Fleet Mission: "To Boldly Go..."

[Steve Malloway]

GATEWAY CONTROL STATION
Main Control Room
1504 hours

As always at present the room was pretty empty. The advancements in the Gateway Control Technology had been minimal since the control of the passage was deemed complete and stable. Well, stable enough for 99% of missions and usage; they'd found the gateway was unstable on approximately 2 of the tests out of the near 130 they had completed. Admiral Malloway had been specific he wanted the project to be flawless before he permitted constant use by any of his officers, or even their ships.

And now, that dream had become reality. Nearly 5 months ago when the report on the latest, and current, state of the gateway was submitted he was happy enough to allow the project to go live. No longer was it a highly classified archive throughout Starfleet, but now instead the successful implementation of the technology and all to do with it was public. Obviously save for the schematics and actual mission reports, but you get the general idea. The only down-side was that since this project became active Admiral Malloway had deemed missions would only undergo at the discretion of Commanding Officers... and to date, none had risked their ship and crew. And so, the Control Station was on minimal power, and minimal personnel. Well... all but one area. But for some reason that section had remained classified to Rear Admiral rank or higher, and only to those within the Starfleet Strategic Response.

Ah, the SSRF; the re-named UFPDF as she used to be. They'd been under this newly activated mandate now for nearly 14 months, and so much had changed. No longer was the Fleet a Defensive regime, she was both that and Strategic in manner. Terrorism within the Federation had increased, and the previous tension with the Klingon Empire was nowhere near a peaceful end; if anything it hadn't gotten any better and the rest of the Federation was beginning to suffer because of it. Last anyone knew the Federation was attempting to negotiate with the Klingons to involve them in the Gateway Project as a form of an olive branch. But so far that was merely rumour and speculation. Besides, the Klingons were warriors not explorers! But still, the SSRF carried on as she was needed; Vice Admiral Morgan was now a full Admiral and shared the Joint Fleet Command position with Admiral Malloway and with that Admiral Targus had moved up to accept the Fleet Executive Officer role, and Commodore Wilkinson had accepted a promotion to Rear Admiral too. The Fleet itself had been re-managed too; seeing Taskforce 354 transferred to another Fleet within the Federation and Taskforce 169 opened within SSRF; commanded by Mr Jackson, now in rank at Fleet Captain and had been for nearly 7 months now. Thrinacia, the Fleet's base of operations and situated not far from the Gateway Control Station, was also currently undergoing upgrade; a good thing too as she had been due one for several years and the attack by the Cardassians over 2 years ago when the Control Station was first activated had made that need ever-more obvious.

But yet while so much had happened; there was so little to do, as Lieutenant Junior Grade Phillip Topham sat back in his chair and interlaced his fingers behind his head, his gaze looking out of the porthole above his station. He could just about make out the small dot that was Thrinacia some way off, orbiting Salon IV.

“Lieutenant…?”

Phillip jumped slightly, startled by the sudden voice breaking the silence of what felt like a cold room, but merely an empty one. “Apologies, Commander.”

The Commander chuckled slightly. “No need to apologise, I suppose at the moment, we do have very little to do… Just don’t get used to it, I hear tell tale of a meeting this evening of the Senior Staff.” With that, the Commander said nothing more, merely winking to an intrigued-looking Phillip.

STARBASE THRINACIA
Commanding Officer’s Office, Operations Deck
1507 hours

“Computer, confirmation report on Senior Staff meeting schedule.”

Meeting Schedule invitation confirmed as submitted to all personnel; Admiral Morgan, Admiral Targus, Rear Admiral Wilkinson, Fleet Captain Jackson,  all Commanding Officers within the Fleet, and all Executive Officers. Confirmed submittance also to Commander Jezebel of Gateway Control.

Steve sat back onto the couch in his office, swinging his feet up to stretch out a little, a warm mug of coffee in one hand and a PADD in the other. “Excellent. Send reminder to all participants the meeting will begin promptly at 1800 hours in Conference Room Alpha. And remind all Taskforce Commanding Officers to make sure their COs and XOs attend.” The computer chirped in her usual affirmative tone.

The Admiral glanced to the window within his office, looking out across the mass of space at the stars beyond, his vision only slightly obscured by the steam whisping up infront of his face from the mug as he drank some of the beverage. The coffee flavouring swirled within his throat pleasingly, a welcome feeling. His eyes looked from the closer stars individually on to the Gateway Control Beacon and a smile crept over his lips. ’Bout time we got that thing on the go…

TAG: ALL