The door swooshes open. A Human CPO is there, accompanying the Kitchissippi's crew.
O'Grady stops at the door. "I'll just leave you in the capable hands of Lieutenant Theron. Sir, I'll be back at my post in the Ops Centre."

Theron says, "Thanks Sean. Tell the CO her wayward lambs have come home, wagging their tails behind them."

"Will do, Sir, but I'll be thanking ye not to be mockin' me Irish heritage. Sir!" O'Grady chuckles and the doors swoosh shut.

Commander Samson reenters the room a few moments later. "Theron, have you been busting Sean's chops again? He was muttering about some anonymous 'blue-balled bastard'.

She takes a seat at the centre of the curved conference table and refills her tea cup. "I've met Lieutenant Dul and her crew. You'd be Lieutenant Anderson?"
This message was last edited by the GM at 23:59, Sat 06 Aug 2016.

"No ma'am. As far as I know I'm already Lt. Anderson - since I joined Starfleet. Is there something wrong with my records? I thought we'd worked things out my first year in the Academy. It's a legal name change - no one could even pronounce my clan name. Something about the shape of your voice boxes or something."

He waved it away dismissively.

"Nevermind, I'll have it all fixed soonest. We're Kitchissippi. This is Kurasa, Merawdr, and Gröen. We're very happy to be on stati...aboar... err, however the semantics work for Dyson."

In reply to Mac Anderson (msg # 2):

Shione leaned closer to Mac ,whispering"It's a human greeting,Mac;intended only to acknowledge both your Rank and name,as a way to open a conversation"

She turns to the Commander acknowledging her rank with a nod I'm Lt(jg)Shione Kurasa of Betazed. It's an honor to be here Ma'am.Looking forward to seeing more of this incredible marvel"

The braided Xenexian looked at Shione as if judging if she was joking, then shrugged. His native language might be difficult for outsiders to vocalize, but it wasn't exactly known for its drastic amounts of nuance. Standard was a wonderful language for slang, and he'd embraced that... but sometimes he still got tripped up by turns of phrases.

In reply to Mac Anderson (msg # 2):

"Sorry Lieutenant. A bit of Sean's Irish brogue goes a long way. Oh, Theron," she says to the Andorian Ops Chief, "Please take that (shudder) stuff with you on your way out. You know how I feel about that Ferengi soda."

Theron winces dramatically. "Yes Ma'am, right away, Ma'am. Will there be anything else Ma'am?"

She sighs, "No, now scoot. I'm sure you have something to do somewhere else."

"So, welcome to the menagerie. We've got a full day ahead of us. First, Athena - Doctor Adonidas to you - wants to give you all your in-routine physical. Security Chief Gavak, who've you've all met, has already received and processed your latest security files. Once that's all done, you'll be proceeding to Outpost Three to meet your immediate superior, Lieutenant Teranin Atek. Ms. Dul and Ms. Kurosa, you'll be interested to know that he, too, is a Betazoid. He's only been here a couple of months, so the briefings are still fresh in his mind. We're going to try something different, something we've been wanting to do and now have the personnel to do so. That is, for many of your missions, the Cuyahoga and Kitchissippi will act as a team. Eight heads are better than four, to mangle a phrase. Your first assignment will be to explore a... station, for want of a more precise descriptor, in your patrol area. Commander M'Rel and his former ship, the USS Thames discovered one just like it six months ago. That's where they met their furry sidekick. It seems these stations, code-named Gamma by Starfleet, are some sort of research facilities with a number of artificial habitats with captive subjects of a number of varying species."

A previously unknown edge to the Lieutenant's voice appeared as he replied.

"Captive subjects? Captive of who?"

In reply to Mac Anderson (msg # 6):

"We do not as yet have any idea. We'd thought that this Möbius might be behind it, but according to M'Rel, Seth and Tal, he has no more information than we do. He apparently is an 'ascended' being originally an Earth philologist named Edward Moebius, Ph.D. who discovered ancient machines of a race known as the Krell on Altair IV. He ascended during a cataclysm which laid waste to the planet in 2185, as witnessed by Captain John J. Adams of the NCC-57. Möbius  has been adopted as a protégé of a transdimensional being known as Yaskoydray or 'The Grandfather'. According to an alien called Farl, his species, the Finorri are 'The Sons of the Grandfather', and this Yaskoydray was responsible for creating the Sphere. We're pretty much convinced that this story is a bunch of mythological oral-tradition legends. There may be a kernel of truth somewhere at the core of the myths, but there's precious little concrete to go on." Samson shakes her head as if the whole concept gives her a migraine. She takes a long sip of her Tarkalean tea and pauses for reactions.

"'Far fetched' doesn't seem to be a strong-enough phrase, ma'am," Gian muses, his index finger curled around his chin. "Just to be clear, though, our mission is to investigate these abandoned lab facilities -- not necessarily to untwist history from mythology."

The Kitchissippi must have made good time after their little detour - or given it up on seeing their sister ship heading inside. Interesting. "A joint mission." Said with no real concern. The war with the Dominion had forced many non-standard practices on the federation. The mythology was similarly interesting but not surprising. Both Betazed and Earth had similar. "Have these habitats been linked to specific races having arrived from outside the sphere? Or are they 'native'?"

[OOC I assume we know who has seniority within the eight man team?]
This message was last edited by the player at 21:54, Sun 07 Aug 2016.

In reply to Gian Seingalt (msg # 8):

"Exactly, Mr. Seingalt. Gather as much information as is available, and it will be analysed to within a micron of its existance by Starfleet. For this mission, I think we'll be swapping out Ensign Gröen for a technological assessment specialist - sorry, Talja. You're back on the Dneister for now. Mac, your new man is Lieutenant 'Fast Tony' Gazzo for now. He'll be waiting for you at Dodge City."

[OOC - Name and rank of replacement crewman revised]
This message was last edited by the player at 18:53, Mon 08 Aug 2016.

In reply to Commander Delilah Samson (msg # 10):

Shione reacted by standing and moving over to take the seat beside Talja
"Sorry Talja,that kinda sucks.It was nice working with you,hope we get the chance again"
she gives the girl a quick ,but sincere hug and remains next to her

"Commander,does the briefing give us the findings from Commander M'Rel's team.Be nice to see the layout,and whatever security they encountered?"

As Cassiadora waits for her question to be, her eyes do briefly flick to Shione.

"A for the species, Ms. Dul, some of the non-sentient species are familiar ones fro surveyed areas. The semi-sophonts are unfamiliar to us, but may be autocthones. We have layouts of Gamma One. Security seems to be an EMP device to knock out power systems of flying vehicles, so you'll be going in in teo Type 15A shuttlepods flying NOE. The towers have inside several autonomous robot sentries but these are armed only with tranquiliser darts to stop escaped captives, none of which to date have been fully sapient creatures."

She taps an icon on her desk, and an image pops up on the viewer.


"This is an image of Gamma Two, taken during a fly-by in a Type 15 'pod approaching by the route we've plotted for you. Lieutenant Atek will have more imagery on file for you. Can't spoil all the surprises; I'll let him conclude your mission briefing. We don't know who is piloting the submersible craft seen here, or whether is is being run by the owners or local inhabitants, but it is being run on low-tech fusion power equivalent to early 12^st earth tech. This briefing is more for general familiarity with the Base. Oh, by the way, Lt. Anderson, we've adopted the same terminology for the Sphere as we would a natural planet—saves semantic confusion."
This message was last edited by the player at 23:56, Sun 07 Aug 2016.

Gian leans forward with interest. "It looks like something out of a holodeck spy thriller," he notes. "I wonder if this thing is designed to be submerged, given the way the nodes are arranged. I take it there are two more nodes underwater, to balanced the design?"
This message was last edited by the player at 16:00, Tue 09 Aug 2016.

In reply to Gian Seingalt (msg # 15):

"It does, doesn't it? Like something out of a 20^th century flat-vid movie. James Bond or similar. But no, it doesn't elevate or submerge as far as we are able to determine. If it follows the same pattern as Gamma One, Gamma two should have a dozen globes in a spiral pattern, a helix if you will. Presumably one, at least, incorporates a docking facility for the submersible. That is, of course, if the submersible actually has some connection to the tower."

In reply to Shione (msg # 11):

"Danke, Shione. Have a good mission." As Shione embraces the smaller woman, she can feel that, far from the dumpy figure her loose clothing suggests, Talja has a hard, muscular athlete's body, which matches the grace of movement she noted earlier.
This message was last edited by the player at 18:50, Mon 08 Aug 2016.

Commander Samson taps her commbadge, "Sean, can you contact Mr. Gazzo and have him meet the Kitchissippi's senior officer as soon as they land at Dodge City?"

She grimaces wryly. "Someone, most likely one of our Human crew members, anonymously tagged the three Outposts with 'Ancient West' names. Outpost Two is 'Tombstone', Three is 'Dodge City' and Four is 'Deadwood'. You can look them up under Earth: United States of America: 19^th century Ancient West. Mr. Gazzo, by the way, is an Iotian. He's... interesting." The Commander leaves that comment hanging.
This message was last edited by the player at 19:20, Mon 08 Aug 2016.

"Is that all then?"

He wasn't happy about having his Ensign poached from his very first command or cramming everyone into a Type 15, especially since they could have apparently just replicated a boat and sailed in without worrying about the tower's defenses at all... but he'd noticed that Starfleet had a thing against dedicated atmospheric craft of any flavor ever since he'd joined. This was probably more of the same.
This message was last edited by the player at 21:54, Mon 08 Aug 2016.