Through the Breach (Part 2 of 12)

Posted on 18 Jul 2015 @ 2:52am by Rear Admiral Lirha Saalm & Commander Norvi Stace & Commander Andreus Kohl & Lieutenant Min Zhao

1,485 words; about a 7 minute read

Mission: Episode 09 - Empires
Location: USS Galileo - Various
Timeline: MD 01 - 2015 hrs

Previously, on Through the Breach (Part 1)...

Holliday nodded to himself as he thought the idea over. The shuttlebays would have some rather power-intensive relays running through them in order to supply the power necessary, if they could run the same relays essentially in reverse to draw power from the shuttles, it wouldn't be a terrible idea.

"A good idea Lieutenant - head for the shuttlebay and begin preparations. If you haven't heard from us over comms before you are ready, feel free to plug in."

The CO paused for a moment before continuing.

"And Lieutenant - for future reference, it's 'Captain' or 'Sir'. Not 'Boss' - this is Starfleet, not a cargo ship."

"Yes, sir," he said with a giddy smile as he released himself from the helm with such elegance as to imply actual flight over mere floating. With a swift push Jynn propelled himself towards the jefferies tube. He'd have to move fast if he wanted to accomplish anything in reasonable time and fortunately for him Jynn almost felt more at home in zero gravity than he did planetside sometimes. A short while later and he would find himself in the main shuttlebay with the rest of his flight crew counterparts.

And Now, the Continuation...

[ON]

Bridge Access Corridor, Deck One

Stace looked to Min and Kohl, saw their indication to leave and then pushed through the open doors once again, heading straight for the Jeffries tube hatch. She floated through the air with an elegance that she enjoyed and as she gripped at opening, she stopped herself short, and spun around to allow Kohl and Min to catch up. "Let's get this open and head on down to deck two," she said as she sidled back a little. She pulled out her tricorder and scanned the entrance. "No signs of radiation here. We're good to go."

Kohl's boots connected with the deck near the jefferies tube access hatch. His landing appeared almost graceful initially, as he came down in a slow crouch. Unfortunately, his crouched proved imbalanced and unnecessarily deep, and he ended up falling on his side. Kohl slapped his gloved hand against the deck to right himself and then he reached out for the manual access handle to keep his body from gliding up to hit the ceiling. He twisted the handle around and then pulled the hatch open.

Now that they were far enough away from the Bridge, and there was only Min and Stace to hear him, Kohl expressed his doubts about Stace's plan. "You do remember," Kohl said, "the last time someone asked me to repair a machine, I ended up blowing up an underground control centre?"

"Then I guess we won't let you touch anything will we Commander?" Min replied, grinning through her mask. "Wouldn't surprise me if Engineering already has a team on the way."

"A maroon, a teal and a gold officer floated into a Jeffries tube," joked Stace, flicking her eyebrow up in jest. "I imagine that we'll let the systems specialist deal with things first, shall we?" She cut a glance to Kohl and then winked at Min. "Let's move forward."

Stace pulled at the handle of the hatch and floated through the Jeffries tube with a gliding ease. As she came to the lower deck access hatch, she slowed herself and gripped the bulk head to fully stop herself. Shouting back through the tube she said, "I wouldn't worry about using your magboots or anything through this. Let's take advantage of the zero-grav until we reach the impulse fusion generators." She pulled at the hatch as it unlocked but before prizing it open scanned the tube before her with her tricorder again.

"I'm reading minimal radiation through the Deck Two access tube. But nothing that our suits can't handle."

"My scans agree," Min responded. "Hopefully engineering has a tech on site already but I've touched these before. Assuming the units are intact, restart is pretty much automated, even for emergency cold shutdowns. They just need supervision."

Stace looked to Min reassuringly and then nodded, pushing herself through the hatch and down towards Deck Two again. She repeated the process, pulling out her tricorder, scanning the space beyond and then summising that it was safe for the party to carry on.


Deck Two, Corridor/Impulse Generator Room

As the teal, maroon and gold flashes of colour floated into the corridor, Norvi magnetised her boots and stood up right on the floor, the feeling of partial gravity and a reference of what was up and down returning to her. She waited for the others to do the same as they silently moved to the impulse engine room but scanning once again with her tricorder, her face turned into concerned frown. "I don't like these radiation levels," she said to Min and then showed her readings to Kohl. "Options?"

"Pressure garments are good for light use in hard vacuum so they should protect us long enough to find & lock down the source of the radiation. We need those reactors online Commander if we're going to get the ship running again."

"It's not the necessity of this that I'm concerned about Lieutenant," Stace replied as she ran the scenario through her mind. She took in a breath and then blew the air through her cheeks, considering how to proceed. She paused and then weighed up the dilemma every command officer had to wrestle with: Braving the unknown herself and risking her own safety, or remain in control of the situation and supervise the team as a leader. She looked to Kohl and then returned her attention back to Min. "Myself and the commander will prize the doors open just large enough for you to push through. The bulkhead should protect us out in the corridor from most of the radiation. You've one minute before I pull you out of there and we consider other options."

"Understood. If I can't find and secure the source, we back out and regroup."

Stace then took one side of the door as Kohl took the other. "On the count of three." She pulled against the lock of her gravity boots on the decked flooring and heaved the door open ajar. As it slid, she felt the door of the handle shudder as though a pressure on the other side was sucking it though. As the door gave way, it shifted and then folded in on the pressure as Min was sucked through into the room. Kohl and Stace still grounded by the maglocks boots could only watch in terror as she disappeared through into the room.

The radiation in the room had blocked the microscopic hull breach that had formed on the far side of the room and Stace quickly de-magnetised her boots and followed through, gripping on to Min's foot as she slid through the room. She gripped onto one of the protruding bulkheads and caught, looking only in horror to Kohl for help.

Somewhat more cautiously, Kohl followed Stace into the compartment. He took one long stride through the threshold with his left foot and then braced his left foot on the deck magnetically. He pulled his right foot in from the corridor and planted his right foot as well. He abandoned any hope of using his hands to hold himself steady against the massive change in air pressure. Instead, he hoped his magnetic boots would do the trick. With both hands, Kohl lunged out to reach for Stace, while his boots held firm to the deck. Even through the material of his gloves, he could feel the impact of his fingers hitting pressure-suited flesh.

One moment Min was watching as her colleagues prized open the door and the next Min felt herself being bodily sucked through the door. She didn't even have time to consider what was happening when she suddenly felt her ankle being grabbed by a gloved hand, holding her from rocketing across the room from the force of the pressure equalizing.

It only took a few seconds but eventually the pressure equalized between the room and the corridor, and Min was able to maglock herself to the deck plates. It was only then she realized what had happened and went white as a sheet, her hands trembling.

"Let's not waste time trying to seal that microfracture," Stace said quickly, securing herself to the floor and taking in a few breaths to calm herself down after the anxiety had left her racing heart. "Radiation," she looked to Kohl, "and fusion reactors," she added, nodding to Min. "Let's go."

To Be Continued...

[OFF]

--

RADM Lirha Saalm
Mission Advisor
USS Galileo

CMDR Norvi Stace
First Officer
USS Galileo

Lieutenant Commander Andreus Kohl
Chief Science Officer & Second Officer
USS Galileo

LT Min Nicholas
Chief Operations Officer
USS Galileo

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