Translation: Oh, darn.

Posted on Sat Apr 9th, 2022 @ 5:41pm by Captain Abigail Laurens & Lieutenant Commander William Rogers & Lieutenant Commander Ebrin Valek & Commander Ichiko Gail

Mission: The Koldaran Encounter
Location: Captain's Ready Room

The communication ended, leaving Abigail sitting at her desk for a few moments contemplating before she reached up and tapped her commbadge. "Commander Rogers, Commander Gail, Commander Valek please come to my ready room immediately," she closed the communication and brought up the information from long range scans that had been sent through to her by Commander Gunnison.

While Elder Cleric J'Rayal may not have been able to identify the source of the attack, it was clear on the scans that there were a number of odd looking vessels in the atmosphere of the planet, though they seemed to be somewhat stationary. There were also two distinctly different life forms being detected on the planet.

As the doors to her ready room parted, Abigail looked up, her brow furrowing as Ichiko, Bill and Ebrin entered simultaneously from the bridge. With a flick of her hand, the Commanding Officer brought the ships up as 3D holographic visualisations instead and then turned to Ichiko. "Any idea who these might belong to?"

"Not a design I recognise." Rogers glanced over to Ichiko. "A DQ native species?"

Ichiko took a look at the hologram design and instantly all the joy was drawn out of her face. Her eyes narrowed, her ears started to fold back... "Koldaran..." she muttered, with a voice dripping with the kind of emotion that only could be mustered towards an enemy of the state.

Despite several years of having studied the Delta Quadrant, both from Voyager's mission logs and his own direct experience, Valek's frame of reference (indeed, all of Starfleet's) was still quite small compared to what they did not know. And neither the name 'Koldaran' nor the vessel's design that floated before them were familiar to the young man. But...he was able to put two-and-two together. The fact that these images had come from a distress call, combined with the strong reaction from the from the Astrea's first officer, gave him enough to be starting with.

"Not a friendly, then," he surmised, well-aware he was pretty much stating the obvious, "What do we need to know about them, commander?"

"They're the enemy." she started, simple and to the point. A moment or so passed before she composed herself. Before she realized that to the Federation, those words didn't hold any true weight. "They're an expansion fueled military dictatorship of a people. Raised on propaganda, fed approved food, read approved stories, and constantly on the move for more worlds to consume." there was a fervor growing in her voice. "They expand to new worlds, slaughter the populace they find, set up a terraformer, and move on to the next target. They're not reasonable, they're meticulous and cruel and brutal."

Ichiko took a moment to bring herself back to the here and now, but more importantly, she took a moment to calm herself down. Deep breath. Deep breath. Deep breath.

"They.. are the enemy."

Abigail weighed Ichiko's words mentally as she considered the distress call they had received. "We've received a distress call from Odraiclite," she chose her words carefully as she spoke. "They're under attack from the Koldarans and have no way to defend themselves against the threat. They've asked for our help." There was a pause, a long moment of silence as Abigail turned to face Ichiko directly. "What kind of manpower would it take to stop them?"

"Then they're going to die." Ichiko said, her usual prose and diplomacy having taken a back seat for the moment. "If they cannot defend themselves, the Koldorans will wipe them to the last." a pause, again, to reel in her ambition. Her anger. Her fear. Ts'usugi were usually invisible to empathic powers, but one didn't need fancy genetics to see this display.

"We bring everything we can to overwhelm them. We either pile so many Koldaran dead in that sector that it convinces them that that planet is not worth the investment, or we destroy the invasion party to the last. I'd recommend reaching out to the Ts'usugi or the Dalacari to ensure they're aware of the distress call and the location thereof. Then we head to that world."

"I'll let you in on a secret. This ship is faster than anything in the Ts'usugi Navy."

Destroy the invasion party to the last. The words echoed in Valek’s head. Although he was involved in strategic operations (and had been for much of his career), this kind of total warfare was not something that he’d ever experienced before. Indeed, hardly any of them had.

“We’re gonna need their help,” Valek agreed, “We don’t have that many assets out here to begin with, and most of what we do have is tied up at the forward operating base at Iota…”

Ichiko gave a nod. "I understand completely. You're all in a unique position. When we're done here, I'll make the transmission." a pause, as Ichiko turned to Abigail, "Unless you think it would carry more weight, in the name of good will, if it came from the Astraea officially?"

Abigail paused, steepling her fingers against her lips as she contemplated for a moment. She leaned forward, tapping at the console. "We were meant to meet the Pennsylvania at Tabula Rasa, they can be at Odraiclite within 72 hours," she said quietly. "The USS Wellington could join us within 24 hours after." She turned toward Ichiko again. "Do you think the Ts'usugi or the Dalacari would put lives in front of this thing?"

"The Dalacari would send mechanized units." a pause, "The Ts'usugi will send troops. Saving the indigenous people and denying the Koldarans any advantage will quickly become the same objective." she offered before she did a little math in her head, "Expect the soonest reinforcements from the Dalacari around the same time as the Wellington, while the Ts'usugi will be here maybe four hours after that. Unless the Dalacari act as a troop transport for them, since Dalacari ships can be faster in a pinch."

“What can we expect from the Koldarans,” Valek asked.

"The Koldarans believe in overwhelming numbers. Fighter swarms to overwhelm orbital defenses and begin surface assaults. Clearing LZs for troop deployments. Fighter pilots are looking to prove their valor and dedication to the cause, so if things go poorly, expect dangerous tactics." she started. "Officers are on their starships and will not directly. Soldiers will give their lives to defend an officer, and won't give up their officer's location. So don't expect any interrogation techniques to work. So after a while, we stopped worrying about prisoners." a grim admission.

"Don't expect them to take any either."

"I can prep a full report on their firepower for a briefing on the way." she advised.

"Do we have the kind of numbers needed to pull something like that off?" Rogers asked. The description of the Koldarans reminded him of some the smaller of kingdoms set up by the Tyrants of the Eugenics Wars.

"We don't know how big of a force the Koldarans are bringing to that world, but if they picked a world with little to no way to defend themselves, then it's possible they didn't mobilize an entire armada to take the world. Pilots and soldiers are replaceable, but Officers are a valuable resource."

Valek nodded slowly, mulling over the information. “It sounds like we’re going to be dealing with at least two fronts - space and ground,” he said, “and the Koldarans have a head start as far as both are concerned. Long range sensors should give us a good sense of what we’re dealing with in terms of numbers.”

Pausing a moment, Valek studied the three-dimensional image of the planet rotating before them. “…but we are coming in at a disadvantage,” he continued, “Not only are we going to have to break Koldaran control over the orbital space, but we are going to have to hold it against any reinforcements they might send.”

Abigail nodded slowly, remaining silent, clearly contemplating. Finally, she leaned forward, swiping the holographing projection, bringing up another display, this time of the planet, watching for a few moments as the planet turned in front of her. It was clear that the Koldaran threat was localised to one small area, perhaps that was something that would give them an advantage, if they could find a way to fortify their position, make it something of a stronghold.

"Commander Rogers, have engineering bring the QSD online and lay in a course for Odraclite. I want us there as quickly as possible. Commander Gail, can you locate the nearest Ts'usugi forces? We're going to ask them for help. I'll put calls out to the Wellington and the Pennsylvania. Once we get there, Commander Gail and I will lead ground forces, Commander Valek, you'll have the bridge." She paused again for another moment. "We have one advantage over the Koldaran," she finally said quietly. "We fight because lives matter."

"Copy that." Rogers replied. He wondered what the Captain intended for him in all this. Given she and Ichiko were going to be on the ground he'd have thought, as second officer, that he'd be on the bridge although he had to admit that given his past it would make more sense for him to be groundside.

"I'll need to align the comms array to the Buoy network signal. I'll make the call as short as possible." Ichiko confirmed.

Abigail nodded. "Commander Valek, can you assemble the senior staff in the briefing room in an hour? We'll need to start making plans."