New Orders

Posted on Tue Sep 1st, 2009 @ 5:03pm by Captain Vorn Krace & Commander Jordan Gunning

Mission: Into a Devil's Heart
Location: USS Iapetus/Starbase Ronin
Timeline: MD03 1047 hours

After only a moment, the Federation logo on Vorn's screen was once again replaced by a face, this time that of the man who Vorn only recognised from his service record - Lieutenant Jordan Gunning, the Iapetus' new Security/Tactical chief. Officially, the man was to be assigned as Garhart's replacement, to relieve Reynolds of his post as acting chief. Now, there was no acting chief for him to relieve.

"Lieutenant. I'm Captain Vorn Krace, Commanding Officer of the USS Iapetus," he said, introducing himself to the officer.

"Good morning, Captain. I'm Lieutenant Jordan Gunning. Pleased to make your acquaintance, Captain. I'm looking forward to coming aboard."

"And I'm looking forward to meeting you in person," Vorn replied. "For now, though there is something I need from you while you're still at Ronin. Firstly; have you had any contact with Lieutenant Commander Peter Brown while you've been on the station?"

"Indeed I have, sir." Jordan was instantly troubled by the Captain's opening question. He had thought there was something "off" about the Lieutenant Commander when he had first met him on the base and he had issued a number of strange orders. Now that the Captain was asking about him, he was beginning to wonder if the orders he had accepted were actually legitimate. "Is everything alright, Captain?"

"It's a long story," was Vorn's only reply to the Lieutenant's question. He answered it with his own. "What did the commander say to you, Lieutenant?"

"Well sir, he placed me under strict instructions not to tell you but then again I'm not entirely comfortable with the orders he gave me." Jordan was trying to seem more hesitant than he actually was. In reality he was itching to reveal the orders to the Captain. "He asked me to ensure that the new crewmembers of the Iapetus were kept confined to quarters after a red alert was sounded on the station. He also instructed me to ignore any and all orders from anyone else during that time."

"I see," Vorn replied. "Well I have new orders for you Lieutenant. Commander Brown is to be considered renegade. All his orders and security clearances will be revoked, and he shall no longer hold any authority within Starfleet, pending a review of the actions he has undertaken when he is taken into custody. Is that understood?"

"Aye, sir. Needless to say I'm relieved to hear that."

"Good. Now, the Iapetus is still a day or so away from Ronin, but we can't let his trail go dry. I want you to start an investigation, into how Brown was able to get the necessary clearance to steal the Lincoln. The station Commander's already told me he used a rigged shuttle explosion to interfere with the station sensors enough to prevent getting a fix on his heading, but I want you looking into any other ways we can predict where he was going. I'm hoping to talk to Lieutenant Li shortly too, so you can enlist each other's help in the investigation." He didn't quite feel right leaving the opening stages of an investigation to an officer whom was completely new, hadn't even been aboard yet, and for all he knew, could even be working with Peter, though he doubted the last possibility, after their conversation so far. But he knew that if he left it until the Iapetus arrived, the trail would be well and truely dead.

"I understand, sir. You can count on me. I'll find out as much as I can by the time the Iapetus arrives." Jordan was surprised that the Captain had put so much faith in him already but the fact that the Captain had very little choice would surely be playing on both their minds. "Do you have any information regarding why he would take the Lincoln, Captain?"

"I can't say much over this line, and I don't even have a full understanding of it myself yet. For now, we're going under the assumption that it's some sort of personal 'mission', or vendetta of his." Vorn was still aware that their conversation was being openly monitored by Commander Critchley's CIO. While the information he didn't want to send over wasn't particularly harmful to anyone, he didn't want Peter's actions to become public knowledge. And the way to stop that, is to restrict who has the information to run the investigation. "I need you to find out what you can from your end, and we'll compare databases when we arrive."

"Affirmative, sir." Jordan felt oddly assured by the Captain's lack of information. "See you when you arrive."

"See you soon, Lieutenant. Krace out."

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Captain Vorn Krace
Commanding Officer
USS Iapetus

&

Lieutenant Jordan Gunning
Chief Security/Tactical Officer
USS Iapetus