Brief Affair

Posted on Sat Nov 23rd, 2019 @ 9:53pm by Captain Nathan Hunt & Lieutenant Commander Ty'licia zh'Kirisor & Lieutenant Commander Alexander Thorn & Lieutenant Kori Zad & Lieutenant Rikka Takanashi M.D.

Mission: Shadows of Weimar
Location: Conference Room, Deck 1
Timeline: Mission Day 2 at 1000

Lieutenant Commander zh'Kirisor had arranged the several PADDs in front of her into a neat stack, having the full mission briefing with expanded sections outlined and key assignments listed. This was technically her first briefing as Executive officer, with the full staff assembled, and she was conscious of the fact she might be overdoing it.

Smoothing out her uniform skirt and top, she had to stop herself from fidgeting. One last check to the internal message she sent previously saying that each person had received and read the message, she noted the time, there should be some people arriving soon. There was a lot of information to go through and the senior staff were all quite new to each other, and some to their role, like Ty'licia. She steeled herself to stand taller and drop her shoulders, trying to relax.

The doors parted with a whisper to let Lieutenant Kori Zad into the room, and he moved with barely controlled energy to a seat. He flashed a quick grin at the XO behind his purple goatee as he got settled, "Good morning, sir." He was excited, happy, that much was obvious, but eager too to hear the details of their mission. Though he'd been an engineer for a long time now in the fleet this was his first senior staff briefing as a full department head and that added a certain savour to the moment as well.

Captain Hunt was the last member of the senior staff to enter the conference room - deliberately so. He had tasked his first officer with running the briefing, but he didn't want to appear to be the looming oversight of authority by standing over her shoulder even before the rest of the staff arrived. He wanted to observe how they worked together when they were only just getting to know each other, and how his new XO handled herself after having such a task of briefing them on their first mission thrust upon her. It was actually a tactic he had stolen from Jean-Luc Picard, after hearing an account of how he 'tested' his first officer on the Enterprise-D all those years ago, though with a far more useful scenario than the rare act of re-joining the separated sections of the ship.

As he entered the room, he nodded at everyone assembled politely. "Good morning everyone," he said, before strolling over to the replicator and ordering himself a coffee. He nodded subtly to zh'Kirisor as a signal to start, and then stood casually, one arm behind his back, as he looked out the viewports that ran the length of the room; ready to observe and chime in if necessary, but out of the way enough to make it clear that he was being passive in this meeting, and that the Commander was to lead.

"All right then," Ty'licia started, completely forgetting where to start, "I will keep this short as there is a lot of work to be done," She stalled, then remembering where to begin. Pressing a key on the display mounted to the wall, an image of a planet popped up, showing a Cardassian insignia above the sphere.

"This is Thessia, our destination, a Cardassian Colony that is still feeling the effects of the war, even after all this time. You may know already the main outline of our mission, to transport building materials, medical supplies and industrial food replicator components to Thessia from Altair VI. With our contingent of Starfleet Corps of Engineering passengers, helping to oversee the installation and assist with the task of rebuilding infrastructure. They will be remaining on the surface for some time and rotated out on the next shipment of supplies. We are to use the resources of the Mercury to get the Engineers situated, comfortable and well on their way to getting the job done."

As she was talking the screen behind flowed through a number of diagrams and lists, outlining Transport sites, habitation locations, personnel deployments and even population density of the colony. There was also a brief report delving into predicted weather patterns for the next 6 months, Ty'licia felt she had gone a little overboard, however something about compiling data into diagrams made her feel satisfied.

Ty'licia started handing out the stack of PADDs infront of her, "Here is the fun part, over the last 5 years this planet has been seemingly squandering both it's time and resources and has fallen behind the estimates the Cardassian analysts predicted. This has gone through the Cardassian government and a small task force of ships has been dispatched, with a contingent of Cardassian engineers. We are to link up with this vessel and coordinate our efforts. Hopefully to get the project back on schedule," Ty'licia said, looking to people who were now reading the PADDs provided.

"Are there any queries, comments or concerns?" the XO said, not sure if her briefing was long enough for the Captain's liking. Looking to each member of the Staff assembled before her, she reminded herself that she was not just under scrutiny from the Captain, but those below in rank her aswell, her antennae twitched slightly.

As Kori continued to read through the details on the PADD he'd been given, he was quick to speak up, "It looks like the Cardassians were rather meticulous in their estimates, Commander, and while these plans certainly look ambitious it's not like them to fall far from the goal. Do we know why they're so far behind schedule?"

"That is part of the particular problem, we do not know why, there are some rumours and hearsay, but nothing substantiated. There could be a market for selling the materials, or a diversion of where the materials are going or just gross miss-management. We are to determine for Starfleet what has occured and further assist the Cardassian rebuilding effort," Ty'licia said, not meaning to sound so ominous.

"You say 'still feeling the effects of the war'," Alex said. "What sort of damage are we talking about here? And more importantly, who caused it, us, our allies, or the Dominion? Could affect what sort of welcome we get."

"Thessia was a mining colony before and during the war," Nate answered, turning slightly to face them all from his place by the window. "The Cardassians prized its output highly enough that during the war they expanded the local military barracks into a regional command outpost. The system was attacked a number of times, but the most significant were an assault by a Klingon squadron in late '74 that collapsed two mines and damaged the military outpost enough that a secondary set of buildings had to be used until repairs could be effected, and an assault in the final stages of the war by a combined Federation-Klingon force that left all but one of the remaining mines unusable, and almost completely destroyed the military complex." He had spent some time on Altair VI after receiving his orders researching exactly this, prompted by the same question his second officer was now asking.

"Ground parties took several prisoners of war after the raid, though much of the military staff had been killed from the orbital bombardment. The Klingons left behind a prison detail to keep them on Thessia until they were released under the ceasefire agreement. Starfleet took efforts to avoid damage where possible to civilian areas, but any workers who were in the mines at the time of the assault, or facilities that were close to priority targets undoubtedly got caught in the bombardment. There's likely to still be resentment, but the collateral damage on Thessia was far smaller than other similar systems got during the war. Previous supply runs have reported a grudging acceptance of the aid that Starfleet has been providing in the years since." He nodded back to Ty'licia to continue the rest of the briefing.

"Thank you sir. The task will not be an easy one, as the relationships are tense and uneasy. We are encouraging to get our personnel to be vigilant, but not confrontational as this can have larger implications if any accusations are pointed toward the Cardassians," Ty'licia continued, "We are not expecting outright hostility, but Lieutenant Hunt if you could please have a Quick reaction team on standby shifts whilst we are conducting our logistical efforts."

"There will also be some dedicated facilities constructed whilst we are here. Doctor Takanashi if you could oversee the work on the Hospital and Clinic facilities, and if there is time some training for their Medical personnel," Ty'licia was getting through her list, most of this was outlined in the orders.

Rikka nodded. "Understood. I'll have everything ready before our arrival. I may need to borrow some engineers to set up equipment" she added.

Ty'licia nodded to the CMO, "I will make sure to arrange that," she said taking a note down on her PADD. She looked to the next officers.

"Commander Thorn, and Lieutenant Zad you will be in charge of the logistics and maintenance during this operation. We are going to be here for a while so the importance of regular maintenance is paramount. Transporter systems, Shuttlecraft and replicators are all going to be used to breaking point. I am not opposed to having systems taken offline for repair, as long as we can get them back up fairly soon." Ty'licia said, coming to a close with her presentation.

"Yes, ma'am," Alex said. "I'll get diagnostics scheduled for before we arrive, make sure everything came out of spacedock like it should have. We can also start replicating stuff now to reduce strain when we arrive, if you're not opposed to us filling some empty rooms up with supplies."

"Very good, thank you all. We have a large amount of work ahead of us. As for me, there is a beach on the south coast that has some nice spots for swimming," Ty'licia joked, then turned to the Captain, "Sir, anything further to add?"

"You all know the drill by now," Nate said, turning away from the window. "You're not fresh cadets, but this is a new ship and crew, so the fleet will be keeping an eye on us for this one. See to your assigned tasks, and if the Cardassians cause any trouble, refer it up to myself or Commander zh'Kirisor. Dismissed."