The Delorean Encounter (Columbia)
| USS Columbia | ||
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 INACTIVE STATUS | ||
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Stardates: 238209.18-238302.14
Mission Briefing
The Columbia is being rushed through repairs from the last mission and an accident during warp core installation and been ordered to Delorea. The Columbia's mission is to "pitch" the benefits of Federation membership. Admiral Philson, the director of First Contact at StarFleet HQ assures that this mission should seem more like shore leave for the crew as the Delorians are well known for their hospitality.
The Delorians do favor entrance into the Federation, however with their proximity to Romulan space, Federation sources have hinted that the Delorians are also considering joining the Romulan Star Empire which would give the Romulans a significant system so close to Federation space and StarBase 118. Despite the current peace the Federation enjoys with the Romulans, the Federation cannot let the Romulan acquire a strategically important area of space should the political landscape change.
The Mission so far...
Chapter One : Starting off
While the repairs and the investigation into the explosion during warp core installation well under was, the USS Columbia has headed toward Delorea, orders in hand. Along the was they have picked up three new crew members, Lieutenant Commander C'elest Moranta, who is assuming the role as of First Officer, Lieutenant Jg. Marcus Dickens who is joining Lt T'Lea in the Science Department and Ensign Miller who is joining the ranks of Security.
Captain Avatar on conducting routine command level ship operations discovered that he no longer held command level access and had been in fact shifted to Ensign Montgomery. The Captain summoned the Ensign demanded of the Ensign as to why this was. After a brief exchange Avatar had the Command Codes reverted back to him, and put Montgomery, who had been assigned to Columbia under dubious circumstances, on trial period as Operations Chief.
This has left Montgomery, who was in a federation prison before being assigned to the Columbia, wondering if he had exchanged one type of jail for another.
Meanwhile, Lt. Zubowskivich and Counselor Jelandra Gear, perhaps the only two crew members actually doing work on the current mission, have made great strides gleaming information about the Delorian culture from the First Contact mission notes and independent investigation.
Lt Franks, Chief Medical Officer, has made a fascinating, as yet unexplained discovery in the aftermath of the explosion in Engineering, Lt. Dayna Barnes, who suffered some injury in the same explosion, has DNA consistent with being a daughter of Lt Anderson. After discarding several theories the question remains unanswered.
In Engineering, with the repairs proceeding well. Lt Barnes, after being released from the Medical Bay, has learned that on orders from the injured and unconscious Lt Anderson, via a prerecorded message, that she is to be acting Chief of Engineering.
Lt Alexander is pursuing relentlessly in conjuction with T'Lea, the cause of the explosion in engineering. This investigation may be put on hold until the mission to Delorea is over. Furthermore, Alexander is being investigated by Lt Koran Surit, a officer with the Judge Advocates Generals office for questionable conduct on a previous mission. Lt Alexander while seemingly calm has had at least one troubling sleepwalking incident.
However, Lt Surit is, seemingly, not all that he appears, and may be on the Columbia for other reasons.
Finally, Lt. Zubowskivich after a heavy night of drinking, had a brief drunken, mostly innocent, encounter with T'Lea. T'Lea, nonplussed, felt it was her duty, to get back at the Lt, who did not remember a thing, She has implied that far more happen than actually had, leaving Zubowskivich a bit confused as to where he and T'lea stand, and how he feels about that.
T'Lea on the other hand is consumed with finding information on what happen to her mother, a Romulan who mysteriously disappeared when T'Lea was a child. She is awaiting information from a contact she arranged on StarBase 118
Chapter Two : Enroute to Deloria
Enroute to Delorea, the crew has had sometime to reflect and a bit of recreation.
Captain Avatar, apprehensive at first, agreed to appointment with the good Conselor Gear for a routine mental evaluation. They talked about some of the Captains experiences and philosophical bearings since joining StarFleet, and the growth he's shown through each challenge that he has to faced on his way and during his captaincy. On conclusion, the counselor gave the captain a clean bill of mental health, noting that he is "probably the sanest person aboard our little boat".
Captain Avatar ended by saying that he'd found the session extremely helpful and wouldn't mind continuing them in a regular basis
The good counselor, after the session with the Captain made good on her appointment with Lt Zubowskivich in the holodeck for a spirited workout with knives called bladedancing. After being bested by the counselor, she collapsed. When she came too, she claimed that she had not been taking her medication and that she fine. The ever thoughtful Tash accompanied the Counselor to sickbay, still worried about what health issues she may be dealing with.
Zubowskivich on the other hand, may start having health issues of his own as he frequently, and increasingly been finding comfort at the bottom of a bottle.
Lt Commander Franks, the first officer of the Columbia, after talking with Captain Avatar, has found it in the best interest of herself and the crew to resume her spot as Chief medical Officer, her true, best destiny. She finds this to be a relief, and waste no time in shedding her Command Red uniform for the familiar and comfortable blue uniform of StarFleet sciences.
Lt. Alexander and Lt T'Lea have been some problems lately resulting from the unplanned and impromptu mating. Each is experiencing hallucinations, melding their desire for each other, from the result of the mating, and former lovers. While both suspect something, neither has done anything about it as of yet.
The new officers are assimilating nicely with the crew of the Columbia. Lieutenant Dickens has jumped right into examining the warp core explosion; while Miller is learning the ropes in security.
Lt.Cmdr. Moranta, the new FO, doubts that the crew will as well accept the transition into FO as first seems during introductions.
The Columbia finally reaches Delorea Prime, the homeworld of the Delorians.
Meanwhile on Deloria.
We are introduced to several Delorians, and get a small glimpse of Delorian Culture. On one side we have Soutus, High Theocrat of Delorea, who welcomes the visitors, and the opportunity to join the Federation and on the other we have Luriss Kra'rul, High Priestess, who believes that dealing with outsider can bring only destruction down on Deloria.
Elsewhere on Delorea, the Romulans have arrived, vying on behalf of the Romulan Star Empire for the right to call Delorea one of the planets of the empire. Among the delegation is Ambassador Kogut, a aged Romulan suffering from a fatal disease, and his two aides, whom both seem to have different ideas of what serving the Empire may mean.
Chapter Three : Guess Who's Coming to Dinner
Once the Columbia establishes Orbit around Deloria, contact is made with the Minster of Space Flight. The crew arrange a Diplomatic dinner in which all Senior level officers are to attend. Much to the chagrin to just about everyone, that mean dressing in full dress uniform.
Upon beam down the crew meets with a delegation of Delorians headed by Lord Tomack. There is a bit of disturbance with the appearance of Captain Avatar.
The group however moves on to dinner. The Delorians, who eat food still alive, endeavor to please the visiting Federation, by having some of the food cooked. The crew in the name of diplomacy, digest what is given to them. With varying degrees of success, the crew make it through dinner, when the leader of the High consel ask Captain Avatar to stay as a guest on his estates.
Gear and Tash also accept invitations to stay at another estate not far away to learn more about Delorian culture.
Chapter Four : Trouble on Delorea
The peaceful Banquet Hall ended with Council Member of Delorea and Head of House Tamack LaoR'K's invitation for Captain Mal Avatar to spend the night in his residence, against recommendations from the ship's FO, Lt.Cmdr. C'elest Moranta. With enough basis to suspect Romulan presence, the crew returning to the USS COLUMBIA devised a strategy to deploy an anti-cloak detection grid. Meanwhile, later that night, breaking news from the local broadcasting system brought startling news about Captain Avatar's strange disappearance from LaoR'K's estate. In the interim, Lt. Tash Zubowskivich was seriously injured when attacked by a rogue Delorean at House of LaoR'K's daughter own house, Matodax, without her consent or knowledge... They were safely transported back to the Columbia, and while Lt. Zubowskivich was being treated in sickbay, Matodax provided first hand information and later returned to the planet's surface, to see if she could provide assistance in searching for Captain Avatar.
Chapter Five : The Romulans Show Their Faces
A derelict Ferengi ship found intact in the vicinity was savaged by Lt. T'Lea's away team and used in the search of the suspected Romulan ship's presence, but unfortunately crashed before it could provide any assistance in creating an anti-cloak detection grid. Also, before Matodax could find the USS Columbia's commanding officer, an infiltrated Tal Shiar agent in the Romulan ambassador's team, found Captain Avatar and transported him to the IRS Nexoran-Class warhawk Dewa... While the Romulan ambassador Kogut and his assistant, Centurion Tenec, originally sent to dispute the planet's alignment between the Federation and the Romulan Star empire, have requested political asylum on Columbia. At the same time, the Romulan warhawk's commander has beamed down a security detail force in search for the real mission objective of the Romulan's presence: a strange Iconian artifact, which might explain the accelerated rhythm of Delorean's evolution. Still, with no formal treaties between Delorea and the Federation, there are no grounds for beaming down from USS COLUMBIA an away team to prevent the Romulan's from obtaining their goal.
Chapter Six : The Iconian Artifact
However, a StarFleet Observation team under Lt.Cmdr. Michael Soul's command already on Delorea, has been contacted and joined Lt. T'Lea's crashed team, to try and retrieve the Iconian artifact before the Romulans do.
Chapter Seven : Conclusion
The Columbia is concluding her mission to Delorea. With the planet on the brink of a civil war, Captain Avatar has returned to the surface with Counselor Gear, Lieutenant Alexander and a security team. Their goal is to advise Speaker Soltus, the leader of the Delorean people as to how to avoid this destructive conflict. It seems unlikely that Delorea will be admitted into the Federation at this time, but with the aid of Avatar and his advisers, it is possible that membership could happen in the future, especially now with the Romulans out of the picture. Meanwhile, back on the Columbia, Lieutenants T'Lea, Zubowskivich, and Dickens are in the process of unraveling the mystery behind an Iconian artifact that was recovered from the planet's surface. The artifact appears to be a power source that is used to generate the gateways that the Iconians once used for inter-planetary travel.
The Romulans that had at one point been a major threat to the success of this mission are now preparing to leave the system. The Romulan ship's commanding officer lead an away team to the planet's surface where they met up with Lieutenants T'Lea, Alexander, and Commander Soul. The Romulan commander, in an attempt to prove Iconian ancestry of the Romulans and Vulcans stepped into a gateway that lead to Iconia's golden age on their homeworld. However, at the moment he stepped into the temporal gateway, the world was seen destroyed by invading conquerors, thus missing the golden age and stranding himself and part of his strike team deep in the past.