Lieutenant Anton Richards - A Smuggler's Cube
Writer Guy
((Lower Aft Cargo Bay, Deck 11, USS Octavia E Butler))
Richards: So where is this independent bay?
Nilsen: Attached to the OC. I’ve not had a chance to use it yet/ Kinda looking forward to it.
Arlill: No one has lieutenant, it was flagged OC Chief only, I wanted to keep the seal on it as long as possible or at least until an interesting project or case presented itself. (beat) I believe this qualifies.
Anton wanted to see the new thing, and if he was one of the first to see the new thing, even better.
Richards: I think it does as well.
Arlill: It was gifted by Promontory when the ship was in the buildout phase.
Nilsen: I had no idea he threw that in for us. Sweet. Remind me to send him something to say thanks.::beat:: I'll catch up with both you folks in a minute; Mads is investigating this too and I wanna call him to see what he found.
Arlill: ****It’s not ::looking at Richards and then Lhandon:: to become ship wide news, understood?
Anton nodded, briefly thinking about Sherlocks warnings about the Ops people, before putting them to the back of his head for the time being.
Richards: You got it.
Arlill: =/\= Computer, Toxin protocol 118. =/\=
Computer: =/\= Protocol active, you may proceed when ready. =/\=
Arlill: =/\= Transport this case to OPs Room T1. =/\=
The transport beam surrounded the crate, and shortly afterwards it was gone.
(Independent Bay, Operations Centre Lower Floor, Deck 7, USS Octavia E Butler)
Anton and Toxin arrived to Ops.
Richards: So here we are.
Arlill: Welcome back to Ops.
Anton nodded, he wanted to find a way to start up a conversation with Arlill, but he didn’t know much about him.
Richards: So what’s the deal with the T1 anyways, I’ve never heard that before.
Anton looked over at his blue companion curiously.
Arlill: Let’s just say T1 was a name and not the start of a sequence, shall we?
Anton had thought it meant something along the lines of “pronto” or “stat” as the medical guys would say, Anton mentally shuttered at the thought of medical guys.
Lhandon arrived shortly after the pair.
Nilsen: So I made some calls. Both Chief Petty Officer Ral Shaw of the USS Artemis and Security officer Madison Nilsen, DS9, he's my little brother I mentioned earlier, are certain we've found a smuggling ring. Ral found two crates of contraband, with one meant to come to us. They've since opened those crates. One of those crates were meant to have plasma line decouplers but were empty, the other had fusion power generators when it should have contained EPS control units.
Arlill: Not exactly prime equipment for the black market, most of those items aren’t even classified component designs.
Anton agreed.
Richards: Yeah. Seems like a pretty sophisticated operation for all that stuff.
Nilsen: One of the crates from DS9 to the Artemis should have had empty plasma containers but instead lateral sensor spare parts. ::beat:: but that's not all. They also found in that crate this strange cube device. I've got pictures here. Mads is working that now. He said he’d get back to me when he gets it sorted.
Lhandon showed on his PADD a picture of what appeared to be a simple, unassuming cube - but in Anton’s head there was no such thing as an unassuming cube. Cube of death, Borg cube, cubical. All sorts of terrible things.
Arlill: Have Madison send us his scanner readings of that box, I’m curious if it’s composition is similar to the locks in this box.
Richards: I think that whatever the smugglers are trying to hide from us, that cube must be a clue.
Nilsen: Yeah, I think this pretty much confirms that we've found a smuggling ring. We've got security here already but is this something you want to escalate, or will that tip off the smugglers? At the moment, only five people know about this; us three, Ral Shaw and Madison. Tox, with that in mind, what's your orders?
Anton thought about it for a second, could the smugglers ring go so deep that his fellow officers were involved?
Arlill: I’ll handle the reporting, you three ::realizing he slipped:: you two, rather, work on getting into this crate, but be careful.
Anton nodded once again, this time glancing over at Nilsen.
Richards: Alright.
Nilsen: response
Toxin glanced around the room, while Anton was thinking of more things that were nefariously shaped like a cube. He was out of ideas.
Arlill: You guys work for a moment, I’m going to send a message.
Toxin stepped out briefly, which gave Anton a chance to talk to Lhandon.
Richards: You’ve known him for much longer than I have. Does he seem to be acting suspicious to you?
Anton didn’t want to think that his investigation team had been compromised, but his training in security led him to follow up on every suspicion. Plus he had been warned about the Ops team already.
Could Nilsen be in on it as well?, he thought. Probably not, he seemed just a little too enthusiastic to break into the cube in the first place.
Nilsen: Response?
Richards: Doesn’t he seem like he is preoccupied with something, plus exiting the room to make sure we don’t hear his message. Not to mention he seems to be a little upset that we are even looking into it.
Nilsen: Response?
Toxin returned into the T1 suite and listened to the two officers carry on for a moment. Anton didn’t notice at first.
Richards: Well maybe we should keep an eye out is all. If he is in on it, the smugglers will be one step ahead of us at all times.
Anton’s eye met Toxin’s and he darted his gaze quickly away.
Richards: Oh! And Rubix cube! Heh. That’s another type of cube.
He was going to have to be more careful.
Toxin/Nilsen: Response?
Richards: So what's the word?
This time Anton was going to be observing the Bolian closely. If he slipped up once, Anton would notice.
Nilsen/Toxin: Responses
Richards: I’m just trying to get to the bottom of this smugglers cube, I mean ring.
Nilsen/Toxin: Responses
==========TAGS & TBC==========
Lieutenant Anton Richards
Security Officer
USS Octavia E. Butler - NCC-82850
T239802AR1
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