The Gilded Man
Prologue[edit]
In late 2406, during the Federation Civil War, the USS Champlain entered the Irlix system to investigate the anomolous sensor readings that had detected a Federation Warp signature in this otherwise unexplored system.
The Champlain entered the system only to discover that the local inhabitants, the Irlixians had somehow developed a Federation style Warp drive despite the fact that the records did not indicate that the United Federation of Planets had made contact with this species, nor had they explored this region of space.
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In an attempt to gather some intelligence, and make some sense of their readings, the Champlain's operations team attempted to hack into the Irlixian starship's computer system. However, before they could gather any useful information, their attack was detected and stopped.
To make matters worse, A Doenitz Loyalist starship, the USS Wyvern, decloaked and attacked the Champlain. In the attack, the Captain of the Champlain was killed and the First officer incapacitated. The end result, however, was that the Wyvern was captured and both Federation starships left the system without investigating the sensor readings further.
The USS Bohrs[edit]
In 2413, nearly a decade after the Champlain's initial sensor readings of a Federation- style warp signature, the USS Bohrs, a Mission Scout vessel, (NCC-369477) was dispatched to follow-up on those inital findings.
The Bohrs proceeded to the Irlix system and utilizing her Cloaking device began to collect cultural and military data in an attempt to isolate the original source of the initial Federation warp signature.
The Bohrs was on station for only a few weeks, when a computer attack shut down her cloaking device and left her vulnerable to attack by military starships belonging to the Rhone Union.
The Bohr's was captured and forced down on the planet Irlix, where it was stored in the Seliya Facility.
Khoda Rhone[edit]
Elsewhere on Irlix, in Khoda City, the Supreme Commander of the Rhone Union's military forces Khoda Rhone summoned the Commanding Officer of the USS Bohrs, Captain Sarah Brightman for a meeting. He advised Brightman of his intentions with her crew, which was to use them to further their technological development. He then indicated that he has no need of a Federation Starship Captain, he then ordered her executed there in his office.
Rhone, seemed uneasy with the appearance of the Federation vessel, and this was most likely due to his past. He ordered all units to be placed on alert as he anticipated a federation rescue effort to free the remaining prisoners held at the Seliya Facility.
The Rosenante[edit]
A few days after the capture of the Bohrs, the USS Rosenante was tasked with the rescue of the crew of the Bohrs as well as the recovery and/or destruction of the starship. As a secondary objective, they were tasked with the discovery of the sudden technological boost found in Irlixian society which was inconsistent with the rest of their technological development.
The Away Team[edit]
Because of a significant threat to the Rosenante, in light of the events leading up to the capture of the Bohrs, Captain Ahmed Ibn Salid decided to infiltrate a cosmetically altered away team on the surface of the planet.
The away team consisted of:
- Lt. Cmdr. T'Larah Sullivan, aFO
- Lt. Chance Raschen, CSEC/CTAC
- Lt. Tom Jackson, COPs
- Ens. Mike Rosenbauer, SO
- Ens. Sanok, SO
- Ens. Kimiko Ichijo|aCMO
- Ens. Sam Lopez, ACMO
- Lt. Steven Wade Matrix, ACEO
- Ens. Mitena Rixx, aCEO
- Ens. Louis Remey, ACSO
- Ens. Robert Smith, AOPs
The Hotel Votul[edit]
After arriving in the Irlix system, the USS Rosenante approaches the planet from a polar orbit acheived by following a very broad hyperbolic course. Once in position, the Away Team is sent down to the planet's surface, specifically to Khoda City, in pairs, to minimize the chance of detection.
The Away Team made their way to the Hotel Votul, a business known locally for allowing Gab males and Mol females to mingle in a social setting where they would not normally be permitted to do so. The meeting place at the hotel is marked by an interplexing communications beacon set up by Chance Raschen. The final meeting spot was a public restroom on the first floor of the hotel.
Things got interesting when Mike Rosenbauer showed up with Ios Malinae, an Irlixian female, that he had 'rescued' earlier from an assault and attempted rape. Ios apparently recognized Mike's blood, seeping from a broken lip as belonging to a Human rather than an Irlixian. She then revealed through an encounter with her mother, Sola Malinae that she was associated with the secret Seliya Facility where the research and development of the Alien (Federation) technology was being studied and retro-engineered.
Taking a risk, Mike brought her to the meeting to allow Lieutenant Commander Sullivan a chance to question her and determine if she possessed any knowledge that may aid the Away Team in their mission.
She was not, however, the only visitor to arrive at the Hotel Votul.
Senior Detective Vilox Nigo, a member of the Special Police responsible for dealing with espionage inside the Rhone Union, detected the beacon and set into motion police resources in an attempt to capture the away team, which he believed were spies from one of the other major political powers on Irlix.
When the raid began, the away team put up more of a resistance than Vilox had anticipated and managed to escape although Sullivan, Louis Remey, Steve Matrix and others were injured in the fighting to some degree.
Thanks to the hard efforts of Sanok, Tom Jackson, Robert Smith and Steve Matrix, the Away Team managed to escape the premises, narrowly dodging a perimeter of Police Snipers and pursuing law enforcement forces.
The Safe House[edit]
After the fire fight at the Hotel Voltul, the away team found itself in deep trouble as Irlixian police forces began to close in on their position.
Mike Rosenbauer and Ios Malinae managed to slip out of the police cordon in an attempt to locate a place where the away team could regroup and take stock of their tactical situation as well as assess the potential success for the continuation of their mission.
While the away team was managing to remain out of sight inside the police perimeter, Ensign Robbie Smith managed to infiltrate the police tactical communications network and redirect police units away from the away team's location. Thus when the word came that Mike and Ios had located a suitable rally point, the away team was able to make their way to that location with minimal police interference.
The safe house turned out to belong to a friend of Ios' who was an archeologist away on an excavation and was not expected to be back for some months. The away team, temporarily under the command of Lieutenant Jackson, settled in to treat the wounded and to determine their next course of action.
With the outlook looking bleak and the odds of success becoming slimmer and slimmer as time went by, the mission seemed to be destined for failure.
Cat and Mouse[edit]
While the away team found themselves in a pickle on the surface the USS Rosenante was facing difficulties of her own. under the command of Captain Salid, the Rosenante was forced to break orbit and begin a series of maneuvers to avoid detection and capture once it became apparent that the Irlixians were able in some manner to detect the cloaked Federation Starship.
As the goal was to avoid a confrontation and since the means by which the Irlixians were detecting the position of the Rosenante was unknown, the captain ordered the ship to displace frequently to delay any potential military actions between the Irlixian Fleet, commanded by Fleet Commander Frazil, and the Rosenante.
It was also interesting to note that the detection means was neither immediate nor precise and that meant that simple maneuvering whenever a course change took place among the Irlixian patrol craft happened were sufficient to keep the Rosenante safe from immediate harm.
The Crash[edit]
With the Rosenante well away from the planet, they found themselves unable to respond to the sudden appearance in the system of a Federation runabout without incurring significant risk to the Rosenante.
This runabout was manned by two new recruits to the Rosenante Ensign Junior Grade Eian O'Neill and Ensign Junior Grade Machaire Rabhartaigh. they had been assigned to the ship, but they had not been briefed on the nature of the Rosenante's mission and therefore found themselves entering hostile space unexpectedly.
The Irlixians attacked. The result was the crippling of the runabout, which forced O'Neill to crash land the damaged ship outside the Capital of the Rhone Union, Khoda City.
Within minutes of the crash, however, the shuttle was surrounded by a small squad of Irlixian police. This prevented the immediate escape of the crash survivors.
All hope was not lost, however, as Ensign O'Neill had managed to send out a brief mayday message that alerted the away team already on the planet to their plight.
A quick rescue and recovery mission was organized and consisted of the following personnel:
- Ens. Mike Rosenbauer, SO
- Ens. Sanok, SO
- Ens. Kimiko Ichijo, aCMO
- Ens. Sam Lopez, ACMO
- Lt. Steven Wade Matrix, ACEO
The team made good speed from the safe house to the crash site where they relieved the surrounded crash victims before lead elements of the Secret police force under Vilox Nigo arrived. With the survivors recovered the extraction team returned to the safe house to await contact with the Rosenante and to continue medical treatment of the wounded.
Decoys[edit]
Meanwhile, back aboard the Rosenante, it was becoming more difficult to avoid the ever shrinking search net of the Irlixian starships.
It was the sudden epiphany offered up by Trade Winds Bar manager, and ex-intelligence officer T'Lela, that the Rosenante was finally able to discover the means by which they were being tracked.
The Irlixians were managing to track the automated communications data streams that all Federation starships use to connect to the Memory Alpha database as well as to navigational satellites. And while unable to disable this uplink, the deployment of some Stealth Buoys, set to monitor the same frequency created a series of decoys that would confound the Irlixians and allow the Rosenante to slip free and return to Irlix to get an update from the away team there.
Recall[edit]
When the Rosenante took up a standard orbit and made contact with the away team, it quickly became apparent that the initial mission parameters had no real chance of success. As a result Salid ordered the away team and their civilian adviser, Ios, beamed back aboard the Rosenante.
A New Plan of Action[edit]
While the members of the away team visited Sickbay to have the last of their injuries tended to and to have the cosmetic surgeries undone, Captain Salid was speaking with the civilian advise Ios concerning the situation. It was from that brief meeting and interview that a new plan of action was hatched.
Once the away team was restored, and with the Rosenante managing to remain undetected at the polar orbit of the planet, Captain Salid called a briefing where he outlined the new plan.
He had become convinced after hearing about the history of the Rhone Union from Ios that a member of the Medea crew had managed to infiltrate the government and violated the Prime Directive for their own benefit.
This in turn led the Captain to implement a three pronged plan of action that would achieve a variety of mission goals simultaneously.
First Salid and Louis Remey would be making an appearance at a scheduled media conference being put forward by Khoda Rhone. By hijacking the media feeds of the planet, Salid could insure that the message that he wanted to spread across the planet would remain uninterrupted. Remey would be responsible for running scans of the Rhone Union leadership present in an effort to ferret out the traitor in their midst.
While Salid and Remey acted as investigators, instigators and distraction, a second team led by Lieutenant Steven Wade Matrix and consisting of Marta Nunez, Sanok and Robert Smith would conduct a raid against Rhone Union government offices in an attempt to locate information on the location of the Hostages from the USS Bohrs. Once that information was located, a third team led by Mike Rosenbauer, and consisting of Kimiko Ichijo, Sam Lopez, and Eian O'Neill would begin the operation to rescue the hostages while Matrix's team beamed to the sight of the Bohrs and prepared the ship for departure.
Unfortunately, some parts of the plan did not quite happen as planned. Although The rescue team was deployed, matrix's team was forced to remain hidden in the government offices due to the fact that the Rosenante, Commanded by Commander T'Larah Sullivan, and aided by Lieutenant Thomas Jackson and Chance Raschen, was forced into a military encounter with Rhone Union Starships commanded by Fleet Commander Frazil.
Despite this setback, Rosenbauer's team managed to rescue not only the hostages from the Bohrs, but also Lieutenant Ben Soma, previously of the USS Mithrandir and Lieutenant Doug Masters. The reinforced team managed to make their way to the Bohrs, and after a spectacular diversion with a damaged runabout, destroy the partially restored wreckage of the USS Medea and allow the Bohrs to escape the hanger once her systems were restored.
While members of his crew were engaged in various levels of their portion of the operation, Captain Salid managed to cause Khoda Rhone, whom Remey had identified as Ono Nakamura, previously the Chief Engineering Officer of the USS Medea to confess to his crimes.
As expected, the Irlixians were shocked and Khoda Rhone was ousted from power. He was taken into custody by Remey, while Salid attempted to rectify the cultural contamination that Nakamura had caused.
Epilogue[edit]
After an additional eight days of negotiations, the governments of Irlix agreed to establish a provisional planetary government under the leadership of Ios Malinae. With the arrival of starships from the Federation Diplomatic Corps, the USS Rosenante was released from their mission.
They aided in the repairs of the USS Bohrs before heading to Starbase 989 for some much needed upgrades and R&R.
