Implosion (Part 1 of 3)

Posted on 18 Jan 2026 @ 8:49pm by Commander Morgan Tarin & Commander Allyndra illm Warraquim & Lieutenant JG Serran & Lieutenant JG Sofie Ullswater & Lieutenant JG Nusien & Ensign Amanda Turell & Kivirn

3,683 words; about a 18 minute read

Mission: Episode 21 - Helix
Location: Enus Station - Level 3, Transporter Room
Timeline: MD 07, 1300 hrs

Previously, on Enus Station (Part 2)...

The LCARS crosshairs displayed on the console beneath Tarin's fingers continued to scatter from the intended destination. She held the away team's bio-signatures within the pattern buffer for a long moment while they continued to phase in and out of reality, then finally the targeting scanners achieved a solidified coordinate lock. The captain brought the pattern buffer sliders back up to re-initialize transport then glanced forward toward their sparkling silhouettes. The transport sequence recycled, and this time - within mere seconds - the five officers fully dematerialized from within the starship. The lingering coil whine and latent glittering particles were their only temporary remnants aboard Galileo which quickly faded from reality. Where they were going, where they'd been sent - only they could now tell the story. If they managed to return.

And Now, the Continuation...

[ON]

Galileo's first officer, chief medical and science officers, operations manager and security officer simultaneously transported into the center of a small and compact room within the subaquatic research facility. Their arrival was punctuated by the bright shimmering of their collective forms' transporter signatures whose luminescent glow temporarily highlighted the otherwise-dark interior of the chamber they now occupied.

Faint Federation-style ambient lighting illuminated the deck plating and was accented by the occasional crimson pulsing strobe - an indicator of Red Alert aboard Starfleet vessels which possessed an equally-equivalent posture among most humanoid structures regardless of species. Not too far behind the away team was the station's small transporter alcove consisting of three pads lining the wall; and lining the sides of the bulkheads were a series of flickering blue and yellow LCARS displays. No other life signs were present at first glance...though there was still much more of the facility to explore.

Amanda raised the phaser rifle activating the light module underneath it, she stepped down from the pack of officers and quickly began to sweep the immediate area searching for anything; hostile or otherwise.

There was that split second before all his molecules coalesced back that Serran felt unconnected in more ways than one. But that time passed before he could finish blinking his eye.

He quickly scanned the room looking for anything out of place, or potentially dangerous. He may not have been a security officer but he was good at observing.

Allyndra stood in place for a few more moments. The odd transport effect of blinking back and forth disturbed her, but now being here in the area reminded her that they were not only in an enclosed area, but outside was nothing but water. There was no sky for a long long way. Taking a deep breath she called out, "Do we have any life signs anywhere?"

It took a moment for Ullswater's eyes to adjust from Galileo's bright lights to the darkness of the station. She used the moment to bite down the lump of fear that was crawling up her throat.

A hand reached out and grabbed Sofie's, it gave a little squeeze. A comforting gesture that was perhaps diminished in its effectiveness by the fact it was given by a hallucinated hand belonging to a nightmare creature that existed only in her head. Still, it was what she needed.

As Ullswater pulled out her tricorder and began to scan it's pleasant chirping cut through the quiet. "Main and auxiliary power are both non functioning. I am detecting life signs," She pointed in the direction of the life signs "That way, sir."

"The station must be on emergency then." Allyndra nodded.

Nusien stood relaxed as he leaned on his back two legs. His head turned this way and that as he took in everything that he possibly could. This was, a place that seemed time had forgotten. He only hoped that his skills would no longer be needed on this mission. He hoped, but he doubted that he was correct.

"Very good, finish scans, and then we'll move in the direction of the lifesigns. Ensign Turell, I want you on point. Lieutenant Nusien, your tail, but keep an eye on the scanner. The rest be prepared. I don't like that power is off and no one is coming to greet us," Allyndra gave out the commands. "Let's go."

Serran slipped his tricorder to a clip on his belt. Ullswater had taken the lead with that instrument, so he switched his focus to scanning with his enhanced Vulcan senses.

Having glanced back towards the group slightly, Amanda caught Sofie's point and then, with Allyndra confirming she'd lead the way, she took off slowly down the corridor Sofie had indicated. She swept the phaser rifle back and forth slowly, shining the torch and the rifle's targeting scanner across the area. Nothing showed up either in the white light or the red display of the scanner.

The away team strategically moved down the designated corridor, which soon came to a T junction. The sound of foreign footsteps could soon be heard, and whoever they belonged to approached closer and closer at a rapid pace. A mid-sized Human figure suddenly came into view, then did a double-take at the away team's appearance, mostly brought on by the flashlights now trained on his figure.

"What the--" his startled form recoiled back against the wall before he squinted and made out the Starfleet uniforms adorning the intruders. "Who the hell are all of you? And why are you creeping around in the dark during..." his voice trailed off while he frowned, then stepped closer to reveal a disheveled set of short brown hair, Caucasian skin tone and blue eyes. "Wait...are you all from Galileo?" His white civilian scientist uniform was sweat-soaked across his chest, armpits, and back, which corresponded to the beads of perspiration dotting his facial features.

Allyndra stepped forward. "I am Commander Allyndra from the USS Galileo. You are correct. Who are you and what is going on here? We've had no communication in response to our hails, and scans indicate you are on emergency power. Do we need to affect rescue?" She leaned close to Lieutenant Ullswater and whispered. "Watch our back."

Ullswater gave a quiet verbal confirmation and stepped back a couple of paces, her eyes half-glued to the tricorder. If it detected anybody or anything else approaching, then she would let them know.

"Rescue?" He let out a faux half-laugh laced with exasperation. "Yeah, that would have been nice - six hours ago. We're in the middle of an incursion and just lost two of us who were caught outside... There's nothing you can do now to bring Commander Downing or Lieutenant Binea back to life." His arms folded across his chest to further express his vexation. "Always too little, too late from Starfleet out here. Well, now that's costing lives."

The man's attitude grated on her, and Allyndra wanted to snap back, but what caught her attention was a single word, incursion. "What is this incursion? Everyone, phasers and scanners."

The Enus station scientist's blue eyes widened at the away team's donning of personnel weapons. "You think those are going to deter what's out there?" his hand urgently gestured to the bulkhead, and more importantly, the unknown beyond it within the expansive ocean surrounding them. A frustrated and discordant sigh then escaped his nostrils, which was accompanied by a shake of his head. "Look, just follow me and talk to the others. I don't have the time to go through everything right here." A motion of his hand indicated for them to follow at a brisk pace as he set off back down the corridor from which he'd arrived.

"Perhaps," Serran spoke up, his tone calm and even, "rather than engage in polemical accusations that get us nowhere, you could be more objective and provide us with information that can help us save some lives."

"Specifically, why do you claim that our weapons will be ineffective?"

Warraquim returned her attention to the man. "We rescued one person in the ocean. What exactly is going on here?"

The man stopped mid-stride, then whipped about to face the Galilean personnel. "...You really have no idea, do you?" His scrutiny was laced with genuine surprise at the lack of information these new arrivals possessed. "Well, maybe that's better. Maybe there's something you can see that we haven't. A fresh set of eyes. Let's go," he beckoned for them to trail him as he hastily set back off down to the end of the corridor and around the bend. "Downing's dead, so you'll have to talk to the next in command... That'll be Kivirn, at least until we appoint a new leader."

The scientist's expedited walking pace was efficient by any measure of the word, and soon deposited the conglomerate into the doorway of what appeared to be a large command room. Amid the darkness and pulsing alert lighting, a large holographic nucleic acid double helix slowly rotated atop the middle of the room's central console. Numerous other gold, silver, and blue LCARS displays lined the walls and cast colorful hues across each of the eight Enus Station civilians now in view. They were all dutifully working at their stations to relay pertinent technical information, and didn't seem to notice their colleagues' or the away team's arrival.

Their audible workflow drowned out the soft running chirps of operating LCARS terminals.

"Bring up sector eight-five, I'm seeing the thermal variance returning to normal..." said one.

"Eight-five is still showing the breach, estimated time to--" called out another.

"It's not closing fast enough anymore; another one might break through."

"If we vent superheated plasma from one of the shuttle's relay networks, maybe we can artificially seal it!" came yet a fourth voice.

The man escorting the Galileo away team stepped into the room, then loudly cleared his throat. "Kivirn, we have visitors. Looks like Galileo finally showed up," he nonchalantly motioned behind his back. "They're asking a lot of questions. I told them to talk to you. And the one with the wings said...they rescued someone from the ocean."

The scientist, identified as Kivirn, turned from where he was working. He was a small and spindly man, lacking any of the physical attributes one might associate with leadership but sporting a knitted jumper criss-crossed with intricate patterns. He glanced over the away team, taking special note of the 'one with wings' as his colleague had pointed out. "You aren't Saalm or Blake or Sandoval." The statement was delivered flatly but in a way that made it clear he expected an answer.

"I am Commander Allyndra illm Warraquim, the First Officer of the USS Galileo-A. What is going on here? We detect nothing but emergency power. We have attempted to contact you without any answer to our hails."

He glanced up and down the commander and let out an overly dramatic sigh, "Nobody tells me anything anymore." He didn't dwell on it, though: With a shrug, he gave a gesture around the room with all its displays and busy scientists. "This is Enus Station. I'm Dr Kivirn, currently in charge. At the moment, we are under attack by a giant sea monster, hence the lack of power. We're trying not to be detected."

"Can you be more specific?" Serran asked in a voice not quite monotone. "What kind of creature is it? Was something done to provoke it? Why is it attacking you?"

"Yes, I can be more specific. This entire base was set up to observe and study undersea life. We have enough expertise and data here that we could be absolutely as specific as you could ever want." The scientist wobbled over to a display by the wall and, indicating the away team to come closer, started pulling up images, information from scans, and logs of activity on the screen. "It was maybe provoked, Commander Downing has a love— Well, he had a love for manned submarine missions. We think he died about seven hours ago."

"It seems to have an affinity for electromagnetic waves; it's good at seeing them. So we are minimising power until, hopefully, we can detect it going back into the hole that it came through." Kivirn shrugged and stood back from the panel, indicating that any of the away team could look over the data if they so desired. "It arrived through a hole."

Allyndra listened to the attempted explanation of what was going on and things made even less sense to her than before. "Lieutenant Ullswater, see if you can make heads or tails of the data here, what exactly is going on. Lieutenant Serran attempt to contact the Galileo as we are overdue. If need be use whatever means necessary." She eyed Kivirn. "Tell the captain that we have a hostile entity attacking the station and I'm recommending the station be abandoned until we can get a full debrief. Lieutenant Nusien, please check on all these individuals. I'm not sure how well any of them are working; they all appear to be over-stressed." She nodded to Turell. "Continue to monitor our situation as best as possible."

"Now, sir." Allyndra put her full attention on Kivirn. "What is this hole? Something natural, transdimensional, or what? What exactly has your group been doing here?"

Nusien knelt down beside the individuals, which appeared odd for someone with three legs. However, he began to scan them all and found some interesting results. He decided to run a few more scans for further analysis before giving a full report.

"Aye, sir." Ullswater gave a nod and walked over to the console that the scientist had indicated. She felt light headed and had to scrunch up her eyes to try and concentrate on what she was seeing in front of her. It all seemed like such a jumbled mess. Was something wrong with there computers or was the exhaustion finally catching up?

"Aye Commander." Amanda started to move slowly around the room looking at monitors over peoples shoulders trying to figure out what the threat was.

Serran was curious, which was, of course, not totally logical, but that didn't reduce theemotion he felt. But there was little he could do to make himself useful in that capacity, but he could be useful in others.

"I can maximize your capacity and output," he offered, "That would lessen the strain on your engines. I can't say for sure until I start digging into things, but I estimate an increase of 14.372 %."

"It has the advantage of making you less of a target. Would you like me to do so?"

Kivirn gave the Vulcan a suspicious look. He left the question unanswered for a couple of seconds before finally speaking. "No. I should talk to the technicians first. This is their station." His contempt was completely undisguised though it wasn't clear what exactly he was so put off about.

His gaze lingered for a few moment longer before turning back to the commander. "Well the hole, it's more of a metaphorical hole than a literal one." His hands danced, trying to construct imagery through gesture "A hole in the thermocline. Sort of. Maybe it would be better to say a disruption or maybe a broadening. Yes, that sounds good. Clearly, a broadening enough that a beautiful specimen of abyssal gigantism was peeved enough to try and start biting. It should pass, we hope."

"Pass? Yeah, maybe in five centuries at the rate these things are coming through it," the familiar blue-eyed scientist quipped back at his colleague. He subsequently turned to face the Starfleet officers, his hands clasped together and fiddling in front of his waist. "This isn't a trivial matter - we've been here for a long time surveying and cataloguing life in this planet's unique biomes. Yes, they're subaquatic biomes, but each contains distinct categories of life that all interact with each other in harmony. But the thermocline? What's below it isn't a just different biome...it's an entirely different ecosystem. Life, down there," he flicked his eyes toward the deck plating, "evolved over millions of years to live in an entirely different part of the ocean than up here. And vice versa. This 'hole' is an ecosystem breach that could destroy this planet's habitats if we don't fix it. We're not abandoning anything until we fix this...right, Kivirn?"

"Yes, thank you, Guy." Kivirn's words sounded like poison and the look he gave the other scientist was cold enough to from its own thermocline in the air between them. "I'm dealing with it." In a single gesture of his head, Kivirn communicated to the other scientist, Guy, that he should shut up or face some unfortunate consequences down the line. It was an odd thing to see communicated on such a waifish looking figure as Dr Kivirn, but it was loud and clear.

Turning back to the away team, his tone changed back to something much more amicable. "Yes, I was maybe understating the problem a bit, but I am confident that we can work out a way to fix the broadening. Like Guy said, we aren't leaving. This will pass. We might need to nudge it in the right direction to make sure it does pass but it will pass."

Allyndra listened and understood most of what was said, but it was things not said or hinted at. "You say nudge. Does this mean this breach is not a natural occurrence? If it is, we have no right to nudge anything; if it isn't, was it something that this station did?" Either way, there could be violations of the Prime Directive here. She turned her head toward Serran. "Any luck with contacting the Galileo?"

The Vulcan shook his head. "I have been unable to do so," he commented in a calm and even tone. I was concerned it was an equipment failure. However, after performing a level two diagnostic, I have determined that that is not the case."

"I will continue my attempts. I will start by using some alternative frequencies."

"Thank you," Allyndra replied while waiting for an answer. There was something going on here that didn't feel right.

Serran continued attempting to contact the Galileo/ There was silence on his part for three long minutes as he continued to make adjustments.

Then, in a voice louder than he intended, he used several four-lettered Terran words that he rarely used, even when frustrated.

"Excuse me," he said to no one in particular, unsure if anyone had heard his cursing.

Then, in a louder voice, he continued, "I have concluded, with an 87.454% certainty, that there is an EM dampening field hindering our communications."

"I can attempt to alter the frequency, but it will be at best a temporary fix until we can find the source and nullify it."

/=\"Galileo, this is Lt. Serran with the Away Team. Can you hear me?"/=\

The breach. Guy slowly wandered away from where the away team was positioned and rubbed the back of his neck in a faux-chalant manner while contemplating how best to reply to the inquisitive Starfleet cadre who'd arrived while not upsetting Kivirn in the process. "We transited through the thermocline because we're conducting important research down there. It's possible one of our Starfleet-issue submersibles punctured it, but it shouldn't have happened." He glanced nervously to Kivirn while walking closer to the man.

Kivirn closed his eyes and took a deep breath. A moment of peace, a moment to try and calm the frustration. One moment was not enough though. "I told him, I told Downing something was going to happen but oh that man and his submarines." He forced a smile and cheerful tone "Would you mind if me and Guy just went and had a word over there?" With a nod he indicated the other side of the room and with a glare he indicated to Guy that the attempt to not upset him had failed.

The information was pretty much all Allyndra needed to hear. In the process of doing research, one or more individuals here had initiated the problem. It might have been accidental and that was definitely a possibility, but it also sounded to her as if one or more had gotten a bit sloppy. She understood wanting to explore, but the facility was primarily to observe.

She turned. "Team, whoever you can spare, we need to contact the ship. Whatever it takes." She shook her head. "I am sorry, but as of this moment, I am going to require that this facility be abandoned until we can make a further investigation." She turned to Ullswater. "Lieutenant Ullswater, see if you can get main or auxiliary power back on."

"Aye, sir," A short distance off from that conversation, Ullswater was still struggling to make anything out of the data arrayed on the screen in front of her. It didn't help that in the snippets she heard of the conversation being carried out between the Commander and the base's lead researcher she kept hearing something: maybe it was just anxiety from the two civilians or maybe something else. She needed another set of eyes, or maybe ears, or maybe just a whole new body at this point. Glancing over her shoulder she saw Turell a short way off and called over to her "Ensign Turell, could I grab you for a moment?"

To Be Continued...

[OFF]

--

Lieutenant Junior Grade Nusien
Chief Medical Officer
USS Galileo-A

Cmdr Allyndra illm Warraquim
First Officer
USS Galileo-A

LTJG Serran
Operations Manager
USS Galileo-A

LTJG Sofie Ullswater
Chief Science Officer/Second Officer
USS Galileo-A

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

Kivirn
Acting Administrator
Enus Station
[PNPC Ullswater]

Guy
Scientist
Enus Station
[NPC Tarin]

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