Bang you're dead

Posted on Sat Jan 21st, 2017 @ 12:36am by Commander Bertrand Cuprum & Captain Elijah Michaels & Commander Cor Cordale & Lieutenant Sara'draphia T'eseri & Lieutenant Valeria Mordin

Mission: All the Kings Men: Wargames
Location: Bridge, USS Victory

The Red Alert sounded loudly on the Bridge of the Victory as the dark light dimmed the Deck. Elijah crawled up to his chair after being thrown from the initial volley. "Report!" He barked loudly.

Lieutenant Tarlee, the Gamma Watch Commander was filling in at Ops and the Officer looked at his instruments. "Dorsal Shields at 35 percent, Bulkheads have sealed on Decks 17, 18 and 19." The Alien Officer looked towards the Captain. "That last volley took out our Comms we are on own own."

Elijah looked over at the Bridge Crew as several were littered all over the floor. "Divert Life Support if you need to but get us power to shields, Klibane prepare Aft Torpedo Launchers and target the Frigate at 4798 Mark 34 and fire at will.

"Aye Sir, aft torpedo's ready, frigate targeted, firing now!" Kevin answered, his hands darting over the console as he spoke. The mock torpedo's found their target and he called out "frigate shields down eighteen percent Captain."

Down in sickbay, Sara was directing her people to respond to the most important call outs. With a severe bull breach like this, she was expecting to be swamped with work again. As the first of her response teams went out, she thought to herself 'I hope I can stay awake through this one'

Bertrand was holding tight to his chair with his right arm, preventing himself from being thrown by the artificial jolts from the inertial dampeners, "Casualty reports are coming in."

There was an alarm at the back of the bridge and two monitors went dead. The Ensigns who were manning them stepped away. One lay down while the other, stooped to drag the simulated victim to safety.

"Cor," Bertrand barked through the intra-ship comms as two new figures came in to replace the 'injured' crew, "We are running out of panels up here. How long before we get a damage control team on the bridge?"

Down in the heart of Engineering, things weren't going as well as Cor had hoped. A number of his own panels were marked 'destroyed' or 'damaged', with crews running through the motions to get them back in the game. "What happened to the team I sent u..." he stopped mid-reply. Apparently, the hull breach marked them as casualties. "I'll see if I can spare anyone else." he said, with a little less wind in his proverbial sails.

Bert glanced at the CO, "Looks like the shield enhancements are not going to be enough. We are being shaken to bits in our shell."

Elijah got up and moved to the Conn. "I'll take it from her Ensign." The Captain proceeded to take the seat. "Engaging evasive manoeuvres pattern Gamma twelve, Bert I'll need you to manually take non essential systems offline one by one to divert to engines, I'm setting us on an intercept course with that Dreadnaught."

Bert grimaced, "Given our failed ability to cause damage, I am tempted to include weapons in 'Non-essential' systems."

He stood from first officers chair just a fraction of a second before it beeped that it had exploded. The computer noted his absence and did not mark him a casualty. Bertrand whistled through his teeth as he sat in the captain's chair, pulling up opps.

"We've lost the Tortuga and the Faraday is without power."

Elijah shook his head. "Poor bastards."

The repair team arrived at the bridge and began to 'fix' panels. One of them bent to work on the 'destroyed' first officer's chair. Bert's palm began to itch.

"If this plan fails we will have to consider abandoning Ship and living to fight another day." Elijah said as he took control of the Victory. The Captain didn't want to sacrifice his crew.

=^= Sickbay to bridge, I'm recieveing casualty reports from all over the ship. If this keeps up we are going to start looking paitents =^= Sara reported over the intercom

"Acknowledged Doctor." Elijah said in response.

The Captain looked at Val. "Lieutenant I need you to monitor the Jennarri Dreadnaught, slightest power fluctuation relay it to Tactical."

Valeria gave a nod from her station, her screen already showing a sensor readout of the targeted dreadnought. After a few moments, "There's a fluctuation in their shield harmonics. They're preparing to fire." she warned.

The Captain was about to give the order to fire and start evasive manoeuvres but it was too late. The Enemy Ship had already fired and targeted the Bridge. Sensors began to flash all over the Bridge, signalling that the majority of them were dead.

Tarlee turned to the Captain from the OPS Console. "Captain, we've just lost Tactkcal and Secondary Systems."

"Bertrand how are we doing over there?" Elijah asked with a momentary glance towards his XO.

Bertrand just held up his hands and zippered his mouth. The Captain's chair he had been sitting in was registered destroyed he was dead where he sat.

"It would seem Mister Tarlee you just got Promoted." Elijah said to the Bolian beside him. Though given the way the exercise was going it seemed like a death sentence.

"Bridge shields are at 10%, Hull Breaches on all Decks except the Bridge, Sickbay and the Mess Hall." Tarlee relayed to him. "Engineering has been evacuated and no sign of Commander Cordale."

Elijah looked at Mordin. "Val you're now the Second Officer."

"Aye sir." the rabbitess acknowledged as she turned from her science console. "My recommendation is a full spread aft to occupy their shields, followed by a full burst of phaser fire. As far as our studies have shown, they must open narrow bands in their shields to allow their weapons to discharge. They cannot defend against us, and attack us, simultaneously."

OOC: Point of order. We have lost tactical systems, which means we have no shields or Phasers.

"It could buy us some time."

Elijah nodded. "I'll set us in a direct course towards the Jennarri, have whatever power we can muster transferred from the sealed off sections of the Ship."

Tarlee agreed. "Least we can take then with us."

"Bridge to Sickbay, get your wounded to the Escape Pods and evacuate Sickbay." The Captain ordered as he got up from Helm and towards Tactical or rather what was left of it.

=^= Understood Captain =^= came the quick reply from Sara. Quickly getting her team leaders together, she handed out assignments to them before heading out to start directing the evacuation.

"All hands this is the Captain, abandon Ship." Elijah said pressing the internal coms. "I repeat abandon Ship."

As this was a simulation all that was required was for personnel to report to their evacuation pods, not any actual ejection. The non-esential crew quickly filed off the bridge leaving the Captain, CTO, CSciO and dead First officer.

And the engineer who had been repairing the chair he stood up now and turned to smile at the group.

"Now that the crowd has left, I wonder if this might be a good time to talk Captain?"

Bertrand leapt from his chair unable to contain himself, "Smith! How the hell did you get on the Bridge!"

They could all see it was indeed the enigmatic Agent Smith of SFI.

"I simply reported for duty with the repair team," he explained. "Now I really do have urgent matters to discuss with you Captain, and not much time to do it in. It concerns Admiral Gates and the USS Cosmos."

Elijah looked at him. "What you have to say Smith you can say in front of the Crew, you owe me that courtesy at least."

"Next time you 'simply report' for anything, try not to get spotted" Kevin said to the SFI Officer, throwing down a PADD with Agent Smith's picture on it.

"Karadis had you pinned the moment you stepped on board. She's had orders to check everyone who comes on board this ship to ensure no unmentionables should get onto the Victory without Security being informed" he continued.

Turning to the CO he said "My apologies Sir, the confirmation it was Agent Smith here only just came up on our records, I was just about to bring it to yours and the XO's attention."

Turning back to Agent Smith he continued "Like you Smith, Karadis and I are tarred with the 'once a spook', 'always a spook' label, even though we're now Security, so, we still think like 'spooks', however, we act like Security!"

Smith sighed, "I wasn't hiding from you, Lt. Congratulations on the promotion by the way. I had to walk past that camera three times before I was sure it got a good look at me. However, given what I have come to talk to you about concerns restricted information, I needed to wait till those with a lower access had been removed. This is not a matter for idle discussion."

"Everyone here was informed about project Umbrella. You were all involved in recovering and destroying the data from the research station some months ago. Some of you are still angry about that, as you should be. That is not the only information of... questionable ethics that SFI have on record. Just because we do not use Cloak technology, does not mean we do not have extensive records on how a cloak may work."

"All of this data is stored at a set of secure archives located in high protected zones, and known only to a few key Federation Personnel. There is one that contains a significant amount of tactical blue prints, including Temporal weapons, Phase cloaks, Varon T Disruptors, you get the idea. Only four people know of its location. My self, My superior, the President of the UFP... and now, Admiral Gates."

"My superior was... probed... I don't know there is an appropriate word for the level of psychic assault they made on him. He is in a vegetative state now. We are pretty sure Gates was behind the assault and the USS Cosmos was seen heading in the direction of the Archive with two other ships in tow."

"Captain, I don't have time to explain to the High Command, or a board of Admirals. Gates needs to be stopped and I came to the only people I knew who had the motivation and understanding of how far this man may go. If he is able to access the archive, then project Umbrella is just a glimpse of white he might do. Will you and your crew help?"

"If I may" Kevin said "the request you're making of this crew to go after Admiral Gates, it isn't a direct order coming from Starfleet HQ then, this is either you or SFI who's asking us then Agent Smith?" he queried.

Valeria came over to the gathering after ensuring that all hands had evacuated, "Gentlemen? Sir? Is our simulation over?" she asked first, to clarify. After a pause, she noticed Agent Smith, and she just shook her head gently, "It's somehow unsurprising to see you again, Agent." she paused for a moment, "Did I overhear a request for vendetta? An unofficial request, at that?" she had a ghost of a smirk on her features.

Elijah pondered the thought for a second, it was no secret that Gates was guilty and the Captain knew what damage he could do. "Miss Mordin has a point and so does Kilbane, it's an unofficial request in the middle of a sanctioned War a Games."

"It's no vendetta, Lieutenant, and no it is not an official request. As I have said, there has been no time. My previous Senior, and one of the few people with clearance I could talk to aside from the President himself is out of action. Gates is making a move, and if someone doesn't act to stop him, then he could do untold damage."

"I am going after him, myself and a small handful of crew I can trust in my superior's ship. It is only one against three war ships though. I could use the Victory as backup, or at the very least some extra crew on my ship."

Elijah nodded. "There will be a lull in the War Games for the next few hours I think we can spare the time." The Captain said in response.

Kevin turned to the CO and asked "Can you please clarify that Sir, are you meaning that because there's going to be a lull in the war games for the next few hours it means we can spare the time along with the Victory, or we as crew can spare the time?"

Elijah turned to the Lieutenant. "Both."

"Are you then advocating Sir, that, without direct orders from Starfleet HQ to do so, 'we the crew' and this ship leave the war games and go after Admiral Gates on Agent Smith's say so?" Kevin said.

"Against," Bertrand growled. "AGAINST direct orders. Our orders are for the USS Victory to take part in these maneuvers to prepare for the Jenarri. Regardless of any personal feelings on the matter, the regulations are quite clear. I will not abandon my post. Any attempt to take the ship away would be theft, and the crew aboard who were not aware would be deemed kidnapped. I am sorry, sir, I cannot agree to this."

Smith sighed, "He is right. This is a breach of regulation. But Gates is working outside regulations and if we are to catch him we may need to take short cuts."

"You cannot order me to do this, Captain," Bertrand warned.

Elijah nodded at Bertrand's honesty. "Senior Staff Meeting in thirty minutes, let the Staff make their decision."

Bertrand made to protest but thought better of it. It would be another three hours before they were required for another round of battle.

"Dismissed everyone." Elijah said before strolling off to his Ready Room.