According to the scans by the probe, there appears to be only one entrance into the facility. It is also going to be very difficult to transport into or out of the facility due to the heavy shielding.

<===== Mongoose Shuttle Bay
Control+Conn= 15, rolled a 1 and a 14


Miranda prepares to dock with the Facility.
This message was last edited by the player at 12:38, Mon 13 Aug 2018.

The shuttle flies through the cloaking field without any trouble. The sensors indicate it's there, but to those inside, there is no sensation of the transition. Even the view doesn't change, though there was a momentary ripple.

Approaching the facility, it is clear that the only entrance is at the front, but there does not appear to be any docking mechanism with it. On the other hand, even if the Klingons were crazy enough to run across the surface from their ship to the facility--in a vacuum, there would still need to be some mechanism with the doors for air retention.

Otherwise, landing the shuttle rear end to the door is the only option.

There's plenty of room, though, so the landing just requires a bit of finesse... nothing really delicate.

As soon as the shuttle approaches within 50 feet of the door, a force field extends outward. This is the type know as an atmosphere retention field. The door then opens, letting air out into the force field envelope. Sensors indicate it is standard breathable atmosphere... standard oxygen content, standard pressure, and no harmful substances... all within 5% of standard human requirements.

In reply to StarMaster (msg # 3):

As soon as Miranda has the shuttle on the ground, Shard stands and heads to the back, stopping at the rear hatch controls.

"Well, we're here, Commander," Shard says across the compartment to Miranda, as he draws his phaser with his right hand and sets his left near the hatch controls "Any last minute Engagement Orders?  Perhaps you'll allow a safety observation about entering this facility?"

In reply to Shard Vinzz (msg # 4):

" Vinzz and Val, will take the lead. Felis and I, in the rear. Stilk, Kondratev and Blackthrone on the middle Lead, affirmative on the security observation. "

In reply to Miranda T'Shran (msg # 5):



Shard nods in satisfaction.

"Alright, then. If there is someone in that base and if they detected the shuttle approach and if they are hostile..." Shard's antennae were wiggling in all directions in acknowledgement that that was a lot of ifs,

"They have a couple of options, right now, to take us out that don't involve shooting us.  First, if we go out there in a big group, they just shut down the air-tunnel, and we suffocate.  Maybe a couple of us get back to the shuttle, maybe they come out in environment suits and haul us all in before we die.  Either way, some or most of us die."

"Second, we all go out there and get into the airlock safely, we cycle the airlock, but they override and lock us in there.  Similar scenario.  Without the air-tunnel we can't get back to the shuttle and they can have armed guards on the other side of the inner door.  They don't like anything we do, they just suck the air out of the airlock until we cooperate."

"Suggested solution - Myself, Commander Silviene and Engineer Koram Val go over to the airlock, the rest of you wait here with the hatch closed.  Engineer Val hacks the airlock and gets control of it and the air-tunnel. Once we are in control of the exit, I'll come back and inform you, then everyone can leave the shuttle.  Hopefully it shouldn't take Engineer Val that long -- how familiar are you with Klingon technology, Koram?"

In reply to Shard Vinzz (msg # 6):

"Fine Commander. You have a Go on your suggestion."
This message was last edited by the player at 12:33, Tue 14 Aug 2018.

Silviene nods in acknowledgement an moves up with Vinzz at the hatch.

"Yes Sir."

She looks at Koram waiting for his response.

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 8):

Shard looks to Silviene,

"Obviously you are faster than the two of us, Silviene," Shard says quietly to the Caitian, "So I want you to dash ahead into the airlock as quick as you can, in case someone tries to shut down the air-tunnel -- I'm hoping there is a simple command panel for it inside the airlock, that you can use to re-establish the air-tunnel before anyone catches on."

"I've never known Klingon tech designed for everyday use by everyday Klingons to be all that complicated; the majority of Klingons like their devices to be quickly ready for hard use.  Look for a control panel, once you're inside the airlock; it will probably look like a clearly marked, large button or sense panel designed to be slapped hard."

"Val and I will follow along as quickly as we can."

"Not too familiar with Klingon tech, sir," Koram replies to Shard's question. "Got as much as the Academy teaches, but wouldn't mind serving on a Klingon ship for a bit. Not sure I could handle the Klingon culture, though."
This message was last updated by the player at 01:10, Wed 15 Aug 2018.

Silviene nods to vinzz and readies herself to dash across to the facilities airlock. She snorts a bit at Koram's comment about Klingon culture.

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 11):

"Alright, then, everyone standby, I'm about to open the hatch. Silviene, you take off as soon as you're comfortable doing so." Shard turns to see who's closest, so they can close the hatch behind them.

~~ Oh, of course it is ~~

"Ensign Stilk, once the three of us are out through the hatch, you will immediately close it.  If all goes according to plan, I shall return to inform everyone that the control of the air-tunnel and the airlock has been obtained, and it's safe for everyone to cross over."

Shard turns back to the hatch,

"Okay, opening in three...two...one..." Shard presses the button and the rear hatch starts to lower.

As soon as the hatch lowers enough for her to get through, Silviene leaps out and raced for the facility airlock. She presses the panel to open it.

(Do I need a roll for any of this?)

The outer door of the airlock is already open. This facility was set up with a specific protocol in mind... i.e. there is no docking provision, just access. It's an airless asteroid, so unless all personnel were expected to wear spacesuits just to go from the ship to the base, this is the most logical way to do it.

The old Federation ship is a different prospect. It's not close enough for the air envelope to reach it, so, presumably, one would need a spacesuit to reach it. On the other hand, why wouldn't it have been parked closer?

Silviene reaches the airlock without any difficulty, pretty much just flying across the distance in the near-zero gravity. She enters the open airlock with only a slight glitch--she stumbles into the sudden one-gravity of the facility, barely managing to keep her feet at the abrupt change.

Those in the shuttle can see what happens, and since Silviene is standing and not floating, it's a good bet there's artificial gravity in the facility.

After a full minute of waiting, the outer door remains open, and the air tunnel is still in place.

As with normal airlocks, the inner door won't open until the outer one is closed. Normally, that occurs when there is air pressurization in the airlock equal to the interior. That should be the case here, but Silviene can't get the inner door to open. It's probably just an extra security measure, in case the air tunnel collapses.

Silviene hits her com badge. "Everything seems stable at thing time. I'll need at least an engineer to open the inner door, but we might as well send the whole team doing the facility raid. The federation Ship will be harder to access."

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 15):

"Alright, it's clear." Shard says, standing at the end of the rear hatch, "There's air at standard pressure between here and the airlock, people, but extreme microgravity, so be careful."

Shard slaps Koram on the shoulder, "Val, go!  Get started figuring out the controls over there.  Commander T'shran and I will get everyone else over, behind you."

Shard turns and looks over the heads of the group at Miranda, "All set to go, Commander.  Just give the order."

In reply to Shard Vinzz (msg # 16):

Miranda is out of her chair at the mention of her rank. She moves toward the door.

" Okay, people lets get to work. "

At Shard's urging, Koram makes a low-grav dash to the facility. It was more like a hop-skip-jump type of movement. He knew he didn't need to hold his breath, but did it instinctively.

Once he got to the airlock, he began examining the controls for the inner airlock door. Even though it was Klingon, it looked rather standard. He had to wait for everyone to enter the airlock, though, before he could close the outer door.

In reply to Koram Val (msg # 18):

Miranda steps into the airlock and looks around.

In reply to Miranda T'Shran (msg # 19):

Shard joins the last person out of the shuttle and into the airlock,

"That's everyone, Commander." Shard reports to Miranda.

In reply to Shard Vinzz (msg # 20):

"You all should know what to do. Keep your eyes open and weapons ready. "

Silviene readies herself in a traditional bat'leth battle stance. She places herself in the path of the airlock. Feet braced, with her weight on her back foot. She held her bat'leth in front of her across her body in a deceptively loose grip. Ready incase enemies rushed them as soon as the doors opened. Her ears prick forward and all her attention focuses on the space of the doorway. She nods slightly letting the others know she is ready.

He'd waited until it was his turn... no sense in tempting Fate by all of them going at once... and bounced across the short distance in just two low-gee bounds.

He really had nothing to contribute vocally, so he kept silent... and alert.

This wasn't exactly what he considered his job on an away team... leaping across a baron asteroid landscape inside an air tunnel that could collapse at any moment... and without a spacesuit!

It was almost as bad with all of them crammed into the airlock at the same time. He took consolation in the fact that there were qualified Starfleet personnel there with him to get them out of any difficulty they might find themselves in.

And, like R.T., he had nothing useful to contribute to this phase of the away mission, and remained quiet... just in case.

Once everyone was in the airlock, pressing the 'close' button caused the outer door to close. All other things being equal, the airlock pressure should be equal to the interior air pressure.

As soon as the outer door was closed, Koram Val activated the controls for the inner airlock door. The two overlapping halves slid open with only a faint hiss of equalizing air pressure.

Beyond was revealed a room about 40 feet deep and 60 feet across. Two doors were visible on the right-hand wall, another door in the wall straight ahead, and an opening to presumably a hallway down on the left.

Otherwise, the room was empty and featureless.

Silviene's eyes darted around the new room., swiftly taking I  the new surroundings.  She was almost disappointed that there were no signs of an enemy attack. Still she stepped into the room cautiously, slipping over to peek down the hallway to check it for enemies.

"So far so good" she whispered

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 26):

Seeing no one in the chamber beyond, Shard slowly steps out with the other Away Team members and looks around, replacing his Type-2 onto his hip, as he walks in.

"Everyone try to be prepared for anything -- including the possibility that this facility is filled with friendly, helpful Klingons." Shard says calmly, chuckling at that last, "Yeah, hard to imagine, I know.  I'm just saying, be very sure of hostile intent, before you display a weapon at a Klingon.  Even a friendly Klingon will attack you if you pull a weapon on him; if for no other reason than he thinks you want to have a little comradely bloodletting."

---

OOC:

StarMaster:

Otherwise, the room was empty and featureless.

Okay, the "architectural style" of the facility had been identified as Klingon, or Klingon-like from the outside, does the interior follow?  While it is "empty & featureless", does it still fit with Klingon style & design?  Dim lighting, exposed support beams, lots of dim red & orange lighting fixtures?  Y'know, Klingon Shabby-Chic?

The interior matches the exterior for design and construction. It appears the walls were prefab construction... large sections brought in as is and fastened together. No visible supports. Even the doorways have pocket doors.

The lighting isn't particularly dim, but certainly not bright.

Looking down the hall, Silviene doesn't spot anyone lurking there.

Vague electronic sounds and air circulation sounds can be heard. Otherwise, it seems eerily quiet.

Silviene's ears swivel, listening intently for any sound of habitation.

"Strange. Why would they destroy a ship over a facility that doesn't even seem to be in operation? Unless they cleared it out after."

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 29):

Miranda's antennae particulate furiously.

" This situation is definitely twitch worthy. "

Shard chuckles in response, "That very fact points to this place being a Klingon possession, Lieutenant Commander.  Once Klingons conquer -- excuse me -- once our noble Klingon allies take possession of a place or thing, they never give it back, even if they no longer need or want it.  And you should note that while Klingons will acknowledge concessions made in a treaty, they consider any territorial concessions as being 'taken' from them; thus avoiding admitting to any 'losses', you see."

"Okay, let's move along -- Commander T'Shran, would you please go over and check that door near the corner for labels, or indicators of any kind, which might tell us what's on the other side?  Please don't try to open it, yet -- we should wait until we know what's behind the doors we see here, first, then prioritize opening them."

"Silviene, you're closer to that door opposite the airlock, would you do the same, please.  Check for labels or indicators of what's behind the door, but try not to open it.  Ensign Stilk -- I assume you are armed -- would you and Engineer Val, who is armed, please maintain a watch on the hall that Lieutenant Commander Felis was just looking down.  Please remain here, in this chamber, with the rest of us, for now."

"I will look to this door, here, closest to the airlock, for labels.  Doctor, everyone else, please remain in the center of this chamber, prepared to support any of the rest of us, should it be needed."

"If that meets with your approval, Commander?" Shard asks Miranda, "Let's do it."

---

OOC: Just in case anybody missed it, there is a map of the Klingon Facility in the Game Map section.
This message was last edited by the player at 05:04, Thu 23 Aug 2018.

Silviene twitches one ear in Vinzz' direction but avoids looking at him, resisting the urge to roll her eyes at his comments about klingons. She didn't understand how he had gotten into him position with his views. He obviously had no filter. She nodded and moved over to the door, looking for any identifying details.

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 32):

Miranda nods and checks the door.

There are no labels on or next to any of the doors. The doors all have control buttons (4-inch metal plates) on the wall to the left of the door.

The facility clearly isn't large enough to require labels, since it's obvious that this facility wasn't open to tourists. Anyone here would know what each of the rooms are... or would soon find out.

"Affirmative sir, we'll maintain a close watch of this space and alert you if anything should happen. If the space is secure and time permits, I would like to do a full investigation and scan so that a report can be provided to Strategic Command. "

"I'd say this looks like a research facility," R.T. suggested. "Stuck here in the Expanse, it could be that they were studying the Expanse... all this dark energy... and wanted to keep it secret."

"Yeah, maybe it was abandoned, but I wouldn't jump to conclusions just yet. I can't quite put my finger on it, but... this place doesn't feel abandoned."

Silviene presses her ear to the door to see if she can hear anything on the other side. She glances at vinzz and shrugs one shoulder.

In reply to Stilk (msg # 35):

"After we have thoroughly secured the space, Ensign. "

In reply to Miranda T'Shran (msg # 38):

"Correct." Shard agrees with Miranda, as he makes an adjustment to his Security Tricorder, then turns to look over his shoulder at Stilk, "Aren't you scanning and recording now, Ensign?"

Shard rolls his eyes in frustration, "Did you even bring a tri--wait!", Shard pauses in mid-tirade and looks over into the corner of the chamber opposite where he's standing; on the other side of the airlock door.

"Was there always a door over in that corner?  Did I miss it in my first appraisal of this room?" Shard asks, rhetorically, "Ensign Stilk, go over to that door and, like the rest of us, investigate it without opening it, yet.  If you have a tricorder, scan beyond the door for life signs and the presence of weapon-scale energy cells.  Hop to it, if you please, Mister Stilk."

Shard turns back to the door of his own investigation and activates his Security Tricorder, scanning the space beyond the door for life signs and the presence of weapons, as well as using the specific security subroutines in the tricorder to scan the door for locks, alarms, or traps.

---

OOC:
     Okay, on Page 78 in the Core Rulebook, it says...

"The Gamemaster chooses which Attribute and which Discipline are appropriate for the Task being attempted, as well as if any of the character’s Focuses are applicable. This might be stated by the rules, or the Player may suggest a combination, but the Gamemaster has the final say."

     Okay, I'm thinking, for Shard to make the stated scan, he would use either his Reason Attribute of 8 (to reflect he's using & interpreting the data from a tricorder) or his Insight of 9 (rules say Insight is the Attribute to "notice" and "discover" things) and add that to his Security Discipline of 5 (searching out "bad guys" is what Security is all about, and he's using Security equipment to do so).  I don't believe any of Shard's Focuses would apply in this instance--maybe a really weak argument for his double Focus in Survival (hunches about traps??) but otherwise, nothing.
     So, what do I roll, O Wise and Wonderful StarBubba?

"Understood Commander" As the Vulcan moved with haste to the door and began scanning. While he waited for results "It was logical to avoid dispute with a superior officer given recent events. 'Better to ask for forgiveness than permission' as the human expression goes, does not apply well to intelligence."

((OOC: It's silly to waste time and posts putting up the dice roll now... The rules were written for gaming around the dining room table, not on a message board. If you don't put the dice rolls with your post, I'll deal with it.))


Shard gets a vague reading on the scan... no sign of life forms or weapons on the other side, but he is registering electronics... the walls and door are extra thick duranium... so the scans are getting distorted.


Stilk has the same problem with the other door. Scans are a bit sketchy, but no indication of life forms or weapons. Faint indications of electronics.

Silviene looks at vinzz.

"Which door first, sir?"

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 42):

Shard acknowledges Silviene's request with a nod, then turns to Miranda,

"So far no life signs, Commander, nor any indication of live weapons signatures." Shard says to the XO, "Lots of electronic signatures, though.  I'm actually starting to believe this really is a Klingon research station.  So, you want us to start opening doors here, or move on down that hallway, Commander?"

In reply to Shard Vinzz (msg # 43):

" I say we clear each room as we go. We don't want to be flanked. "

In reply to Miranda T'Shran (msg # 44):

"Sound thinking.  Where shall we start, Commander?" Shard asks.

Silviene looks from T'Shran to Vinzz waiting on their decision. She was somewhat disappointed in this mission so far. Not only had there not been much action so far but there had not been anything to push them into either a cohesive unit or push them apart to see where they stood and what would need to be worked on. She watched those in the room wondering which of those here, in a real combat would stand firm and which would fall or flee.

Not that anyone had been expecting to find lurking Klingons in the airlock lockers, but a quick check had shown that there were ten spacesuits stored in them. Only six showed any indication that they had been used. The lockers could have held another ten.

Since the intent was to move through the facility front to back, it made the most sense to start with the door that Stilk had just scanned. His scan had revealed that there did not appear to be any locking mechanism on the door, so he pushed the opener button and the door slid open.

As the shadow scan had shown, this was partly a storeroom and partly the latrine. It seemed utilitarian... very Klingon.

Once inside, scanning the various crates revealed that they all contained various electronic equipment.

In reply to StarMaster (msg # 47):

"Typical.  Only Klingons would fail to store the toiletries near the toilets..." Shard mumbles to himself, as he completes his tricorder sweeps of the stored crates and then reports his results to the XO.

As the last report confirms the crates all hold electronics, Shard speaks up,

"Commander, the basic scans of this place we got from the Mongoose seemed to indicate that all the chambers off of that hallway might be personnel quarters--which, in turn, hold the possibility of there being personnel inside them.  Despite that possibility, however, I recommend our next action be to continue our systematic search, but to enter the chamber door on the other side of the airlock from this chamber--the chamber I scanned earlier, through its door.  I got no life readings or weapons readings, just indications of active electronics."

"And, if the scan by the Mongoose is accurate, there is a door into a larger chamber inside there that leads further into the complex, to a large chamber that might be either a communal gathering hall, or maybe a multi-station work area."

He was getting impatient. While everyone was being suitably cautious, little was being done.

There were no life signs anywhere, though that didn't necessarily mean there weren't any life forms.

"So, this side door over here next, right?" he said as he walked over and hit the opener. He did wonder about the mechanical aspect of it; he wondered why it couldn't be set to open automatically when one approached. Perhaps you could simply tell a monitoring computer to open it.

If nothing jumps out, he peers around the doorframe to see what's inside.

In reply to Roland Thames 'R.T.' Blackthorne (msg # 49):

" Blackthrone, stay with the away team. So if we are sure there is no Klingons let's pair off. Felis with me. Vinzz with Stilk. Everyone not security pair off with a security officer. "

Silviene nods and moves over to T'Shran.

"Yes sir."

She glanced at Vinzz. She wasn't sure about the pairing of him with Stilk. They could easily clash badly. Then again if anyone could handle the andorian's abrasive personality it would be one of the famously stoic vulcans.

Though he gives a small sigh and closes his eyes for a moment, Shard's demeanor otherwise remains calm and collected, "If I might remind the Commander, she instructed me to stand down the Alpha Security Team.  Lieutenant Commander Felis and myself are the only Security officers on this away mission."

"But I do concur with your security assessment, Commander.  I doubt that there are any Klingons in this facility, and if there are, they are likely only scientists or technicians--not to say Klingon scientists and technicians aren't dangerous; they're just less dangerous than Klingon Soldiers.  So I agree, Commander, it's probably safe to split into pairs."

"As Mister Blackthorne has already opened that other chamber, I suggest Engineer Koram Val join him.  Doctor, as odd man out, you should stay with the Commander.  Ensign Stilk, with me, please--we'll go check the room to the left of where Blackthorn is."

Shard heads towards the indicated door.

In reply to Shard Vinzz (msg # 52):

" That works Vinzz. I think it is proven your alpha team might have been to much. Although, one or two extra security might have been helpful. It has been a couple years since my last security rotation. "

Stilk eyed the two Andorians just briefly. For all of their experience and years in Starfleet, much of their actions and planning seemed to be made at the spur of the moment and without communication with others. This was not how Starfleet trains its officers, but he also recognized much of training takes place in ideal situations, and perhaps more importantly, nothing yet had gone wrong, so any criticism was likely misplaced.

"Understood. Following your lead Sir" the Ensign responded in the affirmative and positioned himself immediately next to the Security Officer.

In reply to Stilk (msg # 54):
This message was last edited by the player at 01:38, Sat 15 Sept 2018.

In reply to Shard Vinzz (msg # 55):

In reply to Stilk (msg # 56):

Shard nods his head in agreement with Stilk's comments,

"Valid points about jumping to conclusions too early, of course.  I'm just glad someone else sees the inconsistencies here--whatever their explanation may end up being."

Shard reaches out with his left hand and gives the large button of the door control a solid slap--just as a Klingon would--then activates his Security Tricorder, in his right hand.

"I can only imagine how Klingons must have opened doors in their pre-Industrial period--kicked them open, probably, wouldn't you think?" Shard comments, as the door opens and he starts scanning.

Silviene made a low rumbling noise in her chest. Not quite a growl but a warning sound all the same. She played her ears back and turned away from looking at Vinzz. She stared at T'Shran waiting to move on.

Koram nods in ascent to Shard's direction and heads over to the door that R.T. is looking through. He continues to scan his surroundings with his tricorder, looking for anything out of place, any anomalies.

"Does it conform to the floor plan that the sensors registered?" he asked R.T.

R.T. sees the room as indicated on the sensor floor plan. There's another door in the right hand wall, and another down on the leftmost wall. There are 2 tables each with a single chair, one just to the left of the door and the other to the right. What the sensors didn't show is that there appears to be a half-eaten bowl of gagh on the table on the left.

There is machinery along the back wall. It appears to be a replicator... a Klingon replicator.


Shard opens the door of the other room. It has several tables and chairs in it, and only has the one other door, which probably leads to the room that R.T. is investigating.


T'Shran, Silviene and Sergei are keeping an eye on the remaining door that was straight ahead, as well as the corridor off on the left.
This message was last edited by the GM at 16:54, Mon 17 Sept 2018.

Silviene looks at T'Shran.

"So, what do you think? Did they get out in a hurry after the incident with the catspaw or do you think they are waiting in ambush somewhere deeper in the facility? Its not like klingons to run from anything."

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 61):

" Not sure. Still not sure what is going on. Not sure why the Klingon's attacked us. We are supposed to be at Peace. "

"I cannot say that I gave it much thought, but a first inclination is that it was probably a behavior that adapted overtime, similar to athletes acting in a more dangerous fashion as their protective equipment improved." Stilk responded dryly, the possibility of humor going completely past him.


Stilks tricorder was also being used heavily in the room, looking for any particular oddities. The Ensign personally keeping an eye out for further irregularities, stopped in his tracks as a singular thought crossed him

"Commander, Respectfully request a moment of your time. The pie in the sky may be too far outside the box, as the Humans say, and I may be about to betray my own rules, but I believe this deserves a moment of consideration"

In reply to Stilk (msg # 63):

While Shard kept his eyes looking around the room, he did lean his head closer to Stilk when the young Ensign  spoke quietly to him--both Shard's antennae leaned over to focus on the Vulcan, as well.

 Shard responds quietly,

Shard makes a sweeping gesture with his left hand, the hand holding his Security Tricorder,

Shard glances at his Tricorder, "Now, let's see what we have in this room--is it an instructional or training chamber, or is it a mess-hall?"

Since it is a somewhat featureless room with tables and chairs set up more like a mess hall, and since the only other door out leads to the galley (with replicators), Shard guesses it's supposed to be a mess hall, but that doesn't mean the tables and chairs couldn't be rearranged to serve some other function.


Other than the hallway with the doors, that leaves a door off of the galley and the door that Silviene and Miranda are watching.

Stilk followed into the mess hall, also scanning with his own tricorder, but also looking at the furnishings in the space, and was hit with a knack of curiosity.

"Sir, what do you know about Klingon hygiene tendencies?" Recognizing that his question needed some clarification "Specifically, if a fight broke here, or in any other space, would they bother to clean up the blood?" As he started to pull the chairs back

In reply to Stilk (msg # 66):

Shard grins as he slowly walks towards the door into the Galley, his antennae casually scanning side to side, "Well, despite appearances, Mister Stilk, the Klingons are as fastidious as everyone else--though, like Andorians, they appreciate a good scar.  Klingons are aware of, and concerned about, diseases and other health issues related to hygiene. But remember, also, that the Klingon biology is, in general, very tough and resistant."

Shard halts next to the controls for the door between the mess hall and the galley and turns to look over at Stilk, "When I was a boy, one of my mothers had a saying about something like this--she referred to it as 'dirt tolerance'.  It was a reference to how messy the sleeping chambers of myself and my siblings got, before we felt the need to clean them." Shard flashes a big smile at Stilk, "Needless to say, my 'dirt tolerance' was significantly higher than hers, back then.  So, compared to many of us, Klingons appear to have higher 'dirt tolerances', because, biologically, they can ignore so much more."

"Does that help with your question, Stilk?" Shard asks, as he slaps the door control to open the door into the galley, where Blackthorn and Koram Val should be.

"Gentlemen, find anything?  Ensign Stilk and I believe our chamber to be a Mess Hall, so the chamber you're in should be a Galley, yes?"

"Since that device against the wall appears to be a replicator," R.T. replies to Shard, "I guess that would make this the galley."

He points to the table with the tray of food on it.

"Sort of confirms that, but then it asks the question: where did the eater go?"

"We were just about to open this other door, which, based on the sensor scan map, is probably a store room. Holds the raw material for the replicator, or maybe some real food."

With that, he presses the button to open the door, only marginally prepared for something to jump out if it does open.

Miranda steps up to the door and sees if it opens. If it does she walks in and looks around.

Silviene moves with Miranda, protecting her back, her eyes always scanning everything. Her ears swiveling to catch any out of place sound and tracking the movements of the others as much as she can.

R.T. and Koram see just what the map indicated... a storeroom. Various crates and barrels are stacked around the room. A cursory scan indicates that the containers here all contain food stuffs. There are two barrels of gagh in suspended animation, much like stasis chambers in Sick Bay.

A quick search of the room does not turn up anyone in the room.


Miranda opens the door at the other end of the main room, and finds just what the map had indicated.

It's a wide side-to-side room with electronic consoles against the opposite wall. There are four chairs in front of those consoles. In the center of the wall is a blast door.

Silviene looks at the consoles and the blast doors.

"We should have one of the engineers look at those consoles. Maybe they can tell us whats behind those blast doors."

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 72):

Miranda taps her combadge.
=^= T'Shan to Val, we could use an engineer here. =^=

Since he was the only engineer on this away team, it fell to him to check over the equipment that they found, especially since they hadn't brought a Science Officer.

He stopped first at the replicators, just to verify that the device really was a replicator. There were two... one was a food replicator, and the other was an industrial replicator. That made sense for such a small facility.

They were both in Klingon, though; there were no patterns in the computer to produce anything but Klingon food. At least, it didn't look like it. He didn't have to time to go through the whole list, even if it wasn't that large.

He left the galley room and headed down to the other end of the main room and through the door to where T'Shran and Silviene were waiting.

He pulled up short at the site of the blast door.

"At a quick guess, I'd say that main engineering lies behind that door," he offers. Then he walks over to the four consoles and began examining them.

It only took a few seconds to determine that all four consoles were strictly oriented to Klingon.

"The input/output/interface is only in Klingon," he tells the others. "I suppose it makes sense if this is strictly a Klingon facility. It's not like they were expecting any guests."

"Now that's interesting. These are the master controls for the entire facility. That one on the end is environmental control--covers gravity, heating, lighting, air, water and waste circulation."

"This one monitors everyone's life signs. At the moment, we're the only ones that the sensors are detecting. Okay. Here. There were six Klingon life signs up until 17 hours ago. Then they just vanished."

"Over on this side of the door we have power control, and the end one is sensors and the cloak."

"I'm only getting a power consumption from the rooms beyond the blast door, though. No other details are covered by this console."

Silviene flattens her ears to her head. Trying to sort through the flood if information that the engineer had given out.

"What do you mean they dissapeared? Did a ship come?"

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 75):

Miranda sighs.

" I suppose you should at least attempt to search for transporter trace. "

Silviene opens her mouth and inhales, trying to bring any scents in the room to stimulate the jacobson's organ in the roof of her mouth. Anything out of place. There were no signs of battle so far. It seemed as if the klingon researchers had simply vanished. It must have been a transport, but why? Why abandon their work and the lost ship?

"It'll depend on how long ago the transport was," R.T. said, "and what system was used. I don't see any transport controls here."

"17 hours could still be within Rozhay's limit."

He uses his tricorder to scan for transport traces.

15:33, Today: Roland Thames 'R.T.' Blackthorne rolled 15,16 using 1d20,1d20 ((15,16)). Reason+Science.

Bleh.

"I'm not reading any transporter residue," he reported.

"I think it's a fairly reasonable assumption to say the answers lie behind this other door," Koram offers.

"It's another heavily shielded blast door. And you've probably noticed that the whole facility is just as heavily built. Even for Klingons, that's a bit of overkill... especially since this place isn't armed."

He walks over to the door control, makes sure that Silviene is ready, then stands aside as he pushes the door button.

Silvine stands ready at the door with her batleth in a loose grip in her hand just in case.

According to the equipment in this room, there wasn't anyone in the room beyond. As Koram opens the door, it quickly becomes apparent that the equipment was accurate, as there was no one in the room.

There's another blast door leading into the last room; it's closed.

This room is longer than the previous room, almost twice as large. It has an impressive array of electronic equipment down on the left, a pair of consoles down on the right, and another pair of consoles right in front of you, in the middle of the room.

All of the equipment appears to be active.
This message was last updated by the GM at 07:29, Thu 25 Oct 2018.

Silviene twitches her ears in agitation. Where was everyone? Why would klingons abandon this station without a fight? Why leave everything running?

"Something is wrong here. Why leave everything running when they left?"

"Yeah, something's been wrong here ever since we arrived," R.T. added.

"Looks like you're up again, Koram. What does all this stuff do?"

"We should probably wait to open the next door... I believe it's the last one, except for those down the hallway, which, from the floor plan, are probably living quarters... until Koram tells us what's behind it."

In reply to Roland Thames 'R.T.' Blackthorne (msg # 83):

Shard steps slowly into this second 'control room', pointing his security tricorder at everything.  Halting at the center of the room, he looks around and makes an observation,

"Alright, if this were a Federation facility--which I acknowledge it is not--and Koram had identified that outer room as having controls for everything needed to run this base, then we would assume that this control room is the central observation point for whatever experiment was being run at this facility.  And that behind that door..." Shard points at the as-yet unopened blast door at the far end of this room, "...would be one of, if not the only, laboratory where the experiments are actually taking place."

"Of course, this isn't a Federation facility, and I have no idea how Klingon scientists conduct their experiments, so I'm likely whistling in the cold, here.  But I think it would be a good idea to assume that whatever is behind that door, the chamber beyond is likely to be more dangerous than any we've seen so far.  Be cautious.  Mister Val, have you identified any controls that might let us see what is on the other side of that door?"

In reply to Shard Vinzz (msg # 84):

" As far as I follow you, Mister Vinzz, it seems your logic is sound. So, lets be careful. "

In reply to Miranda T'Shran (msg # 85):

"Right. Thank you, Commander." Shard acknowledges with a nod, "Alright Stilk, while Koram continues to try and access any kind of security video feed from inside that chamber, in there, why don't you start on getting the door open?  Everyone else, stay on alert."

As soon as the door was open and it was determined that there wasn't anyone in the room, Koram headed for the main control panel but he could see out of the corner of his eye that all the other panels were active.

The main control was mostly power distribution, but there was also a secondary control for a series of force fields. Unfortunately, while it gave the energy rating for the fields, it didn't actually say what they were for. Probably to the Klingons that set up this facility it was obvious.

That was the real issue here. He could read the language, but he wasn't familiar with the way Klingons used symbols and 'abbreviations'. They also didn't think quite the same way as Humans and other Federation species.

"Okay, here it is," he said as he found the button that toggled between screens. The second screen showed the status of all the other panels in the room.

"These are control panels for an assortment of energy types... apparently they were generating them as well as detecting them. We've got tetryon emitters, graviton generators, neutrino collectors, theta-band radiation monitors... polaric ion exchangers, anionic pulsators... They've got a harmonic resonance chamber set up... although it's reading at zero right now. That makes no sense."

"Sorry, Shard, there does not appear to be any cameras that view the other room. It might be a Klingon privacy thing... or it just might mean that there was no reason for anyone out here to look into the room."

"I'm not showing any radiation in the other room... at least not on these consoles. There is flicker of tetryon particles."

Silviene nodded to vinzz and remained ready dispite the lack of action so far. It wouldnt help anything for something to go wrong just when she'd stopped being ready for it. She glanced at Val but she wasn't a scientist so she only had the barest idea of what he was talking about.

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 88):

"Alright, Stilk, let's see about getting that door open, then." Shard says.

Stilk moves over to the door, stands to the side and pushes the button that should open the door.

There didn't appear to be any way to lock the door, and it was clear that the doors in this facility weren't security oriented.

So, the door slides open.

The first thing that happens is that everyone's communicator receives a distress signal.

The second thing that Stilk and Shard see is the hole... in space.

Somewhat in the center of the room is an energy effect that kind of looks like a miniature wormhole... at least like the one at Bajor.

In reply to StarMaster (msg # 90):

"Only the Klingons..." Shard grumbles, as he reaches for his comm-badge, "Only the ice-hole Klingons would open a mini-wormhole in a gravity field!" he shouts, then taps his distress signal receiving comm-badge,

COMMS>>> "This is Lieutenant Commander Shard Vinzz from the Federation StarShip USS Mongoose.  We are receiving your distress beacon, can you respond?  What is your status?  How many survivors?  Please respond if you can."

Shard releases the comm-badge, "Stilk, get what tricorder readings you can from there and then back off!  We don't know how far out the effect of that thing reaches--you could get sucked into it just by reaching out your hand, so be careful."

"Silviene, take Koram and R.T. and--I don't believe I'm actually considering this--go back through the store rooms we've found and get all the ropes or cargo straps you can find.  Anything that we might be able to pass through that wormhole to try and extricate the so-called scientists who might be stuck on the other side.  Go!"

"Doctor, I think you should stay here, in case someone injured comes through while we're waiting.  Commander," Shard says, addressing the XO, "I believe you, Mister Stilk, and myself should arm ourselves and keep a watch on that--wormhole, portal, dimensional gate, or whatever it is--just in case the Klingons that were here, didn't leave voluntarily."

The distress signal is very weak.

It only takes a few minutes for Silviene, Koram and R.T. to return with... nothing.

=/\= "This is Commander Meng of the Klingon Research Facility pegh QeD! You are trespassing on Klingon property!" =/\=

In reply to _Meng (msg # 93):

OOC: Oops.  I got the wrong format with the comms identifier, there.  Got it, now.


=/\= "I'm sorry, I didn't quite get all of that--your Emergency Beacon seems to be over-riding your regular comm signal.  I say again, this is Lieutenant Commander Shard Vinzz off the Starfleet starship USS Mongoose.  We were exploring the Expanse when we detected a faint call for help from what we thought was another Federation vessel.  We followed that signal to your super-sneaky research base, hidden in unclaimed territory, right next door to a Federation vessel that's been listed as missing for a very long time.  When we hailed, nobody answered, so we came down to see if we could be of assistance to anyone--you know how us Federation types are about jumping in and helping folks. =/\=

=/\= "When we got down here--pretty easy, since nobody was manning the control station for the stealth shield around this entire asteroid--we found an uninhabited station--not a soul to be found, here.  And, y'know, now that you mention it, the architecture does sort of look like Klingon construction!  Imagine that.  Well, anyways, with nobody here or aboard the old Federation wreck, we were about to recommend to our Captain that we just shut things down, here, and file a report about the base when we return to Starbase Narenda, in about eight months-or-so." =/\=

=/\= "But then we hear your emergency signal--coming out of what very much looks like an un-monitored, un-supervised, possibly un-stable micro-wormhole, here in the back store room.  I'm told these things can be very, very dangerous, sir.  So I ask again, do you require assistance?  If you and anyone with you are fine where you are, we'll just shut down this facility--since nobody is here to run it--and be on our way again. =/\=

=/\= "Or, and I can't imagine why you would want to, but, should you wish to file a complaint or make some other kind of official record about this incident, please feel free to make any statement you wish--as everyone knows, it's standard operating procedure for Starfleet comm-badges to record all message traffic that passes through them." =/\=

=/\= "Over to you, now." =/\=

Shard took his finger off his comm-badge, and smirked at T'Shran, "He's either going to come charging through that wormhole--if he can--to retake control of his base, or his head is going to explode because he doesn't dare have a recording made of what he really wants to say to me."

=/\= "This is Kreyton, chief scientist for this facility. Meng is just frustrated because there is nothing here to fight."

"During our experiment, there was a power surge. We were all pulled through an aperture in space. We cannot return. We require your assistance." =/\=

Silviene eyes Vinzz.

"Sir, I have experience with Klingons. Shall I talk to them?"

She starts speaking softly. Like going over a translation.

"nuqneH, Silviene, ghojwI' Duypu' wo'rIv. ben law' batlhmey wo'. laH DaQaHlu'meH vay' wIlo'bogh"

(Anyone who understands Klingon should get Hello, I am Silviene, student of ambassador Worf. Glory to your empire. We will do anything we can to assist.)

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 96):

Shard thinks for a moment, then nods, "Yes, there are three things we need to know right now.  First, is anyone over there injured? Does anyone need assistance to move?"

"Second, how many of them are there, in total?  So we can be sure we've rescued them all."

"And Third, when he says they were all 'pulled through' that thing, just how far away from the opening was the furthest person located?  We need to know how close we can get to it and remain safe."

Silviene taps her com for the distress signal.

"nuqneH, Silviene, ghojwI' Duypu' wo'rIv. ben law' batlhmey wo'. laH DaQaHlu'meH vay' wIlo'bogh"

She nods to Vinzz adding his three questions.

"rIQ vay' pa'? boQ vIH nIS vay'? tu'lu' 'ar? chay' Hop Ha' Sam Hop ghot? vaj chay' SoQ laH Suq chavmeymaj ratlh QaD DISov."

Koram had continued to check all the control panels in the room, finding most of them to be monitoring stations. While the panels had minor controls, they didn't have any way to affect the other room.

"Based on that data, I think I know what they were doing," Koram says.

"Most of the control panels are in the other room, though. I believe they were trying to create a forced singularity as a power source, much like the Romulans have done."

"There are six of us," Kreyton replies.

"None of us are physically injured, but we are not in perfect health. Possible radiation problem of some kind."

"All six of us we in the... experiment room when it was activated. We do not know how far the effect spread though it did bring the core system with us. It has no power."

In reply to _Kreyton (msg # 100):

COMMS>>> "Message received.  We are assessing recue methods.  You say the core system is there with you and has no power, so you have no control over there.  We have engineers with us--could we possibly alter the system from this side to bring you back?"

Shard considers the situation while waiting for an answer from the Klingon scientist,

"Alright, anyone have any bright ideas?" he asks the Team, "Anyone have any dull ideas?  In-the-Box, Out-of-the-Box, or even Off-the-Wall?  Now's the time to speak up.  How're we going to get those sophonts back here?"

"Anybody think just tossing a rope through that event horizon and pulling them back through will work?"

Suddenly both Shard's antennae and his white eyebrows rise up,

"Wait!  What I just said--pull them through." Shard says, "Remember, we came down here in a shuttle because we couldn't beam through the cloaking shield with certainty--and we brought pattern enhancers with us, to overcome that effect.  What if we tossed the pattern enhancers over to the Klingons, they set them up and activate them, then we use the runabout's transporters to beam the Klingons back here?  One at a time, if we have to."

"That's just me thinking in rescue operation terms--any of you engineers or science types have any thoughts on it?"

"Until we actually enter the room and peer into the... 'hole'," Koram offers, "we don't know that anything can pass through the 'hole'. I'm not sure it actually is a wormhole--it could just be something resembling it."

"Physical objects may not be able to pass through. I'll need to look at all the equipment in there... see what it's telling me."

"If we can pass something physical through, we could send a portable generator through. I wouldn't be so sure, though, that the device on the other side could bring them back, or that the Klingon scientists could manage it."

"As for the pattern enhancers, good idea, but not sure the Mongoose's transporters will be able to penetrate this facility's walls."

"Which reminds me... we should be able to contact the Mongoose using this facility's communication system."

Silviene considers all the incoming information.

"We could try sending something through and asking if it arrived with the Klingons"

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 103):

"Exactly, Silviene, we'd test it before we started using it on people--even Klingons" Shard said with a grin, "And Koram, I agree with you that I'd like to use the Mongoose's more powerful Transporters, but my suggestion was to use the Transporter system aboard the Runabout, just outside.  Or, are you saying you don't think the Runabout's Transporter is powerful enough, even though it's closer?"

"As for going into that chamber--well, Mister Val, you are the person I'd ask, to determine if that's a good idea.  So...do you feel it would be safe for you to enter that chamber, with that active whatsit in the middle of the room?  If you think it's safe, I'll authorize it.  Up to you, Engineer."

In reply to Shard Vinzz (msg # 104):

Miranda smiles as she makes a personal note that she will have to think quicker around this crew.

" I concour with the Lieutenant Commander. The Runabout's shuttle out to be enough and Mr. Val your opinion about the safety of your movement is important to note. "

"I'm not detecting anything harmful," Koram replies. "Energy, that is, coming from the other room. The Klingons partitioned this facility in such a way that energy is shielded from penetrating the walls, ceiling, floor... I'm thinking now that was not from the outside but from what they were doing inside."

"I doubt that the runabout's transporter will reach through the... hole... even with all the doors open."

"Anyway, I can't really be sure that the other room is safe to enter unless I can look over all the controls... IN the room. You call that a 'catch-22', right?"

Silviene twitched her tail slightly.

"Again the best test might be to push something into the room and see shwat happens."

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 107):

Shard sighs,

"Right, fine, then." Shard grumbles, "Well obviously the Klingons survived a short exposure to the--hole, portal, whatever--as well as surviving the passage through it.  And since there appears to be no way to shoot a transporter beam into that vortex--are you sure about that, Koram?  What if we got more pattern enhancers and set them up in a series between the Runabout and the vortex?  Y'know, like angling a series of mirrors to reflect a beam of light around a corner?"

"But anyways, if we can't use the transporter, then obviously we have to do this the moronic way--somebody has to go through the vortex and bring back the Klingons.  Given concerns for the possibility of radiation build-up inside that lab since the creation of the vortex, I suggest the use of an environment suit.  Should be one on the Runabout.  Also, we take all the EVA Safety Cable from the Runabout--use the runabout's replicator to make more, if we think we need it."

"So, wearing an Environment Suit and clipped to an EVA Safety Cable--which we secure the other end in here--then we open the door to the lab, there, for just a few seconds for someone to enter then close the door, then I enter the vortex, pass through, and get the Klingons.  We have comm contact, so once I've got all the Klingons secured to the cable, I send a signal, and all of you pull us back through."

"That is the most moronic plan I can think of, so it should work.  Right?"

Silviene blinked slowly at Vinzz, trying to work out his logic. Honestly the man baffled her, but he was her superior officer.

"Um Sir, don't you think we should do a test run on an inanimate object before exposing a humanoid to a potential wormhole? I'm not scientist or engineer but that seems safest to me."

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 109):

" I agree, and as this is my away mission to command. Felis, you may choose an appropriate inanimate object to test with. "

Silviene thought for a moment. She wasn't sure her idea would work but it was worth making the suggestion.

"We could try sending through a pattern enhancer. Even if we can't use it to pull them through using the run about it may still aid us in locking onto their location and bringing them back with whatever equipment they have in this facility."

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 111):

Shard nods in agreement with Silviene, "Sounds logical.  I like it.  Proceed."

Then Shard reaches out with a free hand and lightly smacks Stilk on the back of his head, "Why didn't you think of that, Ensign?"

In reply to Shard Vinzz (msg # 112):
" I guess since I am being ignored, I will do a log entry. First officer's Log begin entry. I recommend all officer's including myself go back to academy and brush up on chain of command and the meaning of away team leadership. Second, file recommendation for recommendation to Lieutenant Commander Shard Vinzz and Silviene Felis for insubordination. "

Miranda says all this without even setting her tricorder to record said log.

Silviene blinked in surprise. What had she done? The first officer had been the one to tell her to recomend what to send through.  Beforehand she had simply been trying to reign in Vinzz before he jumped into an unknown wormhole.

"Sir? uh sorry Sir. Awaiting orders."

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 114):

" I didn't actually record that log. But it seemed like I was being ignored on my away mission. Especially, by you, Mister Vinzz. Silviene your suggestion for something to test portal with is heard and understood. Send through the pattern enhancer. "

Miranda smiled.

In reply to Miranda T'Shran (msg # 115):

"Can't imagine why, sir." Shard responds with a shrug, "I've noted your silent presence this entire time."

Silviene backed away and went to retrieve a pattern enhancer. She wasn't really scared. She was a warrior and a good warrior knew when to back out of a potential fight that wasn't really her business. Though it might be amusing to watch T'shran strangle Vinzz. Both of the two seemed to be quite volatile. Caitans, like their feline ancestors tended to be more patient. Silent ambush predators. Then again she was used to Klingons and they had the most volatile natures of all. Well except maybe for the Jem'Hadar.

"I think it's safe to enter the room," Koram suggests, "but I think you may be misinterpreting what I said about the wormhole."

"First of all, it's not really a wormhole... or, at least, not like we understand them. The energy readings have some of the same frequencies as a wormhole. It's more like a pinprick aperture into subspace. A wormhole goes from one point to another. This one doesn't."

"I don't believe you can send anything physical through the aperture. While the pattern enhancers would probably work, I don't think you can just shove them through. At least not and remain intact."

"I think the only way we can rescue those Klingons is to expand the aperture, or possibly reverse the process that sent them there."

Silviene stopped moving and turned to look at T'shran. No sense in wasting resources if the science guys said it wasn't going to work. She was becoming agitated. With all the bickering and grandstanding who knows what could be happening to the Klingons on the other side of the whatever it was.

"Sir? What should we do then?"

"Exactly what I was thinking," R.T. concurred with Koram.

"I would go so far as to say that the device that moved the Klingons into their little pocket universe by way of the aperture went with them. While we might be able to get the Klingons to tell us how it works--but I wouldn't hold my breath on that, we may not have the ability to recreate it here and now."

"The answers are in this next room."

"We have to enter it to find those answers."

With that statement, R.T. walked forward and through the door into the next room.

In reply to Roland Thames 'R.T.' Blackthorne (msg # 120):

OOC:  What the...?  Aw, dammit.  Guys, I'm sorry, I'm a bonehead.  I thought we walked through the airlock into a sorta Central Foyer, then from that into THE Control Room--beyond which was the lab with the "portal".

But after R.T.'s comments, there, I went back in confusion to check the map and saw that there was another apparent Control Room between where we are and where the "portal" is.  I'm so sorry--because I thought the "Portal" was in the immediately next room to us, that's why I've been just standing around with my thumb up my butt and not advancing into the next room.

Most certainly, if there is another room ahead of us, let us proceed into it and see how much damage we can do in there!  Progredi ac subiugare!  ^_^

In reply to Shard Vinzz (msg # 121):

" I understand Mister Blackthrone. Let's proceed. "

Miranda follows The engineer in.

Silviene follows the others into the next room. She really just wanted to get those Klingons out and get back to the ship. This mission was turning into a fiasco.

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 123):

"So, what are you two saying, then?" Shard asks Koram and R.T., as everyone enters the next control room, "We just need to toss one end of an extension cord through the portal so the Klingons can power up the portal creator device they have with them, and they can get themselves home?"

"Doubtful, sir," Koram replies to Shard as Koram follows R.T. into the other room.

"All these other control panels might be needed to control the central device that was supposed to generate the singularity. We won't know until R.T. and I examine them."

"I'm pretty sure that the Klingons weren't expecting what happened to happen, so the equipment wasn't supposed to do what it did. It could have been a malfunction, an overload or a miscalculation... possibly... probably... all three."

With the final barrier out of the way, they should be able to get better readings on the sensors. He'd leave that to R.T.

Meanwhile, he began making the rounds of the control panels, examining them for what they showed and what they didn't show. He was hoping he'd find a computer that might have recorded events.

In reply to Koram Val (msg # 125):

" Felis, remind me I need to have a discussion with the Captain. Thank you Mister Val for your in-depth analysis so any suggestions about next course of action. Mister Vinzz you may guard the door."

In reply to Miranda T'Shran (msg # 126):

Shard stops just inside the door,

"Aye, Commander." he responds with a nod of his head, then steps closer to the door controls, there assuming an At Rest stance.

Silviene nodded to T'shran.

"Yes Sir."

She was quiet and subdued a bit after being reprimanded by her earlier. She clipped her Bat'leth into its holder on her back. She wasn't going to use it so putting it safely out of the way seemed prudent. Her tail moved with a restless energy.

R.T. and Koram begin examining the peripheral equipment in the inner room.

Three things can be determined:

1. the singularity was created 29.4 hours ago.

2. the calculations were off, and the singularity ruptured a hole into subspace. The Klingons are stuck in a pocket of subspace... inside the singularity.

3. when the hole was formed, it sucked the singularity, the singularity generator and the Klingons into it.

Silviene flattened her ears in confusion.

"Wait so the singularity pulled itself inside of itself? how?"

"No, it didn't quite work that way," Koram replies to Silviene. "The singularity wasn't the hole but that was because it wasn't formed properly. The process created a hole in normal space that punched into subspace. It was that hole in subspace that pulled in the almost-singularity and everything in its vicinity."

"Kind of like a vacuum that sucks in the surrounding air."

"Some of this equipment is showing odd readings. The problem is that the main console that holds all the important data is on the other side."

"I need to figure out what happened scientifically before I can postulate a way to reverse it. Even then, we may not be able to produce that effect."

" Away Team to Mongoose, We read. We will stay put on station. Away Team Out. You all heard Quinn. Prepare for a longer stay. "

As the team waited for Koram and R.T. continued to study the consoles, they saw that one meter was showing an increase.

It wasn't quite clear what was increasing, but it was soon accompanied by similar readings on most of the displays.

It was a steady increase that shifted to a progressive increase that quickly spiked!

Koram had a moment to try to warn everyone... and then there was a 'flash' of blackness followed by a purplish glow that quickly faded.

In the aftermath, half of the team had disappeared: Koram, Sergei, Shard, and Silviene.

Miranda, R.T. and Stilk were the only ones left.

Silviene moved into a battle ready stance just in case as she spoke in Klingon to the Klingons.

"toH, legh rur maH Hoch qaStaHvIS qay' rap."

[Well, looks like we are all in the same predicament now. ]

In federation standard she says,

"It would seem that whatever system they have is still working."

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 134):

" By the Ice Caves. "

Miranda taps her communicator.

" T'Shran to Shard, report. "

"What?! How did you get here?! the pacing Klingon snaps out as he whirls, draws his disruptor and points it at the Away Team.

"Federation! You will not steal our discovery!"

    Shard had been following orders when Koram shouted his warning--Shard had been standing guard at the door controls--his phaser hanging at his right hip, his security tricorder hanging at his left hip, but more swung around behind his back.  He stood looking forward, feet approximately his shoulder-width apart and his hands clasped behind his back.

    When Koram shouted, Shard looked over at the Engineer, bringing his hands around in preparation for--whatever.  But then he was suddenly ... somewhere else.

[IN THE WHITE NOTHINGNESS]





"Stand down, Silviene!" Shard snapped in a voice low and edgy--but still just loud enough that the Klingons could here him. "Get out of that battle crouch and settle your fur!  You only eat people when I tell you to eat people."

Shard takes a couple of slow, casual steps forward, and glares at the Klingon pointing the deadly disruptor at him.

~~I hope I've remembered this right--Xenopsychology was never my best subject.~~ Shard thought to himself, before shouting at the disruptor-wielding Klingon.

"We got here the same way you did--obviously!" Shard growled at the Klingon in a loud, angry voice, "And as for your silly fears--hey Empire!  We will not steal your discovery!  You want this empty little fold in subspace?" Shard raises his arms and gestures at the white nothingness that surrounds them, "It's all yours!  I officially acknowledge your Conquest of Nothingness!"

"But if you mean that piece of broken drek, you can keep that,, too!  If we wanted a micro-singularity power system, we'd just buy one from the Romulans--who already know how to build such--then we'd disable all the bombs and other booby traps they'd put into what we bought, and finally we'd retro-engineer a working model from the fake they thought they'd sold us."

"So put your frelling weapon away before you hurt yourself with it, and we'll get on with the business of getting us all back to the real Universe--where we can pass resolving this muck-up on to higher authority while we hit the bar."

"Do you think you can do that, Klingon?"

---

OOC: Is Shard receiving the comm-signal from T'shran?
This message was last edited by the player at 07:37, Thu 24 Jan 2019.

((OOC: Yes, Shard receives the comm message from T'Shran.))

In reply to StarMaster (msg # 138):



Shard suddenly breaks into a rather feral-looking smile,

"Well, that tears it, Chubby.  That's my Commander calling--yet another irritating Andorian to piss in your gagh!" Shard says to the armed Klingon, "So, are you gonna put that disruptor away, or do I tell my Commander to pull us out of here, and leave your hairy ass behind?  Decision.  Now!"

Silviene looks at Shard and sighs. She straightens up slowly and simply narrows her eyes. Well if nothing else maybe she would get to watch Shard get shot. She did bare her teeth a bit, not to menace but as if to say, see I am a predator respect me.

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 140):

Miranda taps her coms again.

=/\= T'Shran to Shard or Felis, report. By the Caves, report. =/\=

In reply to Miranda T'Shran (msg # 141):

"Alright, Chubby, you had your chance." Shard says, raising his hand slowly towards his comm-badge, "I hope you have fun ruling your own private universe--empty as it is about to become."

Shard taps his comm-badge.

=/\= "Shard to Commander T'Shran.  We made it through, Commander." Shard sends, "No real issues on this side, except for one stupid Klingon who thinks threatening everyone with a disruptor is scarier than the thought of being trapped in here forever.  I have informed the officer that he is free to stay here, while the rest of us leave, but he still won't put away his little toy.  I'm thinking he just needs a little time to think about it."

"Meanwhile we're going to ignore the bigmouth and get started with the smart Klingons to open the way back.  With Koram Val working with them on this side, hopefully it won't be long before--as I have informed the Klingons--you can pull us back, as planned." =/\=

Shard emphasizes a few words at the end, and hopes.

Silviene simply stares at the Klingon with the disrupter. Not taking her eyes off of him incase he decided to attack and she needed to spring into action.

"Well I suppose that is the bold choice. I guess it's not to bad here even if the is a distinct lack of Blood wine and Gagh."

"Don't be an ass!" one of the other Klingons says to the one holding the disruptor.

"This little pocket of subspace is shrinking! There will be no glorious death for you here--you'll just be squashed down into a speck of debris. And I can assure you it will be quite painful... for you and the rest of us."

"Now put that damn weapon away! It's not the tool we need right now."

"Our only chance of escaping this prison is with the Federation's help."

As the other Klingon scowls in anger and frustration, the speaker turned to the Mongoose crew members.

"I am Gorvok, chief scientist on this project. The angry Klingon is Meng. He did not want this assignment; he felt it was beneath his ability."

"As you may have already determined, our supply ship is due at any moment... assuming that time works in here like it does on the outside. That was why we were sending a distress signal out on our comms."

"We did not expect anyone on that ship to be able to help us, though. So you can imagine our surprise when we received a comm from you."

"Are one of you a scientist or engineer? Can you help us figure out how to reverse this event?"

Silviene decided to let Shard handle the hostel Klingon since he seemed to want to get shot and responded to the Klingon science officer. Glancing at Koram and Sergei in turn.

"Koram is an excellent engineer with a grasp of what's going on here. We have also brought a medical officer incase any were injured."

She continued with the line that they had ended up in the anomaly intentionally so as not to appear devided in front of the klingons.

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 145):

Shard smiles at Meng and gives a flippant salute to the officer, then turns and steps a little closer to Silviene and Gorvok--but not too close, Shard wants to leave Silviene room to let go, if that becomes needed.

"Ah, Science Leader Gorvok, hello." Shard says, introducing himself, "I'm Lieutenant Commander Shard Vinzz, off the USS Mongoose.  I believe we spoke earlier, on the comm?"

Shard nods, first towards Silviene, then towards Koram Val--but both of his antennae are swiveled to the right, pointed towards Meng, "As Lieutenant Commander Felis has said, Engineer Koram is one of our best, he's been lead engineer on the res--uh--our inquiry, here.  The Mongoose is a deep space exploration vessel, specifically tasked with wandering The Expanse.  We should be able to provide you with whatever assistance you may wish to call upon."

Shard cocks his head to the left a bit, and swings his left antenna around to point roughly at Gorvok and/or the activity around the device behind the Klingon Scientist,

"Forgive me, Science Leader, if I ask an obvious question--I am barely trained in any engineering knowledge--but, from our previous conversation, I don't suppose the answer to this problem could be as easy as just putting a fresh power supply into your device and then just...reversing it?"

"While I understand the basic principle behind what you were attempting to accomplish," Koram addressed the Klingon scientist after being introduced, "I was not able to ascertain what caused the problem, since the most significant equipment was no longer in the lab, but here."

"To answer your question, Commander: no, merely reversing the process would not get us out of here. Think of it like a salt shaker. You can turn the shaker upside and shake salt out of it. But, if you try it in reverse, it is virtually impossible to shake the salt back through those tiny holes."

"Yes, there are ways to accomplish that, but it requires considerably more effort and equipment. Fortunately, Commander Blackthorne is in the lab still. Between the two of us, we should be able to modifier the equipment to extract us."

Back in the lab, R.T. was thinking pretty much the same thing. He'd had doubts as to whether the Klingons in the pocket dimension would be of any assistance, but also couldn't see an alternative.

"Oh-oh," he says as he scans the consoles again to see if there's any change in the readings.

"Here... see this indicator? It's a countdown. That new energy pulse that swept away half our team into the subspace pocket... it was a function of the first one that took the Klingons. The first one happened 24.6 hours ago. There's an energy siphon coming from the pocket. It hit a benchmark that produced the second fluctuation."

"A secondary result is that the countdown has sped up. By my calculations, the next fluctuation will occur in 15.1 hours. If the countdown speeds up at the same rate, then there'll be another fluctuation in 7 hours after that."

"That should drop the siphon to zero. I think... that would mean that the subspace pocket collapses in on itself."

Silviene Twitched her ears. Well she supposed that the cat was out of the bag, about their ability to get everyone out. Were Trill always so bad at dissembling? You would think that would come from the vulcans. Then again Stilk was still on the other side. She glanced around at all those assembled in this little pocket dimension. She still wondered what any of this had to do with destruction of the Catspaw.

"I suppose none of you would happen to know anything about an attack on a federation ship near your base?"

"How would we know anything about an attack on a Federation ship?" Meng snaps back almost too quickly. "We've been trapped in here!"

"Can you get us out or not? I do not wish to spend the last moments of my life with you Federation petaQ!"

Silviene bared her teeth at Meng again. This guy was getting on her nerves as much as Shard.

"Don't test us Qa'Hom. If you would stop blustering and let us work we might be able to get your Lo'LaHbe hide out alive."

She narrowed her eyes and glared at the angry Klingon. He was the kind of klingon that would only understand one thing. Getting his ass kicked. Well she would present him the opportunity if he wanted.

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 151):

"Lieutenant Commander Felis…" Shard, a smug smile on his face, says in a low voice, keeping his attention on R.T and Koram as they go over the device with the Klingons,

"In regards to my previous directive concerning your physical interactions with the Klingons?" Shard turns his smirk towards Silviene, "When it comes to Commander Meng, at your discretion, you may ... eat ... him.  Just do not let him interfere with the other Klingons or the efforts to get us out of here."

"Can you build a fusion reactor with a bat'leth?" Koram directs his question at Meng.

"Don't feel bad. I doubt if I could, either, even if that is what is required in this situation."

"Fortunately, I have one advantage over the bat'leth--I have people on the outside with sophisticated equipment."

"We're working on determining the precise vibrational frequency of the subspatial terminus. Once we've done that, we can build an inverter and a modulator. We'll need the modulator to control the size of the inversion aperture. Otherwise, when we activate the inverter, we'll be returned to normal space... but we'll get shoved through a pinhole to get there."

Although he was an engineer, he could sense the tension between everyone. If Meng and Silviene went at it, there was going to be a lot of bloodshed in this little space. He didn't for one minute think that the Klingon scientists wouldn't side with Meng. Blood is thicker than mathematics.

If you can't dazzle them with brilliance--baffle them with bullshit! The old adage came back to him. He hoped 'explaining' the process would defuse Meng a bit... unless he was a total Luddite.

Silviene smiled and nodded slightly as she twisted one ear in shards direction.

"Acknowledged Sir."

She listened to Val's assessment of their situation and his plan for getting them out. Could that work? She didn't have any clue honestly. She like Meng what more the bat'leth type. And she didn't see anything wrong with that so long as she wasn't reckless or indiscriminate in her use of it. Meng seemed to be both.

As Koram relayed his information to the outside team, R.T. had pretty much come up with the same solution... sans the modulator. He hadn't crunched the numbers that far yet to determine the necessity of it, but it made sense. He could see that's where the equation was leading.

The diminishing inverse would have bottomed out at .0001 or thereabouts. Clearly, Koram had gotten there ahead of him.

Based on the missing equipment, Koram could build the inverter on the other side, but he wouldn't have enough to handle the modulator as well. R.T. looked the Klingon physics lab, assessing the equipment that was there. Yes, he could build the modulator.

"Copy that, Koram," he replied over the radio. "I take it you can build the inverter? I've got the modulator covered. We'll just have to sync the two up. Probably need to boost the comms."

While the security forces were posturing and the science geeks were figuring out how to get out of here, Sergei tried surreptitiously to scan everyone with his medical tricorder. Nobody looked injured, but who knew what an unprotected transfer to subspace might do. Lots of harmful radiation in that scenario.

He was both surprised and self-satisfied when the scans proved him right. He'd started with the closest Klingon, making sure the tricorder wasn't pointed at the equipment. He was quite sure that they were well aware that he was a medical doctor, but still, they'd think he was trying to steal their research.

"As the Klingons reported, sir," Sergei directed to Shard, "there is a high level of interphasic tetryon energy being emitted by the subspace rupture. It's almost like antibodies trying to fight off an infection. The energy is causing cellular degradation in all of us. The Klingons have been here longer, so they've been affected to a greater degree."

"I can give them an injection of arithrazine to help resist it, but it's only temporary. If they aren't out of here within 24 hours, they'll start turning to goo. We'll follow a few hours later."

"As it is, they've already started losing coordination, and are probably experiencing headaches as their synapses are being over-stimulated. They could lose consciousness within another hour."

In reply to Sergei Kondratev (msg # 156):

     "Shrack!" Shard spits out quietly, as his antennae twitch nervously,

     "Just what we frelling need, on top of everything else, isn't it, Doc?" Shard asks Sergei quietly, then turns his attention to the group of Klingons working around the large device.

     "Ah, Science Leader Gorov?  Could you spare a moment and--I know this is a long shot, but--do any of your officers, there, have a background in life sciences?  Please bring them over here, if you do."

     Then Shard closes his eyes for a moment--simultaneously his antennae both droop wearily--and he takes a deep breath.  Opening his eyes and lifting up his antennae, Shard turns to Meng,

     "Commander Meng." Shard calls, "You would do me great honor if you would also come and speak with us--as Military Leader of this station, your knowledge and experience would be an invaluable input."

     Without waiting for a response from Meng, Shard turns back to Sergei, and keeping his face turned away from all the Klingons, he whispers around a snarl, "Better to get back on Meng's good side, just in case his increased surliness is a result of the radiation on a normally surly Klingon.  Try to get a close-up scan of him, if you can, Doc--see if his head is more rotten than the others."

     Shard turns to await the Klingons--if not with a smile, at least he's lost the snarl he was showing Sergei.

     When whoever is coming gets there, Shard jumps right in.

     "This is Doctor Kondratev, Chief of our ship's medical department.  He's been taking some scans and has found some disturbing results--I asked if you had anyone trained in life sciences so you could look at the Doctor's readings, yourselves, to confirm his conclusions." Shard gestures at Sergei, "Doc, why don't you explain what you've determined--tell them exactly what you told me."

After the Doctor explains his readings and his deductions and diagnosis, one of the Klingons steps forward.

"I am Kreyton," he introduces himself. "I am also the Life Scientist here, and I already alerted you to the presence of radiation."

"However, I did not know it was that extreme. I believe it is due to the subatomic decay from conversion to a subspatial state. Much like energy is released during normal chemical reactions."

"As you've no doubt already determined, we have no protection here from that type of radiation. With the proper equipment, we could suppress that conversion temporarily, but we do not have that type of equipment here either."

"So, yes, we need to exit this unstable subspace pocket as quickly as possible."

"And you are correct: Meng is already suffering from partial synaptic dysfunction. Your medical treatment will be appreciated."

"MENG! The doctor here will give you an injection that will keep you from turning to... as he so succinctly put it... goo. If you wish to become goo, of course, you can refuse the injection."


Almost as if it was causing him great pain, he reluctantly let the doctor administer the injection.

Silviene gave Meng a softer smile and patted his shoulder.

"See, wIj jup I knew there was still Klingon honor and bravery under all that."

R.T. starts going around to all the consoles and cabinets in both this room and the outer room.

"I need this one opened... and this one... and this one," he says to the others, as he spots a system that should have the equipment he needs.

Once he makes the rounds and indicates 7 areas that have the right equipment, he tackles the last one... pulling off the front panel and probing around inside to find the magnetic induction coil that he needs.

He hopes Stilk and T'Shran have decided to assist him by pulling off the other panels.

Meanwhile, Koram was doing the same in the subspace pocket... only, he doesn't have the same resources as R.T. does.

Fortunately, cobbling together an inverter was somewhat easier for him since he had the core of the basic system in front of him.

"We need to disassemble what's left of this unit. Is that a proton ram? Okay, that's got to go."

"Oh, wow. Good construction! The anti-matter bottle didn't rupture."

"We need to reverse the micro-polarity infuser. Dismantle it and swap the two ends over the central chamber. Here, you can use my protoplaser." He hands the tool to the Klingon named Vork.

He was giving a running explanation in case something happened to him; those remaining might be able to complete the process.

"The phoratic impulse generator needs to get fastened to the positive end, and then the antimatter injector gets fastened to that. The final step is to use the photon regulator to control the resulting energy stream."

"Then it just needs power. We don't have enough time and equipment to tap the antimatter, so we'll need to use phasers and disruptors to power it."

In reply to Koram Val (msg # 161):

"Now aren't you glad I made you take that Type-2, back on the shuttle, Koram?" Shard calls over to the engineer, as he removes his own Type-2 from where it hangs at his waist,

"Here!  Here's mine!" Shard warns, before tossing his own phaser pistol over to Koram, "Silviene, please tell me you at least have a Type-1 tucked away somewhere, and that that bat'leth isn't the only weapon you brought along on a Security Detail?"

Silviene ran her tongue along her sharp teeth and unsheathed her claws. Giving shard a look.

"most of my weapons are natural. I was trained by ambassador Warf which I take as a point of pride. My training in Klingon martial arts utilizes my natural weaponry. While I can use phasers they are not my preferred weapon. "

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 163):

Shard casts a frustrated grimace towards Silviene, then adds "A talk for later, Lieutenant Commander."

Shard then turns and raises his voice to address the whole group, "Alright everyone, give your energy weapons to Engineer Val--yes that humanoid right over there, draining hand weapons into the capacitors of the singularity device.  We're going to need all the energy from the power cells of as many personal energy weapons as we have."

Shard raises both hands in a placating gesture--and glances mostly at Meng--"Please, keep your melee weapons.  I don't want to attempt an interdimensional subspace shift without everyone having some kind of weapon--am I right, Commander Meng?  Eh?  Never venture into the unknown without a good blade at your hip, right?"

Shard hopes the meds that Sergei had given Meng will mellow the man somewhat, but a load of ego-boosting, as well, never hurts.

In reply to Roland Thames 'R.T.' Blackthorne (msg # 160):

T'Shran assists Blackthrone.

I believe the Difficulty to build the subspace inverter is 2 (1 standard +1 for having to use Klingon equipment). Target Number is Reason (11) + Science (4) = 15.

12:43, Today: Koram Val rolled 8,15 using 1d20,1d20 ((8,15)).

His quantum mechanics focus would apply, but since neither roll is below his Discipline (Science) level of 4, it doesn't matter.

So, that should be 2 successes.

With the assistance of the Klingon scientist, he is able to build the inverter. Now, though, he needs to power it.

13:34, Today: Koram Val rolled 14,7 using 1d20,1d20 ((14,7)).

Probably the same situation as above, but using Engineering instead of Science, which is still 4.

So, 2 success again.

He's got the power wired in.

Now he just needs to sync the inverter with the modulator that R.T. is building.

13:40, Today: Koram Val rolled 8,3 using 1d20,1d20 ((8,3)).

That should be 3 successes (if his Focus comes into play).

So, Stilk and Miranda help R.T. scavenge the parts from the Klingon equipment. Part of that requires pulling out a bunch of wires to wire the modulator into the power grid.

Pretty much the same routine as Koram: Reason 10 + Science 5 = TN 15.

13:45, Today: Roland Thames 'R.T.' Blackthorne rolled 16 using 2d20 ((15,1)).

No focus, though, so the '1' will generate 2 successes, for a total of 3.

I'm guessing that since a power source is readily available, the construction of the modulator will include powering it.

Again, if the Klingon equipment increases the standard Difficulty from 1 to 2, then that's one Momentum, which he'll carry forward to sync the modulator with the inverter through the subspace aperture.

14:04, Today: Roland Thames 'R.T.' Blackthorne rolled 25 using 2d20 ((15,10)).

Not sure what the Difficulty is, but even it's as high as 3, he should succeed.

Silviene simply looks at Shard before nodding.

"Yes sir."

R.T. has no problem assembling the modulator. It's just not as easy as picking up a tricorder and pointing it at some object.

Without Koram on the other end, though, it would have been really tricky syncing it up with the inverter.

Of course, no one knew what would happen, even if it was successful.

As the two engineers slowly brought the two devices output together through the aperture... suddenly everyone in the subspace bubble was back in the facility, including the device that had generated the forced singularity in the first place. It's no longer connected, though.

Everyone from the subspace bubble feels like they are being squeezed through the opening of a soda bottle. They aren't physically being squeezed; rather, the subspace bubble is being squeezed back into normal space and everyone goes with it.

"Well that was unpleasant but we are back."

Silviene  moves over to be checked out by the medical personnel.

In reply to StarMaster (msg # 169):

     Upon appearing back in normal space, Shard's antennae droop and he places a hand over his eyes.

     "Owwwwwwwwww-chuh!" Shard moans, "My head hasn't hurt this bad since that hangover after a night of stupidly drinking all that Bloodwine swill. Urp!"

     Shard suddenly removes his hand from his eyes, and looks around the room--mostly at the Klingons--finally sighting the XO.  He walks over to her and assumes the At Rest position.

     "Lieutenant Commander Shard Vinzz reports the successful completion of Operation to rescue missing Klingon Lab Personnel.  No incidents, no casualties.  Doctor Kondratev has reported that we have all been exposed to some radiation, and only one of the Klingons seems to be suffering advanced effects of the radiation--and according to the timeline set down by the Doctor, we all got out of that place in time, and everyone can still be successfully treated for the radiation."
     "Over-all, XO, these Klingons seem amenable to working with us to clean all this up--all but one of them appear to be from the Klingon's technical caste, and that one exception is a Warrior Officer.  The radiation was hitting him pretty hard, though, so we might not have the pleasure of his company any time soon."
     "That's the over-view, XO.  Officer Felis and I will have more detailed reports for you by oh-nine-thirty tomorrow."

=/\="Acknowledged, Commander Shard,"=/\= comes the reply from the Captain.

=/\="Commander T'Shran, finish up with the Klingons, and then report back to the Mongoose. Captain th'Valla out."=/\=

He couln't very well tell her about the other ship and the other Klingons over the comm.

They still needed to find out about the Federation ship sitting on the asteroid just outside the Klingon facility.

In reply to Anther th'Valla (msg # 172):



=/\= Transporter Cheif Beam us up. =/\=

In reply to Miranda T'Shran (msg # 173):



Shard gestures for the other Mongoose crew members to join him in gathering near T'Shran in anticipation of her ordered beam-out,

"I take it then, Commander," Shard asks Miranda, "that we'll be leaving the runabout here, with the Klingons?"

In reply to Shard Vinzz (msg # 174):

" Oh, thanks Commander. To the runabout. "

=/\= Nevermind Transporter. =/\=

In reply to Miranda T'Shran (msg # 175):

"Yes, Sir." Shard nods at Miranda, then turns to address the others,

"You heard the X-O, folks! Double-time to the runabout!  Captain wants us back on the Mongoose before the ice in his drink can melt, so lets get moving!  Hup-hup-hup!"

Shard jogs out to the entry chamber and up to the inner airlock control panel, where he stops and looks at the controls.

"Now, how does this work for Klingons, again?" Shard asks rhetorically--but loud enough to be heard by every one, "Green means Poison Stay Away, Red means Thanks For Stabbing Me, Amber means I'll Kill Your Whole Family.  Hmmm."

Shard looks up, "So. . .anybody remember how to open the airlock?"

Silviene follows Vinzz and T'shran back to the airlock. She wished she had more time to talk to the klingons but they had missions to handle. She wondered if they remembered the reason they had come down in the first place.

In reply to Silviene Felis (msg # 177):

" let's see "

Miranda works the airlock based on the few  engineering classes she had in academy.

In reply to Miranda T'Shran (msg # 178):

As Commander T'Shran works the airlock controls, Shard backs off to give her room to work--taking the opportunity to go back and find Gorvok.

"Officer Gorvok," Shard says, walking up to the Klingon science officer, "Just one last thing before we leave--it's the reason we're here, actually.  What can you tell me about that old Federation Starship parked just outside your super-secret research facility, here?  It was a distress call we received from it that brought us here, you know."

Gorvok looks around at the other Klingons before answering Shard.

"We detected no such signal coming from the ship. It was acquired at an Orion space salvage yard. No Klingon ship could be spared for what the others considered a worthless project, so it was purchased and brought here as an emergency vehicle in case something went wrong and the supply freighter wasn't here."

In reply to _Gorvok (msg # 180):

     Shard, picking up on the Klingon's cautious behaviour, lowers his voice a little, "Now that, Sir, is a very strange tale.  The Mongoose not only received such a signal, but after we had used some of our most sensitive equipment to clean up the signal, it was clearly stating the transponder ID for this specific vessel.  Then we also..."

     Shard stopped himself before he revealed just how sensitive the Mongoose's sensor upgrades were, "...also pinpointed the source of the signal to within one AU of this location.  It was sheer luck we detected a power fluctuation from your cloaking shield--probably something related to the incident, I'm sure."

"The ship is old, Commander," Koram spoke up. "I believe it was broadcasting on an old frequency that hasn't been used in a very long time."

"The only reason we detected it in the first place is because we operate a rotating scan, something the Klingons could easily do if they wanted to, but probably don't because it's normally a waste of time, energy and resources."

"On the other hand, it seems completely reasonable to me that the Orions might have been aware of it and left it on in case they needed to track the ship. It isn't likely that they were expecting the ship to enter the Expanse."

He'd been about to state that the dark energy in the Expanse could have easily masked the signal, but then the Klingons might have wondered how the Mongoose detected it.

In reply to Koram Val (msg # 182):

Shard nodded in apparent agreement with Koram's assessment.

"Ah!  I see, just a still active emergency beacon, operating on some low-band subspace frequency that hasn't seen use in a century.  Yes, I can see that happening--something like racking your spacesuit and accidentally leaving the comm unit on with a channel open.  It's weeks before someone notices there's an open channel somewhere, and another week before the suit with the active comm unit is discovered.  Got it."

Shard straightens up and gives a slight nod of his head towards Gorvok.

"Officer Gorvok, allow me to express my thanks for your understanding and willingness to excuse our intrusion into your facility.  On behalf of the USS Mongoose, let me say that we are glad to have been of some use to you, during this small crisis.  As always, we are proud and honored to be in an Alliance with such strong and understanding a people such as the Klingon Empire."

"Now, we have been ordered to return to our ship.  I do not believe that there will be any issue, in the future, concerning the old Federation ship.  You honorably acquired it through the disreputable Orions--and the Gods of Space alone know where they got it from!  And it is so old, Starfleet would likely happily gift it to you, if you demanded.  So we shall think of this no more."

"Goodbye, Officer Gorvok--and do give my best wishes to Commander Meng--assure him that I said he was Terrifying, truly Terrifying." Shard finishes with a smile wide enough to show his canine teeth.

"Should we meet again, Gorvok--Qapla!"

Shard turned and headed for the airlock, and the runabout, reaching out towards Koram to bring the engineer along.

As the two stepped out the open airlock, Shard said very quietly, without turning to look at Koram,

"Of course, you got detailed scans of that device, yes?  Starfleet Intelligence, as well as Starfleet Engineering, will be very interested in just what these Klingons are doing, here.  Please tell me you scanned everything, Koram."

Silviene waits patiently to head for the runabout since her superiors seem satisfied with the situation.

"If you are asking if I was spying, Commander," Koram replies to Shard, "then the answer is 'no'. I believe that's Stilk's department."

"But, in order to even begin to fix the problem, I had to first know what the problem was. To do that, I had to scan everything."

"Besides, we already know what they are doing here... they are trying to create a forced singularity to use as a power source. Just like the Romulans. Sorry to say, but they almost succeeded. I think they were aware that something could go horribly wrong, which is why they built the facility here in the Expanse and on the asteroid."

"Anyway, I don't suppose there's any point in checking the ship's computer on the Sehlat," he adds. "If the Klingons did get it from the Orions, the Orions would have copied the data to sell and otherwise purged the computer--they wouldn't give away anything extra."

"Still, it could confirm what the Klingons told us. Not that I think they were lying, but they may have been misinformed."

Away Team "A" returns to the shuttle and the door behind them closes on the facility.

Since the Klingons have a ship even if the supply ship doesn't return, and the facility still has power, the Klingons clearly don't want any additional help. Only Meng would have wanted to kill the intruders to keep the Klingon experiment secret, but he wasn't in any condition to effect that.

Back in the shuttle, the airlock door is closed, and the shuttle lifts off and heads back to the ship.

In reply to StarMaster (msg # 186):

Sitting back in the runabout seat, Shard looks to Commander T'Shran with raised eyebrows and an expectant smirk--both his antennae focused upon her.

In reply to Shard Vinzz (msg # 187):

In reply to Shard Vinzz (msg # 187):

Miranda begins flying the ship back.

In reply to Miranda T'Shran (msg # 189):



=/\= Shran here returning. }-/\=

In reply to Miranda T'Shran (msg # 190):


     As Miranda does those things required to shut down a shuttle from operations, Shard raises his voice a little--enough to be heard all across the compartment, with out actually shouting.

     "Everyone," Shard calls out, "please remember to leave the phasers you were issued outside, at the weapon storage station in the docking bay--they all need to be recharged by the Armorer.  If any of you are carrying personal phasers that had their power cells drained getting us out of that subspace bubble--don't forget that is your responsibility to get the weapon recharged."

     Shard stands up and turns his gaze--and antennae--towards Miranda,

     "Any final mission orders, Commander T'Shran, before we report to the Captain?"

In reply to Shard Vinzz (msg # 191):

" I don't believe there is any further orders. "

In reply to Miranda T'Shran (msg # 192):

Shard nods to Miranda in acknowledgement, and joins the exodus from the shuttle.

=====> moving to Captain's Ready Room