***Sim Log Narrative, SD 201910.25***

ANNOUNCEMENT:

Ensign Denovan Hawke was promoted to Lieutenant Junior Grade and given the post of Assistant Chief of Tactical Operations. Congratulations, Lieutenant! The Captain said, "All right, Colonel, give him his hollow pip."

Bridge:

The *Penumbra* had left the Aslans and the Kyrathians fighting in the ring system at the gas giant and headed further out in the star system to its most distant planet, following a mysterious sensor "glitch".

The most senior officers had been gathered and briefed but the junior officers were being left in the dark. Something truly mysterious was going on.

On the Bridge, Capt. Zak Taylor sat in the Command Seat and crossed his legs, putting on an air of nonchalance that was patently faked; Lt. Col. Travis Patterson sat in the Executive Officer's seat, drumming his fingers on the armrest; Lt. Cmdr. Relok returned to his station at the Primary Science Console, obviously thankful to no longer be sitting in the XO's spot; Lt. Cmdr. Jason Carter was sitting at his usual post at the Helm, being particularly silent; LtJG Tabeshk Tibris sat at his newly rebuilt Operations Console, wondering what to do next; LtJG T'Lin stepped out of the turbolift gazing at her traditional paper notepad as she strolled over to the Secondary Science Station (she'd been expelled from the Astrometrics Lab where she'd been working on the Kyrathian data); and the newly promoted LtJG Denovan Hawke, the only junior officer admitted to the senior officers' briefing, stood at the Tactical Station, checking over all systems to be ready for anything.

Relok glanced up as T'Lin approached, "Welcome back, Lieutenant."

She responded with "Thank you, Relok," and took her seat.

The Captain addressed his Helmsman, "Carter, once we get to our destination, set up a standard orbit at the location Relok finds you." He turned to Relok with a grin, "Assuming you find us one, Commander."

Relok answered, "I am scanning, sir. We'll get better results as we get closer."

Carter nodded, "Aye, sir, ETA 2 minutes."

Tabeshk was scanning his console as he said, "Well then, now that the glitch is seemingly over, how the hell did it happen in the first place, and why?"

Zak said, "Tabby, don't dig too deep into software glitches, sometimes they're just glitches, and sometimes ... well, sometimes we just have to let bygones be bygones."

Tabeshk grunted, "Yeah, I'm aware, Captain. But this is my station, made for me, I think I should know if there's a glitch, why there's a glitch, when there's a glitch, and where there's a glitch. So, if you don't mind, sir ...," he trailed off as he returned to his scanning.

Relok commented, "Tabby, there were many systems that went down when that strange symbol appeared, but ... everything is fine now, aren't they?"

Carter added, "Let it be, Tabby. It wasn't just your station, remember?"

Tabeshk sighed, "Fine. Besides, Carter, my station does kinda sorta connect to yours, right?"

Patterson ended Tabeshk's quest to find the glitch by saying, "Operations, auxiliary power to the deflector, and remodulate the phase inhibitors for 110mH, variance of 20mH plus or minus."

Tabeshk turned his chair and stared confusedly at the Colonel, "What, Patterson? Can you speak English and not gibberish I fail to understand?"

T'Lin interrupted by asking, "Are you not Head of Operations? You went to school for this?"

Tabeshk sighed, "Aye, that I did, but I wasn't taught by Jarhead's ... sorry, Pat."

T'Lin tried to explain, "Provide extra power to the deflector and adjust the phase inhibitors."

Tabeshk scowled then turned back to his console, fingers flying as he said, "Aye, sir, transferring auxiliary power to the deflector. Phase inhibitors remodulated to 110mH with a plus-minus 20mH variance."

Patterson smirked and then turned to the Tactical Officer, "Hawke, shield status?"

Hawke answered, "Shields are at 100 percent."

The Captain opened a commlink to Lt. Cmdr. Bevin MacArdry in Engineering, "Commander, you should fabricate and install multiphasic shielding around the warp core ... just in case."

Bevin's strong Brogue came back, "*Aye, sair, ailraidy daein tha.*"

With a nod the Captain switched channels, calling Dr. Shadow K'Trevala in Sickbay, "Doctor, you may need to prepare a few doses of arithrazine injections in case we have ... uh ... radiation exposure."

The doctor's voice responded, "On it, sir, and I have a series of antiradiation boosters ready to go as well."

Suddenly, the ship shook, encountering turbulence from an unknown energy surge. Carter reported, "Spatial density in the area is more like fluidic space than subspace in terms of starship maneuverability. I'm attempting to compensate."

Zak commented, "I guess that's to be expected, Carter. Best flight path you can get, but get us to a stable orbit."

Carter grunted, "Aye, sir, I'm doing what I can. Gonna be a little outside of my expertise."

Tabeshk muttered, "Lovely."

As the ship bucked and bumped, Relok called, "Captain, I'm getting scans of that outermost planet. It seems to be a small rocky and frozen world, little more than a capture comet. Except ...," he trailed off.

Patterson stood and walked over to Relok's console. "Show me."

Relok adjusted his screen, then lowered his voice to a whisper, "That has to be it."

Patterson interlocked his fingers, staring at the readings a moment or two and then called, "Captain, you may want to take a look at this yourself."

Zak stood and walked over to where his two most senior officers stared at a science console. He said, "That doesn't quite look like what I expected. Maybe ... can you scan for boronite?"

Patterson turned his attention back to the center of the Bridge. "Carter, 115 mark 210. Drop to impulse, and bring the nacelles to Condition Grey."

Carter raised an eyebrow, having just come up with that course correction on his own. He said, "Aye, sir ... 115 mark 210, impulse. Nacelles powering down."

Relok spoke to the Captain, "Captain, I don't think we're scanning through that. It's ... well, it's got some kind of dampening field ... I think."

Again, Tabeshk mumbled, "Oh, more lovely."

The Captain straightened and said, "OK, Relok. Carter, get us in a low orbit over Relok's coordinates. Relok, get us best scans you can."

Carter responded, "I don't think I'll be able to get us any closer than 18,000 kilometers without risking more turbulence, Captain."

The Captain nodded, then asked, "Good enough, right, Relok?"

Relok responded, "Um ... it will have to do for now, Captain." He pressed a few buttons to focus the sensors on the odd dampening field.

Hawke suggested, "A modified probe would be helpful in boosting sensor range and strength."

But Carter asked, "Would a probe be able to survive the telemetry of the orbital turbulence, Hawke?"

He answered, "For a few seconds, more than likely."

Relok mused, "A few seconds of closer scans could give us some answers."

Carter considered, "We could possibly extend our shields around the probe and increase its transmission time, too."

Hawke agreed, "It should, and double the range once it gets past the shields. Configuring probe. Just a moment."

T'Lin interrupted about then, saying, "Captain, I have figured out some of the Kyrathian code, if you would like to know it?"

Zak turned to T'Lin, "You have? Um ... sure, T'Lin, but ...," he glanced at Relok, and then shrugged. "Why not, we have to wait until we get the scans, right?" He stepped over to her station.

Tabeshk overheard them and perked up, "A code?" He actually stood from his console and stepped over to T'Lin's station to get a good look.

"Look here," T'Lin said, gesturing to her console's display. "This glyph means 'food', and this one," she pointed at another strange symbol, "means 'storage' ... or 'shortage', I am still working on it."

The Captain eyed the strange glyphs, "Food? How did you get food from that squiggle? And that one is either storage or shortage? Which? That could be important."

T'Lin answered, "Again, sir, I am not entirely sure. There are two glyphs that are exceedingly similar such that I am still sifting through the differences."

Tabeshk pointed to another glyph, "That one is a pink elephant, maybe?"

Both the Captain and T'Lin turned to him, confused looks on both their faces. The Captain said, "A ... what?"

T'Lin said, "Wait ... did you say pink?"

Tabeshk shrugged, "Yeah, pink." He glanced around, really confused. "I have no idea what I'm doing, it just looks like a pink elephant to me." He started backing away slowly, "I'll ... uh ... just be ... over here, then." He returned to his station.

T'Lin exclaimed, "That's it!" She turned to Relok sitting at the other console, "Relok, remember the first download we got?"

Relok answered distractedly, "Mm-hmm."

She clapped her hands to get his attention, "Relok!"

The older Vulcan finally turned and looked at his younger assistant, "Huh? Oh, sorry, T'Lin, I'm a little ... preoccupied. You said first download?"

T'Lin continued, "The first download we got from the Kyrathian station. The Computer was flashing colors. Tabeshk just said that his hieroglyph looks like a pink elephant."

Relok stood and moved to T'Lin's station to study the glyphs. "I suppose it has some features of an elephant ... and has a pink tone ... but, what does that have to do with anything?"

As Tabeshk sat himself at his console he glanced at Carter sitting next to him, "I, ah, did a thing, and ... now it's caused a thing ... but, I don't know what that thing is. Doesn't seem like a ... bad thing, but ... it's a thing ... I don't understand."

Carter shook his head, "I looked at it myself. Thought it looked like two flamingos back to back."

Tabeshk made a raspberry sound, "Pfft ... flamingos ... no, that's clearly an elephant that happens to be pink. See that's one ear, that's the other, and there's the trunk. Trust me, on Vulcan you see some weird things."

By this time, Hawke had finished configuring the probe and said, "Probe ready."

Patterson said, "Hawke, boost the shields with the excess power from the warp nacelles, and extend them around the probe for as long as we can. Relok, once we receive telemetry, process it as fast as you can. Have MAX assist you." He sat back in his chair and crossed his fingers.

Hawke accessed a few more functions on his console and added the extra power for the probe. "Now ready."

Patterson nodded. "At your discretion, Mr. Hawke."

Hawke pushed one last button. "Probe away, switching to the viewscreen."

Patterson then said, "T'Lin, I'm afraid you'll have to continue to decipher your codex on your own for the moment."

T'Lin was trying to explain her thoughts to Relok and the others, "What if ...," and then she stopped and looked over to Patterson. "All right. We can ... finish this later, I suppose."

Relok glanced at Patterson, then back to T'Lin, "Yes, very interesting. Proceed, Lieutenant." He returned to his own station without another word.

Hawke's probe began broadcasting its telemetry, but exactly 4.4 seconds later, the signal simply cut out, in spite of having shields.

By the time it took Relok to turn from T'Lin's station, take two steps to his own and sit down, the signal was gone. He looked up, "Mr. Hawke, where's that probe?"

Hawke double checked his readings before answering, "Well, it lasted 4.4 seconds, sir."

Patterson leaned forward in his seat. "Hawke ... did that probe lose integrity in less than 5 seconds?"

Hawke answered, "It just couldn't take it ... or there is something else. Will have to go through all the data."

The Captain said, "OK, we need something that can get us scans. How the hell did our probe last less than 5 seconds? What happened?"

Relok reported, "Wait, there's an increase in power levels. Something's down there, Captain. There was a spike then it dropped back to nearly nothing."

Carter said, "I can try to get us closer, but ... integrity might buckle under pressure if we stay too long."

Patterson stood, too tense to remain seated. He tapped his commbadge, "Bridge to Engineering. Did Lea get any of those Delta Flyers upgraded with the Ablative Hull?"

But before he got an answer, Tabeshk reported, "Captain we got a hail from the *Sojourner*, it's Captain Jackson."

The Captain stuttered a moment, "Damn. Um ... Tabby ... uh ... take a message, will you?"

Tabeshk shrugged, "Yeah, yeah." He opened the commlink and said, "This is *Penumbra* you rang *Sojourner*?

Captain Jackson's voice came through the speaker on Tabeshk's console, "Tell your captain I am returning Mr. Spearhorse. He has become incapable of handling the duties to which he was assigned to this ship to do. He has become paranoid, and a threat to himself ... maybe even to my ship."

Tabeshk bristled at the man's tone regarding Spearhorse and responded with Klingon fury, "How about I tell you to go f- yourself and give us back our crewman anyway? Because he was just fine here before YOU messed him up!"

Patterson whirled, "Lieutenant!"

Tabeshk spun his chair, "What? I won't stand by when someone insults my crewmate knowing he was just fine here!"

Patterson balled his fists and said through clenched teeth, "Lieutenant Tibris, stand down from Operations and report to the Observation Lounge. Now."

Tabeshk logged out. "Fine. But as a friend, that was uncalled for!" He stepped off towards the Observation Lounge. Over his shoulder he said, "Just get Dean back, at least, that's all I ask."

Patterson grunted, "We will talk about this there." He turned back and sat down at the Operations console and reopened the commlink. "*Penumbra* to *Sojourner*. Apologies for the rudeness of my junior officer. I will be sure to issue a reprimand. We are unable to head to your location currently. If you can have Spearhorse dropped off via shuttlecraft to our current coordinates, that would be appreciated. *Penumbra* out." He closed the commlink, and turned to the Captain. Giving a sigh, he heads to the Lounge to issue said "reprimand".

Everyone was momentarily stunned at the activities until a sudden flash of intense radiation came from the tiny planet, then ... nothing. The flash lasted less than a second, it was barely even perceivable.

Hawke, alerted to a potential Tactical threat, quickly scanned his own console. Whatever he saw there caused him to visibly shiver, as if someone had just walked over his grave.

Relok flinched, "Whoa! What was that?" He checked his sensor feed and then said, "Captain, you might want to take a look at this."

Zak stepped back over to Relok's station and the Vulcan whispered softly while gesturing to his readings, "That looks like a release of energy from the destabilization of an Omega Particle, a half-life release. It's like it ... slipped out."

Zak whispered back, "So ... it is Omega then."

Relok replied, still whispering, "Looks like it, sir."

The Captain straightened and took a breath but before he could say anything, T'Lin, a Vulcan Science Officer sitting in the next seat over muttered, without looking up from where she was working on the Kyrathian code, "Captain, you are not very good at whispering."

Zak cut a glance at T'Lin but said only, "Hawke, ready another probe, we have to get a good look. Let's try to make it last longer than 5 seconds this time."

Observation Lounge:

LtJG Tabeshk Tibris stormed off the Bridge and into the Observation Lounge, followed by a barely restrained Lt. Col. Travis Patterson. As soon as the doors slid shut, Patterson unleashed, "Lieutenant Tibris, what in the Nine Hells were you thinking?! Insulting a Starfleet Captain like that?"

Tabeshk looked away from Patterson as he answered, "Dean was just fine here happy healthy and now some guy I don't know is saying things like that about a man I called a friend." He paused, but before Patterson could say anything else, he added, "What would you do? Because I'm not you. I'm just a half-breed who can't always control himself."

Patterson stared at him a moment and then said, "Whether you like it or not, Lieutenant ... he is still a superior officer, and you will treat him, and anyone else of higher rank, with the respect befitting a Starfleet Officer. This has nothing to do with what I would or would not do. This has nothing to do with your personal feelings. There is a code of etiquette that must be abided by. You know this, as does every other Starfleet Officer out there. Your outburst? Will be the LAST outburst, or I will relieve you of duty. Is that understood?"

Tabeshk nearly growled as he answered, "Fine."

Patterson almost growled back, "The answer is 'Yes, sir.'" He stared at him a moment longer and then said, "Now, I am putting this in your file as a formal reprimand. I want you to report to Sickbay for a full psychological evaluation before you return to duty on the Bridge. That is an order. Dismissed."

Main Engineering:

Lt. Cmdr. Bevin MacArdry headed back to Main Engineering after the briefing of the most senior officers in the Observation Lounge and set about efforts to "beef up" the ship's condition, considering what they might be facing in the near future.

While she was working, her commbadge chirped with a call from the Captain, "Commander, you should fabricate and install multiphasic shielding around the warp core ... just in case."

She responded in her strong Brogue, "*Aye, sair, ailraidy daein tha.*"

Right after that exchange, the ship shook with turbulence from an unknown energy surge. Knowing the risks they were facing, she ignored the turbulence and continued working to upgrade the shielding around the core. Once she'd established secure shielding, she began working on an idea for a double warp bubble, hoping it might work in case they had to try "something crazy" to get out of the area.

Her idea was that perhaps an "onion style" series of layers of warp fields might enable them to escape a null-warp area by "squirting out" warp fields like the layers in an onion.

But while she worked, she got a call from Patterson, "Bridge to Engineering. Did Lea get any of those Delta Flyers upgraded with the Ablative Hull?"

But before Lea or Bevin could answer, a sudden flash of intense radiation came from the tiny planet they were orbiting. The flash was ever so brief, but the intensity of the radiation set off alarms in Engineering.

Sickbay:

Dr. Shadow K'Trevala returned to Sickbay after the briefing of the most senior officers in the Observation Lounge. Shortly after arriving there (and trying to dissuade the curiosity of the junior officers who were wondering where the senior staff had gone, and why), he received a call from the Captain, "Doctor, you may need to prepare a few doses of arithrazine injections in case we have ... uh ... radiation exposure.

He responded, "On it, sir, and I have a series of antiradiation boosters ready to go as well." He began administering the inoculations to the medical staff and gave instructions for them to spread throughout the ship with them as well. Just after completing the shots, there was a sudden flash of intense radiation and an alarm went off in Sickbay reporting the spike.

In Attendance:

Capt. Z. Taylor, LtCol. T. Patterson, LtCmdr. Relok, LtCmdr. MacArdry, Dr. K'Trevala, LtCmdr. Dean Spearhorse, LtCmdr. J. Carter, Lt. (JG) T'Lin, Lt. (JG) Tabeshk Tibris, Lt. (JG) Denovan Hawke, MGySgt Hines

NPCs:

MAX (played by Hines), Capt_Jackson_Sojourner (played by Spearhorse)

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