Log Matsiyan 291016-2237

[Matsiyan]

Personal Log, Lieutenant-Senior Conrad Matsiyan, TSN Lancer, 4th L.D.
Stardate: 291016-2237

Captains Evans and Xavier were both still attending to division organization in the expanse at the start of shift. So briefing fell to the self-effacing Captain Jemel.

The first order of business was to recognise cadet Beaumont’s completion of his exams and brevet him to Acting Ensign.

The plan was to run some simulations in separate suites for two or three ships at a time until the command net is completely performance tested. But in the event, it scaled up well so they kept us all in the same environment.

Lancer had all regular crew members aboard; Jemel in command, The XO, Aposine at Helm, Morlock on Weapons, Xiph at Engineering, Mundy on Comms and myself at Science. With a serious mission coming up to investigate the dense nebulae in Sector XII we decided to hone our talents at primary expertise positions rather than extend ourselves in alternate posts. The sims went very smoothly with the Lancer crew reading each other’s minds about what was needed where and when. The captain had overall command of the division, which he hasn’t done for quite a while. In the first sim there was a moment of confusion when all initial tasks had been completed. Individual vessels were not reporting back on completion of their tasks and were choosing their own next objective, which was less than optimal. Once that was sorted out the rest of the sim went well and the second sim ran very smoothly.

Next up was the actual mission. The data gathered from the probe launched last shift had been analyzed. The probe had come to a sticky end in what could have been a primary beam strike or some other high energy impact spike. Even running a carefully crafted Photinavian filter to screen out the antimatter particle radiation did not reveal more than that.

On the basis that not much more intel could be gathered remotely and acknowledging something dangerous was in there, the fleet captain ordered a reconnaissance in force with all active division vessels acting in concert and initially staying in close formation for mutual support given the extremely limited sensor range due to the intense Barrion radiation.

Once in the sector, finding that the situation was not as bad as feared, Phoenix, escorted by Horizon, was tasked with deploying sensor relays to boost range. This she accomplished, though there was a misunderstanding of the number of relays available and needed, so the distribution of the relays was not optimal.

Meanwhile, Raven and Viper scouted the central nebulae with Lancer as roving escort. Radiation levels became quite intense and had to be monitored carefully. The cause seemed to be a black hole that appeared near the centre of the sector and then disappeared. It that location debris of a station was discovered and numerous samples collected for later analysis. The gravitational anomaly appeared and disappeared elsewhere a couple of times changing the primary locus of the radiation. Initial guesses from the division astrophysics and stellar cartography gurus speculate this could be an unstable wormhole terminus that might be ripe for stabilization into a usable jump gate.

There was enough Hegemony and pirate presence in the sector to require caution and coordination. They must also be curious about the radiation. It would be desirable to deny them this potentially valuable resource, especially as we do not know where the other end on the wormhole might be, if it is one at all. There was also speculation as to whether the debris was from a previous local station damaged by the moving anomaly or whether is was deposited here from the other end and may represent some unknown civilization.

At the end of the shift I sat in with Mundy and Aramond as the Fleet Captain ran through some ideas for advanced Comms training. It was frustrating as my console decided it didn’t want to talk to the command net at that point even after diagnostics and reinitialisations, though it mysteriously recovered later. Fortunately I was able to follow along through the psi-link with Mundy. There is room for operational efficiencies through good coordination with local defence forces. I look forward to putting that into practice.

While I worked on my console Mundy commanded Raven crewed by senior officers and seemed to do pretty well. It made it much easier to concentrate on command decisions when she knew each station knew its business.

Time to get some sleep and catch the early shuttle escort back to civilization. Mundy and I are remanded to more officer training and psych evals in a series of roleplaying simulations that is going to keep us out of the next couple of shifts.

Where’s that sleeptab?
[End log]

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