Doth the Future Hold

Posted on Sat Apr 29th, 2017 @ 8:22am by

713 words; about a 4 minute read

Mission: Unknown Life, Unknown Dangers
Location: Bridge. U.S.S. Dreadnought

I was sat on the Bridge reviewing the changes to Tactical that our stint in orbit had earned us. I hated times in orbit because some tech or engineer always wanted to tinker with something, 'update' or 'enhance'. Personally if its not broken...don't touch it but no as soon as a fancy starship comes within reach they are all over it like a virus. The targeting database had been updated which was fine, it was always good to have latest information when it came to foes and dangers but what did bother me was that when I ran a simulation test, power demand was up by 4%.

Why the jump?

I did some checking around and enhancements had been made to the prefire chambers of all the phaser arrays, which considering there were 26 of them that had to be some undertaking. Energy transfers had become more efficient but in doing so the draw from the warp cores was higher, thankfully the draw from a particular core was spread based on location of the weapon. My guess was they wanted to speed up weapon recharge which was fine but I bet that threw a spanner into the Chiefs efficiency ratings a bit.

While all these fancy upgrades were great and all the only notification I get was that during our time in orbit was that the weapon systems would be deactivated. Always nice to get literally the bare information and nothing more to complicate a job.

Seeing Ayla in command red made me smile, I was glad the Commodore had kept her on as his First Officer. I knew Ayla would eventually want a shot at the centre chair and that was expected of First Officers since they were a kind of 'Commanding Officer in Training' so to speak. It gave me further rise to thinking about resigning my commission, with Miracle we had to juggle day care, if she was ill one of us had to stay at home and for Ayla being the First Officer that just couldn't happen. If I resigned then I'd be at home, I wasn't sure what I would do to occupy my time all of the time but at least it would take that pressure off of us and Ayla could focus on her career.

There were some new faces on board which was good, glad to see the history of the ship didn't scare everyone off and then Xavier had finally taken up the post of Chief Medical Officer. Damn position dodger for so many years but he'd more than earned it, I made a mental note to go congratulate him when I next see him.

For the rest of us though it was business as usual, new CO, new mission and off we went. Sooner or later a mission briefing would be held and we would be informed of what the situation was and it always helped the team know so that we could work better as a team and in unison. I was still on the fence about this Commodore Hood, his service jacket was impressive enough, former Captain of a Defiant class so he knew the intricacies of warships to starships which was a plus. Every indication that he was a sound tactician but known to take a risk or two if needed. It reminded me in a way of Admiral S'iraa, that was someone who could take a calculated risk at times and wasn't afraid to use 'all' of the options open to him, he'd shield rammed a ship or two in his tenure as Captain of the Dreadnought which considering the size of the ship and its handling capability was a feat unto itself.

I was glad to read the figure of munitions on my console, I'd always felt that the loudout of the Dreadnought was low but now, at maximum fire rate we would expend all our torpedoes in just over 9 minutes instead of 2. This not only enhanced our tactical capability but also our combat endurance. Sure 26 Type 12 phasers were impressive enough but if we had to slog it out with something, heavy munitions went a long way.

So I just had to wait, wait and see what came next, this Commodore and honestly, my future in Starfleet.

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