Old Friends
Posted on Wed Dec 6th, 2023 @ 8:50pm by Captain Ewan Darrow & Rear Admiral Yoshi Minawara
Mission:
Shakedown Shake-Up
Location: Observation Lounge
2099 words - 4.2 OF Standard Post Measure
Ewan frowned as he stood staring out the small window that had been afforded to the ship's Observation Lounge. Being a ship designed for combat and border enforcement windows in the small sleek, or rather not so sleek at the moment, Nelson, seemed more like a luxury than a requirement as any hole could and was deemed a risk in a prolonged battle. A point of which Ewan found rather funny himself considering they were a space navy where they and their enemies threw massive amounts of energy weapons and explosive projectiles at each other that could gouge holes in the very armour the windows had been removed for.
That however was not what Ewan had been considering as he watched the last bits of debris from the Republic shuttle be tractor-beamed under the leading edge of the saucer section and down under the ship heading towards one of the shuttle bays or cargo bays, he wasn't sure what one. No, Ewan was more considering the ramifications of the very arrival of the ship within the Quadrant, and he liked none of them.
Ewan turned and tapped at the comm's panel again, the connection still going through the encrypt phase as the holo emitters and cameras warmed up. Holo-communication was a lot more personal and better for really gauging one's reactions. Still, the increased data loads over longer distances and with the added encryption needed for a conversation like this, it sometimes took a while for the initial connection to form. Every advancement had its downsides after all.
A voice filtered down through the speakers in the overhead, "Captain connection is established, routing you to the Admiral now." The communications officer at Esquimalt commented before there was a slight click of the Ensign disconnecting from the call.
The Admiral had finally chased off the last of the various civilian members that had crowded his space and been chattering away at him. His annoyance had been palpable when the door had hissed open and one of his Yeomen had snuck in and stood looking somewhat frazzled at the doorway. "Sorry to bother you Sir," the younger man said, stiffening up. "We are just dealing with the communications traffic and local space control chaos, which is finally coming back together. All stations are coming back green and communications has fully reestablished connections with all relays. We seem to be back in order."
Yoshi turned to face the man, from where he stood pouring himself a coffee from the third pot of the day - Martin was going to kill him. "This could have been a comms message Ensign," he said, sipping from the coffee before carrying on. "I assume there is a reason you're here physically?"
"Yes sir! We have fifteen priority messages coming through. Athena and Arcadia are seeing if we require assistance. Also the Nelson has a priority communication coming through from Captain Darrow requesting an immediate response." Yoshi scratched at his face, thinking it over.
"Put through the Nelson first, and send Athena and Arcadia that we are fine, we don't require assistance at this time, though have the Arcadia recalled as soon as she is done her supply mission, we will need to have her take on establishing new relations with the surrounding outposts."
From Yoshi's perspective it was Ewan who appeared, standing in the middle of his office where space had been set up to allow for it. Turning to face his friend, Yoshi smiled. "Ewan," Minawara said, letting a sigh out as he composed himself somewhat. "I feel like we just talked, sorry about the communication issues, we aren't where we are supposed to be. What can I do for you?"
Ewan nodded as Yoshi appeared before him in the small but functional Lounge, "Well it was only a few hours ago discussing the.... issues that the Nelson has." Ewan replied as he reached for the mug of tea before he paused, "Wait did you just say you're not where you're supposed to be? Did... did the starbase move?"
It was a moment where Yoshi paused, then stiffened. "Ah yes. You remember that deep space transport program, the one using quantum entangled microsingularities? Great news is it works, bad news is if there is something that causes an issue across subspace you can swap the places of the entire apparatus it is attached to. Everyone is fine." His eyes darted to the section of his desk and grimmaced. "Well, physically fine. Emotionally..." He put on a half smile that showed far more of his tired eyes. "I'll send the details of where to return to, but what can I do for you?"
Ewan's mouth opened as to respond to Yoshi's statement of the entire starbase literally being transported from one place to the other via essentially what was quantum teleportation via a few extra steps before he stopped, that was a much larger headache then he wanted to open at the moment, he already had his own. "We've run into an old.... friend. I suppose," Ewan said as he reached to the table beside him and tapped a few buttons. A holographic photo appeared between him and Yoshi showing the shuttle that had dropped into existence infront of the Nelson. "Recognize the design? Might have to think back a bit, its been a few years."
The Admiral's eyes narrowed as he studied the design, looking it over. It looked bashed together, but it also looked familiar. "Republic of the First Worlds, right? The racist avians, they hated us, still showed up for the Transtellar Relay. I remember them. This doesn't look fully like one of their designs though, something about it is off." Looking from the design to Ewan, his eyes narrowed further, as he studied his friend now. "Normally I'd assume this was an ongoing curiosity, but you put through a priority message... What mess have you gotten into?"
"This one found us, technically." Ewan said as he waved a hand and the image disappeared from between the two, "That shuttle dropped out of high warp approximately thirty minutes ago, the crew is still going over the preliminary tests and downloads but theres no way that thing got here from that far away simply using warp. Based off of the underlying structure being based on a Federation design, so Im told stripped and rebuilt, and the transponder coding it was giving off." He paused for a moment as he considered what he was able to say, "Yoshi I think they got the Gravition Catapult working again and we just found a test ship."
A pause hung in the space, and in that moment Yoshi understood why every Admiral, regardless of age he'd met had grey hair. His face scrunched up, and he took a deep breath that ended in a sigh. It was bad enough that the Federation had further contact with the Republic - they had been an absolute nightmare back in the day. Worse, two years after the Vesta had gone missing the situation had turned sour. The catapult was used one last time to send everyone home, before it was supposed to have been destroyed. This meant somewhere someone had fucked up beyond compare, and at this exact moment it was somehow his problem again to deal with. "Computer display coordinates of the Beta Quadrant Graviton Catapult - Authorization Minawara Eight, Niner, Six, Zee-ro, Omega, Epsilon, Six." There was a pause as his Brass level clearances kicked in, declassifying the location to him. His eyes studied the sector of space, before looking back to Ewan.
"Under no circumstances is the pilot of that ship allowed unsupervised," he started with, stating the obvious for official record more than anything else. "You're to make for the Cygnet System at best possible speed. The Cadenza,Aria, and Hadfield will meet you there. The system is under lockdown, but the catapult is still functional as is the staircase there." Cygnet now acted as effectively a large military installation, with access to the catapult effectively off-limits to anyone. Once the intent had been for a civilian facility there to allow shipping and deep space colonization. "Treat your guest as best you can, try and maintain some form of diplomacy. But our relations with the Republic aren't great. This is going to become a matter of Starfleet Security and Intelligence, and while we are at it, I am sure diplomatic affairs. I'll let Izzy know, add it to the pile of chaos..."
Ewan nodded, "Security is already watching but they're all holograms I'll make sure to put some of the Marines on the pilot and keep them there. Martin is dealing with him now, the shuttle... well lets just say by our standards they likely tested far too early." Ewan shook his head, even if the Republic had managed to reactivate the catapult they obviously hadn't managed to reactivate all of the safety systems.
"Operations and Engineering are stripping the shuttle and its computer to the bone and rebuilding it. We'll have every drop of information that thing recorded for our own records. I'll be instructing Saffiyer to install a worm into the computer that will wipe all of the records when it gets back to the quadrant too." Ewan said as he ran through his mental list of things he had already determined would need to be done. "Im going to task them with figuring out how to get one into the catapult's operating system as well but we'll need access to those records. But we'll need to figure out a more... permanent solution for the Delta side."
The pause returned as the connotation of what Ewan had just stated hung in the air. A thought occurred to Ewan, "So... do you remember that probe idea Intelligence came to the QSD team with? Do you think they ever built it?"
Every bit of Yoshi wanted to commandeer a ship and head to the site to look at that ship, to crawl over the data with his crew. He also knew that was no longer his place, though the slight disappointment still found a way to creep onto his face. "No, the test fit hadn't worked. But that was a first-generation Quantum Slipstream Drive. With the modern, smaller ones, it could be made to work." Yoshi didn't have to ask where this was going, he knew his friend well enough at this point, that he could only nod. "I'll see about having one put together. Won't be ready for when you get there, but it could be set up. Sent on its way. As for the ship's data, send it here when you are done. I'll have the local intelligence teams crawl all over it, see what they can't glean."
"Let me know then," Ewan let out a sigh as he moved to the replicator and tapped in an order for a tea, "We'll send everything we get back to the station when its all downloaded." There was the familiar hum of the replicator creating matter out of thin air before Ewan grabbed the mug and lifted it to his face taking a deep whiff of the fragrant tea. It settled him a bit as he turned back to Yoshi's hologram.
"This was not what we needed, not now. Months of routine patrols, missions, science and everything always seem to happen all at once. The reality thing, the station... moving? Now this." Ewan shook his head as he took a sip of his tea, "You think this is what it was like for Archer, Kirk, all those early explorers?"
"Kirk and Archer for sure," Yoshi said with a laugh. "Though I think the little Errant Starship novel might have been more of a true story if we were living like Kirk, from what I remember reading on Command Course." A chime in the distance caught Yoshi's attention and he sighed. "I have to go, it appears there are some more annoyed people coming to complain. Good luck Ewan, keep me in the loop." With that, he killed the comms system and turned his head towards the door, fading from Ewan's view.
Ewan chuckled at the thought of that horrible novel as Yoshi disappeared from sight. Turning to look out the small viewport the Observation lounge afforded on the warship, Ewan stared out at the stars.
When did exploring become so complicated?
