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Kari
| | Posted on Monday, June 16, 2003 - 09:57 pm: | |
Seven minutes after her command the ship finally began to move out of its orbit, two minutes after that a slipstream conduit was opened - really not that bad, all things considered. As they shot away from Reorsa any concerns Kari Ma`Aru had over the readiness of the Cerberus were left behind with it. The slipstream core was by far the most complicated system onboard, if the cadre of engineers currently working on the ship trusted that it was ready to work then she felt confident they could get the rest of the ship to follow along.
Kari spent that time in the fleet database, going over sensor logs, analysis, and reports, looking for anything which might have warranted the current dash to Grid 008. Her search returned nothing, every aspect of that area seemed unchanged for months, at least.
A minute after the jump to slipstream the mission package arrived from Whitestone Command containing all the answers she was looking for. Taeren intelligence had spotted a planet currently being besieged by the same spheres which had attacked Cerberus and Chimera, and later Coronado and the two previous generation Defiants inside Xanadu.
Lora Kor obviously wanted to get more information on these..things, but the reaction seemed fairly drastic. Sending such a large portion of the fleet to that area left the rest of defender space more vulnerable for the attack. The decision didn't seem characteristic, and she wondered if the recent high-level conferences amongst the fleet admiralty had an influence on the decision. Whatever the case, she resolved to keep a close eye for any signs that this might only be a diversionary attack, lest a quick response be needed.
Another nine minutes and she decided to see how things were going throughout the ship. She stepped out onto the bridge and was meet with stares from both Farley and her temporary marine-drafted XO. The engineer was sitting in the helm console, his hands over the controls with Steller standing directly over his shoulder. Farley was the first to speak, "When you gave the order to go to slipstream no one else was around who could run the helm console."
She shrugged. "Doesn't really matter. I was looking through the personal files and you're actually one of the few people aboard who's had decent bridge training. If you want to stay at helm I could use you." Farley nodded approval so she turned to Steller. "How's are situation?"
The marine responded succinctly, "All systems above 90%, everything seems to be in working order. We're short on crew, obviously. There are currently 23 people aboard: 19 engineers including Mr. Farley, the two of us, and two science types from the university who were trapped aboard while studying the sphere damage."
"They won't be of much use," she said, "at least until we find something for them to study. Assign them quarters to stay in while we're at red alert." She waited for him to note understanding before moving on. "We're an hour and a half out, I want you to make a complete tour of the ship, look for anything that isn't combat ready, fix it, and then get back here in 70 minutes."
"Yes, Ma'am. Anything you'd like me to bring you when I come back?"
Kari smirked, noting his own slight amusement, she was really learning to enjoy his dry humor. "Just a clean ship, Mr. Steller." He turned and left towards the turbolift.
When he was gone, Kari moved over to the tactical console then turned to Farley. "If you can handle maneuvering and navigation I'll run weapons systems and targeting. It won't be pretty, but we shouldn't have much of a problem if we can keep everything simple."
Farley tried to look confident, but she suspected he wasn't entirely sincere. "I'll do my best, I haven't flown in a while, but at least my training is still current!"
She laughed slightly, pulling up the simulation console. For the next hour she went through various training programs, working primarily in coordination between helm and tactical. There were a number of very helpful situations designed for shuttle combat operations which she found correlated almost directly to handling the maneuverable Defiant class with such a small crew.
When Steller returned to the bridge with a good report she felt confident that the ship and her small crew were ready for whatever was waiting at their destination. |
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