NCC-21806-B USS CLARK
SD 90824 to SD 91031
"Prelude to War"
Senior Staff
Captain Selak Zar
Lieutenant Commander Bronwynn Sheridan
Lieutenant Commander Kalen 7
First Lieutenant Malcolm Connery
Lieutenant Junior Grade Lex
Lieutenant Junior Grade Germanicus
Lieutenant Junior Grade Yan'Och
Lieutenant Junior Grade Val Alrik
Lieutenant Junior Grade Elm Corval
References
Summary
The USS Clark was ordered to perform a joint mission with the USS Xerxes to escort the ambassadorial representatives of the Cardassian and Klingon people to a peace treaty conference. The Clark departed to the Arkanis system to meet the Cardassian representatives. She was sporting the type 1 MMP which contained the AUGUR array. A move that proved to have a critical impact in the forthcoming mission. Commander Zar, acting CO, appointed Lt. Sheridan, the formal CSCIO to serve as acting OPS/20. Ens. Val Alrik reported aboard as the new CEO.
The flight to the Arkanis system proceeded smoothly except for a minor incident that caused the shutdown of the warp engines. Apparently, a crewman's pet cat had gotten lost on the ship and found its way into the PTC where safety systems shut down the engines. The cat quickly found its way out of the PTC and the engines were restarted. To prevent the critter from causing more trouble, Captain Zar tasked the marine contingent hunt down and capture the cat.
Arriving at the rendezvous site the Cardassian ship was immediately spotted and the ambassadorial contingent were transferred aboard. Ambassador Ghetorr and his assistant Dhear were received with full honors and assigned VIP quarters. The receiving party noticed that Dhear had significant influence over the ambassador. Upon departing the system Ensign Elm Corval, the ships Stellar Cartography Officer, detected a minor gravitational anomaly in the Arkanis system. After further analysis by Ensign Lex, CSO, it was decided that the anomaly fitted the profile of a cloaked ship. In response the Clark established a silent track on the disturbance and the information was sent ahead to the Xerxes to alert her of the danger. It was during this time that an incident involving the Cardassians, Corval, Alrik and two marines chasing the lost cat occurred. In the end the cat found a new home with Corval and a sticky situation was avoided with the Cardassians.
The Clark rendezvoused with the Xerxes without incident. The subspace ripple, detected by the powerful AUGUR array, following the Xerxes turned out to be the Dee, the CinC personal stealth equipped shuttle. The Clark and Xerxes joined up and established a secure holotransmission. In a very dramatic encounter the Clark nestled very close to the Xerxes in order to prevent the suspected cloak ship from intercepting the link. During the mission brief the Clark and Xerxes learned that the CinC will mediate the peace talks for the Federation. It was also during this meeting that an attempt was made to take the CinC hostage. Due to security measures taken by Lt. Magwa, CSO of the Xerxes, the CinC was spared as Magwa was himself kidnaped. The ships immediately took defensive measures to protect the CinC and deal with the threat. The Clark bathed the immediate area with tachyon emission in order to achieve a precise location on the cloaked ship responsible for the kidnaping. While the Clark and Xerxes prepared an attack to rescue the security officer the cloaked ship attempted to close again with the starships. Ensign Corval analyzed the ships movement and discovered that they were following the tachyon interference patterns. In order to gain time the Clark and Xerxes began shifting their positions mimicking the patter of ships maintaining a security tachyon field. The cloaked ship, now suspected to be the Kestral commanded by a rogue StarFleet officer named Anderson, realized it had lost the tactical advantage and departed the area. Before leaving Magwa was stuffed into a spacesuite and dumped into free space.
The statships commanders were faced with a difficult situation. They were expected to rendezvous with the Klingons and continue on with the conference, however, they could not ignore the threat the Kestral presented to the talks and the CinC. It was decided that the ships would continue on to the Rolunter system while the Dee loaded with marines and a secure long range communication device, design by the Ens. Val Alrik, would stay behind. It was suspected that the Kestral would follow the Xerxes. Sometime during the pursuit the Kestral would once again be detected by the AUGUR as it passed through various particle fields giving the Dee an opportunity to close and board the Kestral. The raiding party consisted of Ens. Yan'Och, pilot; Ens. Val Alrik, Comms; Ens. Germanicus, doctor; 2Lt Connery, Team Leader; and 10 marines.
The plan worked. The Kestral was detected shortly after following the Xerxes. Ensign Corval vectored the Dee to the Kestral's location. The Dee traveled in the warp wake of the two starships making it totally undetectable by the Kestral. Ensign Yan'Och, the Clark FCO, performed piloting miracles in closing with the Kestral. Unable to make a transporter lock the Dee hard docked to the Kestral hull. The marines enter the ship achieving complete surprise. In a coordinated effort, Lt Kalen 7, the Ops officer on the Clark provided an impressive distraction by making the Kestral believe they were being attacked by the Borg. Achieving the surprise the Federation forces were able to disable the Kestral cloaking device. The plan would have worked except Dhear turned out to be a saboteur and manage to gain access to the Clark's battle bridge. He caused server damage to the Clark and programmed the Clark's weapon systems to unload all of her torpedoes on the Xerxes. Ens. Lex detected the attempts of Dhear and manage to stop the torpedo attack and captured Dhear. In doing so she had to disable all of the Clark's offensive and defensive systems. The Kestral was quick to take advantage of the situation and fired upon the Clark. The Xerxes attempted to protect the Clark by blocking the torpedo attack and taking several of the missiles herself. To make matters worse one of the Klingon escort vessels entered the battle. Captain Broll of the Xerxes didn't know who to trust during the battled warned off the Klingon Bird of Prey by firing low energy phasors at her.
During the confusion of the battle the Kestral manage to make repairs and recloaked. The Commanders and CinC realized they had lost the advantage and recalled the raiding party. Aboard the Kestral the marines ran into heavy resistance. It shortly became obvious that the raid was a trap. Despite the lost of several marines Anderson was captured by 2ndLt. Connery in a daring act of heroics. On the Dee, Ensign Yan'Och was doing the near impossible job of maintain the lock on the Kestral during the wild battle related maneuvering. He was also able to signal the Clark and Xerxes by turning on the Dee's running lights. The marines made it back to the Dee and Lt Connery and Anderson were able to be transported to the Dee just in time to depart the Kestral. The Dee escaped through the warp wake of the starships, being coordinated by Ens. Corval's efforts in using primitive techniques in tracking the Dee's running lights and the Xerxes flashing MORSE code to the Dee. During the escape Ens Alrik received a broken nose and minor concussion when the helmeted head of the marine he was holding down during the rough ride smacked him in the face. Also during the escape the Kestral was able to lock on Anderson and transport him back, denying any victory to the raiding party.
The Dee returned to the Clark and the starships continued on to meet the Klingons. The crew was now at a constant heighten alert. The engineering staff was heavily tasked to repair the damage. Many critical systems were brought back online by using the computer and power resources of the MMP, however, this prevented the powerful AUGUR array from being used. During the trip to the Rolunter systems Dhear was questioned and it was learned that he was a member of the Obsidian Order and that other accomplices were involved. Spies were suspected to be on both ships. A bio communion device was discovered implanted in Dhear. A team consisting of Lt Kalen 7, Ensign Germanicus, the ships CMO, two binars, and the engineer emissions section chief, investigated the bio communication device. Ensign Yan'Och detected pisonic activity that corresponded with increased activity in the device. Quick thinking by Ens Lex, who raised the shields, preventing the device from completing downloading whatever information that was contained in the device. The investigation team determined a way to track the transmission and when the shields were lifted the device began sending the data. Lt Kalen 7 interfaced with the device in an attempt to slow it down so there would be enough time to make the track. He was damage in the effort and performed a self reboot. The destination of the transmission was to the Xerxes.
Before the true nature of the threat from the spies and the Kestral were discovered, the CinC, disregarding all voices of caution, continued with the original plan to meet with the delegates on the planet Arkanis. Immediately upon arriving on the planets surface the Dee's phasor banks opened fire killing both the Cardassian and Klingon ambassadors. The Dee attempted to escape the retaliation from both sides, but was destroyed by the Klingon ship Malevolent. In orbit the Klingon ships began firing on the Clark and Xerxes. The Xerxes once again took the brunt of the beating for the Clark, however, the Clark was severely damaged in the fight. Both ships escaped, but the Clark was forced to drop down to warp 2 due to damage to the deflector dish. Leaving a trail of coolant they knew it was only a matter of time before someone hunted them down. The crew came up with a plan to crash the saucer section into a moon of an isolated system in order to buy time to perform repairs and cover their escape. During this time Chief Duc'Ma of the Clark's engineering section discovered in the Dee's maintenance records that the ship was tampered with back in the fleet yards. Unfortunately, a Klingon BoP was able to track down the Clark and inflict enough damage to cause the whole ship to crash. The Xerxes shortly appeared on the scene in response to the MAYDAY calls from the Clark. Starfurys from the USS Crusader also appeared who were on patrol in the sector. The Starfurys hunted down the Malevalent and destroyed her. The Xerxes surveyed the crashed site until relieved by the USS Regulator. The USS Xerxes reported that the Clark was destroyed with all hands except for the FCO.
Retrieved from ships log salaved from crash site