Echoes and Ghosts

Posted on Tue Jun 16, 2026 @ 4:00pm by Lieutenant JG Anson Lee & Lieutenant Annora Tessaro

2,299 words; about a 11 minute read

Mission: Jubilee
Location: Various
Timeline: Before Day of the Comet

After the morning briefing was complete and the outgoing shift turned in their gear, Annora checked her calendar. With no pressing emergencies or upcoming meetings that required her attention, she turned things over to an junior officer.
"Ensign Akioika. Lieutenant Lee and I will be out of the office for a bit. If there's anything you and Petty Officer Lughaidh can't handle, call me. Otherwise we'll be back in a bit."

She intercepted Anson before he could settle into his office.
"Walk with me if you would. I want your opinions on a few things. Don't worry, you're not in trouble."

"Not yet, anyway. Day's just starting." The way things had been going lately, it seemed easier to Anson to brace for the worst and be pleasantly surprised.

She shook her head at Anson's response as they headed towards the rear turbolift.
"That's the spirit. As long as that trouble doesn't follow you home, we'll be good."

Motioning for him to enter the lift-car, Annora stepped in behind him.
"Deck 1160." She told the computer

"I want to reconfigure the Forge ahead of the final training run for the DART hopefuls. Petty Officer Tihr has give me his preferences, I'm interested in your take. You work with them in a different capacity than he does, and being relatively new here gives you more of an outsider's perspective. We have 9 people vying for 4 slots. While their performance scores weigh heavily, I'm also factoring in the viewpoints of my senior staff."

Anson thought of T'Lul turning up at his quarters and suppressed a shudder. If that ever happened, he would lock himself in his bathroom and never come out. A man needed some space! He forced his attention back to the the question of the DART applicants. "No obvious stand outs, huh?"

He chewed at his lower lip as he considered. "'Course, it's not just about the individual scores. It's how they work with each other. The best individual skills in the galaxy are worthless if you can't work with others. I'll want to take a look at those team exercise results before I give you my recommendations."

She had heard similar words from various instructors, at virtually every training environment she'd been in.
"Agreed. Especially when you're going to be the tip of the spear in any high stress scenario. Don't want a hostage scenario falling apart because the team was too busy bickering, for example. To answer your other question, I know my top four as of now. That could change if they completely blow this last training run."

The turbolift doors opened to reveal the Forge’s entrance just a few feet away. Two large industrial doors dominated the bulkhead, topped by a plaque that read: NOW ENTERING THE FORGE. FORTUNA TE IUVET. Black and yellow warning signs were stenciled onto the doors, Variable Gravity, Ozone and Particulate Notice, EM Radiation Advisory, Kinetic Hazard, and the standard, Authorized Personnel Only. They were designed to ward off any unexpected visitors as much as serving as official notices.

Accepting Annora's authorization code, the doors opened with a mechanical thud, revealing a large corridor heading straight and a smaller one off to the right. Taking the smaller corridor, Annora and Anson entered the control room. As they stepped inside, the overhead lights hummed to life and the master control console flickered into standby mode, casting a soft glow across the room. The other consoles and the massive viewscreen remained dark, waiting for activation. Unsure of the scenario she wanted to run, Annora began scrolling through the list on the console.

"I ran into Lieutenant T'Lul the other day, or more accurately she tracked me down. During our conversation I suggested our two departments could benefit from some cross training."

Anson’s spine stiffened and his eyes went wide, as he looked up from the secondary station where he was reviewing the previous training sessions. T’Lul had been talking to his boss? Bad enough that she wouldn’t leave him alone. Now she was popping up elsewhere. It was part disturbing and part embarrassing. He was the Assistant Chief of Security, and he couldn’t get one woman to leave him alone. “Lieutentant T’Lul? What did she want?”

There was obviously a history between the two, something Annora was going to mostly ignore unless it bled over into official duties.
"Primarily, she was concerned about security's workload and burnout. I assured her it was being monitored as well as informing her of the new schedule giving the staff a 3 day weekend once a month. Of course that will start after this pending Comet Festival, where we're running 12 hour shifts. Less changeover and more people on duty at one time. She did ask if you'd be running the joint trainings."

She paused at the look of worry on Anson's face.
"Don't worry. I told her to coordinate with Mr Tihr. DART may be my creation, but he runs the day to day operations of it all."

Anson gave a huff of relief. “Good, because I have enough on my plate. With the comet coming, we’ll need to coordinate with engineering. Maintenance areas are going to be a popular place for people looking for a spot to sleep. They’re out of the way, not much traffic. And a great place for visitors to cause issues or injure themselves.”

There was a small sigh at mention of the maintenance areas. Just one more moving part to keep track of.
"I'm redirecting more patrols to the promenade and civilian decks. We'll add the maintenance areas to the list as well. I'll let you run point on that. My suggestion, work with Ops to temporarily turn some cargo bays into living spaces. Throw in some cots and privacy curtains, should suffice for the week or so people are here. It's better than a random jeffries tube."

"I'll see what I can do. It'll be a risk for theft, but that was going to happen no matter what with this many people." Anson wrinkled his nose. "I'm not sure our drunk tank is big enough. We'll probably need to plan to use some of the cells." He chuckled under his breath. "But, hey, we're guaranteed all of Security will be on their best behavior if we make clear that anyone stepping out of line gets cleaning duty."

Annora paused the computer screen on a scenario they hadn't yet run.
"I think we're going to switch up the final training run. A SAR mission with several unknowns. See how they handle a different kind of chaos than rampaging Cardassians."

She inputted a few commands into the console to instruct the computer to configure the training area. Once the green light came on, she motioned towards the door leading to the starting area.
"Let's walk the course, make some tweaks along the way."

Anson looked around curiously. He hadn’t been involved much with the training up until now. DART was Lt. Tessaro’s project, not his. Besides, someone had to keep an eye on things while she ran the training. “Search and Rescue, huh? Who are they going to be rescuing? Lt. T’Lul?”

He didn’t laugh at the mental image, but only because he literally bit his tongue hard enough to make his eyes water.

Grabbing a PADD to log the changes, Annora led the way through the heavy access door. The starting area was a standard Starfleet corridor, though it was now cluttered with randomly placed cargo crates and "debris" that hadn't been there a few minutes ago. She smirked at her XO's comment.

"Something tells me that's not what she meant by 'working with the security teams.' It’ll be holograms. The recruits have done several boarding action missions. Both as the attackers and defenders. This final mission won't be as straightforward as clearing a room."

She paused.
"I really appreciate you staying on to help run the department. It's good to have someone with more of an outside perspective. I've been at DS5 since graduating the Academy. I did say I'd prefer a posting away from the core worlds, so guess I can't complain too much. This posting has certainly kept me on my toes. Even if you ignore the various temporal shenanigans that have occurred."

"That was a trip. In many senses of the word. But I'm happy with the whole, you know, not being primordial soup thing." Anson shrugged. "As for staying, what was I going to do? Turn down a promotion? And it's a good change. Don't get me wrong. Utopia Planitia wasn't a bad posting. Some of the things I learned, I'd've never had a chance of on a ship. But after a while, there's a certain amount of ... not just routine, but sameness. It's not a good thing to get set in your ways when you're Security."

They continued down the corridor with Annora pausing every now and then to make changes to the course. Modifying the lighting, blocking obvious paths forwards, triggering alarm klaxons, etc.
"Fair point. Still glad that little trip didn't scare you off. And, yes. Avoiding complacency is a good thing in our line of work. Speaking of time travel. If Temporal Investigations comes poking around, let me know immediately."

Anson frowned, his brow creasing. “You think they might show up? I guess I figured if they were going to catch on to what we did, it would have happened by now.”

She shrugged.
"I don't know. I would also expect them to have investigated already. Guess I'm just a little paranoid. I've dealt with time travel before but not on this scale."

Further down, just before the corridor sloped upwards to the next deck, Annora stopped to consider what variable to throw at the teams.
"I'm thinking of a pile of debris, give them two options forward. They can either forge a path up and over, or burrow their way under and through. Maybe throw in some light smoke to add to the challenge. Thoughts, additions?"

He cocked his head to one side and considered. “It’s Search and Rescue, right? Give ‘em a rescuee, partially trapped under the debris.”

"It is a search and rescue. I was going to place a victim further down, but I see no reason we can't do that here. Just up ahead is a small side corridor, we'll place a walking wounded hologram behind a second pile."

Annora inputted the 2 different additions to the program.
"Perfect. With transporters offline, they'll have to apply a makeshift splint and carry the victim with them."

"You're nicer than I'd be," Anson said.
"Just apply a splint? I'd throw in some hectic complication, but," he shrugged, "you're the boss."

She looked over at her XO.
"I wasn't planning on having an unconscious victim, although we could issue them a flexible stretcher for use in such a scenario. Or they start off mobile but then their condition changes. What do you think? Either way, in short order they're going to deal with lower gravity and reduced visibility."

“I guess I’m a believer in you don’t rise to the occasion, you fall to the level of your training,” Anson said. "I'd rather fail when it doesn't matter than when it does."

The changes were made to the program, with Annora handing the PADD over to Anson for approval.
"An unconscious victim with a broken leg. They'll have to use the stretcher. If need be, it can be operated as a sled, although it's ideal to carry with two people. Of course, that will leave only two people to run point, but they're not facing active hostiles."

Anson looked over the information on the PADD. He nodded in agreement. “Not that they know there are no active hostiles.”

The corridor wound its way upward before stopping at a hatchway.
"This marks the halfway point, and where things get really fun. We're going to drop the gravity in quarter G intervals, stopping at half of normal gravity. They'll be operating only with emergency lighting and palm beacons. A nice layer of smoke will further obscure their vision. Of course everything will be monitored to ensure no real emergencies crop up."

“Don’t tempt fate. The Universe is going to screw us at some point or other anyway. No need to provide a cue.”

When they finished walking the course, Annora and Anson returned to the control room. From there she activated the program, before doing a virtual walk-through with everything active.
"Looks good to me. The first team will report for duty in 5 hours, run the course, then we'll do a hot-wash immediately afterwards. We will then reset the course and start over with the next team. You're welcome to attend, but it's not required."

Anson gnawed at his lower lip as he considered. “You going to have the counselor run both?”

Maybe he could manage to pull off boring and logical at their next meeting, and she'd lose interest. And maybe the Ferengi would declare him their next Grand Nagus.

"T'Lul? No. We'll schedule her sometime after all this comet craziness. It's the same three teams of three we've had since the initial evaluation scenario, with the addition of a different DART member from each of the previous 2 scenarios. After that, it's the final rack and stack and selection."

"Sounds like a plan. Yeah, I'll be there. Recordings are never as good as seeing things live. We'll see if their performance matches what I got from your notes. Once I have that, I'll have my recommendations for you."

Saving the program, Annora followed Anson towards the door.
"Sounds good. See you then."



Off:
LT Annora Tessaro
Security Chief- DS5

and

Lt.jr. Anson Lee
Asst. Security Chief - DS5

 

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