Preston frowned and looked reluctant.  He opened his mouth as if to protest... then settled his shoulders and nodded crisply, an invisible implied salute almost palpable.

"Aye sir," he said simply.

He moved back to relieve Mcreeg at the shuttle, leaving his team to explore the unknown without him...

OOC: Hey, if you guys wanna send away all your ablative armor, it's fine with me! ^_^

Considering the scope and environment in which he's attempting this, the difficulty will be 5.

Decker would roll Reason + Science.  I don't see any Focuses you have that seem to apply...

Jav'Ker or T'Lara could assist.  You can buy extra dice with Momentum... there is currently 4 in the pool.

Decker frowned as he bent over his tricorder. He hadn't been exaggerating the difficulty of the task. Whatever was powering the artifact was filling local space with a veritable storm of energies. The intensity was low enough to be safe, but it covered the entire spectrum which made it extremely difficult to discern between the background noise and any other source more than a few meters away.

Just as he began to despair of making any progress, he heard another tricorder switch on next to him. He glanced up at the other officer, and smiled, "Of course. Even with a fairly small baseline, using a pair of tricorders in tandem should significantly improve their ability to discriminate point sources in this environment." He grinned, "There's a reason they put a few hundred of us on a starship."

He quickly linked the two devices together and began a fresh sweep. Within a few moments, working in parallel, the two officers began to identify patterns in the noise and assemble a filter that allowed them to scan much more clearly. Once again, Starfleet's emphasis on teamwork would prove to be one of its greatest strengths.

I'm going to invoke the value "Strength in numbers" and spend his point of Determination to add a die roll of 1. He'll also spend a point of momentum to buy an additional die.

Today: LCDR Christopher Decker rolled 14 using 3d20 with rolls of 4,9,1.  Tricorder scan to locate Federation technology - Reason (12) + Science (5).

That's a total of 6 (!) successes plus the result from the mystery officer who assisted.

T'Lara nodded at Christopher.  She had a good scientific foundation; good enough, at least, so she could understand and follow his instructions to use her tricorder as a noise-filter.

OOC:  I'm the mystery officer! :D

07:49, Today: LCDR T'Lara rolled 6 using 1d20 with rolls of 6.  Reason+Science (assisting Decker) .

Mcreeg moves out of the way, letting Preston replace him, still feeling the triumph of having gotten the shuttle started, of being creative and doing what for most might be impossible..and then he waits, not sure what to do next, wanting to keep contributing bit not having a way again..yet, stills smiling as he remembers to key the comm...

"sounds perfect, Sir"

The task was difficult... no.  Incredible, impossible even.  But Decker pulled together everything he'd learned, keyed in on T'Lara's scans, and sent scanning beams outward, while pulling back passive data inward.  Their scan was specific... looking for remnants or signals of Federation tech.

The first, obvious, and quickly-ignored ping was the Type-F shuttle behind them.

Then the real work began.

After some time, he was able to pin down three distinct Federation power signatures.  Even with his result, he couldn't detect something as subtle as a Starfleet uniform at 10 miles distant.  But he did find the working source of a pair of tricorders and a pair of communicators.  None were together, and ranged in distance from 1 to 10 miles away.  But all were in a general direction that he could track.

For his own part, ch'Pertha found something interesting.

There was no dust.

Simply no dust on the ground that would leave tell-tale footprints or signs of passage.

That implied some level of active life-support and filtration, if not outright maintenance.

However, there were a few black scuff marks on the white floors that could have been made by a Starfleet boot.  For what it was worth, they lead in the general direction of Decker's scans...

Preston passed Mcreeg as they swapped places in the old shuttle.  The taciturn security man nodded and gave Mcreeg a thumb's up before taking his spot in the rustbucket.

The last view Mcreeg had of Preston was through the shuttle's viewport as it lifted up and banked around to head out of the bay.  Preston smiled and nodded, his lips mouthing the words, Good Luck.

And then he was gone.

Decker muttered under his breath, "Gotcha.", then nodded absently in C'Pertha's direction, "We have a lock, sir. Looks like a pair of communicators and a pair of tricorders. They aren't together and they aren't close, but assuming the layout of this facility isn't too maze-like, I should be able to direct you there."

He pointed in the initial direction. "The first is about a mile in that direction."

He can't help himself, seeing a bit of the man in himself as well, returning his thumbs up, having to smile when he reads the man's lips, mouthing his own response "Thanks, We're going to need it"

The moment shared and past Mcreeg sets about to join the others, hoping there's as much to do for him coming up as there was on the shuttle, quiet time not his favorite times, even in the middle of missions..

Silently wishing he had a useable phase alread weighing on his mind..

Jav Ker fell in behind Dekker as the folloeed the signal traces.

'Ventilating this space would require significant equipment.' He mused aloud as if to justify his place on the away team. 'It us nearly as clean as my engineering section.' He added with a self satisfied snort

ch'Pertha smiled, warmly, as he watched his crew in action.
They were all performing, individually and as a team, like a well oiled chabathnak; and he was very proud of them.

"Right then, lets push on", he said.
They would continue the same 'advance, cover, scan' movement patterns that had been established; ensuring that if ch'Pertha became trapped in a forward position, his team could reopen the way back.

They'd use the triangulation that Decker and T'Lara were working on to guide their movements, with JavKer and Mcreeg scanning and observing their surrounds for any clues to the other teams movements/presence ... and any threats that might have gone otherwise unnoticed.

It quickly becomes apparent that the corridor layout of this massive station isn't exactly a grid.  In fact, it's something of a maze.  It keeps everyone glued to the tricorders, except those using their mark II eyeballs to catch more immediate threats.

Turning a corner, they are greeted with a  long hallway, littered with fallen beams.  Continuing in this direction will require moving them.  The normally bright lighting is flickering like an old neon sign here.
This message was last edited by the GM at 02:17, Mon 10 Aug 2020.

Jav Ker quickly knelt to inspect the nearest of the beams. Looking for signs of corrosion, fatigue. Or if raw force had dislodged them

OOC: No roll required here, given the difficulty and skill ratings involved.

PM to JavKer:

'Wait' Jav Ker cautioned. 'These have been ripped from the structure. There are no blast or mechanical failure apparent. Perhaps the gravity well is less stable than first anticipated.'

"Anyway to know for sure?"
She was a bit worried at first; if the gravity well was unstable, than the other team might be in danger.  But the signal they were tracking was still a bit far.

"Sure", ch'Pertha smiled, as he reached into his pocket and pulled out something small*.
Turning to watch, it tossed it into the area to see if it reacted to gravity as they would expect it to under normal conditions.



* perhaps a small tool, or writing implement

Mcreeg's eyes drift to his mechanical arm for a moment and he can't help but shiver as he always does when he truly focuses on it, things coming to mind..

"Could they have been brought down by someone..or something? perhaps in some kind of exo- suit, maybe to aid in deterring anyone from following?"

OOC: sorry if it's not the right tech for Trek

The small electronic stylus tossed by CDR ch'Pertha pinged off a girder and skittered along the floor, just as you'd expect it should under normal conditions.

OCC: Is it possible to make a different scan without losing the lock-on to the Federation tech?

Sure, I’d say.   Just borrow someone else’s tricorder, and do both.
If you wish, simply post Decker asking for ch’Pertha’s ... and then what you do with it when ch’Pertha passes it over. .

OOC: ch'Pertha has the right of it.  You could also have T'Lara's tricorder keep a lock on the targets, since she assisted you in finding them.  Either way.

Decker looked over the wreckage for a moment, then cleared his throat, "T'Lara, please keep a lock-on to that equipment. I want to take a gravitational scan of this area."

ch’Pertha seemed happy with ‘the flying stylus’ test, and was about to move forward when Decker indicated that he was going to take another scan ... so ch’Pertha stalled a moment to see how that turned out.

Decker's scan revealed that the gravitic field in the hallway appeared normal... appeared stable.  At least as far as the tricorder could tell.

Whatever happened here, may have happened a LONG time ago.

The girders still present an obstacle, however.