Discovering the Unknown (Part 1)

Posted on Sat May 29th, 2021 @ 4:41pm by Captain Dirk Taggart & Lieutenant Adora (Addie) Hart & Lieutenant JG Vespa Kale
Edited on on Thu Jun 8th, 2023 @ 2:39pm

Mission: Exploring the unknown
Location: Delta Quadrant-Unmapped sector

=Ready Room=

A month had passed since Dirk first took command of Pennsylvania. Within 48 hours they departed friendly skies to continue mapping unknown portions of the Delta Quadrant. The crew hadn't completely come around to welcoming him as Kamar's replacement, but they had settled into a routine and things did seem to have calmed down. He was just finalizing a report for Starfleet when an urgent request summoned him to the bridge.

=Bridge=

Shri'rao was on the bridge when it happened a contact of sorts.

'Sir, Sensors are picking up some sort of gaseous anomaly perhaps a small nebula, I'm reading Cyclohexane, Ionozed diatomic dilithium, Anhydrous sulphur monoxide, ammonium, nitrogen diazomine, and other unknown trace elements. It is also multiphasic, part gaseous and part plasma alternating between both states simultaneously, at bearing 109 Mk 16. Shri'Rao stated.

"Helm, full stop, let's take at this," he said as he stood to get a better view. "Science, what are you seeing on your sensors?" The captain inquired.

Rouni brought the ship to a stop quickly. " Aye, all stop. Helm standing by."

Vespa brought the full scope of Pennsylvania's available sensor suite to bear. "It appears to be a Class Four nebular mass, though as stated there are unknown elements within the mix." one of her twin forms gave Shri-Rao a nod, "An excellent initial discovery. The only thing I can potentially..."

"... add to the initial report is the nebular mass is expanding at a slightly elevated rate from standard nebular expansion. Though, it's only a two per cent variance, which can easily..."

"... be a product of its high energy status. It's pretty tough." she commented, "I'll keep the sensors on it, and see what else we can find. Transitional fourth state nebulae are rather..."

"... rare in this pocket of existence." Kale finished her assessment, never taking one set of eyes off her instrument panel.

"Is it normal for a Nebula to do that Lieutenant Kale?" Griffith's asked looking at the Lieutenant, for some reason she was alarmed at this news, but she could guess the Lieutenants answer, but she needed to hear it for herself.

"Normal is a relative word, Major? Yes, Major. Sorry, still getting used to everyone's titles." she apologized, "Though the rate of expansion is alarming, there aren't many instances of a nebula this energetic to..."

"... really compare it to. My suggestion would be to launch probes and observe. From a safe distance, of course. After all, Fourth State matter is nothing to sneeze at." "Alright Lieutenant, we shall proceed," the Captain said quickly. "Lieutenant Hunter, prepare and launch 2 probes when you're ready."

Simon replied "Probes ready and Launched Sir and shall be in a position in 2 minutes," as he knew the readouts from those would get sent straight to science to study, he continued "all readouts will be sent to Science Sir," as he knew that it was best to do so than not to after all the debacle with the supplies hadn't gone down well with the Captain.

Captain Taggart nodded, "Understood, thank you."

"Engineering, remain on standby, I'm not sure what we're looking at yet, but if we need to move I want them engines purring!"

Not like being spoken to like that, Arianna started to be a bit curt in answering but, just answered, "Understood Sir!". She was heated but for what reason?

Turning to his First Officer he asked quietly, "I know we're just investigating a Gaseous Nebula, but do you think it would be presumptuous to go to an alert, say Yellow?"

Feeling uneasy at the situation, she felt somewhat reassured when the Captain spoke to her, and in an equally low voice "I agree yellow alert Captain, as I have a bad feeling about this!" Griffiths said.

Taggart nodded, glad they were on the same page. "Security, set Yellow Alert."

"Yellow Alert, Aye Sir." Lt. Sh'veqan replied putting the ship on Yellow Alert and energizing defensive fields.

"Medical and Counseling, we are currently scanning a large nebula, if either of you would like to watch from the bridge your presence would be most welcome." The captain said to both of them. The real reason for the summons was to have his senior officers together before deciding on how to proceed.

=/\=Trallos here. On my way.=/\=

After a few moments, the doctor walked out of the turbolift. He made his way over towards tactical and leaned next to the console above the Major. "Captain, Major." He said as he made sure he was well out of everyone's way. "Mighty pretty view."

Looking up with a smile as Trallos entered "hello Doctor, yes, it is a pretty view" she said quickly looking at the nebula.

Addie slipped quietly onto the bridge, lingering at the back where she wouldn't be in anyone's way. "It almost looks like it's alive," she commented quietly. "The way it's swirling."

Taggart watched the Nebula begin to grow, "Why is it getting closer? Is it moving or are we?" He asked with growing concern.

"Possibly a trick of the viewscreen representation. Also, everything in space is moving to some degree." one of the forms of Vespa noted, "Though I can try to calculate our relative velocities." the pair turned their attention towards the console for a moment. "Oooo, that's..."

"... very interesting. So, the nebula mass is slowly approaching the ship. Perhaps there's a magnetic attraction?" she mused aloud, "There's no place close where we..."

"... can alter our electric potential, possibly adjusting the navigational deflector to alter our electromagnetic alignment?" she offered as a guess. Oh the joys of science. "Either way, fascinating."

Looking at Kale "are you saying you are going to randomly rotate the shield frequencies with an opposing set of frequencies to stop attracting that Nebula?" Griffiths asked

"Ultimately that was the theory. We'd need to be near a planetary body with a magnetic field to effectively change our electrical potential, so that's out." she started, before her focus shift moved the conversation to her other body. "So the only option left is to vary the polarity of our hull. I'll have a fluctuation assessment ready in a few moments to execute, and we should know if it worked or not almost immediately."

True to her word, a few moments later and she had a list of seemingly random shield harmonic frequencies.

"Hmm" she simply said and closes in on Kale as she leans over the officer's shoulder to look at the screen "was that thing moving to us prior to our shields going up?" She asked and without any questions being asked of her she answered "if us going to Yellow Alert is the reason the nebula is moving towards us, then tactically we have a problem Captain" She said and returned her attention to Kale "how does it look El-tee?" She asked.

"I don't know precisely, since we didn't really stop to take full notice of it before, but it is certainly moving towards us now. Slowly, but the rate is..."

"... consistent." she turned one form's attention to Griffiths, while the other stayed focused on the screen. "Though I do concur if a Fourth State Matter nebula is heading..."

"... towards us, additional caution would never be a bad thing. The harmonic flux patterns are loaded and ready for execution sir. Ready on your go."

"Begin Lieutenant," Taggart said trusting the Dalacari's knowledge and hoping his solution would work to protect the ship.

Arianna was not happy over the fact the Nebula was advancing towards them. There were too many things that could go wrong to the ship let alone the crew. It made her skin crawl as it got closer. "Captain, I will keep working on repairs to our engines, but, be warned, a Nebula of this type is known to affect ship's systems and if we are drawn inside, as it seems which it might do, we also lose sensors. We will be blind inside, and we also do not have any idea on how it will affect us," she finished saying.

"Understood Commander, thank you," Taggert said to his Chief Engineer, turning to Commander Rouni he asked, "Is there any way for us to get around this thing?"

Round replied, "I have tried manoeuvre around it Captain but it seems to stay in front of us. Not sure what is going on Sir."

The closeness of the nebula to the ship, plus the fact it was closing in on the ship, made Arianna begin fear for the crew and ship. There were strange feelings coming from crew members and even giving her Klingon warrior's heart reason to fear, but from what? What could possibly make her fear for her safety?

"I have a bad feeling about this nebula," she mentioned.

Vespa couldn't help but nod in agreement. The cycling of the magnetic polarity of Pennsylvania's hull did little to detract from the nebula's seeming intent to collide with the ship. "I have a bad feeling about it too, now." she echoed Arianna's sentiment.

Rouni being a telepath began to notice signs of fear and even some were experiencing anger to each other. There were reports of fights and arguments among crew members. She herself was experiencing issues of mistrust and fear. She did what she could to protect herself from them by distracting herself with the duties of controlling the ship. And trying to avoid the gaseous cloud. She heard a crew member mumbling about how she needed to do something. But ignored it.

The doctor looked around. Everyone seemed to be getting uptight about the nebula moving. This was all outside of his expertise but still, he was curious. "It's a cloud of gas. Other than some sensor disruption and scramble some peripheral electronics, how bad could it be? I know this isn't my field, but I did manage to stay awake through Astrophysics 101. I didn't think common nebulas were dangerous. Or at least not supposed to be."

"It's a cloud of gas. Highly energetic gas. Potentially fourth state matter." Vespa mentioned, "Calling a nebula just some gas is like calling a meteor just a..."

"... rock. Also, nebular masses don't move. Ergo, concern." she continued to explain.

"Lieutenant Vespa & Lieutenant Hunter, Double check our sensors and heading, I want to know if that thing is moving or if our engines are giving us a false readout," Taggart said quickly.

"Aye, establishing zero point reference." a few taps at the console before the pair to load up a probe. No instruments, no scanners, just a very loud sensor profile. By design.

"Launching reference probe. Five seconds to zero probe velocity. Four. Three. Two. Probe full stop." The trick to finding velocity in space is it was hard to find a reference. Vespa did just that.

"Probe confirmed zero velocity. Sir, sensor pings off the stationary probe..."

"... show that it isn't the nebula that's moving towards us. It's us, we're moving towards it. Could be residual inertia, if the compensators are..."

"... malfunctioning. Or it could be actual engine motion. Sending my readings to engineering to confirm momentum." and with that, the binary officer sent her results off to be shared with the engineering panel.



Taggart listened as the officer spoke quickly and precisely. The engines were moving the ship, it wasn't the nebula moving after all. He called to engineering, "Commander Sky, Helm indicates the ship is not home but all sensor data indicates the ship is moving into the nebula, Stop the engines and ..." Before he could finish giving his order the edges of the nebula overtook the ship.

[Continued on Part 2]

Captain Dirk Taggart
Commanding Officer
USS Pennsylvania

Major NS Griffiths
First Officer
USS Pennsylvania

Lt. Cmdr. Arianna Sky Kamar
Chief Engineering Officer
USS Pennsylvania

Lieutenant James Trallos MD
Chief Medical Officer
USS Pennsylvania

Lieutenant JG Vespa Kale
Asst. Chief Science Officer
USS Pennsylvania

Lt. Shri'Rao Sh'veqan
Chief Security Officer
USS Pennsylvania

Lieutenant Simon Hunter
Chief Operations Officer
USS Pennsylvania