The Tour
Posted on Wed Jun 24th, 2020 @ 2:03am by Commodore Tyler Malbrooke & Major Cornelius Tremble
Edited on on Tue Jul 21st, 2020 @ 2:22am
3,001 words; about a 15 minute read
Mission:
Episode 10 - New Home, Same Pioneers
Location: RDF Staging area / Starbase Sirius
Timeline: MD004 1500hrs
Neil saw Tyler walking toward him and saluted as Pioneer’s CO joined him in the tube entrance to Sirius Station’s Rapid Deployment Force (RDF) staging area. The two Pioneer’s were due a face to face introduction to the Marine/Fleet component.
"Neil you dragged me out of bed this early it better be good..." Tyler paused while speaking and took a long gulp of his coffee. The one thing he hated about command, no sleeping in. What made things worse was that he left his wife in bed, and that was something no man would want to leave. "...Right so I believe we have an inspection I am hoping this will not be too long as I still need breakfast." Tyler smirked as he stepped toward the hatch and fell in step with Tremble.
The two moved to the hatch, which cycled as they approached and were met by a smart looking, dark haired Andorian female wearing BDU’s bearing staff sergeant chevrons saluted the Pioneer officers.
“Sirs, I’m Sergeant P’ma,” the general is waiting for you, if you’ll follow me?”
Neil grinned at the Tellarite and said, “Good to see you again, P’ma. Or did you forget me?”
The female gave him a look and said cheekily, “Aye sir. My memory may be better than yours…you still owe me six strips of latinum.”
“It was four or are you adding interest these days like your old pal Devii…and I hope your poker playing got better since I saw you last,” Neil said, then turned his glance to Malbrooke. “Sir, Staff Sergeant P’ma and I served together on the D’Sha’al. She had just made buck Sergeant when they kicked me off. Drow, you’ll be glad to know Captain Malbrooke’s one of the best Fleet officer’s I’ve served with.”
The Andorian glanced askance at Neil, and nodded to Malbrooke. “Nice to meet you sir. That’s a pretty rare complement coming from the Gun…Captain, sir. Either that or he’s really drank the Cool-Aid…”
"Well we do make a good drink on the Pioneer..." Tyler replied with a smile. "...I am glad to be here although a little puzzled our orders came a little abruptly. You folks here have some mighty shoes to fill General Sobel runs a well oiled machine."
"Well," a booming voice sounded from a doorway, "I do hope that we can live up to Francis's reputation." As they entered, they found a well appointed office and a Tellarite wearing a Fleet Marine Lieutenant General's uniform.
As the Pioneer's officers entered, the general chuckled and waived them into seats on a couch to one side while he took an arm chair around a coffee table. "Sergeant, bring them whatever they want?"
After the Sergeant brought in a service, the general took a drink from his strong smelling caff and said, "Speaking of the Brigadier, I've read the after actions on the battle of Empok Nor." The general's gaze moved between Neil and Tyler and he said, "Seems like some hard fighting and good work was done there."
Tyler set himself up with his usual cup of coffee although this time he added a small amount of synthetic whiskey, "General I would have to agree with you. If it weren't for Sobel's men and The Cure of course Empok Nor would have been a total loss."
Tyler paused as he sipped the coffee. He did this to allow for a change of subject, he knew that Tellarites were not ones for small talk. He smiled broadly. "General I am sure that you did not want us here to simply discuss past victories. What can we expect from the corps here are Starbase Sirius?" The tone in Tyler's voice showed that he knew Tellarites to be up front. He was simply communicating on the General's comfort level.
The general eyed them both for a moment, then sat back a bit in his chair and spread his hands. "A light touch," the Tellarite told the Pioneer officers. "Unlike Francis's Brigade, we are the headquarters element for combined forces should they be called in. More a house-keeping, administrative role. The air arm provided by fleet and the Raider and reconnaissance units are meant for fast reaction and intelligence gathering than what you, Captain Malbrooke, maybe used to at least."
The General's hands came together on his desktop and he continued, "We typically have half of those units out on leap frog listening post missions, scattered through our Area of Responsibility or AOR. We embed some of those with legitimate shipping and the like and lean heavily on Fleet Intelligence to help put together as best a picture as we can on what the Romulans, and others, are doing."
The general paused, touched a control on his desk which caused an indicator to flash red three times before going a solid green. "And now that I've run the bug stompers through my office," he added with a slightly irritated voice. "I can tell you we also conduct behind the fence operations into and through the old Neutral Zone area. Those are conducted by deniable assets and are need to know only, as you can imagine."
Tyler nodded he liked what he was hearing. To deal with Romulans you need brains not brawn, and this General seemed to have brains. "This information you are gathering on the old NZ I can rely that it is being uploaded to Starfleet Intel. I would hate to have to cross that line and be caught with my pants down. However, I am happy to hear about the lighter touch. It is nice to see someone in charge that does not want to shut the doors and hide."
The general glanced at Neil who met the general's eyes and the Tellarite squinted. "Captain. Have you been giving Captain Malbrooke the idea that marines keep their heads in the sand?"
Neil kept the general's gaze and said, "No sir. The only time the Cure get's it's head in the sand is when we're being shot at. Sir."
The Tellerite guffawed then and slapped his desk. "Sergeant P'ma told me you were a straight shooter. Good." Then he turned his eyes back to Malbrooke, "Speaking of hiding in the sand though, let's take you on a bit of a tour and we'll show you how we do a few things."
Ten minutes later, the Pioneer officers led by General Corallus were in a large, circular two story room that had rings of desk and monitors and a central circular holo-tank that continuously sifted through images. "This is the Hub. We monitor signals traffic, ships, everything that we can. Station operations handles localized, relatively speaking, traffic. The Hub gets intel from our parters: the Klingons and Ferengi, mainly. The Cardassian's as you well know are having their own problems just now."
The General let that sink in as they toured the upper catwalk. "It's a snap shot, but it impresses the diplomats and lets them think they're keeping a pulse on things. All signatory diplomats and officials who have clearance can come in here at any time to get an update on something...within reason."
The General led them down two levels and into a smaller room that resembled the one above. "This is our actual CnC. All deployed assets and intel is analyzed here." The general gestured to a same circular layout at the edges of the room. The center had another, smaller desk at which a Klingon in an KDF uniform, a Ferengi in leathers and a human female Marine senior enlisted worked at consoles and conversed.
The General introduced Tyler and Neil to his staff : Deputy Commander, Brigadier N’vosh, son of Duvan of the House of Kor, KDF; Chief of Staff Daimonl Duak, of the Ferengi Alliance and Chief Senior Enlisted, Command Gunnery Sergeant Hazel Wild.
After introductions, the General said. "You may be wondering at the red carpet, if you want to call it that, but I learned a long time ago you need to know who you're working with. So, you get to meet everyone and we get to meet you," he told Malbrooke.
Tyler found it interesting that the General would involve members of other fleets on his staff. He made his way through the group being sure to shake hands or greet them in their own way. "General I must say that seeing members of other fleets on your staff is curious and inspirational. In a time when certain political powers within the Federation would disagree with this principle in it is certainly refreshing to see. Tell me though, if you don't mind, why?"
It made sense to Tyler why one would invite the Klingons. But the Ferengi what would one warrant them, or more accurately what profit was in it for them.
The general grunted and gestured with a thumb at his staff. "When we set up the Rapid Deployment Force, it was with the idea that it wouldn't be left to just any one of the Khitomer Accords Alliance signatories. If trouble comes, everyone needs to be pulling their weight right at the start."
The Ferengi caught his bosses eye and activated the holotank which briefly mirrored that of the Hub's, but then cleared slightly and many of the dots dropped from the image. "All signatories have fleet patrols out there and they are tasked under us to organize and channel data through. They also share with their home fleets, but we combine the data too and send it on so everybody has an idea of what's going on, with the understanding they don't know all of the operations that are being conducted."
Daemon Duvon chimed in. "Knowledge is good for business."
"Part of that knowledge being that if any one group tries to profit at the expense of another's, they'll be left out in the cold," the Klingon rumbled. There wasn't animosity in his tone and the Ferengi didn't seem to mind the reference.
"Alone, the RDF can't handle a major incident by itself. But it can deploy forces and plug them into a conflict faster by it's nature. With ranking members of the various groups, we hit the ground running."
"That's the theory, anyway," Daemon Duvon said, glancing toward N'vosh. "The last scenario's we ran, several of Brigadier N'vosh's ships balked at being pulled away from their own business."
The Klingon glowers and made a rude gesture toward the Ferengi then and Duvon laughed, showing rough teeth with scattered embedded gems.
"Which is why," General Corallus picked up the narrative, "We run the drills and are working at hammering out the kinks, isn't that right gentlemen?"
The Ferengi and Klingon nodded to the general and then N'vosh said, "That has been clarified and made abundantly clear by the new Ambassador, General. In fact she is currently making the rounds to inspect the various Klingon forces in theater to make sure they understand it as well."
Turning to Tyler, Corallus said "That's right. The new Ambassador sends her regards, to both of you in fact. I believe you know Larta, daughter of Shog?"
Tyler practically did a spit take of coffee at the mention of Larta. "Yes we know the Ambassador very well. If it were not for the honor and glory that her and her crew fought with me and my crew may not be standing here. I just did not expect to see her in an Ambassadorial position. However, I am glad for it. As to the ships that are in the are both Klingon and Ferengi, are they at the disposal of Starfleet? As you are aware this station was built as a hub for Obsidian Fleet's Task Force 47 and as such if there is going to be a need for assistance can we count on our Klingon and Ferengi friends coming to our aid."
General Corallus grunted and said, "Right now, getting aid is probably best described as tenuous." His nostrils flared as he took a breath and continued. "Right now, only Federation ships are attached to the RDF. Our Klingon and Ferengi counterparts share some information and may be available for aid on a case by case basis." The Marine general glanced at his command team and said, "This is why it was so important to have members of those commands as part of my team. I think the Klingons will be willing to aid in most things."
The Tellarite's eyes crinkled slightly as he said, "The Ferengi, I am informed, will decide if a given situation would be profitable or not before deciding if they will grace us with their aid."
The klingon gave a chortle at that and the Daemon looked at the Marine general nonplussed. "As I have told you sir, that is the answer I received from the Captain's counsel. My uncle however, assures us that in most things we will abide by the treaty."
"Devon's uncle is the Grand Nagus," Corallus informed the Pioneer officers.
The fact that the Grand Nagus was Devon's uncle told Tyler all he needed to know about how the Ferengi fleet worked. However, he made sure to keep that thought well hidden. "Well General I am certainly glad to have all of this at our disposal. The Pioneer has been given a Romulan expert of sorts to serve on the crew. She has informed me that they are exploring something known only as The Artifact. It seems that a large amount of Romulan resources are being spent to explore this. Any idea on what this thing could be?"
The general considered and nodded to his exec, who worked his terminal and a buzzing sound as the hatches to the area sealed. One minute later the Klingon nodded and said, "We're secure."
Corallus gestured at Devon and the Ferengi fiddled with a terminal and the holo image of the area of the quadrant that it had been expanded to showed a flash of light within Romulan territory and then zoomed in. "Romulan ships, convoys and other traffic was tracked by various sources heading for a supposedly empty region of space and SI in cooperation with Alliance trading ships began pooling information roughly four months ago."
Devon paused and flickering imagery popped up to reveal a shape both Pioneer officer's recognized.
A Borg Cube.
"We sent a long range reconnaissance flight in. They spent two weeks in and two weeks out, crawling at low warp to get this image," the Daemon commented. "SI and Alliance assets have been working to get more detailed information. The Cube appears to be mostly without power, but it would be very nice to know what they're up to."
Tyler blanched white, the idea of a Borg cube being in anyone's hands, powered or not, horrified him. Tyler could not presume to order the General or his staff about. He turned to his Second Officer, his friend "Niel when we get back to the Pioneer make sure Masters makes this her top priority. Share all data found with the General here. I want to know what they are doing with a Cube pronto."
Neil merely nodded and said, "Aye aye, sir."
Tyler turned back to the General. "Thank you for this it is yet another puzzle piece in this jigsaw that the fleet has stuck me with. There is a small part of me that thinks after the debacle that was the Romulan relocation effort we should just let the Romulans rebuild. But then again who knows what they can cook up if left to their own devices."
The General considered that for a moment then met Tyler's eyes. "Verdavian mole rats sometimes react to conflict within the pack by pushing outwards into other territories. Conflict makes change easier, for some reason. It allows aggression to be put to a productive use and allows for strength to be measured and displayed."
In the short exchange that they had Tyler already knew that he and the General would get along famously. "Well said General if that is the case then I am glad we have people like you to act as exterminator when needed." He smiled, "It is quite the operation that you all have here. I hope one day you will come aboard the Pioneer and we can return the favor."
"I look forward to that, Captain," the general told Malbrooke. "But this is just the the rear echelon marine factory doing the admin work," he said, giving a Tremble a knowing look. "The people that do the real work you'll get to meet next. For that, I'll turn you over to them. It's been a pleasure, Captain Malbrooke."
Looking at Neil he said, "And yes. I am well aware what REMF stands for, Captain. But I prefer to take the high road and pretend..." The general winked at Neil who had been biting his lip in amusement.
The two Pioneer officers saluted and followed Master Gunny Wild from the chamber and toward what Neil recalled was the squadron bay.
Tyler smiled at the exchange. He liked a General who could poke fun at himself, it was a refreshing change of pace. He gave his Second Officer a knowing look in reference to the latter's comment. As they walked Tyler thought how much progress was made at Sirius in such a little time. He was certainly glad that the resources were available to him, but hoped that he would never have to use them.
A Joint Post By
Captain Cornelius Tremble
Marine Commanding Officer/Second Officer, USS Pioneer
Captain Tyler Malbrooke
Commanding Officer, USS Pioneer
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