War Games

Posted on 26 Feb 2020 @ 3:19pm by Lieutenant Commander Gemma Alexander & Commander Terry Walsh & Lieutenant Commander Camila Di Pasquale

1,697 words; about a 8 minute read

Mission: Sentience
Location: Security Operations Room
Timeline: MD 1 || Immediately following Shakedown Briefing

Camila headed into Security after the briefing and immediately went into the Security version of the war room. There, she accessed the interface and activated the wall interface that had hundreds of different scenarios that she had came up with for ship defenses, both internal and external. While she waited for the others, she headed to her office to grab a fresh mug of Raktajino and a green tab of something she popped in her mouth, then headed back to the room to prepare herself for what was to come.

Gemma walked in with her trusty PADD, "Commander." She greeted. She'd pretty much come straight from the previous meeting after getting the notice of the timing of this meeting. "Handy we could jump into this right away." She said the timing suiting her just as as she wasn't inclined to let grass grow under feet if there wasn't a need.

"Commander," Camila returned the nod. "You're certainly climbing the ranks fast."

Gemma found a place to sit, "Bit of a shock to me as well." She said with feeling, "I'm minding my own, next thing I know..." She shrugged, gesturing at the new black pip on her collar. To be honest if it was anyone else but the Skipper and Walsh doing it she'd play it off as in a war the survivor gets awarded for breathing but as it was she was trying to just take it as the measure of respect and trust that it showed. It still felt a bit odd though. She glanced at the Security Chief, "Congrats to you by the by." She gestured to Camilia's own new rank.

"Thanks, but you're more deserving of the promotion," the Security Chief said. "Now shall we get down to business?"

"Rather." Gemma agreed, waking up her PADD and calling up her notes. "It's your office, you want to show and tell first?" She nodded at the wall interface that seemed to have multiple scenarios.

"Since we're working together, this is just the scenarios that I have for Security and Tactical," Camila explained. "While I do have solutions for attacking fighters, it's ones that are already established. Since you're now the CAG, I'm sure you have your own scenarios for fighters attacking ships. So why not bring yours up and then we'll make changes and come up with new scenarios as we go."

“Understood. I hope we put a few of your ones for defending from attacking craft to good use, work out any possible kinks. I have a few scenarios that might help.” Gemma replied. She meant it sincerely, better to test it thoroughly first if one could. “That being said, I am thinking at least one scenario should be a particularly useful one to warm up with.” She called it up on the holographic console, “The initial steps will depend on ship location but the essential point will be all available fighters will either be attacking or defending. We can modify numbers on each side in addition to other wrenches to make it more of a challenge for one side or another.” It was a standard framework but allowed for significant modification, some options of which where already listed to one side of the image.

Camila studied the scenarios that Gemma had put up for a few minutes before she nodded. "We'll need at least a dozen scenarios based on this. Computer, compile scenarios using Security File J-Fourteen Di Pasquale One."

The Chief of Security waited while the computer merged the fighter scenarios with the ship and came up with two viable ones.

"The first is a pincer move," she said. "The art of misdirection. Put a decoy in front of us and close in with the fighters from both sides to harry us until we concentrate on one or the other side."

"The second is more direct. A full assault on the engineering and bridge section while targeting weapons. Also the most dangerous for the fighters."

Gemma leaned forward her focus on the screen total as her mind worked the angles. “With either one, though we’d want choose just to keep things interesting, we could make it a distress call. Even work up life signs for the decoy.” She considered it further, they had 21 gryphon craft they could do some serious swam damage if they properly overlapped their firing angles. “I think we could split the fighters into a trident hit from the sides and below or somesuch without losing supportive fire in a future scenario if we wanted. Any idea if we’re planning the location for this training or will that be assigned?” She glanced over. The field they fought on would matter just as much to the planning as the equipment they'd be using.

"A trident hit..." Camila echoed and paused to think about it. "That would definitely work on the ship and force Tactical to adapt faster. Let's work the numbers on that one. Three groups of seven and a decoy?"

Gemma nodded, "That's about what I'm thinking if we want to make that a main scenario it would work fairly well. Should add to the challenge level to both sides nicely."

Terry walked in right after that comment and looked around. It was obvious that they had already begun, for which he was glad. He didn't want to be one of those XO's unless he had to be. Plus, he trusted both ladies to know what they were doing and get down to business without him being around. "Apologies for the tardiness." He looked from the Squadron Commander to the Security Chief. "Could I be brought up to speed?"

Gemma looked over with a smile, "Hey Ro..Commander..." She replied, trying to get used to that. "Haven't missed too much, just fleshing out a trident scenario, three groups of seven fighters on the ship with multiple attack vectors and a lovely decoy." She nodded at the hologram and glanced at De Pasquale see if she had anything she wanted to add.

Camila gave a shake of her head and looked at the new Executive Officer to see what he'd say.

"Not a bad idea, utilizing the entire squadron at once," he replied. "But what happens when the ship gains the upper hand? Where will the backup come from?" He paused a moment to let that sink in. "The whole squadron on the offensive is certainly a force to be reckoned with and a good training scenario, but the Black Hawk is a large vessel. You can't expect small craft to take out a capital ship, only to cripple it. And sometimes waves of attacks from fresh pilots and fully restocked arms is the way to go." He hated doing that, questioning scenarios and the like. But this was the planning stage after all. Lots of things had to be looked at.


Gemma nodded understanding, "This is meant to be one of several training scenarios. This is a go for broke style, meant to capitalize on the first few minutes of surprise in combat and give an idea of max stompage." She explained, "We can work in a wave option in for another training." She paused and shrugged, "Unless we want to switch to an endurance style as the first focus. It just matters what we want to be looking for in a particular training scenario as one is not likely to cover everything." she finished thoughtfully, trying to explain the reasoning behind the idea but she was flexible and waited to see what the others would say.

"However you set the fighters up, it's still them against the ship and I'm going to handle Tactical," Camila said. "How about attacking in seven waves of three?"

Gemma looked thoughtful for a moment adjusting her thinking, "Only three at a time could work though if I could suggest we could drop back to a pincer plan and use six at a time we can do three waves with a rotating element that could tag in as needed of the remaining three. We could even rise and repeat, rotating the six active for say two or three runs each." She was thinking of an oceans waves continuously going in and out.

"Ah," said Terry as he nodded, "several scenarios rather than all at once. I see. Then the go for broke scenario and wave scenario would be separate." He glanced at Camila, "I hope you're planning on giving them hell in each scenario, then. We for dang sure have gotten enough of it all at once to know how to dish it out."

"You taught me what the Black Knights can do, even if I did watch from the bridge," Camila said. "I've made plans for fighters based off of those, Commander."

"Excellent. I like the sound of that," he replied. "We keep learning off each other like that, we'll be a force to be reckoned with."

Gemma grinned, "Now that's a plan I can get behind, no stone upturned." she said in agreement. "It sounds like we're on the same page now, why don't we finish fleshing out the wave as we continue our plotting?"

"I think we can run with this," Camila said.

Terry nodded. "It sounds like you two have things down pretty well. I'm looking forward to reading the reports and looking at the data."

Gemma nodded, "It's got legs, should be good for all concerned." least she hoped so, that's why these were meant to be tough so they got surprised in the field less often.

"Excellent," replied the XO. "I'll leave you two to tie-up any loose ends. If there are any of those." He turned and headed out of the Security Operations Room.

Camila looked at Gemma as Walsh left and gave a nod. "Let's wrap this up and get moving," she said.

Gemma nodded eager to do so, "Now that we have the basic scenarios for Wave and Go For Broke set let's look at details before moving on..." She began pulling her PADD toward her and the two officers continued their planning, trying to prepare the New Black Hawk to better survive whatever it may encounter.

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