The Black Box

Posted on Sun Dec 9th, 2012 @ 5:09pm by Commander Jordan Gunning

Mission: Heart of an Explorer
Location: Chief of Security's Office [Deck 6]

[ON]

The blinking sensor hits which represented the communication buoys were distracting Gunning from the work of the moment as he did his best to activate a high-speed relay between the Iapetus and the last buoy that they had left. Subspace communication had never been a specialty of his, to the point that he had dropped out of the '101' class at the Academy.

The little green indicator stretched out in a line from the representation of the Iapetus toward the first buoy. Gunning made a gentle adjustment to the frequency, hoping that the signal would be strong enough to reach back.

It did.

The relay burst into life as the communication buoys all kicked into life and transmitted a signal back to Starbase 900. His comm screen flickered from a deep black to the symbol of the United Federation of Planets. That's a start, he thought as he began to cycle through open communication channels, trying to find the communications switchboard on the station. "They never put the things you need on the top." He mused quietly.

The screen flickered into life and a collar appeared. A Chief Warrant Officer... with a face attached. The Andorian female eyed him suspiciously. "This is Starbase Nine Hundred. Please state your vessel designation."

"USS Iapetus," Gunning said flatly, noting her desire to forego the niceties, "NCC-Eight-Three-Seven-Two-One."

"Transferring you to the officer responsible for your mission."

"Ha-" Gunning tried to stop her, it wasn't important enough to bother Vice Admiral Dowd.

Another face flickered onto the screen but it was not the Admiral. The pips read Lieutenant Commander and the face was immediately familiar.

"Commander Gunning. Jordan. It's nice to see you again," greeted the Japanese woman who the Commander would know as Youko Hara, a colleague from Starbase 386. "Your contacting the station is unexpected but welcome. How have you been?" It had been some time since Youko had last seen the Commander. Five years, to be exact. The two of them had a good working relationship when they served together.

"Not too bad, Youko." Gunning replied with something of a smile passing across his face. "You know, tripping the light fantastic of galactic exploration. How's life back on the sensible side of the galaxy?"

Youko returned the smile and then pushed a strand of stray hair behind her left ear. "It's still as busy as you left it but we're managing," she offered. There never seemed to be a dull moment on 386.

"Listen, I need you to do a bit of digging for me." Jordan said bluntly, skipping straight to the business at hand. "I need some information on the last known coordinates and the black box information from the USS Mjolnir if it's available."

"The Mjolnir?" said Youko, the request causing her to be a little surprised. She looked down at the computer monitor and began inputting a series of commands into the panel before her. She took a few moments to read over the information before relaying some of it to the Commander. "Well, the information isn't classified... which is a good thing. Hmmm. Looks like the Mjolnir was destroyed about forty-three days ago while exploring a system a few light years out of the Typhon Expanse. The rest of the info is here. Why do you need it?" she wondered.

"Forty three days, huh?" Gunning whistled through his teeth. He's been holed up a while. He lowered his voice slightly. "Off the record? You probably won't believe this but we rescued one of their escape pods with an Ensign aboard."

"In the Delta Quadrant?" It was difficult for Youko to hide the shock that was apparent on her face. As she didn't really know what had been happening on the Iapetus, it was understandable for her to be a little confused and slightly in awe. "How did he get all the way out there? Were there any others?" The official records had shown that none had survived but if this ensign had, then there was a bit of hope that there would possibly be more.

"That's what I was hoping the black box recordings would be able to tell me," Gunning mused as he rubbed his jaw, "the Ensign believes that they were investigating some strange energy readings and somehow ended up out there. He was the only survivor that we found."

Youko checked the data on her computer display again. "It does mention here, in the science logs, that they encountered some kind of subspace filament. They were analysing it when a surge from the rupture made contact with the ship." She then pressed a few commands into the console before which initiated the transfer of the files to the Iapetus. "I'm sending you the information now. I may also inform our Captain about this. Maybe there are other survivors out there." She hoped that would be the case at least. It was always a bit sad when Starfleet lost a few good men and women.

"Hmm," Gunning mused, "can you send me that information through and I'll see if our Science staff can do anything with it? Perhaps they'll be able to reverse engineer it and see if there's someone still out there."

The Japanese woman looked down at her console to verify the status of the information transfer. "It'll take a bit of time to reach you but it should all be there. Was there anything else you needed Jordan?" asked Youko. She didn't want to take up too much of the Commander's time even though it was nice to speak to him again.

"No, that'll be everything. Thank you, Youko. It was good to speak you again." Gunning closed the connection and began to complete his report to Captain Krace.

[OFF]

Commander Jordan Gunning
Second Officer / Chief of Security
USS Iapetus

Lieutenant Commander Youko Hara [Played by Ensign Thryskal]
Starbase 386