Posted by Ensign Rand Farquharson (Yeoman First Class) in Main Sim - Bridge - Arrival To Vok III

Posted by Gamemaster Fate (GM) in Main Sim - Bridge - Arrival To Vok III

Posted by Ensign Kovan ch’Sirhc (Engineering & Communications Officer) in Main Sim - Bridge - Arrival To Vok III
Posted by… suppressed (15) by the Post Ghost! 👻
[snip]

The probes finally came back with more information. Out to a range of a light year or so both could confirm there was no obvious sign of any ships. If there were they could be cloaked or using some more advanced stealth system that the probes could not counter. But beyond the expected traffic in the region from the three colonies on record nothing seemed out of place. There was that earlier odd signal silence that Ch’Sirhc caught though such a band should be full of recent or fading echoes of comm traffic but there wasn’t any as noted.

GM CockRoach

Kovan felt he’s heard enough, or lack of enough, to come to the conclusion that something was wrong. “Sir,” He swiveled his chair around to face the XO, “I’ve found something of note. An oddity, if you would. Put on an ear piece and listen to band alpha zeta pi. You tell me if a productive colony with flourishing trade would be so quiet on a common subspace radio traffic line.” Kovan gave the XO a moment to tap into the frequency and hear for himself. “This line should be full of pings and echoes and all you can hear are murmurs from Vok’s flight control. Take that out and. . . nothing.”

Space may be a massive void of emptiness but silence? This close to a populated planet? That warranted investigation.

En ch’Sirhc, COMMO/ENGR

Roman used a receiver and tapped into the channel for himself. He wasn’t trained in Comms, but there was… A lot of nothing. Almost nothing at all. The noise must be there, perhaps just hidden somehow? He nodded to Kovan. “Investigate the signal and figure out what is hiding the noise that should be coming from the planet. Keep an eye… or an ear, anyway, out for any other oddities.”

~ Cmdr Alden, XO/CSO

Listening further to the dead silence over the next 30 some minutes began to grate even probably the most patient of people and analysis. The sense of emptiness was maddening. Then as if dropping a drop of water upon a dying man from thirst, there was a soft, very perceptive sounds of ‘SS’ then ‘OD’ then a second later ‘RAT’ that were not letters pronounced by like the sounds they would make on their own, so SS sounded like a ssss and OD sounded like ‘odd’ and RAT sounded like ‘ra ta’. Then after one more repetition of this the sounds vanished back to the maddening dead silence. But as brief as this was they did find two connection points! One seemed to be the receiver for this strange comm burst, which was in their shuttle bay! Likely the stealth ship they had taken aboard. The sending point though seemed to be in a low orbit among the northern pole of the planet.

When someone would decide to direct the ship’s sensors in that way, they would find a few ancient comm satellites, something common place in the late 22nd and very early 23rd century but long since retired by 2230s. The eight or so piece of space junk were clearly that just junk of a forgotten earlier era of the colony’s life. It was then they would notice on one of the larger piece of junk something that stood out and shouldn’t be there. A secondary comm array had been bolted onto the lower half of this ancient relay, deeper scans would show it was partially drawing power from the relays still slightly useful fusion core. But more importantly they were able to quick get a make up of compensation that the construction methods on this secondary array were of Orion manufacture! There was a solid 96.78% certainty on this based on the readings.

GM CockRoach

=O=Sentinel this is Cpt Asam. Send Lt Randall Farquharson down with a psycho-tricorder immediately.=C=

Asam, CO

=O= Lieutenant Randy to the transporter room ASAP. Bring your tricorder, you’re headed to the planet surface. =C= Roman said into the comm in response to the captain’s request.

~ Cmdr Alden, XO/CSO

What separated a good communication’s officer from a great one wasn’t the ability to speak but the ability to listen as well. Kovan waited, fingers silently drumming on the console dashboard. Four fingers drummed down, one after another, a second pause in between. On the minute mark a double drum. A grounding technique Kovan learned long ago when working aboard merchant trawlers. Junky little ships where weight mattered and the crew’s clothes took up nearly all of it. Silence was maddening, but he knew how to be patient.

And oh, was he rewarded. “Got you,” Kovan muttered. Swiveling around, triumphant grin on his face, Kovan called to the captain, “Take a look on the view screen,” With a tap of his fingers he brought the image of the hidden-in-plain-sight comms array to the main view screen. “Either the colonies hired Orion contractors for a little science experiment or some enterprising pirates set up shop right under their noses. That comms array is communicating with the fake asteroid in our cargo bay.”

En ch’Sirhc COMMO/ENGR

“Try to intercept the messages.” Roman said. “If you can’t, then try to find the origin of the messages.”

~ Cmdr Alden, XO/CSO

The messages were not hard to intercept. The first message completely clear to be heard was Tell them to have their payment for the month ready. It seemed as though pirates were inbound and arriving soon.

-GM

Kovan took a listen, and reported what he heard. “. . . ‘Tell them to have their payment for the month ready’. Sounds like someone’s planned a rendezvous. The asteroid ship was headed towards the north pole where the pirates built their comms array. We could turn their meeting into a sting operation. I’ll keep listening in case I hear any receiving messages.”

Ensign ch’Sirhc

Bump

There were others that came through somewhat clearly. Messages to relatives, business calls, normal fare. And then there was a response to the message about payment. Everything is arranged for. Don’t be late.

-GM

Morgan stepped onto the bridge and over to the center chair. “Cmdr Alden. Medical finished their analysis. The human sample was a 65% match to the governor’s brother. She said the sample was too damaged for any further assurance. Also Engineer Ayden got into the ship’s logs. They were ordered to make sure payment was ready. The flight logs also show they have been making a round trip every month from the colony to a location in an asteroid belt the next system over.”

NL Morgan , sec

“Tell Captain Asam on the planet surface right away.” Roman said in response to the information. “The landing party can handle that from the surface.”

Rand moved out of the way, off to the side, pulling her communicator off her belt. “Aye Commander.”

=O= Ensign Farquharson to Captain Asam. = C =

= O = Go ahead ensign = C = Asam answered after a moment.

= O = We have information about the
camouflaged ship. We found … = C =

= O = One moment, Ensign.” Rende motioned for the governor to join her. “I have the governor here, go ahead. = C =

=O= We found 3 different DNA samples inside. 2 Orion samples, but no known matches in the database. The 3rd was human. It was degraded but still a 65% match to the governor’s brother. = C =

=O= Thank you, Ensign. Asam out. = C =

Kovan relayed the response message to Morgan and the captain, “What happens when the ship is late?” He wondered out loud.

En ch’Sirhc COMMO/ENGR

“We may be about to find out.” Roman said, not showing the nervousness he felt.

Rand didn’t think it would go over too well.

=O=Bridge this is Ayden. This ship…there is a large asteroid it flies into on the end of its trip. I’m sending the coordinates up. My guess would be a camouflaged station of some sort. =C=

NE Ayden

=O= Thanks, Ensign. Can you tell us anything else about the station? Who might have made it or be on it, perhaps? We need to know who we’re dealing with here. =C= Roman wasn’t going to put the ship to any kind of alert unless the station did anything that looked hostile.

~ Cmdr Alden, XO/CSO

“If I can get a copy of the black box I can take a look through the communication’s history and see if I can’t learn more about who has been sending and receiving these messages.” Kovan said, then after a moment’s thought, “If I can get my hands on the comms array at the pole I could learn who on the colony is making shady deals with dirty pirates.”

En ch’Sirhc COMMO/ENGR

Ayden answered, = O = The sensors on this ship are primitive, but I will see if I can get any more detail.” To Kovan, Ayden replied, “I will send a tech to the bridge
with it.= C = Then he went to work trying to get more info about the station. 10 minutes later a tech arrived on the bridge with the ‘black box’ for Kovan.

Yeoman Rand

Kovan took hold of the black box and got to work syncing that data stored on the box with his console after isolating his station from the rest of the ship. Sometimes black boxes came with anti-tempering measures and Kovan wasn’t about to fall for a cheap trick. Once everything was set up, he put on his ear piece and began to sort through the data, listening to transmissions and taking note of time each message was sent, the frequency of messages and their contents. He took notes on PaDD with a stylus, and wrote in shorthand with quick and efficient strokes.

En ch’Sirhc COMMO/ENGR

The black box would demonstrate that transmissions were infrequent and brief. Most described quantities of different resources. Time of transmission seemed to be approximately 6 hours after arrival at Vok III or another similarly small inhabited world. The messages were directed to the station from which they had departed and to which they would return.

-GM

=O= Ayden to Bridge. Cmdr Alden. I finished with the sensor logs. The station has 9 identical shuttles like this one, and shows large amounts of latinum, water and various valuable natural resources. Looks like a sea faring pirate’s hide out.=C=

NE Ayden

“The comms log on the blackbox backs it up,” Kovan said over his shoulder while convering his short hand into writing that was legible for everyone else. He held up the PaDD, “Here’s the summary of the log. It details the type and quantities of resources being ferried about and our messages are going to and from that station.”

En ch’Sirhc COMMO/ENGR