Boradis III

Posted on Wed Jun 5th, 2019 @ 5:30pm by Commander K'Niras Sh'howul & Lieutenant Commander Seleya & Lieutenant Kate Jackson & Lieutenant Junior Grade Ethan O'Donoghue

Mission: S01E04 The Outpost Has Eyes
Location: Boradis III
Timeline: TBD

ON:

K'Niras was sort of excited to be taking a team to Boradis III, despite the heaviness of their assignment. It was possible, on the surface, that they could encounter a lot of things that would be unpleasant. Hopefully not, but the Caitian had learned a long time ago not to get his hopes up too much. People disappearing with just a horror movie sounding communication never led to anything good. Hopefully, somewhere, they would also find survivors. It was very hard to go into an away mission without some sort of hope.

He sent messages to his team, letting them know that they needed to meet him in the transporter room, for them to go down to the planet. He had faith in the team that he and the captain had decided on. The new doctor, the kidnapped doctor, Lieutenant Jackson and Ensign O'Donoghue. They had been instructed to come decked out in their environmental suits and the medical team had been asked to bring inoculations against the radiation on the surface.

He stood in the transporter room and struggled a little with his environmental suit. They did not make these things with Caitians in mind and it was a little uncomfortable. He wondered if larger members of his species, with full manes, had the same trouble or perhaps even worse. The last time he had worn one it had choked him the whole time, this time he had asked for a little bigger size. The fit of the suit was much better, but the helmet kept sliding down and he couldn't quite figure out where to put his tail. As he waited for his team to arrive he finally worked out the problems with his suit.

Doctor Egan Calix was not going to forget a damn thing. He was not pleased as to how he came to be in Starfleet or serving aboard the starship Musashi. However, none of that mattered right now. There were colonist missing and nobody knew exactly what they would be beaming down to. Egan arrived dressed in the environmental suit with the necessary equipment with him.

Seleya had left her meeting with the Nurse and headed to her quarters. After a shower and a change into a jumpsuit she went to get suited up. Nobody would notice her outfit under the suit. She sighed as she slid the suite on and clicked the helmet into place. It had been a while since she'd been in one. They were uncomfortable but she was glad to be a part of her mission. She slipped on her two bags the medical bag and the tricorder, a clunky thing, and she headed to the transporter room. She entered to find she and XO were the first ones there. "Sir," she said with a nod of her head.

K'Niras smiled, just showing his front teeth. "Hello there, medical team. Now we just have to wait for O'Donoghue and Lieutenant Jackson. I'm glad you're both here. Do you both have phasers? If not, we need to get you some."

Seleya raised an eyebrow. "I do not require a phaser. I save lives, not take them."

"I understand, Doctor," K'Niras said, with a nod of his head. "But there are potential hostiles on the surface. I would hate for you to be unarmed and caught unaware. We can't afford to lose you, Doctor. Apparently, doctors are valuable commodities. Will you please just consider it. I'm not asking you to carry it out... just have one."

She gave a nod. Orders were orders. "Very well." She took the phaser, securing it to her belt.

When Kate received the order, she wasn't sure if she heard it correctly. She went to the EV suit room to get hers. It had been a while for her since she wore one. She never had a mission that required her to wear one before. And most of the time she was asked to analyze date. But she was trained for these missions, so it was nice to go out on one. She put the suit on and then looked up a tricorder and a phaser before going to the transporter room. She had equipped her suit with the phaser and tricorder, but had her helmet under her arm. She would put it on once she got to the transporter room and onto the platform.

As she walked into the room, she noticed there were already people there. And she greeted them with a soft nod.

K'Niras nodded to Kate and smiled a little. "Greetings Lieutenant. Thank you for joining us."

EJ walked in adjusting his phaser. "Sorry I'm late, Lieutenant. Helm needed resetting," he said as he looked to everyone and smiled, The transporter room was packed the entire landing party was here, Wasn't his first rodeo, but my gosh did it feel like it. He hadn't been on a landing party since they destroyed the Klingon shipyard.

"Alright... now that you're all here, there are going to be some ground rules. Do not remove your environmental suit for any reason. There will be radiation as well. Avoid it as much as possible, but we will require inoculations. It is possible that we will find bodies. I want you all to prepare yourselves for that now, although, it is just as likely that we will find survivors as well. We don't know what caused their disappearance, so let's not assume it came from space and left. It is possible that we will also encounter a hostile species. Please have your phasers at the ready. We will need to put extra care into looking everywhere for survivors. Use your tricorders and keep your eyes open. Are there any questions?" the Caitian officer asked of his team.

Egan spoke up. "Not a question, but I have tweaked my tricorder to render it more capable as a Geiger–Mueller counter. I will make sure that I keep my eyes on the radiation level and exposure," said the medical officer.

"How long does it take you to make those adjustments?" K'Niras asked, impressed with the young man's skill. "It might be necessary to split up into teams on the surface so we can be as efficient as possible. It would be nice to have at least one more tricorder that could do that."

Doctor Egan Calix handed over the large tricorder to the Caitian First Officer. "This one's calling your name then, Lieutenant," replied the doctor. "It will take me awhile to configure another tricorder, but I can get it done. So long as we don't take fire as soon as we beam down, I'll have another tricorder reconfigured in about five minutes or so."

K'Niras took the tricorder offered him and held out his own for Egan to adjust. "I think we can wait here, for you to do that. I think it would be best if we don't take that chance. Thank you, Doctor. It's very useful. Where did you learn to do that?"

"Risa wasn't always known for being a pleasure planet, Lieutenant," replied the doctor. "I may be too young to have experienced it myself, but everyone has heard tales of the quakes, storms, and radiation of Risa's past. I always sort of had an interest in tinkering with my medical toys," admitted the young Risan man. "Sometimes, you don't have the equipment you want or need, but you need to learn to make it work."

The Caitin nodded. "Right you are... Are we all clear on what we need to do?" He looked around at the gathered team.

Seleya gave a nod and took her place on he transporter pad.

"Yes, ready, sir," said Kate. "As a reminder though, I will require sufficient back up, like our medical team here, as I will be required to access the PADDs and nodes to get information. Just a heads up. I am sure the team can handle it." She then got on the platform and put her helmet on.

K'Niras nodded. "We'll see what the situation is on the surface and decide from there, but I'm not going to let anyone do anything alone."

EJ nodded. "Understood Lieutenant," he said, unholstering his phaser and giving it the once over to make sure it was all in working order. He stepped onto the transporter pad with everyone else.

When the tricorders were ready, K'Niras took his place on the transporter pad and made sure everyone else was ready as well, since the environmental suits were necessary. Once all the helmets were on he signaled the transporter operator.

***

When the aura of the teleport faded K'Niras pulled his tricorder immedately. The town that they were beamed into was in complete shambles and there was smoke actively rising from several of the buildings around them. The landscape was barren of life and almost completely silent. Eerily so. It made the Caitian First Officer's hair stand on end all the way to the tip of his tail. They were transported somewhere close to the center of town from what he could tell. The buildings around them were constructed, but not fancy. From the tiny bit that he knew about Humans, it looked like a Human built colony. Except that parts of it were on fire and there were no people.

The town was, for lack of a better term, sacked. Buildings and the environment both showed signs of weapons' fire. K'Niras looked around, turning slowly in a circle with his tricorder in hand, carefully examining its readouts for anything at all. "Let's try and stay together unless we have to split up. We're going to need to search these buildings for survivors. Please look carefully, we're not in a rush," he said when the others had joined him on the planet. He started to walk away slowly, towards a large building close to where they were. "Call out if you see anything... even if it's the smallest thing."

Seleya tried to keep herself in check. She opened her tricorder box and started scanning. The XO was right, from looking around, they needed to be ready for anything.

K'Niras steered the team towards the largest of the structures. It seemed like it might have been a meeting hall of some sort. As the Executive Officer approached, he held his tricorder out in front of himself, noting the weapons' fire on the building. He pointed it out to the other members of the team. "So this looks like handheld phaser fire..." he said, pointing to the specific area he was talking about, where the building had been scored. "But that..." and he pointed upwards to larger scorch marks across the front. "That looks like it came from the sky..." He then looked down at his tricorder. "I'm getting readings from the phaser fire that looks like Federation weapons..."

Seleya had been paying close attention to her tricorder. "I am reading a life sign." She pointed to the room to the right. "Faint but there." She wondered what they would find.

"I'm detecting it as well" replied Egan Calix. "The life sign that is" he added for clarification purposes. "Radiation levels slightly elevated, but nothing to be too alarmed of in the EV suits."

She stepped over to the door and pressed the button to open it. It hissed and whined but stayed shut. She looked at the team leader. "With your permission I will attempt to force the door open." Vulcans had a strength to be envied. She was glad she'd picked it up. She, so far, liked all that she'd picked up from her Vulcan side but not a lot from whatever the heck her other side was. She had a need to get in the room. She sensed desperation and pain and fear. She used all her Vulcan training to let it not throw her. She would have enough trouble with what she found in there. Vulcans were a touch telepathic breed. They picked up vibrations by touch but she had always been so much more. Her touch more sensitive her mind picking up and sensing feelings. She could tell that more than a few of her teammates were stressed and she had to compartmentalize not to be overwhelmed.

K'Niras nodded. "Please, Doctor," he replied with a tiny bit of surprise. He had forgotten that Vulcans were strong. His own species was also known for their strength, but K'Niras was a little on the puny side of a normal Caitian male. Although, what he lacked in strength, he made up in speed. Vulcans though, were often more than a match for even a fully sized Caitian. He had known several in his lifetime, but he had to admit that he had never seen them use that epic strength, so when she reminded him, it had both reminded him and delighted him. He was very glad that their new doctor had claws as well.

EJ looked to everyone as he walked alongside them. His head was swimming, but he was trying to keep his head. Not easy in a situation like this, but he would have to do his best. His tricorder was out in front of him in his right hand and his left was clutched tightly around his phaser, terror gripping him like a wave, as the doctor moved to open the door. "I can help too," he said, stepping forward just incase his help was needed.

Seleya stepped up to the door. She put away her tricorder and took a shoulder width stance. With her hands on each door she closed her eyes and stilled her body. She positioned one hand slightly higher then the other and leaned into the door with all her strength she pulled. There was a long eerie hiss and then the door opened. Seleya was the first through and it was not a pretty sight... or smell. She bypassed several fallen tables and several fallen Starfleet members and zeroed in on the one faint life sigh. She knelt by the woman. Quickly taking her pulse she opened her medical bag and produced a hypo. "I can only do so much to stabilize her. She needs to be on the ship."

"We need to make note of all of the bodies we find," the Caitian said as he pulled out his communicator and flipped it open. =/\="K'Niras to Musashi... we have wounded down here. Is sickbay ready to receive them?"=/\=

Seleya looked up at K'Niras. "Commander permission to speak freely?"

"Please, and never ask me again. I expect you to always feel that you can speak freely, Doctor. I am not afraid of what you might have to say." The Caitian smiled a little, although his expression remained grim.

"It is illogical to ask if sickbay is ready since we had been preparing for just such an emergency. Believe me they are ready. I have made sure of it."

Egan pressed his tongue to the roof of his mouth and lightly bit down with an overbite of his partially sucked in bottom lip. She's a Vulcan he thought to himself. Undoubtedly Vulcan his mind retaliated.

K'Niras chuckled. "Right you are, Doctor." =/\="Sickbay, one to transport on my mark. Mark."=/\= The woman disappeared in a swirl of blue. K'Niras had just closed his communicator and put it back. He looked down at his tricorder and went to pick it back up when he heard a tiny noise. One of his ears flicked towards the sound and he froze. When he didn't hear it again he turned on his tricorder and pointed it and himself toward the sound. "I heard something... further in."

Seleya stood and closed her eyes briefly. She said nothing now, but stepped back in line surveying what was happening.

K'Niras looked over his shoulder at her and then around at the bodies that also surrounded them. "I'm not hearing anything now." He shrugged. "We should continue to look for survivors. I don't want to spend time on the dead until we're sure everyone is safe. We should check the rest of this building and move on."

Seleya gave a nod and followed. Their walk took them to a room that was a large round hall. There were so many lives lost here. She resisted the urge to shudder. While the team surveyed the room she walked over to a control panel. "Sir, I believe I have... found something unusual and I have a request."

K'Niras had started to walk around the room, his tricorder out, looking at each body. "There are more Starfleet in here... What is your request, Doctor?" He broke off his search and stepped toward where Seleya was standing, his eyes on her. "Do you think this was a town hall of sorts?"

"Perhaps, but I am getting some unusual readings. I require more study. There is also... some readings that do not make sense." She looked around. "I think this room will tell us a lot."

K'Niras started to walk away from her again, nodding. "What do you mean by unusual readings?" He was looking at his own tricorder and slowly scanning the room with it again. "Does the control panel work?"

She sighed, "Yes, it is working. I will need to take a few samples to run a forensic scan. I do not guess so. I would like confirmation."

K'Niras nodded again. "Go ahead and do what you must, Doctor. Lieutenant Jackson, Doctor Calix... see if any of these bodies have identification of any sort. Ensign O'Donoghue, I want you to stay with Doctor Seleya in case she needs help with those panels. I also need you to download their database. Understood?" He looked around to the rest of the team.

Seleya gave a nod already taking her samples. She would have these on priority. A sudden wave of Deja Vu caught her. There was something familiar about the away mission and she couldn't help shake the uneasiness of being here.

"Sir, if we can get into their database it will help with identifying the deceased," replied Doctor Calix. "Fingerprints, blood, dental records... all of that will help," he added, as he turned one of the corpses over that had been face down. "This one was... Vulcan," noted Calix with some hesitation and a wrenching face. "The blood is green. The face and body is covered in blistering and pustules. Whoever this was, I suspect they were near a heavy radiation area for quite some time."

K'Niras nodded in agreement. "Then that is our priority. We should do what we can to get into the database. That will save us some time and unpleasantness." He was quiet for a moment, looking at his tricorder. "Do you think the radiation was caused by the weapons fire?"

Kate was still looking around with her tricorder. "Sir, I think I may found a computer console nearby. I think I could try and get access to the main frame and get the information you require."

"That one?" K'Niras pointed to the console that Doctor Seleya was working on. "If there's another console that would be good too. Then we could get multiple things potentially done faster." The Caitian tipped his head back and forth for a moment, looking around, then he seemed to come to some sort of a decision and nodded. "Alright... Ensign, Lieutenant, stay here with Doctor Seleya. Doctor Calix, you're with me." He took a moment and checked his weapon again. "We're going to go scout some of these smaller buildings."

***

In about a two hour time period the away team managed to find and rescue twelve survivors in total and had made a significant dent in counting the dead. The pockets of radiation were their largest problem, aside from the fact that the areas of the ground were unstable and appeared to have been made so by orbital fire. The team took readings of everything, including the weapon signatures that they could not identify. K'Niras had just come up against something else he couldn't identify. "Doctor Calix? Could you come have a look at this. These readings are strange to me."

His tricorder was currently displaying biological scans. "This... this... all of this..." He was tapping areas of his scan with one clawed finger. "All from things I'm familiar with... but this." The area he referred to showed a different color. "This keeps coming up R-3 and I'm not sure what that means... and what is that?" He moved the tricoder and looked at the room and then put the tricorder back and looked again. "I don't even see what it's seeing," the Caitian officer stated.

"Sir, R-3 is the designation of a rather particular and peculiar life form," replied Calix who was immediately inching his hand for his phaser. "Everyone should be on alert. You are detecting a life form or life forms, Sir. I don't know if it's just an echo of the radiation or if there's an R-3 life form near," reported Dr. Egan Calix.

With phaser ready, the young physician was acting more like a red shirt than a scientifically minded blue shirt. "We're talking extremely high body temperatures with radioactive elements... severely non-humanoid. R-3 life forms are metallic life forms with blood unlike yours, mine, or even Dr. Seleya's. Where you and I have iron and Seleya has copper, R-3 life forms practically are bumped with liquid uranium... the rest is theoretical. I know of nobody who has ever met a sentient R-3 life form," added Calix.

"Let's not get too jumpy, but stay alert," K'Niras said, putting one paw out toward Calix. "I don't think any of these spots are moving, although I have to admit that I don't know anything about an R-3's size or habits. Maybe we should back out of this area? Is there any way we can take samples of those things?"

"Possibly," replied Egan Calix. "However, I outside of the theoretical existence of an R-3 life form... the practicality alludes me. What will they looks like? Will they be peaceful..." before he could say any more, he looked at the destruction. "If this place is evidence of how they feel about us, I think we can rule out peaceful."

K'Niras nodded. "Yeah, peaceful is definitely off the list."

***

Seleya closed her eyes briefly. A feeling came over her. "Ensign O'Donoghue... I have an odd feeling that we are being watched."

Kate found the other computer console she saw on her tricorder. There was a lot of debris on it and the lights were flickering. She swept the debris from the console and then opened the panel underneath. "It's just a power malfunction, good, the data crystals are intact can reroute power to the console from auxiliary." She went down and started to move cables, moved chips. The console turned off a moment and then flashed back on. When things remained quiet after the comment of Seleya she pulled her head from under the console and looked around while taking out her phaser.

Seleya heard a small sound from a corner. "Someone is alive... a Vulcan!" She moved quickly finding a figure obscured by rubble. "I found him." The beam that was over him would pose a problem. She wondered if her Vulcan strength would be enough to lift it.

Kate followed the doctor, as she found it unwise to go alone. Or to stay alone. She looked around with her scanner. "Doctor, where is Ensign O'Donnaghue?" She wondered if the doctor had seen him. He was out too long.

EJ Got lost easily in places like this. He wasn't far from the main party, but he looked to them. "Over here!" he shouted, as he looked at the console in front of him, hearing his name. "I get the same feeling Seleya, something's not quite right with this place and I can't put my Irish finger on it." He rushed over to assist when he heard a Vulcan had been found.

As Seleya tried to lift the beam there was a low rumble and then a crash. Seleya had ducked down and when the dust settled she looked around. The wall had collapsed trapping her in the room with the now dead Vulcan and separating her from her two companions. She allowed herself a moment of pure emotion and she swore violently.

"Doctor?" Kate called out. "Are you alright?" She looked at the rubble. And still there was no contact with their pilot. She tried to move the rubble. But the wall was unstable and it would take time to go at it alone. She tapped her badge. =/\="Ensign O'Donnaghue, please respond. Where are you?"=/\=

EJ felt the rubble fall and now he was trapped. Some ways off from Seleya his comm badge buzzed. =/\="I'm trapped on the other side, Lieutenant. A ways off from the doctor."=/\= He looked into the darkness. There was something moving in it. Pressing his comm badge once more, =/\= "Lieutenant Jackson and Lieutenant Sh'howul, there's something over here with us, repeat there's something over here with us."


***

When the team had gathered together again, K'Niras looked them over. They had done well. All in all they saved twelve colonists and counted 144 dead, which left a significant number of colonists still missing, apparently with no traces. It had been fairly obvious that there had been both an orbital attack as well as a ground attack. There were non-Federation energy signatures, that suggested perhaps transporters had been used. More than likely to transport the colonists to wherever. K'Niras lifted his eyes from his PADD and looked at his team, suddenly realizing something was very wrong. "Hey! Where's Ensign O'Donoghue? Doctor? Wasn't he with you?" he asked of Doctor Seleya.

"He... is not. We were separated," she said, still shaken by what had happened, but not showing it.

"Son of a..." K'Niras started. "Alright." He flipped open his comm. =/\=Ensign O'Donoghue, report,=/\= he said in a rather forceful tone. He was ready to be off this planet and out of the environmental suit he'd now been wearing for hours and he was a little frustrated.

Seleya listened to the silence of the radio. "Sir... " She looked at her tricorder.

K'Niras turned to look at the doctor. "Yes?" he questioned. He was irritated that EJ hadn't responded immedately. He lifted the communicator to his helmet again. =/\=Ensign O'Donoghue,=/\= he said more firmly. =/\=Report now!=/\=

"I do not think he can. My scanner is not reading his life signs... nor a trace of his imprint, if he were dead. He is simply... gone," she said.

"What do you mean gone?" K'Niras pulled his tricorder out and flipped it open, scanning the area around them. "He can't be gone. Where would he have gone to?" the Caitian demanded impatiently. If they could have seen his tail, they would have also seen it bristling, but he also wasn't reading any sign of the ensign. =/\=Lieutenant Sh'howul to Musashi. Would you scan our area for Ensign O'Donoghue's communicator? Or life signs? He's not responding.=/\=

There was static over the communicator for a moment and then a voice broke through. =/\=Musashi here. Interference... no human... communicator.=/\=

K'Niras looked at his team and then back to the communicator. He was a little concerned. Interference often meant problems with transport as well. =/\=Come again, Musashi? You say no human life signs and no comm signal? What about teleports? Can you beam us back up?=/\=

=/\=Yes, to both... to be problems with... communication. Still... lock. Signal... ready.=/\=

=/\=We're going to look for Ensign O'Donoghue for a moment. Will signal when we're ready to come back to the ship. Sh'Showul out.=/\= He closed his communicator and put it away and turned back to his team. "Alright... two teams of two and we spread out. I know we're not currently reading anything, but it might be interference and I'm not willing to leave him behind."

Seleya gave a nod. "Sir, a suggestion if I may..."

K'Niras nodded and turned to look at Seleya. "Please, Doctor. Any and all suggestions are always welcome."

"One medical person per team... I am not convinced that patching up, as humans say, will not be needed," Seleya said.

K'Niras nodded. "Alright, then Doctor Seleya, you're with me and Doctor Calix goes with Lieutenant Jackson. We don't have time to mess around. So, the doctor and I will take the left side and Lieutenant Jackson and Doctor Calix will take the right side. We're going to look through where we've been, using the tricorders, quickly."

Doctor Calix was studying his tricorder, running through various signals and frequencies. He was tinkering with it at a frantic pace, trying anything and everything he could to find any trace of the missing member of the landing party, the helmsmen of the Musashi. Egan glanced up with the decision to split up into two teams of two. It was logical. They could cover the most ground that way and separating one medical officer per team was a wise decision.

--Team One--

Seleya followed K'Niras as they headed left. Seleya had her tricorder out. "Clear for now," she reported. She couldn't shake the feeling she had. "Sir... I have a feeling as if we are being tracked."

K'Niras lifted his gaze from his tricorder and looked around. "I'm also not picking anything up that we haven't already checked out. What do you mean you have a feeling?" He stopped moving forward and spun slowly in a circle, his tricorder out, trying to find a source for her feeling.

They wound their way away from the first group. When she spoke again they were well away from Egan and Jackson. "It is hard to explain. Vulcans are telepaths, technically touch telepaths but... it is like sensing a consciousness without it being con..." No sooner had she started to speak then a sound from the direction they were going came filtering through. A high pitched grating sound as if a metal object was being dragged across metal. "Well, that is not good," she said stating the obvious

K'Niras' ears twitched forward, even in his environmental suit and then laid back firmly against his head. "That's a terrible sound. Where is that coming from?" He held up his tricorder, but wasn't reading any lifesigns. "I've got nothing... not even a heat signature, although something up ahead does seem to have some sort of coolant leak? Or plasma?" He could definitely see a slow stream of something on the tricorder. It wasn't giving him very accurate readings as far as the composition of the stream and the other puzzling thing was that the stream seemed to be slowly moving from left to right.

"I suggest we proceed forward with caution. There are no life signs," she said, stating the obvious. "I believe if the layout was right that is the... cafeteria?" She sighed. "Shall we?" She headed down, not waiting for a response. It didn't take them long to get to the cafeteria doors and indeed the sound was coming from beyond there. The door was firmly shut. "Commander, can you work the panel?"

K'Niras put his tricorder away and spent several moments looking at the panel. "I think so. Might take me a moment." He tapped at the console with one clawed finger and then set to work pulling the panel apart. It didn't take long before he had the front panel off and the wiring behind it exposed. "Did you know that Humans call this hotwiring..." He chuckled. "Although, technically I think the appropriate term is hacking..." He stripped several of the wires of their casings with his multitool, pulling them free enough that he could touch them together. When he did the door slid open, with only mild complaint. "Might not be as dramatic as prying it open... but we're in." He grinned.

She gave a nod. During his speech she had readied the phaser he had given her. While she hated that thing she would use it to defend them. Something didn't feel right. As the door slipped open she entered first judging it logical if she took the risk rather then him as the commander.

Inside, the sound they were hearing grew louder. In fact, there was one more door and the sound was directly behind that. "Commander, I think we've found our sound."

K'Niras stepped up to the second door. "Yes, but we still can't see it. So we should exercise caution. He tried the door and found it locked as well. He stepped to the door panel and repeated the early process of removing the face and working the wires. "I'm not sure if this door is just going to slide open when I do this, so you might want to get ready."

"Of course." She stepped aside, ready with the phaser. He worked the door and it slid open. They entered slowly and the sensors, which still worked, brought up the lights. There in the corner was a rudimentary bot with a feather duster. It was dusting the walls.

"Must clean, always clean," it said as it whirled about the room.

"Fascinating," Seleya said.

K'Niras frowned. "Well, that's a hell of a thing. In all of this death and destruction I guess some of us still have to do our jobs." His eyes followed the little robot. "Should we turn it off? It seems... cruel to leave it just running pointlessly."

"It is a cleaning bot. Sir... a life is a life. Perhaps it is not sentient in a way we are, but to take its purpose away would be more cruel. You would never shut a human off. Perhaps we can repurpose him... take him to the ship?"

"Take it to the ship?" The Caitian eyed her. "If we shut it off it won't know it's been shut off. Consider it a mercy killing..." He took several steps toward the cleaning bot. "They're not really designed to be left on all the time. What would we repurpose it for?"

"Wait... it could help in sickbay. It could be repurposed to clean the sickbay." She felt suddenly disconcerted about shutting it off.

"But it has a coolant leak and we're wasting time," K'Niras said. "We're supposed to be looking for the ensign. I don't have time to repair coolant leaks to make it safe to bring back. Although if you really want it I suppose they could beam it up into containment..." He sighed.

She gave a nod. "That would be logical. Let's do that." She couldn't say why, but that bot's life was important.

K'Niras quickly took care of the bot being transferred safely on board. "Maybe it can tell us more about what happened here. We have downloaded all the logs we could get to. I'm not sure we're going to find the Ensign though." He sighed. "Do... do you think it's possible that whoever took the missing people also took our Ensign?"

She gave a nod. "A very valid theory. I believe the most logical course of action is to find out information from the computers and to get back into a bigger group. The smaller we are, the more vulnerable."

K'Niras nodded. "We've searched this whole side anyway. He's not here. If he was we would have found him by now." He sighed heavily and put away his tricorder. "Let's go find the others and get back to the ship."


--Team Two--

Egan moved closer to Lieutenant Kate Jackson. "I'm not sure if we should treat this as though he was abducted by someone or something, or that the Ensign has wandered off on his own accord," said the physician from Risa. "Technology, at this point, seems to ineffective. Do you have any suggestions, Lieutenant?"

"I am technically not that crafty, but as an intelligence officer you learn to bypass things to get information better," Kate explained. "My suggestion would be to patch the tricorder in with the colony's internal sensors and boost the tricorders scanners to get a better range."

Egan nodded. "That sounds logical, hopefully the colony's sensors were mostly unharmed by the attack and are unaffected by the radiation," he replied as he proceeded to do as suggested. "What do you think happened here?" he asked her while he worked. "And I'd hate to think of what may have happened to the ensign who is missing, but it does just seem like he has vanished into thin air... which makes no sense."

"Here's hoping," Kate said as she cleared a computer console and started to punch in some numbers. "The colony's main sensors can only be accessed from the control. I think I can bypass it. I just need to be able to connect this console to control." She started to punch in the keys. She had to bypass several security protocols, but as an Intelligence officer, hacking was her work. She put her tricorder on the console. "There! That should do it." She grinned. "Not only did I bypass the protocols, I also connected the tricorder to control." She looked on the tricorder. "And as to what happened here. As an intelligence officer I can't afford making assumptions. But from the looks of things around here and the radiation on the planet, I would think the planet was fired upon from orbit. And I can't really tell what may have happened to the ensign. There could be many explanations."

The young physician nodded, perhaps most in agreement with something he did know very well, assumptions were not something either of them had the luxury of. "As a Doctor, Lieutenant, I very much agree with your stance on assumptions. If I have a patient... I have to examine symptoms, medical history, formulate possibilities and begin to debunk them one by one, or in some cases, two by two until I can firmly give a proper diagnosis," he said to her. "At this time we do not have enough evidence to lead us to conclude one way or another about the Ensign," he added.

"Hmm," said the Doctor, as he examined his tricorder. "Well this is interesting," he said, mostly to himself, but within earshot of the Intelligence Officer. The Doctor reached for his communicator and flicked it open. His hope was that the radiation was not going to interfere much and that the others were close by. "Calix to Lieutenant Sh'howul," said the young man.

"Lieutenant Sh'howul here," the Caitian responded almost immedately. "We're almost back to your location. We haven't found any trace of the ensign. I hope you've had better luck."

"Sir, I believe I have been able to find a faint echo of Ensign Donoghue's life signs... don't worry, I don't mean that in the sense that he's deceased," the Doctor said quickly. "But I am picking up a high concentration of energy readings around that designated area. I'm a Doctor, not an Operations officer, but if my... working theory is correct, our missing ensign was transported off the planet's surface; These energy readings are not like any I've ever seen though. I don't think Klingons are to blame for what has happened down here. I think the radiation and some of these rock faces have helped create an echoing effect on these readings though."

"Shit... well alright. I don't see that we have much choice except to report back to the ship. If he's been taken from the surface then there's nothing more we can do down here. I agree that it wasn't Klingons. These weapons' signatures... Are not Klingon. Let's go ahead and meet at the rendezvous point and get back to the ship," K'Niras replied.

Kate nodded to Egan. "I guess it's time for us to return." She held up her tricorder. "I was able to download the control's database while we were connected. Maybe we can find something interesting on here."

As the team arrived at the rendezvous point, K'Niras flipped open his comm. =/\="Lieutenant Sh'howul to USS Musashi. Four to beam up. Ensign O'Donoghue is currently missing."=/\=

:OFF