The Weird Shit Begins

Posted on 25 Feb 2020 @ 5:29pm by Captain Mallory Thorne & Lieutenant JG Aleina Sun & Cor Ive & Ensign Kat Walker

2,468 words; about a 12 minute read

Mission: Changing Faces
Timeline: MD 02 - 1700 hours

=/\= Begin Log =/\=

The USS Odin departed their "parking space" just beyond Solaris Station with little fanfare and far less relief than they'd anticipated.

At the helm position just ahead of her sat a Terran Union officer, but on the upside, at least she was right there and Mallory could keep an eye on her. She supposed--grudgingly--that she could understand the ambassador's position, but on the other... Well. There wasn't really anything about the Terran Union that didn't just irk the hell out of the captain of the ship. She hoped that if she carried out this task, this "favor," then they would just let the ship go their own way without the risk of being shot at.

The ship had been moving at a steady pace on toward this "special" destination for about an hour when the first of the weird shit began.

"Captain," Lieutenant Sabine began. "I'm detecting a strange... Well, I'm not entirely sure what it is yet."

Frowning thoughtfully, Mallory got to her feet and walked up behind the the ops station. Crossing her arms over her chest, she looked down at the console and looked at the readings. "I'm seeing, what...electromagnetic field, some unfamiliar radiation, and... Could that be a distress signal?" She peered at one particular readout that stood out on an audible level. "Try filtering it through communications."

After a few moments, there was...something audible, but she could piece out what it was.

"I'm picking up a life sign as well," Sabine added. "It's difficult to pick it out from the interference, but it's there...if erratic. I think someone is in trouble."

Mallory was grabbed up by the hands of indecision for a moment. This was an entirely new, and so-far hostile, universe... What if this led them into a trap? What would they find? They were also stuck in the middle of this mission for a seemingly very unforgiving woman... And yet. Captain Mallory Thorne was a Starfleet captain, and Starfleet had a duty. She was also a person, and one with compassion. She had to know.

"Set course for that signal," she ordered, turning around to head back to her chair.

At the Helm station, Aleina frowned. She had been given specific instructions as to where to fly this ship to, and some random signal was not on the docket. Her hands ceased movement as her eyes flicked to the ambassador for approval.

Elynda frowned as well, watching the ship's captain. "Is this signal of importance to this ship or the mission?" she asked pointedly. She was not refusing per se, but she needed to know exactly what kind of crazy people these were that she was supposed to work with before they reached the Seelie, and this gave her an opportunity to test that.

Oh, right... They were here. Mal took in a breath and looked at the ambassador. "I cannot say if there is value to the mission for the union," she said levelly. "Since we don't know what is going on. However, it is important to the ship. Someone needs help, and even if Starfleet does not exist in this universe, we are still Starfleet and have a duty to provide aid."

Elynda studied the woman for a moment, really looking into her eyes. After a long moment, she nodded. "Very well then." She turned toward her pilot. "Do as she says, Lieutenant Sun."

Aleina nodded, satisfied that her superior officer approved, or at least allowed it. Turning back to her console, she plotted the requested course and took the ship toward the distress signal.

=/\= Fifteen Minutes Later...

Although they had reached the site at speed, they slowed as they approached to keep things cautious. They launched the Spears to advance ahead of the ship and to get a closer picture of what they were looking at, which looked a lot like...an ancient debris field. Everyone on the bridge stared at the viewscreen, somewhat confused and fixated on the view as the sleeker, smaller bodies of the interceptors maneuvered around the edges.

"Can we get a fix on the life sign?" Mal asked, her jaw a little tense.

The answer was a while in coming. "I believe so. There's a a large area of wreckage where the signal is emanating. We could transport it all into the cargo bay."

Mallory considered it. "Do it," she said. "Put up containment fields." She nodded once. "Bridge to Lieutenant Dering, Doctor Dering, and Lieutenant Bran. Please send a medical and engineering team as well as security team to the cargo bay two. We are beaming some wreckage up and there is an erratic life sign. We need to find out who is in there and help them, and I'm not sure if engineering will be needed to do that..."

=/|= Security Offices

"Bakkar, Johnson, Kawolski," Talrian barked as he came out of his office, checking the seat of the pistol in his thigh holster while also tapping his tacvest to make sure it was there. He headed straight for the wall locker with the available rifles.

"Which Kawolski?" Hunter asked as he popped his head around from the other side of his brother's desk.

"This is a security matter," Talrian said nodding to the elder Kawolski. "You should stage several sections down in case we need quick attention, otherwise you're not ready yet."

Johnson and Bakkar were also grabbing rifles, Bakkar grabbing a second and throwing it to Trapper, who caught it deftly. "You only come if you're called," Trapper growled, pointedly ignoring his SecChief's reaction. When it came down to it, Hunter was his brother and he promised their mother. Within a minute of the call, he was following the others out the door and headed toward Cargo Bay 2.

=/\= Cargo Bay Two, Deck 27

There were no active weapons found when the wreckage and debris were scanned. There were weapons, but a dampening field would keep them from starting up out of their dormant state...if that was even possible, given the state of everything. While the medical team moved in and found the source of the life signs, an engineer was surveying the items around them and it didn't take long at all to release the part of the ship with the body was of a different construction than the rest.

Talrian had the team split in half, Kawolski with him and the remaining two on the other side of the room. They were staggered enough to keep out of cross fire, but able to cover the entire room. Talrian growled to himself as the medical team just rushed in without consideration for the security of the matter. But then again it was the way it was on this ship. Something he had to change.

One piece of the debris - or among it to be more precise - stood out. It was not a piece of something larger per se, but a complete thing, though heaped up as it was, ravaged and weathered by tiny space debris for an untold age and obviously damaged in one specific area. A sleek machine, inactive, cold. Now having been brought onboard though, a status light flickered on, subtle, almost hidden. A faint red glow came from it at first, then flickering green, as a quiet whine sounded, the machine's ancient reactor starting up.

"Contact," Talrian called out, bringing the rifle to his shoulder as he covered the suddenly active machinery. Which - "Why is it suddenly active?" he called out to the geeks in gold. His glance flicked to the side to make sure Kawolski was also prepared and covering the machinery. One false movement from it and Talrian was ready to blow it back into space. In small, phaser burned pieces.

"No idea," the young engineer replied nervously, scanning continuously. "But I'm not sensing any weapons signature, simply power."

The machine - a sleek hull with four limbs, two smaller and two larger ending in feet, stirred. A whine of complaint as it tried to move, grinding of dried out, failing bearings, some sparks flying from the damaged portions. It tried to stand up but failed, finding the damage from a weapons hit and the ravages of time too severe to do so. Several sensor modules in the nose though became active, scanning the people in front of the machine and the area around it, littered with debris.

"Contact," Talrian growled as he raised the rifle to his shoulder and covered the...thing?...rising from the debris. "Stop or I'll open fire! Or, freeze or...deactivate, whatever stops you from moving!" He gave a quick look around. "Lieutenant..." the new engineer's name was on the tip of his tongue but he couldn't quite remember it. He wanted to say 'Dering' but that was the new doctor's name. Too many "new" people all at once. "Lieutenant Engineer person!" he called over to her, "if it doesn't shut down, you'll have to examine the parts I leave behind."

Given the situation, the young engineer forgave the name and just looked at him slightly wide-eyed. "Yes, sir," she replied.

The machine didn't move again, having decided that to try would only be likely to cause more damage to its already shot systems, frozen bearings, out-of-tolerance hydraulics and other assorted issues. Instead the sensors on the front of the hull focused on the people before it, scanning them. A moment later with a shimmer a hologram flickered into existence projected from the front of the machine's main body, a projector amidst the sensor array.

The hologram was of a young human woman, maybe in her early twenties. Flawless skin - almost too perfect, steel blue eyes and middle length sandy blonde hair, tied back out of the way. She wore a uniform similar to the people in front of her, though without rank pips. With the weapons aimed at her she calmly raised her hands to show she was unarmed and maintained a respectful distance from the people before her. She spoke in a soft voice, an alien language, her tone calm. A few glitches in both the visuals and the audio were evidence of the pervasive damage to the machine's systems.

The glitches were also enough to tell the engineer what they were looking at. "She's a hologram!" the woman explained with that sort of wonder that her sort usually had. "She must be tied into that machine somehow..."

Talrian blinked a few times as he kept an eye on the machine. "Good work, Lieutenant," he drawled. "Any chance your geek speak is compatible with it's geek speak and we can find out what the hell it is and why it's approximating being alive?"

As much as they didn't understand her, she didn't understand them either. The hologram slowly lowered her hands, taking a calm, slow step towards Talrian, then another, before she halted, observing him. She spoke again, the same alien language, a calm tone to her voice. She motioned to herself and the machine behind her, speaking another alien phrase, though the first syllable sounded a lot like 'Kat'.

"Kat..." the engineer repeated. "Given some time, I'm sure we and the computer can figure it out... I need to call in Lieutenant Dering."

"Not sure how a doctor can help us here," Talrian muttered as he put his rifle in low ready, able to bring it up in a nano-second if necessary, but so far it was refraining from the use of force or violence. "I'm sure you can't understand me," Talrian said, "but the more you talk, the more our translators can work out commonalities in your language and ours. But it requires data to understand syntax and word usage."

As the armed one lowered his weapon the AI decided to be slightly more bold, but only slightly. It held a hand up, palm facing upwards, and projected a hologram for the people before her to see. It was the machine, but in full repair and standing upright. There was a simple legend floating over the machine, indicating a red dot pointing to a frowny face and a green dot pointing to a happy face. The representation of the machine became filled in with colored dots, mostly red, on various different locations, indicating systems. As they appeared the holographic woman narrated, listing off systems and their status.

"Doctor what?" the engineer asked with a frown, stuck on that for a moment. "Lieutenant Dering. The chief engineer," she corrected, although her words slowed as she took in the image. "That's...a lot of busted systems."

The final thing the holographic woman showed was a container with a lightningbolt symbol on it, hovering above the representation of the two-legged machine, dripping down from the container to the machine, and showing the container near empty. A big frowny face overlaid on the entire display.

=/\= Meanwhile...

In the other area of the bay, the medical team swarmed the piece of wreckage containing the body. "I can't scan properly through the container," a nurse said. "It looks like the humanoid inside is unconscious. Can we transport the body out?"

"Not as things are," an engineer replied. "I think I can hope this hatch, though."

When they opened the hatch, they'd find a man with long black hair, and purplish-grey skin, he was lying face-down on the floor towards the rear of the craft. On the floor next to him was the remnants of what looks to be a medical kit, as well as some sort of hand weapon laying nearby.

A small cut on the back of the man's hand was oozing a blue-colored blood.

They medical officer began to enter but saw the weapon. However, scans showed that it was inactive--like the rest--and this person was unconscious. She didn't recognize what race he belonged to, but the similarities were enough to recognize consciousness.

"The transporter is working now that the hatch is open," the engineer announced.

Johnson did move in and kicked the weapon away, while also looking for any other potential dangers and hazards.

"Emergency transport, two to sickbay," the medical officer said immediately. "Alert Doctor Dering that I'm en route with one critically injured." She couldn't be sure the transporter wouldn't do some damage, but it wasn't likely to be worse than how things already were...

"Lieutant Bran to Security, send a team to Medical," he said quickly into his commbadge. He was sure he was going to get flak for it, but since it was protocol he relied on that. "Johnson," he said simply with a nod.

"On our way," Johnson said as he tapped Bakkar as he walked past. The two would go to medical to ensure security was maintained there.

=/\= Bridge

Meanwhile, the ship returned to its heading and the previously-scheduled strangeness.

 

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