Uneasy Meeting

Posted on Sat Feb 7th, 2015 @ 1:42am by Fleet Admiral Mike K`Wor Bremer & Commander Jonathan Roebuck IV & Sogh Varn Son of M'ron & La Ch'Tal Son of Ren'al & Major T'Lana & First Ramata`tar & Commander Robert Stark & Fleet Admiral Sevlek & Admiral Deela T'Lar & Lieutenant General Jewel 'M'lara' Dartt & Commodore Leon `Lee` Pike & Captain R'nard Lokran & Lieutenant Commander Holly Gillo & Lieutenant Saith i-Ki Baratan & Commodore Alexandra Harrison & Sergeant Maal son of Torg & Commander Joseph Cronkit & Ensign Vortek & Ensign Lovan & Lieutenant JG Janelle Sykes & Gunnery Sergeant Agtx & 1st Lieutenant Taz & Corporal Nas & Corporal Warner Schmidt & Private 1st Class T'ork & `Doctor` & Sa K`Vada & Commander Tamarith & Gul Mavek

2,522 words; about a 13 minute read

Mission: Mission 87 - Disaster
Location: Starbase 400
Timeline: MD1, 1345hrs, Following 'Getting Underway'

ON:

Once the relief force had departed, Mike pulled up information on Ra' Graline's ship. A Krazzle Tigris class Battleship, it was well within Federation space now. It, and the four escorting Federation Starships, were only an hour away from Starbase 400 now.

As planned, Bremer ordered a few of Starbase 400's vessels to meet the 'diplomatic convoy' and escort it to the Station.

Mike tapped a few buttons on the Tactical Two console he was using and asked T'Lyn, Sevlek, Hurd, Pike, and K'Temoc to report to Ops.

Lee was sitting at his desk in his office, he tapped his badge:"I'm on my way" He then arose from his desk leaving his office to head for Ops.

Sevlek was talking via subspace comms with Captain Zandusky when Bremer's call came through. He nodded to Zandusky and said, "Take the ship where you must to finish repairs on the external holographic projectors. Few people know what the ship actually looks like, it must remain that way."

Zandusky nodded, "Aye, sir."

As the screen went blank, Sevlek stood and began the journey to Ops. After the short turbolift ride, he stepped onto the Starbase's sprawling command deck.

Once everyone arrived, including Marine Sergeant Taz, Bremer stepped away from the console he'd been working at.

"Admiral, Graline's ship is approaching the Kaleb system and dropping out of warp." Roebuck reported from Tactical One.

"On screen." Bremer replied.

After a moment, the massive Krazzle vessel appeared on screen. It dwarfed the escorting Starfleet ships and was clearly too big to dock inside Starbase 400's internal bay.

After a few more minutes, the Krazzle ship was close enough to enter orbit of Kaleb IV or Starbase 400 itself, and Bremer was about to give permission for the Krazzle ship to enter parking orbit...but an alarm sounded.

"Admiral, the Krazzle ship has raised shields and charged weapons!" Roebuck reported.

As Bremer opened his mouth, Taz grabbed the Admiral's arm, "Sir. The Krazzle are like a mix between the Klingons and Romulans. Sneaky, sly, and treacherous like Romulans, but respect power like Klingons.

Bremer looked back at the Sergeant, smirked, then gave his orders. "Mister Roebuck, raise shields and lock ALL weapons onto the Krazzle vessel and signal our escorts to do the same. Miss Gillo, hail the Krazzle vessel."

"Aye, sir." Her hands worked across her panel as she went about carrying the order to hail the ship.

Roebuck did as ordered as he sat up a little taller in his seat.

After a moment, the main viewer switched from a view of the ships to a view inside the Krazzle vessel with three Krazzle standing in the middle of what looked to be the ship's Bridge.

"That's not the way to starrrt a peace conferrrence, is it?" Graline said in his gruff voice.

Bremer smirked and crossed his arms, "Lower your shields and disarm your weapons, then you can enter orbit of the Station. Our ships and Starbase 400 itself will then lower shields and disarm weapons."

Graline made a grunt and then some hiss-like sounds as he looked at the two others beside him before looking back at the monitor. He studied Bremer's expression for a moment, then ordered his ship to power down it's weapons and shields.

Once the Krazzle's systems were secure, Bremer ordered the escorting ships and Station's weapons and shields powered down too.

"When you're ready, we'll beam you and a small delegation over. Try to keep it to fewer than ten." Bremer said to Graline.

"Ten of your minutes." Graline replied, then closed the channel.

Mike looked back at his Senior Staff, "Thoughts?"

Holly spoke up as she had been paying attention to the way that the transmission had been going. Not to mention she was sure that the transmission was ended when she spoke. " I don't sense any attempts at hiding the truth, Admiral. Nor, any hostility towards the way that you treated him." That was all she managed to say as she worked her hands across her panel making sure that the base was read for whatever was coming up next for them.

Lee stood there with his arms folded across his chest watching everything play "I agree with Lieutenant Gillo sir, I also don't sense anything that they could be attempting to hide something from us."

Jewel sat there and looked at Mike, "I think he was testing us in some way." Jewel spoke up, "lets just hope that nothing else happens and everything will go smoothly. I just don't feel at ease about all this even as a Diplomatic Officer." Jewel stated looking around the room.

Mike waited for anyone else to chime in, then replied. "All right then, I guess we passed our first test. Commander Lokran, you're with me, Admiral Sevlek, Admiral T'Lar, General Hurd, and Captains Pike and K'Temoc. Captain Harrison has Ops, Commander Roebuck I want you and Lieutenant Gillo here too, keep a close eye on that ship."

R'nard had been there all along, in his usual way of showing up unnoticed. "Aye, sirr." he said. He got up to follow Bremer.

"Aye, sir. The ship won't move without us knowing about it." Holly then went about moving her hands on her console to change accordingly and adjust the station for what was to come.

Lee gave a slight nod:"Yes Admiral"

Mike then added in, "Gillo, send a message to the USS Cairo, her new CO Colonel Marcus Hannon, advise them to hold off on their mapping mission to Sector 1235 and have them proceed to Union Colony. Have them pick up supplies for Hunster II. It'll take them less time than it will for our ships to arrive at Hunster, then go get extra supplies from Union, and then go back to Hunster. Have the Cairo monitor the Krazzle border closely on their trip."

Holly just nodded, "Aye, sir." Her hands flew across her panel to carry out the orders.

Before following Bremer out of Ops, Sevlek spoke to Harrison, Roebuck and Gillo. "Rotate sensor frequencies to subset Gladiator-3-9-Delta. Many of the Gladiator's preset frequency rotations have been added to Starbase 400's tactical database."

Alex chimed in, "Will do."

At a questioning look from Bremer, Sevlek spoke again, "The Romulans have given the Krazzle a number of the D'vorak cloaking device." The D'vorak was the most advanced cloaking device the Romulan's had at their disposal. The Vulcan was certain that information wasn't lost on the officers present. "It is possible, that during the conference a number of cloaked Krazzle assault vessels may arrive and accuse us of taking their leader hostage."

Bremer nodded. If the Krazzle had Romulan cloaks in their position, then it also stood to reason the Romulans also provided the Krazzle some engineering assistance, otherwise those cloaks would be useless on Krazzle ships because their power distribution technology was so poor...and if their power distro was better, that would also mean other systems aboard their ships were improved now too. Sensors, shields, weapons, engine performance...

Jewel stood up and followed Bremer and the others to where they were going, she just felt uneasy with this meeting and wanted to get it over with. She didn't let her uneasiness show but it was there.


Transporter Room One

A few minutes later, Bremer and the others were on Level 3 and in Transporter Room One. A few moments later, orange light filled the air as several Krazzle beamed in and materialized on the pad. There were seven of them, three standing on each side of Ra' Graline.

Bremer took a step forward, and spoke in a friendly yet firm tone, "Welcome to Starbase 400, I'm Admiral Bremer, and these are members of my Senior Staff."

Graline looked around the room carefully, looking at each person present and taking a mental note of their species, ranks, everything. He eyed Bremer for a moment, unblinking, unmoving before he finally took a step forward.

Jewel Stood there not showing emotion but looking at him, "Welcome aboard." Jewel replied as she stood there assessing them.

R'nard just stood there silently, unwilling to speak unless spoken to.

Lee just gave a slight nod looking at them.

Graline looked down at the smaller Security Chief, then looked back to his own Staff who were also looking at Lokran curiously. A moment went by, then finally the leader of the Krazzle Empire spoke. “Thesse, arrre memberrrss of my Ssenior Sstaff, they will accompany me.”

Bremer nodded respectfully then asked, “Would you care for a brief tour before we get down to business?”

“Therrre iss not much herrre that rrreally interrresstss uss, howeverrr we arrre hungry. You will feed uss.” Graline demanded.

Bremer looked back at T’Lar then Sevlek before he replied. They hadn’t planned on a meal, not today anyway. They had planned on a short meeting to lay out the foundation of the talks, then retire for the rest of the day before getting into serious discussion tomorrow, but the Krazzle were hungry.

“You’re welcome to try something in Promenade, they have a vast array of foods you can try.” Bremer replied.

Graline nodded, so Mike motioned for T’Lar and Jewel to lead the way. Mike stayed back and had R’nard remain a moment as well. Once the Krazzle were out of the Transporter Room, Mike addressed his Chief of Security.

“Have Saith standing by with a Security team in the Pomenade...just incase the Krazzle don’t like the food.

"Underrstood." said R'nard. "I am orderring it now."

Lee stands there silently watching everything:"This could be fun" He mutters.

Bremer smirked as everyone left the Transporter Room and headed for the Promenade.

Jewel lead the group towards the transporter room, she hoped things would go alright with them being on board the station.

Saith acknowledged R'nard's order and selected 16 officers to join her on the Promenade. As they left Security she gave them specific instructions and tips on dealing with the Krazzle contingent.

Several tense minutes passed as the group of Krazzle and Starfleet Officers made their way down to the Promenade. Everyone was on their guard, especially in the tight confines of the turbolifts. Once they arrived in the Promenade however, the situation didn’t improve.

As they walked through, all eyes were on the Krazzle. Some Civilians quickly turned and went the other way. The new C’Hakilian restaurant closed and locked its door.

One of the Krazzle turned to Graline, but spoke loud enough for Bremer and the others to hear him, “Thesse Federrrationsss arrre sscarrred of uss.”

Griline and the other Krazzle smiled their toothy grins.

T'Lar wasn't surprised, "Typical."

It was all Saith could do not to roll her eyes as she stepped up to the Krazzle entourage. “Hardly” she looked the group over her eyes daring them to say something. “Do you have any ideas what you might like to eat?" Ignoring a potential answer she nodded at Bremer, "Admiral.”

Saith had four groups of security personnel in key locations around the promenade. They were no completely conspicuous but could arrive virtually anywhere at a moment’s notice. She glanced around as she waited for the group to continue.

The group then move forward, Bremer commented, “Perhaps we should go to the Replimat, you can order just about anything there, and I believe there’s several Krazzle dishes in the system too.”

Graline looked back at Bremer, then at Sergeant Taz, then back to Bremer, “We Krrrazzle prrreferrr ourrr food frrressh...alive. I thought Klingonsss did too.”

“We do, but Klingons are also practical, there is nowhere to hunt on the Station.” Bremer replied.

“Perhaps there should be.” Graline bluntly replied.

A moment later, one of his Staff made a grunt noise, as if to say ‘Sir’ in Krazzle. Graline turned around to see a man standing in his way. He was slender, only about 190kg and 2m tall. He stared blankly at Graline while standing right in his path. He showed no signs of fear as he was nose to nose with the Leader of the Krazzle Empire.

“You are Graline.” It was more of a statement the man made than asking a question.

Graline grunted, “And you arrre a C’Hakilian, I could ssmell you when we arrrrrived.”

Bremer and a few others quickly stepped forward, but the man continued on.

“I’m only half C’Hakilian, my father was C’Hakilian but my mother was Human.” He paused before adding, “You will be judged for your crimes.”

Bremer motioned for two Security Officers to come and escort the man away, and he quietly walked off, he’d said what he wanted to.

Graline watched the man walked off as his Staff talked among themselves. Bremer didn’t apologize, he didn’t want to appear weak.

T'Lar didn't react as Bremer had already taken care of it.

Saith followed suit, simply nodding slightly to the security officers. She waited. That was the part about this she hated most. The wait and do nothing part of diplomacy. It was enough to make a person gag!

Jewel was going to step in and try to calm the situation, but looks like Mike beat her to the point. She just shook her head as she looked at everyone and sighed.

After a moment, Graline nodded to his Staff then turned to Bremer, “We arrre rrreturrrning to ourrr sship, we will rrreturrrn tomorrrrow to begin talks.” He pulled out his communicator, tapped a button then spoke in Krazzle. A moment later, the group of Krazzle were transported back to their ship.

Bremer looked over at Sevlek, Hurd, and T’Lar and shook his head...

T'Lar hadn't said much of anything during this whole debacle. She returned Bremer's look, "That went well."

"Hopefully tomorrow will be....better to say the least." Jewel replied as she also shook her head. "I think we need to keep those two apart during there stay. We don't need anymore problems during our talks." Jewel voiced her concern.

Sevlek raised a brow, "This is the standard Krazzle approach to diplomatic engagements." He turned to face Bremer, T'Lar and Hurd, "Very early in tomorrow's proceedings they will attempt to exert dominance." He paused, then added, "They must not be given the dominance they seek. If they will not reason, then we must make sure they understand how resolute the Federation is. We have been authorized to inform Graline that the Federation Council is prepared to approve a war to reclaim all of the lost C'hakilian systems."

Bremer nodded. He felt deep down it was a bluff, but with the assets the Federation, Klingons, and even the Cardassians had in the region...patrolling the Krazzle border as well as engaged in relief missions helping the C'hakilians...it would make quiet a first strike fleet.

"If there isn't anything else, sir; I will remove my officers to Security." Saith waited to be dismissed.

Bremer blinked, then looked back at Saith, "Make it so, but I do want at least two additional patrols round the clock on the Promenade, for now."


tbc...

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