[snip]

The first point that was highlighted was some location deep within the Gamma Quadrant sometime in around 2602, a rough scan showed something akin to 30 some Serpent ships doing something in a 9 planet system in that distant region of the galaxy. The second point highlighted was much further in their past about 3 million years ago on Earth, an area somewhere in the north central region of what one day would be Germany was highlighted, there a single Serpent ship, quite smaller then the others seemed to show 3 of its crew, in some detail. Here they got their first glimpse of the aliens menace, they had two forms, one was humanoid like the single figure seeming a ‘worker’ in function standing roughly 5‘8 in height with two arms and two legs, but a quite almost serpentine middle torso that showed it was overall quite flexible then say a human. The other two were more snake like flowing across the rough dirt of a ancient forest. The three figures in the blurred temporal scans were seen being shot at by ancient Neanderthals with sharpened wooden sticks and as the sped up scan showed interestingly the first known use of that period of stone tools and weapons! The scan ended with all three being slain and eaten by the primitive human ancestors. : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : “Hi…” Bo-Ro-Mah was about to say “hideous looking things” but realized that that may be racist to some members of the Federation. “Hi…rmph. “ : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : The third point highlighted was sometime around the 1820s, this time the location was in the distant Delta Quadrant in some non-descriptive system with nothing but asteroid rubble. The three serpent ships seemed to be doing some kind of mining. The forth point highlighted then was in 2156, here they saw the familiar shape of the SS Greyhound in orbit around a familar planet, they saw how the Serpents had come out of a subspace fissure and attacked the lost Earth ship, the resulting fight played out much as the Merrimack crew had come to know, the CO of the Greyhound beaming his crew to the surface as the Serpents boarded his ship tearing apart the few remaining crew, the port impulse engine being ejected and an unstable warp bubble being formed followed by a burst of photonic torpedoes destroying the impulse engine as the warp engines were engaged, this in turn caused an high radiation pulse to hit the enemy ships killing all on board the two ships, the one was destroyed crashing some where with its remains in the southern continent of the planet, the 2nd drifted in a crash to the northern continent, and likely was of the one htey had seen being studied by the northern planet people there. : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : The fifth point highlighted moved again to their past, sometime around the early 200s BC by Earth time. The system highlighted was what later would be known as the Col System 10 light years from Earth, where previously Drudoc had mentioned in the 22nd and 24th century the Mayan ruins had been transplanted by aliens unknown. But here they got some answer. In orbit of Col III were blurred images of some alien ships, fighting many more of the Serpent ships. From what they could tell on the scans as Drudoc had mentioned these aliens were ‘defeating’ the Serpents in a pitch battle, what scanned information that was made out showed perhaps a weakness in the enemy force. The shielding system in use seemed weaker along the aft sections of many of the ships. There was also seemingly a preference of the Serpents to go to great length to protect what seemed to be their hatchery on the Col III system (and as mentioned others), perhaps if they located such a hatchery here they could use it as a bargaining chip if they could maintain control and threat of use against it. The scan finished showing the aliens defeating the Serpents by using non-common energy forms of attacks, as well as some kind of gravemetric charges to create miniature black holes or something similar. They then were seen ‘moving’ the Mayans from Earth to Col III and setting them up as guardians of the remaining hatchery there. The sixth point highlighted, was also familiar to the Merrimack crew, it was of the sudden surprise attack by the Serpents while they had been in dock, and Cross in command. Not much else was learned here. The last point highlighted was of the attack in the late 24th century around 2393, and played out in a familiar fashion as the Ark Angel crew had known it. : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : Looking things over in a concise manner the crew could form some common patterns when overlaid together so far. : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : 1) The pattern of emergence and focus across the timeline and in this reality seemed focused upon their current point in time with the Merrimack, 2301 in this case. The quantum fluctuation patterns that emerging enemy forces might shown here gave some patterns which with some tweaking to their phasers, shields, and torpedoes could be made to cause damage or prevent damage in an enemy attack. : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : 2) Scans from the Ark Angel of the Merrimack’s temporal period, and the ship itself showed that the ship’s various forms of travel as Starfleet of this time had mentioned had put the ship and her crew (during those events) in a slight ‘phase’ of their own, this meant that they had a form of natural resistance to varying temporal or quantum changes to varying degrees. The down side would be that when temporal or quantum alterations might occur near them odd anomalies might crop up (OOC: aka like thw engine emissions gas anomaly on the Ark Angel atm!) : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : 3) Gravitic anomalies like black holes or similar anomalies seemed to greatly weaken the enemy ships on the molecular level. They also seemed to cause a dampening effect upon the enemies systems. Forming such anomalies on a small scale in an engagement would be useful! This could easily be accomplished by use of their Red Matter in small amounts fired by modified torpedo casings. : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : 4) The last commonality they formed was that the further into the future or past one went from 2301 the stronger the enemy became. But it seemed from this focal point they would be on a more even footing in engagements if they made the proper planning and adjustments noted above. : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : “From what I can gather here, it looks like the aft sections of their vessels are weaker to our weapons. The enemy vessel systems seem to also be affected by anomalies such as black holes which we should be able to replicate if engineering modifed some torpedoes to use the Red Matter.” He then looked at the others to see what they may have noticed. : : : : : : : : : : : : : : : “I agree, but how do we take advantage of that weakness?” Tiglath replied, staring at the data, his mind thinking. “The Ark Angel isn’t the most maneuverable craft in the fleet. Maybe we can modify the torpedoes to overshoot the enemy then return back, like a boomerang.” He suggested quickly, “Maybe we can use the red matter, place it in torpedo casings and use them like mines.” Tiglath continued, he leaned back in his chair. : : : : : : : : : : : : “We don’t necessarily have to hit the ship with the torpedo itself. We could fire in a spread around the vessel, overlapping the blast radius of each at the center of the vessel’s aft section. Concentrate the most force at the dead center of the thing and see if that doesn’t disrupt their operations.” Cochrane interjected. “And with the temporal flux those things seem to exist in, triggering the mines by proximity could prove problematic. We could always do remote detonation, though. But we should assume that their technology level will allow them to detect those prior to coming into range.” : : : : : : : : : : : : : : =^=Computer, what do we know about their culture?=^= He asked the computer. : : : : : : : : : : : =/\= No cultural information exists about requested subject =/\= The computer replied. : : : : : : : : : Remon raised his hand. “What if you modified the mines with the temporal shielding we have installed on the ship? I am no engineer but is this a viable option?” He asked the questions with confidence which belied his lack of engineering and science knowledge. : : : : : : : : : Fashioning shielding on torpedoes would be a almost impossible task given the small size of the casing, much less then the added support for the temporal shielding unfortunately. : : : : : : : “We could also map out the locations of existing spatial anomalies and if possible, plan our engagements to take place around there or have them so that we could retreat,” Bo-Ro-Mah suggested. “If we are going to fight them, we have to do it in this year as it looks like they get stronger with every year into the future we go.” : : :
What the COS mentioned could be a viable plan to start with, astrometric scans could be done once they returned to the bridge. : : “We do it on our terms” Do’trahk suggested, “these Serpents have a history of defending their hatchery’s at all costs, so we find one, and bring them to us.” He leaned forwards in his seat and bared his teeth as he spoke, “We set a trap, shuttles blockade the Hatchery and when the enemy appears, we perform a short warp jump from a concealed location in behind them and target their weak point with a volley of torpedoes and energy weapons. You have no cloak, so you need the tactical advantage.” : : “Hello Doctor? Do you wish me to stay or go? Sir!” Trax asked quickly knowing he still had other chores and duties to preform in sickbay.

Cochrane looked at the CMO and said “While I can appreciate the tactical advantage that would give us, there is a morality issue in using children as bait or leverage that I believe would complicate that particular plan. If we could find something else that the enemy holds in a level of high importance, perhaps then we could use that.”

“I agree with the ethical issue of using their children as bait and we should try and look for something else.” He took another look at the Data,”Maybe I’m reading this wrong, but it almost looks like they are looking for something, something religious in nature. If we can figure out what that is, maybe we can use that.” he suggested.

Cochrane nodded to the CTO. “Agreed. If we could find out what is focusing their attention here, we would have a lot more leverage… both diplomatically AND tactically. For that we will need to know what transpired with the Captain’s meeting on the Merrimack. She should be back any moment, so lets prep with the plans we DO have, and we can adjust if she brings back any intel that we need to incorporate. Questions, anyone?”

OOC: A note, the player of Trax is currently LOA, we’ll assume they got sent back to sickbay 1 to prepare as ordered for now.

At this same time NE Zell came in on the comms =/\= Ensign Zell to Commander Cochrane, Captain Andone is currently returning to the ship. She has said you are to meet her on the bridge to go over both your findings and finalize planning. Further orders are waiting for you also by NLt Barns and for the rest of the staff..=/\= She said.

GM CockRoach