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Mission 358

AC Lexington, formerly USS Lexington Hull ID LCBH09, JASMINE code a909t48hs is a USN Bunker Hill-class light cruiser which had a glorious career in the Secession War for the Alliance of Free States.

History[]

Lexington was commissioned on 2114, December 28. Its first captain was Barbara Cochran. Its first combat mission was at L52 after which it returned to space and stayed near the sun. It also had a historic confrontation with the UN Heavy Cruisers Beijing and Kiev. In 2121 it participated in the battle for Delta Pavonis V.

In 2133 it underwent a modernization at McHenry yards with a new weapons system, computer system and interplanetary drive.

In 2134, Lexington participated in Mission 161. Accompanying Jericho, it departed from the Eisenhauer orbital docks of Titan. During the course of the mission, they engaged an enemy vessel, and after some days they arrived to Deneb Kaitos.

However, despite the secrecy, the mission was compromised. A spy who was an officer on the Lexington trapped the ship with an anti-matter bomb and a transmission device; by the time the ships arrived to the system, UNS Dharma waited on the far side of Persephone.

Original timeline[]

After the ensuing battle, Garrick waited for the surrender of the crew. But with the actions of Steven Dayna, a warhead hidden in the ship-to-ship missile detonated, destroying the ship and killing everyone so that the discovery on the planet would not be given to the UN. The Lexington was stranded above the planet. Worrying about the end of communication, Allied Command sent the heavy cruisers Midway, Iwo Jima, Otawa to Persephone, escorted by the Concord and a squadron of destroyers.

One sole supply officer was left behind, who however managed to land on the planet and complete the mission, however after he traveled to the future, the UN fleet destroyed the base.

Alternate timeline[]

That officer on board the Lexington, received an insight from the future, notified the commanders about James Poole's treachery and persuaded the captain to allow him to employ the Hype drug in order to use the prototype Hype/Telecon system. Dharma was destroyed and the Alliance scientists investigated the ruins. Eventually this led to the end of the Secession War in favor of the Alliance.

After the end of the War, it was one of the many cruisers that were refurbished for peaceful purposes in high publicity. It was renamed as AC Lexington and was dedicated to deep space exploration. It was seen by Lewis Tyrell near the Earth Transfer Station next to CTS Hope.

Structure[]

The Lexington's standard crew complement is 20. Her maximum complement is 25.

Habitat module[]

Habitat

The crew is housed in the habitat module of the Lexington, a large rectangle structure mounted well forward of the reactor and fusion engines. The Habitat Module includes the bridge, crew quarters, communication center, medical and science labs, mess hall, computer center and storage areas.

All decks are equipped with a local expert system called DCS (Damage Control System) Knowledge Base.

Bridge[]

1

The first deck is composed of a short corridor leading to the bridge. The circular bridge with six stations; the center is occupied by the Captain's chair looking directly towards the viewscreen. As in most ships, the Tactical Console is to the starboard side with the backup to port.

Some of the controls of the bridge are

1st station
  • NavMaps which pinpoint the ship's current position.
  • Backup Tactical System
  • Sensor display screen showing the results of a multi-spectral EMF and graviton scan of the planets.
  • dataline interlocks
  • data collection and analysis systems for the sensor arrays, with controls and dataline interlocks
2nd station
  • LS-Alpha controls for overriding the computer settings for life support system parameters such as venting thresholds, particle filtration levels and ambient humidity.
  • LS-Bravo controls override the main computer settings for pressure, temperature, oxygen/nitrogen balance for the Habitat Module's atmosphere etc.
4th station
  • External Visual Monitoring System showing a view of the outside of the ship fed in from one of the external microcameras mounted on the radiator fins.
  • Supplemental NavComp
  • CRYO/LS System which is life-support related
  • OMS (Orbital Maneuvering System) Manual Overrides which transfer control of the reaction thrusters from the computers to the joysticks on the console
  • Master Caution indicator for major ship systems, to provide an overall warning that something is wrong and prompt review of specific ship problems. It is a vestigial safeguard dating back to the MC lights in aircraft with little real utility.
  • Intercom system for communication within the ship
5th station
  • C3 Telemetry Monitoring System from drone transceivers
  • Tactical Console containing a Hype/Telepresence Control System interface (Rev. 3.1).
6th station
  • Bow dorsal, stern dorsal, stern ventral, bow ventral, starboard lateral, port lateral, stern retro ERCS (Emergency Reaction Control System) controls for the system thrusters which are mounted in various places on the ship; they are anti-collision devices to be used only if the computer systems and all local backups have failed completely.
  • TS Abort aka "Panic Button" which manually aborts a computer-sequenced Tal-Seto faster-than-light jump right up until the jump drive cores engage.
  • IPS (Interstellar Positioning System) Synchronization. In case a ship is in a star system with multiple TRB beacons, the TCS polls all of the beacons and computes the ship's position relative to the star and the IPS grid within a few meters.
  • Lobotomizer which seals off the Bridge and eliminates local access to ship systems from anywhere else, with potentially deleterious effects. it is used in the incredibly unlikely event when the ship is boarded.
  • Rocker Idiot Switches which turn all ship functions ofver to the computer systems unless manual overrides are engaged.

Deck 2[]

2

The second deck aka 'Officer Country' has crew quarters of the Captain, the commanders and other officers. During Mission 161 the staterooms (and their VIS override codes) were

2A
(TX11) Taewon Narang
2B
(B29X) Renato Olivar
2C
Jennifer Tran
2D
(DC22) Michael Dahl
2E
Supply Officer
2F
(IH31) James Poole

Across the Captain's Stateroom, there is the Officer's Wardroom with an ACN screen; it is decorated by a 900:1 miniature model of the ship provided by James Poole, and four paintings by Beth Erenor Kalb commemorating the ship's history.

Further to the corridor is the Communications Center and the Secure Storage storeroom.

Deck 3[]

3

Deck 3 was for the Crew.

3A
Paul Mandon
3B
(L6EC) Kimberly Falcon
3C
(F111) Hideki Miura
3D
Erica Moore
3E
(JU88) Mary Quan
3F
Mark Mulroney

It also contains the Mess Hall which is equipped with Mark IV Variable Acceleration/Null Gravity ACDs (Automated Consumables Dispenser). There is also a Sony/Matsushita Karaoketron VR system used for entertainment, propaganda/training and briefings, with holograms and surround sound audio projected via the panels along its ceiling. The system projects the "Lexington Orientation" and "Why We Fight" flicks.

Deck 4[]

4

Deck 4 consists solely of cramped crew quarters for noncommissioned officers and enlisted personnel; they are twelve the number, in two rows of six.

During Mission 161 it housed James Randall, Rebecca Cassell, Maria Gajardo, Philip Slocum, Jiro Sushido, Allen Gaiser, Mark Aguilar, David McClary, Masaru Shindo, Lorraine Magrath, Keichi Hasegawa and Thomas Carradine.

As with all other decks, it also houses a computer terminal.

Deck 5[]

5

Deck 5 contains the Medlab, a complete, state-of-the-art hospital in two rooms and and the doctor's console. It has plenty of capacity for a 20 person crew and designed to handle a few patients at a time. In practice combat injuries are rare since the losers are usually vaporized. The centerpiece of the lab is the autodoc, a spherical robotic treatment unit and a sophisticated non-invasive scanning system; with the computer's vast database it can detect, diagnose and treat any injury and illness treatable at the time. There is also an two-bunk enclave for recovering patients.

The Science Lab is the working environment for the ship's designated Science Officer. Notably it is ht only area of the ship that hasn't been upgraded or overhauled and retained a retro feel. The scientific equipment was outmoded when it was installed in 2114 and seemed ancient the following years. The space is dominated by a heavy cylinder made from a crystalline material with a perfectly aligned atomic matrix, the gravitometer designed to pick up the faintest of gravitational distortions, used to provide information about composition, density and arrangement of bodies from asteroids to stars. It also contains a cabinet labeled for the FRT (Field Research Team) containing a Geiger counter and a Marker/Ritter Microscanner Model 715A by Cambridge Scientific.

It also contains the Cyber Systems Center, the heart of the ship's main computer system. The Central Computer (nicknamed "Betty" by the protagonist) was programmed to seem sentient by the Alliance AI techs and software engineers, thanks to its decade-old evolution of language algorithms. According to psychologists and behavior specialists it should be compatible to the crew's personality, and seem like part of it. As its designers were passionate about AI, her data stores are filled their logs, researches and papers.

Deck 6[]

Deck 6 is located below the habitat module. It contains the Shuttle Bay overlooked by the Air Lock Control Room with a Manned Maneuvering Unit and controls for the doors and the pressurization.

There is also the cavernous Cargo Bay with heavy equipment spares, bulk stores, consumables, and everything else except electronic components.

Weapons Bays[]

The ship has 3 weapon bays arrayed in an equilateral triangle around the core of the ship.

The bays house the 18 Lockheed RC09 Basilisk Drones of which 9 are deployed for combat, using rotary launchers.

Reactor Spaces[]

Engineering[]

Power[]

Reactor

The operating principle behind the ship's power reactor is a slow fission system, not a sustained plasma fusion reaction common to planet-based power systems. Magnetic containment would be inappropriate given the design creiteria for the ship.

A conventional liquid-cooled nuclear reactor is mounted forward of the engineering compartments of the ship, used to charge the capacitors for the infusion (by firing the compression lasers) of the fusion engines and provide power for the linear accelerator, life support, and all of the ship's electrical system. The compression lasers collapse the fuel pellets and create the fusion reaction that drives the ship. The power reaction also feeds the ship's linear accelerator and electrical systems indirectly supplying power to all life support, computer, communications, and opto-electronics systems.

The Reactor Coolant System (RCS) is the main power systems consisting of a network of holding tanks, pipes, pumps, and automated valves. The RCS console provides manual control of the system.

Propulsion[]

The Lexington is equipped with 3 propulsion systems.

  • The Orbital Maneuvering System (OMS) consisting of several chemical reaction thrusters for use when in orbit, or when maneuvering in close proximity to other ships.
  • The interplanetary drive with 4 deuterium-tritium fusion Pulsedrive engines, used for travel inside a star system able to produce and maintain a constant acceleration of up to 6 gravities for extended periods.
  • The Tal-Seto Faster Than Light jump drive, located on the boom forward of the bow which allows instantaneous travel along threads of spacetime deformation that exist between the Tal-Seto jump points.
Pulsedrive

The Pulsedrive engines are fed by a linear accelerator that runs down the spine of the ship from fuel tanks mounted near the bow. A continuous stream of microscopic deuterium-tritium fuel pellets is accelerated into the four thrust chambers, with magnetic containment at the stern of the ship. High energy lasers bombard the fuel pellets and create a fusion reaction by implosion. Thrust is channeled backwards.

A fraction of the resulting energy is fed back into large capacitors which are used to fire the lasers for the next explosion. Large radiator fins on the outside of the ship help to regulate temperature.

Defense systems[]

The Lexington's principal weapons system is a complement of 18 Lockheed-Martin RC09 Basilisk Multimission Autonomous Strike Craft. Up to 9 of the 18 drones can be active at one time. The drones are deployed using rotary launchers mounted in 3 weapon bays. These bays are arrayed in an equilateral triangle around the core of the ship.

Each drone is capable of carrying several types of ordnance mounted on standard hardpoints on the dorsal and ventral surfaces. Drone weapons include antiship missiles, torpedoes, particle beam guns, railgun cannons, and lasers. A Basilisk drone with a full combat ordnance load is capable of accelerating at 100 gravities.

The Lexington is also armed with a Close-In Combat System, or CICS, which serves as a weapon system of last resort if any enemy drones or long range weapons penetrate the defensive screen of Basilisk drones. The CICS consists of 8 missile launchers, 2 railgun turrets, and several chaff ejectors mounted on various points of Lexington's outer hull.

Behind the scenes[]

Concerning the conception of Lexington as the setting of Mission Critical:

"To create an immersive experience, we wanted a 3-0 environment you could move through, one that felt real.
This posed very serious design constraints. It meant you couldn't have a game populated by hundreds of characters. And the environment had to be somewhat constrained, as well. The ship was the ideal vehicle. We tried to create something that was robust and immersive, but that wouldn't be impossible to build from a budgetary standpoint.
"
― Mike Verdu[1]
  1. Mission Critical Strategy Guide
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