Away We Go

Posted on Sep 28, 2018 @ 4:43am by Commander Jacob Crichton
Edited on on Sep 28, 2018 @ 4:43am

Mission: The Uncertainty Principle

= Away We Go =

(cont’d from “Three Generations, Cute Animals”)

**********************

LOCATION: USS PHOENIX, in dry-dock at Utopia Planitia Shipyards
SCENE: Dr. Eden’s Temporary Quarters
STARDATE: [2.18] 0927.0030


Dr. Lorraine Eden was dozing lightly in a chair when the sound of the door chime roused her. She lifted her head - her neck had started to go stiff - and blinked groggily in the direction of the door, not quite sure if she had heard the chime. When it sounded again a moment later, that made up her mind; she pushed herself slowly out of the chair and started for the door. She only made it a few feet when weariness overcame her, and she had to steady herself against the back of the plush purple couch. She closed her eyes, waiting for the faintness and dizziness to pass. Meanwhile, the door chimed a third time.

“Oh, give me a moment, would you,” she barked, eyes still closed.

From the other side of the door came a muffled, “Doc? Is everything alright?”

“‘Doc’ indeed,” Eden frowned. She opened her eyes; the dizzy spell had passed, and she made the rest of the way to the door. She disengaged the lock and activated the control, and an instant later the door slid open to reveal a Bolian woman, with hair streaked through with purple that almost matched the color of Eden’s couch. The woman was dressed in civilian garb, and was holding a steaming cup of tea, but for the moment Eden was to distracted by the unconventional hairstyle to pay it much notice.

The Bolian grinned. “Special delivery!”

Eden frowned. “You’re not with Starfleet.”

“No ma’am,” the Bolian shook her head. “Iphigenia Bonviva. I’m the boss down at the Tribble. Sorry I missed you earlier.”

Eden was unmoved by Iphie’s friendly demeanour. “I had hoped it would be on the Starfleet officers who brought me my tea.”

Iphie blinked. “Oh. Well, you know those fleet types, they’re always on their way to some crisis or another. I thought I could at least take this one off their hands.”

“I had hoped it would be a Starfleet officer,” Eden continued, “so I might inquire as to when we would be on our way. These delays are very bothersome.”

“Nobody tells me nothing,” Iphie shrugged. “Did you want your tea? I don’t want it to get cold.”

Eden considered it, decided that sending the Bolian woman away in a fit of pique wouldn’t actually gain her anything, and stepped aside. “Please set it on the table by the chair.”

“As you wish, doc,” Iphie winked, and swanned into Eden’s quarters. She set the cup on the table Dr. Eden had indicated, then took a moment to look around, taking in the decor. “Not the nicest digs on the ship. I hate to break it to you, but I get the feeling Kane doesn’t like you very much.”

“Who Captain Kane likes or dislikes is not my concern,” Eden said. “He is obliged to assist with my project, and as long as he does, he can dislike me as much as he sees fit.”

Iphie grinned. “You and Kane have a lot in common.”

Eden frowned a little at Iphie. “I hardly think so.”

“If you say so,” Iphie shrugged. “Anyway, enjoy the tea. No tip necessary.”

She moved to leave, but Eden’s voice stopped her before she could. “Bonviva… why do I know that name?”

Iphie stopped, turned back to Dr. Eden. “You might be thinking of my sister.”

“Who is your sister?”

“She’s an ambassador,” Iphie said. “Xana Bonviva. Used to be in Starfleet. Active in Federation politics. She’s pretty famous, I guess.”

Eden walked over to the table where her tea was waiting and lowered herself slowly into the chair beside it. “I see. And you’re a barkeep.”

Iphie narrowed her eyes. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Merely a statement of fact,” Eden said. Iphie thought she could see a twinkle in the old woman’s eyes as she said it.

“I am a chef,” Iphie said, crossing her arms. “Who *runs* a bar.”

“I imagine that distinction is very important at family gatherings,” Eden said, as she reached for her cup of tea.

Now it was Iphie’s turn to frown. “Now listen here, you--”

The teacup slipped from Eden’s hand, spilling the hot tea down the front of her clothes, before the cup itself shattered against the floor. Eden cried out, tried to stand, swayed, and fell back into the chair. Iphie was at her side in a moment, doing her best to mop up the spilled tea with her own shirt tails.

“Are you alright, doctor?” Iphie was saying. “Did it burn you? Gods, but it’s everywhere--”

“I’m fine, I’m fine!” Eden said, swatting at Iphie’s hands. “If you please, Ms. Bonviva, I’m quite capable--”

“I can get the docs up here in a flash,” Iphie said. “The medical docs, I mean.”

“That won’t be necessary,” Eden said firmly. “It’s just a bit of spilled tea. I may be old, but I am no wilting flower.”

There was a force behind the words that made Iphie stop trying to help clean up the mess. She took a step back and frowned at Dr. Eden - not out of anger, but out of concern.

“Are you sure you’re alright?” Iphie asked. “You look kind of pale.”

“All this excitement, I’m sure,” Eden said. Iphie noticed the old woman didn’t seem to want to meet her eyes.

Iphie bent, and started gathering up the shards of broken teacup, deciding it was the least she could do. Dr. Eden didn’t protest, she merely sat in her chair, her eyes seemingly fixed on some invisible point on the floor. Once Iphie had collected all the broken pieces, she straightened, and looked at Eden again.

“I’ll… get you another cup,” she said at last.

“That would be fine,” Eden said.

“Are you sure you’re okay?”

“Yes, yes,” Eden said, sounding annoyed now. “The tea, if you please!”

Iphie wasn’t convinced, but she wasn’t sure what more she could do. She turned to leave. Behind her, Dr. Eden sat in her chair, staring down at her hands. They were shaking.

=[/\]=

SCENE: Bridge


Jake Crichton was seated in the Captain’s chair. Word had come through from Starfleet that the personnelle transfers had been completed; the PHOENIX had lost a few good officers to reassignments, like Cantor Von, Tomas Vukovic, and Aerdan Jos. Jake felt the loss of Aerdan considerably; the Andorian doctor was the ship’s former ExO, and had been with the crew since the PHOENIX had first left Earth on its mission to Limbo, 3 years before. In all the hustle and bustle of his duties and preparations for the new mission, Jake had not had the chance to say goodbye.

But that was life in the fleet. Postings were temporary, and there were always new faces to replace the old ones. Jake spared a thought for the number of other officers who had come and gone over the past several years: Barton, Rochemonte, BaShen, Chaucer, and others. Some had been reassigned, some had died, and in the case of Barton, he’d simply disappeared after the Battle of Earth, and Jake didn’t hold out much hope that he would ever see the burly, bearded officer again. Von, Vukovic, and Jos were all exemplary officers, but Jake could at least hope he would have the chance to serve with them again. For now, there was the next mission to consider. He made a mental note to meet with the new officers as soon as he got the chance.

Kane had retired to his quarters, leaving Jake to give the order to get the PHOENIX officially underway. They were only waiting for the go-ahead from Utopia Planitia to officially disembark.

Lt. Byte turned from its position at Ops to look at Jake.

{{Commander, Utopia Planitia has signalled that we are clear to disembark.}}

“Thank you, Mr. Byte,” Jake said, standing. “Helm, set a course for the Wolf 1061 system, warp 5.”

Wolf 1061 was just over 13 light years away from Sol, still safely within Federation territory. With a stable M-class red dwarf star and no inhabited planets, Starfleet had identified it as a safe place to conduct Dr. Eden’s transwarp test. Jake would have to trust their judgement; aside from some basics, the details of Dr. Eden’s test were all classified, to be revealed to the crew while they were en route to the mission destination. Such protocol was unusual for scientific missions, which meant that Dr. Eden could well be sitting on a groundbreaking discovery in transwarp theory.

Though Jake was an engineer by training, he had focused on computer systems and starship design in his academy days… he was no slouch at warp theory, but Dr. Eden was of course several degrees of magnitude above Jake’s level of expertise. Even so, Jake wished he’d had the chance to review her notes, or at least to get some kind of indication of what they were getting themselves into. There was no reason to think this mission would be anything but routine, of course, but then, that’s what they’d thought about their recent trip to Sherman’s Planet, and look how that had turned out.

Jake pushed the misgivings aside. Whatever awaited them at Wolf 1061, the crew of the USS PHOENIX would face it together. They always did.

“Course laid in, sir,” the young officer at the helm reported.

Jake smiled, and took a moment. He loved this part.

Then, with a flick of his hand: “Engage.”

=[/\]=


NRPG: We have left Mars and are en route to the mission system. I will hopefully be putting out a post this weekend that officially gets the “mission” part of the mission underway, at which point I will be soliciting volunteers for the first “time jump” post. No need to answer now, but please start thinking about what your schedule next week will be like and if you’ll have time to post, I want to try to have as quick of a turnaround time on those time-jump posts as possible.

In the meantime, there’s lots to do aboard the ship! We’ll have a few new faces soon (I’ll let Jerome give you more information about them), but you have a lot of familiar faces to catch up with, not to mention Dr. Eden. Plus, have you guys thought about how we’ve been doing this iteration of the game for nearly four and a half years? We’ve had players and characters come and go, done nearly 20 mission storylines, and (I hope!) had a lot of fun while doing it. Your characters have an awful lot to reflect on, so if you’re not sure what to write, maybe a little navel-gazing is in order!

Fun Fact: Wolf 1061 is a real star system, and it actually contains one of the closest known, potentially-inhabitable planets. I looked it up and I could not find any instances of it being used in Star Trek before, so for our purposes we’re going to rule that its three planetary bodies are all rocky and uninhabited (because I am tired of looking up stars and want to go to bed now), but in real life, there might be dinosaurs or fish or dinosaur fish living there.


Shawn Putnam

A.k.a.

Jake Crichton

Executive Officer

USS PHOENIX