Go, No Go

Posted on Tuesday 28 March 2017 @ 15:03 by Captain John "Apollo" Barstow, M.D. & Captain Melody Jones & Commander Caroline Miller & Lieutenant Commander David Tan & Lieutenant Caleb Mitchell & Commander Save'ena (Sav) Tillatix & Major David Scarlet & Lieutenant JG Etain McLaughlin

Mission: The Perez Nebula
Location: Deck 1, Briefing Room
Timeline: Last Day in Dock
3113 words - 6.2 OF Standard Post Measure

ON :

Captain John Barstow stood at the window looking out over the forward section of the saucer section out to the starbase. He was leaning heavily on the window frame with both hands as he thought. It had been a rough few weeks, changes on top of personal stresses had left his head spinning. With Cales departure, the Captain had given Merlin create an extra week leave while he took care of appointing a new exec. But, now they had to get back to work and get the ship squared away for its mission. John took a breath and closed his eyes, pushing all his worry and frustration into that little box in the corner of his mind where he locked away the bad so he could move forward.

David had been back only a day, his venture resolved. His Deputy Chief, Lysia T'Seng, had worked wonders during his absence. Admittedly he was only away from the ship for four days in total, but it impressed upon him how competent she was in her duties. Now though with all the repairs and upgrades finally completed, the Merlin was about to venture out into open space once again. The Captain had yet to inform his Command Staff of the nature of their next assignment, but it would happen, and in the meantime, he needed, though 'needed' might be too strong a word, he wanted, to go over the final reports to ensure there would be no surprises once underway.

He was pleasantly surprised that while the Bridge layout hadn't altered, there 'had' been changes, mainly cosmetic, for example, the carpet was darker, not that it made one iota of difference to the day to day running of the ship, the plexiglass interfaces on all of the stations had been upgraded, more information was available, more options, more scope. He glanced at his chair, realising his disappointment that is appeared to be the same one they had arrived with. He had a flash-back to Mackenzie moaning that the seat she used at the table was old. He'd secretly taken it to maintenance, given it a coat of paint, a bit of new padding, and generally spruced it up. It had taken his six-year-old all of three seconds to see through his ruse.

Melody walked into the briefing room carrying a PADD with her notes on. She stopped when she saw the Captain stood looking out of the window. "Captain?"

John pushed off the bulkhead and pulled the hem of his uniform jacket down before turning, "just thinking, Melody. I think I am coming to understand why Marines are required to retrain before taking command of a starship," the Captain replied before moving over to his seat and sitting down, "how did the homework go?"

Melody took a seat near the head of the table next to the Captain "I've been looking over the specs of our new computer AI. I'm not sure I like the idea of Starfleet using the Merlin as a guinea pig for an untested AI. Remember what happened with the Enterprise and the M-5 Computer. Let's hope that this doesn't end the same way."

Barstow smirked, "well, when you start getting your name mentioned along with the best ships in the fleet that also means you get to be tested on," he replied with a proud chuckle, Merlin was becoming a rising star fast despite it's short time with her new commander and crew, command was taking note of the work they put in and he had heard scuttlebutt that there were a few Admirals on Earth that were surprised he had not gone green and just blown the Romulans and Vulcans out of the stars.

With a last look around the now completed Bridge, he turned and headed to the briefing room ... Entering he could see that only the Captain and first Officer were present.

"Captain, Commander," he said as he moved around the table and took his seat. While the two most Senior Officers spoke he revolved his seat to look out onto the space dock. Across from them was another vessel, smaller but no less useful within the Federation, he could just see the massive space doors, closing now after letting a starship in, or one out to go on her way. They too would pass through those doors soon and on their next assignment.

Lt. Save'ena Tillatix entered the briefing room. She looked about to see who all had arrived so far, all the while fingering the Light Duty Marker near her left lapel of her duty shirt. She moved up to the replicator, asking for a 50/50 cranberry juice/green tea. Taking this, she made her way to the table as she mused she missed having a chance to fly one of the new fighters and hoped to have a chance for a 'dry run' during the new mission.

Picking a far seat, Sav sat down more heavily than she would have liked. She performed a little wave toward Melody, who had been there through thick and thin as her tumultuous past with its deep tentacles had been slowly extricated from her. She was happy the XO, and her bestest friend had fully recovered from the eps shock she had taken when out and about with David. That reminded her of her own surgery as a small shudder passed through her at the thought of 'the mesh was to kill me' trampled through her mind once more. Her body was still feeling pins and needles as the Toluene poisoning was still being flushed from her system, but at least she could now smell, and feel, almost like before that.... that.... she squeezed out a breath to stop those thoughts. Counseling said it would take a long while and to just deal with things, one day at a time.

Caroline entered the room and joined the rest of the officers. "Captain, Commander," she nodded at Bairstow and Melody. The blond doctor took a seat next to Save'ena. She knew this meeting signaled the end of shore leave, a shift she had already been feeling via the patients coming and staff suddenly having an interest in having their medical. She could see no sight of Scarlet. That reminded her. He was yet to report in.

Sav glanced over the person taking a seat beside her. Her sour face brightened a little as she saw it was Doc Caroline. She smiled gently as she whispered, "Hey, Doc... Ahem doin' bettah... some tingling in a skin still... ana nightmares... but doin' bettah."

Caroline placed her hand briefly on her arm and smiled softly. "I am very happy to hear that. The healing is going to take a while but we will be keeping an eye on everything and get you back to full, pain-free health."

David watched the interchange between the Air Group Commander and the Doctor, not out of voyeurism or eavesdropping, but in respect of the fact that Sav was even here, still obviously not back to full health, but wanting to reassure her fellow Officers and indeed the Command Staff that she was well enough if not one hundred percent. He hoped this meeting was to inform them that their extended layover was coming to an end as of the last reports he was privy to, the ship was fit for duty, and apart from a few 'niggling' injuries, so was her crew, so..."

"Good morning," Etain said as she entered the room, the full-length blue dress she wore flowing like water behind her. An old-fashioned leather messenger bag hung from her left shoulder, which she placed on the table before walking to the small replicator in the corner of the briefing room. She quickly returned to the table and took her seat, sitting the class on very cold water on the table. The glass...it was frosted over, which was well outside the parameters of the replicator.

Scarlet breezed into the meeting room and hesitated only a second to find the nearest seat and slide into it. He barely made eye contact with anyone, save for a glance at Jones. Things were shaping up just how he wanted, and an exec meeting talking about long range scans wasn't at the top of his priorities right now.

David was about to ask a question when the Exec' stood and began speaking, he decided it could wait.

Melody cleared her throat "Right then. Now we're all here we can get started. Our mission is a standard recon and patrol of sector five five two on the far border of Romulan space. En route we will be investigating some interesting sights along the way. Melody walked up to the wall monitor and activated it. It brought up the Merlin's course to sector five five two and as Melody narrated each point of interest was highlighted on the monitor.

"First we have an unexplored Mutara Class nebular here, then we have Lazarus star here and finally an M-class planet here. The Nebula has only been observed on long range sensors and displays some unusual energy readings. This star recently went supernova and then re-ignited itself and finally this M-class planet has an ionosphere that will prohibit main transporter function, any away team would have to be shuttled down. There could be turbulence and static discharge. Any questions so far?"

Sav raised her hand, then spoke up, "Will the fighters be involved in any escort duties for these three events? And, are there any sensor modules available that will fit the fighters upgrade modules if so?"

"Thank you, Lieutenant," Melody tuned to Save'ena. "Hopefully this will be a relatively quiet trip so all fighter groups will have a chance to get familiar with the new fighter that have been delivered from Starbase. There are some engineers making some final adjustments to them so they should be ready for test flights any day now. We might have to use them when we reach the nebula as sensor range might be limited. Other than that we won't be needing you until we reach our assigned patrol station where it will be standard patrol protocol. Upgraded sensor pallets are being installed as part of the upgrades. Is that ok?"

Sav nodded and said, "Sounds great, XO. I'll get shifts worked out for the training and also have fighters perform escort checks for further training when Merlin is taking her time from one place to another."

Melody continued "Also during this mission, we will be acting as a test bed to a new AI that Starfleet Command is thinking about rolling out across the fleet."

Melody walked back over to her chair. She turned to Barstow "I think that just about covers everything Captain."

"Just one query Commander," David said, "The planet orbiting the Lazarus Star, is there any information as to whether there's an indigenous population, or have previous scans shown it to be lifeless ?"

Melody turned to Tan. "The planet is actually in a nearby star system and while it is currently uninhabited, there is evidence of an extinct civilization. I managed to get some information with the help of Mister Carson, the ship's librarian. There's not much to go on I'm afraid. The planet is called Ceylon 6. Known locally as Cothore. There was a bit on the local mythology. It says that the inhabitants were referred to as “Miestro Tempro or Masters of time.”

Sav flinched a little at hearing the final words of Melody as they invoked the shared dream the two had several weeks earlier. She grasped her glass of cranberry green tea and whispered out, "Custard and Fish Sticks."

Caroline shivered at the mention of "Miestro Tempro or Masters of time." That didn't sound good. Then she looked on at Save'eena confused at her choice of language.

Sav felt the stare and turned to look at Caroline. She leaned over and whispered, "A weird dream Melody ana Ah shared.. involving a Time Lord as well as Custard and fish sticks.. Fingers.. Fish Fingers they were called. Ah'll.. say more later."

David looked at Sav, not quite catching the whispered comments, but picking up on the seemingly slurred vocalization.

"I look forward to it," Caroline grinned. It sounded a very odd dream but Sav was dreaming about things that were not nightmares now and as odd, time lordy and custard fish sticks as it was that was a good thing.

Sav now raised her hand, and when acknowledged asked, "Will any protocols be put in place for dealing with possible unknown temporal occurrences?"

Scarlet had already brought up his padd and began running over his staffing for who still required more training and what he could shuffle around to ensure his security teams were ready for the unknown.

Melody smiled "Temporal protocol are always put into place after the fact....... or is that before...." she chuckled. "I Hope nothing serious arises, we could do without a visit from temporal investigations, right Captain?"

Barstow had sat back listening, letting Melody present since charting the course had been the first thing he'd assigned her when she's come aboard. The Captain chuckled and sat forward, "yes, let's not have to bring them in. They have a habit of thinking they already know best. Now, I had the Commander plot us a course where we could do a little scientific study. However, there is one other piece of Intel," he said and zoomed in on the nebula, "along with the ruins on the Time Master civilization on the planet we also have this here. This nebula is one even the Romulans will not go near anymore because they have had ships go in and never come out," Barstow said and let that hang in the room for a moment.

"Now, with what Commander Jones found out about the planet we seem to have a Bermuda Triangle and Atlantis correlation going on here. It'll be interesting to see if the missing ships are related to the planet."

Sav's eyes narrowed at this information. That there was a mystery of disappearing ships made it that much more dangerous. She thought for a second, then asked, "XO, Captin, Isa there any tether beams on board fer attaching to the fighters? Ifin this place is a ship stealin' area, fighter reconnaissance flights with Tethers would help to keep track of each other, and if one gets sucked in, all telemetry ana communications would be recorded, ayuh."

Melody thought for a moment "We should be able to set up a secure data-link between the fighters and the Merlin. As well as Comms, it would carry telemetry and sensor information. The only problem the range will be limited. You won't be able to stray too far without the signal breaking up in the nebula." She turned to Tan "Can you set that up Lieutenant?"

David didn't realize he'd been spoken to for a second, then replied:

"We can send out remote transponder relays if need be, but if we narrow the range we should be able to get what we need, Communications and Tactical would be better suited to make the sensor modifications," he said.

"Lieutenant Tan, I'd like for you to head that," John said and sat forward, "Work with Lieutenant Scarlet to get it set up," he added, giving Scarlet a brief nod before smiling, "We have a few thousand year old mystery to solve, let's see if we can beat Enterprises record of dusting off answers to old mysteries," he added with a grin and looked around the table.

David looked across the table toward the Security Chief. He'd already begun to think on the problem at hand and was pondering the idea of a narrow-beam carrier emitted from one of the phaser arrays that could essentially directly link and of the ships craft with the ship herself. There would need to be a safeguard, so should the weapons systems be needed the link could be disengaged instantly, returning the phasers to their primary use. While the Captain continued he put the idea onto a PADD. In a lull in the conversation he slid the device over to Scarlet:

"Take a look at that Lieutenant, do you think it's a workable idea ?"

Scarlet simply glanced over the idea and frowned. Anything that could add time for the phasers to come online bothered him. He looked up at Lieutenant Tan and sighed. "I'll have to run simulations to see the delay in converting the phasers back." He looked back down at his own padd for a moment before looking back up at Lieutenant Tan. "The idea has definite merits which will be investigated as well."

Sav went to speak up, then held her peace. If the Merlin did not have any tractor beam tethers on board, then it didn't. She would let those in the know do their jobs as she went about planning for her fighter pilots. She glanced at Caroline, wondering if the Doc would let her fly in any of those recons. She could do it very well, but, should she let Doc Miller know about her ability? That was the sticky part. Right now, only Melody knew.

"Security will be ready to act if any mysteries turn up sir. If the Enterprise taught us one thing about this type of work, it's that we need good people in the field or it turns into a damn meat grinder." Scarlet said grimly. The Enterprise had a long and storied history, much of the older stuff read as horror stories for those getting into Security.

Melody chuckled "Lets hope we have better luck eh? She looked around the table at the various faces. "Dose anyone have anything else they wish to add?"

Sav shook her head in the negative. It was not up to getting the fighters ready and making the case to let her go out in one.

"Alright then, with the exception of the Counselor, everyone dismissed," John said and stood up, "Melody, you have the Bridge, I'll fill you in later," he added with a nod and motioned the counselor over to the chair nearest the head of the table.

Melody stood "Aye Sir. The last of the supplies and new crew members should be aboard within the hour. We should be ready to get underway by then."

OFF:

Captain John "Apollo" Barstow
Commanding Officer
USS Merlin

&

Lieutenant Commander Melody Jones
Executive Officer
USS Merlin

&

Lieutenant Commander Caroline Miller
Second Officer / CMO
USS Merlin

&

Lieutenant Caleb Mitchell
Chief Counselor
USS Merlin.

&

Lieutenant David Tan
Chief Operations Officer
USS Merlin

&

Lieutenant Save'ena Tillatix
CAG / Uroboros Squadron Leader
USS Merlin

&

Lieutenant David Scarlet
CSTO
USS Merlin