd-briefing-lounge

Yoro'clis walked into the room and immediately made his way towards the back. He wore his standard black and blue Dominion duty uniform with a Starfleet phaser pistol holstered at his side. While he was the station's chief of security the Honored Elder did not want to get into the way of the main briefing. He hoped to stand at the back and listen to the information without doing anything else yet. If requested, he would do more but for now Yoro'clis was willing to be another soldier at the meeting. The Honored Elder was still adjusting to Starfleet standard operating procedures, especially on away missions. Most of his career had consisted of rushing into battle heavily armed and shrouded but this was something completely different. This was an investigation, and such brute force was not allowed. Yoro'clis still planned on remaining vigilant and defending the group in whatever way was necessary though. That was his role as a member of the Starfleet security division after all.

Having taken the time to adequately prepare for the mission, Tevis made his way down to the Eventide, initially surprised he hadn't yet in his time aboard, and entered into the briefing lounge, PADD and comically large mug of raktajino in tow. Noting he was among the early arrivals, he quickly took a seat, and mindlessly went through some paperwork as he waited for more people to arrive.

To be honest, she was nervous. She hadn’t been on a mission of this nature in a while, but she was feeling somewhat confident in herself. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad, in and out and she’d probably not do much, in contrast to Archanis. She made her way inside, taking a seat and scrolling through PADD as she waited. Her antennae twitched a bit, flairing back and forwards as she looked around anxiously, though she did her best to hide it facially, her antennae were never good liars.

Not saying a word, Copia slowly stepped inside the briefing lounge. This time around, unlike the original incident, Copia was calm and collected. Although, she still wasn't happy with herself from the last time. Her head hung low, and her shoulders drooped. She was ashamed of herself from the New Dawn incident. From practically screaming at Tewari -- or whatever its actual name was -- in the long term brig. She needed to make it right. And she needed to make it right now. Copia had everything she'd need, phaser, PADD, the flower from Rilek, and a support note from Tobias. Copia still kept her hands behind her back as she made her way in, still remaining silent and not really making eye contact with anyone. Right away she knew that this time around, she'd have to be on her absolute best behavior in all circumstances no matter what. And after this all was done, Copia certainly owed an apology to someone. To all of the Undine on that mission, but especially the Tewari impostor. Hell, she didn't know what they were going through! How did that give her the right to chastise them? And so, Copia remained professional, and would exemplify exactly what she needed to and then some. She promised herself. She promised Vara'l. She promised Vara. And Sadhbh. And Mo. And yes... Even Tewari's impostor.

At some point, Saren was here too - just appearing somewhere in the back in that quiet, unannounced way the Lareth usually did. The scientist's gaze was downcast to his PADD, the contents of which he was idly scrolling through, with only an occasional glance up at the public to see the newcomers. (edited)

Soon enough, Vara entered the room and took a seat near the window. She gave a hum, normally she wouldn’t be interested in such a combat intensive mission. She was a thief traditionally, if you got into a fight, you were doing something wrong! Yet here she was, why you may ask? Because the leader of the imposters had made Copia feel bad, and she figured payback was due.

Allan figured the last one had gone... fine enough. A little scary? Sure, but he'd headed here anyways. Something about it intrigued him. The mystery? The danger? Whatever it was, he was here, in his typical on-duty wear, jacket half unzipped as was typical as well... and sat down next to Yaveru after looking for fellow engineers. "Heyy, how's it going?" He smiled at her as he took out his PADD to take notes or something like that. For now though, he was just going to look on SpaceBay for any hot #deals on things.

Vovvi hadn't been on the first mission. With the small training exercise and the extensive research she'd done on the reports from the last, she at least thought herself a little bit ready. Ivissa was with her babysitting program, and Povala would be calling soon. She steeled her nerves and waited patiently, glancing at all the officers around on their PADDs.

Senang entered the briefing lounge, surveying the many people already there. It was good to see that the last away mission didn't deter too many people from joining once more. One could hope that whatever was going to happen to them this time around, it'd end far less devastatingly than it had last time. She nodded to Tevis, not having really spoken to the man before but recognising his superior officer, and the various people who had been there last time. She recognised the red-headed engineer, and the Andorian intelligence officer, and the android... It was good to see so many repeat volunteers; at least that meant that morale hadn't been affected too much.

T'she slipped into the briefing lounge, looking serious -- granted, they always looked serious, especially when away missions were concerned. They had signed up because they wanted to help, they had signed up because a part of them had been shaken and they wanted to give it their all. They just hoped that they would not falter during the mission. In the meantime, they had their PADD up in front of them as they read some book that they had been meaning to read for a while, they had the time after all.

Vara'l stepped into the briefing lounge, his face a carefully schooled serious professional calm as he looked about the room and nodded in greeting to those individuals he recognized. With the greetings then out of the way, Vara'l paused a moment as he spotted and then silently greeted the CTO with a inclination of the head before he then slipped off to one side. Once out of the way, he quietly waited for the briefing to commence.

He took the time to take in each member of the team, mentally cataloguing who would be on his own, before setting down the PADD and mug in his seat, and standing, making his way to greet those under his command. With a sharp nod, he passed by Vara'l, looking up at the man as he said... "Good to see you here Commander." Before finally stopping at Senang. It was with a tight-lipped grin and a nod that he greeted her. "Lieutenant. I know we are both aware of eachother, but I figured now would be as good a time as any to introduce myself personally. Your record is quite something, we are fortunate to have your expertise for this mission."

Copia wasn't aware that Yoro'clis or Vara were here as her head still hung low and she focused on the ground, not making eye contact with anyone. That is, until her eyes naturally darted up to look around, coincidentally when Vara'l walked in. Copia noticed Vara'l giving her a polite nod, to which she reciprocated the gesture and replied in a voice no louder than a whisper. "Sir." Then, Copia noticed Vara and Yoro'clis. Now she had not only one but three familiar and close trusted resources around her! Copia let out a quiet sigh of relief at that. Slowly but steadily, Copia approached Vara first. "Vara...?" Copia said, almost in a bit of disbelief. "You're... here?" But as she said that, a slight smile appeared on Copia's face, although it was indeed still a smile. Immediately Copia felt comforted again knowing she wouldn't be alone in this second attempt. (edited)

“Sure am!” She said with a smile as she fiddled with her hair, putting it into a ponytail. “Figured I might as well come down and help out, since I knew you would be here.”

Aoife walked into the briefing room fashionably late. She had her hair tied up in her usual bun and a phaser sitting comfortably in a holster, her purple uniform looking pristine as it always was. She scanned the room for a second, looking for someone to make smalltalk so she didn't have to awkwardly stand in the edge of the room, after a second of scanning she saw Tevis and walked over to him. "It's good to see you boss." She said half joking as she snuck up on him from behind.

Having heard of the mission like everyone else and taken into consideration the dangers of said mission (hopefully) like everyone else, Elwyn had made her way to the briefing lounge aboard the Eventide along with everyone else who had decided to volunteer for the mission. The android had quite the habit of going on dangerous missions of one sort or another. It was like getting out of the house from time to time to touch grass, only with more risk to life! Entering the briefing lounge with a phaser holstered on her belt, the perky Health and Safety Inspector gave everyone a friendly smile and a wave before making her way to a less crowded part of the room.

Ezran was here too, just standing in the corner like a massive statue, waiting for the briefing to begin. It had been a very long time since he had been on a proper away mission so he was excited to see what this one had in store. The Undine Threat... That was no small task. But whatever this mission threw it them, he was ready to catch it. Dad's are great at playing catch.

At the sound of a very familiar voice, Tevis turned to greet his former assistant with a half-smirk and a lazy roll of his eyes. "Oh, look whose come back...the purple doesn't look too bad I suppose..." He said with no small amount of sarcasm and snark, before breaking out into a small grin and clapping the Human lightly on the arm. "It's good to see you, long time no see. They have you hard at work down in the dungeons I suppose?"

"Oh yes the dungeons have basically become my kingdom now." Aoife replied with a hefty amount of sark. "They wheeled me out personally for this one though, something something 'extensive combat experience' no dobt that's why you're here, well that and you make a smaller target." Aoife said with a small laugh, she always liked Tevis sense of humour, the gallows humour of tactical was something she missed deeply after her transfer, everyone in intel was so serious.

Tevis gave her an exaggerated mock glare, before breaking out into a grin and a belly laugh as he responded in kind. "I guess I'll just have to use you as a Human shield then lofty! You'll be fine, especially with all of that 'extensive combat experience'!" He said with airquotes. "I'm here because they clearly recognize my age, beauty, talent and humbleness." He said totally straight faced deadpan, just his eyes twinkling with amusement.

Equally fashionably late was the Intelligence officer who had put out the message on the bulleting board earlier. At least she had a reason: the main folks on the bridge had been receiving a shorter version of the briefing first, so they could get underway as soon as possible. Now it was time to do a more extensive briefing with the officers who were going to make up the away team. As Zai walked in she was surprised to find that a surprising number of people had gathered here, all volunteering for the mission. She had made them all aware that this was a pretty dangerous thing that they’d be embarking on, right..? Maybe this crew just liked danger. “Hey, all!” She said as she made her way to the front of the room, looking over the folks gathered here and giving them all a wave with one hand. In the other she held a travel mug of coffee – and upon catching sight of Tevis with his own mug, she raised hers in recognition. Stopping at the head of the room, she hopped up onto the desk to sit on it instead of actually taking the chair. “Sorry I’m late guys, I was giving the crew on the bridge the run-down before speaking to all of you. And there are a lot of you. I’m impressed! You guys must love getting into the action.”

As soon as the unfamiliar Intel officer stepped in, Saren closed his extremely important "psittacosaurus sp. countershading coloration variability depending on their habitat" tab (but not before sending it to another fellow ancient reptile enthusiast, for their very scientifically valuable holodeck project), and lowered his PADD to now solely focus on the stranger, who's comment made the Romulan let out just the softest of chuckles, expertly masked in an exhale: "Something like that..." as he murmured that, his gaze wandered over the familiar faces, pinch of concern and worry somewhere in his gut making sure that Saren was aware of it. Missions went well before... he had to hope this would also be the case.

Copia nodded to Vara, a smile making itself more known on her face now. "I appreciate you more than you know, Vara. Thank you for being here, and being here with me. It is an absolute privilege to serve aboard this station with you, I hope you know." Then, when Zai walked in, Copia sat down next to Vara and took some silent but deep breaths. It was real now. Not that it wasn't before. But it was even more real now that Copia knew what she was getting into. Copia responded professionally and respectfully to Zai after they spoke. This was not simply a means of self-redemption for Copia: it was a full-blown penance. Copia certainly needed to take accountability for the past, and fast. And now was as good of a time as ever to do it.

T'she took this as a sign that the meeting was actually starting and quickly closed the many tabs of futuristic archive of our own that they had pulled up and were switching between while they waited. They needed to give their full attention to the officer giving the briefing -- lest they find themself in avoidable danger later.

Having happily stood waiting for the briefing to begin, when the Commander finally appeared Elwyn greeted her with a friendly smile. As she waved the android waved back. Commander or not, a wave was a wave! "Hi Commander!" They greeted cheerfully, really just happy to be here and excited to hear what this mission was going to entail.

Yoro'clis continued to stand in the back of the room, silently observing the scene. He nodded towards the few people that he recognized as they entered the room but that was it. Other than that, he simply stood there. While the hulking Jem'Hadar was not exactly able to stealthily blend into the shadows he was doing his best. His first impression of the spy in charge was that they were no solider. Yoro'clis had spent most of his life fighting with and leading Jem'Hadar and could tell that this Commander Zai was one of the more casual members of Starfleet. While this did not signify anything major the Honored Elder missed the military professionalism he was used to in the Dominion.

A grin was given to Elwyn at how she said ‘hi’ back. It was nice to see people who were enthusiastic! Kena shuffled back on the desk a little so she was properly seated on it, and held her mug in both hands. “Thank you all for coming here today – I’m sorry that I couldn’t give many details in advance, but y’know… Starfleet Intelligence. If something isn’t secretive then we don’t want anything to do with it.” She gave a little shrug, but her tone was light-hearted and joking. “Were all of you on the Eventide’s response mission to the distress call from the AFS New Dawn? Because all of that ties into this. Does anyone who was there want to give a quick run down to make sure we’re all up to date with that?”

Vara blushed at the words of Copia before lightly nodding towards the question of the New Dawn. She remained quiet though, she didn’t want Timi on her ass after all.

In an attempt to redeem herself, Copia opened her mouth to speak in response to Zai, but then, she froze before closing her mouth and retreating. She in truth didn't have all of the intel or facts that others did, and especially not all the details from the Undine. She was way too emotionally charged and compromised at the time, and none of it properly sunk in. So, professionally, she decided to take it safe and not say anything.

Vara'l remained silent for now as he waited to see if someone else would give the run down from those who happened to have been there. He'd already made his report about it and filed that.. and this would be a good way to gauge how others happened to feel about it. If it happened that nobody spoke up, Vara'l intended to speak up himself make no mistake, but for now he remained professionally silent.

God, he hated awkward silences. Not that it was that long of a silence, but after a few seconds Allan decided he might as well say something, even if he didn't really have all the information freshly in his brain. "So uhhh, guess I'll give it a shot, um-" he spoke first to sort of clear the air before he actually went into it, "basically, we went into the New Dawn, found out these guys on the bridge and such were being like, awfully sus, like, the Captain kinda didn't want us going anywhere near the ship, and we were like 'okay, understandable, have a nice day', but like, we didn't, we made up some excuse to fix the lights and shit and then we went onto the ship, found out who had set up the little SOS lights - by the way, a very cute exocomp was in charge of carrying it out, but umm..." He paused for a moment as he tried to think about the parts that weren't related to the exocomp, the fellow redhead engineer, or the CEO who loved throwing her spanner around. "Oh! And then we realized they were Undine and like, they started going sicko mode on us, like - attacking us and holding people hostage and stuff, oh, and they tried to get the ship to self-destruct and we stopped that and like, knocked out the Undine and stuff, I dunno how the stuff on the bridge went, but in engineering, Commander Dhúill like, literally fucking dropped from the ceiling to get 'em, soooo... yeah! Uh, probably need someone who was on the bridge to like, confirm what happened there though."

Yoro'clis just silently listened to explanation with a blank face. He understood the majority of what Allan and said but was confused by some of the slag. The Honored Elder knew that there was official Starfleet language, hell he had learned all of it, but none of that was reflected here. Instead the CEO had presented a very strange and convoluted story full of words that the Jem'Hadar had never heard of. He just hoped that he was correctly understanding what had actually happened. If not someone would likely soon clarify.

Oh, he actually understood pretty much all of that. Side-effect of hanging out with this particular human.

As Allan spoke Elwyn listened with a smile on their face and their hands clasped together in front of them, rocking back and forth on their feet as they tried to take in every piece of information they could. The occasional nod was made in response, despite how much they in fact didn't understand. The exocomp sounded cute, though!

Eshen, who had definitely been here the whole time, understood that as well. "Yep, that's about right! I ended up in quite a tussle with one of the Undine, as did the rest of us. The reason so many were acting 'sus' was, of course, because they were Undine in disguise, and when we tussled they were in these quite fearsome 'sicko mode' alternate forms, so be very careful and don't get yourself alone in a room with one of them." Fearsome, he said, but he would be lying if he said he didn't enjoy the fight a little.

Vara'l supresses the urge to raise an eyebrow at that. For someone who happened to be from a military background, what he had just heard while it happened to make some sense, thank you doctors, happened.. to also be very very wordy. "They.. became aware that we knew something was up and suspected they were compromised and after utilized shapeshifting to rapidly close the distance with non-compromised crew members and the away team, as well as all that's been said I'd add, be aware of their speed." He paused. "They will try to close the distance, should they be so minded to, very quickly."

“You’re right: the Undine can be very dangerous when they’re provoked,” she mused, having nodded along with the explanations. There hadn’t been a single eyebrow raise or look of confusion at all to Allan’s wording. It made perfect sense to her. “But the fact that you’ve already fought them is good. You have experience which is good… Because you’re about to fight them again. Well – you might not have to! You might manage to do all of this very sneakily and not have to fight them at all… But unfortunately, knowing the Undine, I doubt they’ll be so unobservant.” There was a pause as she took a sip of her coffee. “Your mission – I was going to say should you choose to accept it, but by being here you already have! – Is to retrieve the replaced members of the AFS New Dawn. The Undine that you took prisoner has revealed to us that they’re still alive, and now we know their location. We also believe that there are more people than just them. Unfortunately, we don’t know who… But scans of their base of operation has suggested that there are more than just five prisoners.”

Senang had been listening quietly so far, having his own questions about some of the words used to describe their experiences on the New Dawn. What the hell was 'sus'? Or 'sicko mode'? No matter, Commander Zai didn't seem to mind at all, she seemed to understand just fine. "Do we have any indication of how many prisoners there may be?" They asked instead, hoping to get a better read on the situation. Were they expected to save everyone? Or was stealth the priority, and did they need to focus on the people they knew were gone? He'd never actually been on an Intelligence mission before, always having stuck to plain old warfare before now.

“It’s been difficult to tell,” Kena replied, sounding apologetic. “One of the Intelligence ships managed to scout the structure they’re being held in. It’s a structure that the Undine use to train so they can get used to the environments of ‘normal’ planets, so they know how to function outside of Fluidic Space. Because of that, all of our scans pick up the Undine as normal species, so we can’t use that to tell them apart from any prisoners. Judging by life signatures, though, and how some were notably weaker than the others… We’re suspecting at least ten.”

Yoro'clis took a few steps forward, deciding it was finally time to ask questions. There were a few very people coming up and flooding Zai with questions after all. The Honored Elder had not been at the last raid of the ship and therefore felt the need to ask a question or two that others would likely already know. He also felt the need to see if there was any plan for what would happen once the group had made their way onto the ship. "Is there any strategy in place for entering the vessel, clearing the vessel, or any amount of teams that you wish for us to divide into?"

The Intelligence officer didn’t seem at all fazed by the Jem’hadar approaching. It was actually quiet interesting to see the level of diversity in this crew! “It’s actually not a vessel – like I say, it’s a structure. A terrasphere, to be precise.” Kena hopped down from the desk and turned around, tapping upon it a couple of times to activate the console’s screen. She was on the wrong side of the console – not at the side where the desk was – so it looked like she was pressing buttons upside down. Whatever it was she was doing worked, and from the centre of the room – empty and devoid of chairs – a holographic display of a terrasphere flickered to life. “They’re these massive space stations. The domed section at the top creates an environment from holographic technology and particle synthesis that can replicate anywhere with near-perfect accuracy. We don’t know what sort of programme they’re running on it, but our scouting scans indicated that it’s some sort of M-class environment. The terrasphere looks like it’s a bit run down – they normally have fourteen generators online, but this guy only has nine – but it’s still got some defences active. The very centre seems to have the most shielding, including transport inhibitors, so we’re presuming that’s where the officers are being held.”

Huh. So a sort of mission impossible heist-style rescue! Copia liked the thought of that. Maybe this wouldn't be so bad for Copia after all.

"That sounds fascinating, honestly. Our scientists would probably love to study the place if they could." Maybe if they took over the whole place with their out of this world combat skills, they could get all the scientists in there to study the terrasphere, but that wasn't really the point of the mission.

"Me. I'm the scientist," he voiced after Eshen, albeit jokingly. But it was also an honest truth - a terrasphere was something unfamiliar and new, and the vast potential of it's study... "By chance, while we are there and suddenly stumble upon any downloadable or grabbable information... should we just go for it?.."

Okay so it was a rescue mission in a structure, but not a normal kind of structure. It was like they were going to be rescuing people on a planet of sorts minus the planet, it seemed, so both survival tactics and tactical tactics were going to be needed! The more Elwyn listened the more the expression on their face turned from bubbly happy fun times to serious and focused, the seriousness of the mission soaking in as the briefing went on.

“Oooh jailbreak.” Vara said as she leaned against the window with almost stars in her eyes. While she had never broken anyone out of jail, the mechanics were somewhat similar to her skillset! “Do we know anything about sensors, internal and external? Are we going to be able to try and do this quietly?”

“They are very cool. You never know, if we manage to kick the Undine out of this one then maybe we could claim it for our own.” You really did never know; Intelligence did love to investigate things. “As for information? Definitely. We managed to get a decent amount from the Undine you guys took prisoner, but anything else is more than useful. Oh, here,” she shoved a hand into one of her pockets and extracted three isolinear chips. “These are adaptable isolinear chips; they’re designed to work with Federation technology but adapt to fit consoles of other factions. It’ll automatically translate and download information once you plug it in. There are three, and you’ll have three away teams, so one per team.” When Vara started asking questions too, the Intelligence officer held up her hands. “Right, wait, okay, too many questions at once! Let’s let me answer one before going onto another, yeah? I only have one mouth and one brain. I can only say limited words at a time.”

She blinked slightly. “Oh, yeah right sorry!”

“Right. So.” She shook her head like she was trying to clear her thoughts and get back to the start of the questions instead of going through them all in her head. “If you look at this map here…” A moment where she turned to the console to change the holographic display, “you’ll see that there are nine blue dots. Those mark the consoles that control the generators. Not only do they make the terrasphere’s fake environment, but they’re also what power the shields and transport inhibitors. We can’t get down into the bowels of the terrasphere to attack the generators directly, but we can get into their environmental section and get to the consoles. If we disable the consoles, we take out the defences – and that way, we can get to the prisoners in whatever this central structure is here.”

Copia thought about it all for a second - and then, after forming a hypothesis in her head, decided to speak up, raising her hand politely. "Sir, like you mentioned, we must practice stealth while in the terrasphere. However, for all that we know, the Undine from the New Dawn may have warned the Undine present on the terrasphere, thus putting them all on alert for any uninvited vessels, especially the Eventide, which may very well be a marked ship in their eyes. How will the Eventide even be able to exist within 3000 meters of the terrasphere without eliciting suspicion from the Undine, if they detect the presence of the Eventide?" (edited)

“One of the Intelligence ships has already managed to get over there without suspicion. I don’t think that the New Dawn managed to get any word to them at all; from what we gathered, they avoided trying to send subspace communications into Fluidic Space at all, because it’s both tricky and easily detectable. Any information was handed over physically at meetings, like when the New Dawn was visiting certain outposts and such. Plus this ship,” she took a sip from her mug with one hand and patted the console behind her with another, like she was petting the ship itself. “Has a warp signature masking device and a cloaking device. It’s the perfect candidate to get in close.”

Copia nodded respectfully in response. "Understood, sir. If I am understanding you correctly, this has become, in the colloquial term, spy versus spy. The Undine were able to quite literally camoflauge themselves at least for a period of time - am I mistaken in saying that, for this mission, we will have to think like them and, for lack of better words, camoflauge ourselves individually in a way as well, if we are already accounting for the Eventide's warp signature masking and cloaking abilities?" (edited)

“Honestly, trying to blend in might be the best way to go,” she mused, having mentioned earlier that they could potentially do things in a more sneaky fashion. “The Undine are going to be pretending to be normal people like us – so there’s a chance that you guys will be able to look like… Look like Undine pretending to be normal people like us, but you’re already normal people like us.” What a way to boggle your brain. “I doubt they’ll stay oblivious forever though, especially once their generators start going down. So even though we want you to blend in, we’re not sending you down there without armour, phasers, and equipment.”

Lisa had been listening in on all of this. She was grateful for the intelligence that had been gathered. She didn’t like going in without any knowledge of what was truly going on. That had earned her a nasty bite wound last time. She assumed abominations like that thing that bit her would be around on the station they were headed to. She would definitely be on guard. But she was here to save the trapped officers. She had known the real Tewari, she was a good Captain and Lisa knew she had to give her all to rescue her. “I agree, blending in for as long as we can is a wise idea. Going in guns blazing gives them more time to lock down the prisoners, which will make it harder to conduct our rescue.”

So stealth will work, but it probably won’t work for long, so they have to make the most of it while it lasts. Thinking about the concept of looking like real people a thought suddenly popped into Elwyn’s head along the same lines, not because they weren’t a Real People™️, but because of what they were on scanners. Raising a hand as if asking a question in school, the Ensign spoke up. “Hi, quick question, does me being an android pose any issues in terms of us being detected when aboard the structure? My life signs don’t show up on any scanners because, well, I don’t have any, but my energy signature will.”

She scratched her chin as she looked to Elwyn, pondering. “Huh, that does throw a spanner into the works. We don’t know if they’re going to be actively paying attention to scans. I’m going to hope they aren’t, because to them, they’re just… Chilling on the terrasphere, learning how to live on an M-class planet. Do you have any sort of in-built energy signature masking capabilities? Or have any devices that could do that? It’d be better to be safe than sorry.”

Copia didn't even think about that! "As am I an android. Unless everyone who is an organic life form acts as if Elwyn and I are hostages to be detained as well, at least, upon arrival? That way once we are no longer in the direct line of sight or suspicion from the Undine we may assist with the remainder of the mission accordingly." (edited)

A little later than she would've liked, but still on time nonetheless, Maya quietly made her way into the Eventide's briefing lounge and listened in fron the background to surmise the bits she may had missed. Hearing out the concerns of the androids, an idea popped to mind and the engineer raised her hand. "If I may interject... we could make an emitter for the two of them that could simulate life signs, at least from the scanners perspective. Its very similar to how the holodeck can emit such signals during training exercises. Not sure how long that illusion could last though, depending on their capablilities."

Vara hummed ad they listened. “Yeah, run a scam on them. That’s pretty smart!” She said with a smile at Maya. “If you’re a comfortable presence, people don’t look too deeply.” (edited)

Copia's eyes twitched as her brain wrapped itself around Maya's idea - and when it fully computed, Copia nodded to Maya approvingly. "I shall support that idea." Welp. Time for Copia to act - she never acted in her whole life. Maybe Eshen could give everyone acting lessons? (edited)

Having not actually realised Copia was an android and not being the kind to assume based on appearance, Elwyn was pleasantly surprised to hear that she was, but focusing on the mission took priority so they responded to the Commander’s questions instead. At least, they were going to before Maya spoke up, at which point a grin spread across their face as they turned to face the Lieutenant. "I was just about to suggest something like that!" Great minds think alike! "I know for some away missions people have previously been able to disguise their biological signature as a different species to go undetected, so I was going to suggest us using whatever device we normally use for that and modify it to disguise our energy signatures!" They said cheerfully, before looking back at the Commander. "To answer your question, Commander, I can't mask my signature, buuut I think we might have just found our solution!"

A grin was given to Maya and Kena clapped her hands together. “Now that sounds like a good idea to me! There’ll still be some time before we reach the terrasphere – it’s a little bit of a way from where we’ll make the rift into Fluidic Space – so I’m sure you guys can uhh… Rustle something up by then. Now that we’ve been over the basics, is there anything else that you’d like to go over? I’d give you the run-down on fighting the Undine but you’ve already been through it, plus I heard that you’ve also already ran a drill about how to engage them in combat, so you’re well ahead of me. I’ll have the computer start analysing your files and allocating you all away teams… So – any questions while it does its work?”

"Thank you, I'll do my best. With help, we could get it done with time to spare!" Maya smiled lightly to the others as she went on about thinking of how exactly to make best use of the time the emitters before their arrival to fluidic space. Though the happy high was somewhat short lived as she was caught off guard by last bits of the Commander's statement, turning a bit pale from the realization.. "T-there was a drill?" Maya whispered under her breath, hoping no one would hear as she scrolled down her PADD and checked when it had taken placed, which she missed. Maybe she could get a run down on what to do later on, that could be enough, right?

Lama stood in the briefing room, having been surprisingly quiet the whole time. He was simply deep in thought is all. "Stealth is my middle name-- well it's actually e-Hei," Lama said with a little laugh. "Yeah, there was a drill, but don't worry about it," Lama whispered back to Maya whom he was towering over standing behind her. Lama was short for his species but clearly still very tall.

As soon as Maya mentioned help speeding the process along Elwyn’s attention immediately turned back to the Engineer with a grin. “I can help! I don’t know much about engineering, but I know my own systems!” The android offered cheerfully, before looking over at Lama. “I don’t have a middle name.” They said with a smile, stating what they had just said completely casually as if it was a normal thing to do such a thing like that.

"I'll let you two get started on your work. The same goes for the rest of you guys -" she spoke up then to address all of the officers gathered. "-If anyone has any more questions then feel free to stay behind, otherwise you can head out and prepare. If you could all replicate your division's armour suits and gather your equipment, and have it ready, and we'll call you all to the transporter room when it's time for us to head over to the terrasphere."

"Aye aye!" Lama saluted and smiled proudly. He did the drills, he studied all the right moves! He was ready! "Oh armour suits! I love the armour suit, I look sexy in armour!" And with that, Lama headed off to go replicate the suit and change in the nearest wash room.

Allan had actually been taking notes as the Intelligence officer spoke - notes such as 'big ass terrasphere' and 'can't get into the bowels :(', and had smiled when the officer patted the console behind her. Classic move. If you didn't show some love to a ship, rumor had it that it would fuck up somehow later on. There must have been some sort of disrespectful person on the original Enterprise, then, because it sure as hell wasn't Scotty mistreating her. 'Look like normal people.. in armor' was the next thing he wrote down. And even though he hadn't said it out loud as an interruption, he wrote 'fucking excellent' before actually writing down Maya's idea for a life sign emitter for the two androids. "Sounds like a plan, thank you," he said with a nod as Zai gave them their orders. He couldn't help but laugh, though, when Lama said something about looking sexy in the armor suit. "Oh, we all look sexy in the armor suit, Lama," he grinned, and then walked over to Elwyn and Maya, "I have two middle names, so that's ought to be enough for the both of us, right?"

Vara'l slipped out of the briefing lounge and headed off to replicate the armour suit and to gather the other equipment that a tactical officer like him needed for this. As he did this he also briefly paused to make additional files available to those who decided to look into the drill that occurred that he reckoned would help them with understanding it if they looked it over.

As the meeting concluded Elwyn grinned at the Commander before turning her attention towards Allan as he approached, giggling lightly at what he said about middle names, the comment about everyone looking sexy in the armour suits washing right over her head. "Hi Allan! Yeah I think that's enough for both of us!" She greeted and then replied cheerfully.

As the briefing ending Vara sighed as she continued to sit by the window and simply watch the stars go by. “Heh, you get so used to the worst of the universe, you forget how beautiful it can be.”

Except for once they went through the rift into fluidic space there were no nice stars any more... Just ominous, swirling orange liquid, like the ship had been plunged into a strangely thick sea.

And he'd been there the whole time take notes and preparing himself mentally for what was to happen. When it was time to replicate the armor suits, he was as usual brutally efficient, and came back into the room suited and equipped in record time. Glancing down at the suit, he chuckled slightly and nodded, mumbling under his breath. "Not half bad...gotta wear something like this on my next date..."

Vara blinked. She stood up and headed for the transporter room,

After a while the briefing was concluded - and a while later after everyone had left, the call went out for officers to report to the transporter room.

Eshen also departed the briefing lounge, headed to the transporter room through #etd-corridors .

Vovvi sighed and collected herself, following the others out as they slowly began to file through the corridor.

After ensuring that he had all that he could need on himself and with himself and also, perhaps, getting stuck besides a window to stare at the gekli for a minute or two, Saren followed the rest to the #etd-corridors .

Without preamble, he made his way out into the corridors and to the transporter room, expecting his team would already be on their way.

Copia left last, making her way down to the #etd-corridors.