STF

Main Sim - A Rare Meeting - tag XO, COS

Posted May 9, 2022, 9:58 p.m. by Gamemaster Matrix (Gamemaster) (Sage Pennington)

Posted by Lieutenant Maria Beckett (Chief of Security) in Main Sim - A Rare Meeting - tag XO, COS

Posted by Commander Dantius Massana (XO) in Main Sim - A Rare Meeting - tag XO, COS

Posted by Gamemaster Matrix (Gamemaster) in Main Sim - A Rare Meeting - tag XO, COS
Posted by… suppressed (12) by the Post Ghost! 👻

SNIP

The robots took their sweet time before responding to the XO again. “One organic. One leaves to betray the many. The will of the King. Signal sent. You are not allies of the Traitor?”

-GM

“No, we are not. We have no information regarding the Traitor’s identity. I am confused - how is one who is doing a King’s will a traitor? Is the will of the King different from the will of the many?”

  • Commander Massana, XO

At least he’s giving time. However, maybe they could help find this traitor. The team had the resources. It had a doctor, an engineer and forensic expert. That would be all you need. “Cmdr. perhaps we could assist in the search for this traitor?”. BJ whispered over.

Janzen

“If I am guiding this conversation correctly, they will most likely enlist our aid,” Massana told Janzen. “Thank you for the suggestion if that does not happen.”

The phaser rifle was getting heavy. Maria knew she had a few minutes before her hands would start to shake, and she would sweat. Not a great in an arctic environment. But at least things were not escalating. She let the tip of her weapon dip a dozen centimeters and shifted it off-line from the units. It might help, but she could still snap back on target in an instant. As BJ made their suggestion she spared the tiniest glance. Mentally she cursed. Damn Starfleet for being so tight-lipped about this place. For now she had nothing worthwhile to offer, and wasn’t sure what would set the bots off verbally.

Lt Beckett, COS

The robots considered. And considered. And considered. “We are vessels for the will. Insufficient words. Words inadequate. If you do not stand in opposition, you will stand alongside. Come with us.”

-GM

Danora bit her lip and glanced up at the XO. “Ummmm, Sir… Perhaps a couple of us can stay behind? We can be sure no one else shows up and,” she glanced at the robots, “and maybe find the traitor’s identity?”

She knew it was a long shot, but they needed to keep control of the computer systems and try and figure more out.

Danora
CE/AI Spec

Dantius looked over to the Chief Engineer. It was a good idea, but he wasn’t sure whether the automatons would care to leave potential hostiles to their own devices. However, keeping track of the data transfer to the Memorial (the captain just had to get bored in orbit, hadn’t he?) instead of letting the AI continue the uplink was definitely preferable. He considered how to voice it, given that he had already managed to cause an information overload.

“You were assigned to protect this area from the traitor or others who would assist the traitor,” Commander Massana began. “Are all of you escorting us to wherever you will be taking us, or will some of you be staying behind? If the latter, can some of us stay with those units which remain here?”

  • Commander Massana, XO

Danora’s refried rose slightly, along with the edges of her lips. “Nicely done,” she half murmured in amusement. Perhaps the XO was going to be with his salt after all.

Danora
CE

This took them longer to calculate. Like they were doing vector calculus. “Some may stay. But we will monitor. Others. You” they all in unison gestured to Massana “will meet the King.”

-GM

“Understood,” Dantius said.

He chose his next words carefully, as he did not wish to give any indication as to either their hierarchy or their roles.

“Beckett, you and your people will join me so that I am not alone. Janzen, you are in charge here. Pilots are to be trusted in case of any emergency.”

He turned to the automatons.

“Lead on.”

  • Commander Massana, XO

The Lieutenant looked for a moment as though she’d tasted something sour. Only a career interrogator or cardsharp would likely see it. They were being taken to a second location. And splitting the party. Both were bad ideas. But, tactically it made sense. She lowered her phaser rifle then fell in behind the commander. Surreptitiously she scanned the synthetics, getting as much data on them as she could. After the destruction of Utopia Planitia and Mars, she was far from comfortable around those things.

The Automatons led the Memorial crew out and to the hut they had emerged from. The door opened and the inside was revealed to be a rather spacious elevator. The robots waited for their Starfleet counterparts to go first.

-GM

Dantius looked at his companions.

“I believe we are meant to get in. I have never been one for underground shafts, but if this is a means to understand the situation, then so be it.”

He was not sure why a subterranean elevator had been disguised as a hut, but he doubted that it had been an original part of the plan. If it had been, the nature of this study was not what it seemed.

  • Commander Massana, XO

They descended for a while. About ten minutes. The only sound around them was a motor powering the elevator.

The doors opened again to reveal a large space, about thirty people immediately visible inside. They resided in tents and sheet metal shelters. Conditions appeared to be.. lacking. The automatons led the crew towards a large double door on the far wall.

-GM

Commander Massana was definitely perplexed. Official reports stated that four members of the research team had been left on the planet, but they were presumed dead. Although he knew that the automatons could not answer the questions he wanted to ask, either because the questions would be seen as hostile or because they lacked the information required, he decided to comment to the rest of the crew with him.

“Temporary shelters in an underground area. Do you or anyone on your team have experience building such things, Beckett?”

“Well, I’m engineering certified, sir. Grew up on a ship, so I can build stuff like it. And then there was Academy survival training and some further stuff since. But it wasn’t really geared toward occupancy, but field self-reliance and self-sufficiency,” she said, keeping a weather eye on their surroundings. As usual, scanning with her wearable tricorder, slurping up as much data as she could.

When they stopped at the door, Dantius paused.

“Are we meant to open the doors ourselves?”

  • Commander Massana, XO

“We can take you no further.” The automatons replied. They opened the doors before the Memorial crew, but made no moves to enter. The room on the other side was harshly lit, there were four large chairs, split two to the right and two to the left and what seemed to be a throne at the end of the room. All were thus far unoccupied.

-GM

Dantius led the way, making normal strides, hoping that he appeared neither hurried nor languid. He doubted that the automatons were programmed to tell the difference, but he knew that whoever was supposed to be in here was likely to notice. He did not glance backwards as he passed through the door. He walked directly to the center of the room and waited, standing at rest.

“And now, I suppose, we wait until whoever is in charge here enters.”

  • Commander Massana, XO

The whole way into the room, the team could feel eyes on them. The eerie silence of the space was broken only by the sound of their footfalls. The automatons slammed the doors behind the away team. Dantius’ remark echoed around the stone walls. “Enter… or are made known to you?” Replied a feeble voice. An old man with a walking stick hobbled out from behind the throne. “Oh dear…” he clicked his tongue. “This doesn’t bode well at all.”

-GM

“Are?” Dantius asked simply. “Are the occupants of every chair behind them?”

Commander Massana found himself intrigued. He was not certain why the man considered the situation to bear ill tidings.

“Regardless, I believe an introduction is in order.”

  • Commander Massana, XO

The bots didn’t seem to recognize their weapons as weapons. Or they didn’t care. Or … It didn’t matter. That latter possibility bothered the intelligence officer. But for now she kept it to herself, yet stayed close to Massana, a silent shadow just behind and to the right. He was doing a pretty bang-up job in dealing with these synths, better than she would have. Not to mention her own worries, they were… Odd. Internal processing seemed strange. So far he’d avoided the mines in the proverbial minefield they’d been traversing with them. And now this.

Quietly she muttered, “Did we step into Narnia or something?” Not that any of them would likely get the reference, it was an obscure story from a few hundred years ago.

Lt Beckett, COS

((OOC: So sorry for being absentee boys and girls. Burnout sucks, and then the situation going on with the Viking was really sucking the life out of posting. But all is good now. Let’s see what these tin cans and their king want.))

(Just to do a quick catchup in a relatively neat post: On her way in Beckett would have been able to get the sense that the shelters were not so much for protection from the elements as they were for safety and privacy for individuals or small families.)

The old man once again clicked his tongue at Massana. “Indeed. But do take care what you wish for. Not all you want is what it seems.” He banged his walking stick on the floor and something in the light shifted ever so slightly. In the five chairs were now five people. As if they had been there the whole time. “Speak with caution, Massana and Beckett.” The old man warned.

The figures sat for a moment before one stood on the small plinth her chair rested on. “Have you come in war or peace?”

Another rose. “It must be war.”

Another. “No. See their weapons. Unused.”

Another. “War or peace, they cannot stay.”

At the end of the room, from the throne, softly a young man spoke. “Silence. All of you. Let them answer the question before we pass verdict.”

-GM


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