A Test of Loyalty (Andaris Task Force)

			Season 1, Episode 1

ATF Mission History Season 1 1. A Test of Loyalty 2. Open Your Mind and Say Ahhh! 3. Kam’Jahtae 4. P-409 Sigma Prologue 1. Sleep Tight 2. The Bulls vs the Rams 3. In Sickness and In Death Specials Throne of Fire

Act One

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With the end of shore leave came the inevitable recognition ceremony attended by all the Blackwell’s senior staff. R’Ven, Cook and G’Renn were awarded the Medical Science Ribbon. Captain Zaekia and Thoran were awarded the Diplomacy Ribbon. The Blackwell’s newest member Pandorn, who had recently transferred from the USS Za, was presented by Rear Admiral Renos the Explorer’s Ribbon, Purple Heart and Prisoner of War Ribbon. G’Renn and Thoran received promotions to the rank of Lieutenant (Junior Grade). Adding to the jubilation R’Ven was made Second Officer.

The Atlantis was now functional and had a new captain in Captain S’Ranna and First Officer, Lieutenant Commander Udro, with the former captain, Commander Rhynn now acting as mission specialist. Along with new staff, Shayne was made Second Officer, with Pond being made Chief Medical Officer. The Atlantis and Blackwell opened visual comms to present Rear Admiral Renos with a commemorative plaque in recognition of nirs tireless work and commitment.

Once the ceremonies were over, the senior staff on each ship reported their respective statuses before being briefed on their missions. The Atlantis was heading Aelann to handle a trade negotiation with Taventa Robotics, who wished to began a trade partnership with the Federation. The Blackwell was being sent to Arndall, to offer medical assistance to wounded Valcarian soldiers.

Udro along with Pond, Oswald and Reacher were to meet the product developer and find out as much about the robots as they could. Rhynn had the unenviable task of studying trading laws and customs, whilst Shayne would handle the buyer. Lastly and arguable most importantly Logan would be responsible for security matters.

En route to their destination the crew of the Blackwell were keeping busy. Captain Zaekia paid a visit to sickbay, whilst Rear Admiral Renos held a meeting with Jiace and Pandorn to discuss potential threats.

The Caraadian sales representative, Froid Olin, arrived aboard the Atlantis, along with a selection of his robots. First to be displayed was a servant robot with the upper half being human and the lower half similar to a cylindrical cart, with organic skin on the hands and face. For the next demonstration Olin threw tea towards the armoured security robot, which in an instant was able expertly dodged the liquid. He followed this up by tapping his cane on one of the small disks on the ground, a crawler robot. It produced four legs, raised itself up before being directed to clean up the tea spillage. The demonstrations raised some questions from the Starfleet officers; with Oswald noting the robots did not seem much more advanced than anything Starfleet already had, whilst Pond questioned whether Taventa Robotics had any ethical guidelines or if there were Caraadian laws regarding semi-sentient AI.

A second Caraadian representative came aboard the Atlantis, this time the CEO of Taventa Robotics, Janiel Gaddington, who was to meet with Shayne, Rhynn, Sindrana,Logan and Captain S’Ranna. Gaddington made a good impression by questioning whether the Federation had been able to make the Romulans part of their empire.

Udro requested to see the robots programming, with Olin granting the request. He tried to reassure them the robots were not sentient as they were unable to alter their own programming, and their “instincts” was a calculation to decide if a ‘reflex’ command or more complex ‘decision’ command would be executed. Surprising the Starfleet officers, Odin announced he had a new model to demonstrate.

Whilst he was away, Udro along with the others investigated the programming, finding it to be impressive, although Udro did want to examine the biological elements closer. Olin returned with a goo, which he called Biomechanical Multipurpose Gel, that could apparently change form and repurposed to perform specialized functions.

Act Two

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Things on the Blackwell had been progressing along, until a sudden shock ripped them out of warp. Captain Zaekia and E'riQ returned to the bridge. Jiace, who had been in the briefing room with Rear Admiral Renos and Pandorn called into the bridge that he had spotted plasma fires on the port warp nacelle.

Leaking plasma.

Hot on the trail of figuring out what had happened R’Ven noted there were sensor distortions, believed to be caused by a field of verteron particles in the area and E'riQ brought up the ships status. The port nacelle was down; starboard nacelle was at 50%, with impulse available only up to 50% power. Brell and E'riQ left the bridge for engineering, suffering another explosion on route causing a comm system outage.

Avran and G’Renn had been in the counselling suite on deck 19 when the Blackwell was hit. Pandorn contacted the pair with orders from Rear Admiral Renos to start a search and rescue. Meeting on deck 11, the trio commenced their search of the science labs, before being advised by a scientist there were children in the school. Jiace had made it to engineering where he was joined by Brell and E'riQ, who decided it would be best to get internal communications online first. Tu'Peq reported to the bridge, taking over the science station from R’Ven.

Tu'Peq started his shift by launching a probe, which found an area not too far that was free of the verteron particles. Rear Admiral Renos had managed to contact the Atlantis and appraised Captain S’Ranna of their situation. Receiving the message from Renos, S’Ranna made the decision to come after the Blackwell. After being briefed Udro gave her apologies to Olin, even offering to purchase one of the robots. Shayne was given the task of diplomatically hurrying Gaddington off the ship. Sadly it seemed Gaddington had felt slighted and upon returning to Aelann informed a colleague the deal with the Federation was off.

Down in engineering Jiace was able to repair the internal comms. It also appeared the Blackwell was not alone, another ship had joined them. Worryingly it did not match any known configuration.

Meanwhile, in sickbay Thoran reported to Jora, as he had suffered a mild head injury on the bridge. Jora performed some tests. As they were being conducted, Thoran fell into a deep sleep. Once he had been woken back up and signed off by Jora, Thoran went to leave sickbay, when the door panel exploded, trapping them.

During their expedition to the school, Avran, G’Renn and Pandorn stumbled upon Lavot. They treated her injuries and continued on the way to the school where they found the children, trapped behind the door. G’Renn and Pandorn left to find a way, via the gym, into the schoolroom. Having found a way in, they now had to get the children, along with an unconscious ensign out.

On the bridge R’Ven had been able to bridge a connection with a shuttle allowing the use of external comms; however it had required the help of the engineering team to fully realise the solution.

With the problems in engineering temporarily resolved Brell, Jiace and E'riQ went firefighting. Reaching deck 18 they met Lux and the trio continued on their way to deck 16.

Act Three

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The Atlantis had finally arrived at the Blackwell’s position. Logan and Oswald provided the bridge crew with the Blackwell’s status. Captain S’Ranna acting on Logan’s recommendation ordered the launching of probes and asked Shayne to contact the Blackwell.

Now they had reached deck 16, the engineering team had their work cut out. Jiace had identified that radiation and air toxicity levels were rising. Meanwhile, the bridge had a new problem, they were being hailed by the unknown ship. It took a few adjustments before they were able to see the view screen clearly. For the short time the view screen was clear, Captain Zaekia noticed the aliens had inky black skin that appeared slightly damp, along with huge eyes on the side of their heads. He was reminded of the Korri, but the image disappeared too quickly to confirm this.

In sickbay, Jora and Thoran were able to jury rig the panel allowing them to open the door. Similarly G’Renn and Pandorn were able to force the school room door open, freeing the school children. Avran guided the children to sickbay, whilst the remaining two officers continued their search, this time heading to the mess hall, but not before grabbing some rebreathers.

Rear Admiral Renos and Lavot had met up and were now making their way to the Bolian family quarters where a medical emergency had been reported. Upon arrival Lyldra informed Rear Admiral Renos that Hars had hit his head was now acting peculiar, so much so she had to shut him in the bathroom. Lavot tried to read his mind, but due to his confused state was unable to. They decided the best course of action was to move Hars to sickbay.

Thoran had now returned to bridge duty. He had not been there long when a second hail came through. It was Shayne from the Atlantis. He was able to get a sentence out before the signal was lost. R’Ven spotted an increase in verteron particles and other background radiation. Adding to that, ship to ship communications were being disrupted along with sensor acuity and shields. Tu'Peq was able to ascertain the background radiation was being caused by the alien vessel and that ship had used its deflector dish to modulate its shields, allowing it to compensate for the verteron particles. Captain Zaekia asked for Thoran’s opinion on the matter, who advised they could launch probes near the alien vessel to give a clearer picture of what they were up against. There was still the problem of communicating with the Atlantis. To rectify this, Tu'Peq proposed they could use the deflector to send out a neutrino pulse, that the Atlantis should be able to detect. Just as they seemed to be formulating a plan that could work, R’Ven, using an earpiece noticed that the mines were humming.

The engineering party led by Brell agreed the best course of action was to make auxiliary cargo bay 10 safe, as it was showing elevated radiation. Upon entry they found nearly two thirds of the wall that bordered the medical lab engulfed in plasma fire. E'riQ noted that the lab on the other side of the flames was the pathology lab, which should have had a quarantine. E'riQ suggested they could use portable force fields to force the fire into the lab, then close the quarantine field, with Jiace instead recommending they create a concussive force to break up the fire. The team split up, with Brell and Jiace leaving the cargo bay.

With the failed connection the Atlantis crew were trying to find a solution. Shayne recommended against transporters, but a shuttle instead. Unfortunately Captain S’Ranna pointed out the conditions were too severe to send a shuttle. Perhaps they could clear the field to help instead. Oswald suggested they could target and disable the unknown ships verteron generator and asked Logan if he was able to isolate the device.

Act Four

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Just when things were starting to look up for the Blackwell, two new ships appeared and opened fire upon the original unknown vessel. The aftershock of the explosion hit the Blackwell. The ship had been hit hard, with shields at less than fifty percent, phaser arrays offline and the deflector had taken damage. Captain Zaekia queried how they could have the Atlantis help them, perhaps with a probe. R’Ven stated they may be able to communicate with a probe and piggyback the communication to the Atlantis.

Just as G’Renn and Pandorn retrieved the rebreathers, they were knocked off their feet by the second blast. They managed to find their way to the mess hall, finding a small stove fire which was quickly extinguished, before they started to evacuate the personnel from the area. . Unfortunately for them, one of the previous crewman advised there were people still in the library. Upon reaching the library they found a few crewman unconcious over their consoles. As they got to work, the power was cut. They hoped they could use a library terminal to send a message to the bridge, letting them know they were still on deck 11, but were not met with much success. They needed another solution, perhaps a medical override on the life support system was the answer. With a flicker of the lights, they succeeded and now it was time to get the injured to sickbay.

Back on the Atlantis, Oswald had detected the blast. Logan advised they may be able go badge to badge to contact the Blackwell. Hailing the new vessel the Atlantis was surprised to find it was commanded by none other than Gaddington from Taventa Robotics. He advised Captain S’Ranna that they had come to retrieve their mines. Shayne was not convinced and questioned why they needed to lay down a minefield. Captain S’Ranna asked Gaddington for their assistance with the Blackwell.

The team on deck 16 were still working on a plan to disrupt the fire that had broken out. Jiace recommended the best option would be to program the generators. E'riQ and Lux, were just opening a door when the sudden jarring of the ship caused them both some hand injuries. Once they entered the room, they found a crewman lying unconscious on the floor and with a struggle managed to drag him to the corridor.

The Blackwell bridge crew detected another sensor contact, possibly one of the other ships and were joined by Counsellor Avran, who started to work with Tu'Peq on communications. Captain Zaekia, remembering his medical roots, stated they could use a marker that may make the mines easier to see on their sensors, to which R’Ven responded they could use the deflector dish to send out a neutrino pulse, much like a radar. With everything coming together, they slowly started to get back underway; however they had some mines blocking their path. As they were working on a solution, the Blackwell started to receive an incoming hail from the Regent, Gaddington's ship. He offered to help the crew navigate out of the minefield.

With the Taventa ship out there, Oswald recommended they try a covert message to the Blackwell, and once established he was able to send a text only message. Tu'Peq received the message on the Blackwell and promptly responded.

The engineering team had successfully set up the generators and were getting personnel out of the way. With a count of ten they set off the generators at various intervals, causing the plasma fires to extinguish as predicted.

A situation had developed in the brig of the Blackwell. Due to the damage, the force field guarding a Klingon assassin, KamuQ, was rendered inactive, allowing them to escape. They had their eyes set on E'riQ, killing a security officer as they escaped and calling a medical emergency in the brig. The call was picked up by Petty Officer Gibson, who upon entering the brig found it empty. KamuQ was able to surprise Gibson, grabbing him from the shadows and interrogating him for E'riQ’s location. Gibson was able to subtlety press his combadge, opening up a link, hoping somebody would over hear. Thankfully KamuQ did not notice. Security picked up on the situation and reported it to E'riQ, causing him to lash out in frustration in front of Brell. The commander gave him to leave to resolve the situation.

Meanwhile, on the Atlantis, Oswald suggested they could remotely deactivate the minefield, using the codes from the Taventa robot. Captain S’Ranna approved the idea, allowing the bridge crew to get to work. Just as they started to shut down the mines, Gaddington gave the order to detonate them. The sensors on the Blackwell slowly became operational, as the minefield disappeared in front of them. Engineering teams and relief crewmen from the Atlantis came aboard to assist in repairs and give the exhausted crew some much needed rest.

Extras

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PNPCs

• KamuQ, Klingon Assassin - played by E'riQ

NPCs

• Petty Officer First Class Clarence Gibson, Field Medic, USS Blackwell - played by Isabel Pond

MSNPCs

• Froid Olin, Taventa Robotics Representative - played by E'riQ
• Janiel Gaddington, CEO – Taventa Robotics/CO of The Regent - played by Merrick R'Ven

			REV SD 239501.18