STF

Bridge - Main Sim

Posted July 15, 2019, 9:07 a.m. by Lieutenant Junior Grade Ben Park (BO Tactical) (AJ Paulson)

Posted by Lieutenant Dagen Thor (CE) in Bridge - Main Sim

Posted by Gamemaster GM (Gamemaster) in Bridge - Main Sim

Posted by Captain Calvin Marius (Captain) in Bridge - Main Sim
Posted by… suppressed (18) by the Post Ghost! 👻
snip
Deeg’s gaze followed it all. He was paranoid enough that he didn’t want to leave things to chance. “I’m reading increased activity in the mine since our start of approach,” he said, eyeing the readings. What kind of ‘activity’ was that? he studied. “I’m showing considerable mining in the lower regions where the area has been virtually stripped of anything. There is still considerable deposits higher up in the mountainous regions. I’m not seeing any activity there.” He paused. Why would that be? he wondered. Was it that they could not do it economically? Perhaps they just had not gotten there yet, having worked at the ‘easy’ deposits first. That was typically what happened. The wonder was .. was it all taken back to the homeworld? He did a scan of the primary resources that this world had and which had been removed. What did they need?
- Deeg, NE Eng

“That doesn’t make any sense.” Why would they mine where there was nothing left. “Unless they are mining for something we haven’t detected yet or they have no ability of knowledge of the deposits above them.” But even that made no sense, while their sensors had to be superior if they could see it this far out. So did the native.

“Can you get me more on the ships?” The mines were n’t going to shoot at them.

From the scans, the minerals that were mined were primarily used for building and powering up Pallasian starships. There were some signs of habitation before but there were only organic debris left on the surface. There were no signs of the minerals in the abandoned habitations.

In the mines, where there were activity, there were people moving to various positions. There were projectile weapons detected under the ground but they were not near the surface.

GM

OOC: Or at least so Marius thought

Marius XO

IC: The ships were similar to the normal Pallasian ships, only older and seemed to have been patched up with parts from more advanced ships.

GM

Deeg studied thing. He wanted to get things straight in his own head. “Scans show they are older vessels. Similar to what we have seen at their homeworld, only older. They are patchwork. Any repairs have been done with newer components. I’d take from that that any space battles resulted in serious damage to the pirated vessels else they would have been using the new and not just scavenging materials. Mining operation were used for shipbuilding by mineral residue left. Scanning for any shipyards now but I doubt it else they’d have better ships.” He paused.

“Newer parts? Newer Pallasian parts or new tech entirely?” It was an important distinction.

“I see projectile weapons underground but not on the surface. Scanning to determine how far underground.” They could have hatches or silos that they could raise them to. “Quite a bit of activity in the mines. Scanning to see if they are clustering around the weapons. Also scanning for any transmissions”
- Deeg, Eng NE

From the positions of the projectile weapons, it was clear that the weapons were meant to protect the underground base.

There were no shipyards discovered but there were what would seem like workshops for the patched up ships.

Transmissions were within the base. It would seem that the underground base had detected a ship approaching. They were rallying to defensive positions.

GM

Deeg strove to make sense of what he was seeing. “Their weaponry - projectile based - appears defensive. I see what looks like mock shipyards - just docking areas for their ships but no shipbuilding facilities. Internal transmissions only. They look to be taking up a defensive posture.” They hardly seemed like pirates when they were just going defensive. Had they seen the Genny? Or were they reacting to something else? “I’m scanning around for any other ships in the area or if they have seen us. I have a trace on their transmission frequency - sending it to you if we wanted to talk to them. They don’t seem much like pirates if they are hiding underground if it is us they were seeing. One ship.” He turned to the sensors again. “Scanning as well for specifics on their missiles.” They were at yellow alert and shields were up. Still a close nuclear strike could mess with their systems.
- Deeg, Eng

“Hmm,” Marius grunted. He had hoped he would get more time undetected but, sometimes land based sensors were more effective just based on the fact the could be so much larger.

The transmissions underground revealed that the Genesis was indeed the ship that they had detected. However it was clear that they did not know very much of what kind of ship the Genesis was. It seemed that the Genesis was not in any schedule and they were not sure why a single ship would venture near the old mining colony. They did not even know that the Genesis was not a Pallasian ship. An order was given to maintain radio silence as the base wished to remain hidden.

Their missiles were indeed nuclear. The warheads looked rather dated but they were well maintained.

GM

“Lieutenant you seeing what I’m seeing on the scanners. They are nuclear. Rather old looking by the design but it’s in rather good condition.”

Park

=/\=McGregor to Genesis. We just finished lunch, learned a little bit about their food production and preparation processes and introduced the concept of a restaurant. Heading back to resume the tour now.=/\=

COS

“They’ve seen us,” Deeg said. “They think we’re Pallasian. Hang on ..” he read a number of other transmissions. “They’re going silent. Hiding. We’ve confused them.” Turning about in the chair he addressed the others. “They know we’re not on a scheduled run so they must have some access to a schedule for flights. My guess is that they have a mole on the home world for that information. But they are confused too that we are only one ship. Their missiles are maintained though.”
NE Deeg
OOC: GM .. small clarification This is on the moon and is not the ‘colony’ that they were speaking of that would be on the main world? Just trying to get my notes in order.

OOC: The base is on the moon of the colony planet. Both planet and moon have been abandoned. Unlike the Earth’s moon, this moon has an atmosphere.

GM

Marius paused as he thought. “Honesty or a little deception?” He offered the question to the assembled officers on the bridge. “There are no wrong suggestions.”

Marius

“From a Tactical standpoint honesty Sir. We don’t want to give them any opportunity to cut off talks and cut our trip short here .”

Park

Deeg pondered things. “I think we should try to talk with them, see what happens when we contact them.” They could guess all they wanted but they found them. There didn’t seem to be much of a ‘colony’ left. “That might be what is left of the presumed colony. The worlds look pretty stripped of resources. Perhaps they abandoned things and are using piracy as a way to not have to say that the colony failed after the resources were taken out.”
- Deeg, Eng

Tom spoke from just over Marius’ left shoulder.

“There’s no reason not to be honest. According to our information this is an isolated colony of the homeworld, cut off by pirates, and the homeworld knows of our presence. There’s no reason they shouldn’t either. There’s no known security risk in open communication at this time as, as far as we know.”

Tom was familiar with games of semantics. If there was an issue, the scenario Tom had just laid out should protect them from any administrative backlash should things turn sour.

“Remember, it’s all about what we’ve been told.”

Just as soundlessly Tom faded back to the blind spot in the bridges internal sensors.

  • Tom, IntSec

“Fair enough,” Marius decided to go with the majority. It was what he prefered to do anyway. Just the paranoid part of him resisted give out information when he didn’t have to. “Open hailing frequencies.”

=^=Good Afternoon, Lunar Base. This is Captain Marius of the Genesis. We are on final approach and mean you no harm. Please put your weapons on standby. We simply wished to pay our respects and offer a line of communication to the homeworld if you’d like.=^=

“Keep out of missile range. Don’t want to get them excited before we make nice.”

Marius CO

There was no reply.

There was a hail from a point on the other side of the planet.

=/\=This is the Pallasian colony on planet Aegeas. Is there something we can do for you?=/\=

This was a surprise, considering that the habitations on the planet seemed to be abandoned. However, the source of the hail was from a small corner in the far part of the planet where there were six life signs.

GM

“Six life signs in a distant part of the planet itself,” Deeg reported. “That is the origin of this transmission. They are not replying from the moon base here.” He turned in his seat, his ‘old skills and senses on alert’. “My first guess is that the transmission was rerouted to this location from the moon base to this base used for communications to dupe whoever it is to suggest that there is a colony there still.” He glanced at his console and then over to Tom. “Tom, can you verify that comms did go from the moon base to this other location?” Then he looked to the Captain. “I would suggest assuming that we are unaware of this deception until we can glean what they are trying to do. Perhaps they are trying to lure us into missile range in which case they would suggest berthing there or coming in closer. Perhaps we may launch a probe to circle the world and get a better scan of it and the moon to determine if the colony is, in fact, no more.”
- Deeg, NE Eng

=^=Actually, I want to make you the same offer. We were informed that this base was either uninhabited or cut off. We have the ability to transport any number of you back to the homeworld quickly and safely… or render humanitarian aid if you desire it.=^=

=^=An additional question, why has the lunar base and the ship in the surrounding area failed to respond to our hails and taken, defensive actions. We come in peace.=^=

Marius CO

=/\=Welcome to Aegeas. We are a small security team left on the planet to guard it. As far as we are aware, the base on the moon is completely abandoned. We were not aware … Oh! Thank you! You have helped us tremendously. We have had reports that the pirates were hiding somewhere in the planet but we have not found any trace of them. We have also searched the tunnels in the mines on the moon but we could not find them.=/\=

“Uggh” Marius groaned before he covered his mouth. Well there went the non-interference regulation. He hoped that wouldn’t ‘need’ to go in the official report.

=/\=Let me explain about the uninhabited colony. Although the mining facilities have been abandoned, there is a small community of about 120 who continue to live in this wilderness. The small community who were living here had decided to go back to Pallas to welcome you, the people from space. We are not as advanced as Pallas and contact is sporadic, but we aren’t completely cut off.=/\=

GM

Deeg still was not convinced. An entire colony packing up to pop home for what? None of them were likely in the small tour guides that the away teams had on Pallas.

=^=Well, I don’t remember that in my briefing, but I will have to confess that I don’t have quite the memory I used to. We aren’t here to take sides, even against pirates. Just want to make friends. If you don’t mind we’d like to approach and make face to face contact.=^=

=/\=Very well. You’re welcome. If you need to land, there is a large clearing east of my location. I believe it would be large enough to allow you to land. Our smaller landing sites would not be sufficient for your large ship.=/\=

An old mentor of Deeg’s had sported a curious expression when faced with something categorically unlikely. “Horse-hockey,” he muttered under his breath. Any travel from the ‘colonies’ would have been seen especially when they had had investigated elements of their news and space program and learned that there was a colony but that over the years had faded in from the news and attention. Not to mention them not having searched too hard for the pirates.

But just to be safe, Deeg ran back in the sensor logs to see whether there had been anything approaching from the ‘colony’ to the Pallasian home world. To welcome them, the people from space. How patronizing for them to think they’d fall for that. “Permission to launch probe to confirm these 120 Captain? Will also scan for ships and launch sites in their vicinity to corroborate this. Suggest scanning local space for any vessel traces around the colony world.”
- Deeg, NE Eng

There were several ships heading towards the main planet. They were in the sensor logs but because there were several ships moving about when the Genesis reached the planet, the significance of those ships was not noted.

They had been some hours out from the planet when they had noted the failed experiment of the warp drive of the Pallasian vessel. They’d watched the subsequent clean up that they did to mitigate the radiation in the area. At least one of those ships ‘could’ have come from the colony. Deeg didn’t negate that possibility. But all of them?! Leaving 6? That made no sense. Sending 6 and leaving the 120 made more sense. Surely that would have made the news that they had been scanning. Even if ‘they’ were kept on the QT for the world news surely a return of the colony after so many years would have made some news. Somewhere.

“I can also assist with tactical scans to Dagan’s suggestion Captain.”

Park

Deeg nodded his thanks to Park.

Marius nodded… “send her out slow. I don’t want them to think its a missile.”

Marius

A slow probe. “Aye,” he replied as he programmed it. “Launching. Indirect course to not make anyone nervous.” He would do the nervous. Deeg was good at that.

The probe was sent and information returned showed that the colony’s primitive “sensors”were not powerful enough to go underground. The landing sites for the colony ships were indeed present and showed that although not new, they were well maintained. The only underground missiles were found on the moon. There were ground missiles at the colony but they were small and were above ground. The sensors showed that there was indeed a very small village just at the fringe of the forest. The buildings were in the cover of the forest and so were not so apparent in the sensors because they were devoid of life signs. The location of the security force was a natural cave at the side of the mountain some distance away from the village. The landing sites were between the village and the security force.

GM

“I read a maintained landing site between where the troops are in the mountain and the village. It is at the fringe of the forest. No life signs. Modest defenses. Ground based missiles.” He looked over to Ben to fill in anything else including his opinions. “The scale bothers me. To strip mine so much of the resources would take a lot more manpower than 120 people there. What are they even doing there? A colony has purpose if it was going to be maintained. Pallas suggested in their news history that they set up the colony and then lost contact with it or forgot it. And now a mass homecoming? That would seem like a good opportunity for the so called pirates in the mines.” To Deeg’s paranoid thinking this was laden with inconsistencies. It may yet be entirely true and he left with egg on his face.
- Deeg, Eng NE

“Confirmed. Mountain coverage does present a problem for any advancing ground forces assaulting onto the mountain. I know we adhere to the Prime Directive, but an aerial assault could flush them out. ” Ben quickly glanced at Dagan.

Park, Tactical/Security


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