To the Stars (Part 1 of 3)

Posted on 25 Mar 2012 @ 11:42am by Rear Admiral Lirha Saalm & Captain Jonathan Holliday & Lieutenant Commander Chauncey Remington III (KIA) & Lieutenant JG Robin Hilyer MD & Lieutenant JG Drusilla McCarthy & Lieutenant Commander Evelyn Coleman & Command Master Chief Markum Quinn & Lieutenant Lilou Zaren & Tarishiana Barel & Crewman Nazhzhalh & Ensign Im'er Mor'an & Ambassador Si'tar Del'an
Edited on on 25 Mar 2012 @ 11:55am

1,965 words; about a 10 minute read

Mission: Episode 00 - Pre-Deployment
Location: San Francisco Fleet Yards, USS Galileo
Timeline: MD 06 - 2345 hrs

[ON]

A chilly March breeze manifested itself under the clear night sky while the twinkle of stars dotted the horizon as far as the eye could see. The city of San Francisco was almost asleep for the night, with the exception of a large crowd which had gathered on the Golden Gate Bridge to witness the launch of Starfleet's newest Nova Class starship. Five miles from the Bay, all of the Fleet Yards' construction sites had gone dark and silent for the night...except for one. Perched elegantly on her landing struts, the Galileo's silver hull shined brightly under the drydock's spotlights. A myriad of support craft buzzed around the complex, delivering final supplies and withdrawing construction personnel.

Quinn stepped back into the shuttle craft as he finished the final check on the Skipper's requested art on the port nacelle. It was perfect. He took a moment while standing on the nacelle. It was a beautiful night; it was slightly cool, and clear. Quinn couldn't remember the last time he had seen such a clear night. It was almost as if the stars were out to personally watch the maiden launch of the Galileo. Fitting he felt, seeing how Galileo was the man to first come out against the old church and proclaim it was the Earth that rotated around the Sun, not the Sun rotating around the Earth. He was brought back with a warm hand on his shoulder. "Thanks for bringing me up here dad to see you off. I'll miss you."

Quinn gave his only son a bear hug and with trembling words, "I'll miss you too Champ. Take care of your mother, and don't get kicked out of the Academy while I'm gone. I love you." The two looked about one final time before Quinn gave to command to beam Markus back to the viewing area. Quinn hustled down the access hatch and sealed it.

From the Bridge, John found himself entering the final set of requisition commands into a nearby console, it would be useless now, but it would ensure that when they reached the Starbase, they would find their remaining supplies ready and waiting, including the all-important torpedoes that John had been banking on them receiving.
As he worked, a small panel caught his attention informing him that one of their shuttles was still outside of the bay, with one, now well-trusted Chief Engineer still on board. Thumbing the comm panel, he called out.

=/\= Galileo to Quinn, Chief we could do with you back here any time soon, that warp core isn't going to monitor itself =/\=

Quinn replied =/\= Aye-aye, sir. Already on my way to Main Engineering Commander. Let the Skipper know that her requested mural on the port nacelle is completed, and looks magnificent."

=/\= Understood Chief, I'll pass on the message. See you shortly =/\=

On the bridge of the Galileo...

Lirha stepped out of her ready room and onto the bridge, looking around as several officers and enlisted crew arrived and moved to their stations. With a tug on her uniform to straighten it, she walked to the center of the room and stood quietly next to her chair, arms folded across her chest as she gazed at the viewscreen while deep in thought. The moment she had diligently prepared herself for over the last few weeks had finally arrived, and her anxiety had now reached an almost unbearable level. She picked up a PADD from her seat and began to read over the dock master's final status report in an attempt to calm herself.

Tarishiana had watched the CO enter the bridge. A ripple of anticipation ran through her as she awaited what was to come. She had never been on the bridge during a maiden launch and had barely spent any time manning the science station. A smile crossed her face as she turned to her console, double checking the status of her department.

Beside her, one of the junior officers, a Crewman Nazhzhalh, was perched on a chair balancing on his feet which more or less represented a bunch of claws that held his balance as he sat with his hands poised over some controls. Ziyal as he preferred was simply fascinated by all of the bridge technology, and the fact that he'd been invited at all. He looked up from his reverie as the captain approached.

"Captain on the bridge!" Remington took the liberty of announcing from his station at ops. In a formal ceremony, the traditions of formality asserted themselves and he came to attention in order to acknowledge the official start of Lirha's command.

After hearing the words of his Ops officer, John turned around from the auxiliary console that he had been using to complete his own duties before launch. The sight of his captain appearing was somewhat calming, the command structure was now in place, and he was pretty confident that she would be able to get this vessel off the ground and into the cold depths of space without too much trouble. Signing off from his console, John headed towards the XO chair and gingerly lowered himself down, it was becoming more and more familiar each time he used it, and he was sure that he would be spending plenty of time there, or in the so called "big chair" over the course of this voyage.

"Nice to see you on board Ma'am, ready to get this show on the road?"

Lirha nodded and once again glanced around the brightly lit bridge before her green eyes finally settled on Commander Holliday. "As ready as I'll ever be." she answered, and gave him a reassuring squeeze on the arm. "Did you take care of the 'arrangements'?" she asked in a quiet voice.

"Yes ma'am, everything is prepared and accounted for...you just give the word" He mentioned with a smirk of his own, before giving her a brief tap on the elbow to reassure her himself.

"Just make sure you get this baby off the ground without scratching the paintwork huh? I can imagine the look on Command's faces if we had to repaint the hull before leaving the Sol system"

After his tour through the port nacelle and port strut, he entered Main Engineering. The area was alive with noise. Chirps, buzzing, multiple conversations, and not all in Federation Standard. "Wink, get the mains online, bring up power to pre-launch status." The specialist nodded and replied with an "Aye, Chief." Quinn thought, 'All these years, and I still get butterflies when we get ready to depart.' Quinn pressed the internal communications relay switch. "Engineering to Bridge. We are Green for pre-flight systems checks."

After a moment of pause, the captain's voice sounded clear through the comm channel, "Acknowledged, Engineering, stand by." she replied.

The turbolift halted at the bridge and, before stepping out, Cadet Im'er Mor'an breathed deeply to calm herself and ready her mind. The young Tarkannan had been waiting for months for the moment when she would step foot on the bridge of the Galileo, her first mission from Starfleet. The turbolift door slid open with a delicate hiss and Mor'an breezed onto the bridge with confident strides. She was ready for this. She immediately greeted Captain Saalm with the traditional Tarkannan hand gesture.

Seeing the young cadet promptly arrive and greet her, Lirha smiled and gave her an appreciative nod. "Take your station, Cadet." she said, her eyes flickering towards a vacant console in the raised starboard alcove. With a full complement of personnel aboard the bridge, Lirha had to improvise and figured the mission ops station would be a good starting point for Mor'an on the upcoming journey.

Mor'an watched the captain's eyes flicker to her appointed station. "Aye, sir." She turned and walked calmly to her station, settling herself on the seat.

As the ship was leaving her dock, Dru had decided it best to join everyone on the bridge. Not just would this give her the best vantage point to watch lift off, it would also give her an opportunity to observe the crew in their working environment. Dru laughed softly as the phrase, mixing work with pleasure came to mind. As the young counsellor stepped onto the bridge, she stumbled slightly seeing Lirha already there. This was the first time they were seeing each other after what happened last night. Lirha had been busy prepping the ship and Dru had been busy...well avoiding Lirha. Dru recovered her step quickly and stood to attention, "Permission to come onto the bridge Ma'am?"

The captain turned around at the sound of a familiar voice and smiled slightly at the counsellor. "Permission granted, Lieutenant." she said, secretly happy that Dru had decided to visit the bridge for the launch. "We're a bit full at the moment but you're welcome to give Miss Barel a hand at one of the secondary science stations." she added while motioning towards the raised port alcove bristling with scientific monitors and consoles.

Dru nodded her head in acknowledgement, "Thank you Captain." Dru headed over to Barel, feeling slightly worried about being put in front of a control panel again after what happened during the system tests. All she needed was to somehow blow up a panel and make Lirha cross at her because the ship's departure would be delayed.

Ziyal watched as everybody began piling onto the bridge, tilting his head a little from his spot in the shadows as they all milled about. He was like a big scientist looking at bugs in a microscope, totally fascinated by all the people in front of him.

Evelyn stepped off the turbolift walking towards her assigned station. She sat in her chair, getting comfortable. She looked around and saw the eager faces of the crew and smiled softly. She turned to the console and began to review the intelligence reports for the surrounding systems.

Robin entered the Bridge from a forward turbolift and sat down at an auxiliary station. He turned it on to interface with the Sickbay Monitors. Since there were no patients in the infirmary, the monitors were silent. But not his heart. It was pounding loudly in his ears.

Ungracefully, Ziyal stood up as the bridge got more and more crowded. Eyes seemed drawn to him as he stumbled a little, and he blinked sheepishly and raised a couple of tentacles in their direction. He made a slight scratchy noise and tacked on, "Ehh, hello!"

Hearing a strange familiar sound behind her, Lirha turned around and smiled as she saw the unique-looking form of the ship's biotechnologist. "Well hello, Mister Ziyal." she replied, happy to see that he had found his way to the bridge. "Please take your station." she said, and pointed to one of the terminals in the science alcove.

Ziyal gave a solemn blink. "Yes, sir!" he said excitedly as he crawled-climbed-walked back into his seat and began once again monitoring the status of the science labs.

To Be Continued...

[OFF]

--

CMDR Lirha Saalm
Commanding Officer
USS Galileo

LCDR Jonathan Holliday
Executive Officer
USS Galileo

LCDR Chauncey (Will) Remington III
Chief Operations Officer
USS Galileo

LTJG Robin Hilyer MD
Chief Medical Officer
USS Galileo

LTJG Evelyn Coleman
Chief Intelligence Officer
USS Galileo

LTJG Drusilla McCarthy
Chief Counselor
USS Galileo

CWO Markum Quinn
Chief Engineering Officer
USS Galileo

MWO Tarishiana Barel
Chief Science Officer
USS Galileo

MWO Lilou Peers
Engineering Officer
USS Galileo

CN Nazhzhalh
Biotechnologist
USS Galileo

CDT(SR) Im'er Mor'an
Red Squad Cadet
USS Galileo

Si'tar Del'an
Ta'rkan Observer
USS Galileo

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