Genesis Marker (Part 2 of 3)

Posted on 20 Nov 2019 @ 2:45pm by Rear Admiral Lirha Saalm & Ensign Mimi & Chief Warrant Officer 3 Azra Ghoc & Petty Officer 1st Class Gabriel Stark & Petra Varelli Ph.D.
Edited on on 20 Nov 2019 @ 2:47pm

4,497 words; about a 22 minute read

Mission: Episode 17 - Crystal of Life
Location: Latari A III - Shuttlecraft Virginia
Timeline: MD 01, 0722 hours

Previously...

Petra saw another piece with writing on it. She cleaned it off. NCC-1. She swore. "Hey, Stark, what missing starship is NCC - 1864? Might be some other numbers in there."

Gabriel started running the numbers, glancing back to the shard with interest, his features thoughtful as he ran his gaze over the fragment that had clearly seen some hard times. "What are you doing so far away from home..." he said softly, shaking his head slowly.

And Now, the Continuation...

[ON]

"Gotta wonder if this is the fault of the Tholians somehow, if this ship was caught in a web. Or if it's just plain dumb luck," Petra asked.

Ensign Mimi spoke up as she too observed the startling revelations. "We need to take samples and send this data to Galileo at once."

"I'll let the scientist take samples from the important antique relic..." Gabriel murmured lightly, shaking his head with a small smile as he started to send the information he'd managed to gather so far on his tricorder to the shuttle. "Stark to Virginia, did you receive my data?"

"That's my cue," Petra said, reaching into her cross pack. She took several samples from the debris, including rock, soil and mineral. She also took some small pieces of metal. "Any way we can beam the pieces with the writing into a shielded space? I think the Galy would like to look at this."

Azra's boost to the comms power had been a good choice. The data came through complete, but only barely. There was a perceptible lag, something which didn't happen except at great distances now that subspace communication was the norm. Once all of the data had loaded into Virginia's memory, Azra set the shuttle to automatically relay it to Galileo and ran it through an analytics program.

The program started returning data immediately. The hull composition matched Starfleet hull design of around a century earlier. Carbon signatures definitively placed the hull as having been laid almost exactly 100 years earlier in a Federation shipyard. Before Azra could take in any further information, Virginia's communication system reported that short-range transmission to Galileo had failed due to one or both ships being out of range.

Azra switched over to the shuttle's scanners. While the ion storm still distorted readings through the atmosphere, there was no sign of Galileo anywhere. Further scans pieced together weapon signatures as well as Trial surrounded by what the sensors assumed were three Tholian vessels and the corresponding "webs."

"Ghoc to Away Team," Azra said in a hurry, keying communication to Mimi and the rest of the party, "there's a situation in orbit. Get the last of what you need and get back here. I think we've run across the Tholians."

Petra tagged the pieces of debris she wanted transported to the shuttle. They needed to take those with them, especially if the Tholians were involved and they might not get back here again.

There was a long pause of silence while the chief warrant officer waited for a reply. "Chief this is Mimi. Wh... do you mean?" came the Nekomi's distorted voice. The channel's signal strength started to dissipate again.

Azra tried to boost the signal again, each touch more forceful than was required. "Tholians. Return to the shuttle, ASAP." She enunciated each word, keeping them brief and succinct. There was another ion storm headed this way. While it probably wouldn't hurt the shuttle while it was grounded, it would make an ascent hell if they didn't leave soon.

The ensign copied Ghoc's message then looked up to the sky in the hopes of glimpsing what was occurring. To no avail, she then turned to her two fellow team members with urgency. "Message from Virginia, Ghoc says Tholians are here and we need to leave."

Stark looked across to Varelli with dark eyes, his jaw clenching with something close to anger. Because it meant that the ship was in danger and he was stuck down on a planet instead of being there to help. He snapped his tricorder closed and slid it away, ready to move quickly.

Petra tagged the last piece of debris and turned to Mimi. "Can the shuttle transport these?" She'd put some smaller pieces in her pack, just in case. Getting back to the shuttle in one piece was far more important than the relics, especially as they'd been scanned, so it wasn't a priority.

The ground beneath the away team's feet suddenly began to tremble and their tricorders blared with new biological and proximity warnings. Fractures in the surface crust shook the ground as entire slabs of the earth began to break apart and expose glowing veins of yellow magma. Thermal vents burst from the surface into the air all around the Starfleet crew, rendering visibility near zero.

Gabriel's arms lifted out of instinct to balance himself as he felt the ground shift under his feet. He let out a sharp breath as he half turned, taking a careful step back, turning to take in the chaos that was literally breaking out around them. It was like something out of an adventure holonovel...only without the safeties. "What the...we should move..."

Petra lost her balance and fell to her knees. She still had her tricorder in her hand and began to scan the magma.

On the shuttle Azra prepared for a hurried take-off. She'd strapped into her seat, and was keeping an eye on sensors. "Why haven't they moved yet?" she asked the empty air. Then the entire shuttle shook, and sensors indicated heavy geological movement. Oh, and a large silicon-based lifeform emerging from an energy signature roughly similar to a Federation transporter. Sure, the sensors couldn't identify what the lifeform was, but it was a safe bet that it was a Tholian.

"Ghoc to Away Team," she said at an unnecessary shout, "get out of there now! Tholians approaching your position on foot. I repeat, get out now!" She didn't correct her assumption about feet, there wasn't time and it'd just muddy the waters.

Petra didn't need to be told twice. She looked at the others, and hurried back to the shuttle.

Gabriel rocked into a sprint towards the direction of the shuttle, narrowly avoiding a trip over a treacherously ragged tear in the earth that had appeared directly in his path. He took a tight but controlled breath, looking over to make sure Mimi was with them.

Several yards in front of the scrambling Starfleet crew, the ground suddenly erupted and a massive glowing rock formation burst upwards from beneath the earth. The localized earthquakes increased in severity as an orange crystalline appendage the size of a football field reached high into the air, then spread three digits and forcefully slammed down onto the volcanic surface.

To the other side of the away team, another eruption occurred and a second similar appendage burst free from the confines of the planet's crust. Dripping with molten lava, the giant arms pushed down on the ground. Between them now rose a giant five-sided crystal carapace with glowing white triangular eye slits. The unknown creature continued to surface from the volcanic underground until it was a hundred feet high and the top of its pentagon-shaped mantle towered above the humanoids.

Petra had come to a stop with the creature in front of her. She swore and scanned with her tricorder. "It's a silicate-based lifeform." No surprise to any of them, she knew, but stating the obvious seemed appropriate. "We can't get around it."

Gabriel stared up at the...thing in disbelief, starting to wonder if they really had survived that landing or if they were now in Hell. One thing he did know was that it didn't look like a Tholian. Which made him hesitate. His hand reached behind him to rest on the rifle on his back. He wasn't sure what it was meant to do against a massive rock monster, but it made him feel better to have his hand on it, ready to pull it free when ordered.

"I don't think we can shoot it," Petra said. "Any way we could distract it long enough to get away?"

As the question flowed from anthropologist's tongue, their tricorders lit up again - this time displaying incoming proximity energy signatures surrounding both the team and the larger silicon lifeform they'd just discovered. In the near distance, a multitude of cerulean transporter molecules glimmered and materialized a platoon of Tholian shock troopers. They were each clad in a form of dark grey EV suit shaped to fit their six legs, two arms and crystalline mantle. And each carried a large tetryon rifle which they simultaneously aimed in the away team's direction as they began their spidery advance.

The forensic anthropologist learned a colorful vocabulary from hanging out with Marines, and she now put it to good use. She wasn't sure which of the two was the frying pan and which the fire, but they were definitely in the middle of it. She scanned them and then put her tricorder away so she wouldn't lose it and wondered how they were going to get out of this one. She hoped someone else had answers, because she had none.

Stark tugged the rifle sharply off his back, holding it ready in a tight grip. They had no idea of the intentions of the huge creature that had revealed itself to them, but the Tholians were known hostiles. He kept his rifle trained on the Tholians as he took a few steps back towards the rock creature. Literally stuck between a rock and a hard place, they had virtually no options. He hit his commbadge. "Stark to Virginia, we're surrounded by Tholians and an unknown lifeform, we need backup..."

Azra tapped the face of the console impatiently. What was taking them so long. Suddenly, a jumbled mess erupts over the communication line. Only a few syllables got through the static.

"St...Ia.....rrou....lian....unkn....form....b...up" Azra tried to piece together the message, but given the sensor readings, there was really only conclusion she could make. The away team needed a pickup.

Azra strapped into the shuttle and engaged the vertical takeoff protocols. She turned the shuttle, which rocked as it was buffeted by the first blast of a new storm. "Virginia to away team, I'm coming in." She accelerated wildly toward the team's location beacon, hoping to reach them in mere seconds.

Petra looked from the giant biosilicate creature to the Tholians and back again. Could the shuttle beam them up in time? And if not, would they be squashed, immolated, or shot?

The Tholian shock troopers closed in with surprising speed thanks to their multiple legs. Their weapons were trained in the direction of the away team and then they suddenly opened fire.

Twelve Tholian tetryon rifles simultaneously sent a massive barrage of blue energy pules just over the away team's heads and into the large silicon exo-lifeform. Weapons fire pierced through the atmosphere and each shot screamed through the air before slamming into the creature's midsection...to no effect.

Each Tholian weapon shot impacted the larger crystalline form and was seemingly absorbed with a brief glow. The Tholians continued moving forward and engaging, adjusting their concentration of fire to target the two limbs and eye slits while inexplicably ignoring the Starfleet crew.

Petra signaled to Stark and began moving away, carefully watching the battle. She was fascinated that the Tholians weren't interested in them, and that their weapons were being absorbed. So, if the Tholians were attacking the biosilicates, did that mean they aren't responsible for their creation? And if not, who was? She pulled out her tricorder and scanned the scene while she carefully moved away.

Gabriel's instinct always screamed at him for running away from a fight, but his head knew it was the only right thing to do on this occasion. Using the distraction, he bolted forward in a low run, still gripping his rifle tight in both hands. He threaded his path for the limited cover of rocks and broken plantlife. He glanced to the others, making sure they were keeping up and away from danger. Mimi was fast, he'd learnt that from sparring with her. Varelli seemed to be distracted by her scanning. He knew her priorities and responsibilities were different from hers, but his concern spiked at the slower pace caused by her work. He gave a sharp, single swipe of his arm to try and encourage her to get to the shuttle.

"I'm coming," she muttered. This was invaluable information they would need later to figure out what was going on. And it was pretty cool, too. She pointed her tricorder over her shoulder and picked up her pace. When she got to cover with the others, she continued scanning.

The Tholian ground formation continued to close in on the towering crystal lifeform and continued sustained infantry fire. From all angles surrounding the creature, it was assaulted by the most technologically-advanced weapons in the quadrant yet didn't flinch once. Instead, it rose one of its large hands then brought it down with the force of an earthquake on top of one of the Tholian fire teams. They were instantly crushed, then with its other hand, it swiped at the left flank and sent three more Tholians flying off into the distance.

"I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it," Petra whispered. "That was amazing. It didn't even flinch at their weapons, treated them like chess pieces." She checked to make sure she had it all on her tricorder. "I wonder what the others will think of this?"

Mimi was running at the front of the team and quickly changed her heading for an opening she now saw in the Tholian lines. If they could just get through and escape the kill zone... "This way!," she called over her shoulder, her tail straight and extended rearward to keep her balanced.

Gabriel saw her shift in direction, following her lead as he kept running, his breath hard in his chest not just from the exertion, but also the adrenaline of the battle literally going on around them. He slowed in pace when he clocked Petra, shifting pace and direction to let her follow up behind Mimi first, falling into step behind both of them to make sure they got through safely.

Petra was doing her best to keep up while still getting information on the battle going on around her. She'd stopped twice when she had a place to shelter for a minutes, but now she had to focus on keeping up with the others.

Virginia buzzed close overhead and dropped rapidly stopping only a few meters from the fleeing away team. The ramp to the back of the shuttle was already down, hovering over the shaking ground. She hadn't dared use the transporter with all of the electromagnetic interference. If it scrambled high-powered communication, she didn't want to think about what it would do to a transporter pattern.

Azra turned halfway around in her seat and shouted, "Get in! Let's go!" Although her attention was focused on the away team, she couldn't help but notice the energy blasts from skittering armored units and a giant rock-creature. It was not something she would have wanted to encounter at any closer range than this.

Petra followed Mimi up the ramp and onto the shuttle. She went straight to the science station and began scanning the Tholians and the biosilicate creature.

Gabriel scrambled up the ramp last, his breath caught in his throat. He might well be an adrenaline junkie, but that had been excessive. Still, it could have been a lot worse, and unfortunately, it could still be.

As the last person's foot contacted the ramp, Azra triggered it to close. She turned back to the controls and plotted a steep course upward. "Any injuries?" she asked, as they angled upward. The turbulence wasn't bad yet, but it would get worse before they broke atmosphere.

"I'm fine," Gabriel checked in quickly, already strapping himself in. He brought up the tactical display in case they were in for a fight. He well and truly hoped not. He had no idea what the creature was they had just witnessed, but he wasn't above hoping that it provided enough of a distraction for them to make a clean get away.

The shuttle's artificial gravity compensated for the planet's gravitational pull, which should have tugged everyone toward the back of the shuttle. As they got higher, the ion storm got worse. Azra's teeth rattled as the force of the turbulence overloaded the inertial dampeners.

The shuttle bucked, skipped, and slid through the air. "Shields are below twenty percent," Azra warned, "it's going to be a tight exit." Even as she said it she saw the shield drop another three percent.

In looking for the Galileo, Stark was confronted with the grim situation of the USS Trial. His jaw tightened at the dire predicament...and at the lack of real firepower they had to offer. "USS Trial is in high orbit...she's in trouble, surrounded by three Tholian frigates. I can't reach Galileo, her transponder is being jammed..."

"Under other circumstances, you might sell this trip to Adrenalin junkies," Petra said, strapping herself in so she wouldn't be thrown out of her seat. "The Trial's encompassed by an energy absorption field. That must be what a Tholian Web looks like." Even though it was terrible to watch, she couldn't help being impressed by the technology and how it was utilized.

Gabriel looked to Ghoc, who had enough on her hands trying to keep the shuttle in one piece, then to Mimi, his eyes even darker than usual. "We have to help them..."

"We can't, we need to hide or else they'll come for us too," Mimi said in return. The hair on her back was sticking up with a sense of dread, and seeing the numerous Tholian starships was enough to rule out any sort of confrontation.

"We can't take them on directly, but is there anything we can do to help in some way?" Petra asked.

"Not unless we can take care of that Tholian Web..." Gabriel shook his head with a frown, already scrolling through the data pouring into them. "We might not be able to take of those ships, but we could at least try and rescue some of the crew that's trapped if we can find a way to shut it down."

Azra listened to the conversation with less than half her attention. The rest was entirely focused on getting them above the storm and, hopefully, into a blind-spot away from Tholian scanners. Although the shuttle took yet another beating in the final part of the ascent, it emerged from the storm intact. Azra's nerves, on the other hand, were a frayed mess. "We're clear of the storm, I'm moving into the moon's sensor shadow."

"How do you short-circuit a Tholian web?" Petra asked.

"Not easily," Gabriel frowned, shaking his head as he kept a keen eye on the readings, impressed by Ghoc's skill in getting them this far, let alone having to face down the Tholians as an encore. "People have had better luck being small enough and skilled enough to fly through the gaps...."

"Are we small enough?" Petra asked. She turned to check the calculations. "If we could get some of the crew without too much risk..." She glanced at Stark with a raised eyebrow, not sure if it was even worth trying.

Mimi was reviewing tactical data streaming in to her console from the Trial. Her ears twitched at the proposals she overheard then shook her head negative in reply. "It might look like it has gaps but it doesn't. Those solid lines are interlinked tractor beam emitters and the whole grid is a solid forcefield." She paused to think for a few long seconds. "Maybe we can disable one of the nodes and collapse a portion of the web? But that would get their attention."

"If we could allow some to escape, or even beam them off, it might be worth it," Petra said. "But we'd have to make sure we could get away safely before we try anything. It would do no good to get caught ourselves."

Stark looked across to Azra, his jaw set and eyes dark. "If we can get even a few out, then it's worth the risk," he said firmly, unable to hold the feeling in his opinion back. "If we manage to get a portion of that web down, then maybe it will give both us and them a chance to seize the opportunity before the Tholians can get a grip on what's going on...even better if we can find a way to give the Trial a heads up before we make our move. We have to try."

Azra's plan was simple enough, but simple didn't always mean easy. The computer managed speed and trajectory, and as long as Azra had programmed it correctly, they'd avoid detection easily enough. Azra watched the sensor readouts as they made the quick transit through the upper atmosphere and into the blind-spot offered by the planet's moon. For around a minute or two she'd had to hold her breath when it looked like they'd been painted by active scans. The moment passed, and she began breathing again, and relaxed somewhat when they finally fell into the rocky moon's shadow.

With the shuttle now safely out of orbit and hidden, Mimi reviewed the situation in her head then eventually spoke up again once they were clear of any potential threats for the moment. "We have two problems we need to fix before we can go back for the Trial. First, how do we get close enough to the Tholian web undetected, then how do we escape from them once we are detected?" the Nekomi plainly asked.

"Where's a giant rock monster for distraction when you need it..." Gabriel murmured, shaking his head with a slight sigh, frowning. "Would they even react and be distracted by the threat to their troops?" he asked absently, but more to himself as he shook his head slightly with the prospect of so many unknowns on the table.

Gabriel didn't know enough about their psychological makeup to figure out if they were likely to be distracted by the danger to their people, or if they took a more practical, mercenary approach and viewed them as expendable. His knowledge of previous battles on record made him lean towards the latter, with just how ruthless and focused they were as opponents. However, their fierce territorial nature would indicate at least some level of instinctive protectiveness in their culture. In truth, they were still a species that held a lot of mystery to the Federation. Too much. It put them at a distinct disadvantage.

"Or a giant bio-silicate. They sure seem to hate those," Petra said.

Azra rubbed the back of her neck, closed her eyes, and took a series of deep breaths. They were out of the frying pan, as the saying went, but headed right into the fire. Lucky for her, she could take something of a breather before they landed in the hot part.

"I think," Azra finally said, "we will just have to take some risks. There's the old trick of going inertial on a near-intercept course and hoping that they don't think to scan us too thoroughly, or you know, look out a window. Figuratively speaking, of course." She didn't really even like the idea. It had a laughably low success rate and relied far too much on luck.

"Now that we're outside of the ion storm, transporters are more reliable, as are communication channels. I'm not sure what we can do with that, yet, but there might be some options." Azra shrugged. "We also have EVA suits for everyone aboard, so there are probably other options, if we can manage to come up with ideas."

"Those all sound interesting," Petra said. "Drifting in has its advantages. I mean, do Tholians even have windows? Or doing an EVA or using the tranpsporter to attach a mine to a Tholian ship. If we do enough damage to disrupt the field, we can transport people off, can't we?"

Gabriel nodded with a frown, rubbing the back of his neck. His mind went back to the scenarios that he and Luke had run....and how they'd ended up dead in the water over and over. It was something he kept to himself though, it was hardly helpful. "Unless someone thinks of a better plan, I think we should go with the inertia idea...it's better than doing nothing, we have to at least try."

"Mimi?" Petra said, turning to her friend. "You're the boss."

The ensign listened to the input from the team and weighed the possible options as best she could. "We will first need a detailed tactical analysis so we can adapt our emissions for stealth." She did a momentary calculation in her head to determine the type of scans required. "At this range, a ten-second scan of the Tholian ships should be enough. But using active sensors will reveal our presence..."

"Then we use a passive scan," Petra said. "That might not be noticed."

Mimi shook her head negative. "It would take too long. Hours. The Trial doesn't look like it has that much time." She stopped to think more then presented a new option. "Can we access the ship's Starfleet uplink channel and download their tactical logs?"

Gabriel watched her with interest at the idea. Fingers moving quickly, he reeled through the frequencies, finding what they'd need to tap into the channel. "Got it..." he assured quickly, nodding with a touch more hope about him as he managed to get to what they needed, downloading the combat logs via the innocuous datalink. "It worked..."

"Good job," Petra said. "Let's have a look at what you got."

Azra accessed the downloaded data and set the computer to run a number of predictive analyses based on the strategies they'd suggested, as well as an idea Azra had. The computer modelling started, estimating two minutes to complete simulations. "The computer's predicting outcomes. It has just less than two minutes before we'll have results."

To Be Continued...

[OFF]

--

CAPT Lirha Saalm
Commanding Officer
USS Galileo-A

Ensign Mimi
Operations Officer
USS Galileo-A

Petra Varelli
Forensic Anthropologist
USS Galileo-A
[PNPC Sandoval]

CWO3 Azra Ghoc
Boatswain
USS Galileo-A

PO1 Gabriel Stark
Security Officer
USS Galileo-A
[PNPC Blake]

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