Debrief Part One

Posted on Sat Feb 5th, 2011 @ 11:39pm by Captain Vorn Krace & Commander Acle Walex & Commander Jordan Gunning & Lieutenant Valkris Edwardson

Mission: Shadows Fall
Location: USS Iapetus
Timeline: MM2 MD28 - 0008hrs

"This Edwardson," Vorn asked, as he, Walex and Kaldor walked down the corridor at a hurried pace towards the transporter room. "She was scheduled to be transferred to the Marconi?" He felt it more than a little strange for her to come out of the blue like that, and on a Klingon ship with such an arrogant and self-centred captain, and he wanted to know as much as he could about her before letting her move freely aboard the ship - considering the circumstances they found themselves in presently.

"Yes. We had her due to meet up with us in this system but not for another day. We needed to ensure that the Klingons had no idea why we were here and what we were doing."

"Interesting that they chose to shop up a day earlier then. Also interesting that the Romunlans attacked when they did." Acle mused, more to himself then his companions.

As the three entered the transporter room, Vorn looked over towards the transporter chief, who nodded, signalling that The Emperor's Fist had signalled they were ready to send the Lieutenant over. "Energise," he ordered, looking towards the transporter pad.

In an instant, her world view dissolves from that of seeing her sister and friends aboard the Emperor's Fist, to what must obviously be the Iapetus Looking around she notes the rank pips and quickly deduces that the men standing before her were the Captain of the Marconi, and of course the Captain of the Iapetus.

"Lieutenant Valkris T. Edwardson, reporting for duty sir...." stepping off of the transporter pad she looks at the gathered officers "Captain Krace, it is a pleasure to meet you in person" Smiling, Valkris greets each of them with a warm smile. "Captain Kaldor... I am sorry that we couldn't arrive here in time. Here are my transfer orders and...recent service record. I was recently promoted to First Officer aboard the USS Hera when I requested some time off to attend to some...personal matters at home. Starfleet sent a communique advising that the Hera was being mothballed and that I was being reassigned to the Marconi, The Emperor's Fist was travelling this way more or less and agreed to deliver me here ahead of schedule.. "

"I can forgive that, Lieutenant. In all honesty, we have much more on our plate at the moment than to reprimand the Klingon Empire for good timekeeping." Kaldor offered.

"Yes Captain, I'm sure you do.." Valkris said. "The Emperor's Fist was completing the last of her shakedown cruise, and due to my sisters considerable piloting skills, shaved 26 hours off of our travel time." Valkris turns to Captain Krace "Captain, the IHV voDleH ro' (Emperor's Fist) will stay in system for as long as they can to assist you before they will have to return."

"The system is too sensitive for them to stay, I'm afraid. We are heading out to follow our lead, they can follow us along the way until we make a decision as to whether to ask for their further assistance or not," Vorn said, giving a slight nod to Acle, who discretely relayed the message back to the Bridge. "First however, as I'm sure you can understand, I want to debrief you, before you can access any other part of the ship. As the Marconi was very recently destroyed," - he didn't tell her it was from an internal explosion - "I am stepping up security on the Iapetus. Since your timing of arrival was immediately after the incident, I'm sure you can agree with me when I say I need to put my mind at piece that it was merely coincidence. If you'll follow me to the conference room, we shall get started."

Turning and walking out of the transporter room, Vorn didn't give her the option of questioning the debrief, and simply led the group towards the room in question.

Valkris followed Krace and the others to the conference room and found a seat. Her mind began to consider the events that knew to be true and possible reasons for the resulted outcome. "Captain, just before I transported over, the Emperor's Fist was about to initiate a standard sensor sweep of the area," she began to say before anyone else tried to interject.

"The Emperor's Fist isn't unlike most ships of her size, and isn't normally equipped with a cloaking device. Unless you were looking out of a view port, you'd never see her on external sensors. D70 commanders activate ECM prior to entering a hostile system and run a standard Tachyon sweep to detect any other cloaked ships in the area. Commander K'nera was about to do that very thing until we spotted the Iapetus." Valkris looks at the other officers in the conference room, their expressions told her as much about the situation as did the kinds of questions they asked.

".....you've already determined who's behind this..." Valkris states.

"Romulans." Came Kaldor's terse response

"We have an idea, nothing more," Vorn responded, throwing Kaldor a look - partially to remain elusive, but mostly because he knew there was no way to tell who was on that Romulan ship, or who had sent it there, if it wasn't indeed acting on its own.

Moving back to the debrief, careful not to let control of the conversation get taken away from him, he started his questions. "You said you were attending to some personal matters after leaving the USS Hera, before being assigned to the USS Marconi. Was this on Qo'nos, and what were the nature of these matters?" He knew that under normal circumstances, he would be considered to be prying into an officer's personal life, but under the circumstances, regulations granted him the right to ask more in-depth questions in order to eliminate any possibility of the new arrival being involved in the recent incident.

"...Romulans....well that explains a few things" Valkris relaxes in her seat, her mind going over the last few things she saw before transporting over to the Iapetus "as for your other question, no...I did not go to Qo'nos Captain Krace, and yes, the nature of my leave was of a personal nature.." She bristled at the implications of Captain Krace's questions. "....Captain Krace, is there something you wish to ask me in relation to this situation?" breathing calmly to control her rising anger Valkris began to weigh and consider her options.

Captain Krace had every right to ask any question he wished of a member of his crew on his ship. Valkris however, was not a member of his crew and although she was suddenly notified by Starfleet to report to the Captain Kaldor on the Marconi, The ship was now gone which put her in limbo. "I was originally scheduled to return to the Hera as First officer and Chief Tactical/Security Officer!...."

Valkris looked at Captain Kaldor, searching for any sign of what was going on here.

"The Hera, as you know, has been mothballed since those orders were issued, hence your more recent ones to report to the Marconi," Vorn replied tersely, not taking the evasion of his questions lightly. "All I am trying to do here is determine whether or not your arrival here at this time was merely coincidence, or whether it bears a correlation to the incident we witnessed, even if it was by the design of another. You know the protocol for these situations, Lieutenant, you went to the academy just like the rest of us, and you know my first duty is to protect the lives of my crew. I am not going to let any newcomer roam the corridors of my ship until I am satisfied that they had no involvement in the Marconi's destruction, however insignificant."

"..I am well aware of the circumstances that led to my being reassigned to the Marconi Captain Krace" Valkris says calmly "...Though I am begning to wonder if your..interrogation of how I came to arrive here, and what my activities were while on leave are not motivated by some...other reasons? I am half Klingon, as anyone can plainly see, and have had the luxury of having served both the Federation and at times, the Klingon Defense Forces. Would your line of questioning be so..voracious had I simply arrived Late on a slower, commercial transport instead of using my family connections to arrive earlier than expected? Would this line of questioning be even considered if this newcomer were fully human? Your insistence on what a Starfleet Officer does on leave astounds me? I should surely doubt that you would answer such questions were the situations reversed!"

Valkris turns to Captain Kaldor, her rising anger at this absurd situation she finds herself in directed much at him as it is for Captain Krace."....Captain Kaldor, you received my orders to report to you on the Marconi,...... my posting to your command was not my doing! I was looking forward to my field promotion, and had the Hera not been..mothballed, I suspect this conversation would never have taken place at all. That is the Marconi would still have been destroyed.."

It took every bit of her training to keep down to keep down the rage welling up inside of her. She knew that her Klingon half would love nothing more than to reach over across the table and.. Breathing slowly, Valkris dismissed the thought from her mind remembering what her mother Janice always told her about Humans and thier natural prejudices towards other races despite their statements to the contrary.

"...Believe me, I can understand your...desire to ensure the safety of your ship and crew in light of what's happened. I was never on Qo'nos, The Empire has thousands of habital worlds and not every Klingon lives in the home sector. If my word as an..Honorable Officer is not enough for you then by all means....contact Starfleet Command and ask for verification from the KDC Klingon Diplomatic Corps to verify exactly which route one of its ships took in order to return a Federation officer of dual heritage back to them! Doing that, I suspect you'll have two options, place me under guard and charge me with the involvement of the destruction of a Starfleet vessel so that you may continue your...investigation."

Acle cleared his throat and spoke for the first time.

"Captains, if I may?" he asked, looking to his superior officers.

Acle looked directly at the Lieutenant. "Lieutenant, I don't believe anyone is questioning your honor in this situation. Believe me when I say that if we truly believed you were a threat," Acle's eyes took on a darker gleam "you wouldn't be sitting there right now. However, what type of command officers would we be if we did not take every precaution when it came to protecting the lives of those under our command from harm? It is our sworn duty to do this, and that means from all harm, whether or not that harm comes from an internal or external threat. I was an intelligence officer for most of my career. I know more about internal threats then most."

Acle paused for a moment, looking at Captain Krace before continuing. "Please, do not take offense to our questions, no one is accusing you of anything. We simply need to be sure that what we do is the right course of action. And to do that means asking questions at this moment. Allow us to honorably discharge our duty."

Welcoming the break in tension, Valkris smiles "Commander, be assured that if I were a threat, this....conversation wouldn't be taking place.." her eyes sparkle with a gleam matching his own. Sitting back in her seat she considers the situation "...now then, lets consider what the facts are, The Marconi is destroyed, I suspect that the question of how is still not entirely known or we wouldn't be sitting here would we? You've initiated a Tachyon sweep of the area, and have discovered a cloaked Romulan warship correct? Good then it stands to reason that if you've discovered said Romulan vessel and have not been contacted by them, the likelihood that they are the cause of the destruction of the Marconi is...much greater than any other suspects."

Valkris taps her fingers on the table, as she works through the problem, completely ignoring any other questions as to what she did while on leave or who she may or may have not met with. "...Has your science officer turned up any other information? Never mind that, back to the Romulan vessel you suspect is the cause of this. What are you going to do about it?" Valkris states flatly.

Kaldor took a look down at the Lieutenant's orders which showed her to be part of his crew. The only part of his crew left. "Watch your tone, Lieutenant. We had the Romulans in our sights until the Klingons dropped out of warp right on top of them. For all we know, they're out of the system by now. I'm not sure they'll be around for another one of Gunning's sweeps."

"Yes sir, I only meant that we cannot expect that if the Romulans are behind this attack, they will simply fade away. Their doctrine will no doubt mandate the elimanation of Science vessels first then any other tactical threats second. That is if they can't slip away undetected."