Primary Objective - Part One

Posted on 13 Sep 2012 @ 7:57am by Captain Jonathan Holliday & Rear Admiral Lirha Saalm & Lieutenant Aria Rice & Lieutenant Lilou Zaren & Ensign Im'er Mor'an & Lieutenant Commander Evelyn Coleman & Petty Officer 1st Class Gabriel Stark & Commander Andreus Kohl & General ('aj) D'Grath Son Of N'Vor (KIA)

1,999 words; about a 10 minute read

Mission: Episode 01 - Project Sienna
Location: Klingon Bird of Prey - Holding Cells
Timeline: MD09 - 2320

[ON]

The flicker of a Federation transporter signal was the only source of light in an otherwise darkened Klingon corridor. The damage from Galileo's last assault must have been enough to damage primary power, so much so that this section of the ship had been sacrificed into darkness in order to keep power going elsewhere.

Around the beam in site were a few Klingon bodies, warriors killed when the plasma conduit behind them chose that exact moment to explode, sending shards of metal and white hot plasma through the air that cut them down like a knife through butter.

The tricorders so far showed no sign of Klingon lifesigns in the immediate vicinity, it seemed that the away team had picked the perfect point to materialise, phaser rifles armed and ready for whatever might come ahead.

Taking a moment to collect his thoughts, Holliday activated the light on the top of his phaser rifle, bringing a small amount of illumination to fight back the darkness, before activating the second wrist mounted torch that he had brought along as a backup, in case his rifle was damaged or lost in combat.

Out of habit, Mor'an immediately took stock of her surroundings before using infrared to find any Klingons that may happen to be nearby. She didn't see any in close proximity, but that didn't mean they weren't somewhere near.

Aria let out a shaky breath as she looked around, her eyes large and confused as she took it all in. It made her shiver...like someone walking over her grave. Her grip tightened around her phaser rifle and she closed her eyes briefly to regain her control.

As soon as his eyes adjusted to the darkened surroundings, Andreus Kohl moved closer to Aria Rice. It was an instinctive decision, certainly not made on any conscious level. He moved on the balls of his feet, trying to step lightly and quietly. Kohl, too, had a torch strapped to his wrist and it was his primary source of illumination with only a type-1 phaser on his belt. Kohl's hand hovered over the phaser until he felt sure there were no conscious Klingons in this compartment. When everything remained calm and still for more than a rapid collection of heartbeats, the nurse adjusted the shoulder strap on his medical kit.

Lilou, for her part, remained still as the last of the vaguely ticklish transporter sensation left her. The others were checking the area for life-signs. She shifted her grip slightly on her phaser, eying the dead. Karma's a bitch, she thought darkly and felt no prick of sorrow over them.

The ship was still eerily quiet, the sound of Galileo's weapons tearing through the hull had ceased, and it seemed for now that the mighty Bird of Prey was suitably crippled. Lowering his rifle for a moment, the XO pulled his tricorder free from it's mount and flipped it open, scanning for anything that might give him a clue of where to go.

"I'm picking up non-Klingon lifesigns....one deck below us...there's a maintenance hatch about 200m up this corridor we can use....the Klingon version of a Jeffries Tube I expect....ready to move out?"

Mor'an simply nodded, phaser at the ready.

"Alrighty then...stick together people."

Raising his phaser rifle to the ready position, his finger poised on the trigger guard, the XO slowly began to make his way along the corridor. So far there had been nothing to offer them any resistance, it seemed that with the losses from their failed boarding party attempts coupled with the crew injured in this recent fight with the Galileo, there were only really enough Klingons to maintain the ship's systems, let alone deal with intruders.

Eventually they reached the access to the maintenance conduits. Grabbing hold of the panel with his hand, John was surprised to be rejected by a forcefield that made him pull back his hand in disgust. It seemed that someone on the Bridge at least knew where to stop an intruder getting in.

"Forcefield...nice....Peers, think you can shut this thing off? There must be a power transfer conduit somewhere around here."

Lilou holstered her phaser and drew her tricorder, scanning the forcefield and then the immediate area. Klingon ships were a mess, engineering-wise. Once they'd been out of the shop for a year, they became a hodge-podge of parts; the end result of hasty patch jobs mid-battle that were never exactly corrected. In this case, the conduit was hiding behind a rat's next of bare wires. She nudged them apart with gloved fingers, flipping the small light on the side of her goggles on, and scanned the coding. "I can take down this particular shield through trial and error; this board has been re-routed so many times, I doubt the labels are correct. Or I can shut down the whole board. It'd look like an ODN failure, rather than tampering. Think they know we're here?"

"I have no idea..." John replied, looking down at his tricorder and tapping several more commands into it, searching the area for a Klingon biosignature that so far was eluding him. Either their security net was entirely shot, or this was a trap.

"So far I haven't picked up any resistance, in fact there's nobody within 100m, unless they've found a way to elude our tricorders.....screw it just shut the whole thing down...it'll be faster right?"

In answer, Lilou pressed the tangle of wires back against the conduit and smiled as the sparks flew around her gloved hand. The dim and dirty red lighting of the corridor shuddered and spent. ODN routed locks unlatched, opening doors along the corridor and the forcefield sputtered and failed.

Watching with satisfaction as the forcefield disappeared from view, Holliday was more than impressed with the more...practical form of engineering that Peers had just demonstrated. It seemed that with most things, messing around with the wiring was a great way to break something. His satisfaction was going to be short lived however. The moment the forcefield dropped, an alarm began blaring through the corridors, along with an announcement of some sort in Klingon. It didn't take a linguist to know that if the Klingons didn't know they were there before, they certainly do now.

"I guess we just outstayed our welcome....alright everyone in the hatch - let's get off this deck!"

Checking down the metallic tube with his rifle, Holliday was satisfied that for the moment at least, they were alone in there, before crawling inside and turning back to make sure his team were in pursuit.

Gabriel held back at the entrance of the tube, nodding to Aria firmly. "I can take the flank," he assured, lifting his rifle to keep a watch around the gloomy room in case anyone arrived while the others clambered in.

Aria looked at him before smiling weakly. "Yeah, yeah...just don't accidentally shoot me," she said almost playfully, but the smile didn't really stick to her as she too held her rifle ready.

Kohl took in a slow, deep breath before climbing into the maintenance tube. He shone the beam of his wrist-torch towards the spots where he was planning to put his hands, watching out for anything sharp or bloody or otherwise stereotypically-Klingon. Climbing in on his hands and knees, Kohl balanced his medical kit in the small of his back and caught up with the body ahead of him.

The Klingon equivalent of maintenance tubes were just about as Klingon as you might have expected. Emergency repair jobs of systems were evident throughout, with panels having been torn off and replaced with a multitude of wires and conduits in order to repair battle damage. There were signs of plasma damage from more recent combat, and the air was thick with the smell of burning wires.

Light was certainly at a premium - aside from the glow from the phaser rifle torches, it would have been easy to mistake this environment for total darkness. interspersed only periodically with the flicker of a sparking cable somewhere in the depths of the shaft.

Crawling with one hand; the other occupied by his tricorder, Holliday slowly led his team towards the objective, watching as the distance counter between him and what he hoped was the Captain began to descend towards zero. Eventually, they ran out of tube, and reached a small ladder, with another hatch beneath it.

Looking around, it took Holliday a few seconds to spy the manual release for the hatch, before grabbing the chunky handle and wrenching it downwards, looking below him as the hatch doors parted. Grabbing his phaser rifle again, he peered down towards the deck plating, seeing and hearing nothing. So far his tricorder hadn't given him any clues, but with the amount of ambient particle interference in this section, readings were less than ideal.

Nodding to his team, he began his descent.

Looking down the open hatch, Kohl's hand hovered over the phaser on his belt, but he didn't see anything except his crewmates climbing down the ladder ahead of him. Kohl patted his medi-kit with the pads of his fingers. Satisfied the he hadn't lost his tools, Kohl lowered his feet onto the top rungs of the ladder.

Finally reaching the base of the ladder, Holliday allowed himself to fall from the hatchway and onto the deck, sweeping around him with his rifle ready to fire, watching for any signs of life. Nothing. Not a whisper.

"There's some kind of thoron field in this section" The XO replied, whispering himself.
"I can't get an accurate reading....there are definitely non-Klingon lifesigns near here....but I can't pinpoint them. Watch yourselves."

Coming down from the ladder, Kohl hesitated before allowing his boots to connect with the deckplates -- as if that one tinny sound would bring armies of Klingons running. Kohl stepped out of the way of the ladder, but he didn't move very far. He left his medical tricorder in his medi-kit, expecting it to be just as befuddled as Holliday's tricorder. Kohl nodded at Holliday's advice, but couldn't think of anything to recommend. He kept silent.

Gabriel was the last person to drop down from the hatch, landing solidly on his feet as he glanced around, lifting his rifle to use the piercing beam of light on it. "Guess we'll have to search the old fashioned way?" he whispered, catching his breath as he took the room in.

Nodding to his security officer's suggestion, John began to make his way along the corridor, sweeping his rifle from side to side whilst keeping it tight in against his shoulder - if a Klingon did decide to appear from one of these siderooms, the last thing John wanted was to be caught out by a dodgy grip.

The corridor in itself was relatively straight, with few rooms, if any, most of which were sealed due to exposure to space...it seemed Galileo's attack had done more damage than first thought - luckily Holliday knew enough Klingon to understand the "do not open" signs flashing above each door's alcove.

At the end of the corridor, were two final doors, each sealed shut. In front of them lay a pair of Klingon bodies...bloodied and burned, with a sparking plasma conduit at their sides. It seemed that the conduit must have overloaded, and these two unfortunate guards were caught right in the middle of it.

"Stark, Kohl, Rice - take the left hand door. Mor'an and Peers with me."

To Be Continued....


[OFF]

Lt Cmdr Jonathan Holliday
Executive Officer
USS Galileo

CMDR Lirha Saalm
Commanding Officer
USS Galileo

Lieutenant JG Evelyn Coleman
Chief Intelligence Officer
USS Galileo

Ensign Andreus Kohl
Nurse
USS Galileo

PO2 Gabriel Stark
Security
USS Galileo

Ensign Aria Rice
Security
USS Galileo

MWO Lilou Peers
Assistant Chief Engineering Officer
USS Galileo

Cadet Senior Grade Im'er Mor'an
Red Squad Intern
USS Galileo

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