Energise

Posted on Fri Nov 27th, 2009 @ 10:56pm by Captain Benjamin Byrne

Mission: Metronian Diplomacy
Location: Cestus System - Pegasus Fleet Headquarters
Timeline: MD01 1142hrs

As the USS Endeavour dropped out of warp for the fourty-second time since departing from her dry dock in Earth, Ben stood ready on the bridge, watching as the starts relaxed from streaming white lines to millions of singular dots, and as the green globe that was Cestus III grew from nothing on the viewscreen.

"Inform me as soon as we're in transporter range," Ben ordered Ensign Kitonuh, who was manning the Ops console. They hadn't been able to find a Chief Operations Officer before leaving Earth, and so the Ensign had been filling in on the Alpha shift bridge duty. "Number One, you're with me."

As the two officers entered the turbolift and descended towards deck 8 and transporter room one, the same question played through Ben's mind as had been present during their entire trip from Earth - what was this mission that the Vice Admiral had wanted them to come so quickly for. Pushing the ship to its limits had put a toll on the crew, especially the engineering and flight control staff, who had to keep up constant maintenance and diagnostics, making sure that the warp core was safe and usable for each 12 hour stint at high warp. In total, it had taken them three and a half weeks to reach their destination, after accommodating for the time at impulse whilst the warp drive was cooled down and prepared for another run.

The two officers stood on the transport pads in silence, awaiting the word from the bridge that they were within transporter range. Ben had left orders to enter a high orbit once the two had beamed off. He wanted to be able to move out of the gravity well as quickly as was needed for whatever mission the Admiral had for them, though he hoped to spend at least a day or two at Cestus to allow the crew some time before setting off on another journey.

"Bridge reports we're in range, Commander," the transporter chief reported from her station.

"Very good," Benjamin responded. "Energise."

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Commander Benjamin J. Byrne
Commanding Officer
USS Endeavour NCC-86105