Time is Fleeting – Wargames
by Lieutenant Commander Bruce Freeman & Captain Tasha Tahir (NPC) & Lieutenant Commander Jarred Wallace & Commander Chelsea Dunham & Lieutenant Jana Kasikova & Commander Karen Villiers & Lieutenant Vincent Tan & Commander Richard Dunham & Colonel James Darson & 1st Lieutenant Daniel Brady & Lieutenant JG Petro & Alderman Dorian Gabriel & Lieutenant Commander Greo Tovon
Post Details
ON:
{Aboard USS Bunker Hill}
As the two ships took up position in space, on the bridge of the Bunker Hill Jarred sat in captains chair and looked at the tactical display on the main viewer, he could sense a bit of nerves from the junior crew members, the silence was broken by the comm signal beginning the exercise, "Mr. Elliot set scrambler code Wallace one, Ms. South maneuver sequence Wallace Alpha, Mr. Freeman rotate shield settings to Freeman one, Ms. Mackenzie signal Daedalus to move to phase two, Helm move to primary target, All hands BATTLE STATIONS!" the ship echoed as the alarm klaxon roared throughout the ship.
{Aboard USS Daedalus}
Dirk appeared on the main bridge in a shimmer of blue light hoping everyone else was where they were supposed to be. He walked up to his chair and sat down. He looked down and saw that everyone had acknowledged that they were at their respected stations.
"All hands prepare for separation." He said initiating the command to start separating the ship into multi-vector mode. Once the ship had been separated Dirk stood. "All hands Red Alert, let's show these higher-ups just how much power we have!" He looked down on the display on his arm rest again. He grinned, their plan had worked the marines had successfully boarded DS5. A few had gotten out but he knew they would be taken care of by his ACEO commanding the third section of the Daedalus.
= Ops =
The central rostrum was bathed in a yellow light as the crew began to settle down to initiate the battle simulation.
Davies took a single step away from the center console and tapped his comm.
=^= "Commander Gabriel, Colonel Darson, are your men in position at all the key points?" =^= Davies asked in a hushed voice, wanting to be sure that all the primary areas were covered. Security were covering all the computer and crew areas, whilst the Marines were monitoring weapons and docking bays.
=^= "Gabriel here, my men have properly secured main promenade and we have directed all civilians and non-essential personal to their quarters or their designated ships. We've also begun locking down the primary, secondary, and backup computer cores. Internal sensors have been programmed to detect any comm-badges that have not been calibrated to our station's frequency. We'll know and immediately respond to anybody on this deck that doesn't belong there." =^= Gabriel responded.
[Marine HQ]
Darson sat high up on his throne in the MTAC, staring intently at the large curving display at the front of the room, displaying Deep Space 5 and all surrounding space, including the multiple ships right off the station, marked with Hostile indicators. Multiple Marines were running around below him, moving with purpose to get the station ready for whatever might come up. He shouted out, “Status report on troop deployment?”
Lt. Flynn quickly ascended the steps to the dais and gave a quick battlefield salute, before handing him a PADD. Darson gave it a quick look over, then dismissed the two Marines to go back to their duties, which they proceeded to do.
He triggered the Comm at the same time as he manipulated one of the panels on the chair’s arm to set up scrambled channels.
=^= “Commander, this is Colonel Darson. I have deployed two thirds of my regiment. They’ve been deployed to key areas such as Main Operations, Main Engineering, and other crucial junctions as well as locking down and securing all Weapon Lockers, Docking Bays, and other likely points of infiltration, as well as cooperating with Security to deal with any other civilian related issues. I also have prepared several boarding parties, provisioned for siege, standing by for both Transporter infiltration, and Hopper transport. The other third is remaining as a Quick-Reaction force, and can be diverted wherever they need to be at a moment’s notice.” =^=
[DS5 Ops]
David studied the console for a moment, tagging each of the groups. Green for marines, Yellow for Security, blue for civilians and crew, keeping red for unknowns.
=^="Keep me informed. Davies out." =^= He said closing the comm.
[Marine HQ]
Darson turned to look silently at the Cage located at the back of the room. Inside that secure room he knew were several security relays that, when provided with concurrent authorization codes by the CO and either the XO or CSO, would grant him the capability to control all of the station’s tactical and defensive systems from this one location. Given that Mr. Gabriel was still getting used to being the CTO, and had little experience with fleet engagement tactics such as these, and the CSOO Mr. Tan was also relatively new and inexperienced…well, sufficed to say that even as a Marine, he had a larger wealth of tactical experience than anybody on the station or the other ships out there.
And yet, he hadn’t raised the issue with the Commander. He would see how the situation played out, and if things went south (which he had an uncanny feeling it would), he would be able to pull it out as an Ace in the Hole.
He opened up a channel to Lt. Brady in the CCC. Even restricted to limits, Darson had given him a chance to redeem himself, albeit inside the Marine Complex.
=^= “Lt. Brady. What is the status of the boarding parties?” =^=
=^= "Sir, all boarding parties are present and accounted for. Awaiting further instructions, Sir." =^=
=^= “Good. When there is a sufficient opening in any of the enemies’ shields, transport them in. They’ve already been fully briefed on this operation and what is expected of them. For our part at least, this is going to be slightly easier.” =^=
He closed the channel and looked at the screen again, “Status of the AO?”
One of the tech’s responded, “Colonel, the AO has been cleared. All civilian and non-essential traffic has been grounded and secured for the duration of this exercise. Message buoys have been deployed in a spherical perimeter with an approximate radius of one million kilometers. They are broadcasting a general warning to all ships that approach that they are entering a temporary Federation Training zone with live fire exercises in progress, and that they should exercise extreme caution and are strongly recommended to divert course.”
“Good,” Darson replied as he turned to view the screen again. He moved his hand to the panel next to him and deftly manipulated it to get him connected to the Complex as well as all the Marines he had on station, =^= “Attention. Attention. This is Colonel Darson,” He said in an uncharacteristically serious tone, “All units, stand by to engage in wargames scenario. Phasers have been set to simulation mode, 1/1000 power. Projectile weapons have been outfitted with TTR practice ammunition. Be advised that training protocols 697 and 9788-B are in effect.” =^=
He cut that connection as well after the announcement and leaned back in the comfy chair as he steepled his fingers. By all accounts this was a joke. Two ships up against a military starbase like this one? Even with the Prometheus’s obvious Vector assault advantage wouldn’t even up the odds that much…it would take something more…something like what the Romulan’s had when they had attacked…some kind of advanced stratagem, laid in place before hand to Sabotage whatever they could to reduce the station’s operating capacity.
“How many Marines would the combined enemy force have available to them?” He whispered quietly. The techs were momentarily surprised by the question and were about to go and frantically search for the answer when Lt. Chau’saura stepped forward and said calmly, “The Daedalus would have 32 available, the Bunker Hill would have 64, for a total of 96…though the Daedalus is the only one running with a full complement at the moment. Why do you ask sir?”
“Because I think that the fact that this battle is supposed to be a surrogate of our fight against the Romulans is going to come back and bite us in the ass. Run an immediate ship wide scan for any personnel that don’t belong. Look for Marine ID tags from the Daedalus or Bunker Hill. Don’t bother checking any of the areas with high concentrations of our own Marines, they wouldn’t have a chance…focus elsewhere.” The Lt. Saluted and ran off to the Pit to get one of the techs to help her.
He turned back to the screen one more time and leaned forward calmly staring at the holographic representation of the ships, “This is going to be fun.”
{Bunker Hill}
Ensign South acknowledged briefly to keep the verbal replies to a minimum as protocol instructed. "Aye Sir" was all she said as she tapped swiftly over the LCARS panel in front of her, initiating the maneuver pattern she had just been given. Instantly the ship responded and Taali held her steady on the sequence as it became visible the interactive display.
Martina looked at her consoles, "Skipper I'm getting a lot of internal comm traffic from the station, and an indicator that they could be soon launching fighters, we'll need to act if we're gonna carry through with this phase of the mission."
Jarred looked up at the ensign, "Ok, then we need to move to phase two now" he paused and touched a key on the captains chair "Daedalus proceed with phase two."
Claire sat manning her science station. ~The things I do to get research for a psych paper!~
"Gave permission for them to take out the fighters as soon as we left. They had a little trouble but I am getting a report that some of the fighters got out before they were able to disable the rest. I have one of the battle sections looking out for those that got out. The rest of us are starting our run on DS5." Dirk responded.
"John start our run on the station at your convenience, watch out for any fighters that have already launched."
"Aye, Sir," Elliott responded, keying commands onto his console. The ship sprang to life following the course towards their destination.
"Ensign," Davies spoke to Petro without turning, "Power the guardian platforms and prepare the AHDAs, that should be a welcome surprise for the Admiral." He said nodding up to the large window in which the Admiral looked down upon them.
"Aye aye, Captain," Lieutenant (jg) Michael Duquense stated as he placed a reassuring hand upon Petro's shoulder. "AHDA's are reporting at full power and I've assigned an additional security detail to the lower power junctions just to make sure we don't have a repeat of last time." Duquense said as he took his seat at tactical.
Petro gave a small sigh of relief. She wasn’t sure that she could handle tactical again and the words of Gabriel haunted her mind. ~ Standards which are in place to save lives, Warrant Officer. Perhaps you should review those the next time you *think* about accepting such a daunting task."~
Davies took a deep breath.
“Red Alert. Battle stations, this is a drill!” His voice boomed as he glanced to Petro then turned his head to the upper window where the Admiral stood watching.
~Stop looking up there. It makes you look scared.~ Petro thought, knowing that she was doing everything she could not to follow his gaze. ~Makes me nervous too.~
Noticing red blips appearing in the hangar bay, Davies gave a sly smirk. ~ Now I know what Alfonse meant ~ He thought.
=^=“Colonel Darson, unfriendlies in the hangar bay. Take them down. Phasers are set to simulation mode and they are to be taken as prisoners of war. Commander Gabriel, initiate full security protocols and bring the phasic shielding online, we don’t want any more unwanted visitors.” His eyes danced cross the various consoles as crew began to call out updates. =^=
[Marine HQ]
Darson had spotted the enemies popping up on the screen with several intruder alerts popping up at the same time. His suspicions had been half right, but he was glad he had given this some thought beforehand, =^= “Already on it, Commander. And don’t worry, we won’t hurt them…much. Now all you need to do is give me a hole in their shields, and I can send them a little present of our own.”=^=
He opened a channel to the Marines stationed in the section around where Hostile’s had appeared. =^= “Marines, Intruders in Docking Bays 357-B, 11-A, Secondary Transporter Room 56-B, and Deck 561 Section 8, moving up. Stand by to repel boarders.” =^=
[Deep Space 5 Ops]
"Sir, Daedalus has entered multi-vector mode and are reading all systems full charged." Duquense reported. "I see that Wallace and Freeman have been at work on the Bunker Hill's defense capabilities. Their shielding frequency is on a rotating sequence." He added. "Orders sir?" Duquense requested.
“Bring guardian platforms 1 and 2 to bear full weapons to the Daedalus.” He turned to Petro.
“Load platform 3 with Tri-cobalts and take down the Bunkerhill. Load 4 with Quantums and when the Daedalus’ shields are at sixty percent, full barrage.” He gave a single nod to Petro as he spoke in a quieter voice.
Petro sent the order down to her contingent that were manning the mass armaments. A quick response was given and the lights soon after indicated at all were ready. She looked at Duquense, hoping that she wasn’t getting in his way. There was a lot she could learn from him.
He spun about and jumped to tactical.
“Duquense, I want the Broadswords to form a defensive line and any shuttles that emerge from either the Daedalus or the Bunkerhill are to be shot down. No prisoners!” He said in a flat tone.
Looking around, Davies searched for where the Chief Science officer was located. "Somebody inform Lieutenant Tovan his presence is required at ops. I want to know the full capabilities of both of those ships." He barked.
Duquense began to direct the Broadsword to begin a strafing run towards the Daedalus only. He knew there was no way the Bunkerhill would fall for the routine, so he decided to dedicate his energy on the Daedalus. Chances are he'd only get one shot at it before their tactical officer discovered the rouse. The momentary distraction would give the Station enough time to proceed with its original plan of attack.
The Broadsword came about and proceeded towards the Daedalus while bringing its weapons to full power and locking onto the opposing vessel.
{Bunker Hill}
Bruce laughed hard. "They try to use holographic ships against us. Not too smart to use something I installed against me." He turned towards Jarred. "Should we let the Daedalus sweat a bit?" He asked him.
"No, Fire the starshell torpedoes see if we can disrupt the holo-emitters, then fire a second salvo at launch bay two we need to keep those fighters grounded." Jarred turned to Marti "Get our anti-matter spread ready, we might need to lay down cover for the Daedalus as they attack the main sensor arrays."
Marti keyed up the simulated weapons and called up the anti-mater spread, it wouldn't look like too much but to the simulated images it will look like one hell of a fire works show, "ready!"
"Signal Daedalus to begin there run on our signal" Jarred called out.
{Daedalus}
"I fell for the Holographic ships sorry. I have ordered my ships to load Tri-Cobalt heads. Giving you the heads up Lt." Dirk informed Jarred.
The Daedalus XO broke in "I've got indication that the fighters are green light."
Dunham was sitting in his fighter pit. His ship ready to launch from the rapid launch bay. The rest of the fighters were around him. Though he could not see the individual pilot through the tinted glass of their cockpits. He knew each had a face concentration. He took out the gum he had been chewing and stuck it under his flight control dashboard. ~kick the tires and light the fires~. Thought Dunham to himself. The green go light. Activated in the launch bay. So Dunham sent out the scramble code to the rest of the wing.
Duquense monitored the Daedalus' reaction and smiled to himself. ~And he flew too close to the Sun . . .~ He began to target the Bunkerhill and opened fire on their starboard side to buy enough time to release the Fighters.
"Commander, Bunkerhill reports damage." Duquense stated.
The fighter wing flew forth from the bay.
{Aboard Bunker hill}
"Direct hit, deck 12, five seconds too hangar bays." Martina Called out
"FIRE!" Jarred barked
As the simulated torpedoes launched and struck their mark the bridge crew saw that eight fighters left the hangar before the door closed indicating a hit to the bay of some kind, Martina called out "Direct hit, fighter bays are off line, but eight fighters were able to launch."
"John Set for alpha strike, signal Daedalus to move to secondary targets, Bruce looks like we're gonna have to go all in to score the big hit we wanted." Jarred said knowing that they were about to have full hands.
"I was hoping that we wouldn't." Bruce grinned. "But it sure will be a blast. Computer load all bolt on cannons." The computer chirped in acknowledgement. Bruce then started work on the Engineering console. "Every unessential system has been shut down and that power relocated to the phasers. It's now or never Jarred."
"Wallace we aren't going to stand much longer over here. I have a little surprise but I cant put it into use until we are just about to use it. I think we need to make our last stand and attack simultaneously." Dirk informed Wallace.
Dunham Looked behind dived his fighter out of the flight path of a torpedo spread directed at the docking bay. Checking his sensors hie saw that only eight had got out of the hanger bay. He curded to himself under his breath. Thinking briefly that their team would need to work on rapid reaction deployment skills so as not to get caught out again. He then issued orders to what was left of the fighter wing. They swung about and began to harass the enemy with hit and run phaser tactics. They didn't do any sort of damage on the heavy armored vessel but they were drawing some fire away from the station.
= DS5 Ops =
The alarm on the console sounded. David’s eyes shot to the information and reported the hit on one of the hangar bays.
"Fighter deck has been hit, seventeen casualties, though we did manage to get eight fighters out." He tapped at the console.
=^= Commander Monteros, please report." =^= He called, swinging around to Lieutenant Tan. "Recommendations?" He inquired.
There was no response from the Commanders craft.
"Commander, I believe that we can use the civilian shuttle bays on the lower decks as a base for our fighters. Their position is away from the direction of enemy fire and relatively protected. Not all our fighters are fully fuelled are ready to go," Vincent paused, thinking the situation through. He suddenly remembered a tactic he had seen when serving on the Ajax during the Dominion War. "Might I suggest a diversion in order to move them down to complete their preparations? A few probes and drones set to emit false signals may hide them from enemy sensors for long enough..."
"Transfer as many ships as we can from fighter bays to civilian bays." Davies replied, his hand coming to his chin and rubbed in a thoughtful manner. "That is a very good idea, now if only we could provide some form of smoke cover." He said aloud, thinking of some form of jamming signal to foil the Daedalus.
"Lieutenant Duquense, I need you to initiate some form of pulse, to jam signals to 'Blind' the attacking ships. Any ideas?" Davies asked.
Duquense looked at the power levels within the station compared to the distance of the two vessels. "Normally, it would not be a problem, however, we are not operating at full capacity and we only have 8 fighters that are in action right now. I don't believe that we can completely shut down the multi-vector vessels without destroying them." He said as he attempted to calculate the telemetry of the available probes within the fore and starboard launchers. "I think we can fire a similar pulse that will terminate the communication relays within each vessel. It would cause the Daedalus' primary communication relays to attempt to compensate for the overloaded relays. Essentially, the primary vessel lose direct control over the secondary portions of the ship." Duquense said as he began to think while spoke.
"That's one of the flaws of the Prometheus project that prevented mass production during the Dominion War," Duquense said as he spun his chair towards Petro and Davies. "If we can get Astrometrics and Engineering to determine the precise spectrum of the Daedalus, it will force the tactical computers to go into somewhat of a feedback-loop that will force the vessel to re-combine into one ship." He said.
"That'll take the wind outer their solar-sails." Duquense said as he turned back in his chair towards his console to prepare the targeting trajectory.
David grinned. Even though the ship looked awesome as she separated, the thought of a single target, rather than three gave him a warm tingly sensation.
"By all means, initiate it!" The commander responded to Duquense
[Marine HQ]
In between his dealing with the Intruders onboard the station, Darson had been observing intently the telemetry of the battle. He watched as against all odds, the two ships were actually holding their own in the battle. He cringed slightly as the shields of the station buckled temporarily and a salvo of simulation torpedo’s struck a docking bay. As the casualty reports began coming in, He began to feel a slight surge of anger. This was ridiculous. He didn’t know which brass had orchestrated this little charade and was observing, but he had a feeling they were watching with something akin to either pity or disappointment, or some combination of both.”
He was interrupted by a cry from one of the Marines, “Sir! We’re detecting a massive build-up of energy in the Bunker Hill. They’re shunting everything they’ve got into their weapons systems!”
Darson interpreted what that meant in a heartbeat and quickly and efficiently palmed the panel for the Comms, and opened up a secure channel to the Commander up in Ops and said calmly, =^=“Commander! This is Colonel Darson, We’ve detected the Bunker Hill putting everything They’ve got into weapons. There’s a high probability that they’re setting up for an Alpha Strike. Just thought you should know.” =^=
[DS5 Ops]
"Alpha Strike! Tactical, what is their target? Reinforce shields and deflectors. Petro, where are we with the Guardians!" David asked in a calm tone as he responded to the Colonel.
“Guardians ready sir.” Petro replied, a little stunned by the volume of her response.
=^= "Thank you Colonel. Have your men detained the interlopers outside the hanger bay?" The Commander inquired as he stepped towards the weapons console and Petro.
=^= “All hostile boarders have been neutralized Commander…And I’m ready to board them as soon as you give me a hole in the shields.” =^=
“Sir, everything is ready here.” She replied, nodding to Duquense.
[Main Astrometrics]
Greo looked up at the vast screen again, checking the progress of the battle. It seemed the ships were doing well and his scans had finally come together. He'd had to sideline his temporal scanner project to get everything up and running properly. Various smaller ships moved about the battle zone darting between the larger vessels. He tapped the communication panel on his station, calling up to main operations.
=^= "This is Lieutenant Tovon reporting from Main Astrometrics. I am monitoring the simulation from here, the sensor interface is a bit more sophisticated. I have been trying to evaluate the shield modulation pattern of the Bunker Hill and the tactical frequencies of the Daedalus. I think I may have something." =^=
Davies tapped the console at his fingertips. "Report Lieutenant, what do you think you have?" Davies replied to the science officer.
"Commander the Bunker Hill's shields are rotating on a unique pattern. It was difficult to lock it down, but I think I have the pattern. I am sending it through to your station now..." Greo watched as a small blip appeared on the screen on the edge of the battlefield. As soon as it appeared it vanished. He blinked, maybe it was just his eyes playing tricks on him. "...as for the Daedalus I believe that a broad spectrum gamma pulse might disrupt their communications and inhibit their multi vector assault mode."
Davies smiled. "I just asked Lieutenant Freeman to formulate something along those lines and Duquense has a working theory." He remarked, "Work with them, I want that pulse ready ten minutes ago and initiate as soon as possible. Petro, are those warheads in place?" He asked.
“Yes sir.” She said absently, thinking about the last comment. “Sir. Kentar, I mean, Commander Kentar mentioned something like that in his specs for a shuttle. I had an emitter beacon set up in conjunction with the Guardians. They’re small. I’m not sure they’ll work.” She explained. “They’re set for Gamma as well as Delta.” She said. “His idea.”
Warrant Officer Hiroshi spoke in "Everything is ready here in Engineering."
"I just need a few seconds to send the correct gamma frequency. Stand by." Tovon reported from Astrometrics.
"Engineering, science, I want these all working in conjunction now." He turned to the Ensign who seemed to be confident in her and her teams work and had the faintest smile on her thin lips.
"Ensign Petro, fire the first salvo." Davies ordered.
"Tovon to Davies. I have set the EM emitters on the main array to emit the gamma pulse. I have rerouted control to your station. It's ready for activation."
"Firing Salvo." Petro replied, setting the stage for victory.
{Bunker Hill}
Knowing that the station would have a surprise of their own Jarred waited for the final stages of the alpha strike salvo to complete its cycle, "Lock on to primary target, ops level." Jarred ordered. the tactical display showed the target lock, he looked over at Bruce Freeman, then at John Elliot, "Fire"
On the simulation displays of all the participants of the exercise showed the simulated alpha strike, a mass volley of phaser, photon torpedo and quantum torpedo fire being sustained at the station, then as if coming from nowhere the Bunker Hills deflector array came to life with a building charge of some kind.
"Arrays are online. Charging normally no problems so far." Freeman reported watching the display.
"The station has sustained massive damage to several sections, simulated fires and outages all over the target region, deflector dish weapon is fully charged." Martina reported
"Daedalus going in for their final run."
"Send the signal to the chief" Jarred said
{Aboard DS5}
Chief Ayers emerged from the Jefferies tube inside the shield generator room and began his work placing the simulated charges on the shield generators, as he placed and armed the last sensor unit on the generator he heard voices and quickly tapped in the commands to his tricorder, the short pulsing tones became a solid tone as the simulated charges went off, Chief Ayers quickly slipped back into the jefferies tube returning the way he came.
Gabriel read the Padd in his hand as it reported the simulated damage throughout the station due to the Alpha Strike. "Ah hell," Gabriel said aloud. The damage was going to significantly hinder a counterstrike against the opposing force.
Instructions had been given to capture any invaders and keep them in pre-designated holding facilities. The last thing he needed was an uprising in the middle of the battle.
*Taps* "Ensign Sheppard to Commander Gabriel, sector 3 team has detected an intruder within the jefferies tube near the shield generators." The officer reported.
~ So much for originality ~ Dorian thought to himself. "Were you able to stop him?" Gabriel said as he signaled for three nearby officers to follow him.
*Taps* "Not completely sir, he was able to activate the detonation sequence before he arrived to the area. However, we were able to stop the last sequence of charges from going off." Sheppard reported. "Damage was significant, but no where near as bad as it could have been. We need Engineering to get down here and do a more extensive survey of the damage, but for the time being we've got our would-be saboteur." Sheppard said as he kept the phaser trained on Chief Ayers.
*Taps* "Take him to the designated holding area until further orders are given. Have the rest of your team increase their patrol of the sector. There's no telling what other trick the other side is going to hatch." Gabriel said.
[OPS]
Petro worked to reroute the power for the shields to come from sources not necessary at the moment. There were several subroutines in place but only enough to bring the shields up to half of what was lost.
"Somethings wrong. Again. Shields are failing." She said, doing what she could to make sense of the senseless.
As the first volley hit the Bunkerhill, so their return fire hit the station.
The simulation panel lit up like a Christmas tree, reporting all sorts of damage upon the hull around Ops.
"Medical to Ops, we have reported casualties up here." Davies said with a heavy frown and shaking his head.
=^= Two teams on their way =^= Chelsea replied briefly, simultaneously giving the nod to the awaiting medics standing by who picked up their medkits and stood ready. Looking towards Ryan for his *senior officer* approval of these routine actions under his command, she received *his* nod of acknowledgment and instantly responded by tapping her comm badge again.
Instructing the computer to initiate site-to-site transporter transfer of the medics she joined one of the trios herself with Ed McBain leading the other. They materialized in Ops and the simulation registered their response. Taking out the indicated number of crew they returned to Sickbay leaving Ops short of the appropriate 'casualties' to authenticate the simulation.
"At least the Bunkerhill is nearly out of commission." Davies turned to Petro and continued, tapping the console for Commander Villiers to stand ready on the EMP. "Ensign, full spread from the Guardian platforms, finish the Bunkerhill before we concentrate on the Daedalus." He commanded, "Full phasers to the Daedulus with a backup spread of mini quantum's, time to finish this." Davies said with yet another quick glance to the now vacant window and tapping at comms.
=^= "Flight control, Lieutenant Dunham, take your wing to the left flank of the Daedalus. Commander Monteros, yours to the right."
=^=Roger that Sir=^= replied Dunham into his comm. He took what was left of his fighter wing past the left flank of the Daedalus. Ducking and weaving through enemy fire directed at their ships that looked so small next to the hull of the Starship they were now firing on. But although they looked small they packed a hell of a punch and each launched its full complement of weapons.
{Outside holding area}
As security escorted Chief Ayers over to the holding area he was stopped by Lieutenant Commander Gabriel, "Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me, fool me tree times?" he said trying to avoid laughing too hard.
"oops, guess your boys didn't do that good of a job disarming it." Chief Ayers looked at the two security "First round is on me."
Gabriel sighed in irritation as the device 'went off' killing all the occupants of the room. "You bastard." He said as his Padd registered the deaths of the four officers within the room.
"Congratulations on your Pyrrhic victory." He said begrudgingly. "Lock him up anyways just so I don't end up strangling him." Gabriel said to the other two officers as he checked with Ops on the status of the simulation.
[Marine HQ]
Darson steepled his hands once more and gazed at the situation on the screen. That last strike had been particularly damaging, and he was working the odds in his head to determined just how much they had shifted, when there was a blaring alarm, and several warning indicators popped up as the shield ratings for the station dropped like a stone.
“Sir! We have indications of simulated detonations on the primary shield generators. Shield efficacy has dropped off by 70%!”
“Who was in the area?” Darson hissed, “I thought we had gotten rid of all the boarders?”
“Affirmative sir…the only life-sign in the vicinity of the shield generators before the sensors were ‘destroyed’ was Chief Petty Officer Craig Ayers.”
Darson let out a low rumble of a sigh. So there was the saboteur. He hated being right, almost as much as he hated other people having smart ideas, “Alert Commander Gabriel, and dispatch a squad to that location to apprehend the Chief.”
“Yes sir…Sir, it appears that Commander Gabriel was in motion already. He has detained Chief Petty Officer Ayers, and is bringing him back to the Holding area.”
“Well, turns out that the good Mr. Gabriel really can do something right once In a –“
“Sir! Registering an explosive detonation in the holding area…4 dead: Chief Petty Officer Ayers, Two security officers, and Commander Gabriel.”
Darson let out a short chuckle, “I retract my previous statement. He’s still just as useless. Alright, since he’s gone, that leaves a void to fill. Patch us into the Security frequencies, and get us the ACSO…ask him if he wouldn’t mind us taking command for the rest of the exercise.”
“Right away sir.”
“And get me a status report on how my boarding parties are doing.”
“Yes Sir, Colonel.”
{Daedalus}
Dirk noticed a drop in DS5's shields and they weren't returning. "Klans I want that power boost now."
Once the power was activated Dirk took control of the weapons on all three sections of the ship on his captains chair. Sweat was dripping down his face. Even though this had been short it still was enough to get his adrenaline pumping. With the Daedalus coming to bear on DS5 pressed the button on his arm rest and fired all that they had. At the same time a volley of fire came from DS5. Noting that his ship had been 'destroyed' Dirk turned to Ensign Hudnall. "Hail DS5. Its time acknowledge their victory."
The Bunkerhill was lying silent, the lights were on, the transponders were signaling as the final round of warheads were dispatched from DS5.
"Sir," the man at comms began, we're getting a message from the Daedalus, they....."
He didn't finish his sentence as the view screen lit up in a bright whiteness as a live round hit the Bunkerhill midships.......
The whole of the operations crew stared forwards.
[Main Astrometrics]
Greo looked up in horror as the computer registered the live round on the vast display above him. The ships shields had been all but gone. He looked on as the computer readout displayed damage reports for the Bunkerhill. Real damage.
Petro looked up from the console in shock and horror. "Sir." She said to Davies, her eyes glued to the viewscreen.
"What in Gods' name!" Davies remarked.......
"What the Hell was that!" Shouted Dunham as a live torpedo round streaked passed and through the fighter wing narrowly missing his wing man an then tearing a hole into the side of Bunkerhill an explosion ripped forth creating a cascading fireball shaking the vessel violently and throwing her into a spin. =^= Bravo Leader to DS5. We have a blue on blue situation. repeat blue on blue. We have just Fired on the Bunkerhill!=^=
"Oh my god," Karen said, leaning her palms on the console. She was as powerless as any of them to avert it. How could it happen? One of the crew ... the station was flooded with members of less than friendly species ... could they have? Did they even know about the exercise? These thoughts spiralled through her mind as it hit.
[Marine HQ]
Darson sat up straight as the giant screen lit up with warning indicators and more alarms began to sound. He shouted out, “Somebody silence those alarms! Report!”
Lt. Flynn ran up with a frazzled expression on her face, “Sir, Deep Space 5 has apparently just fired a live round at the Bunkerhill! It went right through her shields and struck amidships!”
Darson threw back the hood of his cloak, then stood up and said in a loud voice, urgently but calmly “Send out a message on the emergency Comm frequencies. ‘To all units in the area, this exercise is terminated. Repeat, terminated. Disaster Response protocols are in effect. All Federation vessels capable of rendering aid should begin assisting immediately.’…and somebody find out exactly how this happened! I want an initial report ASAP!!”
TO BE CONTINUED......... in "Casualties of War"
Commander David Davies
CO: DS5
Lt. Cmdr.
Dorian Gabriel
Chief of Security
Bruce Freeman/Dirk Alphonse
CEO DS5/CO USS-Daedalus
Lt. Colonel James Darson
Marine Commanding Officer
6th Combined Operations Group
Lt Richard Dunham
Squadron Leader
Jarred Wallace/Marina Perth/Craig Ayers/Mikeal Akerfel
CIO DS5/Intel officer DS5/Encryptions/XO USS Daedalus
Lt. j.g. Vincent Tan
Chief Strategic Operations Officer
Lt Greo Tovon
Acting Chief Science Officer
Ensign John Elliott,
Assistant Chief of Operations, DS5
Ensign Taali South (NPC)
Helm Officer - USS Bunkerhill
1st Lieutenant Daniel Brady
Marine XO, DS5
Ensign Petro
Quartermaster - DS5
Commander Karen Villiers
Executive Officer. DS5
by Lieutenant Commander Bruce Freeman & Captain Tasha Tahir (NPC) & Lieutenant Commander Jarred Wallace & Commander Chelsea Dunham & Lieutenant Jana Kasikova & Commander Karen Villiers & Lieutenant Vincent Tan & Commander Richard Dunham & Colonel James Darson & 1st Lieutenant Daniel Brady & Lieutenant JG Petro & Alderman Dorian Gabriel & Lieutenant Commander Greo Tovon
Post Details
| Title | Wargames | |
| Mission | Time is Fleeting | |
| Author(s) | Lieutenant Commander Bruce Freeman & Captain Tasha Tahir (NPC) & Lieutenant Commander Jarred Wallace & Commander Chelsea Dunham & Lieutenant Jana Kasikova & Commander Karen Villiers & Lieutenant Vincent Tan & Commander Richard Dunham & Colonel James Darson & 1st Lieutenant Daniel Brady & Lieutenant JG Petro & Alderman Dorian Gabriel & Lieutenant Commander Greo Tovon | |
| Posted | Sun Sep 20, 2009 @ 1:45pm | |
| Location | USS Bunkerhill | |
| Timeline | SD14 10:00 |
{Aboard USS Bunker Hill}
As the two ships took up position in space, on the bridge of the Bunker Hill Jarred sat in captains chair and looked at the tactical display on the main viewer, he could sense a bit of nerves from the junior crew members, the silence was broken by the comm signal beginning the exercise, "Mr. Elliot set scrambler code Wallace one, Ms. South maneuver sequence Wallace Alpha, Mr. Freeman rotate shield settings to Freeman one, Ms. Mackenzie signal Daedalus to move to phase two, Helm move to primary target, All hands BATTLE STATIONS!" the ship echoed as the alarm klaxon roared throughout the ship.
{Aboard USS Daedalus}
Dirk appeared on the main bridge in a shimmer of blue light hoping everyone else was where they were supposed to be. He walked up to his chair and sat down. He looked down and saw that everyone had acknowledged that they were at their respected stations.
"All hands prepare for separation." He said initiating the command to start separating the ship into multi-vector mode. Once the ship had been separated Dirk stood. "All hands Red Alert, let's show these higher-ups just how much power we have!" He looked down on the display on his arm rest again. He grinned, their plan had worked the marines had successfully boarded DS5. A few had gotten out but he knew they would be taken care of by his ACEO commanding the third section of the Daedalus.
= Ops =
The central rostrum was bathed in a yellow light as the crew began to settle down to initiate the battle simulation.
Davies took a single step away from the center console and tapped his comm.
=^= "Commander Gabriel, Colonel Darson, are your men in position at all the key points?" =^= Davies asked in a hushed voice, wanting to be sure that all the primary areas were covered. Security were covering all the computer and crew areas, whilst the Marines were monitoring weapons and docking bays.
=^= "Gabriel here, my men have properly secured main promenade and we have directed all civilians and non-essential personal to their quarters or their designated ships. We've also begun locking down the primary, secondary, and backup computer cores. Internal sensors have been programmed to detect any comm-badges that have not been calibrated to our station's frequency. We'll know and immediately respond to anybody on this deck that doesn't belong there." =^= Gabriel responded.
[Marine HQ]
Darson sat high up on his throne in the MTAC, staring intently at the large curving display at the front of the room, displaying Deep Space 5 and all surrounding space, including the multiple ships right off the station, marked with Hostile indicators. Multiple Marines were running around below him, moving with purpose to get the station ready for whatever might come up. He shouted out, “Status report on troop deployment?”
Lt. Flynn quickly ascended the steps to the dais and gave a quick battlefield salute, before handing him a PADD. Darson gave it a quick look over, then dismissed the two Marines to go back to their duties, which they proceeded to do.
He triggered the Comm at the same time as he manipulated one of the panels on the chair’s arm to set up scrambled channels.
=^= “Commander, this is Colonel Darson. I have deployed two thirds of my regiment. They’ve been deployed to key areas such as Main Operations, Main Engineering, and other crucial junctions as well as locking down and securing all Weapon Lockers, Docking Bays, and other likely points of infiltration, as well as cooperating with Security to deal with any other civilian related issues. I also have prepared several boarding parties, provisioned for siege, standing by for both Transporter infiltration, and Hopper transport. The other third is remaining as a Quick-Reaction force, and can be diverted wherever they need to be at a moment’s notice.” =^=
[DS5 Ops]
David studied the console for a moment, tagging each of the groups. Green for marines, Yellow for Security, blue for civilians and crew, keeping red for unknowns.
=^="Keep me informed. Davies out." =^= He said closing the comm.
[Marine HQ]
Darson turned to look silently at the Cage located at the back of the room. Inside that secure room he knew were several security relays that, when provided with concurrent authorization codes by the CO and either the XO or CSO, would grant him the capability to control all of the station’s tactical and defensive systems from this one location. Given that Mr. Gabriel was still getting used to being the CTO, and had little experience with fleet engagement tactics such as these, and the CSOO Mr. Tan was also relatively new and inexperienced…well, sufficed to say that even as a Marine, he had a larger wealth of tactical experience than anybody on the station or the other ships out there.
And yet, he hadn’t raised the issue with the Commander. He would see how the situation played out, and if things went south (which he had an uncanny feeling it would), he would be able to pull it out as an Ace in the Hole.
He opened up a channel to Lt. Brady in the CCC. Even restricted to limits, Darson had given him a chance to redeem himself, albeit inside the Marine Complex.
=^= “Lt. Brady. What is the status of the boarding parties?” =^=
=^= "Sir, all boarding parties are present and accounted for. Awaiting further instructions, Sir." =^=
=^= “Good. When there is a sufficient opening in any of the enemies’ shields, transport them in. They’ve already been fully briefed on this operation and what is expected of them. For our part at least, this is going to be slightly easier.” =^=
He closed the channel and looked at the screen again, “Status of the AO?”
One of the tech’s responded, “Colonel, the AO has been cleared. All civilian and non-essential traffic has been grounded and secured for the duration of this exercise. Message buoys have been deployed in a spherical perimeter with an approximate radius of one million kilometers. They are broadcasting a general warning to all ships that approach that they are entering a temporary Federation Training zone with live fire exercises in progress, and that they should exercise extreme caution and are strongly recommended to divert course.”
“Good,” Darson replied as he turned to view the screen again. He moved his hand to the panel next to him and deftly manipulated it to get him connected to the Complex as well as all the Marines he had on station, =^= “Attention. Attention. This is Colonel Darson,” He said in an uncharacteristically serious tone, “All units, stand by to engage in wargames scenario. Phasers have been set to simulation mode, 1/1000 power. Projectile weapons have been outfitted with TTR practice ammunition. Be advised that training protocols 697 and 9788-B are in effect.” =^=
He cut that connection as well after the announcement and leaned back in the comfy chair as he steepled his fingers. By all accounts this was a joke. Two ships up against a military starbase like this one? Even with the Prometheus’s obvious Vector assault advantage wouldn’t even up the odds that much…it would take something more…something like what the Romulan’s had when they had attacked…some kind of advanced stratagem, laid in place before hand to Sabotage whatever they could to reduce the station’s operating capacity.
“How many Marines would the combined enemy force have available to them?” He whispered quietly. The techs were momentarily surprised by the question and were about to go and frantically search for the answer when Lt. Chau’saura stepped forward and said calmly, “The Daedalus would have 32 available, the Bunker Hill would have 64, for a total of 96…though the Daedalus is the only one running with a full complement at the moment. Why do you ask sir?”
“Because I think that the fact that this battle is supposed to be a surrogate of our fight against the Romulans is going to come back and bite us in the ass. Run an immediate ship wide scan for any personnel that don’t belong. Look for Marine ID tags from the Daedalus or Bunker Hill. Don’t bother checking any of the areas with high concentrations of our own Marines, they wouldn’t have a chance…focus elsewhere.” The Lt. Saluted and ran off to the Pit to get one of the techs to help her.
He turned back to the screen one more time and leaned forward calmly staring at the holographic representation of the ships, “This is going to be fun.”
{Bunker Hill}
Ensign South acknowledged briefly to keep the verbal replies to a minimum as protocol instructed. "Aye Sir" was all she said as she tapped swiftly over the LCARS panel in front of her, initiating the maneuver pattern she had just been given. Instantly the ship responded and Taali held her steady on the sequence as it became visible the interactive display.
Martina looked at her consoles, "Skipper I'm getting a lot of internal comm traffic from the station, and an indicator that they could be soon launching fighters, we'll need to act if we're gonna carry through with this phase of the mission."
Jarred looked up at the ensign, "Ok, then we need to move to phase two now" he paused and touched a key on the captains chair "Daedalus proceed with phase two."
Claire sat manning her science station. ~The things I do to get research for a psych paper!~
"Gave permission for them to take out the fighters as soon as we left. They had a little trouble but I am getting a report that some of the fighters got out before they were able to disable the rest. I have one of the battle sections looking out for those that got out. The rest of us are starting our run on DS5." Dirk responded.
"John start our run on the station at your convenience, watch out for any fighters that have already launched."
"Aye, Sir," Elliott responded, keying commands onto his console. The ship sprang to life following the course towards their destination.
"Ensign," Davies spoke to Petro without turning, "Power the guardian platforms and prepare the AHDAs, that should be a welcome surprise for the Admiral." He said nodding up to the large window in which the Admiral looked down upon them.
"Aye aye, Captain," Lieutenant (jg) Michael Duquense stated as he placed a reassuring hand upon Petro's shoulder. "AHDA's are reporting at full power and I've assigned an additional security detail to the lower power junctions just to make sure we don't have a repeat of last time." Duquense said as he took his seat at tactical.
Petro gave a small sigh of relief. She wasn’t sure that she could handle tactical again and the words of Gabriel haunted her mind. ~ Standards which are in place to save lives, Warrant Officer. Perhaps you should review those the next time you *think* about accepting such a daunting task."~
Davies took a deep breath.
“Red Alert. Battle stations, this is a drill!” His voice boomed as he glanced to Petro then turned his head to the upper window where the Admiral stood watching.
~Stop looking up there. It makes you look scared.~ Petro thought, knowing that she was doing everything she could not to follow his gaze. ~Makes me nervous too.~
Noticing red blips appearing in the hangar bay, Davies gave a sly smirk. ~ Now I know what Alfonse meant ~ He thought.
=^=“Colonel Darson, unfriendlies in the hangar bay. Take them down. Phasers are set to simulation mode and they are to be taken as prisoners of war. Commander Gabriel, initiate full security protocols and bring the phasic shielding online, we don’t want any more unwanted visitors.” His eyes danced cross the various consoles as crew began to call out updates. =^=
[Marine HQ]
Darson had spotted the enemies popping up on the screen with several intruder alerts popping up at the same time. His suspicions had been half right, but he was glad he had given this some thought beforehand, =^= “Already on it, Commander. And don’t worry, we won’t hurt them…much. Now all you need to do is give me a hole in their shields, and I can send them a little present of our own.”=^=
He opened a channel to the Marines stationed in the section around where Hostile’s had appeared. =^= “Marines, Intruders in Docking Bays 357-B, 11-A, Secondary Transporter Room 56-B, and Deck 561 Section 8, moving up. Stand by to repel boarders.” =^=
[Deep Space 5 Ops]
"Sir, Daedalus has entered multi-vector mode and are reading all systems full charged." Duquense reported. "I see that Wallace and Freeman have been at work on the Bunker Hill's defense capabilities. Their shielding frequency is on a rotating sequence." He added. "Orders sir?" Duquense requested.
“Bring guardian platforms 1 and 2 to bear full weapons to the Daedalus.” He turned to Petro.
“Load platform 3 with Tri-cobalts and take down the Bunkerhill. Load 4 with Quantums and when the Daedalus’ shields are at sixty percent, full barrage.” He gave a single nod to Petro as he spoke in a quieter voice.
Petro sent the order down to her contingent that were manning the mass armaments. A quick response was given and the lights soon after indicated at all were ready. She looked at Duquense, hoping that she wasn’t getting in his way. There was a lot she could learn from him.
He spun about and jumped to tactical.
“Duquense, I want the Broadswords to form a defensive line and any shuttles that emerge from either the Daedalus or the Bunkerhill are to be shot down. No prisoners!” He said in a flat tone.
Looking around, Davies searched for where the Chief Science officer was located. "Somebody inform Lieutenant Tovan his presence is required at ops. I want to know the full capabilities of both of those ships." He barked.
Duquense began to direct the Broadsword to begin a strafing run towards the Daedalus only. He knew there was no way the Bunkerhill would fall for the routine, so he decided to dedicate his energy on the Daedalus. Chances are he'd only get one shot at it before their tactical officer discovered the rouse. The momentary distraction would give the Station enough time to proceed with its original plan of attack.
The Broadsword came about and proceeded towards the Daedalus while bringing its weapons to full power and locking onto the opposing vessel.
{Bunker Hill}
Bruce laughed hard. "They try to use holographic ships against us. Not too smart to use something I installed against me." He turned towards Jarred. "Should we let the Daedalus sweat a bit?" He asked him.
"No, Fire the starshell torpedoes see if we can disrupt the holo-emitters, then fire a second salvo at launch bay two we need to keep those fighters grounded." Jarred turned to Marti "Get our anti-matter spread ready, we might need to lay down cover for the Daedalus as they attack the main sensor arrays."
Marti keyed up the simulated weapons and called up the anti-mater spread, it wouldn't look like too much but to the simulated images it will look like one hell of a fire works show, "ready!"
"Signal Daedalus to begin there run on our signal" Jarred called out.
{Daedalus}
"I fell for the Holographic ships sorry. I have ordered my ships to load Tri-Cobalt heads. Giving you the heads up Lt." Dirk informed Jarred.
The Daedalus XO broke in "I've got indication that the fighters are green light."
Dunham was sitting in his fighter pit. His ship ready to launch from the rapid launch bay. The rest of the fighters were around him. Though he could not see the individual pilot through the tinted glass of their cockpits. He knew each had a face concentration. He took out the gum he had been chewing and stuck it under his flight control dashboard. ~kick the tires and light the fires~. Thought Dunham to himself. The green go light. Activated in the launch bay. So Dunham sent out the scramble code to the rest of the wing.
Duquense monitored the Daedalus' reaction and smiled to himself. ~And he flew too close to the Sun . . .~ He began to target the Bunkerhill and opened fire on their starboard side to buy enough time to release the Fighters.
"Commander, Bunkerhill reports damage." Duquense stated.
The fighter wing flew forth from the bay.
{Aboard Bunker hill}
"Direct hit, deck 12, five seconds too hangar bays." Martina Called out
"FIRE!" Jarred barked
As the simulated torpedoes launched and struck their mark the bridge crew saw that eight fighters left the hangar before the door closed indicating a hit to the bay of some kind, Martina called out "Direct hit, fighter bays are off line, but eight fighters were able to launch."
"John Set for alpha strike, signal Daedalus to move to secondary targets, Bruce looks like we're gonna have to go all in to score the big hit we wanted." Jarred said knowing that they were about to have full hands.
"I was hoping that we wouldn't." Bruce grinned. "But it sure will be a blast. Computer load all bolt on cannons." The computer chirped in acknowledgement. Bruce then started work on the Engineering console. "Every unessential system has been shut down and that power relocated to the phasers. It's now or never Jarred."
"Wallace we aren't going to stand much longer over here. I have a little surprise but I cant put it into use until we are just about to use it. I think we need to make our last stand and attack simultaneously." Dirk informed Wallace.
Dunham Looked behind dived his fighter out of the flight path of a torpedo spread directed at the docking bay. Checking his sensors hie saw that only eight had got out of the hanger bay. He curded to himself under his breath. Thinking briefly that their team would need to work on rapid reaction deployment skills so as not to get caught out again. He then issued orders to what was left of the fighter wing. They swung about and began to harass the enemy with hit and run phaser tactics. They didn't do any sort of damage on the heavy armored vessel but they were drawing some fire away from the station.
= DS5 Ops =
The alarm on the console sounded. David’s eyes shot to the information and reported the hit on one of the hangar bays.
"Fighter deck has been hit, seventeen casualties, though we did manage to get eight fighters out." He tapped at the console.
=^= Commander Monteros, please report." =^= He called, swinging around to Lieutenant Tan. "Recommendations?" He inquired.
There was no response from the Commanders craft.
"Commander, I believe that we can use the civilian shuttle bays on the lower decks as a base for our fighters. Their position is away from the direction of enemy fire and relatively protected. Not all our fighters are fully fuelled are ready to go," Vincent paused, thinking the situation through. He suddenly remembered a tactic he had seen when serving on the Ajax during the Dominion War. "Might I suggest a diversion in order to move them down to complete their preparations? A few probes and drones set to emit false signals may hide them from enemy sensors for long enough..."
"Transfer as many ships as we can from fighter bays to civilian bays." Davies replied, his hand coming to his chin and rubbed in a thoughtful manner. "That is a very good idea, now if only we could provide some form of smoke cover." He said aloud, thinking of some form of jamming signal to foil the Daedalus.
"Lieutenant Duquense, I need you to initiate some form of pulse, to jam signals to 'Blind' the attacking ships. Any ideas?" Davies asked.
Duquense looked at the power levels within the station compared to the distance of the two vessels. "Normally, it would not be a problem, however, we are not operating at full capacity and we only have 8 fighters that are in action right now. I don't believe that we can completely shut down the multi-vector vessels without destroying them." He said as he attempted to calculate the telemetry of the available probes within the fore and starboard launchers. "I think we can fire a similar pulse that will terminate the communication relays within each vessel. It would cause the Daedalus' primary communication relays to attempt to compensate for the overloaded relays. Essentially, the primary vessel lose direct control over the secondary portions of the ship." Duquense said as he began to think while spoke.
"That's one of the flaws of the Prometheus project that prevented mass production during the Dominion War," Duquense said as he spun his chair towards Petro and Davies. "If we can get Astrometrics and Engineering to determine the precise spectrum of the Daedalus, it will force the tactical computers to go into somewhat of a feedback-loop that will force the vessel to re-combine into one ship." He said.
"That'll take the wind outer their solar-sails." Duquense said as he turned back in his chair towards his console to prepare the targeting trajectory.
David grinned. Even though the ship looked awesome as she separated, the thought of a single target, rather than three gave him a warm tingly sensation.
"By all means, initiate it!" The commander responded to Duquense
[Marine HQ]
In between his dealing with the Intruders onboard the station, Darson had been observing intently the telemetry of the battle. He watched as against all odds, the two ships were actually holding their own in the battle. He cringed slightly as the shields of the station buckled temporarily and a salvo of simulation torpedo’s struck a docking bay. As the casualty reports began coming in, He began to feel a slight surge of anger. This was ridiculous. He didn’t know which brass had orchestrated this little charade and was observing, but he had a feeling they were watching with something akin to either pity or disappointment, or some combination of both.”
He was interrupted by a cry from one of the Marines, “Sir! We’re detecting a massive build-up of energy in the Bunker Hill. They’re shunting everything they’ve got into their weapons systems!”
Darson interpreted what that meant in a heartbeat and quickly and efficiently palmed the panel for the Comms, and opened up a secure channel to the Commander up in Ops and said calmly, =^=“Commander! This is Colonel Darson, We’ve detected the Bunker Hill putting everything They’ve got into weapons. There’s a high probability that they’re setting up for an Alpha Strike. Just thought you should know.” =^=
[DS5 Ops]
"Alpha Strike! Tactical, what is their target? Reinforce shields and deflectors. Petro, where are we with the Guardians!" David asked in a calm tone as he responded to the Colonel.
“Guardians ready sir.” Petro replied, a little stunned by the volume of her response.
=^= "Thank you Colonel. Have your men detained the interlopers outside the hanger bay?" The Commander inquired as he stepped towards the weapons console and Petro.
=^= “All hostile boarders have been neutralized Commander…And I’m ready to board them as soon as you give me a hole in the shields.” =^=
“Sir, everything is ready here.” She replied, nodding to Duquense.
[Main Astrometrics]
Greo looked up at the vast screen again, checking the progress of the battle. It seemed the ships were doing well and his scans had finally come together. He'd had to sideline his temporal scanner project to get everything up and running properly. Various smaller ships moved about the battle zone darting between the larger vessels. He tapped the communication panel on his station, calling up to main operations.
=^= "This is Lieutenant Tovon reporting from Main Astrometrics. I am monitoring the simulation from here, the sensor interface is a bit more sophisticated. I have been trying to evaluate the shield modulation pattern of the Bunker Hill and the tactical frequencies of the Daedalus. I think I may have something." =^=
Davies tapped the console at his fingertips. "Report Lieutenant, what do you think you have?" Davies replied to the science officer.
"Commander the Bunker Hill's shields are rotating on a unique pattern. It was difficult to lock it down, but I think I have the pattern. I am sending it through to your station now..." Greo watched as a small blip appeared on the screen on the edge of the battlefield. As soon as it appeared it vanished. He blinked, maybe it was just his eyes playing tricks on him. "...as for the Daedalus I believe that a broad spectrum gamma pulse might disrupt their communications and inhibit their multi vector assault mode."
Davies smiled. "I just asked Lieutenant Freeman to formulate something along those lines and Duquense has a working theory." He remarked, "Work with them, I want that pulse ready ten minutes ago and initiate as soon as possible. Petro, are those warheads in place?" He asked.
“Yes sir.” She said absently, thinking about the last comment. “Sir. Kentar, I mean, Commander Kentar mentioned something like that in his specs for a shuttle. I had an emitter beacon set up in conjunction with the Guardians. They’re small. I’m not sure they’ll work.” She explained. “They’re set for Gamma as well as Delta.” She said. “His idea.”
Warrant Officer Hiroshi spoke in "Everything is ready here in Engineering."
"I just need a few seconds to send the correct gamma frequency. Stand by." Tovon reported from Astrometrics.
"Engineering, science, I want these all working in conjunction now." He turned to the Ensign who seemed to be confident in her and her teams work and had the faintest smile on her thin lips.
"Ensign Petro, fire the first salvo." Davies ordered.
"Tovon to Davies. I have set the EM emitters on the main array to emit the gamma pulse. I have rerouted control to your station. It's ready for activation."
"Firing Salvo." Petro replied, setting the stage for victory.
{Bunker Hill}
Knowing that the station would have a surprise of their own Jarred waited for the final stages of the alpha strike salvo to complete its cycle, "Lock on to primary target, ops level." Jarred ordered. the tactical display showed the target lock, he looked over at Bruce Freeman, then at John Elliot, "Fire"
On the simulation displays of all the participants of the exercise showed the simulated alpha strike, a mass volley of phaser, photon torpedo and quantum torpedo fire being sustained at the station, then as if coming from nowhere the Bunker Hills deflector array came to life with a building charge of some kind.
"Arrays are online. Charging normally no problems so far." Freeman reported watching the display.
"The station has sustained massive damage to several sections, simulated fires and outages all over the target region, deflector dish weapon is fully charged." Martina reported
"Daedalus going in for their final run."
"Send the signal to the chief" Jarred said
{Aboard DS5}
Chief Ayers emerged from the Jefferies tube inside the shield generator room and began his work placing the simulated charges on the shield generators, as he placed and armed the last sensor unit on the generator he heard voices and quickly tapped in the commands to his tricorder, the short pulsing tones became a solid tone as the simulated charges went off, Chief Ayers quickly slipped back into the jefferies tube returning the way he came.
Gabriel read the Padd in his hand as it reported the simulated damage throughout the station due to the Alpha Strike. "Ah hell," Gabriel said aloud. The damage was going to significantly hinder a counterstrike against the opposing force.
Instructions had been given to capture any invaders and keep them in pre-designated holding facilities. The last thing he needed was an uprising in the middle of the battle.
*Taps* "Ensign Sheppard to Commander Gabriel, sector 3 team has detected an intruder within the jefferies tube near the shield generators." The officer reported.
~ So much for originality ~ Dorian thought to himself. "Were you able to stop him?" Gabriel said as he signaled for three nearby officers to follow him.
*Taps* "Not completely sir, he was able to activate the detonation sequence before he arrived to the area. However, we were able to stop the last sequence of charges from going off." Sheppard reported. "Damage was significant, but no where near as bad as it could have been. We need Engineering to get down here and do a more extensive survey of the damage, but for the time being we've got our would-be saboteur." Sheppard said as he kept the phaser trained on Chief Ayers.
*Taps* "Take him to the designated holding area until further orders are given. Have the rest of your team increase their patrol of the sector. There's no telling what other trick the other side is going to hatch." Gabriel said.
[OPS]
Petro worked to reroute the power for the shields to come from sources not necessary at the moment. There were several subroutines in place but only enough to bring the shields up to half of what was lost.
"Somethings wrong. Again. Shields are failing." She said, doing what she could to make sense of the senseless.
As the first volley hit the Bunkerhill, so their return fire hit the station.
The simulation panel lit up like a Christmas tree, reporting all sorts of damage upon the hull around Ops.
"Medical to Ops, we have reported casualties up here." Davies said with a heavy frown and shaking his head.
=^= Two teams on their way =^= Chelsea replied briefly, simultaneously giving the nod to the awaiting medics standing by who picked up their medkits and stood ready. Looking towards Ryan for his *senior officer* approval of these routine actions under his command, she received *his* nod of acknowledgment and instantly responded by tapping her comm badge again.
Instructing the computer to initiate site-to-site transporter transfer of the medics she joined one of the trios herself with Ed McBain leading the other. They materialized in Ops and the simulation registered their response. Taking out the indicated number of crew they returned to Sickbay leaving Ops short of the appropriate 'casualties' to authenticate the simulation.
"At least the Bunkerhill is nearly out of commission." Davies turned to Petro and continued, tapping the console for Commander Villiers to stand ready on the EMP. "Ensign, full spread from the Guardian platforms, finish the Bunkerhill before we concentrate on the Daedalus." He commanded, "Full phasers to the Daedulus with a backup spread of mini quantum's, time to finish this." Davies said with yet another quick glance to the now vacant window and tapping at comms.
=^= "Flight control, Lieutenant Dunham, take your wing to the left flank of the Daedalus. Commander Monteros, yours to the right."
=^=Roger that Sir=^= replied Dunham into his comm. He took what was left of his fighter wing past the left flank of the Daedalus. Ducking and weaving through enemy fire directed at their ships that looked so small next to the hull of the Starship they were now firing on. But although they looked small they packed a hell of a punch and each launched its full complement of weapons.
{Outside holding area}
As security escorted Chief Ayers over to the holding area he was stopped by Lieutenant Commander Gabriel, "Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me, fool me tree times?" he said trying to avoid laughing too hard.
"oops, guess your boys didn't do that good of a job disarming it." Chief Ayers looked at the two security "First round is on me."
Gabriel sighed in irritation as the device 'went off' killing all the occupants of the room. "You bastard." He said as his Padd registered the deaths of the four officers within the room.
"Congratulations on your Pyrrhic victory." He said begrudgingly. "Lock him up anyways just so I don't end up strangling him." Gabriel said to the other two officers as he checked with Ops on the status of the simulation.
[Marine HQ]
Darson steepled his hands once more and gazed at the situation on the screen. That last strike had been particularly damaging, and he was working the odds in his head to determined just how much they had shifted, when there was a blaring alarm, and several warning indicators popped up as the shield ratings for the station dropped like a stone.
“Sir! We have indications of simulated detonations on the primary shield generators. Shield efficacy has dropped off by 70%!”
“Who was in the area?” Darson hissed, “I thought we had gotten rid of all the boarders?”
“Affirmative sir…the only life-sign in the vicinity of the shield generators before the sensors were ‘destroyed’ was Chief Petty Officer Craig Ayers.”
Darson let out a low rumble of a sigh. So there was the saboteur. He hated being right, almost as much as he hated other people having smart ideas, “Alert Commander Gabriel, and dispatch a squad to that location to apprehend the Chief.”
“Yes sir…Sir, it appears that Commander Gabriel was in motion already. He has detained Chief Petty Officer Ayers, and is bringing him back to the Holding area.”
“Well, turns out that the good Mr. Gabriel really can do something right once In a –“
“Sir! Registering an explosive detonation in the holding area…4 dead: Chief Petty Officer Ayers, Two security officers, and Commander Gabriel.”
Darson let out a short chuckle, “I retract my previous statement. He’s still just as useless. Alright, since he’s gone, that leaves a void to fill. Patch us into the Security frequencies, and get us the ACSO…ask him if he wouldn’t mind us taking command for the rest of the exercise.”
“Right away sir.”
“And get me a status report on how my boarding parties are doing.”
“Yes Sir, Colonel.”
{Daedalus}
Dirk noticed a drop in DS5's shields and they weren't returning. "Klans I want that power boost now."
Once the power was activated Dirk took control of the weapons on all three sections of the ship on his captains chair. Sweat was dripping down his face. Even though this had been short it still was enough to get his adrenaline pumping. With the Daedalus coming to bear on DS5 pressed the button on his arm rest and fired all that they had. At the same time a volley of fire came from DS5. Noting that his ship had been 'destroyed' Dirk turned to Ensign Hudnall. "Hail DS5. Its time acknowledge their victory."
The Bunkerhill was lying silent, the lights were on, the transponders were signaling as the final round of warheads were dispatched from DS5.
"Sir," the man at comms began, we're getting a message from the Daedalus, they....."
He didn't finish his sentence as the view screen lit up in a bright whiteness as a live round hit the Bunkerhill midships.......
The whole of the operations crew stared forwards.
[Main Astrometrics]
Greo looked up in horror as the computer registered the live round on the vast display above him. The ships shields had been all but gone. He looked on as the computer readout displayed damage reports for the Bunkerhill. Real damage.
Petro looked up from the console in shock and horror. "Sir." She said to Davies, her eyes glued to the viewscreen.
"What in Gods' name!" Davies remarked.......
"What the Hell was that!" Shouted Dunham as a live torpedo round streaked passed and through the fighter wing narrowly missing his wing man an then tearing a hole into the side of Bunkerhill an explosion ripped forth creating a cascading fireball shaking the vessel violently and throwing her into a spin. =^= Bravo Leader to DS5. We have a blue on blue situation. repeat blue on blue. We have just Fired on the Bunkerhill!=^=
"Oh my god," Karen said, leaning her palms on the console. She was as powerless as any of them to avert it. How could it happen? One of the crew ... the station was flooded with members of less than friendly species ... could they have? Did they even know about the exercise? These thoughts spiralled through her mind as it hit.
[Marine HQ]
Darson sat up straight as the giant screen lit up with warning indicators and more alarms began to sound. He shouted out, “Somebody silence those alarms! Report!”
Lt. Flynn ran up with a frazzled expression on her face, “Sir, Deep Space 5 has apparently just fired a live round at the Bunkerhill! It went right through her shields and struck amidships!”
Darson threw back the hood of his cloak, then stood up and said in a loud voice, urgently but calmly “Send out a message on the emergency Comm frequencies. ‘To all units in the area, this exercise is terminated. Repeat, terminated. Disaster Response protocols are in effect. All Federation vessels capable of rendering aid should begin assisting immediately.’…and somebody find out exactly how this happened! I want an initial report ASAP!!”
TO BE CONTINUED......... in "Casualties of War"
Commander David Davies
CO: DS5
Lt. Cmdr.
Dorian Gabriel
Chief of Security
Bruce Freeman/Dirk Alphonse
CEO DS5/CO USS-Daedalus
Lt. Colonel James Darson
Marine Commanding Officer
6th Combined Operations Group
Lt Richard Dunham
Squadron Leader
Jarred Wallace/Marina Perth/Craig Ayers/Mikeal Akerfel
CIO DS5/Intel officer DS5/Encryptions/XO USS Daedalus
Lt. j.g. Vincent Tan
Chief Strategic Operations Officer
Lt Greo Tovon
Acting Chief Science Officer
Ensign John Elliott,
Assistant Chief of Operations, DS5
Ensign Taali South (NPC)
Helm Officer - USS Bunkerhill
1st Lieutenant Daniel Brady
Marine XO, DS5
Ensign Petro
Quartermaster - DS5
Commander Karen Villiers
Executive Officer. DS5