Resuming Command

Posted on Mon Feb 22nd, 2016 @ 1:12am by Captain Enalia Telvan & Commander Angelica Fairchild

Mission: Talosian Perversions
Location: Captain's Ready Room

Enalia was still a bit headachey from time to time since that energy being that had been inhabiting her, then the ship, had fled but she was at least able to resume her duties. She was glad that Angel had been up to the challenge and that Amelia had had the knowledge to draft that flight plan on a PaDD unassisted. She was either mad or a genius and Enalia wasn't sure there was a difference between the two at times.

This was why she was sitting in her ready room now, rather than resting on the holodeck or even in astrometrics or her quarters. That slingshot maneuver had dragged the Hera into the future... It was only by three days, and could be easily explained by the gravimetric time dilation so close to the binary neutron stars, but it was still disturbing. In that time, they had received new orders and were listed as missing for almost a day before communications were reestablished with Starfleet.

And their new orders... They were already late for their scheduled rendezvous with the USS Solstice and the USS Prospero. The Solstice had been out here a while now, the Rhode Island class ship having been outfitted specifically for researching this area of space in-depth. The USS Prospero, though... The small Centaur class had been out here a fair bit longer and had been thought lost more than once - a testament to the density of the JFS47 stellar nursery.

And the mission? It was a simple resupply rendezvous. They needed supplies and the Hera had enough to keep both ships running around out here for another twenty years. Hence the new assignment - they were to be a semi-permanent fixture running supplies from the nearest starbase or gathering them themselves for the other, much smaller ships in the area. In essence, the Hera was now a mobile outpost.

Officially...

It was the classified portion of their orders that she wasn't happy about... And that was something she needed to discuss with her first officer in private. "Computer, please inform Commander Fairchild that her presence is requested in my ready room at her earliest convenience." With an affirmative series of chirps, Enalia knew the message had been sent.

'Earliest convenience' was a joke. It had to be; Angel didn't know of a single other Starfleet captain who said it. Only Enalia, and though Angel usually treated it like a 'come now' request, this time she did take her time getting there. Since she'd been invited, she didn't bother ringing the chime, just tapped in her access code to open the door.

"There you are," Enalia said, not looking up from her terminal. She just waited for the door to close then pressed the security lockdown trigger on her desk. "What do you know about Talos 4?"

Angel raised an eyebrow at her, not liking the sound of the door locking behind her. "Enough to know that there is no way in hell I'm letting you take this ship there. Dare I ask why?"

"Starfleet Intelligence reports that two ships have been there. While we're running supplies for the ships in the area, we're to make sure no others have been compromised." Enalia explained, looking up from her terminal and turning it so Angel could see the profiles of an intrepid class and a Klingon ship. "And no, we're not going there."

"The Intrepid-class is the Katana... everyone knows that story. Supposedly they let the crazy bastard out of prison, if you can believe that." The Klingon ship though... Angel wasn't sure about the Klingon ship. There hadn't been any reports of a bird of prey approaching the quarantined planet. "And good thing we aren't going there because I'd have to shoot you."

"And I'd welcome it. It's insanity. Apparently, it was the same group of people under the command of the same man we had aboard for tat court martial. Looking over those records, there are a lot of inconsistencies..." Enalia wasn't looking very happy about all this - especially since it had been her crew's responsibility to see this man to justice.

"Um... what? And why? That doesn't make a lick of sense." Already, Angel's head was starting to hurt.

"Command didn't say and I suspect they had a hand in it. Our job is just to make sure no one else in the area goes there, but I'll be asking questions none the less." Enalia noticed the headachey look in Angel's eyes and punched up a glass of water and a headache tablet from er desk replicator and motioned for Angel to help herself.

"I hang out with you too much if you can do that after just looking at me." Angel gladly took the tablet and swallowed it with a few sips of water. "Are we meeting with them somewhere and do they know about it?"

Enalia just smirked at Angel's first comment and continued. "We'll be meeting with every ship that's been within half a parsec of Talos 4 in the past several month. First on our list are the USS Solstice and the USS Prospero. We're likely on an investigations list as well so I expect tensions."

"The last thing either of us needs is more tension. Sinek already thinks I'm losing my mind." Angel sighed and sat down in one of the chairs, drinking some more of her water and hoping that pain tablet kicked in soon.

"I'm sure. I just hope we don't end up firing on any Federation ships." Enalia said, pulling up the info on the USS Prospero. "This is our first ship we're to rendezvous with and resupply."

"Not familiar with them. That's probably a good thing." Angel gave the information a brief glance before looking away from it. Starfleet still hadn't mastered a screen that didn't make her eyes burn when she already had a headache. "We've met the Solstice before though, haven't we?"

"Yeah they're the ones that dropped off that court martial team and that lovely pair of gentlemen from temporal investigations." Enalia said, leaning back in her chair.

"Right, those assholes. I'll try not to hold it against the crew." Angel rolled her eyes, remembering just how much hassle that mess had been. "How soon are we meeting them?"

"We missed our rendezvous yesterday due to our recent jump forward in time so as soon as we get there." Enalia said. "Which is in about six hours."

"Oops." It wasn't really her fault and the 'oops' wasn't all that sincere either. Angel really hoped the Solstice had gotten rid of those temporal agents because if she had to defend the three-day jump she was probably going to kill someone.

"Oops indeed. I'm just glad we're in one piece and I don't have some ancient energy being living in my nervous system." Enalia grumbled.

"I did tell you not to go over there." Had they not just been talking about Talos IV, Angel might have laughed. Instead she just rubbed the side of her head. "I'm starting to feel a little possessed by energy beings myself."

"And next time I'll listen and let you go over and get posessed." Enalia said with a bit of snark. "Seriously though, this Talos thing could be just as dangerous. If anyone is showing signs of Talosian influence, act upon it. Even if it's me, ok?"

"I'd shoot Sinek if he was acting like he was under Talosian influence, so yeah. Okay. But same goes for you... I'd rather explain to command than end up enslaved by uber-telepaths." Angel ignored the snark of the first comment. She was used to Enalia's sarcasm by now.

"Good. I've already set up command codes to require an extra person when entered for anything dangerous and navigation won't accept anything near Talos 4 without 4 sets of command codes." Enalia leaned forward as she spoke, back to business mode.

"Don't we only have three... oh." Once she thought about it, Angel realized it made perfect sense. With only three command codes available, they'd never be able to take the ship to Talos IV. "That's kind of clever."

"Exactly. We'll need a command code sequence issued in direct orders from Earth as well as our three." Enalia was grinning wryly at her cleverness.

"Which would never happen. They'd send someone to blow us up." Angel snickered a little before sighing and rubbing her temple. "I think I need to meditate or take a nap. Whatever that pill was, it's not doing much."

Enalia nodded. "Go get some rest then. Just try to be on deck when we start the supply transfer."

"I'll set an alarm, don't worry. I'd never leave you to handle that by yourself... you'd go crazy." Angel smiled a little as she got up and went over to the replicator, sliding her empty water glass in to be recycled. "But seriously, call me if you need me. I can deal with a little pain if I have to."

"I will, thank you," Enalia smiled somewhat weakly. She almost looked mortal for a brief moment, showing in her face just how much she relied on her XO.

"You're welcome. See you later, my crazy friend." With a bit of a smirk, Angel left the ready room in search of a quiet place to rest for a while.