Mission Log 22 - Stardate 21701.16 "Hostile Negotiation"

The Sheridan is dispatched with a Federation Councilperson aboard in order to provide escort to the Ecurai system in order to negotiate further trade agreements with the Democratic Romulan Republic.

When the ship reaches Ecurai and the Federation Councilperson beams down, chaos ensues...

More to come here...

Captain's Logs

Cdr Griffin Wright

Stardate 21707.29

Captain's log - Stardate 21707.29
Commander Wright, USS Sheridan

As I compose this, I am hidden away in a quiet corner of the Sheridan's reading room. With all of the damage throughout the ship, I've been staying with Lt Murphy (to my delight, which I really shouldn't have in this log, but oh well) but need a quiet place to catch up on paperwork. We are very close to Starbase Bravo, our new home as we are now part of the 2nd Fleet. Once we dock, I will report to Commodore Nezmah for debriefing and to prepare Ensign Black's Court-Martial.

I do not know what this will mean for my future, as I was in command during the 'incident', which I will get to. However, I'm confident the Sheridan will continue to be a worthy ship with a fine crew, no matter what happens...

Our assigned mission didn't sound like it would be eventful: transport a Federation official to talks with the DRR and provide security and diplomatic support. While the Ambassador turned out to be an ***, I certainly don't feel his unfortunate end was justified.

The trouble started as we briefed the crew and got underway, with an explosion in the Observation Lounge. I have now been blown up so many times I've lost count. Regardless, that is still under investigation, but we continued on our mission.

Once we made it to our destination and beamed down to the surface of Ecurai with the diplomatic detail, we discovered that my Chief of Security had gone missing. While we were eventually reunited with Commander Sothrick, we have yet to figure out what happened, and he hasn't been the same since. I am recommending he undergo a full psychiatric evaluation while on Bravo.

To make a long story short, there was an attempted assassination during the conference, and we lost one of our crew, Crewman th'Kolen, who made the ultimate sacrifice. In addition, Ensign Jeffries was seriously injured as well. That was not my finest hour, and the suspect got away, transported away before he could be secured.

And then...

While we worked to help the search for the suspect who had been transported elsewhere within the capital facility, Ensign Black was handed a logistics PADD and was discussing it with one of her Romulan counterparts. Moments later, she went quiet and pulled her phaser. Before she could be stopped, she killed the Ambassador (again, an ***, but not deserving of death) in cold blood, in front of us. The shot was point-blank, and nothing could be done to save him. Security Officer Tom McCroy quickly took down Black, and we all returned to the Sheridan with the Ambassador's body in-hand after a hasty departure. Suffice to say our relations with the DRR were not improved by these events.

Ensign Black has been secured in the brig during our travel to SBB, and the Commodore has been made aware of the situation. I am to meet with her upon our arrival, and Court-Martial proceedings will begin straightaway as well for Ensign Black.

I am ashamed. I certainly had no inkling that Black was capable of such treachery, and it breaks my heart. She had so much promise, and threw it away in an instant. She claims to have no memory of the incident, so I guess I don't know what will happen. We will find out before too long, however. In the meantime I will oversee the docking at Bravo and coordinate repairs to the ship which was severely damaged to to anti-tachyons infiltrating the ship - we still don't know what caused all that but the teams of Bravo will figure it out.

The state of my ship, and the events of this most recent mission while I was in command don't seem like they'll speak well for my career, and I am eternally frustrated by this. I will hope that Cmdr Nezmah is understanding...

End log.

Crew Logs

First Officer

Cdr Harrison Boislevesque

Stardate 2107.10

First Officer’s Log
StarDate 2107.10

First Officer Commander Harrison Boislevesque reporting.

I am really going to get my derrière kicked by either Captain Wright or someone from Command due to my ability not to make reports more regularly.

So down to business, our mission was to transport an Ambassador from Earth to a meeting with the Democratic Romulan Republic as it seems as there has been no completion of treaty terms after there wee helped to evacuate Romulus.

We had the mission briefing in the Conference Room where we learnt about the mission and the fact that the Ambassador for some reason didn't like the VIP quarter which are the most luxurious ones on the ship and he chose to disrupt Lt Feta's life and throw him out a his own quarters and take up residence there.

Towards the end of the briefing it seemed as though someone didn't want the mission to go ahead as an exploration ripped through the Conference Lounge, I managed to stay sort of save as I flung myself towards the Captain knocking him out of his chair and onto the floor, luckily there was no fatalities among the people in the room.

Upon arriving at the DRR and initial contact was established we sent a diplomatic team along with the Ambassador, as it was a sensitive nature I declined the lead role form the Sheridan and indicated that Captain Wright was the best option to lead the team, but he had to be accompanied by the ships Chief of Security Lieutenant Commander Sothrick.

With the away team in the surface the rest of us turned out attention to the issue which were happening around the planet, it turned out the for some unknown reason there was pockets of anti-tachyons which when they come in contact with the hull started eating away at the hull plating, the issue was that we were having some technological issue with our deflector shields and they weren't protecting the ship.

In the end it got to a point where I ended up ordering the evacuation of Deck Two and also Deck One, I sent my family and Lieutenant Orano’s young daughter to The Ten Forwards Lounge on Deck Five and the crew which were based on the Main Bridge, we went to the Auxiliary Bridge to continue with the running of the ship.

There was so many thing that were happening on the ship around this time that I think I might have lost count of them, there was the two decks being closed down, no working deflector dish, no gravity on deck six and those anti-tachyons were now digging in to the hull near the anti-matter injection system which if they did intermix then we would be in some serious trouble and there would be a ship left to come home too.

We managed to fix the anti-tachyon issues by emptying the Buzzard Ramscoop which seemed to be housing the normally useless tachyons which counteracted each other, this gave the ship the ability to use its sensors again, along with it's transporters.

The good thing was that as there was no more anti-tachyons attacking the ship, which meant that we were able to start getting thing back on track and find out what has happened to the away team and information on that wasn't what I was expecting either as from the information we were told that there had been another explosion on the planet which caused massive amount of damage to the conference building a there was some fatalities.

We also leaned that the Ambassador had been killed during the mission and to make things worse it seemed as thought Ensign Black was responsible for the murder/assassination or what ever it is being called.

We will have to see what happens when we get to StarBase Bravo as the Ensign will be put thu get a court martial, which I'm thinking that I might be apart of.

End Log.

Tactical

CTO Lt Maggie Murphy

Stardate 21708.02

Chief Tactical Officer's Log
Stardate 21708.02

This is one Away Mission I really missed out on. Since being promoted to Chief, I've given up the ability to jump at missions – instead, I send someone else. This mission, while interesting to Starfleet HQ, seemed like a simple deliver-and-drop. An Ambassador to Romulan space, where they -the Ambassador- could work out troubles between the Romulans and whoever they've pissed off lately.

Whoops. I'll try to refrain from cussing. Save it for the personal log, I know.

The Ambassador, all personal comments aside... appeared ready for the job. He confiscated a crewman's quarters without permission, and set about doing his work. When we arrived at the planet, he insisted on having a Starfleet accompaniment, so the Captain and some Security went down with him.

What happened on the surface... I really can't tell you. The talks were about to happen, as I understand it, and there was... an explosion? And everyone was evacuated. And then the Ambassador was shot and killed. I'll... I'll withhold names for now, pending the investigation. I also didn't see it happen with my own eyes, so I'll just...

• Sound of a throat clearing *

Anyway, back at the ranch... the Sheri and I got into a bit of trouble. We were doing okay, orbiting Romulus with another of their ships, presumably to keep an eye on us. Since we weren't doing anything but waiting for Griff-- Captain Wright to come back, it wasn't really an issue. Of course, something always has to happen - “Murphy's Law,” right? - and we encountered the strangest thing. Tachyon clouds! Man, I wish we had time to investigate. Unfortunately, we're not a Science Ship, and though we were able to send out a probe, it did little to help us. Oh! Yeah, the tachyon particles started permeating the ship, god, and starting just all sorts of sh—issues for us. It actually turned pretty bad... the ship's in rough shape. The Captain's personal room is destroyed. We couldn't even seal off decks with force fields.

The Romulans saved us. We couldn't escape the cloud on our own, and we couldn't communicate with the other ship to try and think of a plan. The Romulans... they used what they could of their engines, and butted us out of there. We managed to empty the bussards -which were full of these tachyons- but it was too late for the Romulans... and they were destroyed.

The Away Team beamed up. We've someone in holding. We're limping our way back to Bravo.

Oh, yeah. That's our new home base now. Bravo.

Hope they can handle us.

End Log.

Security

Ens Mazikeen T. Black

Stardate 21707.02

Witness Statement
Mazikeen T. Black Ensign SN: TYD-197-R USS Sheridan. DD-4088

I had been assigned to the USS Sheridan. Upon arrival, I was present when an explosive device was detonated on the observation lounge containing a majority of the senior staff and the Ambassador.

I will state for the record that upon meeting the Ambassador I thought he was a complete and utter [Redacted].

The rest of the voyage to our destination was uneventful.

When we arrived, I was assigned to the awayteam along with Doctor Hurst, and Lieutenant Oregano. Were were first to transport down where we were greeted by the Romulan delegation.

The Ambassador and Captain transported in next with a detachment of three security officers. Commander Sothrick was not present despite the transport operators conforming his transport.

We as a group moved into the Embassy building. I gave orders to Ensign Jeffries to deploy her personnel how she deemed best while I requested more support from the Sheridan to assist in both the Ambassadors protection and to assist in the search for the Commander. I will admit now that the Ambassador did get my goat right up, and I had words with him.

The Council chambers were sealed and we were about to begin our search for the Commander when there was an explosion from within the chambers.

Lieutenant Oregano managed to open the lockout and we assessed the situation. The Captain and Ambassador were both okay. Jeffries was unconscious, and there was one fatality from our group, Crewman th'Kolen.

The next thing to happen was the Romulans arrived en mass, demanding at first we hand over our weapons, before they were told to stand down and a suspect was produced.

This suspect was subsequently extracted by his people right under our noses.

The last think I remember was being handed a PADD containing tactical data pertaining to the terrorists they had been tracking and believed responsible for the attack.

Then I was standing over the Ambassadors body with my phaser.

I honestly don't know what happened. I obviously shot him. And I'm sorry. I just don't know why I shot him. I mean, sure he was a total [Redacted], but why did I do it?

I wish I knew.

End Log.

Engineering

CE Lt Dick Powell

Stardate 21610.31

Official Log, R. S. Powell
Chief Engineer, USS Sheridan, DD-4086
Stardate 21610.31

Another mission completed. Not too successfully, but it didn't entail blowing up a Federation ship, unlike my last assignment. We managed to permanently scar the population of a planet with a protector-god-creature, their "mother", by broadcasting a fantastic symphony, Strauss' 2nd, over their own telecommunications infrastructure---and nearly at their request!

Midway through first contact, a replicator detonated, injuring the captain. That is currently my project---it needs replaced, and the captain would like to know why it detonated. I've coupled that with a security audit and some maintenance of all other replicators. Atop those, I would like to modify the transporters to function through the biological shield that the "mother" of this planet was. I've been studying the sensor logs to look for weaknesses. I plan to forward them to some professors at the academy, to see if they have any suggestions, or would like to take a crack at the problem. I'm also studying the teleportation technology the shield provided.

It seems that our captain still has some things to learn---like myself, he is impulsive at the worst of times, and a little careless and aggressive at the best. Sothrick was a rock on the bridge. He kept cool, and provided sanity checks for every action we took. He wasn't perfect---even a Vulcan couldn't be, but he did try. This crew still has some work to do, to pull together and act like one.

End Log.

Science

CSO Lt Feta

Stardate 21610.23

CSO Feta's Personal Log
Star Date 21610.23

Okay, wow. The planet, home to the Eklata, turned out to conform to a number of both our hopes and fears. There was almost a loss of life due to misunderstanding, but other than that it went well. Well... except for the fact that the Eklata, or perhaps just the "Mother", have decided to remain isolated for now.

The Mother was interesting, confirming theories of an unnatural origin. It's self-insertion into the Eklata is much to far in the past for us to feel any obligation to prevent it from interfering further with the Eklata's development. I am not sure we could stop it if we tried in any case. I suspect this will be a topic of debate among Federation scientists, politicians, and anyone interested in ethics. Depending on how public our mission becomes, that is. We have not been ordered to keep quite, for now.

I was probably not the best choice of Scientist for the Away Team, but I can see how sending one of the more specialized members of the crew would not be ideal in First Contact. I am going to have to smooth things over with the people I had assured would be able to visit the planet in person in the future. At least we have countless hours of Eklata broadcasts for them to pour over, I guess. What we had learned of the language can be used to make the UT algorithm better in the future.

The novel biology, culture and alien "Mother" of the Eklata will be of great interest across the Federation.

Overall, today was a great boon for Science!

End Log.