LtJG Jovenan – In a haystack
Jovenan
((Bridge, USS Artemis))
MacKenzie: Take us in, Mr. Yalu.
Yalu: Let’s do it. ::to Kader:: Ensign, one-quarter impulse, bearing 015 mark 019.
Kader: response
Yalu: ::to Silveira:: Lieutenant, shields to maximum. ::to Vedic:: Ensign, steady as she goes. Keep an eye on our propulsion systems as we cross the threshold.
Silveira: Tactical systems ready. Shields up.
Vedic: Engines are compensating for the resistance of the nebula, drawing five percent more power, captain. Nothing to worry about.
The ship began to glide into the Nebula. The impulse speed is sub-light speed and hence enormously much slower than warp speeds, but it still didn’t take long for them to dive into the cloud. At first, one couldn’t even notice the thin dust floating around them, but the nebula grew denser and soon they were surrounded by a purple veil.
Jovenan had started her work without a separate order. The scientific sensors were under her now, with all active sensor requests suspended. The bridge needed the sensors for themselves when the hunt would begin, not to mention they wanted to avoid leaving too much of scanner emission for the Berlin to detect. The Nebula was dangerous region, but the drill required the scans to be well controlled.
Savel: response
Jovenan: Mapping all the plasma currents and other hazards we can currently see. Shall I start following the Berlin, sir?
Silveira: If you can see them. My tactical sensors don’t allow me to target properly. But I can take a pot shot. With some luck we hit them somewhere it hurts.
She divided her interfaces to three. One was for their environment, showing readouts on all the plasma currents, eddies and objects their sensors could pick up. The other was for sensor status and stellar cartography reports. After all, the people in the pod and on Deck 9 were working hard as well. Lastly, she had a screen dedicated to any signs of the Berlin: impulse wakes, hull’s metallic components, non-naturally occurring radiation and so on.
As of yet, there were no definite signs of the Berlin. But it was somewhere out there.
Vedic: With my luck you’ll hit a pocket of charged dilithium and blow a hole in our shields.
oO That’s how much you trust my abilities to spot hazards? Oo
Yalu: ::beat:: You’ve got this, Ensign.
MacKenzie / Kader / Savel: response
Silveira: I know, I know, but at least we would get the merit of drawing first blood.
Vedic: I’d rather draw last blood, myself.
Jovenan kept inputting new data of their surroundings to the navigational charts so that the helm and the command could spot the hazards and potential hiding places. So far, they had avoided all the tricky spots, but there were also no signs of the Berlin either.
The Nebula became denser and the composition of the cloud more hostile. The passive sensors and low-energy scanner were becoming unable to see through the mass.
Jovenan: The Nebula is getting too dense for standard sensors. Activating periodic long-range scanner sweeps to compensate, low-level at first. ::pause:: It will increase our particle emissions, but at least we’re less likely to hit something nasty.
MacKenzie/Kader/Savel: response
Vedic: Captain, I’m going to tether the auxiliary sensors into the navigational deflector, so we have an extra set of eyes in case we lose the first.
Good. The had a secondary sensor array on Deck 9, much harder to hit than the big hump on the ship’s back.
MacKenzie: response
A sudden tremor shook the ship, and the shields flashed briefly. Jovenan took a hold of her console to keep the balance, but the quiver wasn’t strong enough to topple her.
Vedic: Shields holding, Captain.
Jovenan checked the readings on her interface. A minor plasma flake. Unexpected, but not dangerous. Yet.
MacKenzie / Silveira / Kader: response
Yalu: Lieutenant Jovenan, those plasma flares are increasing in intensity. Can you identify a cause?
Lieutenant Jovenan. That sounds so funny. No, concentrate!
Jovenan: Uh, there is… Ummm… Just a second… There’s a particularly dense region of molecular cloud a million kilometres from us, mark 087. A potential protostar if something triggers a gravitational collapse. Its magnetic field is disturbing the plasma concentrates.
It was also blocking some of their scanners. Great place to hide, but also immensely dangerous.
Yalu: Ensign Savel, deploy security teams to Engineering, the shuttlebays, and the bridge. Use your best judgment for their number and type of sidearm.
Savel: response
Yalu: Lieutenant Silveira, give us an imaginary enemy. Say, 10,000 kilometers off our port bow and closing at one-eighth impulse. Ready weapons. Ensign Kader, plot an oblique intercept course. Ensign Vedic, give us as much speed as you think we can handle.
Silveira / Kader / Vedic: response
Jovenan wasn’t sure what practicing with an imaginary target was good for when a real one – friendly, but still – was still after them. But she trusted the Captain and Commander Yalu to know what they were doing.
The ship shook again. No matter how well she kept mapping them and Kader kept avoiding them, running a ship through a spot like this was a risky game. Jovenan tried to control her breathing. Vedic might have had a point the whole time. Keep calm. Don’t let the anxiety take over again.
Yalu: ::to MacKenzie:: When Genkos and Talos decide to strike, I want to be ready.
MacKenzie: response
While the rest of the bridge crew were preparing with the imaginary target, Jovenan kept her attention on the hazards of their environments. She increased the long-range scanner intensity periodically to compensate for the difficult surroundings.
Any: Response
A blink. Jovenan turned to face the screen that looked for signs of the Berlin. The numbers get running cross the screen, but some of them were different. Larger. Not by much, but there was something there.
Jovenan: Sir! I’ve spotted something that might be an impulse wake.
MacKenzie/Yalu: Response
Jovenan: ::shakes head:: Not sure. It was there just for a split second before being obscured behind that plasma bubble. Permission to activate a multiphasic scan on that direction? It would give us better readings but might alert them that we’re scanning them.
MacKenzie/Yalu: Response
Any: Response
TAG/TBC
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Lieutenant JG Jovenan
Science officer
USS Artemis-A
E239911J11