In reply to Jacques Keveloh (msg #228):

OOC1: Different trill from the one Dani shot.

OOC2: No clear shot at the upper trill.

OOC3: ATV has its own (tiny) airlock.  ATV airlock door on left side (away from you).

In the few minutes it takes for the rest of the atmosphere to flow out of the bay, Danica and Hayden arrive in the workshop with the rescue balls.

Indications are that the vehicle bay has less than 0.0001bar pressure.  Dirty looking orange-brown "snow" swirls around the workshop and out into the passageway.

Inside the bay itself there is no motion except for the last vestiges of rocking from the corpse of the trill that Jacques shot.  There are no other trills in sight.

"Pathfinder's lead the way," Hayden said to Jack and Jim with a wink. "Saw that on a recruiting poster I think."

"Of course the Ozawa brochure read, make money and live to spend it." Marks said with a laugh.

OOC: Hayden's carrying rescue balls in lieu of the shield at this point.

Dani trailed behind Hayden with two more of the rescue balls in tow.  Her laser rifle was slung over her shoulder, given her load.  She smiled at Hayden's joke, though her visor hid it; a slight chuckle did escape her lips over the comms.  She cleared her throat in an attempt to cover it.  "The FRA recruiter told me," Danica noted rather deadpan, "that I would get to visit exotic new places and people within and without the Federation."  Then she added after a pause and a slight snort, "He merely forgot to mention the part about blowing those places up and killing those people..."  Her tone is, at least, half-joking.

"Uh, Doc..." the Gypsy Moth's pilot ventured, "Do you want to take these?"  She extended her arms with the rescue balls.  "Or do you want to provide cover with the laser rifle?" she prompted rolling her shoulder so that the laser rifle on her shoulder bobbed up and down a bit, indicating that he could take that instead.

"'Finder's recruited me by rescuing my ass," Jim replied relaxing a bit in the humor.

Taking Dani's balls, Jim added, "I'll stick to that role if you all don't mind..."

OOC: I crack myself up... :)

In reply to Dr. Jim D. Jones (msg #232):

OK, there's still no movement visible through the iris valve or the drone's feed.

To get by the trill that Jacques shot, you will have to push it out of the way somehow.

To get to the ATV's airlock you can go under (1.5m clearance), over (1m), in back of (1m), or in front of (2m) the ATV.  Since you're in zero-G, there really isn't an orientation issue whichever way you go.

In reply to Referee (msg #233):

"I assume you guys are going to recce with the drone before you set foot in there? take a look around, nudge old possum there..."

"Indeed, Thera.  That was my plan - and to see if the airlock looked serviceable," Jim replied.

"Also giving them a moment.  The Trill seemed to have survived for some amount of time on just a tenth pressure - and shown quite some vigor to boot."

Having observed no undue signs of pressure loss from the ATV, Jim sent the drone to the underside of the abused vehicle, to traverse lengthwise and observe the wheel wells.

Jack chuckled as the others quipped about the services. It seemed everyone was loosening up - himself included - now that they were able to finally do what they had come here for.

He eased further into the workshop to allow the others through, keeping his rifle aimed at the iris. He was relieved that a single shot had incapacitated the trill; indeed, it seemed to be dead.

"Once we're ready, I'll go in first to clear the way - and claim my catch." Jack sounded light-hearted but focused. "I vote for taking the route around the front of the ATV - more clearance means less chance of a suit tear. So Doc, once you've checked underneath perhaps you can send the drone around front."

"Sure thing, Jack.  Though I'd like to get a peak around the other side before you risk that," Jim replied, his tone serious once again.

"That recording indicated more Trill than the three we've seen, and, besides, the airlock might be totally unserviceable...," Jim began, trailing off in thought.

"Hey, maybe we should try pushing the ATV against the outer bay wall - if we can find something to safely push with from here?  That would work in this blasted no grav, wouldn't it?"

In reply to Dr. Jim D. Jones (msg #237):

Jim guides the drone under the ATV.  It takes a few minutes to guide the drone into all the narrow spaces necessary to verify that there are no unpleasant surprises lurking under the ATV in the wheels wells or other underbody crevices.

One thing you do notice is that, although all the atmosphere has frozen out, not all of it has frozen solid.  The skin of the ATV is covered with a brownish "dew", indicating that, whatever the chemical composition of the atmosphere in here was, it has a liquid range between solid and gas at these low pressures.  There is no dew on the deck or bulkheads of the bay, or any other surface for that matter, also indicating that there is still some level of heat in the ATV.

Peering out from under the vehicle to the left side of the ATV (the one away from the iris valve), the drone feed captures the forms of four trills.  One is missing a leg, and its' body appears cut up and mutilated.  It is clearly dead.  Two others are floating motionless, their legs splayed out. The fourth, slightly smaller than the others, is also motionless and is attached (clinging, stuck, or simply adjacent is unclear) to the ATV's primary heat-exchanger.  The heat-exchanger is where the excess heat generated by the ATV's power plant would be vented, and would logically be the warmest place in the frigid bay, if the ATV's powerplant is running.  The heat-exchanger is midway between the ATV's airlock door and the back end of the vehicle.  The trill there is curled up, dead spider style, and isn't moving.

The ATV's airlock door looks intact.  As you recall, the ATV's airlock is a tiny, one person affair.  The old joke about it is that it's too small to change one's mind in, much less one's clothes.

You also notice that the forward left corner of the ATV is touching the the port bulkhead of the vehicle bay.  Although going in front of the vehicle has the most clearance in front of the vehicle itself, that way is blocked as soon as one rounds the left front corner of the ATV.  (picture a smaller rectangle inside a larger one.  rotate the smaller rectangle until the upper left corner touches the larger rectangle.  That's the ATV inside the vehicle bay.  Make sense?)

Lastly, can I get a recon check from anyone who wants to try (including Thera or Dagala).

"Hmmm... five of six accounted for, or do I have the count wrong?"

Jim has the drone rotate in place to visually sweep the entire lower bay, including the 'stuck' Trill Jack shot, as he brings it back toward them in order to send it over to the top of the ATV to check for any missed Trill.

Danica handed Jim the rescue balls, allowing him to have some.  She unshouldered her laser rifle and readied it for action.  She flipped the safety and even through her vacc suit gloves could feel the light vibration, the old familiar hum, of the solenoid powering up.  She took a deep breath and made ready to follow the others into the cargo bay.  Like Hayden, she seemed to presume that the Jack and Jim would lead the way.

"Unknown, Doc." she noted dutifully, "Your count is right, but the precise number of Trill that should be present is unknown."  The ex-FRA officer advised, addressing the entire boarding party, in a tone that was authoritative and insistent, "Keep alert.  In my experience, there is always one more enemy than you are expecting.  And that is the one that gets you."

She watched the video feeds carefully, as Doc moved the drone up and around the ATV to get the lay of the land.  Dani purses her lips reflexively as she watches.  "Hmmm..." escapes her lips, but nothing else follows for the moment.

[OOC:  23:22, Today: Danica Moreau rolled 8 using 2d6+2. Recon/Int Check - Drone ATV feed.]

In reply to Danica Moreau (msg #240):

Thera and Dagala view the video feeds looking for anything of interest.

09:05, Today: Thera Santorini rolled 4 using 2d6. Recon Drone feed.

09:06, Today: Dagala Aksina rolled 13 using 2d6+1. Recon Drone feed.

OOC: Thera dropped the ball there, but clearly Dagala has her eye on the ball. (Ok enough ball-gags - oops I did it again...)

After Dani handed Jim his balls...

...her reply and subsequent hmmm-ing had him shooting her a quick glance, wondering if she had succumbed to something or was just remembering past nightmares...

In reply to Dr. Jim D. Jones (msg #242):

In reply to Referee (msg #243):

"Guys, have you noticed that those two splayed out trills have puncture wounds to the head? Looks like maybe these things turn on each other when they're wounded - or maybe it's a mercy killing. That mutilated one that Dani shot the leg off doesn't look like a mercy killing, though, it looks like it's been savaged to me."

"Ah - keen eye Dagala.  An aggressive species to be sure...  though I wonder if those head wounds may not be so much mercy killings as survival of the fittest, or even indications of self sacrifice to sustain another?"

OOC: In an attempt to needlessly use up all the bad rolls ;)

13:27, Today: Dr. Jim D. Jones rolled 7 using 2d6+2 with rolls of 4,1. Life Sci/INT: Wound reasons.
Not sure if Dagala's effect would count as an assisted task, but the difficulty of such speculation certainly isn't routine...

"Perhaps those wounds are from the crew, before they locked themselves in..." Jack murmured, not believing it as he said it. "Though if the trills did attack one another, they've certainly made our job easier."

Jack kept his eyes on the drone feed, slapping the releases on his rifle's back pack and slipping it off his suit. He let the weapon and its power source drift in the zero gravity of the workshop, pulling his snub pistol from his holster.

"We know there's one more in there still kicking, somewhere up top. Once we find it with the drone I'm ready to go in and see if I can draw it out. They don't seem adapted to zero G so hopefully we'll have a bit of an advantage there..." He checked the snub and chambered a round then looked across the frozen workshop to Dani. "Ready for some bug squashing?"

He chuckled. "By squashing I mean precisely placed laser fire from the iris..."

As the Droid headed for the ATV top, Jim picked up his medikit, awkwardly juggling his balls [sorry, it just came out] as he under-compensated for the lack of gravity.

"Well, I'm ready to do some rescuing," he stated, not bothering to clarify who he might be rescuing.

Dani merely interjected into the speculation about the Trill, "Humaniti isn't the only species we have found that turn on their own."  Unfortunately, it seemed to her that every sapient species did it, and many pre-sapient and non-sapient species also seemed to engage in sociopathic and cannibalistic behaviors at various points.  She rolls her shoulders slightly, before continuing, "Especially when limited resources and survival are involved."

She nodded to the Gypsy Moth's navigator.  "Ready when you are." Danica acknowedged Jack simply in response to his query about killing any more living Trill.  She sighted the hole in the iris with her  laser rifle and made ready to move forward with the others.  Her gloved finger was conspicuously held near but not on the trigger of the longarm for the moment.  The edges of Dani's mouth curled up slightly, though no one could see it, given her visor.  While she was not that good in microgravity, given a bug hunt, Dani was in slightly more familiar territory with respect to the immediate mission parameters.

In reply to Danica Moreau (msg #248):

You do not see any trills atop the ATV with the drone.

"Where did the damn thing go?" Jack muses aloud when the drone doesn't reveal the trill. He hunkered near the iris, pistol ready, looking through the slightly open valve for signs of movement on the near side of the ATV.

"Maybe it's suffocated... Hayden, care to do the honors?" he asked, ready to enter the vehicle bay.

Hayden quickly cranks the valve all the way open, before moving out of the way and behind everyone.

Jack's expression watching Hayden hustle to the back of the line would have been comical if anyone could have seen it through his visor. He figured Dani had a smirk on her face too and he instinctively shot her a look as if they were on the bridge of the Moth instead of in a dead ship wearing plasteel helmets.

With the valve open, Jack took his time to inspect the area immediately inside the iris, looking for any sign of trills lying in wait.

"Doc, let me know if anything pops up in the drone feed, I'm going to shut it out of my visual so I can concentrate." He punched a couple chord keys on his forearm readout and waited for any of the cigar-shaped things to drift away from the iris before he took a small step into the vehicle bay.

With the barrel of his gun Jack reached out and poked the nearest extremity of the trill he had shot, a quick, hard stab to try to jar the thing into activity before ducking back into the workshop.

If the trill responds Jack will shoot it point blank with his snub pistol.

If the shot trill does not respond, Jack will check the ATV side of the iris again before moving in to try to dislodge the creature. He keeps his feet under him at all times in case he needs to quickly push back through the iris.

In reply to Jacques Keveloh (msg #252):

The trill does not react to being poked and you are fairly certain it is dead.  It's body requires little effort to push out of the way, though it is still caught by one of its hindlegs in a tiedown point on the deck of the bay.

Jacques works quickly to twist the creatures body so that it will tend to sway away from the iris valve and out of your way.

You see no movement in the bay,apart from swirling "snow" and minor debris while working.  One small brown-black, cigarette sized object floats by.  It occurs to you that it might be a leg bone from one of the small trills, like the specimen Hayden and Dani found in the starboard lab.