[right][b] Dr.Anderson, Mr.Ford, Mr.Karlson and RADM.Locke.[/b]
Admiral William Lockes Study
0900HRS Local Ship Time
[sub]Written by [@Draken],[@RedLeather],[@The Spectre] and [@Sep][/sub][/right]

William sat on one of the sofas, the other sat facing him with a table between the two. All around the room, which held the same steely feel as the rest of the room, were bookcases and various display cabinets. Most filled with various trinkets given to the Vitae from various sources across the world, the only item in this room that truly belonged to him (other than a fine bottle of Scotch Whisky) was a model of the Nightfury on the desk behind him. Given to him by his peers when he had to step down in order to devote his time to Amara it was a memento of to this day, what he considered to be one hell of a ship. The Reaper-Class, while based off of the design, just wasn’t the same as his old girl.

In the room with him sat Kevin Ford, Karen Anderson and Erik Karlson - probably the closest thing he had to experts on anything alien. “I’m sure by now anyone who recognises anyone else in the room has figured out why I asked you here. Though I’ll talk my way through it to be sure.” He lifted up the small metallic mug off the table and took a sip of coffee out of it, just a small sip. There was only so much Earth grown coffee left in existence, and while he was Martian born and bred he had to admit when it came to growing coffee the people from Earth knew where it was at. “We’re currently passing through hyperspace into uncharted waters, so to speak, and to this day we’ve only encountered one alien race and they weren’t exactly friendly. I’m sure you all know this.”

He lowered his mug back to the table before he continued. “We’re going to face aliens out there, some sentient some not so much. You three are here as our foremost expert in terms of linguistics-” He nodded at Erik “-Xenobiology-” at Karen “-And finally diplomacy. You’re going to be incredibly important which is why I’m going to organize these meetings once a week and with the exception of Kevin-” He turned to the man “-Who I need to talk to about something else. I’m going to give you both your own departments, I’ll have resumes sent to you before the end of the day of people wanting to join your new departments. On Earth the higher ups didn’t feel it was necessary but I’d rather be prepared which is why I am doing this now that it’s my call. Doctor Anderson, don’t worry about Eden you can still pitch in there whenever you want. Any questions?”

With a bit of visible relief on her face, Karen decided to carry the discussion to the area that was probably most important. “Thank you, Admiral, and I do have a key question. What do you, personally, already know about the aliens and our fields? I don’t think any of us intend to make you an expert, but informed decisions are better decisions, right?” Karen absentmindedly took a sip of her own coffee, and immediately regretted it, as the drink had never appealed to her.

“I know about as much as anyone with brass on their shoulders does. They utilize some form of biologically designed armour and can pack one hell of a punch-” He raised his hand to his eyepatch “-I’ve seen them in action Doctor. I’ve done the research, or at least as much as can be done. Obviously we don’t know everything about them, hell they never transmitted anything to us before until yesterday.” He nodded at Erik. “As Mister Karlson well knows having been the one to study the message. Let me be clear on one thing though. The Devastators won’t remain the focus for long, I’m pretty sure we’ll meet something new soon enough. Which is why I want to ask if you two are happy to be cleared for away missions to planets. I know that the first planet we come across is unlikely to be our new home but it could always have something we need. Having you two on the Nyx where you can easily deploy would be beneficial. I already have teams building a makeshift lab aboard for you.” He took another sip of his coffee.

“Doctor, any request to bring any alien life on board will be solely in your hands. We have labs with containment cells already set up onboard, those are going to be your labs if you know the ones I’m talking about. Down in sector 9 near the main bio-labs.”

At this point Erik chimed in. “I am infinitely grateful, Admiral, for the privilege not only of having a staff to help me, but to be given the opportunity to engage with alien language firsthand.” He paused, considering something. “Perhaps it might also be helpful to assign me someone with a more…technical, knowledge. I think beginning work on some kind of universal translator might be good. As we encounter more and more languages, we could give some manner of AI practice in deciphering them without my help. Which eventually make me obsolete, but hopefully I can teach the next generation about old-world language when they… wake up.” He smiled at the Admiral.

Then, he turned to Ford. “Mr. Ford, I don’t suppose you could grant me access to the part of the archives where - “ he broke off, pulling out a sheet of paper. “-information and dictionaries on Mandarin, Hindi, Swahili, Farsi, Portuguese, Japanese, and Indonesian? It would be helpful in discerning the rest of the Devastator’s message.”

(the Spectre is unavailable for an undisclosed period of time as such I, Sep, will be puppeting him)

William turned to Ford as he nodded “Feel free Mr.Karlson, at the Admirals request-” He raised his arm pointing at William “-We’ve set up an office near the Archives for you and have given you clearance to copy or remove materials as you need them.”

William nodded. “While I can assign someone of technological, or more accurately programming expertise, in fact two people come to mind when thinking about making advanced programs. However bear in mind that it is unlikely that if we encounter more than one species that their languages will be similar to anything we have ever heard before. So prepare to be frustrated.”

He nodded at Karen. “Such as you Doctor Anderson shouldn’t expect all alien life we encounter to be like anything we’ve seen. I propose as a liaison between your two departments I am going to assign Michael Smith-” He slid two copies of his portfolio across the table. He of course knew it was false, one of the few people aboard who knew of Michaels true identity. “-He doesn’t have a PhD but he’s got an amazing IQ and is some kind of prodigy, soaks up information like a sponge. Any more questions? I’m sure you have a lot you want to get done.”

Karen flipped open the portfolio, and her eyebrows raised as she recognized the picture. “Oh, I believe I’ve managed to already meet him, although I’m afraid we didn’t discuss much. Also, I am quite well aware that we almost certainly will not be encountering life similar to that on Earth. That’s what separates us from our non-xeno counterparts, after all - being open to ideas that would be absurd on Earth.” 

She then turned her head to the admiral, as she closed the portfolio on her lap. “Currently, I don’t technically need any staff, but I will need to be shown through how the containment units work, and have enough staff to keep the place watched constantly, ideally by at least two pairs of eyes at a time. We wouldn’t want some strange, dangerous life form wandering the ship, and I wouldn’t want to leave it behind.” She stifled a yawn, covering it almost daintily with her hand. “Speaking of which, once we have specimens, the place should have dedicated guards as well, if not already.”

Erik spoke up again. “Of course I understand the difficulties of learning completely unique alien languages, that’s the whole purpose of the program. The idea would be to have software that could figure out a completely unique language without human input. Computer learning, in a restricted sort of way.”

He turned back to Ford. “Thank you for allowing me an office, I shall make use of it for sure.”

William raised took another drink from his mug. “You’re both getting staffs now, so you can get them set up the way you want and get them trained on anything they need trained before the time comes.” He turned to Erik. “I will send someone your way when I can spare him to look into making this program, though even if we complete it I’d like to keep the human element.” He stood up from the sofa. 

“However we are all busy people, I am sure once you arrive at your new office and lab respectively-” He indicated to Erik and Karen in turn “-You will have questions and requests once things are set up. Feel free to point them at Noah as he knows the proper route of communication for requests for heads of departments. That said if you ever need my assistance my door is always, figuratively, open. Thank you for your time, though I am afraid I have other duties to attend to.”

The four of them dispersed in silence and in thought, leaving behind only three empty mugs of coffee, and one barely touched.