Into the Night

[Slacker]

So, zero surprise on the vote, so I had this pretty much prepped to go.

The red dwarf seems like the best bet to get some truly new information on what's going on. That said, a Golden Commonwealth expeditionary cruiser is going to get a less than warm reception. Fortunately, you have some tricks to disguise the ship so it's not so bloody obvious. Your onboard electronic warfare systems can alter your signature somewhat so you don't scream "the fuzz" to everyone and their cousin, and holographic technology built into your ship's hull can alter its physical appearance to the casual observer. There are limits, and it really doesn't hold up as a system once you're in combat, but it should let you at least casually observe the system and send any away teams to whatever station OPF thinks is lurking there.

What will you disguise the Challenger as?

[] A mercenary cruiser. Most mercs can't afford the firepower of a full-up heavy cruiser, but those who do are considered pretty heavy hitters and don't attract too many questions.

[] A Golgothan corsair. Lighter than the Challenger, but with a sprinkling of recovered Sword of the Cutting Truth technology that could explain away some of Challenger's advanced systems.

[] A large armed freighter. Pose as a free trader, which will attract the least attention. On the other hand, it'll be really hard to explain if the Challenger is forced to engage in heavy combat or move quickly.

 

[Slacker]

Main Bridge, GCS Challenger
Red Dwarf Chart Number P7V-113
February 11th, 2452

The bridge of the ship was silent as the Challenger de-folded into the system OSP had pointed to as a possible connection to the attacks. You had ordered the ship to jump into interstellar space from Ctesiphon, so any prying eyes wouldn't see the hull of your ship seemingly morph into a very different configuration.

The ship now looked, to the outside world, like a Golgothan corsair. Roughly the same length, corsairs were granted to the Free Port's most trusted captains, not the average run of freebooter. They were configured and customized to each captain's specifications in the recovered Sword autoyard the Golgothans had used ruthlessly to maintain their independence in the post-Collapse era, giving the holodisguise some flexibility in concealing Challenger's true origins.

"IFF and EW signatures still up to snuff?" you ask the two officers to the left of the command pit, eyeballing the number of contact lights crawling across the holotank. A good dozen ships had already been detected by Challenger's passive sensor arrays, and you were still two AU out from what seemed to be the main center of action in the system.

"IFF reading us as Corsair Granuaile, sir. I've got Golgothan comm frequencies and handshakes loaded into the system to use as long as we're here." the communications officer replies. You nod, and raise an eyebrow at your tactical officer, who was working with the ship's AI to further conceal the ship. He looked back at you with a small shrug. "EW is running in deception mode and the holodisguise is working. As you know sir, we can't duplicate a corsair's cloak, so..."

"I understand, Demeter. You're doing fine." you say, reassuring Lieutenant Almassy. The slim man of Hungarian descent seemed almost painfully young, but he'd come with a number of recommendations from both of his previous postings. Unfortunately, he was still in the "In a super important job and didn't want to fuck it up" stage, which to be fair described about half of your senior officers.

You decide this isn't a bad time to test your new XO, looking over at the apectid who was helping the sensor officer parse out contacts. She was settling in nicely, actually, and had taken to managing all the new crew alongside you exceptionally well. Some of that was undoubtably apectid social mores-they naturally tried to build consensus, although here she was working without the psychic senses the apectid had to use with each other for communication and social cues-but some of that was also her personality. bin-Tran had spent a couple of decades around humans and had learned how to manage them well.

"XO, thoughts on how to proceed from here?"

She looked up from the sensor console with the same smooth fluidity that informed all apectid movement-one early wag had termed them "six legged hyena-ferrets" soon after First Contact with some justification-and took a moment to look at the holotank before replying.

Good. You think. Rather than rushing into a decision, she was aware they had time to consider their options, and was as a result studying new data before making a recommendation.

"Captain, as I see it we have three options here, in increasing order of both payoff and potential danger." She flowed over from the sensor station to stand beside you at the main tank, bringing up some information to consult as she did.

"First, we could just sit here for a while and see what develops. We probably don't want to go fully active, that might weaken our subterfuge, but we're getting quite a bit of data even on passives and we might catch a break. Golgothans generally speaking hold themselves above the rest of the riff-raff in the Demimonde and Verge, so we'd be within character to just ignore everyone while we did whatever it is the Granuaile is here for."

You nod, accepting her reasoning, and she continued.

"Second, we could openly engage with the station and other ships. Have the intelligence teams try and get some information, present ourselves as between missions and looking to make some side money. Stay onboard, but I'm sure we could mock up convincing enough code to make you look like a freebooter? Perhaps with an eyepatch?" She said with a short apectid bark of laughter. "Finally, send a team to the station and conduct some undercover work. Most dangerous but we could send in some of the Hoplite team as backup. We have two DDI Mark 17s we could use, they're a common enough shuttle that they wouldn't stick out."

You consider all three options. She was good-you hadn't even thought of the second possibility. Which option do you pursue?

[] Stand off and glower, while gathering whatever intelligence you can via passive sensors. Least dangerous but also least likely to have a big break.

[] Atempt to communicate with the station and see if any "contracts" are available that could give you leads.

[] Send an away team over to actively gather intelligence. Feel free to make suggestions for away team makeup. (You will take over as whoever leads the team for this operation, in Expeditionary Command captains do not stick themselves out there for no purpose. That's what you have junior officers for.)

Modly Notes: Each XO would have made a different middle path option depending on what you suggested, based on their personal racial lens. Also Nasir made a command check (with a bonus because he was the senior guy in the options presented) to have the Challenger jump into deep space between Ctesiphon and your destination for extra deniability.