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Main Sim - Bridge - The Arrival

Posted Dec. 9, 2020, 7:21 p.m. by Lieutenant Commander Renveer (Executive Officer) (Ben Z)

Posted by Captain Molly Holloway (Commanding Officer) in Main Sim - Bridge - The Arrival

Posted by Gamemaster Alias Smith N. Jones, Esq. (GMT) in Main Sim - Bridge - The Arrival

Posted by Captain Molly Holloway (Commanding Officer) in Main Sim - Bridge - The Arrival
Posted by… suppressed (6) by the Post Ghost! 👻

It had taken the better part of two weeks for the Dresden to make the trip to the Julian Echo Station. As the ship got ever closer, the departments on board had been working diligently to prepare for… well… everything. Contingencies and speculation had flooded discussions both on and off the clock. What would they find? What had befallen the station so that communication had gone dark? Was the crew safe… or even alive? All of these questions and more had swirled through passageways, quarters, offices, and labs like the air through the life support systems.

As the ship dropped out of warp some ways away, the first view of the station came into view. From all visual assessments, the station looked as it should: a large transparent dome supported by a robust and multi-level foundation. No signs of damage, and it was in exactly the correct location. From the outside, it appeared perfectly fine…

As did the large black and gray vessel docked at one of the three ports. As the ship and station came into view, the Dresden’s comms indicated an incoming message.

GMT

Forgrave’s eyes narrowed as the visuals came on-screen. He’d been wondering what they would see for… well, it felt like months now. He had sent the order to launch the probes they’d built a short while ago, and he was hoping to hear from them soon. But that vessel… what was that? He didn’t remember any mention of anything resembling that in any of the briefings or documents he’d studied, though it was entirely possible he’d simply overlooked it. And that shape…

Ignoring the comms, he quietly queued up the sensors; reading the information that the passive sensors gave them before firing up the Dresden’s powerful active suite. He sipped quietly at the ever-present thermos of coffee as he digested the information displayed on the various screens.

-Forgrave, CoS

Passive sensors picked up the vessel… and it matched nothing in the Federation database. The ship resembled a razor blade: very thin, wide, long, with a needle like section that appeared to be the bow. It was docked at the station and…

Thats when the readings went awry. The station, and between half and a third of the strange vessel, according to the sensors, was not there. Then it was. Then it wasn’t. Then it was. Alternating back and forth several times a second. When it wasn’t there, it was simply not there. When it was there, it was absolutely identical to the previous reading. The security station was taxed to its limits trying to decipher such complex data.

GMT

OOC: Assuming all primary bridge crew are present for the arrival.

Lieutenant Commander Renveer stood slowly and, similarly to Forgrave, narrowed his eyes at the viewscreen. He scanned his memory for known cultures that might use such a design… Not recognizing the make of the vessel, warning claxons went off in Renveer’s mind. “Lieutenant Simms, scan for lifesigns, I want to know who that ship belongs to. Helm, what’s the source of that incoming message?”

(Lt. Cmdr. Renveer, XO)

Priscilla had actually stood up at seeing the odd ship and the fluctuation of the station and its appendage. When the Xo asked for the scans, she nodded and sat back down in her seat. “Of course.” Her fingers danced in a familiar rhythm over the console as she tried to catch a pattern to the flickering ‘there and not there’ and get the computer to read during the ‘there’ moments hoping it would be a bit easier on the intermittent scale. “Scanning now… or at least, trying to, Sir.” She bit her lip and furrowed her brow as if her own concentration would help the computer any.

Lt Priscilla Simms
CSO

The scans returned much of the same data that the Security station had for a few long moments until the more ‘esoteric’ kinds of data came in. The scans showed the following:
Dozens of life signs aboard the station and on the vessel.

Of the life signs on the station, all were completely immobile and while living, did not exhibit any normal signs of life such as respiration, mobility, or anything else.

Of the life signs on the vessel, approximately half were in the same state of ‘alive but not’. The other half were mobile and of an unknown species.

The station was saturated with chroniton particles at a much larger concentration than the space around the station. In fact, half of the unknown vessel was as well, but the half furthest away from the station was not.

The vessel was no match to anything in the Federation Database, both in make and material; although the hull seemed to be of a similar material to deuterium and titanium.

Tactical scans would show weapons of unknown design, but no activation or power to those systems.

Engineering scans would show a propulsion system similar to Warp drive technology, but on a less advanced design than currently in use by most Federation species.

The comm station still registered and incoming hail.

GMT

OOC: I am also assuming that Drillek is among the people on the Bridge. Feel free to void that part of my post if that is not the case. – Joana

IC:
The station itself was a stunning sight, and Molly found herself lost in its beauty as she contemplated the view. Until her eyes picked up the foreign vessel. She opened her mouth to speak, only to be overpassed by her First Officer. A corner of her lips twitched upwards into the hint of a smile.

The vessel was unlike anything she had ever seen, which was to say something as her uncle owned one of the largest ship building companies in the sector. She wanted to believe that it was nothing but some prototype the Federation was working on, that just so happened to be tied to some project at Julian Echo. But given the station’s primary observational purpose, Molly knew that to be very unlikely. Could it be tied to the mysterious warp signature module that FedSec seemed so interested in?

As Holloway waited for Simms to report the scan results, and for the helm to report the source of the incoming call, she turned to Drillek in the hopes that his answers might soothe her fears of an unknown alien vessel docked at the station, but deep down she knew that he was probably just as confused as she was. “Doctor, were there any scheduled visits to the station that you might not be aware of? Or, was there any other project being developed there that could explain that ship?”

There was only one way of knowing, Molly thought, and that was to accept the incoming message. She was planning on doing just that, the moment they knew a little more about where it came from. In the meantime, she pulled up a PaDD and searched for any matching ship on Starfleet Intelligence’s database.

Holloway, CO

Drillek’s eyes were locked on the view screen; taking in every detail of the image before them. “N-n-no, Captain. Not at all.”and he shook his head to clear it. Lookingvat Holloway, he said “Captain, I am at least passing familiar with the ship architecture of most of the civilizations of the Alpha Quadrant…” and he turned back to stare at the vessel attached to his station.

“I’ve never seen anything like that before.”

GMT

Molly nodded in acknowledgment, although her mind was already miles away, at the realization that just like her, or Drillek, Intel didn’t seem to have registered anything similar either.

Priscilla shook her head. “Well, scans are interesting, to say the least. While we are getting life sign readings from the stations, don’t exhibit any normal signs of life. So mobility, respiration, nothing. More than half of the adjoining ship is showing the same. Both areas where life is… but isn’t are flooded with far higer cronyton particles than the surrounding area. Like the ship and station were overly flooded with it. The half of the ship furthest from the station isn’t showing the same signs. And the life signs there, while moving and registering, aren’t recognizable to the computer in regards to species or race.” She shook her head and looked at the others. “And without lifesigns from the rest of the ship to compare it to, I can’t even be sure the species that is moving, is related to the species that isn’t.”

She glanced at the Captain then Drillek. Part of her was elated, as a scientist, at the anomalies. The human part of her, however, was frightened that whatever happened, wasn’t a good thing. “I would certainly use caution moving forward and try and stay out of the same area the high readings are in. And I strongly suggest not docking with the station lest we end up flooded and trapped as the other ship is.” It was a given, she was sure, but it bore speaking out loud, for the record.

Priscilla
CSO

Renveer nodded at the helm as the ensign reported that the incoming transmission was coming from the mysterious ship, not the station. He soaked in the information Lieutenant Simms gave with limited understanding, but he got the gist: don’t get too close until we understand what’s going on. He looked to the captain and nodded to acknowledge her handling of the call, then stepped to the side of the bridge and tapped his comm badge to send out a couple messages.

=^= Renveer to Leuitenant Mason. Stand-by to launch the probe at the Captain’s orders. It sounds as if we’ll want a closer look at what’s happened to Julian Echo without getting too close ourselves. =^=

=^= Renveer to Ensign Winter. Report to the bridge, we may be about to make first contact with a unknown race, and I’d like to have your perspective on the exchange. =^=

(Lt. Cmdr. Renveer, XO)

“So… Lieutenant…” Molly started turning to Simms. “Just to be clear. We have life signs on the station, but no vitals? And you mentioned that the areas where we have life in this mysterious state are flooded with chroniton particles… Pardon me for not remembering much of Temporal Mechanics at the Academy. Do you mind giving us a refresher on what you think this may mean?”

Holloway had no intention of going anywhere near the station, much less of docking the ship. However, an unknown ship on a friendly station, it was easy to assume that whatever was happening, that ship had been the attacker. And yet, Simms seemed to be stating that the ship was a mere victim. Well, there was only one way to find out.

“Helm, the transmission. Patch it through.”

Holloway, CO

The Ensign nodded and tapped a few keys on the interface, and then the bridge was filled with… music. It may have been a voice or an instrument of some kind, but it was unlike anything anyone on the bridge had heard before. There were no words, just a cacophony of notes flowing and drifting softly through the comm system. It was not at all unpleasant, but its purpose was not clear at all. The message played for approximately thirty seconds and then stopped, starting again a few moments later.

GMT

Molly’s brow furrowed as the comms filled the room with… music? Whatever it was, it was unlike anything she had ever heard. For a moment, she found herself mesmerized by the sound, before snapping back to the reality of the Dresden’s Bridge.

“Science, can you give me an analysis on the track? Is there anything on record that might vaguely match what we are hearing? Notes, tune, patterns, anything…?”

“Renveer, right now your the sociological expert in the room. We can show this to Dr. Winter when she gets here, but do you think there might be any chance that this might be an attempt at communication?” Holloway wanted to make sure. For a human, music was a form of entertainment, but other civilizations had other ways of living. There were weirder things out there than a species that spoke by singing. The next step in her head was to hail the ship, but it was something she didn’t want to do until she knew a little more about what was going on.

Turning to Drillek, she asked. “Doctor… did you by any chance hear anything like this before, or have there been any reports from the station that mentioned music of any kind?”

Holloway, CO

Renveer’s attention snapped back to the viewscreen as the music played. The executive officer tilted his head to the side as his brow creased in thought, wrinkling the trill markings along his temples. “Song-based communication from unknown alien origins has been encountered before, when the probe that visited Earth in 2286 attempted to speak with the native cetacean species known as the ‘humpback whale’. Although I don’t believe these match the frequencies emitted by the probe, the principle may be the same. Unfortunately, such languages are notoriously difficult to translate.”

Lieutenant Commander Renveer moved to stand beside Captain Holloway, joining her in the center of the bridge once again. “I imagine the only way to confirm that it’s a message is to respond and see if it changes. If the universal translator has any hope of gleaning some sort of meaning from the music, the more we hear of it the better odds we have.” In so many words, Renveer was signaling his support for answering the hail. Maybe it was the innocent nature of the music, but he was inclined to believe that it was a distress call of some sort. And because the ship seemed to be half-disabled, the threat posed by making contact seemed minimal.

(Lt. Cmdr. Renveer, XO)


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