Boarding the Array

Posted on 06 Apr 2026 @ 11:36am by Lieutenant Commander Temerant Bast & Lieutenant JG Dylan McConnor & Lieutenant Maralen Seitha & Lieutenant JG Cajag Lagnas & Commander Krea Rh'Vareth

1,145 words; about a 6 minute read

Mission: Shakedown
Location: Bridge
Timeline: Immediately following Orders Dispatched

The Vega Epsilon Observatory hung in space not far from the USS Cygnus. The habitable portion of the observatory was fairly small, roughly about half the size of the Cygnus's saucer section, but the sensor array was vast, and spread out on either side of the central module, covering an area roughly four times the size of the Ba'Rathian Battlefield Park in Levinshir - and that was by no means a small park, thought Temerant. He'd run several marathons in that park, and had never run through the same area twice.

He looked around the Bridge at the assembled officers, who were waiting for his orders. Rh'Vareth, the Romulan mission specialist, was waiting silently, a cold and calculating look on her face, as if she was only waiting for him to make a mistake.

"Lieutenant Lagnas, I want a full sensor sweep of the array. No one has been here in over twenty years, is the atmosphere still breathable? Lieutenant Ahmad, get your teams ready, and assemble in Transporter Room One."

“Full sensor sweep aye.” Responded Caj with an appropriate level of dacorum and professionalism whilst standing on the bridge of a starship. He tapped away at his console looking at the read outs on the touch screen LCARS display. “Sir. Sensors report grade 2 atmosphere with M Class gravity.”

Maralen stood at his station, watching everything. When they had come into range of the observatory, he had begun scanning its security measures and formulating a strategy for maintaining its security as ordered. He had not done anything yet, however, as orders beyond the basic had not been given yet.

Ravi had begun at her station on the Bridge and had heard and acknowledged the instructions given to her by the Captain. She accepted his information regarding the possibility of there being a influx of visitors/patients to the Sickbay and asked permission to relocate there for readiness, although she did propose that her ACMO, Kensington be sent with the Away Team to offer medical presence there. This was very convenient to her and she left the Bridge with some relief realising that Caj would be part of the away team and since she was actively avoiding him at the moment, that suited her just fine.

Inside her own office, the CMO signed in and kept up with the proceedings on the Bridge, as was her duty at a time and situation like this and also to keep in touch with what was happening - in anticipation of any wounded coming their way.

With word coming from Engineering that their teams were ready, Bast gave the order for all to report to the transporter room, and the group beamed over to the array.

As the transporter effect faded, Bast pulled out his palm beacon, casting his light on their surroundings. The air felt stale, but breathable. The temperature was cold, slightly above freezing, just enough to avoid damaging some of the more sensitive equipment. Internal sensors immediately picked up their presence, and lights began switching on as they beamed over. Most of them, anyway, as a few flickered, but failed to turn on and stay on.

"Fan out," instructed Bast. "Engineering team, let's run a diagnostic on the environmental systems. Lieutenant Seitha, standard security sweep. Lieutenant Lagnas, please locate the long-range astrometrics array, and work your magic."

As Bast took his first steps into the corridor ahead, he experienced a strange sensation, feeling lighter on his feet. Lagnas had reported M-class gravity, but that still left a wide margin. Bast estimated that gravity here was only somewhere around 80% of normal. Possibly as a means of energy conservation, he thought.

Maralen nodded acknowledgement of the order and disbursed the few security people he had with him in a standard pattern. "Sweep is underway," he informed as he followed Bast. As the chief, he had the responsibility of making sure that the Executive Officer made it safely back to the Cygnus. "My people are moving in pairs in a standard sweep."

Dylan took a few cautious steps forward. The subtle difference in gravity made those steps feel awkward, and the toolbox he was carrying felt lighter than it had on the Cygnus, prompting his brain to wonder if he'd forgotten to pack a few tools. Which he knew was just ridiculous - he would never forget to pack his toolbox properly, according to regulations.

He wandered away from the main group, remembering the layout of the place from the schematics. The environmental control subsystems were located a hundred meters to starboard from their current location. And true enough, the console was there. It was an older LCARS system - not surprising, since the array had first been constructed over seventy-five years ago. Regular maintenance operations had been carried out every ten to twelve years, but for whatever reason, the maintenance work had lapsed during the Dominion War. The last maintenance operation to the Vega Epsilon Deep Space Observatory had been carried out nearly forty years ago.

He set down his toolbox, and tapped the console, stirring it awake after all this time. The screen pixelated, displayed multicolored static, and finally coalesced into a coherent display, prompting for Starfleet-issue credentials. Dylan entered his identification, and waited for the software to authenticate him.

As the computer processed his identity, he saw a brief flicker on the screen. So brief, that he wondered if his imagination was playing tricks. He was feeling tired - what with all of these systems tests on the new Cygnus, and the extra hours they'd been putting in. They were beginning to take their toll, he thought.

He looked at the console while he waited for the authentication to come through. It was a standard seventy-year-old console, with a physical keyboard, and keys that you could tap, instead of a modern LCARS console with a dynamic display. Still, the system seemed a bit slow, even for such an old one.

He looked around the console, absentmindedly giving it a once-over. He crouched, and looked under the thing. The cables seemed all right - no visual signs of corrosion, no empty ports that should have been connected. Even the odd-looking external controller...

He paused. What an odd-looking device external controller... He held out a hand, and touched the device. It was warm to the touch, and gave off a very subtle vibration.

He pulled out his tricorder, and tried to scan the device. But whatever it was, the tricorder couldn't identify it.

"McConnor to Lieutenant Ahmad. Could I see you at Environmental Controls? I may have found something strange."

Caj continued to examine the data feeds coming off his own tricorder. His sensors picked up a faint energy spike through the systems of the station. He pressed his comm badge “did anyone just press anything? I got a faint energy spike?”

-= TO BE CONTINUED =-

 

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