Hushed

Posted on Tue Nov 7th, 2017 @ 10:18am by Commander K'Niras Sh'howul & Lieutenant Junior Grade Shras th'Zarath

Mission: S01E02 D-8 With the Devil
Location: Elba II Orbital Transit Station

The shimmering effect of the Musashi's transporter soon faded away as the 'boarding party' materialized, taking solid form once more. Gone was the Musashi's transporter room. Now, they were in some place foreign yet it looked vaguely familiar. A small orbital station, Federation in design. It looked as though it had not been given an overhaul or update in twenty or more years. The environmental conditions were breathable, but there was just something... stale about the place.

Crewmen Mulholland looked around quickly. The station was dimly illuminated as though operating on emergency backup power. There was no welcoming party at all and the place had the most eerily stillness that he had ever experienced aside from being the time when he was a few years younger and his friends had played a joke on him. They left him alone in the dark of the Black Forest. Orson did not find that the least bit funny. "Jeepers Creepers," he said reaching for his phaser. He pulled it from its holster and looked at the Caitian.

Caitians were interesting. At least he had always thought they were. K'Niras was the first he had ever met in person though, but that was not unusual. The young man had only just gotten through basic training. The USS Musashi was his first assignment thus far. Hopefully not my last he thought nervously. He did not want to end up like 'red shirts' that his friends teased him about. "Lieutenant?" he said to the Caitian, noting that the Chief Communications Officer was in charge.

K'Niras pulled a tricorder from his pack, slung over one shoulder and began scanning. The general disarray of everything around them, told him that they needed to be on alert immediately. "Please arm yourselves, but try not to shoot the locals if we find any... so phasers on stun. I don't know what we're going to run across, but the smell in the air says to me that not much is moving around in here. Can someone have a look at the environmental controls? Perhaps get a little bit of fresh air in here... to coin a phrase. Let's keep it sharp people!" He said with much more seriousness.

"This isn't a giant station, but we still need a plan as to how to proceed with our search. Downloading data would probably also be helpful. Especially if we want to find out what happened here. Shras, take care of environment and downloading data banks. I am of the opinion, seeing the state of our surroundings, that we should stay together. Does anyone have any suggestions or questions?" Noting that there wasn't any signs of life in their immediate vicinity, K'Niras righted a seat and took it, in front of a console. "If we can't clear up the air quality, I don't want to waste time on it, but if it's a quick fix, do it." The panel in front of him was mostly unresponsive. "Damnit..."

K'Niras flipped his communicator open. "Musashi... this is Lieutenant Sh'howul. Do you copy?" He might as well report now, so that the ship knew what the away team could be getting into.

A response from the Musashi came quickly. "This is Musashi," replied the voice of the young Trill seated at K'Niras' bridge station. "There's a little interference, Sir. But I can hear you," added Cornet.

"Please let the Captain know that the situation is grim here. We haven't seen any signs of life. We will stay in contact."

The Trill aboard Musashi has a knot in his throat as he swallowed hard. “Please be safe,” he replied. “The Captain and her team are still on Elba II. Commander Samuels is in command, but he’s tied up talking with some Admiral or someone important. I will let him know everything. Musashi out,” added Cornet.

Vanessa materialized next to the Lt. Phillips had told her whenever on an away mission, stay close to the team leader and be ready to protect them at all costs unless otherwise deployed. She was doing that now. She shadowed Lt. Sh'howul and was ready for any trouble. She was equipped with a tricorder and a small first aid kit. And she went nowhere without her light weight Colt. A small back pack with 15 mins emergency air, a container of water and a couple energy bars, just in case. As they moved, she used her tricorder in her left hand, always keeping her right hand free as she had been trained. She was picking up organic scans to their front. "Sir, I'm reading organic material to our front, looks like bodies I'm guessing," replied Crewman Strong as she read the display on her tricorder. "These are humanoid remains sir." As she pondered what could do this sort of thing.

Oh fantastic. My first mission on my first assignment and I’m going to die thought the young Security crewmen. He pulled at the collar of his uniform. “It’s like a dry sauna in here,” he commented as he approached a control console. “This one is busted,” he added.

"This one too," K'Niras replied, moving to another console. "Let's leave the bodies for the moment," he directed at Vanessa. He was horrified that already there were bodies. Indicating his worst fears were probably true and the crew was dead, but who and why. "Are you picking up any readings that might indicate if there were weapons used? I know that sometimes different weapons can leave energy signatures." He finally found a console that worked and attempted to work his way through system controls.

Vanessa tapped buttons at a steadily rapid pace. "No, not seeing any weapon signatures, but maybe it wasn't a weapon as such but some kind of chopping device. Those bodies look like they been through a wringer or something. And if what did that is still here, we need to know sooner rather than later. I'm going to try and tap into this video system to the station via my tricorder and see if I get anything." Offered Vanessa as she went into the equivalent of years gone by Bluetooth tech to see if there was anything there. The best she could do, was what they already had and which is why they were here in the first place. "Just the same call for help sir. Distorted and really hard to discern." As she kept trying whilst still keeping an eye on her Lt.

K'Niras looked up from the console and his ears laid back. "Bladed weapons? Perhaps?" He looked thoughtful, his lips pressed together for a moment. "Maybe we should look at the bodies... best to try and find out what we're dealing with before we sit here like... ducks? and repair things..." Why did people say 'like sitting ducks'? He would have to ask a Teran someday. He stood from console and pulled his tricorder as well. "We need to try to download their data banks. Crewman Mulholland I would like you to stay here."

The Crewmen obliged. "Holding down the fort, got it" replied the young crewmen in security. "I'll contact the ship and have Jakku try to talk me through how to download the data banks," added Mulholland.

"Lieutenant th'Zarath, please see if you can figure what's going on with the life support systems?" K'Niras requested, turning back to Shras for a moment.

Shras nodded. "I'll get right on it. Lieutenant."

"Crewman Strong, you're with me. Let's see if we can figure out what's happened here and have a look at these people. I'd like everyone to keep looking for lifesigns. If there is anyone still alive aboard they might need help. I don't want to go too far yet, so let's not get ahead of ourselves." K'Niras' long tail twitching behind him, betrayed his nervousness. Not only was he under the pressure of leading his first away mission, but they were obviously in a situation that was much worse than they expected.

Vanessa stopped in her tracks. For the first time since they boarded she picked up something on her tricorder's passive scans of the base that did not seem right. "Um, I know nobody asked me, but if someone had asked me, I'd tell them to send over some more security. There's something on this ship that's causing irrational readings on my tricorder, and according to this it's a deck or two below us," replied Vanessa. "I'm just saying." And she was very nervous now!

One of K'Niras' ears swiveled back toward Vanessa, listening to what she had to say even though he wasn't facing her. "When you say irrational readings Crewman, what do you mean? I will have the Musashi put a security team on standby, but I don't want to jump to too many conclusions just yet." He was making his way slowly towards the bodies of the fallen crew. They were indeed bodies. When he reached the first he frowned and used his tricorder to scan the fallen woman. Once he was satisfied with the reading he knelt down to get a closer look at the wounds that she had sustained. They were deep cuts, almost severing her limbs in some places. "You're correct Crewman Strong, these were not made with an energy weapon, it must have been bladed." Not very many people used bladed weapons anymore. Of course Starfleet still taught hand to hand combat, but for the most part it was a skill that often went unused. The Klingon's however, were still very fond of bladed weapons and would often fight hand to hand combat with their long, heavy bat'leths. He didn't want to jump straight to Klingons, but it was looking more and more that way. Why these people? Why this place? What did this station have that the Klingon's wanted? He moved on to the second body of a male. He also had deep, bladed wounds. Neither of the bodies were armed in any way. If they had been then someone taken their weapons too.

Then her tricorder hit on something she believed to be mammal in nature but not human, also somewhat K9, in nature. Then it hit her. The only thing that she ever heard of that could do this kind of damage would be a very large Wolf type creature. "Werewolf?" she asked herself out loud, then she remembered something from an investigations course. No matter how unprovable, when you have ruled out every logical explanation, that which remains has to be whatever it is. Somehow she knew she remembered it wrong but that did not matter. If there was a Wolf like creature on the station, they needed to get off. "This can't be good, but what I'm reading is material that could only be left by some sort of Wolf type creature. And a big one if these readings are correct." She started thinking how something like that could have gotten on the station.

K'Niras put his tricorder away and pulled out his communicator. He stood and flipped it open. "This is Lieutenant Sh'howul, calling Musashi... we're picking up readings of potential animal life... we may need backup." He didn't wait for an answer before he lifted his nose into the air and took a long deep breath. He had spent most of his youth hunting with his brothers, sisters and cousins, there wasn't much he couldn't smell. He wasn't looking for an animal so it didn't occur to him to hunt. Even though the air was stale he had to agree with Crewman Strong's assessment that there might indeed be an animal on board. "Lieutenant th'Zarath? How's the life support coming?" If they could get the air right, he could track it, they could find out what it was and decide from there what to do with it, but as it was the stale air just said it had been here and K'Niras was pretty sure it had probably been most places by now.

Shras' antennae twitched in response in K'Niras' question. One problem, he was a navigator... not an engineer. Looking over the console and using his rather limited knowledge he poked around. "As far as I can tell," he began. "Looks to be fine with a few adjustments." He felt uneasy. He couldn't deny a spooky feeling. He composed himself and punched in a few commands. He made some adjustments, finding the UI rather user friendly. "That should do it."

It only took a little bit for the air circulation to start to clear the stale air. K'Niras took a deep breath of relief. He was feeling like he could concentrate again. He looked around at the away team and assessed what he should do next.

"Animal life?" the reply from the Musashi came. "I do not believe we have an exterminator in the crew compliment, Lieutenant. Should I have additional security sent down?"

"Yes, please," K'Niras replied. "Additional security with perhaps larger weapons..." He lifted his nose into the air again. "When security arrives we will hunt." He grinned a little at Vanessa and then turned his gaze to Shras. "Let's leave off the repairs until we're certain we're safe. I'm not necessarily in a rush to go shooting animals, but we do need to secure it... Crewman Strong? Can you tell us where on the station you're reading the bio signs? Lieutenant th'Zarath and Crewman Mulholland, come with us and we'll see if we can find it. I think we should stay together."

Vanessa did not have to be told twice. "Now that the atmospher is more breathable, my tricorder seems to be working better. The animal is two decks below us and if I'm reading this correctly, is headed for the stairs to come back up. Is it possible that with the fresh get of the air, he or it can now smell us too?" She asked to no one in particular. "Then her tricorder beeped a warning tone. Something else was revealed about the animal that was now hunting them.

"We have a serious problem on our hands. I started trying to break into the data base when we got here. I've finally gotten into the data for the cargo bays. It's not as heavily encrypted as the command section. Somebody was transferring a Le Matya which was captured on Vulcan to a Zoo on some God forsaken planet in the Beta Quadrant. It was due to be picked up here and travel on according to these records. I don't show it leaving the station. Apparently this thing killed four crew who got too close when they caught it.." And she read on "Holy crap. It's got venomous claws people. Venoms claws. OMG, how does that even work?" Offered Vanessa Strong with a bewildered look on her face. As she sent the information to the rest of the team.

Shras readied his phaser, just in case. He couldn't help but get a "heebity jeebity" feeling as he heard about the venomous claws and such. That wasn't his ideal of an away mission after all. Nevertheless he fell in behind K'Niras. He had never even heard of a "Le Matya" but mentally prepared himself for anything.

"Ok, I have more information on my tricorder. It seems this thing was a wild beast from the planet Vulcan. It attacks any and everything. They can not be tamed apparently, which might explain all the dead folks all over the place. The best we can do is probably get it back in containment. If we can get the power back up and find a way to get it back in the cage, we might just be alright. But I gotta tell you. Now that the air is fixed, it's most likely hunting us right now," said Vanessa as she held her phaser tight in her right hand and set it to maximum stun.

K'Niras nodded. He too had heard of the Le Matya. His ears laid back in alarm and the hair on his tail started to stand on end. "More than likely it is hunting us," he said in agreement. "Crewman Strong? Which direction is it coming from? I suggest that we try and provide it with as few visual targets as possible." He looked around at his away team. "Meaning... I think we should hide. When it shows itself we can stun it. Please place your weapons on maximum stun and hide." There were plenty of consoles and blind corners in the command center to provide them with hiding spots. Of course they wouldn't be able to hide from the animal's nose, but without a visual target it would have to look for them and give them the time they needed to stun it.

Vanessa scanned the area with her tricorder. She determined the most likely avenue of approach then she spoke. "It's gotta come from that direction over there. And according to my tricorder, it's on it's way and quick. The fresh air most have carried our scent. Everybody seek cover and be ready." As she quickly got down behind a console with the bulkhead at her back.

To be continued...