Posted on Fri Aug 14th, 2026 @ 10:44am by Captain Xavier Carey & Lieutenant Commander Hunter Carey & Captain Antonia 'Tony" Stoffels & Commander Rutherford (RJ) Milton & Lieutenant Commander Etan tar-Lexros & Lieutenant Sky Carey & Petty Officer 2nd Class Hywell LLewellyn

Mission: We are sick of this.
Location: Bridge
Timeline: Orbital insertion

ON


Orbital establishment was not the difficulty; knowing the exacting maximum range from the surface that will allow consistent Transporter operations became more of a factor. Now taking also into account is that best sensory range, not too far out as to hinder sensor probes while keeping the ship exposure to a minimum.

The Resolution hung in space above the planet; her vast exploratory design lending a perfect opportunity to scan the surface for anything out of the ordinary. Cross referencing past scan logs of the planet for a base line since establishing the colony would be a filter to the new scans. Significant changes or even more subtle ones would be filtered through the computer and comparisons made.

All that needed to be done right off is to communicate with the colony, a scanning pattern, reports from the patient care as too if it has escalated to any personnel requiring transport to the ship for care or if there is still time to find a cure before needing to expose the ship to the problem?

Arranging the supplies to be transported to the surface for the medical operation, technical staff to support and the XO's shuttle to launch for a closer look before the first Resolution boots touch the surface?


Hywell had been attached by his chief to help the XO as much as possible with the mission so he made his way over to the bridge to do his reporting and see what was needed from science. Once there he spotted the doctor quickly enough and sauntered over. "Good morning sir, the chief of science has asked me to lend a hand throughout this mission. So let me know where you need me." He still mostly disliked officers, one of the reasons that he had agreed to join starfleet after getting his doctorate in science was the assurance that he could do so as an enlisted man and not an officer.

Etan was taking the Bridge shift for the moment, handling the bridge Ops station while they made orbit. It wasn't that he was the most effective person to put in the forward-facing role, just that he was the most senior, and seeing the senior staff of the ship assembled might assuage the fears of anyone who'd been worried that they weren't getting the best ship for the job. There was a different tone in his voice when he took the as-needed anxiety meds he'd been prescribed, a smooth confidence that he almost never showed otherwise. And, so far, this was routine. "Orbital path laid in - thank you, Helmsman. We can also retain geosynchrony over the colony as needed. Probes being deployed at appropriate velocities. Science, please confirm that all orbital probes are calibrated and reading true, and then we can deploy into the atmosphere. Transporter rooms, cargo bays, and triage bays all report ready to transport on your mark, sir. Shuttlebay reports all secondary vessels are ready for deployment."

He tapped the comms stud on his board and spoke quietly into the microphone. "Lieutenant Troilin, report ready status of flight wing personnel. Your vehicles have cleared all preflight checks."

He saw the hail from the colony leadership come in, but rather than call it out, he just glanced backwards toward Rendar at Tactical, as it was traditional on Galaxy-class vessels for the Tactical Officer to handle communications responsibilities. Plus, the turning allowed him to mask the slight tic in his neck as the drugs took firmer hold. The brain zaps would pass shortly, but they were unpleasant in the meantime.

Sky was as always sitting in her seat, the ever calm presence of a Counsellor, whose mind was also concentrating on the link she shared with her children. She knew they were safe in the nursery, but the constant feeling of their presence was comforting to her when they weren’t together.

"The shuttle Bay reports the first Shuttle is waiting on the Doctor and Initial Survey is ready." THe call came from Bay One.


[Edge of Sensory Range]

The Vorta sat for a moment, taking the headset off.

"Maintain our vigil here as it is unlikely they have detected us, a Federation Starship answering a Colony in distress is not so significant on the surface, but the speed of the arrival might be... cumbersome should they have Medical and Science facilities above the norm. "I want to know what ship that is and the Medical staff." The Vorta commanded. "I want it now..."

"USS Resolution, galaxy class... weapons formidable, specializes in medical and science mission. Information gathered about the current situation, they have been dispatched to deal with an illness that has plagued the planet." Came the answer from behind.

"Why would the Federation waste a Capitol ship when there are ships that could do the same job and not risk such an asset? The Vorta asked , not expecting an answer but just to have it out there should someone have something to add?

"Something they know that we don't?"


[Resolution Bridge]

In her seat Sky frowned. “Captain I’m picking up on something, it’s not exactly clear to me right now it feels…distant.”

Toni knew to take these hunches seriously. "Are the sensor picking up anything that should not be there?" She asked and then focussed on Sky. "Can you hone in on it?"

“I can try” Sky nodded closing her eyes to try and add more focus to her senses. “I feel like…whatever, or whoever it is, is staying just out of our sensor range. I can’t get a good enough sense to say who it is, just that they’re out there.” She opened her eyes again. “Might I suggest moving the ship? Just looking like were surveying the planet, or something it’ll give me a better sense of which direction we should be focussing on.”

"Helm please lay in a course as the counsellor suggested. I need you all to focus on this while we go to yellow alert." She wanted all the crew focussed if they needed to act fast.

"Understood. Laying in a course." Element replied from the helms position.

Etan nodded without changing his focus and pressed a button on his panel, bringing the ship to Yellow Alert. He leaned in and spoke into the comms stud. "All, hands, all hands. The Captain has ordered Yellow Alert. All hands report to action stations and stand by for further orders. All sections report in when ready." He spoke again, repeating himself exactly. He straightened up and thought for a moment. "Captain, should we fire a probe in the direction of the disturbance?"

"If it has a low chance of being detected then yes. If there is someone out there I don't want them to know we have spotted them."


=^= This is CAP Six, I have a shadow on the edge of range.=^= The Pilot noted. =^= Command , should I break formation and see what is out there? =^=

"Not yet. Keep formation for now but keep scanning and as soon as you pick up more let us know. And be on the alert to act fast if needed." Toni ordered them.

BRIDGE

Sky was putting her focus into picking up a direction, this was something she hadn’t tried before but she could only give her best idea. It took a few minutes before she looked towards Tony. “This direction…definitely. I feel closer to whatever it is now.”

"Anything more." If it was hiding it almost had to be hostile. "What, how many." It is was a whole enemy fleet out there they were a sitting duck.

“It’s not a fleet that much I can tell you, maybe one ship.” Sky added.

"Shuttle Shapley to Resolution=^= The Doctor's voice cut in. =^= I have completed a facial check of the Colony at 100 meters, nothing out of the ordinary to hinder phase two of the Rescue Operations.=^=

It had taken his shuttle several minutes to encircle the landing sight and close scan of personnel from a discreet distance. THis level would allow the Resolution to beam down the sterilization fields and Mobile research facilities with all the equipment to get a through testing. The Medical personnel would be in level one protective suits to run batteries of test to determine the exact conditions of personnel on the ground. The scientists will do soile and air samples of the area for the possible Toxic element plaguing the Colony Personnel while Logistic and Damage Control personnel can be on site to support the Operations of the Colony Equipment where needed.

"Best get the ball rolling, I will land the Shapley and disembark to help over-see the set up ground side.=^= Milton reported.

"Be very careful!" Toni said and quickly filled Milton in on what was happening. "You are probably safer on the ground if something happens. Find some place were you can take cover should you need it."

Milton asked. =^= WE are skids down, what is going on up there? Seems unlikely a fleet hiding, this colony is not that strategic a resource. Also we might have an Enemy force already down here if they really valued something here. THey might be more interested in what we are doing here? =^=

"We have not detected any hostile presence on the planet." Toni said. "And right now you would be in more danger returning to the ship than landing. At the first sign of trouble we will beam you out."

Etan pulled up a menu on his board, scrolling through the probes aboard the ship, thinking for a moment. Toni had given him what he felt was an ultimatum that if he fired a probe, it had to be difficult to detect. That narrowed it down to two casings - a standard comms relay, or a culture study probe. He had the two side-by-side while also watching ship's status overall. After a moment, he came to a conclusion and gestured, speaking up at a fairly normal tone. "Captain. If my current team aboard get five minutes to retrofit a standard comms relay, we should be able to use it to identify if there's any unknown vessel, cloaked or not, in the system. Doubly if they're not fully radio-silent. If I turn up the gain and use the filter algorithms, we can usually even pick up intraship comms. And, to any observer aware of Starfleet practice and protocol, it's completely normal for a ship on station like us to drop a high-gain comms relay in case the colony's systems are subpar, or we need to quickly relay a message to a fleet command. Rather than being undetectable by traditional means, it will hide in plain sight. Permission to proceed, Captain?"

"Do it." Toni said. The wait would be worth it if they could be sure what and how many they were facing.

Etan nodded in response and sent the order down to his team with updated specifications for the comms relay. The Yellow Alert had everyone on edge, at least that was what he could glean from his reports. Usually, calling for a comms beacon in this situation would indicate that it was standing by to be used as an emergency beacon, or a warning to others if the ship was destroyed. But this absolutely wasn't an emergency beacon. It was a listening post. The Resolution was a hunter, rather than the prey. "Relay deployment in five minutes, Captain."

"Go ahead, commander." Toni said outwardly calm. This was what they had trained for countless times and she had faith in her crew.

The probes fired smoothly, and Etan was monitoring as the relay started to come live. There was definitely 'something' there, but nothing that really showed up clearly. There was a subtle shift in his expression - slightly narrowed eyes, tightened lips, and a hunch in his shoulders, as he leaned in. If Toni was watching him, she'd realize something was up. There was an anomaly in the data in front of Etan, something which never sat well with the young man who strongly preferred when the universe around him worked according to predictable rules. For those not watching his relatively limited body language, they'd see it in the data - suddenly the Ops datastream went mostly across the ship, pulling all remote data into the Bridge station - including a priority request to Flight Control and Science to compare the relay against the ship's sensors and those of the shuttlecraft on the surface. In a way, it was very much emblematic of Etan; limited response on the surface but an almost desperate grasp for understanding underneath. Finally, he spoke. "Captain? There's an anomalous reading at the edge of the system. I can't pin it down. I believe someone, or something, is observing us and the colony."

Tony nodded, she had observed him so was not surprised he had found something. "Anyway you can get closer without alerting them?"

Etan considered the request and the situation facing the Resolution. He took a moment and then nodded, writing a new course to push to the helm console and simultaneously changing the probe's thrust vector. While Flight Control handled the helm of the ship, every Ops officer was trained in navigation - especially orbital mechanics. "Aye, ma'am. We can move to a higher orbit, and shift from heliocentricity to chasing the terminator. It shouldn't raise too many eyebrows, especially if we start focusing sensors on a wide area of the planet. Given that we're here to resolve a plague, we can calibrate the biosensors to match the disease. It does mean we'll be decentralized from our Away team, but we're still going to be in transporter range of the planet. Kay and the others will be safe no matter what." He realized he was rambling, so he stopped and took a breath. Realizing he'd missed the actual point of the endeavor, he spoke again. "We can also push the probe directly in the course of those readings and begin to broadcast a temporary yellow-flag system quarantine message once it reaches an arbitrary distance from the planet. We'll have a wider sensor sweep, and the probe will be closer to the blip. Permission to proceed, ma'am?"

"Carry on commander." Toni had caught the moment of panic so she made her voice as steady as she could. She too worried about the away team, but she could not show that here on the bridge where everyone depended on her.

Etan glanced back at Toni - the shift in her tone helped. She understood why his mind had pivoted the way it did. The course was pretty simple, all things considered. They knew the conditions of the planet, and thus it was easy enough to chase the terminator - the sensor sweep he called for from the auxiliary sensor panels would benefit from the gray-line transmission boost, so it would look normal enough. The primaries, of course, were set to scan for any sign of a vessel - gravity shifts, heat, subspace radio transmissions, disturbances of the solar wind, or even a shift in the expected hydrogen concentrations.

Toni waited as patiently as she could for the results to come in.

The Efrosian could almost feel the eyes of the people behind him on the bridge, and he decided to do something that he had rarely done before. While the scans ran automatically, he stood up and looked at the Captain. "One moment, please. Medical, non-emergency as yet. Scans are running, I can't interpret yet." That was enough, he hoped. In that one moment, he darted into Toni's ready room, moving with the kind of shaky speed that could only be indicative of his nerves. Once inside the smaller space, he quickly went to the wall and replicated a glass of water along with one of his emergency doses of antianxiety medicine, making sure that it was entered into Sickbay's records. He swallowed the pills, counted to ten, and re-emerged onto the bridge quickly. He nodded at Toni as he sat down. "Issue resolved, Captain. Scans coming in now." He took a deeper breath, eyes focused on the panel before him. "Captain, I don't like to make assumptions, but both the ship and the probe are detecting unusual graviton emissions at a point on the edge of the system, keeping in line with the planet. Either there's a very stable micro-singularity floating in space, or it's aboard a ship. I'm also receiving unusual readings indicating a course of disturbance in the field's dust in a pattern that could indicate a navigational deflector - the ferrite dust is polarized and carrying an ionic charge."

He looked around and realized that without the Doctor aboard, he was effectively Toni's first officer in this situation. Suddenly, he was very glad for his decision to take the rescue meds. He cleared his throat and looked at her. "Advise we move to ready status and general quarters, but do not verbally announce Yellow Alert over comms, in case the other vessel is hostile and has a probe on the planet to monitor us, sir. We can't tell what or who exactly is out there, but they're not sending a friend-or-foe signal on Starfleet bands, and they're using a drive standard different to ours."

Without a better visual to put on screen, Etan pulled up the map of the system, marking the area that the ship and probe had triangulated the enemy in. It was fairly wide as such things went, but there was definitely something there. He even had a dotted line showing the disturbance of the space dust, and the direction of the majority of polarized charges in smaller arrows. In short, everything indicated that a vessel was out there - observing.

Toni nodded. She was very glad that his thoughts were exactly the same as hers. She quietly put his recommendations into effect and then looked at the map with him.

"Let's hope the away team can get their mission done quickly." She said softly to Etan. For now they were ready for everything.

[Edge Sensor Range]

The Federation Ship seemed to be in typical orbit, getting ready for the deployment as standard support protocols; the picture is panning out as it should. This 'Safe distance will give cover and allow more observation of the New enemy. KNowledge is always best in conquering; finding how they operate leaves evidence of how an enemy thinks.

"Keep them at safe distance." The command to the Helm came across. "If only information about surface operations would be more available; the Maximum range watching the HUman Vessel in orbit did not allow for sharper observations of the surface operations. That would be sporadic at best. Not giving away the planned observation meant longer silence to await a good oppunity to get closer observations.