Atala, part 3
Posted on Fri Oct 27th, 2023 @ 6:14pm by Ensign Delia Sil & Lieutenant Kyan Mackenzie & Lieutenant Naota & Ensign Davna
1,712 words; about a 9 minute read
Mission: Pressure
Acting Captain’s Log, stardate...
...wait, should that be Acting First Officer’s Log? What even is my title right now?
You know what, Computer, start over.
Random Lieutenant’s Log, stardate... whatever. Fill in the time here or something. If anyone’s actually reading this, they’re a) the most bored person in the history of bored people; and, b) probably already got the date from the timestamp on the computer entry anyway.
Anyway, the Atala has broken orbit and is conducting a patrol of the Haumea System. Over the past several hours, we’ve received several updates from the colony – mostly in the form of orders that are either confusing or contradictory, or both confusing and contradictory. Case in point, we were originally told to maintain contact with colonial administration, with routine reports to Ops every fifteen minutes.
Yes, fifteen minutes. It was very annoying. I haven’t seen that since flying combat aerospace patrols during the War, and given the lack of Dominion ships bearing down on us – or any hostile presence for that matter – kinda left feeling like we’re lurching for one overreaction to the next.
As another example? The last communication we received, which was very confusing, we were directed to maintain communications silence. So I have lots of questions, but apparently no one wants to hear about them.
I am one hundred percent uncertain of just what we’re expected to be doing up here. And one thousand percent certain no one on the colony knows either so... so, we’re just winging it.
******
The boy felt for the ensigns.
Their orders had specified that they maintain tactical dominance over the colony by maintaining a geosynchronous orbit. But they were also ordered to investigate a possible ion trail at the edge of the system – something that could only be done from the edge of the system. So Sil likely didn’t know if she was supposed to be coming or going.
Not to mention, what ion trail? Haumea wasn’t Risa, but it still had a fair amount of traffic through the system. Plus, orders also suggested use of a polaron scan.
Just what that had to do with scanning ion trails, Davna would have to sort out. The only thing that came to mind for Naota was that polaron radiation had been a trick that the Dominion had used to try and detect cloaked ships.
So were they looking for a cloaked ship?
It would be really helpful if someone on the colony would communicate with them. But the theme of day seemed to be that communication wasn’t just not forthcoming, it was outright forbidden.
“Let’s just take a lap around the system and see what we find,” the boy finally decided, voicing his thoughts aloud as he added, “If they don’t like what we’re doing, they’ll probably tell us.”
"And let's hope they aren't someone with some weird grudge against the colony," Davna quipped. "I don't think any of the random scavengers who wander out this far would think to cloak; it's an unwise move anyways, considering the amount of firepower we have." Even the Atala, being equipped with its defensive modules could have been intimidating to a hapless passer by. "Initiating polaron scan now."
The Orion whirled around in her seat, offering a tentative smile to the small group. "Hopefully whoever we may find is at least... relatively sane? Nice? Hm... not about to do something wild to the colony?"
The boy put one hand behind his head as he contemplated how to answer that. "Uh..." the small lieutenant began. This was a commonly followed exit vector. At least three ships had passed along this route in the day before the colony had gone to security alert.
"I'm thinking what they're picking up is just the Tellarite freighter that left eighteen or so hours ago," Naota supplied finally. Or possibly the Bolian transport before that. Or the Zakdorn yacht before that. Or even a combination of one or more of their impulse trails.
The boy glanced over at where Sil was at the helm. They were basically at an all stop. Not exactly an exciting time to be a helmsperson.
Delia suppressed a sigh. She'd been happy to get flight hours ...but that was many, many hours ago. Station keeping around and around and around Haumea was getting old, and frankly the dumbest quasi-AI from the previous century - or the century before that - could do this. Worse, she couldn't help but feel that after all this she was going to catch some sort of reprimand for it since directives from the colony seemed to be all over the place. "Just let me know if you want to follow one, sir," she said, a touch of snark coming through as she added. "At this point, just about anything would be following some set of orders."
Thus far, Kyan had been uncharacteristically quiet. He'd been on Haumea for less than a week and other than an incident with a nosy old lady who lived a few housing units over, everything had been pretty normal. Or as "normal" as his life ever was. It was weird living on a planet, but he decided that it was a good weird. Almost like being back on the station with Xasik and Sirol. A grin crept across his face as he recalled the dour Reman in his Scout Leader uniform, complete with knee socks and shorts. He hoped he'd be able to see them again before they got old and shuffled off. Grups were notorious for that.
In the meantime, tactical was mind numbingly boring. And the console would bleep at him if something came up. So he vaulted the rail and plopped down beside the other Onlie in the command chair.
"Sure and it's wide they're makin captain's arses these days that we can both be fittin in their chairs." he offered with a laugh. "An also, did ya ken that we dinnae got no torpedos?"
And people said the Kiwi accents around Auckland were hard to understand?
Naota just blinked as the Scottish kid landed next to him. "Oh," the New Zealander uttered finally as his brain connected with the mention of torpedoes. He thought he knew what Kyan was on about now. "I think I remember reading about that in the maintenance logs. They were offloaded for maintenance. They were supposed to be loaded on Tuesday."
If the station hadn't been in such a scramble to get the Atala at full alert status, they might have noted that the ship didn't have a full compliment of weapons. And Naota was afraid to ask what else might be off-line for maintenance.
Did they even have a tractor beam?
Turning his attention back to Sil's question, the boy answered, "Just maintain thrusters for now while Davna runs the polaron scan."
No, he wasn't imagining that they would find anything.
But for as long as they looked busy, it might prevent Colonial Administration from assigning them an even worse task. Such as sensor mapping the entire heliopause.
It was going to be slow work looking busy though.
"So, anyone got any plans when we get back to doing something other than this?" Naota asked.
"Back to the desk," Davna stated neutrally. While she was sure the others gathered around would find out one way or another what was occurring, she was not going to be the one to tell them. "You know, dogs to walk, people to shoo. I'd honestly rather be behind the console." This was not all lies; Davna felt she couldn't do more than sit on her hands and wait at this point. Even now, when all she was doing was sitting and waiting for a scan to give her answers. This was simply lower stakes as far as she was concerned. "It might be dull, but no news is good news sometimes, right?" As she said it, her eyes shot down to the console display. "... And I have no news to give."
"Stunt glider," Delia said, the anticipation of something challenging clear in her tone. "Assuming the CAP is lifted by then," she amended. "If I can't fly, maybe I'll just do flips on a trampoline."
"That's brilliant," the Maori boy chirped at mention of the stunt glider.
The mention of the trampoline also prompted a thought. "Maybe we should have a Flight Ops zero-G challenge. Kinda like trampoline-meets-combat-training sort of thing," the boy mused aloud, before an alarm sounded at Kyan's terminal behind them.
Kyan's ears also perked up at the mention of a "stunt glider". He was about to ask after mor information when Naota switched to the trampoline, which also piqued his interest. Unlike the glider, he had used a trampoline before. How long ago he couldn't say... Was it on Cestus III? But that failed attempt at remembering was interrupted by the tactical console's beeping out it's alarm.
The boy returned to his station the same way he'd come, over the back of the captain's chair and sliding back over the console. "It's nae fer certain the now.." he called out, reading the results of the scans. "But sure and it could be a ship." He shrugged. "Or maybe it's space junk. We gotta get closer tae see."
"Initial readings don't show much," Davna confirmed, "But a second scan has shown that it leads right into the debris disk of that heliopause over there."
"Forward readings to Colonial Administration," Naota remarked, moving so that he was standing by Davna's console to see the readings for himself. "Delia, take us into the heliopause. Zero-one-five mark eight, zed minus two. One quarter impulse, please," the boy added, imagining the course in his mind as he relayed the thought to Sil.
"Aye, sir. Zero-one-five mark eight, zed minus two," Delia repeated back as her fingers moved over the helm. It didn't matter if all they were headed for was just random debris, it was a new course! "Space junk, here we come."
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