Fleet Blockbuster: Frontier Day (Artemis)
| USS Artemis-A | ||
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 ACTIVE STATUS | ||
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"They’re a little too close to home. Especially when you factor transwarp into the scenario.
I’m sure the proximity to the fleet gathering for Frontier Day is far from a coincidence… But of course, there’s another problem."
- Captain Addison MacKenzie
Aboard Amity Outpost (which previously served as Copernicus Station, a center of anti-Borg research), Borg tech is stolen from a classified research lab. Their investigations leads them to an unexpected collaboration with the USS Artemis-A on the other side of the galaxy, which has discovered a strange sensor reading of a cube-shaped structure hiding in a nebula.
Meanwhile, the USS Kitty Hawk and USS Astraeus have returned to Earth in preparation for Frontier Day before the USS Astraeus then receives orders along with the USS Intrepid to hunt down a rogue Starfleet vessel.
| First & Last Sim | |
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| Be Careful What You Wish For Pt 1 | First Sim - Written by Addison MacKenzie on SD 240106.01 |
| Last Sim - Not written yet | |
Saboteurs in the Badlands
On the Artemis
Someone better have a good reason for waking me up.
Late at night, Captain Addison MacKenzie is summoned to bridge by the Delta Shift Overseer, Lieutenant Alexis Edgington, who reports that the officers on duty has found strange signals within the borders of the Badlands. The Captain orders them to find the source, but is stunned with surprise when they discover a Borg Cube - seemingly inert - within the volatile area of space. However, the Borg Cube is estimated to have only been here for a couple of days, and with most Starfleet vessels across the galaxy returning to Earth for the Frontier Day Parade, the Captain is reluctant to consider it a coincidence. She attempts to brief Starfleet Command on the Cube's presence, but when the communications array fails to function, another piece of an alarming puzzle is revealed: A saboteur is aboard the Artemis, and has silenced her. Filled with alarm and righteous fury, Cpt. MacKenzie summons her senior staff to the Bridge for an emergency briefing.
Gathered on the bridge, with the additions of Ensign Beck of the USS Ronin and Lieutenant JG T'Ama of the USS Constitution-B - both guests of the Artemis hitching a ride back to Sector 001 - the crew exchange their concerns about their current situation. Fulfilling his duties as XO, Lt.Cdr. Dakora enacted the newly established Wildfire Protocol - a contingency plan aimed at combating internal threats to the vessel - making clear how serious the situation was. The Artemis had received a full set of repairs, ensuring it was in tip-top shape for the Parade in Sector 001, so it was all but guaranteed that the sabotage to the communications array occurred after their departure from DS9. Which in turn could mean only one thing: the saboteur was still aboard. The senior crew were split into teams, with a larger group heading to the Cube itself in order to discover the reason for its presence this close to Federation Space, while the remainder of the crew remained aboard the Artemis to repair the damage and locate and apprehend the saboteur.
Repair Crew
LT Hallia Yellir
Chief Engineering Officer- Ensign Chevalier.png
Ensign Jaseb Chevalier
Operations Officer
Heading for the Communication Array, what meets them is an utter mess. LT Yellir orders standard repair efforts - if expedient - but the sabotage is thorough. LT Yellir - struck by a moment of brilliance - realizes that communications could be piggybacked onto the external sensors, allowing them to get a message out to Starfleet Command after all, when an explosion rocks the Artemis. After gathering her senses, LT Yellir realizes that internal comms have died as well. Debating on how to proceed now, the two officers agree that getting a thorough idea of the current state of the Artemis' systems would be easier from Main Engineering, and they could pick up some spare parts to start fixing the issues as well. With that in mind, they start to access the Jeffries' Tubes leading towards Deck 14 - and Main Engineering - but they are not alone...
Coming around the corner, Cdr. Adea announces his intent to join their group, but between Ensign Chevalier's loyal faith in the importance of the Wildfire Protocol and the other Adea's confusion at LT Yellir's query about the state of his leg, it soon becomes apparent that this Adea is not - in fact - their Betazoid CMO, and a desperate struggle ensues between the two Officers and what reveals itself to be a Changeling.
Locating the Saboteur
Cmdr. Genkos Adea
Chief Medical Officer
Ens. Kel Solas
Security Officer
Ensign Gnai
Science Officer
In charge of locating the saboteur, Cdr. Adea and his team head into the bowls of the ship, the Betazoid fatigued with concern about the danger they're in. While they still have no evidence beyond the saboteur's handiwork, Ens. Kel carefully voices the theory that either the saboteur has access to very advanced technology or has intimate knowledge of the ship's systems. Either option is distressing, but not so much as the third voiced theory. This close to DS9 and the main staging area of the Dominion War of years past, the questions poses itself: What if the saboteur is a shapeshifter? Elsewhere on the Artemis, an Internal Security Sensor register PO3 Domingo Martinez, Ens. Marcus Li and Crewman Toro Nubar in the Secondary Sensor Control Room, performing their designated tasks. Ens. Li relieves PO3 Martinez, before producing an unknown object from his bag and going with Crewman Nubar into the restricted area with the sensitive sensor equipment. Moments later, an explosion sounds, and only Crewman Nubar exit the room again, disappearing out-of-view of the Security Sensors. The explosion knocks the turbolift temporarily out of service, and triggers emergency lights on the surrounding decks. Heading to Deck 13, the trio of officers arm themselves and head towards the site of the sabotage.
Arriving at the place in question, the team realizes that the damage to the comm relays will impede the Ship's internal communications, so as Ens. Gnai beings taking scans to find any trace of the saboteur, or indeed the cause of the explosion itself, Ens. Kel is instructed to move away from the sabotage in an attempt to get contact to the Bridge. Unfortunately, all attempts are met with silence. As the team deliberates on how to proceed, they are met with Lt.Cdr. Talos Dakora, who claims he's been trying to reach them since the comms went down. He attempts to lead the group towards the Shuttle Bay where a situation is unfolding. Cdr. Adea finds the situation curious, but allows the two Ensigns to follow the Betazoid First Officer with the telepathic message to keep each other safe. Barely has the trio rounded the corner, before Cdr. Adea is knocked unconscious by an unseen assailant...
In the Shuttle Bay, Lt.Cdr. Dakora orders the two Ensigns to commence their investigations of the shuttles to ascertain whether they have been sabotaged, as he himself goes to the Flight Controller's office. There, he reveals himself to be Ravicz - a Changeling infiltrator - and sets to his diabolical plan. The two Ensigns - suspicious of the circumstances - opt to stay together while investigating the Griffin, when a cacophonous sound ruptures the air and the Shuttle Bay enters rapid decompression. Ensign Kel barely manages to get the shuttle ramp sealed before they are both sucked into the now accessible vacuum of space, and the two of them are now sealed into the shuttle, safe... For the moment.
Minding the Bridge
Lt.Cdr. Talos Dakora
First Officer
LT Vitor Silveira
Chief Tactical Officer
LtJG T'Ama
Operations Officer
Guest writer
Settling into their positions on the Bridge alongside the Delta Shift crew, LtJG T'Ama ensures that the viewscreen provides the Bridge with a video feed inside of the Cube, piggybacking off of the signals from the away team's tricorders. With their primary focus on assisting the away team with their own scans and maintaining a transporter lock, tension is high, but it is nothing compared to the alarm that occurs when suddenly, an explosion occurs in the Secondary Sensor Control Room, rocking the Artemis and killing not only the sensors, but also restarting every bridge console and knocking out all phaser arrays. Accessing the computer bank, LtJG T'Ama locates a video feed from the site of the explosion, and what appears on the video causes her to suggest a hypothesis: Have the Borg assimmilated Changelings?
We need our weapons online, A-flippin’-SAP. ::He pointed.:: If that Cube wakes up and decides it’s time to party, I want to have something more than rude gestures to throw at them.
While the idea itself is a massive leap considering the limited evidence available, Lt.Cdr. Dakora decides it worth acting on. After confirming the location of either Ensign Li or Crewman Nubar - the two identities reflected in the security log - the internal sensors locate Nubar in a Jeffries' Tube near Deck 13 where LT Yellir and Ens Chevalier. Deciding to mind the bridge on his own, Lt.Cdr. Dakora sends the two lieutenants on a manhunt.
Into the Cube
Cpt. Addison MacKenzie
Commanding Officer
Lt.Cmdr. Salkath
Engineering Officer
LtJG Savel
Security Officer
LT Jovenan
Chief Science Officer
LtJG Gila Sadar
Medical Officer
Ens Quentin Beck
Medical Officer
Guest Writer
The Borg are here, even if they’re not here. This cube only arrived a few days ago, and we have no indication that any entity, Starfleet or otherwise, detected their presence. I refuse to believe they just got here on autopilot…
Heading into the Cube itself, Cpt. MacKenzie leads her team to Transporter Room One to outfit themselves with the necessary equipment. En-route, LtJG Sadar recounts the exploits of Lieutenant Sheila Bailey, the then-Assistant Chief Medical Officer of Starbase 118 Ops, who spearheaded the development of a new anti-Borg medication when attempting to cure the assimilated crew of the USS Nimitz. While the medication is years old at this point, and thus there is a very real possibility that the Borg nanites has adapted to it, the medicine is added to the first aid kits of the two Medical Officers. Upon arming themselves with weaponry and other essential equipment, the group is then transported to the Cube itself.
Arriving on the Cube, the away team is concerned upon discovering that there are no lifesigns in the immediate vicinity, and indeed, for quite a distance. It looks - as the scans claimed - inert and abandoned, but LtJG Savel urges caution. Nothing seems visibly wrong with the Cube, so surely there'd be no reason for the Collective to just abandon it in this way. Concerned by the fact that none of their tricorders register lifesigns despite the Cube having only appeared in the Badlands a few days ago, Cpt. MacKenzie orders the group to descend onto a lower deck to locate an access node, so they might get some answers. En-route, the team has a brief stop prompted by an unclear registration of an intermittent lifesign, but with no conclusive evidence, there is little to be done. On the lower deck, however, the team happens upon a lone Borg Drone wandering erratically along the corridors, but most alarmingly: the Drone's lifesign is not registered.
Sadar: But a state of ‘hibernation’ indicates that some sort of trigger will wake them up. And with a half-synthetic lifeform like the Borg, it would stand to reason that the ‘trigger’ is going to come from the system, or the Collective. Captain?
MacKenzie: I can’t tell. It’s like they’re waiting for something.
Sadar: ::whispers:: Please don’t say we’re going to be playing ‘poke the bear’ here.
Savel: I don't believe that 'poking a bear' is ever a sound decision.
As the team stealthily moves towards an access node, Doctors Sadar and Beck attempt to configure their tricorders in a manner to be able to register the Borg lifesign, but their efforts are unfruitful before the Captain manages to locate an access node. Upon accessing it, the Captain reveals that the drones seem to be in a sort of 'hibernation', awaiting a trigger that will eventually activate them again. What that trigger is remains a mystery, so the Captain deems it pertinent that the team head further down into the Cube to locate a peculiar power signature. Barely has the team started moving before LtJG Sadar manages to find the necessary settings to register the masked Borg lifesigns, prompting a cascade of newly registered lifesigns. Not only is the Borg Cube not abandoned, but rather teeming with hibernating drones. She attempts to contact the Artemis to alert them to the required alterations to sensor settings, when her attempts at communications are met with silence. The away team has officially lost contact with the Artemis-A.
Allowing a brief moment of panic, Cpt. MacKenzie soon calls her officers to attention once more. The numerous new lifesigns are not paying any attention to the Starfleet boarders, but are instead heading towards that very same power signature that she noted earlier. And so, with urgency and no small amount of paranoia, the team continues on their way. Upon reaching the lower levels of the Cube, the amount of drones they have to make their way through has grown beyond numerous, and following the current leads them to a large antechamber lit up by a violent green light, with multitudes of Borg arranged around the source of the light in a peculiar pattern.
MSNPCs and NPC Mentions
Dramatis Personae
Dramatis Personae
Dramatis Personae
Dramatis Personae
Dramatis Personae
- Mentioned NPCs:
Lieutenant Alexis Edgington - Science Officer and Delta Shift Overseer
Petty Officer 3rd Class Domingo Martinez
Ensign Marcus Li
Crewman Toro Nubar
FNS Headlines
Fun facts
References