Pre-departure Senior Staff Meeting

Posted on Sun Feb 27th, 2022 @ 1:32pm by Captain Akeno Misaki & Lieutenant Commander Jonathan Miller & Lieutenant Ileah & Lieutenant Commander Raelyn Mckenzie & Lieutenant Rania Bhatti & Lieutenant Commander Mark Johnson & Lieutenant Torvin Anor

Mission: Arista
Location: Conference Room, Deck 1

It was 09:00 hours. The Wayfarer was due to depart Starbase Eighty Three later that afternoon. Captain Misaki had arranged for a briefing of the senior staff to relay and discuss their new mission orders that had arrived that morning.

The Captain had made her way first into the Conference room, PADD in hand and had taken a seat. In the center of the table was freshly made coffee with cream and sugar to add. Holding a cup she had prepared previously she awaited the arrival of the staff.

The XO was the first to arrive, fresh from his recent tour of the ship courtesy of the engineering department’s Ensign McGill. Despite the Celtic sounding name, McGill was a Bolian. A jolly, yet enigmatic, blue-skinned Bolian. Following the tour, Jonathan had made quite a lengthy list of different issues and problems he had detected throughout the ship, but now was not the time to bring those problems up. As one previous CO had told Jonathan once, “Bring me solutions, not problems.”

He smiled at the woman warmly and helped himself to some of the coffee that had been kindly placed on the table. He had never been a sugar kind of person. He’d always quip “I’m sweet enough” whenever anybody asked whether he wanted some in his coffee or tea. He then took a seat and waited for the others to arrive.

Counsellor Bhatti arrived at the staff meeting, her choice of attire may have raised an eye or two to those who had yet to properly meet her. Her head and neck covered as she stood at the threshold and brought her hands together, a slight bow to greet the occupants. "Peace be upon you," she said before entering the room completely.

The woman poured herself a mug of coffee and quietly found her way into an empty seat. It would be her first meeting aboard the Wayfarer with the staff. She was looking forward it.

Lieutenant Mckenzie was out of breath when she entered the conference room. She was practically running. She was in the middle of finalizing reports when she got paged and she had fallen asleep shortly after she finished them. Little did she know she had actually made it to the briefing early, and she had only been asleep in her office for a few minutes. She looked around the room and noticed Counsellor Bhatti, the new Chief Counselor, Captain Misaki, and Commander Miller, the new XO. But the others were not there yet. She then realized that she was early. She took a seat across from Miller, and next to the Captain, nodding a quick and silent greeting to them in the process. That being said, even if she was early and awake, she was still very tired.

"I hope we have an interesting mission ahead," Counsellor Bhatti commented. "One where none of us end up impregnated by an alien being" she teased a bit. It was an attempt to lighten the mood.

"I second that." said the Chief Engineer, Torvin stepping in and taking an internal moment as he reminded himself, again, that he was meant to be here. Most of his 'night' had been the rather crash course in taking his new role. While he had been doing it temporarily beforehand, the paperwork that he didn't have the authority to do before had accrued, and he'd burnt a fair bit of midnight oil getting himself caught up with the current state of things.

He rested up against a wall, instinctually finding the empty space in the room as he added. "I'm all for 'boldly going' places, but I'd rather avoid them 'Boldly going' into me." a faint smile, his own attempt to inject a little levity to the chaos of before.

" You don't have to tell me twice. Hopefully never again" Akeno added to the conversation as she took a sip of her coffee.

Ileah came in with her slightly over sized PADD, it is a special model and one that she has used for years. It is her job to record the meeting and make all the Captain Privy information available.

She went to a corner to the Captain's right shoulder and poised there for the meeting to start.

A Holograph appeared in a chair near the opposite end of the table. He had a mug of coffee as Specter grin around him.

Justin Specter reporting." He raised his mug. "This is the best version for human interaction; believe me, I am not one who likes leaving my Office except in down-time or an Emergency. " He nod. "It does not get better than this for me... You will get better answers from the Holographic Specter than in real face time."

Once everyone had arrived, Akeno cleared her throat. "OK people, lets get this meeting underway" she began.

Ileah tried to be as unobtrusive as possible as she took her notes.

"First of all, we have some new faces" she started indicating with her hands to Rania and Jonathan. "I'll, let them introduce theirselves"

"Rania Bhatti, Chief Counsellor," the woman replied. "I look forward to working with each of you."

Jonathan looked around the room and smiled warmly at everybody present. “I’ve only had a chance to glimpse over your personnel files, but I can already tell that I’m not going to have any problems with anyone. I look forward to serving alongside each of you.

The XO nodded towards his Captain, indicating that he had finished with his brief introduction.

Mark entered the briefing room hoping it was the right one. Everyone was already sitting and ready to start the meeting. "Oh nice, first day and I'm already late" he thought as he took a glipse of all the people in the room.

His uniform was in perfect order and fitted just nicely in his athletic body. A light beard adorned his face.

He had just transferred aboard and he was not used to the Intrepid class layout. Still a bit amazed by the ship's magnificence, he saluted the officers in the room and presented himself "Lieutenant Mark Johnson" he said "I just got my transfers orders and received the invitation to the briefing...I hope I'm in the right place. Am I late?" he asked smiling while handing over a data PADD to the captain with his orders "I'm the new Chief Medical Officer" he concluded.

Akeno nodded at the new Chief Medical Officer. She then turned her attention to the rest of the room.

"Our new orders are to head to this system" Akeno started pressing a button on her panel. A star system appeared on the viewscreen on the far side of the room. "This is system J75-X, as yet unexplored" she told them. "Long range probes have detected what appears to be an M Class planet in the system, and strange radio waves. Starfleet believes there may be a civilization within this system" Akeno paused.

"We are to proceed to the system, chart it and find out if there is a civilization present, determine their development and make first contact if they are warp capable" Akeno told them.

"I'm not an engineer," the Counsellor said with a pleasant smile. "However, I believe I just heard you say radio waves which would mean electromagnetic waves if we are going textbook definition. Would that not point to the likelihood they are not warp capable, or if they are that they are technologically deficient in communications?"

"Most likely." Torvin agreed with the Counsellor "However I'd be careful to say they're not at a technology level to be careful of, Radio propagation at interstellar distances takes a significant time compared to Subspace. If we're receiving them now, at distance, there is a chance their technology level could have developed high enough to detect us entering the local space. I'll make sure the shields and sensors are given a once over to make sure we're not picked up accidentally..." He planned quickly adding "I'll also see if I can get a clearer picture of what they're broadcasting, see if it gives us any clues on what we're dealing with."

Akeno agreed with them both. "At high warp the system is about nine days away. So we should pick up those radio waves closer, the probes were about four days out when they detected them" She explained. "We can use the time to prepare for planetary surveys and getting our new Astrometrics lab operational"

The Counsellor nodded. "To your point, Lieutenant," she said acknowledging Torvin. "You are correct in more ways than one. The use of radio technology has made me think about my homeworld. Sometimes, questionable vendors will be operating under the radar of the Xanthan government by conducting black market deals through unconventional means of communication, often dated ones that are not commonly monitored."

Jonathan remained quiet throughout the exchange, deciding to keep his mouth shut and his ears open. He needed to know what kind of personalities his new shipmates had, and how he would approach each of them when it came to various future circumstances.

As the Ship's Counsellor, it would be Rania's responsibility to work closely with the First Officer especially when crew evaluation time came around. Presently, her only evaluation was of Captain Akeno and of Lieutenant Commander Miller. It was not an official evaluations, but just assessing their personalities and dynamic.

The quiet observant nature of the First Officer was interesting. Counsellor Bhatti looked at him directly and smiled, though she said nothing. She was curious if he was choosing to listen and observe as well or if perhaps he was nervous to engage.

"Not to overstate the obvious." Specter began. "Radio emissions are typicall associated with a type of Carrier- Wave type transmission. Has there been some sort of Universal Translator attempt to decode and see what the Emissions are saying?"

Ileah paid more attention to her PADD, the 'Spook was a point she took great care with, second only to the Captain as Ileah had been ordered to deal with as per her orders from the Captain who did not really like dealing with the eccentric Intel.

Akeno consulted her PADD. "We're the first ship to be dispatched to investigate. All I have on the radio waves is that they were picked up and seem artificial. Not much to go on, however it seems that Starfleet as a whole are still stretched thin after the war."

"Well," Rania said with a bit of an upbeat tone. "This ship was built for at least some science and exploration. Radio waves or not, it can be exciting to venture into the unknown of the uncharted."

"Exactly. Lets look at it that way!" Akeno replied with a nod of her head. "Its about time we did some proper exploring. No more nebula's or taking on the Dominion!" she told them all. "But, don't let this seem like a vacation, we still have a job to do out here"

"Any further questions?" She asked looking around the room.

"Any idea what the general area is like in terms of tactical and security?" Mckenzie inquired.

The counsellor thought that was a valid question, but given they had nothing but a radio signal to work off of, Rania figured that intelligence on what the tactical circumstances were in the immediate area was slim. Perhaps, they knew more though?

Akeno pondered for a moment at the Lieutenants question. "So far we only know it's an uninhabited system. I would stay aware, just incase we run into anything" she replied. "You never know what's out there"

Akeno looked around as a silence fell upon the room. "Have all your people ready to depart at 15:00 hours. We'll have a few days before we reach the system so that'll give everyone some time to get our new crew settled in" she told them all. "If you have problems see Commander Miller or myself. Dismissed"

"Bye for now." Specter said before the image faded.

Ileah stood in her place as it is her job to keep records for the Captain and would leave when she did naturally.

Torvin nodded and stepped out, quickly turning to a light jog as he vanished off down to engineering. Rushing to get to work.

Tags

Posting by

Captain Akeno Misaki
Commanding Officer

Lieutenant Commander Jonathan Miller
Executive Officer

Lieutenant Justin Specter
Chief Intelligence Officer

Lieutenant Ileah
Captain's Yeoman

Lieutenant JG Torvin Anor
Chief Engineer.

Lt. Mark Johnson
Chief Medical Officer

Lieutenant Raelyn Mckenzie
Chief Security/Tactical Officer

Lieutenant Rania Bhatti
Chief Counselor