The particle beams lit up over the transporter pad as a man in a Silver and Red Trimmed Dress Uniform materializes into the room. The Ensign at the control panel hits a button on the console, sounding the audible chime of station-to-station comms. “Transporter Room Two, to the Bridge. Commander Barron is on board safe and sound.”
“Good to have you back commander, how was DS-13?” A woman over the intercom asked. Maikull Barron stepped off the transport pad, and immediately undid the claps on his shoulder. “It went well, I’m heading to my quarters to change, but go ahead and summon the Senior Staff to the conference room, I want a final update on the refit and we need to go over our new orders.” He said, loosening his collar, clearly agitated at his dress uniform. “Aye aye sir, we will be ready in 10.” The woman confirmed before closing the channel.
On the bridge, Commander Jessica Stern sat in the Captain’s Chair and took a deep breath. The Andorian Tactical Officer looked over his station behind her a little unnerved “He…doesn’t know, does he?” he probed. Stern shook her head, [“No, but we will go over it in the briefing. Don’t worry, you didn’t do anything wrong.” She assured before hitting the console at her chair. The boatswain whistle rang on all open channels within the ship, as a computers voice announced:
Now hear this, Now hear this. All Senior Staff; Please report to Conference Room 1 for debrief. All Senior Staff, Please report to Conference Room 1 for debrief.”
Most of the Senior Staff had already anticipated this, and were already standing by for the call. It took them no time to report to the conference room behind the bridge, all of them congregating around the tables talking amongst themselves waiting for the Commanding Officer to appear. Executive Officer Commander Stern took her seat already at the right of where the C.O would sit. Chief Tactical Officer Lt. Cmdr. Zach Brannigan, the Andorian Tactical Officer from the bridge was standing and chatting with the Bolian Chief of Engineering, Lt. Cmdr. Kif Southerland. The Klingon Chief Medical Officer, Cmdr. Roptojmey sat across from Cmdr. Stern looking as disgruntled as ever. The VulMulan (Half Vulcan, Half Romulan) Chief of Science, Lt. Cmdr. V’era stood with the Liberated Borg Chief of Operations, Lt. Cmdr. 3 of 14, aptly nicknamed by the crew as Lt. Cmdr. Pi.
As the doors slid open, Cmdr. Stern stood, announcing to the room “Captain on Deck.” To which all in attendance stood by their seats at attention. Commander Maikull Barron stood in the doorway in his standard (And more comfortable) White shouldered Duty uniform on. “Please, take a seat” he stated as he walked over to his empty chair and settled himself. “Let’s get down to business” he continued as everyone else found their places.
Taking a Padd off the table, he quickly reviewed it as he talked “So, Mr. Southerland, how are we on the shakedown from our newest Refit?” The Commander asked, looking up at an extremely nerve wrecked Bolian. Lt. Cmdr. Southerland stood slowly as he addressed the table, all whom were well aware of the situation with the exception of Cmdr. Barron. “Well sir…” he began, clearing his throat out of apprehension, “There is Good news…and Bad News.”
Maikull sat down the padd, giving his Chief of Engineering his full attention, “Go on Kif, hit me with the worst of it, hopefully the good news will give me some cushion to fall back on.” He asserted. Southerland took another deep breath before continuing on. “Well sir, we were able to install the Impulse Capacitance Cells without an issue, and in standard test runs, they worked as well as we could have hoped. We were able to dump Warp Energy into the impulse engines, giving us a significant Sub-Light speed boost without overloading the Impulse Engines. It’s like a Nitrous Boost in old combustion engine vehicles! It would be hard pressed to find something that could keep up with us at sub-light speeds. I mean, we can’t do it repeatedly, and id highly recommend diagnostic maintenance between uses, but it works like a charm!”
Maikull listened intently at his engineers’ words, and nodded. “I’m not seeing the ‘bad’ side of this story yet…” he implored. Southerland nodded and continued, “Well sir, as you know…there are a lot of systems we -can’t- use while utilizing the stealth generator…but we can use Impulse Engines, so…”
Maikull’s head fell into his palm softly as he could see where this was going. “Four Engineers in sickbay for Shrapnel and Second Degree Burns…” Commander Roptojmey cut in. It appeared as though Commander Stern was also about to interject, but he finished “And the Ensign from the bridge, but he just got sparks in his face when his console flared up, he’ll live.”
“How bad?” Barron asked as he wiped his face and looked down the table at his Senior Staff. “It completely blew, millions of pieces, it’s unrepairable.” Lt. Cmdr. Brannigan answered. Barron sighed at the revelation of what happened, but then looked up once more counting heads. “Where is Marco?”
At the mention of the name, a transport initiated inside the Conference Room, at the end of the table, the ships Chief of Security, the Photonic Officer Mark-0 (Nicknamed Marco) teleported before the senior staff, dressed in full faced MACO Uniform. “Reporting for Duty Sir, I apologize for the delay, I was finalizing the report on the Stealth Generator Investigation. My findings indicate there have been no signs of sabotage from ship, or station personnel.”
Barron nodded as Lt. Cmdr. Pi piggybacked off the Security Officers testimony, “If any were to be at fault, it would lie in the simulations ran by Starfleet Engineering Corps. They failed to take into account that our generator was gutted from a Klingon Battleship, and frankensteined into a Tal-Shiar Freighter. It was a miracle we managed to re-wire it from a Singularity Core to our Warp Core when we got our hands on it. And to be honest, I’m surprised it hadn’t blown out on us until now.” Stern followed up with, “And command has stated that at this time, there are no replacement unit’s available.”
Maikull nodded at his Operations officer’s assessment. “Well, it is regrettable, I did just brag to the Fleet’s Executive Officer of our stealth capabilities. This defiantly takes us out of Stealth Recon missions, but thankfully we never hinged much of our operations on that feature. What of the weapons systems?”
Lt. Cmdr. Brannigan stood and smiled “Glad to report all is well. The new Mark 12 Andorian Phaser Arrays were installed, and are operating at peak efficiency! We were able to integrate them in with the Quantum Phase Capacitor, so we should see the same effectiveness from the previous phaser arrays, with a little more kick to them. Also, the Phaser Turret Point-Defense System is active, and is now capable of managing small debris, fighter craft, and heavy projectiles automatically.”
“So, all in all everything was a success. The loss of the Stealth Generator is discouraging, but if they wanted too, Command could have easily given us a replacement. Plus, where we are going we shouldn’t have to worry about Stealth Romulan fighters to contend with, so I guess it all works out in the end.” Cmdr. Barron announced. Cmdr. Stern looked a bit surprised, “So…We -will- be assigned to Argo?” Maikull nodded and stood from his chair, the screen next to the conference table switching on to the 38th Fleet Star Chart.
“Once we have finalized all system checks, we are to report to DS-13 in the Aldebaran Sector, there we will be assigned to the Taurus Squadron performing Patrol, Response, and Peace Keeping in the surrounding sectors; so not much different from what we have been doing, just a change of scenery.” Barron explained, as he pointed to keynotes on the screen. “Once we get our feet wet, and get a better understanding of our surroundings, we can expand our mission statement to be more specific to our talents and needs.”
Brannigan raised his hand a bit, and waited to be called upon by the CO before speaking, “So, hypothetically speaking, Risa falls into our Patrol Block?” the Andorian said with a smirk. Cmdr. Roptojmey grunted under his breath “Damn tourist trap…” Barron grinned along with the rest of the table. “Afraid not, new kids on the block, we won’t have the seniority. As I understand it, most of the Fleet is already on leave due to the festival, so we will be picking up the slack till they all return.”
“Speaking of, as soon as we arrive there are some initiation protocols we will need to adhere to before we go sailing through uncharted waters. All Personnel who have not undergone recent Physical and Mental Evaluations, will have to do so by Fleet Command personnel before being cleared for active duty, myself included.”
This time Lt. Cmdr. Pi raised his hand, and Barron acknowledged him. “Sir, I’m over 60% Cybernetic at this point, so do I need a medical evaluation or an engineering diagnostic? I mean, I could try to contact Unimatrix 47, but I doubt they would send my medical files over.” There was another hushed chuckle at the table. Barron took a minute to compose himself, “I think I’ll let Fleet Medical figure that one out for themselves.”
“On that topic, The Sun-Tzu will also need to undergo a Readiness Inspection by Fleet Engineering Department before we can set off as well. So, I want everyone to make sure their departments are in shape, and in order, ready to get these tasks knocked out so we can get back out to doing our jobs. Roptojmey will send lists for all personnel who need their evaluations, so ensure the schedules allow for most, if not all of necessary personnel are able to depart as soon as we dock to get it taken care of. While we are enroute, I want rotating Level 3 Diagnostics ran on all systems. Any Questions?”
Lt. Cmdr. Marco, who had continued to stand at the end of the room stepped forward, “Sir, are we looking at any personnel transfers once we reach the Fleet?” Barron shook his head, “Not to my knowledge, Sun-Tzu is maintaining all personnel for the time being. Anything else?” There was a moment of silence, which Maikull broke by dismissing the assembly. There was a lot to get done in a short amount of time. There was roughly 65 Light-years between Earth Space dock and Deep Space 13 which gave them a little over 4 days to prepare themselves.
And first impressions, always mattered…