Outcast Quest [Updated 10/10/18 - Turn 14]

[Razor One]

If you want a sidearm, you have to go to the armory. If you want protection, the have two marines bring Rodriguez to medical vote implies that you're taking the other two as escort wherever you're going, which I really should have made more clear.

Passing the sidearm, realism aside, would negate the option of going to the armory in the first place amongst other things.

[joestej]

I don't think we can entirely rule out hostile action of some sort, so we need to check on enviromental to make sure things aren't going to get worse. I think there's an argument to be made that a hostile would be in the armory, laying an ambush there, but hopefully there's not ship-scuttling explosives stored there or anything.

If there is a trap at an armory, it'll likely be of the explosive kind. If they had the resources to sabotage our jump engines they're likely to also have the resources for the old grenade-on-a-string trick. As for ship-killing weapons, to sink us they'd just need the engine room. Turn off the reactor's safeties, blow the fuel, or just smash stuff until we can't fix it anymore. The fact that no one even attempted to seize that room when there was only a single person on duty is somewhat telling.

We may also be overlooking a second possibility for intruders: stowaways, smugglers, or other more harmless criminals. With the almost four hundred passengers we picked up there are bound to be a few less-than-savory types. This whole thing could have been kicked off by someone stealing an expensive part without realizing how much the ship needed it or sticking their satchel of contraband in the wrong cooling duct. If that's the case we're going to be looking for either guilty parties trying to slip back in with the group or opportunistic scavengers seeking to loot some valuable equipment (and weapons) while we're too distracted to notice. Looters are a possibility even if this really was an accident. We DO have a set of Complications coming our way, and a criminal network popping up would certainly make our lives more interesting...

[Suederwind]

[X] Check environmental control.

(I still think we should have done that first)

and:

[X] Go alone. Have two marines guard Engineering and two bring Ensign Rodriguez to medical.

There seems to be no aliens or mutineers aboard, but engeneering needs to be save at all cost and Ensign Rodriguez needs help to get to medical.

[Jericho]

[X] Check environmental control.
[X] Have two of the marines bring Ensign Rodriguez to medical.

This seems to be the most reasonable choice for now.

[Siber]

I'll take yall's word for it on the sidearm issue. I stand by the rest of my votes though.

[alpha]

[X] Check environmental.
[X] Have two marines escort you to environmental.

[X] Have two marines bring Rodriguez to medical.



Edit: Changed vote because pairs are better. Also, never split up the party too much. Even if the party is you and some NPCs.

[dragoongfa]

One of the rules for guarding and carrying someone is to always use a team of two (such a pair is called an element).

The reasoning behind it is that it is far harder to take out two armed guards or two soldiers carrying someone. If I was the corporal I would politely deny the 'suggestion' simply because the colonel would have my behind for putting my team in danger in such a way even if it would make sense at the time.

Then there is the issue of a single person carrying a knocked out man for a couple of hundred meters. Fatigue aside, it won't do the one who is unconscious any favors if he is handled in an awkward manner.

[Logannion]

[X] Stop by the armory.
[X] Have two marines bring Rodriguez to medical.
[X] Have two marines escort you to the Armory.

Really, if the armory hasn't been tampered with, then I'll have no more worries about saboteurs still being active.

[sunphoenix]

[X] Check environmental.
[X] Have two marines escort you to environmental.

[X] Have two marines bring Rodriguez to medical.

Edit: Changed vote because pairs are better. Also, never split up the party too much. Even if the party is you and some NPCs.

I think I'm going with this option

[X] Check environmental.
[X] Have two marines escort you to environmental.

[X] Have two marines bring Rodriguez to medical.

My Vote

[Razor One]

[X] Check environmental control.
[X] Have two of the marines bring Ensign Rodriguez to medical.

--

You let out a breath you didn't even know you were holding. Engineering not being a terrorist nest has assuaged what concerns you had that your ship would become another KKV incident like the Tripoli. The fact that neither the bridge nor engineering were targeted removes the possibility of terrorism in your mind.

Instead you focus on your next most pressing problem. Ensign Kelly is missing and your environmental systems are down. You refuse to believe that's merely a coincidence. You need to secure your ship and crew. As captain you can do no less.

“Corporal Young,” you say, “I need Ensign Rodriguez taken to the medical bay for treatment. I'll also require an escort to the environmental systems.”

“Yes ma'am,” he says before turning to his team, “Private Kessler, Private Slade, carry Ensign Rodriguez to the medical bay. Private Rose, you're on escort detail with me.”

“Sir, yes sir,” they chorus.

Kessler and Slade carry Rodriguez out of engineering with you and your escorts in the lead until you need to part ways.

“Captain Sheridan? Do you read me?” said Commander O'Malley over the comm.

“Loud and clear Commander,” you reply.

“Good to see you back on the net, Ma'am. Comms are slowly coming back online, I assume all is well in engineering?”

“All clear in engineering, the chief was just being eccentric again,” you say.

“Again?” replies O'Malley, the frown in her voice readily apparent to you before she changes the subject, “I'm afraid I've got a bad situation to report at the armory.”

You freeze on the spot with a sinking feeling.

“What's the situation,” you demand.

“A pistol was checked out of the aft armory. The time index posts it at seven minutes after we jumped... Ma'am, we were all out of it for at least a few hours,” she says.

You know for a fact that only the senior-most officers have access to the armory, and that security measure severely limits who might be responsible.

“Does the log say who checked the weapon out?” you ask.

“The log says Captain Harlan, ma'am,” O'Malley says.

“That's not possible,” you say.

You and O'Malley know full well why. His security status should have been revoked the moment he transferred command to you two years ago. It's the most basic of basic security precautions.

“I suspect the logs have been tampered with ma'am. I've found a few other inconsistencies that point to a rush job. Whoever wanted that gun wanted it fast and didn't care to cover their tracks well,” O'Malley says.

A sinking feeling hits you in the gut. The kind of person who could spoof your security like that would have to know your systems very well. It has to be an engineer, and there's only one of them unaccounted for.

“Ensign Kelly,” you say numbly.

“But... why? Ensign Kelly has never even handled a gun,” says O'Malley.

“Do you have access to the security feeds for environmental?” you ask, pushing past your XO's disbelief.

“One moment,” she says, pausing a moment before responding, “I have feeds up for both armories, the bridge and several other areas. Environmental and engineering still have no signal however.”

Your back is to engineering and you know what's going on in there. The cargo bay is mostly depressurised, and the part that is has marines guarding it. There's only one place that Kelly could be.

“I'm heading to environmental, standby,” you say to O'Malley before turning to Corporal Young, “Change of plans Corporal, let's double time it.”

You run the remaining distance with your mind racing. Had O'Malley read that log right? Had Kelly truly checked that weapon out a mere seven minutes after jumping? You trust O'Malley too much to think her mistaken in this matter. If that's the case, then Kelly was the first to wake up. He'd had the run of the ship for at least two or three hours, gun in hand and yet...

You don't know what to think. None of this makes sense. You can't reconcile Ensign Kelly the good kid who'd never held a gun before with the Ensign Kelly that would race for a gun, hack your security and, you strongly suspected by now, shut down life support for the entire ship. Even that is contradictory. If he wanted to kill you all he'd had ample time to shoot you all in the head while you were unconscious.

As environmental control looms ahead, Corporal Young gets you to stop.

“How do we proceed, Captain? What's the game plan?” he asks.

“I need Ensign Kelly taken alive,” you say almost without thinking, “I believe he's taken a weapon from our armory and may be a danger to himself and others.”

“What kind of training does he have, Ma'am?” asks Private Rose.

“Just the basic training he'd have received as a cadet,” you say, “I don't think he's ever logged range time since.”

Rose and Young look to each other for a moment and nod in agreement.

“A pair of flashbangs should do it then,” says Young, “We'll secure your crewmate Captain, but we'll need you to remain here for your own safety until then.”

You almost protest, but after seeing these marines in action for the last half hour you think you have your finger on the way they work. If they think you should stay back, you're not going to argue with them.

At your nod they slowly shuffle up the corridor. What you'd thought of as stealthy before seems positively loud compared to what they're doing now. It's a lot slower going than it was before, but you'd swear that if you were to rely on hearing alone you'd have never heard these marines moving through your ship.

They reach the door and in what appears to be a well practised and coordinated move, they pull out a pair of flashbangs, wait a few seconds, then open the door and toss them through just as they explode.

You understood that those things were intended to incapacitate but the sheer loudness practically rings through the ship. Barely a second passes before the marines are through the door, charging through the smoke.

You wait what feels like minutes before Corporal Young emerges.

“All clear Captain!” he yells towards you.

You move up to join him before stepping through into environmental control.

Ensign Kelly is dead. The shot through his head and the gun in his hand is clear enough evidence of that, let alone the vacant look in his still open eyes. The damaged console in front of him is his last testament and will. You can't tell without examining the weapon, but you guess that he must've expended almost all the ammunition in it on that console before turning the weapon on himself.

And you still can't reconcile this. It makes no sense. Kelly was smart. He'd know that shooting the console would do precisely nothing to disable the life support, nor would it prevent anyone from simply reactivating it through the numerous other consoles in environmental control. As you reactivate life support, you realise that he didn't even try to encrypt the system as he well could have. It's a mix of brilliance and insane ineptitude that constantly has you churning in circles.

An officer of yours lies dead without explanation. That will simply not do. You know you're in shock at this but you can't help feeling angry about this simple fact.

“Dr. Campos,” you signal through your mostly restored communications net, your voice far steadier than your inner turmoil, “Please report to environmental control, I need you to examine Ensign Kelly's... remains.”

“Yes, Captain,” replies the doctor a moment later, as surprised and shocked as you are.

You step back out into the corridor. The marines offer you sympathetic looks but know better than to try to console you in this state. You need space and they know it. You've never lost an officer under your command before. Could you have done something different? If only-

No. You stop yourself there. You refuse to question your prior decisions, at least not right now. You made the best ones you could with information you had available at the time. You refuse to destroy yourself with 'if only'. You know it will destroy the confidence you have to command and none of you are out of the woods just yet.

You promise that later you'll think things over. Later you'll question what decisions you did right and what you did wrong. You'll think about how to prevent this from happening again... and you'll write the letter to the family that is going to miss him terribly.

“Captain? Captain Sheridan? What's the situation?” asks O'Malley over the comms, interrupting your time to breathe.

Feelings shelved, you respond the only way you can. Officially.

“This is the Captain. Commander, please file a report that as of 16:19 ship time that Ensign Kelly was found dead with a gunshot wound to the head. Believed to be self inflicted pending an investigation. That is all.”

With the immediate dangers resolved, you collect your thoughts and consider the future. There are two things that most immediately occur to you that need doing.

Pick Only One

[] All Hands On Deck

A lack of information can kill. Your house is in order but you still don't know the full situation. Meet with your senior officers and Colonel Pierce and find out how deep the rabbit hole goes.

[] See To Your Passengers

Your passengers are your most precious cargo. Now that you have an idea of what happened, they deserve to be informed. The only question is how informed.

If you chose this option, choose one of the sub-options below

-[] The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
-[] Truth enough to get them by, keeping the more sensitive or alarming portions to yourself for now.
-[] Lie. (Write In)

--

Intrigue Roll O'Malley vs. Computer: 78 + 14 = 92
Intrigue Roll O'Malley vs. Kelly: 26 + 14 = 40
Intrigue Roll You vs. Kelly: 38 + 12 = 50

Poor Kelly. And poor you of course. Alas, you could not have known up front that he woke up first amongst all of you and had the run of the ship with a gun. In time, Dr. Campos may or may not have answers as to what happened to him.

[dragoongfa]

[X] All Hands On Deck

Preparing a fully informed 'briefing' for the passengers takes some preparation and we still don't have the full picture of what is going on in the ship. Furthermore Dr. Campos may have an idea about the prolonged jump nausea, something that the passengers will want to know about. Then there is the Navigation 404 which the captain has kept in the back of her head by now.

[sunphoenix]

Hmmm... I smell a 'cultist'...

[X] All Hands On Deck

A lack of information can kill. Your house is in order but you still don't know the full situation. Meet with your senior officers and Colonel Pierce and find out how deep the rabbit hole goes.

And...

[X] Have a THOROUGH system check on whatever computer access the destroyed console could have had to see what may have been tampered with looking specifically for any time released data viruses. Include in that an equally THOROUGH Search of EVERY Inch of Environmental.. something Else much more vital may have been sabotaged! Also have the computer logs searched for ANY other anomalous computer access that might have been logged during the time 1 hour BEFORE the jump and arrival with the crew being unconscious when Kelley might have been awake.

I don't believe this is what it seems... I think something was done to the data-systems of the ship or Environmental and this sabotage/destruction of the console is meant to hide something else going on.

[Suederwind]

I don't think Kelly was a cultist, but sunphoenix has a point here. The whole thing smells fischy.
So:
[x]All hands on deck

And:

[x] Truth enough

I am not sure if this was already adressed, but we don't know enough about Kelly. We should therefore:

[x] Find out more about Kelly

Let two marines Check his quarters and his personal computer logs. Let the doctor check his remains for clues and let a technician find out whatever he tried to hide by shooting that console. A clue about his motive could be very usefull. Maybe he sabotaged the jump drive or knew something we didn't. Also try to find out _how_ he could do that and if this was a plan with more people involved than just him.

[Razor One]

Preliminary findings into Kelly's actions will be presented at the meeting in [X] All Hands On Deck.

All hands and Seeing to your passengers are exclusive at this time, so the sub-options attached to that are invalid if you vote for All Hands.

The basic idea here is whether you get more info before seeing to your passengers, or seeing to them first and then getting more info. There are pros and cons to either approach.

[joestej]

Well, that could have gone better, I suppose. Ah well, Kelly has obviously fallen prey to the dreaded SPACE MADNESS! A regrettable occurrence, but sadly a well-documented hazard of interstellar travel.

On a more serious note:

[X] See To Your Passengers
-[X] Truth enough to get them by, keeping the more sensitive or alarming portions to yourself for now.

Leaving the passengers alone for another hour or two seems like a bad idea. The longer we keep these people in the dark, the harder it's going to be to calm them down, especially when we've got armed marines keeping them locked up. A riot in the hold is the LAST thing we need. We give them the basics (there was a malfunction in one of the jump engines, several major systems are offline), leave out the parts we don't fully understand or that would be disturbing (basically everything about Kelly). Stress that we're working to get everything fixed and in order to do so we're going to need them to remain where they are for now, and that we'll update whoever is leading the colonists as soon as we know more. ...do the colonists even have an official leader?

Once that's done we can get everyone together and figure out what to do next.

[dragoongfa]

What a surprise, an other vote switch

[X] See to your passengers.
-[X] Truth enough to get them by, keeping the more sensitive or alarming portions to yourself for now.

The reasoning behind this choice and why it made me change my vote is simple. Seeing to them now and telling them just enough to calm them down lets your subordinates investigate things further and has the added benefit of hopefully cooperative specialists if Volkova needs more manpower to fix certain parts of the ships quickly.

It's a win-win-win, with the only con being that the time used to talk to the passengers could be used to better coordinate things. It could take some time but our subordinates will inform us immediately if something big happens.

--[X] Write in.

Busy people in the passenger module are people who are not bothering anyone. Let's find something small to occupy the passengers in a way that could be helpful later (have passengers cross reference the passenger manifest between themselves for example) and ask them if there is someone between them with Medical or Engineering expertise that could help Dr.Campos or Volkova if needed.

[Nugget]

[X] See to your passengers.
-[X] Truth enough to get them by, keeping the more sensitive or alarming portions to yourself for now.

Leaving the passengers alone for another hour or two seems like a bad idea. The longer we keep these people in the dark, the harder it's going to be to calm them down, especially when we've got armed marines keeping them locked up. A riot in the hold is the LAST thing we need. We give them the basics (there was a malfunction in one of the jump engines, several major systems are offline), leave out the parts we don't fully understand or that would be disturbing (basically everything about Kelly). Stress that we're working to get everything fixed and in order to do so we're going to need them to remain where they are for now.

Basicaly this.

[joestej]

Busy people in the passenger module are people who are not bothering anyone. Let's find something small to occupy the passengers in a way that could be helpful later (have passengers cross reference the passenger manifest between themselves for example) and ask them if there is someone between them with Medical or Engineering expertise that could help Dr.Campos or Volkova if needed.

I like the idea of keeping them busy, but I do have some concerns as well. With the current plan, we're holding back some information from the civilians, and anyone we bring in to help us is almost certainly going to learn more than we want them to about that.

The marines we can likely trust to keep their mouths shut (at least in the short term), but I doubt the civilians will be so cooperative. As soon as word gets out that one of the crew went nuts and shot up our life support, things will get ugly. The fact that we hid it from them will make it worse. The extra hands won't be worth the paranoia and ill-will that'll buy us.

Also, if we do choose to address the colonists first and leave out some details, is there a way we can leave ourselves some wiggle room regarding any information omission? We're going to have to tell them about Kelly sooner or later (it's a small ship, SOMEONE will talk), and things won't go well if it seems like we directly lied to them. Maybe something vague like "an investigation is ongoing" and promises to release all the details once we have a full report on the situation?

[dragoongfa]

Busy people in the passenger module are people who are not bothering anyone. Let's find something small to occupy the passengers in a way that could be helpful later (have passengers cross reference the passenger manifest between themselves for example) and ask them if there is someone between them with Medical or Engineering expertise that could help Dr.Campos or Volkova if needed.

I like the idea of keeping them busy, but I do have some concerns as well. With the current plan, we're holding back some information from the civilians, and anyone we bring in to help us is almost certainly going to learn more than we want them to about that.

The marines we can likely trust to keep their mouths shut (at least in the short term), but I doubt the civilians will be so cooperative. As soon as word gets out that one of the crew went nuts and shot up our life support, things will get ugly. The fact that we hid it from them will make it worse. The extra hands won't be worth the paranoia and ill-will that'll buy us.

Also, if we do choose to address the colonists first and leave out some details, is there a way we can leave ourselves some wiggle room regarding any information omission? We're going to have to tell them about Kelly sooner or later (it's a small ship, SOMEONE will talk), and things won't go well if it seems like we directly lied to them. Maybe something vague like "an investigation is ongoing" and promises to release all the details once we have a full report on the situation?

Asking to see if there are specialists among them is not the same as having them drafted on the spot. It's just a short term measure to keep them 'busy' and have them think that they have some power to help themselves and everyone on board if needed. We will have to tell them about Kelly in the long run (secrets have a way of spreading and soon all of the marines will know about Kelly) but for now we will have to keep them calm by saying that they are not in any danger while in the passenger module, that the ship is under no further danger, that we have found out what is broken and are in the process of fixing it, then we say that a preliminary investigation to discover what exactly happened is ongoing but regulations forbid us from disclosing what we find to them for security and legal reasons. Something that is true since Kelly looks like to have sabotaged the ship which would involve a criminal investigation whenever the ship would reach port.

Remember that at this point no one on the ship knows that they won't return home and the captain is still legally bound to TCA regulations in regards to criminal investigations. Her talking about Kelly is a serious breach of these regulations. If they insist for the time being she can site those regulations and point out that in time all proceedings in regards to this incident will be made public but for now they have to maintain secrecy in order not to complicate the jobs of TCA naval investigators when they return to port.

EDIT: Hell, lets point out that them being cooperative will help them get through the legal debriefing quicker when they return to port. People will jump through hoops in order to get to their destination quicker after such an ordeal.

[joestej]

I largely agree with your assessment, though odds are good none of these colonists would ever see investigation even if we could get to our original destination.

With what we're carrying, I can only assume our mission was to either supplement a starter colony or establish a new one ourselves. In either case there won't be any investigators there, and the colonists wouldn't normally be coming back to port with us. I can't see dragging all these people back, unloading them, interrogating them, putting them back on a ship, and shuttling them away again to be an option the TSA would realistically consider for this situation. The colonists will likely know that. Bribing them with 'shorter delays' won't be a carrot we can offer.

Still, 'not dying' and 'not being adrift for weeks' are very much carrots we can dangle if we need them.