It's Always Bad News

Posted on Sat Mar 9th, 2019 @ 6:13pm by Commander Rita Paris & Captain Enalia Telvan & Rear Admiral Farenia Meowlith & Lieutenant Mona Gonadie & Maica III 47

Mission: Gaia Reborn
Location: USS Hera, Deck 1, Captains Ready Room

Sitting on the bridge in the big chair was not a duty with which Commander Rita Paris was unfamiliar. She had held the bridge when she was a LTJG on the USS Farragut, then on the USS Exeter. The USS Hera was not a Constitution-Class starship, the mightiest of the line back in her day. Heck, she wasn’t even a direct descendant. The Hera was far more advanced, larger, of a completely different design, and she barely resembled the old ships of the line of the 5 year mission days. If anything, she looked more closely related to the Dreadnaught class USS Vengeance or USS Conquest.

Not that either vessel had existed in this reality, and the only person in existence who would understand the reference was Sonak. Rita remembered though… the vengeance had devastated her home town of San Francisco, and in a heated battle that she’d masterminded with Sonak’s help, they had defeated the Conquest as well. Without destroying their starship as the crew of the Enterprise had, which gave her no small degree of pride.

Although that mission, like the rest of her career, existed only in memory now. Enalia Telvan had taken a lot on faith taking on a stranger from another reality, and Rita Paris had striven hard to validate that faith in a Starfleet that had only an unremarkable service record that ended when the lost lieutenant have disintegrated screaming on a transporter pad in 2260, on board the USS Constitution. Her counterpart in this universe bore only a superficial resemblance to her, as did Sonak’s counterpart. Mnhei’sahe Dox’s favorite theory was that Rita and Sonak were from the Holvid Universe, where everyone was prettier or more handsome, as if they were attractive modern actors playing the parts of historical figures.

As it no longer existed, Rita was tempted to start calling their universe of origin the Holovid Universe. After all, there was exactly one other person to argue the point with her, and he didn’t care what she called it.

Bridge duty was, oddly enough, one of her least favorite things about the job. While she could review and run reports from her office or the bridge, Rita was a hands-on officer, and she preferred to personally check on departments and follow up on reports in person. On the average she tended to log in about 30 kilometers a day at least, marching to and fro across the great starship in the course of her duties. But today the Captain was stuck in meetings with the brass, which she found mind-numbing and tedious, so that meant the first officer needed to hold the bridge for her. Which was all part of the duty, which Rita accepted without complaint, although it was certainly not her favorite thing.

Sending a text message to Maica, she advised the captain’s bride that her wife would likely very much benefit from a luncheon delivery, and seeing Maica would likely brighten the Captain’s otherwise dreary day. Which might have been presumptuous, but one of Rita’s many duties was looking out for the commanding officer’s mental health as well as her physical safety, and the holographic hostess always seemed to bring a smile to the Trill captain’s face.

A message came back almost immediately that she was on her way with something special and before long the holographic hottie was stepping out of the turbolift with a large lunchbox full of food and a thermos. "Hey Rita, I made extra spice tea if you'd like to join us."

"I would love to, but it's alpha shift and I'm covering for the Captain. You two go have some time, eh?" the first officer declined with a friendly smile and a wave from the command chair. "I'll try to make sure the universe doesn't erupt in crisis."

Having just jinxed it, no sooner had Maica entered Enalia's ready room, a call came in from their favorite Commodore, as reported by the Ensign at operations. "Commander, a priority one transmission is incoming from Commodore Meowlith. Should I put it on screen?"

Rolling her eyes at the cosmos, Rita suspected that Enalia would take it in her ready room, as she was secretive by nature. But Rita was sitting in the chair, and if the crew couldn't be trusted on the bridge, then why were they here? "Captain to the bridge. Onscreen, Ensign SAG."

It only took a moment for Enalia to get on the bridge and in that time, Meowlith had already popped onto the viewscreen and introduced herself to Rita. "Commander, I wish I could say this was a social call, but it never is, is it? Remember that dark matter ion storm you discovered that the USS Amaterasu has been researching?"

"We were out there a few weeks ago, dropping off a chunk of it that had been trapped on the Hera. Has there been a chance in the status of the storm?" the gold-clad commander queried, curious if some new development had occurred, as perhaps something wondrous had occurred.

"Yes, and you're not going to like it," Meowlith nodded to Enalia as she came up beside Rita, motioning for her to stay in the center chair. "It's formed into what we've been able to identify as the Titan Gaia. It's attacked three planets with some sort of protomatter projectiles and literally transformed barren rocks into lush planets covered in hostile flora and fauna in a matter of hours."

"Define hostile flora and fauna, ma'am?" Waking up and terraforming planets sounded like something wondrous if Gaia was seeding life where there was none. Seeding it with life hostile to any other life sounded a lot less wondrous.

"Dinosaurs and carnivorous plants big enough to eat them," Farenia defined. "On top of that, Gaia is heading towards a system that has primitive cave dwelling life on a class M planet in it now."

Definitely not wondrous.

"What are your orders, ma'am?" Paris asked, since the Captain seemed content to observe. Rita had come tot he conclusion that often, Captain Telvan deliberately stood by to see how Rita would handle situations, much like she herself did with the junior officers. It made her appreciate the room to gain experience, as unlike Stuart before her, Rita didn't have to clean up Enalia's messes.

The Commodore got right to it. "The Amaterasu and Photon will maintain a perimeter while the Hera finds a way to deal with the Titan. We'll monitor the situation and do our best to keep any traffic out of your way. Gaia is at the following coordinates now. She's kind of hard to miss... Also, once Gaia is done with the current system, the current path takes her directly to Trill."

"We'll find a way to halt her rampage, Commodore." Paris said with a confidence she didn't necessarily feel. How in Hades were they going to talk a titan out of regenerating every planet she came across, making it hostile to humanoid life? Shrugging, the ancient astronaut brushed it aside. That was a problem for later than sooner. For now, time to get to work. "Hera out."

As the main viewer returned to the view of the warp field sliding ahead, Paris swiveled the chair to Ops. "Ensign SAG, you have those coordinates? Good, share them with flight control please." The chair spun again, this time pointing to flight control. "Helm, plot us a course. What's our ETA at Warp 9.2?"

Mona punched in the calculations and came up with a number pretty quick. "Course laid in, Ma'am. ETA four days, six hours. Three hours before she hits her next target if the math the Commodore sent stays the same."

Tapping away at the control panel on the captain's chair, Paris ran the numbers, plotting a course herself. "Recalculate for warp 9.4, Ensign Gonadie, and lay in this course. That'll give us an extra 14 hours to analyze, determine what we're dealing with and figure out how to stop her."

"Confirmed. Not sure the engines will handle that speed for that long, but it'll at least buy us more time, Ma'am," replied Mona, recalculating for warp 9.4. "Ready to engage on your order."

"Alert Engineering to brace for the strain- we just got her all polished up at a starbase, so she should hold together," Paris opined, checking for the nod from the Captain, which was given, then she gave the command.

"On our way. Warp speed, Miss Gonadie."

"Roger that. Computer confirms that all personnel are aboard and docking authority has cleared us for departure. Warp speed in three... Two... One..." Mona finished her manual piloting and tossed the ship into warp, starlines appearing on the viewscreen.

Enalia grinned as she relaxed. "Looks like we're already heading back into the fire."

"Computer, show us a representation of the systems of Trill, stone age civilization system Flint 2, and the Gaia entity relative to our projected time of arrival," the curvaceous commander called out, then turned to eye the captain. "If we're going into the fire, we may as well take a look at the forge."

The viewscreen shifted to display the requested map of the Trill sector, overlaying the projected path of the Titan Gaia and the projected location. Enalia whistled softly at the projections. "It looks like if we can't stop her, we'll have three days before a pre-industrial civilization... Then five more days until she hits a Trill colony... And two more days before Trillius Prime..."

"Assuming she doesn't change course," Rita studied the star display then called out another order. "Computer, please add an overlay to show any other inhabited systems within reach of her at current speed on an alternate heading. Speaking of which, Ensign, how fast is Gaia moving?"

"Warp eight," came the reply from the computer as a few alternative paths were calculated, including one which included the system that Enalia was actually raised in and had her family's orbital fortress.

"Well if it wasn't personal already..." Enalia muttered.

"Trill or the Fortress. Here's hoping she isn't moving with a grudge against you- but why would she?" Rita asked hypothetically. "Ops, coordinate with the Photon and the Amaterasu. Get us their sensor reports of the storm, the transformation from the storm into whatever state Gaia inhabits now, and the scans of the protomatter planetary terraforming- say that ten times fast."

"Get the data to Science for analysis. Get some geologists on just how she's doing this to these planets and why- seeding them with life that's hostile to humanity to what end, that's the big question. Is she mad at us or is this part of some bigger picture." Paris paused at that and cocked her head. "Somehow I never imagined titans terraforming planets at high speed would be a part of the daily report, yet here we are. Another glorious day in Starfleet. Orders, Captain?"

The spotted captain performed a Picard maneuver on her uniform top and turned towards her ready room. "Steady as she goes, Commander. As soon as we have some data to go on we can start our analysis. Also, prep a team for a survey mission to one of these... New Genesis worlds? Proto-worlds? Whatever the Commodore and her teams are calling them. Full MACO arms and armor with quarantine sample protocols."

"Aye Captain... steady as she goes."