Impact

Posted on Thu Sep 6th, 2012 @ 6:17pm by Commander Jordan Gunning & Lieutenant Commander Sara Archer & Lieutenant Henry Marx & Lieutenant JG Bonnie Myers & Lieutenant JG Nicholas Tenebroso

Mission: Heart of an Explorer
Location: Research Lab #2 [Deck 4]

Gunning sat in silence as he waited for the Ensign and the Lieutenant Commanders. He had left Lieutenant Riddle in charge on the bridge while he cobbled together a group to have a think about the spread of the virus. He could think of no better officers to help him work through his suspicions than Myers, Archer and Drex.

However, they would also require a medical perspective. He let out a small sigh as his hand rose to his comm-badge. "Doctor Marx, please report to Research Laboratory Two."

Henry's head shot up from the PADD that he was reading. He tapped his combadge, opening a channel to the caller. "I'm on my way."

He stood up, heading out of his office and toward the science lab. Truth be told, he hadn't had much contact with the rest of his crew. He actually hadn't even really had a conversation with the captain yet, although he supposed that was long overdue. He made his way to the turbolift and then toward Deck 4.

He was yet to meet the Iapetus' new Chief Medical Officer who had- until now- squirrelled himself away in his sickbay on Deck Five. Gunning couldn't hold it against the physician, especially given his responsibility both on this mission and for the crew's general well-being.

He'd have taken his time too.

Sara didn't waste any time getting to the lab. She had been studying the military capabilities of the Meltorrans, and brought that information with her.

"How are you feeling?" Gunning asked without turning round. After their conversation in the Observation Lounge he had been tuned into Sara. Physical contact with anyone often meant that he could detect their proximity to him for hours afterwards. Ninety percent of the time it was a massive inconvenience.

"I'm fine," she answered, thinking that Gunning was taking a page from her book. "How are you feeling?"

"Top of the world," he answered sarcastically, "I do feel a bit better though. I've managed to get some perspective. There's a swarm of zombified, infected people down there who could drop dead at a moment's notice. I'll just keep my focus on them for now."

Archer nodded as she moved to Gunning's side. "That's probably for the best. We need to focus on the mission at hand." At least that was her way of dealing with emotions.

He caught her eye and then immediately looked back to the table. "Indeed we do."

Henry entered Research Lab, taking a look around at the officers gathered there.

"Good afternoon everyone," Henry smiled.

Nicholas was next to arrive, followed closely by Bonnie, though she did so with a perplexed expression on her face. She'd expected the bulk of her involvement in this mission to have been concluded after they'd tracked down the Maltorran's homeworld, unless the situation with the virus became dire enough that a new one had to be selected; after such a short time, with the Captain still on the planet as well, she seriously doubted it had come that far. "Commanders," she said, nodding politely to Gunning and Archer. "Doctors."

"Good afternoon, all of you." Gunning opened, offering his open palm around the table. "I've gathered you here to try and get an impression of what this pathogen... disease... hammer-horror-zombie-apocalypse, call it what you will, is and how it's spreading on the ground."

"Have we had any samples of the disease to study?" Bonnie asked, not being aware of the details of the investigation from her own position, even though she was within the sciences department. "Or any data from the planet's scientists? We've been running atmospheric scans, but it's going to be hard to draw any theories if that's all we've got to go on."

"I've had Allison, Lieutenant Cathcart, transmit a few tricorder scans from some of the terminals in the facility but it appears that a lot of their information is based on guesswork at the minute."

"We're going to need to do a proper scientific study ourselves if we're going to be able to come up with anything workable," Tenebroso said, speaking up for the first time in the meeting. "It's very difficult to work on minimal data."

"Even if we can postulate a few theories to give something for the ground teams to go on, I reckon that would be a positive outcome," Gunning elaborated, feeling the mood in the room lift slightly.

"Well," Bonnie said, speaking up again. "I've been looking at some of the atmospheric data that the cartography sensors have been gathering since we entered close enough range of the planet." She shrugged, looking relatively uncertain. "There's been unusual patterns in the weather, though I'm not by any means a specialist in the subject. But most planets I've seen tend to have weather patterns which move across the planet - Maltorra's winds seem a bit odd. There are whole sections of the planet where the winds seem to be confined; almost like they're penned in behind an invisible wall in the air that stops them from circulating with the normal airflows."

"Artificial weather modification?" Tenebroso asked, looking over at her.

"Maybe," the cartographer responded. "But I've not seen any of the usual signs of that technology; not like we see on Earth or Risa at least."

"Can I see the areas affected?" Tenebroso asked, taking the PADD off the ensign and studying it.

Gunning's hand swiped elegantly over the console, producing a vibrant holographic map of the virus' hot zones.

"Sir," Tenebroso said, speaking up from his study of the PADD. "These areas with the odd wind patterns; they're almost exclusively over areas that have been affected by the disease. With the disease having become airbourne by now, these wind patterns are effectively containing it, but the planet's data doesn't suggest that they have even thought of dealing with the issue this way, even if they do have the technology for it."

"So what your suggesting is that there's something controlling the weather, controlling the spread of the disease?" Gunning asked, more perplexed than he had been when he'd sat down. He looked at his companions around the table. "Are you saying that someone is controlling the spread of the disease?"

[OFF]

Commander Jordan Gunning
Chief Of Security/Second Officer

Lieutenant Commander Sara Archer
Chief Intelligence Officer

Lieutenant Henry Marx
Chief Medical Officer

Lieutenant (JG) Nicholas Tenebroso [NPC: Krace]
Assistant Chief Medical Officer

Ensign Bonnie Myers [NPC: Krace]
Stellar Cartographer