241601.05 Joint log: CO, CEO, EO

Posted on Wed Jan 6th, 2016 @ 6:58am by Captain Alistar McKeon & Lieutenant Kev Walker & Lieutenant Jera'turak Ros

882 words; about a 4 minute read

If there was one thing Alistar hated, it was not being prepared for a situation he knew little or nothing about beforehand. For that reason, he had called his top two engineers in to the ready room. As he waited, he read over a full report he had received from Starfleet on ship that had disappeared in that sector. The list wasn't long, but it also wasn't complete. The records only went back twenty or so years, so there could be far more than what was on the list that was missing. The list he had was interesting enough, in all nearly twelve ships that Starfleet had reported as missing in that region. It wasn't exactly as helpful as he had thought it would be.

Jera hurried to the ready room with Walker a few steps behind. Rather than grumble at the fact that he was slowing her down, she tried to use the extra time to figure out why they were both being called to the captain’s ready room. In her experience, that wasn't always a good thing and the recent situation with the gambling set up was still ringing through her head. The worse that could happen in Jera's mind was that she could lose her field commission, and with the way McKeon had handing out disciplinary actions lately, that was a possibility. Arriving at the ready room door, Jera pressed the door chime.

"Enter," Alistar said without looking up from the padd he was reading.

Jera took a step through the doors and hissed softly as she noticed that the captain was reading something. That was never a good sign in her experience. Stopping in front of the desk, she adopted a parade rest stance and waited.

Kev hurried down the corridors after Jera Ros and mumbled under his breath. He was taller than the chief engineer, but somehow the short woman managed to get halfway down the corridor before he had taken three steps every time he tried to follow her somewhere. It was a mystery and it drove him crazy trying to figure it out. Either way, Kev followed her to the ready room, trailing several steps behind the whole way. Following Ros into the ready room, he followed suit and stood at rest while the doors slid closed behind them.

Alistar glanced up and hid a grin as he caught the worried looks on the faces of the two engineers. It was a small entertainment, and being captain he took every chance he could at terrorizing his crew without stepping over the line. "Ros, Walker. We've detected a Starfleet signal somewhere in this region and are en route now. I'm not sure exactly what we'll find, but I want engineering to be ready. How soon can you have a team ready to go?"

"That depends on what's going on, sir," Jera said in reply. "There could be any number of propulsion issues, system malfunctions, or even worse the ship could be in a self quarantine. Then there's the matter of whether or not there's any life support systems on line. We'd have to prioritize what we worked on, and that means the team would most likely have to be a mixed team of specialists."

"If they're unable to do anything but send a distress signal, they could have battle damage, or worse," Kev added.

"What's worse than battle damage?" Alistar asked with a frown.

"A domino effect," Jera answered, shuddering.

"A what," Alistar asked.

"It's what we call a domino effect, sir," Kev said. "Basically, one system fails and sets off chain reactions through which multiple systems that are tied to the previous system or in some way affected by its functioning also fail. It's not as common as it once was. On older ships like the old Constitution and even some of the Excelsior and Miranda class ships it was known to happen from time to time. Most modern ships have safe guards in place but it can still happen if a failsafe system is turned off or if the engineering crew is totally incompetent. The last time I heard of it happening it affected a Nebula class ship during the war."

Alistar frowned thoughtfully for a long moment. "How often do these malfunctions take place on civilian ships?" he asked.

"More frequently than on Starfleet ships," Kev replied. "But then, civilian codes and standards aren't as strict as Starfleet."

"And the possibility of a quick fix?" Alistar asked.

"A quick fix? On a domino effect?" Jera snorted. "There isn't one. It could take a week just to track down what set the whole thing off in the first place. Sir, the best we can hope for is that this ship is suffering from engine problems. Otherwise we might be a while."

"Alright. Once we locate this ship, our top priority is to find out what's wrong and work up an estimate on what it will take to complete repairs. Put a team of field specialists together and have them on standby when we arrive. That'll be in and around five hours. Ros, I want you on the bridge to make an initial estimate when we arrive," Alistar said.

"Yes sir," Jera said. "Is that all sir?"

"That's all for now. Dismissed," Alistar said.

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