[snip]

That desire though strong was held up by none at first being available, so they spent another 2 and a half weeks in dock mostly doing idle hand work and lending extra shift time on other construction or maintenance projects on a pair of as of yet unnamed Intrepid class vessels in the next dock frames over from the Sojourner. But finally during the late morning hours of 1030 during a period where beyond a few NE’s being elsewhere off ship, the communications officer on the bridge at the time would note a hail coming in from Starfleet HQ from Commodore Malkova.

GM CockRoach

Heather was idly flipping through ship status reports as she walked around the bridge. It had been nice to be home, but she was itching to get back into space. For some reason the ship didn’t feel cramped when they were flying through the stars. But just sitting and waiting, it was getting a bit claustrophobic.

“Ma’am, incoming hail from Command,” Aiden reported as it popped up on his console.

Looking up from her data pad, she made her way to the center of the bridge. “Signal the Captain and go ahead and put the transmission through.”

Cmdr. Grace - XO / CSO

“Aye, Commander,” he acknowledged, putting it on screen and turning to the internal comms to contact Capt. Renault.

Ensign Aiden Conlon Linguist/Comms Officer

Commodore Malkova, a mixed middle eastern and african descendant woman, came up on the screen. Brushing back a lock of her braided hair, she then composed herself to speak to Grace, =/\= Good morning Commander. I trust Captain Renault is soon to arrive? =/\= She asked.

Once words were given she nodded, =/\= Very well, I know the Sojourner’s crew are probably chomping at the bit by now to return to a mission outside the Sol system. It just so happens I have one for you. However, before that I want to also send Commander Alan’s and Franks thanks for some of your crew and NE’s help in replacing the pressure systems on Luna base’s water treatment and ice extraction plant a week ago. They both told me without your crew’s help they likely would have set the base back by a good 2-3 months in repair work..=/\= She said.

OOC: Just something to add filler for anyone wanting to rp that as inspiration or just to provide filler on what NE’s were doing....

=/\= In either case, command is sending you all out on a survey mapping mission from Sol out to a range of about 9 light years on a planned course that should take about 3-4 months or so following a trail of bread crumbs we laid out with survey probes over the past 2 years. Obviously we’re looking at mapping some pockets of gaseous regions, nebulas, as well as a pair of star systems in more details. The first part should be pretty straight forward as the six marked pockets of interest are about a week or so out from Sol. The pair of systems are a bit further out though and we only got the most basic of details from our probe results. =/\= She said pushing a button on her desk, and a minute later a split screen came up showing the outlined route and information on the two target systems.

=/\= System one we have labeled UES-23, it has a single sun, and only one large planetary body, and a smattering of smaller asteroids and commentary matter. From long range scans, our astronomers believe at some point in the past there may have been two or three more planetary bodies, but a likely massive gravitational event shattered them. The remaining planetary body may be class-m but scans by probes were inconclusive. The second system is UES-24. This is a binary sun system with 2 planetary bodies. One is a large gas giant on the outer edge of the system, the other is an inner planet which though suspected is not confirmed to be possibly a class-m. A few smaller large asteroid bodies are also present. =/\= She explained.

=/\= We of course asked the Vulcans for information but they simply said they were ‘uninteresting and had no strategic or mineral value, and we would be wasting our time and primitive resources surveying them’ =/\= She said with an eye roll and sarcasm with a hint of annoyance to her voice. =/\= Command has said Renault is free to choose which of the two system’s you go to survey first after the first leg. Mainly we want to see detailed scans of the systems and after that we’ll follow up with further orders. Any questions? =/\= She asked.

GM CockRoach