Galorndon Core Briefing

Posted on Wed Apr 29th, 2020 @ 9:19am by Rear Admiral Farenia Meowlith & Captain Enalia Telvan & Commander Rita Paris & Lieutenant Commander Mnhei'sahe Dox
Edited on on Wed Apr 29th, 2020 @ 1:57pm

Mission: Return to the Core
Location: Captain's Ready Room
Timeline: 2397

While these meetings weren't common, they were getting a bit more so than Enalia liked as they required the Hera to come to a stop and encrypt all com lines just for an intel briefing like this. Still, the subject matter was quite concerning from what little she knew so far. The Persephone and her captain - Naraan Seria, had detected not only the Iurret, but half a dozen other Romulan ships crossing the neutral zone.

This was why they were now in a three-way call between Meowlith, Naraan, Enalia, and Rita.

While Meowlith and Naraan were holographically sitting on the couch, the Trill captain leaned back in her chair and thought about this first tidbit of information. "We have a course and heading from their ion trails... but why would they be so blatant about it? It has to be a trap."

"Agreed, Captain," Paris piped up. "If she is being this incautious it's because she wants us to follow her and she's laying a trap of some sort. The question is, what now?"

"Normally, I would say we spring the trap..." Enalia began, looking over the readings one more time.

Farenia interrupted with a wave of her hand. "But with almost a dozen signals, it makes the Kobayashi Maru look like a walk in the park."

The spotted woman scoffed slightly at that remark. "I don't think I have to remind my Academy ops officer that that scenario was a literal walk in the park for me. However... I think you're right."

"Well, for the rest of us who are simply mortal, this is quite the troubling turn of events." Said the tall, stern-looking Cervan woman in command crimson. Her eyes had a half-lidded, judgmental expression and her jet black hair was up in a large bun on the back of her head, and between the slightly olive complexion and slight points on her ears, indicative of her race being an offshoot of the Vulcans.

Captain Naraan crossed her holographic legs and looked at a PaDD in her hand. "Long-range sensors picked up her trail behind a trade convoy passing a checkpoint near the Barolian trade route. That's not far from Galorndon Core. The Persephone is currently on maneuvers but at high warp, we would only be a few hours behind the Hera if we adjusted course now."

"So she's going back to the Galorndon Core, where her space station..." Paris rolled her eyes to the overhead as she concentrated, pulling the call numbers from memory. "336 was located, where she was experimenting on the corpse of a titan. Which I kind of handed off to the Asgardians as a peace offering to prevent Odin from doing something a lot of us would regret. Not my finest shining moment in Starfleet, but it was a solution for the moment. Real question is, what is she doing out there now? Was there something we missed, was there a cosmic phenomenon she was studying, is she trying to rendezvous with someone or something out there?"

"What we've got is a lot of questions, and no answers," the throwback officer observed. "If it is a trap, since she stopped short of a bread crumb trail, clearly she wants us there. So the motivation is a mystery and her plan is the same. Do we have any way to prognosticate her plans, or do we have any more data?"

The admiral pulled up a bit more data on one of the ships they had detected. "Well, one of the ships has four nacelles and a new core big enough to move a station the size of starbase 336... But its tachyon and ion scans put it at one of the smallest ships in the group. There's no station for them to move, though."

Leaning forward slightly, the Cervan captain of the Persephone raised an eyebrow. "That Romulan Singularity drive was what originally tripped the sensors. It was putting out a massive amount of energy that caused their cloaks to be ever so slightly imbalanced."

"Commander Paris, you said that the Asgardian's took claim of the station after the incident? Was it not removed from our space through some sort of... trans-spatial rift that this... Odin... opened?" Captain Naraan said, looking at the Top Secret data on her PaDD that the Admiral had shared with her.

Sighing, Paris nodded. "Yes, that's pretty much how it happened. Couldn't tell you HOW he did it, but he did. You don't think she's poking around trying to reopen that spatial gate, do you? The hazards inherent in that process, even from what limited amount I know about the process, renders it practically suicidal if you can't guide, monitor, and power the process. Although one cryptic note I did get about it was that it was a lot like a soap bubble- the key is to penetrate without permeating, if that makes sense in a cosmic sort of way."

Raising a brow, the holographic representation of the Cervan Captain pondered Paris' question. "I would not have the first idea how such a thing could be guided or monitored... but powered. That singularity drive was producing a significant amount of energy. Enough to be detectable through a very good cloak. If she has the means to guide or monitor such a process... opening a spatial rift... that might be what she will use to power it."

"That said, it is pure, wild conjecture from this position." Captain Naraan concluded as she sat back slightly.

"Sounds like she wants her space station back," Rita quipped with pursed lips, the fulsome first officer wagged her index finger as she conjectured. "What are the odds that wherever he put it, Odin just left it there once he was done with it?" Paris mused, turning to Captain Telvan. "I suppose if she's after it, and she thinks she's somehow going to open a space warp to retrieve it, maybe if it isn't in the same spot we might just be able to foil her in advance this time? Perhaps we should send a communique to the Asgardians?"

"Yeah, that sounds like something he'd do. I'll send a message as soon as we're done here, but in the meantime, I'm pretty sure the Hera still outperforms them on sensors even if we'll be severely outgunned." Enalia tapped at her desk a moment, working out a plan of attack. "We'll assume for now that Rendal does indeed have some information we don't know about, and has figured out a way to recover Starbase 336 from wherever Odin stashed it with the Bifrost. We'll engage full stealth mode and approach at warp six from the northern pole of the sun, taking passive scans to minimize our chances of being detected. If I remember right, the sun put out a lot of extra EM radiation from the poles which should mask any ions."

"Captain Naraan, if you could stay at a distance and scan the system at a range they can't detect you at, I think that would be for the best since your stealth plating isn't quite up to quite the same specs as ours." Tapping her desk a few more times, the buxom captain nodded slightly. "Besides, if things go poorly, we'll need cavalry, and it seems you're it."

"Then the Persephone shall be at your disposal, Captain Telvan," Naraan said with a respectful nod.

"Thank you, Captain," Enalia replied, returning the nod.

"Well, sounds like we have a plan," Pris summarized, stroking her chin as she pondered the problem at hand. "Maybe Odin could offer us insight into how spatial bridges between locales operate, so we can be doing a bit more than trying to analyze the scans of the times we have encountered their Bifrost space bridge to determine how this all might play out. Meanwhile, assuming this IS a trap, perhaps we should employ some smaller support craft in the system, just to add an element of unpredictability to the encounter?"

"And by support craft am I to assume you mean the ones from R&D?" Enalia asked with a grin. "You have an idea?"

"Our standard operating procedure would be to warp in and keep everything self-contained on the Hera," Paris pointed out, then proceeded to elaborate on her thought process. "By fielding a number of support craft, it will be a large scale change in our tactics. Since we've all decided this is a trap and we've all decided that this is her expecting us to react like Starfleet, let's not react like Starfleet. Instead, let's arrive outside the system, deploy a dozen support craft and deploy into the system in a search and destroy pattern so that the tactics she is counting on will immediately be called into question, if not nullified. A change in tactics is a sound tactical plan, and changing our Modus Operandi will likely have some psychological warfare effect on Rendal. Thoughts?"

"That sounds pretty much like how a certain someone beat the Kobayashi Maru," the admiral replied with a grin. "I think it's an interesting plan."

The spotted Captain nodded thoughtfully, running over the scenario in her head. "Far be it for me to object then. We'll approach at stealth, then launch a small fleet to catch her by surprise. We keep transporter locks on all personnel in the support craft, though. That means you're on the bridge." Enalia waggled one finger at her first officer.

"Somebody's gotta fly the ship..."