Task Force: Gamma

uvek · Posted: Thu Jan 21, 2010 11:55 pm Post subject:

Uvek frowned at his console.

"Captain!" He called out. "Shields on the derelict are going up, engines have resumed operations. Transporters are nullified, no additional security have beamed over. In addition, I no longer have sensor lock on the away team!"

He looked to Phell. "See if you can ramp up resolution through lateral sensors." he ordered. Phell moved quickly, then shook his head.

"Captain, the situation is dire. I recommend red alert!"
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Live a life of action...not reaction.

IAmTedSmith · Posted: Fri Jan 22, 2010 2:48 am Post subject:

ArjimCalodan · Posted: Fri Jan 22, 2010 3:13 am Post subject:

"Lieutenant, I'm picking up life signs approaching Engineering. Human. I thought our people wer -- ARGH!"

Calodan reacted to Beck's call of pain and rushed over to help. His tricorder was little to no help, just showing rapidly failing vitals with no cause. It also showed an approaching humanoid life sign, but Beck was priority. Calodan crouched over the crewman and tapped his commbadge.

"Calodan to Hartington..Medical Emergency." Nothing..just the telltale chirp of a dead channel. Then the warp core hummed to life...running a startup sequence that put the regs to shame. "What the hell is going on?" The tricorder's urgent chirps showed Beck's quickly declining vitals. "Calodan to Qech." Nothing. "Calodan to Anyone on the derelict." Nothing. "Calodan to anyone..please respond." Dammit, why didnt I listen to mom and become a doctor.

"Dammit Beck..stay with me. Don't you die!" Calodan remember little of his emergency medical training from the academy..not that he had any supplies he could have used anyways. He stripped off his uniform jacket and balled it up under the man's head and continued to warily watch Engineering's entrance with his phaser at the ready. The lifesign on the tricorder had disappeared but he wasn't taking any chances.

Beck's lifesigns continued their rapid decline until they flatlined...the tricorder's beep signaling a stopped heart. CPR...how did it go..dammit..think! He began what he hoped was the CPR technique he learned at Academy. Compress, compress, breathe...repeat...nothing. Not even a blip. After 5 minutes...he knew there was nothing he could do and gently closed Beck's eyes. He covered him as best he could with his uniform jacket...and then moved away. It was time to work.

A quick status check showed the ship's shields and dampening field were back online and at full strength. With the warp core almost fully started, the ship would be able to jump to warp in under 5 minutes. No, it won't he thought and began working at the consoles he had unlocked previously. Nothing...locked out. "Damn ship is playing hard ball," he said to the air. "If there's one thing I know how to do..its damage a warp engine." After a quick check of Engineering for the mystery intruder he walked over to a panel by the core and opened it. Inside were the ship's antimatter injectors. A quick scan showed them fully charged...they would electrocute him to death if he reached in. That was what he was hoping for.

Hoping desperately that a holovid he once saw was based loosely on fact he set his phaser to its thinnest setting and cut a strip out of the panel he had pulled off. The duranium was thin, so it cut fast. He was left with a strip of metal that fit nicely down into the injector assembly that was highly conductive. Standing to the side of the open panel and gripping his cut piece by an edge...he tossed it in. The flash was brilliant..and the smell of ozone was instant. Calodan was just about to celebrate...when a sharp impact to the back of his head put him on the deck.
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Marek · Posted: Fri Jan 22, 2010 9:34 am Post subject:

Croft watched the message, his initial shock turning to horror as the message continued. He glanced at the bodies on the bridge when the message mentioned a virus, and immediately began to feel warm. Psychosomatic Croft, get a grip, your fine He downloaded the message into his tricorder for further analysis. He had just finished the process when the ship bucked and came to life. He jumped up and moved over to the helm, uncermoniously pushing the body out of the way so he could sit at the console. His fingers flew over the console, error beeps following his every command. Damn He taps his combadge,

"Croft to Commander Qech, I can't regain control of the ship, all command functions have been rerouted to the secondary bridge, wherever that is." The hiss of an empty line greeted his ears,

"Croft to away team," A pop of static, then nothing. He taps his combadge again,

"Croft to Hartington," Nothing. He glances at the security officer, then runs a hand through his hair. He started running scenarios through his head, but they were all bad. A thump jostled him from his thoughts, he looked over at the security officer. Croft jumped to his feet as he saw the officer was now on the floor, trying to sit up.

"Hold on!" He ran over and helped the officer into a sitting position, with his back against the bulkhead. The officer was non-responsive, but otherwise seemed ok.
This is going from bad to worse real quick, what kind of mess have we found this time?
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Davynn Qech · Graphics Chief Joined: 16 Jun 2009 Posts: 809

Only seconds went by with Qech receiving no report from the other away team members. She tapped her combadge again.

"Qech to Hartington." No response. The already unstable light system in the halls began to flicker rapidly, giving the already uncertain atmosphere on the deck a very unwanted strobe-light effect. Qech could see Koester and Zh'rel looking around, but all their movements now appeared in slow motion.

"I have a feeling that the backup we asked for is stuck at the gates. I'm not getting any response from Hartington, or the others on the Derelict." She looked straight ahead at the door, which was now locked open and no longer struggling to close itself. She could hear a faint hum coming from somewhere on the other side of the bulkhead, a sound that they hadn't encountered anywhere else during their scan of the ship. What reached her senses first, however, was the smell; She coughed as the stench of something distinctly rotten and unplaceable assaulted her senses. She put a hand up to her face and looked between Koester and Zh'rel.

"We're going to leave this place as an afterthought. I want to find out what happened to the others and what the hell is going on before we go poking around in dark doorways." At this point, the Commander's concern for her own rose above her morbid curiosity. I'd rather leave the mystery unsolved then lose anyone on this team.

Qech glanced down the hall toward the turbo lift, which she didn't at all trust, and spotted the hatch to a jefferies tube across the way from it. She gestured to the hatch, understanding that her motions would appear dramatically slow in the pulsating lighting. "We're closest to the bridge. Let's check up on Croft first. And stay together, things just got weird."

She crossed down the flickering hallway and cracked open the hatch. Lieutenant Zh'rel insisted on going in first and climbed into the narrow passageway, with Qech and Koester at her heels. Qech sighed, looking around the dark, oddly smelling pass. And I thought the hallway was creepy.
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Marek · Posted: Fri Jan 22, 2010 3:38 pm Post subject:

Croft pulled out his tricorder, scanning the area to see if there was a gas or some other explanation for the Security Officers behavior, only to find a faint set of life signs approaching from below. After a moment he could identify one as Trill, causing him to breath a sigh of relief. He walked over to the Jeffries tube access and opened the panel, waiting for Qech and the others to arrive so he could assist if needed.
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Cory Drake · Posted: Fri Jan 22, 2010 9:23 pm Post subject:

LT. JG Cory Drake
USS Hartington
Bridge

"Very well Lieutenant," Drake responded to Lieutenant Solana and then looked as she quickly pointed out the changes aboard the freighter.

Drake quickly turned towards the captain's chair.

"Um, Captain, we have a problem here," Drake said, with a hint of urgency in his voice. "The freighter is coming alive. Warp core is active, power being generated and her shields are going up!"

Drake turned back to his console, and began pressing a sequence of commands into it.

"Can't pick up any further readings in it, Sir," Drake said. "She's moving starboard, Captain."

Drake wondered at the same time as he worked to get further information for the captain why the away team hadn't contacted the bridge yet. No word, no calls for help, nothing.

"Where are they?" Drake asked himself, not losing focus on his task.
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uvek · Posted: Fri Jan 22, 2010 9:44 pm Post subject:

"Petty Officer Smith to Lt. Uvek... Sir, It would appear as though we will be here for a while longer. Do you wish for Echo team to stand down, or stay here until the situation is normal again?"

Uvek looked up from his now flashing boards. "Standby, Petty officer, we are assessing possibilities. It may be necessary to use a shuttle, but we do not know enough yet. Maintain position."

He looked back at his boards, saw the situation was becoming more serious, and hit the [b]RED ALERT[/b]. Alarms flashed all over the ship, and the crew immediately went to the ultimate level of security. He tapped some console switches and turned back to the captain.

"Captain, the ship will be fully functional in moments. I have forwarded possible travel routes to the helm in the event they leap to warp, and I have targeted their main drive and shield generators. Give the word and I'll ensure that they are incapacitated."
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Live a life of action...not reaction.

Captain David Brennon · Posted: Sun Jan 24, 2010 1:23 am Post subject:

Location: Jefferies Tube to Bridge, Freighter Apollo

Qech, zh'Rel and Koester crawled on hand and knee through the labyrinthine tunnels of the freighter, slowly making their way towards the bridge. Several meters from the bridge access hatch, Lieutenant zh'Rel stopped in her tracks, pulling out her tricorder. Tense moments pass as she swept the scanner around the tunnel and just as Qech's mouth opened to ask for a report the Andorian spoke.

"Commander, I'm picking up a life reading in the tube with us... it's everywhere, all around us."

Her antennae twitched about as the trio searched for the being causing the readings. Several minutes passed with the three looking around as they crawled, turning up nothing as they did. Finally, they reached the hatch, with zh'Rel stepping out onto the Bridge first while offering her hand to the Commander. As Qech took the woman's hand she noticed a blackish film staining her palm. The Lieutenant shook her head, antennae quivering slightly as she looked away, towards the now kneeling Lieutenant Croft and the fallen security officer.

***

Location: Engineering, Freighter Apollo

A fog of vision returned to Lieutenant Calodan at the same time consciousness did the same. He found himself laying on the ground near where he had fallen, looking up at a humanoid form working the station. As he quietly examined his situation, Calodan found himself bound by the wrist, though his captor had left Jim's hands tied in front of his body as well as having left his feet untied. As the haze cleared, the Lieutenant could see very little of what the alien, as his appearance was most certainly not human, was doing. What he could tell was that the creature was currently accessing the master systems control over the ship and appeared to be rerouting control, to where he could only guess.

***

Location: Main Bridge, USS Hartington

Captain David Brennon stood and strode over towards the tactical station, looking his Romulan friend in the eye. His expression serious and his voice unwavering as he gave commands he dreaded with the whole of his being.

"Lieutenant, we need to make sure this ship doesn't take our people away. Work with sciences to disable the ship without harming the away team... we need to regain control of this situation." His eyes turned to the Science station, settling onto Lieutenant Drake.

"Mr. Drake, intensify your scans, we need information."
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ArjimCalodan · Posted: Sun Jan 24, 2010 1:49 am Post subject:

Caldoan winced at the bump on the back of his head, but kept quite. His current predicament removed his ability to effect any change to the alien's plan so all he could do was quietly watch. He flexed his hands, but the binding on his wrists was too tight for him to get any movement.
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Davynn Qech · Graphics Chief Joined: 16 Jun 2009 Posts: 809

At nearly five months pregnant, crawling through a narrow jefferies tube in almost complete darkness was challenging enough. So Qech wasn't exactly glad for Zh'rel's next report.

"Commander, I'm picking up a life reading in the tube with us... it's everywhere, all around us."

Qech was about to respond when a dull light suddenly flooded into the tube. Zh'rel had found the hatch. "Well that seems to rule out a humanoid then" she said as she watched the Lieutenant pushed herself through the opening. Qech was about to take the Andorian's offered hand to do the same when she discovered something unusual on the woman's palm, something black.

"Lieutenant" she began, finally extracting herself from the tube, and quickly checking to make sure Koester was still behind her. She gently took Zh'rel's wrist, careful not to touch whatever it was that she'd come in contact with. "There's something here... Hold still."

Qech's tricorder hummed as she scanned the Andorian's palm, but the results revealed very little. She shook her head. "Some sort of unknown bio matter. Very complex... But that's all I'm reading. The computer can't make heads or tails of it."

The Commander looked up briefly at Croft, who was taking in the entire thing a short distance away. She was relieved to find him unhurt, but his security comrade was another matter. She made a quick attempt to sterilize the 'goo' on Zh'rel's hand (a fruitless attempt) before running to the fallen man's side and scanning him with a medical tricorder.

"Report, Lieutenant" she said, sparing a glance at Croft as she worked.
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Marek · Posted: Sun Jan 24, 2010 9:47 pm Post subject:

Croft glanced at the Security officer, then at the viewscreen that was still playing back it's message. "I found a recording that seems to imply a virus of some sort caused the condition of the crew members here on the bridge, the message had barely played through when the security officer collapsed. Add the ship control being rerouted I'd see things are getting out of control." He took a deep breath, "Sorry sir, just a little confused, I'm a pilot, not a science officer."
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uvek · Posted: Sun Jan 24, 2010 11:48 pm Post subject:

"Lieutenant, we need to make sure this ship doesn't take our people away. Work with sciences to disable the ship without harming the away team... we need to regain control of this situation."

"Understood, sir." responded the Romulan. He looked to Solana and Drake. "Lieutenant Solana, can you generate a depolarized Graviton beam using our deflector dish? If so, target the derelict's main engines. The result will cause a systemic failure in the warp core and keep the ship sublight! I have seen this on Romulan cruisers in the past, they had to keep secondary graviton generators on hand for just such a problem. In addition, energy shields will be ineffective against the depolarized beam, as it will not register on their systems."

To Phell he said, "Short of that, stand by to fire the phasers at the shield generators on sections one-C, three-D and main engineering. Simultaneously, we hit the main engines. I do not want to puncture the hull, so attenuate the particle emitters to their lowest concentration."

The Benzite nodded into his breather, and with nervous fingers rechecked the phaser settings. He dipped his head at Uvek. "Ready Lieutenant." He said simply.

Uvek looked to Solana and nodded. "Activate the beam as soon as you can!" he called out.
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Live a life of action...not reaction.

Davynn Qech · Graphics Chief Joined: 16 Jun 2009 Posts: 809

"I found a recording that seems to imply a virus of some sort caused the condition of the crew members here on the bridge, the message had barely played through when the security officer collapsed. Add the ship control being rerouted I'd see things are getting out of control. Sorry sir, just a little confused, I'm a pilot, not a science officer."

Qech looked up from her scanning of the security officer at the mention of a virus. She could see, just past Croft, the end part of a message playing on the viewscreen.

"Play it from the beginning" she said. Croft complied and the four of them watched the jumbled message play out. Qech looked down at Ensign Tay, who was looking worse for the wear, and shook her head. "The only thing I can deduce from these scans is that he is, in fact, infected with something that at least behaves like a virus." She looked up at Zh'rel. "The same compound you have on your hands. I suppose 'don't touch anything' goes without saying."

She sighed, and returned to her scans, looking grave. "It's spreading through his blood like a poison... There's nothing I can do for him here." Putting down her tricorder, Qech fished through the medkit for a hypospray and pressed it against the Ensign's skin. His eyes, which were previously half-open in a vacant stare, slowly began to close and his body drooped casually to the deck. Qech eased him the rest of the way to the floor and stood up. "That will slow down his heartbeat. Buy him some time, and spare him any suffering in the meantime."

She looked Croft, the sadness in her eyes giving slowly away to professionalism. "You said the controls were rerouted?" She asked, making her way to the Ops station to confirm the endless tide of bad news. "We need to get communications back up. But we're going to have to do it through the ship..."

Qech turned around to face the others, biting her lip in thought. "This is going to sound unorthodox, but..." she took her combadge off of her uniform as she spoke "take your combadges off."

The Commander let the obvious confusion settle before expounding on her order. "We need to get to engineering, find Calodan and Beck, and get Communications back up. If the Hartington finds a way to beam us back aboard I don't want it happening before we can get a message to them to beam us into quarantine. We can't risk infecting the entire ship, and if they have a window with which to get us off this rig, with or without communications, they're going to take it." She set her combadge down on the control panel. "At least this will make it more difficult for them to do so."
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Marek · Posted: Mon Jan 25, 2010 6:25 pm Post subject:

Croft just stared at the Commander for a good two seconds, he was struggling with the idea of an opponent he couldn't see. Finally he pulled off his combadge and set in next to Qech's.

"Well, this just keeps getting better." He tapped the console, "I believe the controls were rerouted through engineering, that would probably be a good place to start."
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