:ON:
Tru muttered to himself about the bulky
space suits that he had to wear because there was no life support over
on the starbase. He looked around at the other three officers as they
rematerialize on the starbase. The transporter chief was suppose to
transport them as close to the bridge as she could.
"Soren, Jackson. Take a quick sweep of the starbase. See what
you can find. I doubt anyone survived, but who knows. Rommie and I
will head to the Command Area."
"Aye, sir," Jackson replied. He already had
his tricorder up and scanning. The corridor they had been transported
to was empty. Jackson hoped it remained that way, only because that
would indicate there are indeed survivors.... somewhere.
From his database schematics, Rommie new
they weren't far from the command center. He started in the direction.
Soren nodded, having taken out her tricorder already
as well. She headed in the opposite direction as Rommie had.
Tru turned and followed Rommie, still
feeling all to uncomfortable in the suits. "First thing we should do
when we get to the command center is see if we can reinstate life
support. Okay, getting power first would probably be beneficial."
"I-I don't think
that's going to be possible, Tru," Haas commented. He reached the
entrance to the command center and had to force the door.
"The whole engineering section of this station is missing. From
the external views, it almost looks as if it was surgically r-removed,
albeit a poor surgeon."
Tru sighed, "Somehow, I figured you were
gonna tell me it wasn't possible. Let's at least get all the
information that we can as quickly as we can. You have the external
power source so that at least we can get power to some of the panels?"
"I-I had them beamed
into the command center, so they should already be waiting," Rommie
confirmed. As he entered the command room, his hand beam came across
two white boxes sitting in the center of the room. "There they are."
"Good. Let's get to work. We can split up
and work on two consoles to get the work done twice as fast. I'll work
on getting logs downloaded if you want to work on starbase sensors and
recorders."
"You got it, BOSS" Rommie said. He had a
hint of humor in his voice knowing how much Tru ENJOYED being the
acting XO.
Tru glared at Rommie for a moment, though,
because of the face shield, it was not evident. He just moved one of
the white boxes and started working on connecting it to a console that
was near by.
Ltjg Daniel Jackson was the first to descend the ladder to get
tot he next level. He moved cautiously into the corridor and scanned
again. The corridor was completely dark . . . the emergency power had
already died out which would have provided at least a low level of
light. Dan scowled as his tricorder did not register any life forms.
His scowl deepened as his hand beacon showed numerous bodies in the
corridor. Some were ripped open by disrupters, others by manual
weapons.
Soren followed Jackson down the ladder and looked around at the dead
bodies. "Did the Firegon run out of disrupters? It seems illogical to
use manual weapons if they didn't. Much higher chance of sustaining
injuries yourself."
"It may seem illogical to you, Soren,"
Daniel replied, "but to a race like the Firegon, it was probably more
gratifying than disrupters."
He continued his search down the corridor. As far as he could
tell the bodies were mostly of station security people. Figures they
would go without an argument. The other rooms he scanned were empty.
"It is still inefficient. The Firegon are too much like
the Klingons in that respect. The enjoy the brutality of things. Very
illogical." She kept searching the area, quickly scanning most of the
bodies looking for any evidence that might be found. She took detailed
scans of some of the disrupter blasts, and of the damage done by the
manual weapons. It might come in useful later.
Rommie tapped into the console with the
power supply. It came to life. He started a search through the recent
sensor logs. He saw the approach of four ships. Three of them were
definitely Firegon. The fourth he did not recognize and the station's
databanks had no such ship listed. The unknown ship fired on the
station. The three other joined in, eventually wearing down the
station's defenses.
Rommie could see another energy pattern indicating the station
could not send out a distress call. That would explain why no one knew
what had happened. Suddenly the sensor data stopped. Rommie guessed
that was when the deflector array was destroyed, blinding the station.
Tru had the computer run a list of recorded
logs, starting with the most recent and working backwards for 6 hours.
He knew that the last contact with the station was 5 hours ago, and
gave an extra hour for leeway.
He downloaded the information to the PADDs that he had brought
along. While he waited he played the last duty log entered by the
Commanding Officer of the Starbase.
"Rommie, come take a look at this."
Still somewhat stunned by the ferocity of
the Firegon attack, Rommie shook his head and walked over to Tru.
"What's up?"
"The Commanding Officer was able to make a
brief recording during the attack.
"It looks like he made the recording after shields and weapons
were disabled on the starbase."
Tru played the recording for Rommie to hear. The Commanding
officer indicated that he had tried to send out a distress call, but
that it had been jammed. He also indicated that the unidentified ship
was crewed by the Firegon and that he had never seen anything like it
in his entire career.
The CO had attempted to sound the abandon starbase, but
unfortunately, it was too late. The few ships that made it out of the
starbase were destroyed within seconds.
Before he was able to finish the log, a group of Firegon appeared
behind him. One of whom carried a Batleth like weapon. The last image
on the log was of the weapon being dug deeply into the back of the
commanding officer and the other Firegon laughing.
"By the holy goes," Rommie muttered almost
silently. "Th-this shows the Firegon have gotten some new technology
since we last encountered them, Tru. I-I don't like this at all."
"Neither do I. I think we should inform the
Captain immediately. Who knows if the Firegon plan on coming back
anytime soon. The Eagle could be a sitting duck out there right now."
"Th-the downloads should be completed," Haas
said. "Let's get Soren and Jackson and get back to the ship."
"No arguments from me."
Tru tapped his comm badge. "Lts Soren and Jackson. Report back
to the beam in sight immediately. We are getting off this starbase."
He then contacted the Eagle and informed them of the plan. He had
the transporter chief beam the white boxes back to the Eagle.
"Let's go meet Soren and Jackson. The sooner we get off this
place the better I'll feel." He headed out of the command area.
Jackson had just opened the next access door
to get to the ladder to go down the next level. As he peered through
the opening, He saw there was no next level. It was a good thing the
atmosphere was already gone, or he could have been sucked right out
into space.
Daniel turned back to Soren, pointing his thumb over his
shoulder. "We're done here anyway."
"Indeed. You should be more careful in looking where you're going. If
you had fallen out in space, it would have been most troublesome
getting you back. Based on the risks and rewards, it might have been
worth the effort." She turned and headed back carefully the way they
had come.
"Soren?!" Jackson said in a jovial shocked
tone. "Did you just make a joke?"
"Vulcans don't make jokes."
:OFF:
Lt. Cmdr. Tru Lee Lost
AXO
USS Eagle
Lt. Cmdr. Roman Haas
CEng
USS Eagle
Lt. Soren
NPC by Gwen
Lt. jg. Daniel Jackson
NPC by Rommie
