Keeping it Professional

Posted on Sun Mar 15th, 2020 @ 11:13am by Senior Chief Petty Officer Mason Malone & Lieutenant Kevan Dash

Mission: In the Family
Location: Marine Quarters
Timeline: MD-4 (After 'Investigations')
1169 words - 2.3 OF Standard Post Measure

ON:
Kevan took the lead, almost uncomfortably, leading Mason to the turbolift silently, then announcing: "Deck 12."

Sensing the question, he looked at Mason. "The Marine offices and quarters on board are empty; we're not carrying any detachment. A few of us figured that it was dead space and set it up as a place to lay low," he explained. "I guess people won't see us working there and get the wrong impression." Hopefully, he noted in his head, because nobody else would be there.

For a moment, Mason just stared, his expression utterly unreadable though his eyes seemed to betray his annoyance. "Who cares," he finally answered, "Kev, we're colleagues, not lovers. Who cares if people sees us working together. And as I said before, even if we weren't just colleagues it isn't of anyone's business but our own. You gotta relax mate.. this crampy attitude of yours will actually only have the opposite effect. The more you keep publicly saying that nothing happened, the more people will think something actually did. And if you're so scared that something did happen, and I promise you, nothing happened, then why not have a doctor confirm it?"

"Why would I want the doctor to confirm anything?" Kevan frowned. "I know nothing happened." He pondered that for a moment. Of course nothing happened. Relax, he reminded himself. Mason was probably right.

As the turbolift doors opened to the completely unoccupied section of the ship, Kevan led the way into the marine CO offices, which contained the bare minimum of furnishing; a desk, a few chairs.

"So, how should we approach this, then?" he asked.

"Probably start with gathering all information and go from there. Sort facts and group them as we go." He looked around. "Wow....Spartan here... So the quarters in this area are vacant huh....maybe I'll ask to move here then."

"You not happy with your quarters?" Kevan asked, plopping himself down on one side of the desk and bringing up the report from their captured attackers.

"Eh... got an annoying roommate, who's just super picky about everything. Clean, apparently isn't clean enough. Tightly made bed not tight enough... She's a clean freak, that's what." He sighed. "So what've we got so far?"

Kevan almost snorted at the comments about Mason's roommate, but kept the thought to himself. "Preliminary notes from Lt Commander Horn, Lt Mortigar and Lt Sar do say that there was clearly a Paratan royal crest printed on the hull. Maybe we're looking at an inside job?"

"Or someone making to look like it was," Mason commented as he stared at the notes. "Magnify that image over there for me would you?" He pointed at one of the screens. "Is that the actual royal crest? Or is it something that just looks like it? And the pilot... has medical got any notes on him? Is he Paratan, or is he something else?"

Kevan tapped a few controls, tweaked the image and sharpened it. "Modified, but the computer confirms it's definitely Paratan and definitely nobility, but there are some subtle differences." He slid the next screen up. "Pilot is shown as Paratan male, approximately mid-twenties. Apparently in reasonable health until the inertial dampeners on the fighter failed and he got squished." He couldn't help but grin slightly. "Bet that was a mess to clean up."

"Lieutenant Sar's report says that there was quite a smell when she and the counselor got in the ship. Their initial survey seems to confirm that the damage was caused by our phaser fire. So.... did that ship have shields fail, or did it have none to begin with." He pulled up another report. "Outside survey confirms phaser damage but... it wasn't us that crashed it. See those marks there and there? Those aren't consistent with phaser scorching. See?"

"Huh. So they were in a scrap before they got toasted by us," Kevan nodded thoughtfully. He glanced over at Mason. "You're pretty good at this stuff."

"Eh, had a good teacher is all." He scrutinized another image. "what are those marks over there? Can you cross match them with any known weapons?"

Kevan pulled the image up closer. "I've seen something like this before. Not phasers or disruptors...seen plenty of those. Possibly something plasma-based? Certainly not the sort of high-yield thing we'd normally run-into, but if you were a newly warp-capable culture with limited energy weaponry, it's something you might use."

"New warp huh..." Fingers flying across the console, Mason pulled up a list of pre-warp and new warp cultures. "Prime directive would prevent us from talking to them, I suppose but well they've had skirmishes of their own. Perhaps we have their signatures on file?"

"Look," Kevan said, motioning to another data file. "This is the preliminary files we have from the Federation registry. The signatures are clearly Paratan." He leaned forward. "This craft used Paratan weapons signatures and had Paratan markings, and the pilot was Paratan. I mean, you're the investigative officer, but a small child could figure this one out."

Mason scrutinized the images for a moment. "If these are Paratan weapons signatures, then someone shot down their own ship," Mason commented, flicking through some of the files. The signatures were the same, this vessel was definitely shot down by one of their own. "It doesn't even look like friendly fire, there's just too much damage. What do you think?"

Kevan nodded, bringing up comparison images from multiple angles. "You can see our phaser burns here and here," he pointed. "So these damage markings here suggest they did take damage before they came at us. Like you said, someone else took a shot at them too."

"We did hit them, but we defended ourselves and the ambassador's vessel, they're the aggressor.... weren't they?" Mason looked up. "Somehow I feel we're missing something here, but I can't seem to figure out what."

"Yeah." Kevan shook his head. "I guess that's why the boss wanted us to work on this stuff. *It's like we're missing something; we need more information."

"We could talk to the officers involved?" Mason suggested, "if we're not intruding in their investigation of course. Do we have any survivors on board that you know of? Maybe we could talk to them."

"Nope," Kevan shook his head. "Pilot was dead on arrival. However..." He started to work through some data on the screen. "These plasma weapon signatures are pretty unique, right? Definitely not something you see everyday. With the sensor suite on board maybe we could scan for more of them?"

"We could," Mason agreed, transferring all data to a single PADD. "Let's go and see if we can cross reference them with anything, and see if sensors pick up more of them in the area." He grinned. "Let's see if we can make the boss proud hm?"

Kevan couldn't help but grin back. "Let's go."




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Lt Kevan Dash
Security Officer
USS Athena

SCPO Mason Malone
Investigations Officer
Pnpc Savin