[snip]

”..The Mythology class explorer which the Ark Angel is built upon, is indeed a larger ship. Like the Galaxy class explorers we have provisions for families, children, and such on what are expected longer than usual missions, surveys, or exploration duties. Given the Viking as I recall is of an older Viking class explorer design which by standard did not include provisions and rooms to support children or families long term, and the Leviathan is of a dreadnought class too this does not surprise me..” Drudoc said. “..As my daughter Tel’eck said, any children or civilians among the crew which stay long term aboard here, are expected to go through mandatory training to understand what they are to do in an emergency or during yellow or red alerts..” she said.

” yes as I recall the Viking was worn down and most of the decks had no power to the, as for the Leviathan she no simple Dreadnought class ship. But that is highly classified” Luna said

”..I was not referring to its classified nature, Ensign. But rather the class of ship it uses. In this case a modified Mjolnir class heavy dreadnought carrier design..” Drudoc amended.

Tel’eck spoke up, “..What my Mom here is saying is when things get bad all us civvies get to hunker down in either a civilian shelter, or if us children are in school hunker down there till the all clear is given..” the teen explained.

“will I be in class with you?” Cerenity asked.

Tel’eck smiled gently, “..Afraid not little scamp. Us older kids like me are in other school rooms for higher education classes. But sometimes the teachers work together with you younger scamps to have recreational parties or events. Plus..” Tel’eck leaned in again whispering loudly, “..My Mom here has a lovely tradition on the ship where after every mission we throw a party for the whole crew. There’s usually a theme of some kind usually with a sort of contest where folks say dress up and younger kids like you get to vote on who wins, after the folks who dress up or whatever give a little educational fun lesson on what it all entails..” she explained. “..Plus its lots of food, fun, and even rewards and stuff given to the crew who were involved in the mission. Really makes a ship of even this size feel smaller and closer knit like an extended family..”

Drudoc again nodded, “..Short but correct, as my daughter says. All civilian shelters, schools, and nurseries, are reinforced and self powered and stocked with supplies that were a critical failure of the ship to occur those inside those areas could survive without worry for up to a week. Those who man those areas are also specially trained in medical and emergency response and repairs, and during yellow or red alert are supplemented by special trained Starfleet officers to manage those in those areas as well in a crisis..” she went on. “..All in all in the five or so years the Ark Angel has been out on missions no civilian has ever been.....lost..” she said amending likely the word ‘killed’ for Cerenity’s presence, “..While on the ship.” Returning then her attention to Cerenity then Luna, “..So long as this is understood, Ensign, and you both pass the courses for assignment in the next few days before our next mission, there will not be any issue with your daughter being aboard..” she stated.

Luna as if she might cry for a second. Cerenity would actually be safe when they got into dangerous situations. ” There were so such precautions put in place on the Viking or the Leviathan. it was quite the ordeal but I am her only living family.” Luna said quietly. Cerenity leaned over to Tel’eck ” I was attacked by a shadow monster that had hunted me from the Viking. It’s the only thing to ever win a fight against my Mommy.” she said. The look on Luna’s face made it clear at least part of what Cerenity said was true.

Tel’eck at the mention of Luna being a single mother, gave an understanding nod, so too did Drudoc, though hers was sadder in quality. Obviously she too had experienced great loss of a loved one in her life. “..My Dad was human, he was a Lt Commander in Starfleet when he and my Mom met on the USS Rogue back in the 2380s. On one of our vacations he.....well he got sucked out into space on a runabout accident. Mom had to raise me alone till about two years ago, some anomaly it seems caught my Dad before he could ya know die in space and plopped him safely on a class-m asteroid in subspace. What was almost 7 years for us was barely two days for him when we happened to find him. Sadly he barely had returned to us and gotten back on his feet when a later mission took him again from us fighting some bad guys near the ruins of Romulus that were trying to take over the remains of the Star Empire. He saved a lot of people that day..” Tel’eck said.

”..Your Father, Bradley Mitchell will not be forgotten, Tel’eck, not by us or Starfleet, and neither for his sacrifice in protecting those among what remains of the Star Empire..” Drudoc saidly quietly then took a long gulp from her glass to wash aside the sadder thoughts mucking up the meeting.

Cerenity happy sat across from Tel’eck ” I’m Cerenity it’s nice to meet you umm” She said. She did not know the other girl’s name and was unsure what to say. Luna smiled taking a set Next to cerenity. ” This ship is beautiful,” Luna said.

Ensign Luna

Drudoc smiled in a motherly way to Cerenity then, “..It is nice to meet you too Miss Cerenity, I hope your time with us will be an enjoyable one..” she said.

Looking then to Luna, Drudoc nodded a bit looking around, “..The Ark Angel in its current form is certainly a well storied ship since being commissioned 5 years ago, she has certainly more then exceeded the expectations I think of its crew and even designers. She may not be the most sleek class of ship in the fleet, nor the fastest or most combative, but the Mythology class is certainly a robust, comfortable, and rugged ship for many mission profiles. It also has proven time and again for us to be able to be pushed far beyond its designed specifications may imply..” Drudoc explained.

Rolling her eyes, Tel’eck leaned down to Cerenity whispering loudly with a hand to her cheek, “..What my Mom is humbly trying to say is we’ve set a lot of endurance records, and such in the historical sense.” Looking then to Drudoc she said, “..come on Mom, tell them about our last mission in the GN-Z11 galaxy!” she prompted. As Luna may know the GN-z11 galaxy was the farthest and oldest known stellar object from the Milky Way, it was such a far distant galaxy that to get there on conventional warp would take easily over 300,000 some years! Much less to get back to the Milky Way.

Drudoc sighed giving her daughter a look, “..Honestly, Tel’eck while the outcome of that unexpected venture by the Q entity was not in our original mission parameters and we all excelled well in our two months out there, I don’t…” she began to say but Tel’eck interrupted.

” What is a Q? and why are they called Q ? do they look big talking letter Qs” Cerenity asked

Tel’eck laughed a bit at Cerenity’s question smiling, “..Nah the Q are like these super powerful alien beings, they can like snap their fingers and make stuff happen, change, or appear, or whatever else they want..” she said to the girl. Turning back then to her Mother Tel’eck pressed on.....

”..Oh come on! Leave out the ‘scary bits’ if you must for the little scamp here, but it is in hindsight proof of what you were just saying about the things we do on here!” Tel’eck said. “..If you’re not going to tell them then I will!”

” I lived on a haunted ship and another one with monsters on it. I highly doubt you can scare me” Cerenity said. Luna smiled and shook her head. ” Cerenity be nice” Luna worned.

Tel’eck gave a wry grin to Cerenity, “..Ohh that sounds like a challenge to scare you then later!” the teen said. Whether she was joking or not was unclear.

Frowning a bit, Drudoc seemed about to reprimand her daughter, but then caved in looking to Luna and Cerenity, “..Well ok, originally the Ark Angel 6 months ago, was tasked to deliver a large shipment of colonial supplies from Starbase 243, to an outer colony on Federation space. Originally the mission was to last about a month or so to get there, deliver the supplies, and attend then to any colony needs, before returning to Starbase 243. However, a week into our trip there, one of the Q entities showed up on our bridge. They informed us that the Continuum in particular was having an exciting debate over things the Federation and in particular the Ark Angel had done in the past year prior. We were told that to solve this debate among the Q we would be exposed to some ‘extreme conditions’ to judge how we would react and cope. Without much further explanation the Q snapped their fingers and we all were knocked out. When we awoke and got our bearings we found we were deep in the GN-z11 galaxy, further the Q said we were to be on our own until such time as we had settled the debate of the differing Q’s that they would then return to take us home. With that they vanished leaving us to manage on our own..” Drudoc said pausing to sip her glass of liquid.

”..During the first three weeks, we found several alien races and cultures which were on par or below current Federation technology, or in some cases exceeded. Thankfully none were outright hostile, and we found that the region of space we had arrived in was controlled by a alien race which kept control and provided trade by the use of information. The rarer the information the more value it had. Once this local government learned where we had come from you can imagine how much interest we soon garnered, thankfully no more ‘pirate’ elements in the religion decided to challenge us, but by bartering various cultural databases, entertainment databases and the like all of which had never been known of by these people we secured enough return information to get a better picture of the region we were in and trapped in..” she went on.

”..During the next few weeks, we scouted the region not only attempting to find a means home under our own power, as slim as it was, but also to keep active and focused knowing that the Q were no doubting observing our reactions. We eventually found a mineral rich nebula which we discovered was actually a nursery of sorts of a protomatter and dark matter based life forms. These life forms were capable of interacting with living beings, reacting to their thoughts when they were about to die and creating a myriad of different reactions. We realized that the local religious orders in this region who were seem to have ‘divine’ abilities were those who happened to be able to predict and to a degree control these older life forms. Hence creating ‘miracles’ for their flock and followers. We kept this information closely under wraps as revealing its source would have no doubt destabilized the region in ways we could not predict..” Drudoc went on.

”..In the end, we were able to keep to ourselves and found a way to isolate and even communicate with these creatures directly, they were at first confused of the idea of organic material beings like ourselves, given that until they manifested a physical form they had little in the way of perceiving the world as we do. It was only by an accident with one of our junior scientists causing a much younger matter life form reforming into a small one foot tall version of the JO in question that we came to fully understand them and they in turn us. Through this little ones help we located a very old matter life form in its dying stages, and through the little one was able to communicate to it our need of collecting its dying energy as a means to transport us back to the Milky Way. In short we were obviously successful, the little one is as I last knew currently attending cultural classes on Earth. Though she is an exact match physically for the JO in question, mentally she is quite different and obviously at only a foot tall challenged by her new life that she was stuck into. The end result was in the dying moments of this much older life form, we were able to channel the collective thoughts of the crew as a focal point to return us from GN-z11 to a light year or so outside of Starbase 243 here. Suffice to say it was quite the debrief for all concerned. The Q were actually annoyed that we had not settled their debate, and worse in their eyes figured out a solution which did not put us at their mercy for help..” Drudoc explained.

Tel’eck laughed a bit finishing her milkshake, “..Oh come on Mom! You KNOW you and the crew loved giving the Q the big boot by ignoring them and showing we did not need to rely on them like they thought!” The teen said.

Drudoc smiled a bit and shrugged, “..Maybe a little..” she stated. Turning then back to Luna and Cerenity, “..So suffice to say my advice is expect the unexpected while aboard the Ark Angel, it never seems to be a dull moment here..” she finished

Drudoc Andone CO

Luna and Cerenity both stared at Drudoc. Luna was processing what she had just heard. It was Cerenity who spoke first. ” Wow that’s insane,” she said wide-eyed.

Drudoc smiled fondly to Cerenity, “..Insanity is part of the job when you’re in Starfleet to put it one way..” She said.

“Thats a lot of thought not too different from my life so far. I have heard of the Q but never seen one that must have been startling. did they just appear like they are rumer to?” Luna asked

Ensign Luna

”..Indeed, a white flash and there he was on the bridge, and after a bit of a jovial rant snapped his fingers and off we were into GN-z11..” Drudoc answered.

By this point the four were joined once more by the 17 year old waitress that Luna had met before coming in, “..Hey sorry, I got tied up cleaning one of our reclamation sinks in the kitchen. Can I get any of you anything else or something new?” She asked.

Tel’eck raised her glass, “..One more milk shake for me! But only a smaller cup this time, thanks Jean.” The girl said obviously knowing the slightly older waitress from school.

”..A small cup for me too of a ginger and mint tea with a bit of sugar..” Drudoc requested.

The waitress known as Jean looked to Luna and Cerenity then, “..Anything for you two?” She asked.

GM CockRoach