I Spy...

Posted on Sun Jul 28th, 2019 @ 7:22pm by Captain Abigail Laurens & Lieutenant Commander William Rogers & Lieutenant JG Charlotte Aschail

Mission: War and Peacekeeping
Location: USS Astraea - Bridge

Abigail stepped out of the turbolift onto the bridge, casting a quick glance around. "Status report," she asked as she headed for the center chair.

William didn't turn from his instruments. "We're five minutes out from the launch co-ordinates, Ma'am." He replied.

"Drop us out of warp, assume a holding position and take the ship to yellow alert," Abigail ordered calmly. "Advise Lieutenant Carver that they are cleared for launch when ever they're ready. As soon as the fighters are clear of the ship raise the shields again."

"Copy that, Ma'am. Dropping out of warp now." Bill's hands moved quickly over the controls, although he was not yet so familiar with their layout that he could do it without a glance down. He tapped his comm badge. "Flight to Lt. Carver. You are go for launch. I repeat, you have a go."

Abigail turned in her seat, casting a glance at the engineering officer working at the console. "Is Engineering ready?" she asked.

Charlotte took a deep breath and let it out, nodding, "We're ready, ma'am." Her deep Southern accent making it sound slower, a smile on her face, "We're having an anti-matter flow regulation problem, varying too much and too little. Obviously, we don't want too much or it'll eat the warp core, should buy us a few hours in the name of safety."

Taking a deep breath, Abigail settled back in her seat, watching through the view screen as the stars outside the ship slowed and the ship gently halted. Almost immediately the yellow strobes started to flash. As she drew in a shallow, almost shaky breath, they watched as the fighters departed the ship and streak away into the darkness of space.

"And now we wait..." Abigail said quietly as she watched the screen, her hands gripping the arm rests of her command chair.

It was barely an hour later when the notification of an incoming transmission came up. "Ma'am, we have Captain Sorenson on transmission from the Zendaya."

Abigail nodded slightly. "Put it on the view screen," she said quietly.

Half a moment later the rather angry face of the other Captain appeared on half of the view screen in front of them.

"Captain Sorenson," Abgail said politely, adding a genial smile. "What can I do for you?"

"Commander Laurens, we've been advised that the Astraea has come to a complete stop. We've not been notified of a change in your plans. Would you mind telling me what the hell you're doing?" Sorenson almost growled.

Abigail did the very best to feign innocence. "Well, your sources must be very on the ball," she said quietly. "It seems, Captain, that we're experiencing some difficulties of our own..." she cast a glance toward Charlotte. "I'm sure my engineer can explain it better than I can. Would you mind Lieutenant?"

The engineer swallowed hard and nodded, "Captain Sorenson, Sir, we've been monitoring a slight issue with the antimatter injection system within the warp core. At first it was within normal fluctuational levels given that we just came out of a major refit that involved replacing critical portions of the warp core, so we felt it would just work itself out within the first forty-eight hours, the normal observation period. However, within the last ten minutes we've monitored a far larger flux than normal and as a precaution we were forced to shut the warp core down while we check it out. Due to the volatility of antimatter, we have to flush the system and then make our scans and probably a physical inspection as well. We don't want to play around with too much antimatter in the system, Sir, especially not with VIPs on board."

Abigail smiled sweetly as she turned her attention back toward the view screen. "As i'm sure you're aware, these things happen. We can't risk an antimatter explosion aboard the ship, our only alternative is that we take time to investigate and resolve the issue. I have my entire engineering team working on it and I've been told we can expect a resolution in a few hours, give or take. It's just a minor delay Captain, we'll be there before you know it."

With another smile, Abigail turned her attention back to Lieutenant Rogers at the helm. "End communication Lieutenant and return us to the view screen."

The inflamed gammon of Captain Sorenson's face quickly cut away to the star dusted black of interstellar space. "He seemed nice." Bill remarked drily.

"Yeah, about as nice as a pit of vipers," Abigail shook her head, drumming her fingertips on the armrest of her chair for a moment before standing up. "I'll be in my ready room, alert me as soon as the fighters come back, or if anything else changes."

"Aye, Ma'am." Bill replied.