Through the Paces (Part 4 of 5)

Posted on 16 Nov 2023 @ 9:17pm by Commander Morgan Tarin & Commander (La) Kuran & Commander Scarlet Blake & Lieutenant Aria Rice & Lieutenant JG Rafe Caradec & Lieutenant JG Zara Ghemora & Lieutenant JG Sofie Ullswater & Lieutenant JG Montgomery Vala & Ensign Mimi & Ensign S'Ers-a M'Lyr'Zor & Ensign Amanda Turell & Petty Officer 1st Class Gabriel Stark & Petty Officer 1st Class Lysander Octavio & Petty Officer 1st Class Ember Locksley & Petty Officer 2nd Class Leon Inaros & Petty Officer 3rd Class Jeysa Zeror & Petty Officer 3rd Class Constantin Vansen & Marcus Mulder & Master Chief Petty Officer Toren Vral & Petty Officer 2nd Class Amul & Petty Officer 3rd Class T'Paaru & Petty Officer 3rd Class Reexio Ubax

3,732 words; about a 19 minute read

Mission: Episode 18 - Cold Station 31
Location: USS Galileo-A - Various
Timeline: MD 19, 1305 hrs

Previously, on Through the Paces (Part 3)...

Laeon shook his head, sighing as he moved into the back to help her batten down the hatches. How had he become a kitchen porter? It was an unexpected turn that he decided he needed to fix. If the ship didn't shake itself apart. Otherwise, it was a moot point.

Nesh looked a him, seeing the set of his jaw, his shoulders. She reached out, to touch his shoulder and giving it a squeeze. "I'd give you an evening sunset for your thoughts," she said, before she grimaced. "Although that might have to wait..."

Laeon's shoulders relaxed a notch with the words and he grinned as he looked to her with awe. "An evening sunset? Only if you paint it for me..."

And Now, the Continuation...

[ON]

Deck 1, Bridge

The expanding anomaly ahead of the Nova-class starship now dwarfed the tiny survey vessel and its battle cruiser escort. Pulses of turquoise and teal light continued to rapidly pulse from its pitch-black event horizon, visibly increasing in frequency as it creshendoed within the depths of empty space.

Tarin's personal armrest console was illuminated with an abundance of pending system failures but she didn't dare keep her eyes on the display for too long. "Auxiliary power to the structural integrity field," she loudly projected over the cacophony of alerts coming from each bridge console. "Helm, 90-degrees starboard, emergency turn - and slow us down!" She looked over to Blake with rare concern present in her sharp hazel eyes. "These gravitational forces will tear us apart if we can't get away from this..."

Tarin's order had not really been necessary, the moment after she'd deciphered her consoles myriad of warnings and just before the yellow alert had done it anyway Mimi had already powered up both back up SIF and IDF generators and had gradually shunted more and more power into them. "Done. Everyone hold on." She warned.

Rafe's fingers moved across his console, trying to adjust the ship's speed and trajectory. He knew these increasing forces were going to wreak havoc unless something drastic was done. He had to break them free! Knowing the risk, he began turning the ship 90 degrees starboard. The ship wouldn't comply. The anomaly wouldn't let go of the nose of the ship. Galileo started to turn starboard but not completely. The anomaly had them and he could feel that same impending doom come over him as it did at Cold Station 31. "The ship's responding but the anomaly is pulling us in!"

Blake gripped the arms of her chair to help keep herself rigid as the ship trembled and shook. "Can we use the main deflector? Adjust the polarity against the chroniton surge?"

Vala squinted to keep track of the myriad datapoints that were appearing, his fingertips deftly filing them into various different programs and algorithms to process them into something more useful. Having a vast and intricate sensor suite had proven useful, but the scale of the anomaly was beginning to tax its ability to delivery a full spectrum of data in real time.

He looked up for the first time in what felt like an eternity, his eyes adjusting to the room. He glanced over to Blake as she posed her suggestion. He wasn't an expert on the ships deflector array, but he was more than familiar with the particles. "Its typically possible, Commander, but in this case it'd be touch and go depending on the fields density. It's taken quite a hold." He refocused his attention back on his console, sending as much data as was useful over to the other bridge stations.

…Coming up to the turbolift at a swift pace, Ghemora pressed to summon it but quickly took note of how many orders it had queued. There wasn't time for this, and the Captain's order had been unexpected and urgent. Putting in her Security Override code, when the doors opened, the trio of crew members gave the Security Deputy an odd look as she stepped on and ordered the lift to the Bridge.

Stepping out as the doors opened, the Cardassian stepped to the railing that lined the back edge of the command area to announce, "Captain, Security Deputy Ghemora reporting as ordered. Awaiting direction, sir." A glance at the viewscreen didn't indicate any hostile entities but did cause the woman's gaze to linger as she took in the unusual sights. With it apparent Vala was more needed than she, the lieutenant reached out a hand to grasp the railing, ready to keep herself steady in case of another shudder of the ship.

Tarin bit her bottom lip again while she swiftly input priority commands into her console. The structural integrity field was holding for now, with the extra power allocated to its generators, but it wouldn't last long. The science officer's lack of confidence in deflector usage wasn't a great sign, but with no helm control, there were few options left. "Do it, Mister Vala!" said the captain when the ship lurched again. She looked over her shoulder to the new voice which had announced their arrival. "Lieutenant, relieve the master chief and take his station."

Vala wordlessly pulled up the deflector configuration and began adjusting the polarity. He had done this particular task many times in lab when working closely with chronitons, but the figures scrolling down the left hand panel told an unpleasant story about the intensity of this field. "Ready, sir."

Toren took the cue, nodding respectfully towards Lieutenant Ghemora as he vacated his temporary position at the science station. Moving with a measured grace, anticipating any further jolts that the ship might suffer, he reached the last remaining free science station. After a final brief glance at the swirling, anomalous visuals on the viewscreen, he began accessing the relevant data feeds, preparing to lend any assistance he could.

Though she gave the empty auxiliary station a glance at the captain's order, the Lieutenant saw no reason to interject into the tense situation by vocally acknowledging the command, instead choosing to move swiftly to replace the already shifting Toren. Given her familiarity, she quickly offered, "Ghemora-Bravo-One-Five-Alpha," when prompted for her authorization. Suddenly the previous screen flickered to that of the complex Tactical Systems Display as the deputy got to work.

Focusing so much on keeping the SIF generators from burning out and trying to siphon power for whatever Vala was going to be using the deflector for, it took Mimi a few moments to notice the blinking light that showed an incoming hail, with all the noise reverberating around the bridge even her expert ears had missed the alert chirp. "Captain the Praxis is hailing us, there is a lot of interference."

"Put them through," the captain rapidly replied. With options for escape from this unknown phenomenon dwindling, perhaps the only hope lay with their Klingon companions who were following Galileo in close warp formation.

Through the bridge's overhead comm channel, Kuran's voice boomed with intermittent cut-outs and a heavy dose of static interference resulting from the anomaly. "--alileo, we are caught in...avitat...wake! Prep...ing.....orpedoes!"

Though the message was distorted, Tarin was able to decipher the gist of it which caused her heart to momentarily to flutter in her chest. Preparing to fire torpedoes... "Vala!" she immediately called out, "what'll happen if the Klingons fire on that anomaly with anti-matter warheads?" She then suddenly remembered IKS Praxis was also in possession of a small quantum torpedo inventory. "Or zero-point warheads?"

Eyes wide, Vala looked up from his console with an expression of deep concern. "Absolutely nothing good, sir," Bloody Klingons - the concept of a 'science officer' clearly eluded them. Anyone with a basic understanding of physics should know that throwing any variety of quantum matter, foreign particles or, elements forbid, antimatter into a field of fourth dimensional particles like this was asking for trouble. "Anything from a substantial shockwave to a singularity. I would advise they do not," he raised his voice over another rumble and jolt, "under any circumstances fire anything into the anomoly."

The captain reached up and pushed her fingers through the dark hair adorning the side of her temple with extreme trepidation. "Send an an urgent message to Praxis," she yelled to the Ops station, "tell them under no circumsta--"

"Praxis Firing! Three Away!" Ghemora called out as she tried in vain to gain a weapons' lock on any of the trio of torpedoes in hopes of intercepting them. Between the interference from warp and the anomaly, all the Tactical officer could do was watch as the indicators on her screen screamed away from the pair of starships toward their target.

Captain Kuran's loud bass-filled voice again projected through the bridge. "...baH..!"

In space - as warp trails continued to streak past both vessels - IKS Praxis' forward torpedo launcher glowed bright red then flashed, firing three quantum torpedoes in a single salvo. The portent ordinance rapidly passed along the starboard side of Galileo at high velocity on a direct course to the center of the anomaly. The torpedoes' cerulean flares twisted and sparkled in the near distance as they approached their target, then simultaneously detonated with proximity fuses just before reaching the heart of the event horizon. The explosions were brilliant and washed out the main viewscreen with bright candescence. But as the remains of the detonations quickly subsided, it suddenly became clear the attempt to destroy the anomaly had resulted in the opposite effect.

The gravitational shockwave resulting from the quantum torpedo's interface with the chronitron-based anomaly rippled across the small Nova-class' hull and violently pushed the starship's nose away from its flight vector. Galileo began to rotate and slowly tumble around its horizontal axis while still at warp and headed directly into the heart of the phenomenon. Across all decks, the IDF struggled to compensate and the crew was suddenly subjected to a healthy dose of lateral G forces. Within the bridge, several overhead conduits exploded and rained down sparks and debris across the occupants while the alert lighting suddenly became deep crimson in color. Through the main viewscreen, the anomaly had seemingly grown in size and was now much closer.

"Hhakh Klivam" Vala muttered as he grasped his console for support, before steadying himself and getting back to his readings. Thanks to their highly useful allies, any chance that the deflector polarisation could get them out of the path of the anomaly had vanished. They might be enough to keep the ship from undergoing some kind of temporal fracturing at least, he though grimly, but they would be riding this wave to wherever it landed. He grit his teeth and packaged details of the polarisation into a communication and sent it over to the Praxis. They were allies after all, and maybe one of them would have enough of a braincell to make use of the information.

Being nearly thrown from the chair in which she sat, Ghemora's knuckles were pale as she held onto the console as it was the only thing keeping her in place. As the sparks flew and the ship began to tumble, she freed one hand to touch the controls, reading the figures presented as she called out, "Shields holding at seventy percent!"

The ship continued to spin on its horizontal axis, Rafe barely able to start slowing its rotational velocity. "Captain, the shockwave took our helm control offline! I've only got minimal thrusters, starboard side, and those are failing! Brace for impact! Impacting the anomaly in 10 seconds!", Rafe exclaimed.

Sera glanced over to the muttering science officer. ”Hhakh Klivam indeed.” She thought to herself. Hearing the shielding percentages being yelled out and time to intercept Sera scrambled to reroute all additional power she could to the shields. The warp bubble was shearing, the shields were fluctuating wildly from the exponentially increasing gravimetric pressures, and…huh. That hull plate that Petty Officer Andrews welded was holding its integrity 17.9% more consistently than the surrounding plating. If they both survived, Sera would inform him of the results of his labors.

The shaking of the ship became so violent it rattled her teeth and her hands clawed at the console edges to remain upright. The viewscreen brightened from the vibrant turquoise till it shone so brilliantly her eye's inner membrane reflexively closed to protect her vision against the light's intensity.

Sera was struck by an irrational thought, perhaps her last... "This is a less than ideal way to begin a new duty assignment.

"Idf generators are close to overloading, I can not do anymore." Mimi announced. If they did her and the crew would be little more than smears across the walls and deck plating from the forces. She took one last look at the anomaly before returning to the Ops console. To be killed by something that looked so vibrant and beautiful would be a nice way to go.

Having no designated station and therefore no seat to ride out the g forces Jeysa was forced around the bridge, she let out a yelp of pain as she collided with the railing behind the command area rib first.

Unlike Mimi, Ullswater did not take a second glance at the beauty of what the viewscreen displayed. Her eyes were glued to the information arrayed on her screen, they were transfixed by another of the anomaly's aspects. As sparks rained around her she didn't even flinch. How could she pay attention to anything else when this mystery was unravelling itself in the sensor data? As the turbulence of Galileo's spiral grew more intense she had to hold on tighter, gripping to that console like her life depended on it, but she didn't for a moment move her attention. What was this? What were its secrets? While Galileo's world collapsed the answers began to emerge out of the logs like an insect from its cocoon. She couldn't help but smile "You're beautiful."

Toren watched as the shockwave approach with a steely expression. His body tensed, a reflex honed by countless encounters with the unpredictable moods of deep space - It was far from his first rodeo. Around him, as reports came in and sparks flew, he remained a stoic presence amidst the chaos. Without a word, he braced himself against the console, his gaze remaining fixed on the wash of colours on the screen as the seconds ticked down. In these fleeting moments, his thoughts were not for himself but for the crew, the young faces who had never felt the wrath of the cosmos before.

As a last-ditch effort, Ghemora shunted what little power she could from the weapons arrays to the shields, hoping it would be enough to keep the ship from getting torn to pieces as the shockwave was nearly upon it. Upon the flash of confirmation, she closed her eyes as she braced for what could be her death.

Distant and nearby stars unnaturally blurred sideways through the main viewscreen as Galileo continued to tumble toward its inevitable fate. At her command station, Tarin's heart rapidly pulsed within her chest. Helm control was offline and with only seconds remaining, there simply wasn't enough time to issue corrective orders. Kuran...Frost...! was what her thoughts drifted to with primal anger in an attempt to blame something - anyone - for their current predicament. With a final command before they all perished in the furthest sectors of explored space, Tarin thumbed the intraship comm button on her chair's armrest. "All hands, brace for impact!"


Deck 5 - Holodeck 2

As the stress on the ship became untenable, the simulated medical suite on the holodeck started to warp, patches of black and yellow flickering in and out of view around them.

Ember opened her mouth to tell Leon they should head out when the holodeck started to spark and crackle. An audible surge rippled behind the panels and the room was plunged into a smoky darkness. When the dim, emergency lighting flickered back on, the room was nothing more than a black box with yellow grid lines.

Straightening up from the protective crouch she'd instinctively moved to, Ember let out a shaking breath, looking around with a soft, world-weary sigh. "We should head to the Cargo Bay and set up a new medical base."

Leon had crouched down too, hands braced and he pushed himself up slowly, the way a man did when he expected another explosion. For a moment he looked around, with something close to regret before he nodded. "Yes, Doctor," he said and took the medical kits, picking them up. "We should notify sickbay and the bridge of our change of location. Hopefully, it's not causing too many issues. Auxillary cargo bay has medical supplies as well," he added as he gave her a nod. "It's not that far to walk from here either." There were some blessings about it all being on the same deck.

"Let's go," Ember nodded firmly, hooking her own bag over her body as she led the way to the Auxillary cargo bay in a low, hard sprint. She tapped her badge, logging the change of their medical over flow base to both Sickbay and the Bridge while they ran, not wanting to stop with more turbulence due any moment.


Deck 3 - Security Office/Brig

The flickering of the forcefields seemed to coincide with the increased g-forces and pressure. Aria frowned as she watched it, grimacing before she hit the controls to lower them, the same second as the sparks seemed to fly from the frame that projected the Brig forcefields. The surge of energy happened a split second later, but luckily it was more a disappointing pop rather than outright explosions. She sucked in a breath and took a step forward in the deep red emergency lighting, into the cell that held the female guest. "It might be safest if we all strap in," she said, looking at Quil. Securing their guests was a priority. She looked over at her shoulder, at Stark, Octavio, Turell and T'Paaru. "T'Paaru, I want you to go out there, see if anyone needs medical assistance and get them to sickbay," she told the Vulcan.

T'Paaru gave a small nod, her face expressionless as she reached for one of the emergency medical kits. "I shall do that," she said, confirming the order.

"Stark, secure Mulder. Turell, Octavio..." she paused, realising she hadn't asked. "Anyone hurt?" her fingers ached and she realised she had a light burn on them. Nothing worse when coming in touch with something hot, so no need for medical attention. She'd have run it under a cold tap if she hadn't been in the middle of an emergency.

"This is a hell of a ride." Amanda called out, she'd been forced against the wall with a thud but was fighting the G forces to stay standing.

Lysander silently wondered whether his holonovels would become bestsellers were he to die here. "All is well, Lieutenant," he replied rubbing the side of his head, still maintaining his signature smile, "Just a small knock."

Stark pushed into Mulder's cell, taking hold of the man by the arms and tugging him to the ground where it was easier to brace against the wall with him. "Don't suppose this is the kind of science stuff you can fix?" he gave Mulder a half smile with a healthy dose of sarcasm in his tone.

Mulder watched Stark, focused on him before he smiled, but there was no warmth in it. Humour, yes, but no warmth. "No, afraid that we are all slouching towards Bethlehem here..." he said, taking a deeper breath.


Deck 3 - Operations Manager's Office

When the g-forces hit, Vansen had heard the pop before the pain of the bruised cartilage and dislocated shoulder hit him. He had been forced against the wall, grimacing as he collapsed onto the floor. He breathed hard, blinking, reaching for his hypo and pressing it against his neck. The squeezing weight against his organs eased and he felt the wetness on his upper lip. Nosebleed. Too quick acceleration into more than normal G.

"Vansen..." Amul frowned as he moved to his side, kneeling and helping him up. When Vansen grimaced he shook his head. "I'm taking you to sickbay. Ubax, you keep the fort..."

"Not much to keep," she said lightly, watching with mild concern. The emergency lights had kicked in and she watched the blank screens. "And it is hold. I believe.

"Hold, keep...build...whatever," Vansen said and looked around with something close to annoyance. "I can stay..."

"You'd be in the way, sickbay for you," Amul said firmly, but with a smile as he helped him out of the room.

To Be Continued...

[OFF]

--

CMDR Morgan Tarin
Commanding Officer
USS Galileo-A

Commander Kuran
Commanding Officer
IKS Praxis
[PNPC Tarin]

Lieutenant Aria Rice
Chief Security Officer
USS Galileo-A

Lieutenant JG Rafe Caradec
Senior Conn Officer
USS Galileo-A

Nurse Leon Inaros
Nurse
USS Galileo-A
[PNPC Rice]

Marcus Mulder
Civilian Scientist
USS Galileo-A
[PNPC Rice]

CMDR Scarlet Blake
First Officer
USS Galileo-A

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

Dr. Ember Locksley
Medical Officer
USS Galileo-A
[PNPC Blake]

Lieutenant (JG) Montgomery Vala
Deputy Science Officer
USS Galileo-A

Master Chief Petty Officer Toren Vral
Chief of the Boat
USS Galileo-A
[PNPC Vala]

Petty Officer 1st Class Lysander Octavio
Security Officer
USS Galileo-A
[PNPC Vala]

LTJG Zara Ghemora
Deputy Security Officer
USS Galileo-A

LTJG Sofie Ullswater
Science Officer
USS Galileo-A

ENS Mimi
Deputy Operations Manager
USS Galileo-A

PO3 Jeysa Zeror
Yeoman
USS Galileo-A
[PNPC Mimi]

ENS S'Ers-a M'Lyr'Zor
Deputy Engineer
USS Galileo-A

ENS Amanda Turell
Security Officer
USS Galileo-A
[PNPC Mimi]

PO3 Constantin Vansen
Operations Officer
USS Galileo-A
[PNPC Rice]

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