Saturday July 17th 2021
Lieutenant Commander Ezekiel “Zeke” Pride Flight Controller
Lieutenant Elli-Navine Chief Engineer
Lieutenant Alexander Artopolis Chief Medical Officer
Lieutenant Scott McIntyre Chief Tactical/Security Officer
Podcast: To Boldly Roll The (Mis)Adventures of the USS Potemkin
(this report 1663 words)
TBR#015 = 104 mins 6,240~ wds
While on their way to the next sector to continue their exploration Beyond the Veil the USS Potemkin pick up a distress beacon. A Starfleet one. If their general orders were not enough, their interest was piqued, and a course was set. You see, other than the Potemkin there were no other ships in the sector, that they knew of.
With the advanced warp drive the 12 light year trip took mere hours and they settled into orbit around an O-Class planet. No land masses but with an average depth of only 200 meters, a failed M-Class maybe? Either way, while this world was interesting it wasn’t unique and they had come for the distress beacon, a small and battered message buoy in orbit. Scanning the buoy, the crew determine that it belongs to the Potemkin! Checking their own stores they discover the very same buoy, down to the individual part serial numbers.
With this intriguing knowledge they start to scan the planet, what would they find? A time displaced copy of the Potemkin? Would that ship be from one of the possible futures where the Tenzim won? Or worse one where they lost but too the ship down with them? Only time would tell!
Hours passed as they scanned for… well they didn’t really know what they were scanning for, and a wide spectrum multi property scan takes a while. However, as is always the case when something needs to be found it appears. The badly damaged wreak of an Excelsior class ship is discovered on an oceanic shelve 200 meters below the surface of a storm inflicted ocean.
To reach that depth the Away team would need to take the ships sole Delta Flyer runabout. So, safely packed into the USS Angeles and with Pride at the helm the Away team dive first into the hemisphere sized super storm. Pride fought the storm the entire way down, but the Delta Flyer was designed to plunge into Gas Giants. She was a tough little ship and soon Pride had guided her through the storm and transitioned from stormy air to tranquil ocean in mere minutes.
With the storm above the Away team were forced to turn on the shuttles powerful flood lights at just 100 meters. The gloom closed in very quickly, enclosing them within their small ship and the pitch black of the ocean outside. Starfleet officers were not used to this kind of environment but none of the away team showed any signs that the cold, black crushing ocean beyond the forcefield reinforced windows was getting to them.
As the meters passed their readings of the Starfleet ship below became clearer. Finally, the ship came into view, its normally bright chalk blue hull covered in black carbon scoring. Weapons fire! Not only the scoring, but large sections of the hull were also missing, jagged edges of hull remaining. An entire nacelle missing, the other buckled and a hole through the primary hull. Whatever this version of the Potemkin had been through it was clear, it had been hell. How many of their counterparts had died?!
While their scans showed that most of the power systems were offline there was a tiny amount of power generation, from emergency chemical batteries. So, they took the shuttle in and docked with the only intact docking port on the ship. With only their torches to light the way they quickly made their way to main engineering; Elli had insisted on it. She wanted to assess the ships condition and maybe bring power back online. Instead, what they discovered was a piece of machinery that their Potemkin didn’t have.
As scan showed that whatever it was, it was gathering energy, but it was at less than half capacity. Plugging the Zero Point Module, the battery which houses a pocket universe was plugged into a console but as the ships database was being downloaded a warning started to bleep behind Elli. Turning she saw that the device, which they had identified as a universe jumping drive, was at capacity and a jump was less than 30 seconds away. As an emergency beam out back to their shuttle was ordered Elli realised her battery was still plugged in and lunged to retrieve it. She didn’t and they beamed back to the Delta Flyer.
The Flyer swoops out of the area as the ship disappears with a ‘pop’ leaving a void, a void that was quickly filled; the rushing currents pulled at the flyer, but she escaped.
It was a sudden end to their mission, but beyond taking a few scans they had nothing else to do so they ascended back up through the 200 meters to the surface and then back out through the storm. Once out they were able to contact their Potemkin, Pax informed them that they had picked up the energy release, but they had also picked up a second pulse just a few minutes later, this time on the far side of the planet. He orders them to investigate. However, there was always a catch, the second pulse had been recorded at a depth of 3 kilometres. This would push the Delta Flyer’s capabilities, but she had been taken deeper in her design history.
To play it safe, the away team takes the small runabout down to the ‘other’ Potemkin slowly. Once there though they quickly make their way to the same docking port as before. Elli is itching to get her battery back, so they make their way back to main engineering.
Once in engineering they ascertain that the jumping device is once again only drawing the most minimal of power. However, before they had a chance to progress in their mission they are set upon by a trio of armored warriors. Two tall the third was shorter by more powerfully built than the other two. A firefight ensues, the alien’s weapons doing massive, localised damage, destroying entire consoles. While it must have seemed like hours it was just a few minutes. The Alien weapons were powerful but when it came to damage to organic matter it wasn’t nearly as powerful. Their defenses, while initially assumed to be impossible were quickly overwhelmed.
The away team, interested to know who would attack them. Or more importantly how they had gotten aboard. There had been no life signatures when they had boarded the first time. The armour that the aliens wore had killed and then liquefied them once their wearers were incapacitated presumably to keep anyone from discovering their identity.
Once the armor had done its job it them slagged itself, again protecting it’s secretes.
Curiosity got the better of the away team and they wanted to search their counterparts’ quarters. Elli’s wanted to check hers out first, they were located on the underside of the primary hull, in a different place than they were on their Potemkin. They were larger as well. Much of the lose items had been thrown at the front windowed wall from the crash. Picking through them Elli finds that she has a husband.
The others on the away team were now interested in what their lives could look like in a few years’ time. Pride is married also to a woman in his department, a fellow pilot. Scott wasn’t married, he was a ‘neat freak’ though. Even with the mess of the crash it was clear that everything had its place. He also appeared to be fond of pranking his fellow officers, Pride chief among his targets.
The Doctor didn’t wish to check his quarters, but he did want to go to Medical. When they arrived there a non-standard Bio-bed. Scanning it showed that it was integrated Protectorate technology, a kind of surgical tool that allowed the use of tractor beams, transporters and forcefields to conduct non-invasive surgery, even practicing on a holographically generated substitute and then allow the bed to perform automatically.
Aftermath
Three years, 6 months into the future, in another reality the USS Potemkin is in the midst of an apocalyptic battle. The planet that that spun slowly below them was insignificant, but it was here that the 1st, 5th, 7th, and 9th fleets fought alongside Klingon and Romulan ships to push back the incursion by Tenzim forces. Thousands of ships, each with world breaking weapons exchanged fire with hundreds of Thousands of Tenzim ships. Tiny ships flitted around, swarming their larger targets. It was difficult to know who was winning, the Alliance was destroying thousands of their ships but more kept coming and slowly but surely, they are stripping the alliance ships of their shields and armor.
The Potemkin dived under a swarm of Tenzim ships, her phaser firing almost nonstop. Torpedoes exploded in the middle of the swarms as they snaked around the larger ship blowing up dozens of them. With a burst of bright blue light, the Potemkin’s ventral shields failed. One of the few large ships took advantage of the weakness and fired the powerful cherry red beam, the ship was thrown down towards the planet as the beam struck the upper saucer punching straight through. The ship was now speeding down towards the ocean world.
The Protectorate Grand Carrier dropped into normal space with her weapons firing. From her flanks thousands of small fighters streamed, moving to assist the Alliance ships. With echoing pops through subspace dozens more massive kilometres long Protectorate ships joined the battle. They tide of the battle was turning, maybe this was the beginning of the end of the war.
The Potemkin, the flagship of this alliance fleet was being punished. She was taking fire from all quarters. But even as she went down her weapons fired, giving better than she took. It was all in vain though she was now in the atmosphere, hull plating melting and stripped away. As the old warhorse slammed into the water at close to 10 times the speed of sound the crew was beamed away in a cascade light!