Lay of the Land

Posted on Sun Feb 27th, 2022 @ 10:52pm by Lieutenant Didrea Zade & Senior Chief Petty Officer Mason Malone

Mission: With Gleaming Eyes
Location: Ithaca II - near triage site
Timeline: MD04 - 0830 hrs
1782 words - 3.6 OF Standard Post Measure

After getting the translator fixed by Finn, Zade headed to the turbolift to go to the security offices. She preferred working in pairs, especially if Cardassians were involved, and wanted to see if anyone was available or planning to go to the surface. That was the primary reason, at least. Despite two briefings in the past 12 hours, Zade was still not content with her knowledge of the situation. Munro and Kane had basically said the same thing, which felt more like something someone would explain while in a turbolift. By partnering with one of the crew here, Zade hoped that she'd get a little more information about the relationship, if any, between the Cardassians and the locals and how that affects distribution of a cure.

The Trill entered the security offices and looked around. Maybe the officers were already off doing tasks, but the offices seemed... a little emptier than expected. Ideally, she wanted to find someone who has been on the ground, but the only people she knew aside from the team she arrived with were Kane and Finn. It would help to see who has been on the surface lately, then go ask around. Zade moved to a nearby console and began typing to get a record of transports from the ship to the surface.

Mason observed the female newcomer for a few seconds, then chose to walk up to her. "Excuse me ma'am... who're you, and what are you doing here?"

Zade looked up, seeing a brown-haired man watching her. "I'm Lieutenant Zade from the Colossal," she said, lifting her hands from the console. "Your captain told me to work with security to assist the medical efforts on the surface." Realizing that she just waltzed into another ship's security office and started typing away on a console, she mentally facepalmed. She knew if that happened on her ship, she'd be suspicious. "I tend to work in teams, so I came here to find a partner to go to the surface. I apologize for any alarm."

"Ah... well I don't know where Kev- I mean Lieutenant Dash is so I guess it'll be me?" He offered her his hand. "Chief Mason Malone ma'am," he introduced himself, "I'm the ship's investigation's officer." Though he actually used ma'am, he wasn't actually sure if she had a preference towards either ma'am or sir. He knew there were women who did prefer the latter, but he tended to go with what his oldest sister had drilled into him from a very young age. A woman rated being called ma'am, anything else was just being plain rude.

Giving a small smile, Zade accepted the hand and gave it a shake. "Nice to meet you, Chief Malone." Dash must be acting chief of security then, Zade thought, making a note of the name. "Because I was assigned here on short notice, I only have a vague idea of what's going on. Having someone familiar with the situation helps." She paused, then asked, "is there anything here you need to wrap up first?"

"Uhh no... I'm good to go..." There was only that little space egg thing, but that could wait. "Lemme get us both a phaser, and we can go."

As Zade waited for Mason to return, she took the opportunity to look around the security office a little more. It was slightly larger than the one on the Colossal, with consoles and seats around the place. The handful of officers she could see were either seated at a console or walking between places. A couple of them had glanced at her when Mason approached, but they eventually turned their attention back to work.

It was a short trip to the transporter room and then down to the surface. "Where'd you like to go ma'am," he asked, "or uhm...where were you told to go? I've only been in the city and in the mine, really..." He pulled out his phaser, just to be safe. You just never knew with this brewing civilian unrest here, even though most of him felt the Metis had no real blame in this. The Cardassians, as always, were the oppressors.

Zade held the borrowed phaser in her hand as well, following Mason's suit, but kept it at her side. "The triage site." As she looked around, she saw a building with what looked like a force field generator near the entrance, but they were far enough away that it was difficult to say for certain. "What's that over there?" she asked, pointing.

"Probably one of the Cardassian buildings, and given the forcefield I'm sure they're trying to keep both people away from it, and people inside?" Mason nodded towards the other direction. "Triage site is that way ma'am. I've not been there for long, I'll admit, but I do think the place has plenty of security teams walking around, making sure those that are infected aren't mingling with the rest of the population. This thing is highly infectious, and it's even hit several of our crew."

The Trill began walking in the direction Mason gestured. Some of the crew have gotten sick? That was not covered in her briefing, though it makes sense that a virus would inevitably spread when given the chance. It also sounded like security was in charge of limiting the spread. "Hopefully no crew fatalities from the virus?" she asked.

"Not that I'm aware of, but it doesn't seem to affect ah... purebloods. At least none of the purebloods among the crew have gotten sick, I think." Mason shrugged. "We did find something exciting in the mines though, we've called it a probably space egg, as we think it's an egg from the space creatures we encountered last mission. Anyway.." He gestured ahead. "The triage site is where most of the locals are getting treated, those with mild symptoms anyways. And our sick crewmembers, they're uhm... locked away in the shuttle."

Zade nodded along, looking in the direction Mason pointed, then blinked as she finally processed the space egg thing. Finding a space egg here felt so... random. "Interesting..." She paused for a moment to mentally collect what she's gathered on the mission so far. "What's the situation with the Cardassians and the locals? I heard there was a conflict of sorts yesterday."

"From our observation, the Metis are being oppressed by the Cardassians, however this does seem to be going for at least one or two generations now. It also seems not everyone is showing the same behaviour as there are Cardassian-Metis hybrids and there do seem to be stable families, again with second generation hybrid children. Obviously we only see one side of things as we don't really get to talk to any of the more severe cases in this illness. From the reports I read, medical are working hard on a cure, together with science, and the counselor has gone off to talk to people."

The Trill nodded again as she processed the information. The way Mason described it sounded like there was definitely some complex hierarchy going on. Mason was right, though, it seemed they were only seeing part of the whole picture, so she had to be careful with speculation. The task of assisting the medical team was starting to make more sense... if there is some hierarchy, there would undoubtedly be dispute over who gets the cure first once it's ready to distribute. "Does security have a plan yet for when a cure is ready to distribute? Something tells me the Cardassians and the Metis won't patiently wait their turn." Looking ahead at the triage site, she saw a tiny white blip in the air circling in for a landing, probably the team from the Colossal in the shuttle.

"I'm just a simple investigations officer ma'am," Mason replied, "I have no knowledge of how anyone would like to distribute anything. I go where I'm ordered to go, and I do what I'm ordered to do. As far as waiting turns goes... my gut feeling says the Cardassians will hog it all, and the Metis will never see any of it unless we control distribution altogether." Mason too saw the landing shuttle, and nodded to a second shuttle that was a little away from the triage site. "That one holds two of our own," he answered, "Lieutenant Leiko and a civilian, Mister Van Rijn. They're the hybrids I mentioned that got sick."

Either a plan must still be in the works then, or there might not even be one yet, though it does all depend on when a cure is ready, Zade thought with a frown, clearly not satisfied with his answer. She was definitely used to pre-planning, so the lack of knowledge came as a surprise, especially considering who they were dealing with. It tempted the urge to start coming up with her own plan, but she also knew that she was effectively a borrowed officer and it wasn't really her place to tell another ship's team what to do. "My gut is saying the same thing, to be honest." She looked toward the surface, spotting the second shuttle Mason pointed out. "I hope they're doing alright," she said sympathetically. It sounded like this virus was nasty, especially if it could mutate enough to affect people of completely different species than the Metis or Cardassians.

"Oh, you mentioned a Lieutenant Dash... is he the acting security chief?" Zade asked, watching the airborne shuttle settle to the ground. They were close enough now that they could make out some finer details of the shuttle, compared to the white rectangle they saw earlier. "At the very least, I should introduce myself, but I do want to see if there's anything specific he wants me to do down here." Remembering that Mason didn't know where Dash was, Zade made a mental note to ask around later. The last thing she wanted was to be in the way.

"Last I saw Lieutenant Leiko, he seemed in good spirits but he didn't look alright to me." Mason did look concerned even though he didn't know either Betazoid very well. "Yeah I suppose Kevan is in charge, as far as I know he's the ranking officer in security. Perhaps they know where he is," he added, nodding over to the medical facility.

Zade glanced back at Mason, catching the concerned look. "They'll be fine," she assured with a small smile, "I have faith in the medical team." Looking back at the triage site, she saw the team of blue shirts exiting the Nightingale and start unloading supplies. "Well, let's ask around then, shall we?"