Stormy Seas

Posted on Tue Apr 4th, 2023 @ 7:11am by Captain Charlotte Rhodes & Lieutenant Subat & Lieutenant Commander Ryan Knight & Lieutenant Jackson Rutledge II & Lieutenant Alex Drake & Lieutenant Callie Knight

2,079 words; about a 10 minute read

Mission: Episode 1: Runner
Location: Bridge, USS Defiant
Timeline: MD 5: 1000 Hours
Tags: story

It was like watching a hurricane. Violent cracks of ionic lightning ripped their way across the darkness, until reconnecting with the dark clouds of stellar material in a momentary blinding flash of light. The clouds roiled and surged, spinning on themselves like the form a mighty hurricane or the most chaotic thunderstorms the eye had ever seen. The violet and jade hued illumenation from within storm's mass only added an eerie other worldly effect.

Every instinct in Charlotte Rhodes's biology screamed stay away. The momentary brightening of the bridge with each flash might as well be an alert klaxon. The fact that they were instead going to be flying into that mess felt ill advised. She'd seen plenty of ion storms before. They could be very threatening and posed a serious risk to starships and stations alike. But this one was on a different level.

Alex stalked onto the bridge, not even bothering to nod to anyone like he would normally, instead walking up and presenting a tablet to Charlotte.

"In the last 6 months, five separate ion waves emanating from the Carina Nebula have been recorded. Every one contained a temporal differential of anywhere from one day to several years. Anything hit by these waves quickly suffered the same differential. However the waves dissipated rather quickly." He said, summarizing the reports on the tablet.

"None of the objects encountered by these waves had any people on them, and from known data," Alex chose his words carefully, to avoid both skepticism and revealing classified information, "none of them suffered any long-term effects, except a broken chronometer. This storm could be a natural occurrence..." He trailed off, leaving the obvious thought hanging, again, to avoid both panic and a possible intelligence leak.

Charlotte’s brow furrowed. She noted the origins of these reports. All 5 came from non-Starfleet sources, and sources separate from one another. No wonder no one had put the reports together.

“…or it could be not so natural. Well done on collecting this, Lieutenant. You might be the first person to have put these pieces together.” Her eyes then noticed the coordinates. “Did you notice the locations here? They’re practically along a single line. It’s almost as if…” She turned toward the Navigator. “Lt. Caix, can you plot these 5 coordinates?”

The Vulcan-Trill officer read the list off then quickly plotted them on a readout on screen. “Captain, these are nearly a direct path between the Carina Nebula and Eta Halix. In fact, if we plot them and account for time dilation…”

The screen updated, resolving a nearly direct path.

“It’s almost as if…” But the Captain trailed off again in thought as the turbolift opened.

Alex nodded along quietly. Charlotte was right, he was likely the first one to put this data together. Starfleet Intelligence didn't always put together outside sources. The reliability of them was marginal, at best. But Alex had learned that any source could be a valuable source.

Stepping out onto the bridge, Callie paused to look at the viewscreen. “What in the hell?!” It was a frightening sight to behold. “Captain, I’m sensing a lot of emotional upheaval from the crew. Might I suggest an announcement from you to reassure them.”

The Counselor's comment broke through the momentary hold that had grasped Charlotte. She made a mental note to herself that, once again, having a counselor on board was proving to be the right decision. Charlotte took a breath and allowed her mask to fall back into place. When she spoke up, her voice was even but appreciative. "Good call, Callie. Ops, open a ship wide channel."

Rutledge opened the ship wide channel and heard the familiar boatswain whistle.

As the intercom chirped on, Charlotte settled into her chair. "Attention all hands, this is the Captain. As I'm sure many of you are seeing, we've got some stormy seas ahead of us. I can't promise smooth sailing. Past this point, there is no certainty or guarantees of safety. But if that was what we were looking for, we wouldn't have build vessels to explore the stars. Ships are meant to sail, and Defiant is as tall and as tough as they come. She'll see us through. And she's not our only protection. Look around you. Those brightly colored uniforms are a statement and a promise, announced loudly and proudly to the world. We are Starfleet. Everyone of us is made stronger by those around us. We are the links of armor protecting each other and those who are unable to defend themselves. We are the smartest, most resourceful, and most resilient that our world's have to offer. Together, there is nothing beyond our reach. And we are not afraid of the storm."

Charlotte sat forward. "We are explorers by nature, setting out into the void to find that which challenges our understandings of the universe. We are not content with simply sitting in comfort and ignorance. The new, the dangerous, the treacherous, the unknown. That is our specialty. Personally, I've never seen an ion storm quite like that. Let's go do what we do best: explore. Winds and thunder be damned."

Callie smiled and nodded as she felt a more confident air start to come from the crew.

Rutledge listened to the captain give the crew a pep talk, but his focus was on the scans of the storm.

Alex hadn't been expecting the pep talk, but he did feel a bit more inspired by it. There was a degree of camaraderie that came out of pep talks like that, especially when venturing into the unknown such as this.

Ryan had his hands full guiding the Defiant through the worst of the ion storms shock wave eddies. Most of the time it wasn't to difficult, but there were powerful surges at irregular intervals.

Captain Rhodes rose from her seat and rounded the outer walkway to the Ops Station. "Lt. Rutledge, any sign of that pathway through the storm that Starfleet had seen signs of?"

"I've run every scan, looking for a pathway, even a small one. And this is the best I can do, Captain. I located what I think is a way through that's doesn't have as many storm fronts,” Rutledge replied.

Charlotte noted his pathway. It certainly didn’t look like a comfortable trip. But it was a path. “I’ll take what I can get. Good work, Lieutenant.” She called over to her first officer. “Number One, think you can get us through this?”

Ryan checked the sensor feed on his panel. "It might get a little bumpy, but I think can do it without breaking to many dishes in the galley."

“I think ‘a little bumpy’ is about as smooth as it’s going to get,” Charlotte said, bracing herself against the center railing as the ship rocked with one of the shockwaves. “Take us down the rabbit hole, Commander. Course and speed are at your discretion.”

Lt. Caix had been typing away at her terminal once the pathway had come in. The astrogator at the center of the helm terminal lit up at the arrival of her recommendation. “I have found what looks like our optimal path. I have made best estimates based upon the storm’s variance, but I will continue to update as the storm drifts.”

Ryan kept his eyes on his panel and proceeded along the course plot at half impulse. It may not have been the smoothest ride, but shaking was kept to a minimum. "Estimated...," he checked the course track, "20 hours and 37 minutes to planetary orbit."

Charlotte brushed some of her hair out of her face and let out a sigh. "20 hours. I guess we should all get used to the rocking then. Pace yourself, Commander. I want you at the helm as much as possible during our journey, but I want you at your best. Make sure you schedule in shift changes for yourself. You too, Caix."

Ryan made a mental note to adjust the watch bill for the helm and navigation roster for the next day. He figured a four on four off rotation for himself would have him at the helm for the most part, but enough downtime to rest between watches. "Will do. I will have an updated watch bill for you shortly after the end of the forenoon watch is done."

Rhodes made her way over to her chair. “I’ve been thinking about our string of temporal variance reports,” she began, as she secured herself in the seat just in time to avoid a fairly violent wave. “The pathway, the timing. The impression I am getting is that there is a direct correlation between the ion storms hitting and dissipating and the spikes in temporal shift. I hope I’m living up to my old blue uniform here, but that certainly gives the impression of something artificial being triggered or temporarily charged by the storm. As if the waves of ion storms hit, trigger some technological object to cause the time dilation, then the storm passes and the effect fades.”

Rutledge turned in his chair. "Oh my god, that was the variable I couldn't come up with! Yes! You're right!" Then he remembered who he was addressing. "Captain."

Alex nodded, and watched the pulsing of the ion storm, thinking. Too many variables were involved to make this a smooth mission, especially the time dilation.

Callie was already feeling the strain of the heightened emotions coming from the crew, Charlotte’s speech had helped, but emotions were still running high. Being in the storm for another 20 hours was going to be difficult to say the least.

Rutledge turned and faced the captain. "Captain. I had the computer scan all files and logs pertaining to ion storms, and this one doesn't match any storm on record." He turned back to his console.

"It is most certainly a unique storm," Subat, the Vulcan Science Officer replied from his station. "If the Captain's theory is correct, then the object causing the time dilation almost certainly has been carried by the Ion Storm into the Eta Halix system. The storm then remained here for an extended period of time, likely trapped by the dilation field itself. That highly suggests the object came to a stop upon encountering some sort of obstacle. Based upon our assumed trajectory, it is quite possible that it is on or near Eta Halix II itself."

Charlotte nodded. "That would explain why the storm stayed here and why the dilation effect lasted so much longer than other reports. The field essentially sat in one place and kept intensifying. But then why suddenly stop? Time has returned to normal here, so the storm isn't impacting it anymore?"

Ryan glanced at Charlotte curiously. "Something like a chain and anchor? Allowing Eta Halix II to remain in the calm eye of a hurricane after being buffeted by the storm. There is no known natural phenomenon that could cause that. It is possible if there is I just missed that lecture in advanced astrophysics class."

Alex bit back a snarky comment about it obviously not being natural, if anyone had paid attention to his relay of information to Charlotte, instead saying, "It's not natural. While there are ways this could be natural, this isn't. Too regular. It's possible the eye of the storm is currently over Eta Halix II at the moment..." He entered a command into the Intel console, before rubbing his face. "Storm's emitting Chroniton particles...curious."

Charlotte allowed her eyes to drift to the star map of the region on one of the bridge’s upper displays. The Carina Nebula almost seemed to loom over the rest of the sector. Whatever had caused this situation, the storms and time dilation alike, had come from the heart of that nebula. When this situation was settled, she was going to have a long chat with Command about the need to investigate what exactly was inside that monstrous cloud. But in the meantime, they had their own storm to deal with. “Only one way to find out for sure. Let’s see where it leads.”

The bridge rocked once more as the corridor began to fully surround the view screen. Captain Rhodes made special note to ignore how much it gave the impression of heading into the maw of some cosmic predator. The stars disappeared from view behind the violent maelstrom and the Defiant continued its dive deeper.

 

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