Thau'Shir Mrkath

I would definitely want one for the Community & Trek Discussion as well as the Questions & Comments in the Ten-Forward Lounge category because they get more traffic, and to my point of view they are something I like to keep track of even if I don't always reply so having it in RSS would be ideal, especially since I check my feeds often throughout the day. Of course I would like feeds for my particular sims as well but I won't request those specifically for now until there is perhaps a more specific RSS Request thread somewhere or y'all decide how you want to handle those. Of course there was already a topic for that but because I'm so used to tracking the latest topics through the recent items way I missed it, lol. Thanks A9.

A couple of things I've noticed so far... The "View New Content" lists that there are so many new items since the time of your last log in however it doesn't seem to show them all. For example, I got "There are 7 new entries since Yesterday, 10:52 AM" but it only showed me the Caption Contest topic with the 1 new reply from Calestorm. On similar note, I was excited to see an RSS icon but it seems to be for the Community Calendar only. Is there a way to have RSS for the full boards and/or individual forums/topics? Otherwise it's a snazzy upgrade and hope it fixed whatever issues prompted it.

I'd say a BP ship is probably the perfect fit for the Kelvin. The whole twin-nacelle design is supposed to make it easier to balance the warp field bubble around the ship (in-universe, anyway; the rest of it was just Gene's starship design guidelines, he wanted symmetry), thereby making it easier to zoom along at a good clip. But a BP ship will have it's little section to maintain and for the most part toodle around at low speed so zoom really isn't on the list of things it needs to be able to do well. As for the size... We have 44 fighters in the bay, 11 shuttles, and a hopper and a troop transport, probably some heavy-duty EVA packs. The big boys would obviously have a parking spot on the deck while you'd expect the fighters and shuttles would be efficiently stacked in cubbyholes along the side of the length of the hangar pylon. The attached file, a very simple mock-up I made using the specs provided by Crash for the various vehicles on board, shows how much space is needed just for that possible stacked configuration, let alone the extra meters required for the physical structure, a maintenance area, etc etc etc. It could be perhaps stacked one higher, however that would make the height of the hangar bay a little lopsided for what I would consider for the overall height of the ship. In any case there's a lot of room needed just to fit the buggering things in, let alone have room to operate them and get them out. Translate the hangar to the rest of the ship, and yes, she's a big girl. (Big boned, not fat ;) )

(( 4 days into the 5 day TBS )) Chief of the Aerospace Group, aka CAG, aka Thau’Shir Mrkath, aka Basement Cat, aka BC, and aka a few other things not fit for polite company. A lot of monikers for one furry gentleman, but it suited the Caitian in question just fine. Unlike the dratted ice planet of Delta Vega that the Comanche Creek had been orbiting for almost a week. Until today he’d managed to avoid setting foot on the planet, either staying on the Creek doing administrative duty or taking the Chrysomallos for a spin in the system or over Delta Vega. He was a senior officer however and he couldn’t very well spend the whole mission avoiding the surface. So he’d flew down and landed this time, met with the senior people at the station and with one of the cadet squads, but at least the latter was also at the station and he hadn’t gone out into the flea-bitten cold to do it. He’d made nice, impressed the cadetlings with a few flight stories. Then as soon as he was done he’d defrosted his Haribon Class Fighter and was back in the sky where he belonged. Yet there was something else that needed to be done, far worse in Mrkath’s eyes than even tromping around the ice with the cadets in the field. After returning to the Creek, Mrkath handed over command for the remainder of the day and returned to his quarters. Not even bothering to change out of his flight suit for this next horrible encounter, he switched on his room’s private display, went through all the necessary motions to get an outgoing signal, and waited for the connection. “Thau’Shir, how good of you to finally call,” said the female Cait that popped up onto the screen. While his fur was dark enough to ensure he passed for a Mrkath, next to the figure on the screen he might as well been an albino. The true-black furred woman happened to be his mother. “You’d think you weren’t in the same galaxy anymore,” she added. “Hello, mother.” Mrkath added a sigh to the end. “We’ve been on the periphery, as I’m sure you’ve heard on FNN, so don’t start harping on me for not calling. Now that we’re closer, I have.” “What are you doing in that flight suit?” Khariss asked, scowling at the view of her son on her home monitor. “You didn’t get demoted or something, did you?” “No, mother. Just because I’m a CAG doesn’t mean I don’t get to fly now and then, you know.” “I see,” she replied, even if the tone of her voice clearly said she didn’t. “I would think you’d spend more time with the Captain of your ship instead of in one of those filthy machines.” “Most of the time I do spend with the Captain is in a fighter, mother. She’s a former pilot herself, and honestly she spends more time in one than I do,” Mrkath explained. “Surely, you must be joking.” “No, mother,” he said with another sigh. “And don’t call me Shirley.” When his mother looked half-confused/half-affronted, he waved the joke aside with a big paw. “Never mind, just a little Terran humor.” “Terran humor,” Khariss replied, hissing it. “How entirely unbecoming.” “I’m sure it is. Look, I just thought I’d check in, but it’s getting late. Is father around?” “He’s off bowling,” Khariss replied venomously. “Good for him,” Mrkath replied, earning himself a hiss from his mother. “It’s hardly appropriate for a member of the Mrkath Clan to be off bowling with outworlders,” she snarled. “All right, all right,” Mrkath said, putting his paws up in surrender. “I won’t argue with you. We’ve still got a little time left here, have him call me within the next day or two, would you mother?” “If you insist,” Khariss said. “In the meanwhile, you...” “Oops,” Mrkath interrupted. “Looks like I’m getting an emergency call. I’ll have to let you go. Fare thee well, mother,” he said, then cut the comm. “Damn ice queen,” he said to himself. Of course there was no emergency call, though if there had been he’d have rather dealt with it than his mother for any longer, hence the lie. “I need a drink,” he told himself. Hauling himself out of the chair, he left his quarters. It was time to have a pilot-to-pilot evening with his people.

"You let her take what?" Mrkath asked the deck chief. The answer had the Caitian's ears pinned flat to his head and his fangs showing. Five minutes later the deck chief scurried off to his new duties for the week, scrubbing various very large dirty things with a very small brush, while his ears were on fire hot enough to activate the bay's flame sensors. He really wasn't that mad about the fact that Crash had finagled her way into one of the better goshawks, of course she wanted one. She was a good Captain, personable enough, and treated the flight crews well. Pulling out Basement Cat in this instance was because he directed a long time ago as to what fighters he wanted her in and she didn't end up in one of them. The guilty party had to pay the price. In the end, Calestorm would hear of it, know better in the future not to try it again and likely buy the poor man a bottle of brew to make up for having his ears pinned back because of her request. As usual when Crash was out in one of his fighters and he remained on the ship, he went into Flight Ops to keep an eye on her. He greeted the duty officer, waved him back to his post. He was here to monitor, not to take over today. After activating his console and hooking into her fighter's readouts, he watched her fly over Delta Vega, glad she seemed to be behaving herself, but whatever that noise was that she was listening to made him question her sanity. Everything was going fine until, glancing at the systems display for the fighter, he saw the manifold warning. "I knew she'd let it get iced," he muttered. He watched to see if she'd be able to clear it or if he'd have to send someone down to rescue her off the ice; the latter would include hauling her up here to slowly slice her to tiny pieces. He watched her maneuver to clear it, swearing if she didn't kill herself in the process he was going to have a word about atmospheric maneuvers like that over a frozen planet. After she got it taken care of, he made a very definite note on his iComanche and there was definitely no smiley emoticon after it. Thinking she'd perhaps behave herself now, but then he watched her buzz the damned cadets. While he imagined the cadets hooted and hollered at the pass, they always did, he'd already warned his pilots not to do it this time, and while she never got that directive herself, he hoped she'd know better. You never knew with ground like that when the vibrations of a passing fighter could agitate the ice and make flat ground open up into a huge crevasse. The noise the cadets would make if they fell into one of those opening up wouldn't be hooting and hollering. Neither would the noise he'd be making when he got a moment alone with her. "Jackie, get the Chrysomallos ready. Basement cat needs to make a flight run," he called out. Jackie knew the difference between that phrase and "CAG's making a flight run." She left a trail of rubber as she zoomed to comply.

"We'll be hauling what?!" Mrkath asked incredulously as he scrolled down the mission briefing on his monitor. Not being Terran the C.O.W. P.O.O. didn't really register, however the literal bovine excrement that he could imagine in large quantities did. "No way any of them are setting one hoof in my hanger," he declared to the empty office. The dark-furred Caitian noted that the services of his pilots would be required once they arrived for patrol purposes, and the note that the locals were experiencing another kind of poo-related activity, going ape-sh*t over feeling left behind in the wake of the Nero attack. "The more distance humans put between themselves and Earth the crazier they get," he thought. He sent back an acknowledgment of the orders to Calestorm, and then pulled up the system map for Primos so he could contemplate patrol parameters. *** Meanwhile, down below *** Chief Petty Officer Mike Rowe had a dirty job: he was, through an accident of fate, in charge of all the recycling equipment on the Creek. That, much to his dismay, included the waste reclamation system. Because of that the other engineers always called him any time there was so much as a stopped toilet. Now he was being asked to personally see to the disposal of any waste that their bovine cargo came up with on the journey. "Why is there always poo?" He asked the ceiling, or perhaps he was aiming at Fate. Neither answered in any case. The Comanche Creek was a capable vessel that could do many things, but livestock transportation apparently slipped the minds of the designers. Therefore there was no ready way to collect kilograms of excrement and get it into the system. One section of piping ran behind the bay they would be using to hold the cows, so Mike had to tap into it. Unfortunately, even with valves activated to keep any new material from entering that shunt, the system couldn't completely evacuate the line without a full purge taking place, so the sight and smell that greeted him after cutting into it was far from pleasant. His expressive face was a study in dismay and disgust. He, through much wrangling and grunting, was finally able to get a chute installed. He wasn't sure whether there would be a layer of hay or anything included, so he added a liquidizer to the contraption. It was probably a good idea in any case, because the system wasn't quite used to handling large loads in a local section anyway. He made a mental note to see how Tellarites handled their systems, though that wouldn't help now. He reactivated the valve, allowing waste to come back through the line. After the valve in the chute failed however, he was calling out words that, in this very special case, described what shot out of the chute. Fifteen minutes later he had the valve fixed and the line was running normally again, but the mess remained. "Just breaking in the bay for what's to come," he commented wearily. Then he was informed that just setting up the system beforehand wasn't everything. He'd also have to get the poo into the system once the cattle were on board.o "Crap."

The dark furred CAG had been awakened by the Flight Operations duty officer in the wee hours of the morning. It was not an emergency, thank the Great Hunter, but nonetheless Mrkath quickly dressed and padded through the corridors heading for the dorsal hull. After a few moments and a quiet lift ride, he entered the dimly lit, tech-filled room and headed straight for the overview display, his jaw stretching wide in a yawn. "She's in the Boyington, sir," said Ensign Atralin from his position at the desk. "Ah," Mrkath responded, nodding to the blue-skinned Andorian ensign. "It's about time she took it out." After a quick scan of the overview display he spotted her location and who she was with. "Who's on standby?" He asked Atralin. "Ackersly, Timmons and Sivet, sir. They're suited up and ready, and I've already raised them to five minute status." "Good, good," Mrkath replied. He moved over to the communications desk and, after rifling around a drawer for a while, extracted his Caitian-designed wireless earpiece and fitted it in. "Switch me on," he ordered the CPO at comms, and then wandered over to an empty station to monitor the situation more closely. He knew that Captain Calestorm would be infuriated if she knew about the kind of monitoring she was under. It wasn't, in this case, a result of mistrust or believing too strongly in her call-sign of "Crash." Since he was informed of the incident on New Topeka, he had installed the standing order to: A) inform him any time she went out in a craft if he wasn't already aware and B) to increase alert status and make sure the most capable pilots were placed on standby. There was also a threat of disembowelment should anyone speak of it outside of Flight Ops, lest Calestorm get wind of it. Mrkath pulled up the video feeds from the Goshawk nearby, setting them up on the left-side monitor to keep an eye on things in more detail than the floating icons of an overview can manage. On the right he pulled the Creek's tactical sensor feed up, making sure that the threat board was squeaky clean. After a little while he purred his appreciation at the flip-six she performed to study a buoy, and then chuckled at her admonition to the young pilots out on patrol with her. There was only one problem with the statement though: they wouldn't have any skin left for her to take off after he was done with them should they try the maneuver. He watched and listened as she gave pointers and answered questions like a good veteran pilot, making the occasional note of everyone's performance on an encrypted file loaded on his iComanche. As he'd already been through this routine at all hours over the last few days as the Captain availed of the opportunity to get off the ship, he'd discovered that, after getting some more time to shake off the rust, she was a very accomplished pilot. That didn't mean that he wouldn't continue to put the pressure on her when they were flying together. He did that with all his pilots to some degree, and the better the pilot the more he pushed them to continue to excel instead of becoming complacent. A little while later Calestorm and the patrol were on their way in to land as the next patrol shift was prepping for launch. Satisfied that no Orion pirates were going to jump out from behind a space bush to accost the CO, he reset his console, stashed his earpiece and told the duty officer to return to normal standby status. After bidding the Andorian a quick adieu, he headed off to get a breakfast and a very large mug of coffee to make up for the early start to the day.

Thau'shir Mrkath made his way through the streets of the city, garbed in black this night. Combined with his already dark fur he had no trouble slipping in between the small pools of light that spilled sporadically onto the variably paved, narrow paths between roughshod buildings. His sharp eyes spied others using the same tactics already in his first few nights here, so he certainly wasn't going to draw any attention to himself even if he were spotted. Which was his (and the rest of the Comanche Creek crew's) advantage on this mission: a planet with shady operations so widespread if one had the ability to fit in there were fewer obstacles. Another advantage for the Caitian officer was that no one seemed to look twice at one of the felinoid species in such surroundings. It was, to Mrkath, an ironic twist because Cait was a staunch Federation planet with more Caits serving in Starfleet than the more notable Vulcans, even before the Nero incident. The few who chose less reputable activities were far less prevalent than Terrans or even Andorians, yet perhaps it turned into a case of quality over quantity since none of the "bad guys" seemed to mind a Cait playing the game, even an unfamiliar one. In any case, the CAG was patrolling on foot instead of in a fighter this time around, and while he found both the activity and his chosen method distasteful the goal of saving the kidnapped Vulcans made it worthwhile. He slipped into the neighborhood's watering hole, an unnamed and unadvertised pub of the rough and tumble variety. A few females of various species danced on platforms towards the back, none of them seemingly with any enthusiasm and little grace. Their state of dress, or lack thereof, was apparently the draw rather than skill, judging from the drunken and avaricious glances from the male members of the audience near the platforms. Noting that, while occupied, the establishment was far from bustling yet, Mrkath was able to find a table where he could keep his back to the wall and have a good view of the room. He settled in and waited for what passed as service in the joint to come by. After a moment, another bored looking woman, this time thankfully with more clothing on, wandered over. "Andorian ale," Mrkath said. Normally his voice was very smooth in comparison to most Caits, though under these circumstances he allowed the more natural guttural and rumbling nature to come through. He also allowed his accent to thicken. "Out of the bottle," he added, knowing better to trust the quality of their dishwasher, man or machine. While the hard looking woman headed to the bar to fill the order, he sat back and allowed his radar dish ears to take in the room, listening for any conversations of interest. It was no surprise that most Caits ended up serving in security or intelligence, their physical agility, strength, and hearing were well suited to either profession. Obviously not his primary training, however Mrkath had the species advantage to push him to talented amateur status at least, even if he'd much rather be flying, or at this time of night, sleeping. When the server returned with his ale, he pulled out some hard currency, enough to cover the drink and enough of a tip to keep her coming back but not enough for her to be overwhelmed by his generosity, and therefore suspicious. Having checked in prior to making his way to the bar, he was covered for a few hours on that score, so popped open his bottle and prepared to enjoy himself a little while listening in. He figured it would be another hour at least until the ones he was really interested in came in, at least according to the data he'd gathered the night before at another seedy establishment. If he kept frequenting these places he knew that the first thing he would do upon returning to the Creek would be go into decontamination and have Dr. T'aral scan to make sure he didn't pick up any parasites. He was being as cautious as the circumstances allowed, but he'd rather play it safe than sorry. Not to mention anything that could keep him out of his fighter was never a good thing. ~ A little over an hour later, he looked over to see a pair of bulky Orions with sneering faces walking into the bar. Finally. The unimaginative chatter of the drunken male members of the audience near to the shimmying dancers was beginning to wear on the Cait. The new arrivals looked marginally familiar, and he hoped that they belonged to a few of the faces he'd seen on the intelligence briefing, otherwise the Orion faces were starting to run together after seeing so many on Mos Eisen. Watching the pair settle in at a table about three meters away, his ears swiveled and focused on them. After exchanging surprisingly familiar and kind pleasantries with the same middle-aged woman who'd served him earlier, he listened to them comment on various unimportant matters of female anatomy and sports for a few minutes and began to worry he was wasting his time listen to a couple of locals who came in here every night of the week and had no connection to the Audacious. He stuck with it though, since there was little else to listen to other than wolf-whistles at the moment, and watched them be served a pair of particularly vile looking drinks. Another few minutes of mindless chatter had him nearly changing his mind about staying, however one of the two Orions finally said something to make him focus in and forget his boredom. "Wonder when Captain Morohtar will get this business finished so we can move on again?" asked the taller of the two. "Eishva knows, quality loot this time out but harder to find buyers for, I guess," answered the other. "Huh, well sitting around here isn't getting us paid either," said the first. "You thinking of pulling out after we get our cut, Brother?" "Crossed my mind," the elder responded. "Probably not going to find a more lucrative arrangement on another ship, and Eishva knows I'm not going to work in the planet-side stuff." He took a deep gulp of his drink, then continued. "That was a close call with those Starfleeters though, I almost got smashed when that bulkhead caved." "Shoot, at least you didn't have to pay to get a burn treated Bro," replied the younger. The conversation devolved back into run of the mill topics as the pair of Orion brothers continued to gulp down drinks. Deciding that he wouldn't get much more out of their speech, Mrkath left his table and exited the bar. Finding a spot where he could lurk unnoticed, he leaped up and settled in. He would follow them when they came out and see if they led him anywhere other than a cheap flop. Checking in with his contact, he settled in and waited. ~ As morning approached Mrkath was on his way back to his own lodgings. As he feared, the two headed not to a location filled with Orions and Vulcan captives but to a run-down building where they apparently shared an apartment during their time on this demented planet. Nonetheless it was a lead, and he marked the location on a map. His partner could take the day shift and keep an eye on the two to see if they did anything useful in leading the Creek team to their goal. They then could continue to split the duty of Orion watching until that happy moment occurred, found something better, or had to return to the ship.