Preserving the Record

Posted on 13 May 2018 @ 1:24am by Captain Akio Tachibana & Major Terrance West & Commander Juan Zamora (Dec [CDO]-Jan 2389 - TRSNFR to Gorn Dip.) & Commander S’chqenr T’Jedf Tolkath (Jan 2389 - TRNSFR After Gorn War) & Lieutenant Commander Rafe Cassidy (Jan 2389 - TRNSFR After Gorn War) & Lieutenant Jake Winchester (Jan 2389 - TRNSFR, XFY) & Lieutenant Junior Grade Geneviève "Jenny" Lassonde (Dec-Jan 2389 - TRNSFR After Gorn War)

Mission: Ne Me'e Laua Na Paio - Heroes & Villains
Location: Senior Staff Conference Room - Deck 1
Timeline: 1000, 3 Jan 2389

ON:

[Conference Room]

It had been a hell of a morning and it was not over yet. The Hawaii reported the destruction of the Wyoming, all hands presumed lost, with a full report pending.

After the ship seemed safe and most major repairs completed, with course laid in for XFY, Akio called a meeting of the senior staff. He had a chance to do a lot of reflecting as well.

Entering the room, Akio told everyone to remain seated.

He slide a book across the table. It had a thick blue cover. On the front it had the Federation logo and underneath, in embossed letters: SHIP'S LOG.

"Despite the somewhat frenetic pace of the morning, I want to thank all of you for your performance. You and the rest of the crew have served admirably in our first taste of combat. I know I myself made some mistakes, and for those, I apologize," Akio looked down momentarily. "We must move on though. There are many counting on us. As you know, we will have to provide a full report to Starfleet Command. Before we give our report, I think it is important to characterize what we witnessed appropriately."

West shook his head and couldn't believe Akio was even considering this. "You should just tell them the truth... SIR," West added as he saw some surprised faces. "Captain Carson violated half a dozen Starfleet regulations and he put his crew in danger, nevertheless killing them all with that damn ramming stunt."

Akio held up a hand, "I understand your strong feelings, Major. Yet were we just as honorable when we turned our tail and ran?"

West paused. The Commander had a point. "You should tell them the truth there, too. We were taking on fire through our shields. C'mon, I know I was not the only one paying attention on that bridge. There wasn't anything we could do, and while yes, people died, this is war and people always die."

Akio nodded not only in appreciation of the grizzled warrior, yet also in respect. He looked across the room to gather additional opinions.

Cassidy shifted his weight uncomfortably. "I disagreed with Captain Carson when he was in this room, but I don't think we get to throw stones at him for the ramming action when we were going to abandon the Wyoming. And we don't know what happened over there. Maybe he realised we were all screwed, and thought better to lose a Steamrunner's two hundred lives than a Sovereign's eight hundred. And that's just a guess; we're not ever going to know." He glanced at West. "Still, Major, I'm not sure we get to call what he did a stunt, but claim we did what we had to do."

West nodded, "I can respect that. I don't think we should be nominating the guy for medals, though. Their entire crew drew weapons on us. We should tell the truth and let Starfleet sort it out."

"Yeah, not objecting to that." Cassidy lifted his hands. "Captain Carson seemed to be right about the doctor but refused to give us the evidence. If he'd shown that instead of accusing us of being collaborators, things might have gone a whole lot different."

"What we should have done", Winchester said visibly angry and turning red, "Is place them in custody the moment they stepped foot aboard this ship." Shaking his head Jake contiuned, "I said on the Bridge somthing was off about this and it was, and now People are dead because of it".

"Put them in custody the moment they arrived?" Cassidy echoed incredulously. "On what grounds? That they'd been very quiet on their approach in enemy space? None of this could have been predicted."

From where he sat slumped at one end of the conference table Juan let out a heavy sigh and ran a hand through through the chaos that had become of his hair for the umpteenth time. "Whether it pleases us or not gentlemen, the past is in the past, and there is nothing that we can do about it now. No doubt the 'what-ifs' will continue to plague us for some time to come, but we must concern ourselves with 'what now?' if we are going to uphold our duty to our subordinates."

He took a breath before continuing. "I may not be able to speak with authority on matters of combat, but I do have experience with deception. And, deception will get us nowhere useful right now. Right now we have reason to suspect that clandestine forces have infiltrated Starfleet, but nothing beyond that. We do not know, nor do we have any way of knowing, what information might help them, or what might hurt them. Our only option, as I see it, is to pass on the truth and watch carefully as events unfold. I would recommend however that we withhold our final report until such time as we have given Lieutenant Cortez a very thorough talking to."

Tolkath sat back listening to the various opinions coming from the those present. He was a little unsure as to the direction Tachibana was intending this meeting to go. As Captain of the Hawaii he alone was responsible for the decisions taken; whether that was to allow Carson to leave after the man had clearly breached regulations or by making the tactical choice to retreat, instead of supporting the Wyoming during the battle.

While it would be Tachibana who would have to explain his decisions to the Board of Enquiry, the rest of the senior staff, including himself would be required to submit reports. Holding this discussion could be viewed as an attempt at collusion to cover potential misdeeds, particularly if Carson had a good reputation with Task Force Command.

He decided to raise that point. "It might be prudent" He offered "If we restrict discussion of recent events and follow incident procedures by completing detailed individual reports on our personal actions and those of our respective departments, from the first moment of contact with the Wyoming until we went to warp. Those reports should be completed, sealed and then secured with Lieutenant Winchester for safe keeping until arrival at Xavier."

He was not intending to undermine Tachibana but there would be an accounting for the loss of the Wyoming and it was vital that they strictly followed procedures.

"That sounds like a good course of action. No offense to Lieutenant Winchester; however, something like this would rest with the XO. Considering Mr. Marian is currently incapacitated, I will leave it to Mr. Zamora to oversee the administrative matters of collecting the reports and sending them on to Starfleet Command," Akio explained.

Akio then took a pause, briefly looking down again, before continuing, "I did not call this discussion to undermine the truth; however, as many of you know, this is my first command. Captain Carson is an experienced CO and his actions, I think we can all agree on, were unexpected. I do not want to sully his reputation with wild conjecture despite whatever misgivings we all had. I think the words of your fellow senior officers are the canons we should be writing our reports by: the unequivocal truth. Please have your reports ready within 48 hours."

Akio let that sink in before nodding, signalling he was complete.

Juan nodded grimly and just said: "Of course sir."

"Following Mister Zamora's suggestion," Tolkath continued "Perhaps we should explore some of Captain Carson's allegations in more depth?"

He himself had spent some time on those and he was interested to hear what others thought. Particularly as some of those present could indeed be what Carson had claimed - agents of the Gorn Hegemony.

"Yes, without clouding our reports, that is the next topic. I have looked into our Doctor's records and can find no irregularities. Mr. Winchester, I expect a summary of any leads you investigating by this evening. I am not sure if you've had a chance to interrogate Ms. Cortez with all that has been going on this morning," Akio added.

"I think," Juan said, "that we should make it a priority to establish the trustworthiness of Ensign Michaels down in intelligence. If we can rely on him, his skills could be a valuable asset to our investigations. If not, he represents a threat we should deal with post haste."

Akio paused. He felt almost embarrassed for not knowing who Michaels was, yet as the Captain of a Sovereign-class ship, he wasn't expected to know every Ensign aboard. Even the most gregarious captains Akio had met utilized the command structure and yeoman to keep abreast of personnel.

"Good thinking. To be honest, this is the first I've heard of Ensign Michaels. Has anyone met the man?" Akio inquired.

"I admit, neither have I," Juan explained. "With concerns mounting over intelligence, I thought it would be prudent to study the manifest though."

"Good thinking," Akio nodded before transitioning. "Another issue that we need to determine is how the Gorn possessed the technology or wherewithal to use not only frequency modulation for their ordnance, yet also know exactly what were our own shield frequencies," Akio pondered.

"I have a team working on it Captain" Tolkath replied. "We have reviewed the data gathered on the weapons during the attack and collected some samples of them from the impact zones.

As far as we can tell the torpedo has some kind of on-board force field or shield generator, which surrounds the weapon with an electro-magnetic sheath. Unlike a standard field or shield this is not designed to repel or repulse. Instead it appears to be configured to absorb energy from any other field they encounter, then dissipate it around the weapon.

He left out the scientific principles and theory involved and gave a simplified explanation.

"Essentially when the torpedo encounters a shield it is able to absorb the shield's energy and, for a second or so of time, become a part of the shield itself, before it's own generator circuits are overloaded and the field collapses. But, that is just enough for the torpedo to pass through the shield and detonate. It is a highly advanced and ingenious system," Tolkath continued, inwardly appreciating the design.

"If it is truly from Gorn Engineering, then they have advanced further than anyone has thought capable," Akio added gloomily.

"That is correct" Tolakth agreed "However there are some drawbacks that, I believe, can be exploited. The weapons travel much slower that a standard torpedo, so at long range could be avoided. If Flight Control and Tactical can devise appropriate maneuvers?" Tolkath looked to Cassidy and Winchester.

"Sure," Cassidy said, brow furrowed. "We'll go over the battle data and see what we can figure out about their accuracy and rate of fire, look at what might work. I'm sure we can also cook up some combat tactics which keep us effective at long range for next time around so we can punch back while we dodge."

Akio nodded at the Lieutenant's remarks. At least there was a potential way to avoid the devastating fire.

"Furthermore" Tolkath continued "The increased components for the on board force field generator reduce payload and so they are also less destructive. We survived with relatively minor damage.

"Also, it may be possible to overload the torpedo's generator before it reaches our shields. My team is working on methods to achieve that. Hopefully Engineering will be able to assist."

He looked to Kosu.

"Finally, " Tolkath added "Preliminary metallurgy on the weapon fragments recovered indicate some unusual trace alloys, not previously associated with Gorn technology. They are more widely used in Romulan, Dominion and Klingon weapons manufacture."

"Excuse me sir," Jenny cut in, "but, are we even sure that was a Gorn ship? What I saw out there didn't match any profile in the database."

"Good question, Lieutenant. At the moment, I think it is best to assess that it was a Gorn vessel. Do you have any hypothesis to indicate otherwise? From the schematics shown to us by Captain Carson, I want to say the vessel appeared to be an offshoot, albeit a radical one, from the images the Wyoming captured. I do not recall a match to the vessel we saw though. Commander Tolkath?" Akio looked to the Vulcan who had become a resident expert on Gorn vessels.

"I have reviewed the data from our encounter and from those files presented by Captain Carson." Tolkath replied. "I believe it was indeed a Gorn vessel. A further generation of one previously encountered by the Wyoming."

He tapped one of the conference table panels and pointed to the viewscreen, which now showed two images; one of the vessel they had fought with its two saucer sections and one of the ships from Carson's images.

The one from the Wyoming had a single saucer hull section, but with a protruding strut which could mount a second hull, making it of the same design as the double hull one.

"As for the Federation energy readings, it is logical to suppose that the Gorn are now using the same tactic of camouflaging their ships as we were, by mimicking their enemy. It worked in this case and allowed them to get close enough to successfully launch their attack." He finished.

"Isn't that..." Cassidy hesitated. "I don't like this; the Wyoming masking their signature and then the Gorn show up doing the same trick. They both had the same bright idea on the same day? And why were the Gorn prowling around their own space hidden? I'd figure they're following the Wyoming but I guess we'll never know for sure, now."

"In war college, we always wondered what a war would look like with electromagnetic jamming. What we are facing now is exactly what our simulations projected. I am not sure when the masking started, yet it is quite logical, if I may use that word," Akio glanced briefly at Tolkath, "that after the Wyoming was detected with the mask, the Gorn copied the same. You do bring up a good point that such tactics imply a level of intelligence sophistication that the Gorn knew how to mask their signature to fool our sensors."

'It is also the progression of their old tactic, of using false transmissions prior to attack. Now they arrive in false ships" The Vulcan agreed. "Aggression does lead to innovation, as history has shown, at least in warfare"

As the conversation petered out, Juan rose from his seat. "Alright, if nobody has anything else to add, we all have pressing matters to attend to. Do you agree Captain?"

"Absolutely," Akio said as he was drawn out of his daze. The Gorn were becoming quite the adversary, something not even the worst projections had included. "Let's make way for XFY."

OFF:

Akio Tachibana, CDR, SF
CO

Juan "JJ" Zamora, LCDR, SF
2XO/CDO

Tolkath, LCDR, SF
CSO

Rafe Cassidy, LT, SF
CONN

Jake Winchester, LTJG, SF
TACSEC

Geneviève "Jenny" Lassonde, LTJG, SF
CO, FLT 801

Terrance "Terry" West, Maj, SFMC
CO, 3d MRBN