JavKer coughed and sputtered and slowly came awake, clutching his chest in pain.  Decker had, of course, rolled him over before giving him the cordrazine.

"What happened?" he demanded.  "The last thing I remember was shooting a really good looking clone."
This message was last edited by the GM at 19:45, Thu 17 Sept 2020.

Decker smiled slightly and patted his arm, "Indeed. You decisively won the argument with him, but I'm afraid a couple of the others jumped in with rebuttals. Very poor debating style. You'll be alright, though. Take a minute, but I think we need to get moving."

He stood back up and started a *passive* scan of glyphs on the walls, "Mcreeg, how are you feeling? Are you able to function?"

10:57, Today: LCDR Christopher Decker rolled 21 using 3d20 with rolls of 15,5,1.  Passive tricorder scan of the glyphs Insight(10) or Reason(12) + Science (5) - w/ extra momentum die.
Even using Insight, that's 4 successes - or 5 successes if a focus applies.

ch'Pertha gave himself a moment, before regaining his feet.

Realising that the rest of the team were either on the ground being tended to, or doing the tending, he took an overwatch position by course of habit.
But he was thinking things through.

"This doesn't make any sense," he replied aimlessly to T'Lara, "With the level of technology around us, why didn't it attack us in a much more efficient way.
I mean, sending equal force when you could easily muster much more ..."

It seemed more of a test, than a challenge.
Which suggested that 'this test' was done ...  and that next there would be something else.

"We take a moment to catch our proverbials, then we move", he directed, "But I still want a genetic scan of the decapitated officer ... so we can identify him when we return to base".

"I've got no idea either.  Maybe it is studying us" 'or toying with us', she thought silently.
"I still got the oficer's comm, if it helps.  Let me see if I can find out who he is" she stopped and corrected herself, her voice faltering " - who he was"
This message was lightly edited by the player at 18:14, Sun 20 Sept 2020.

JavKer nods at T'Lara's reasoning.  "Or maybe the lights are on, but no one's home.  So to speak."

Decker nodded in response to the XO's order, "I'll take a genetic scan of him in a moment. I'm just trying to determine if those...", he gestured in the direction of the walls, "...are actively posing a threat to us. Passive scan only, this time, of course."

He frowned, "JavKer, are those phasers they were carrying actual phasers?"

Decker's scan was passive, reading emanations from the glyphs and walls for signs of a clue. There wasn't much.  Without using active scanning beams to read through the walls - if they could - all he could glean was what was being emitted.  Some light, some electromagnetic waves... nothing that would explain what had happened.  He was certain, however, that it was steady, with an almost rhythmic pulse that betrayed no danger or active threat.

(OOC: 2 Momentum to the pool, unless you'd like to do an Immediate Spend?)


T'Lara, meantime, was able to pull up the ID on the communicator she'd rescued.  ENS Daniel Morgan, Starfleet, assigned to Abyss Station.

Javker ambled over and took a scan of one of the phasers from the fallen clones.

"Nope," he concluded helpfully.  "Just hollow boxes.  No reason they should do anything."

The Science Officer nodded absently to Javker as he thought about the station's actions. Giving up on trying to read through the walls, he instead quickly scanned in the glyph patterns and tried running them through the UT database.

Bank 1, spend 1.

Running the glyphs through the universal translator that he and T'Lara had cracked for the Ithik language back on Chaktir.  At first, it provides a string of gibberish.  That then congeals into what can only be proper names... something the translator has no context for.  But the way they're arranged... and the column-like fashion... leads Decker to conclude this is a list.

A memorial.

For the dead...
This message was last edited by the GM at 00:02, Tue 22 Sept 2020.

ch’Pertha rubbed his chest where the phaser shot had hit him squarely,  “Empty box, that can’t do anything, huh?” he mused, as much to himself as anyone else.

“Good work, team”, he said, “Let’s make our investigation here swift.  I don’t like the idea of staying in this one spot too long.
Do we still have a lock on those other Starfleet comms?”


Sorry folks, on holidays with the family. Posts may be short and sparse for the following week or so

Decker snaps out of his brief distracted state and shakes his head, "Of course, sir. Let me just take that scan and check on Mcreeg. By the way, all of this...", he waves a hand around vaguely, "...appears to be some kind of memorial. These glyphs are all proper names."

He shrugged and knelt down next to the decapitated form to take a genetic scan/sample.

Mcreeg's breathing goes from shallow to deep, not having changed speed, just the amount of air being moved, his head clearing as well as the rest of him, even as he shakes his head, having had the weirdest dreams in the brief time he was out, even as he realizes that's what he was, the feeling like hangovers he's had after drinking "hey, give this a try" back at parties at the Academy.

Taking a moment to do a test of each body part, making sure everything works and is there, his eyes darting to his arm, even as he flexes it, his mind fully coming back to the here and now and he forces himself to his feet, looking around,fearing another encounter, not truly relieved when he sees he's alone..well, almost alone, averting his eyes from what is around him, his ears picking up voices, friendly ones at that, and he let's a bit of a smile cross his lips as he tries to follow them, to join them, a familiar though running thru his head..

"Still alive and kicking..a small victory but an important one"

"Ensign Daniel Morgan" T'Lara closed the comm she picked up from the dead officer  with a snap "Assigned to the Abyss station"  she still kept her eyes averted from the headless corpse, the sight of which made her visibly uncomfortable

"I hope the rest of his team are fine.  I can't understand why they decided to push through rather than going back, or calling for help, after losing one of their team members"

Decker's scan reads the body as human, and cross-references with his Starfleet file to confirm T'Lara's findings - Daniel Morgan, assigned to Abyss Station as a security officer. Young, about the same age as Mcreeg, on his first deep space assignment.

He and T'Lara had, of course, managed to keep the lock on the other Starfleet signals despite all the chaos.

Mcreeg saunters in at that point, still in his suit as you all are, looking none the worse for wear.

"Who knows, maybe they did," Javker grumbled.  "Who's to say he was killed on the way in?  Maybe he was trying to get back to the shuttle."

"Maybe" she wasn't entirely convinced.  Else why were they tracing the starfleet signals deeper inside the station?   But maybe it was true, and the rest of the away team was captured, or worse.  She tried pushing those thoughts out of her mind.  It wasn't helpful in the least

His heart finally again beating at a normal rate as Mcreeg rejoins the others with a slight wave, having alot of questions, even more as he catches the tail end of what was being said, for once staying quiet and just listening then venturing a comment, something coming to mind this question probably one of great importance..

"Excuse me, but does someone have the phaser I dropped?"
This message was last edited by the player at 21:56, Thu 24 Sept 2020.

"Well, he definitely was who his communicator says he was - Ensign Daniel Morgan." Decker paused, looking thoughtful, "Of course, his head could be alive and doing fine. The station's technology appears to be advanced enough, and I've seen stranger things before. Well, maybe not *stranger*...." he trailed off and shrugged.

With a focusing breath, ch'Pertha made his choice,
"Alright then, we move on.   But before we do, JavKer*, does this 'memorial' list of names include 'Daniel Morgan'?"

Speaking of strange, the Andorian was wondering if this was a memorial to those 'gladiators' that had entered this 'game', but fallen within it?  It would be pretty unnerving, but would also be revealing.

Either way, once the team was ready, ch'Pertha (as always) led the way through that second doorway, and further into their mission.

Decker paused for a moment, glancing between the XO and Engineer, and looking a little confused, "Well, I only scanned and translated a fraction of the glyphs. They're all clearly proper names, but not names that match any cultures we know. I supposed it's possible that they translated our peoples' names into glyphs and added them to the walls, but I'd have to scan and translate them all to be sure. That would take approximately 10 minutes."

Oh, it was Decker who did that.  I thought it was JavKer.  Sorry man

ch'Pertha nodded in acknowledgement, "Ten minutes we don't have.
Lets get moving".

Andorians are weird - I try not to make assumptions.

Decker nodded and reset his tricorder back to tracking the remaining Federation signals.
 Then he switched it over to his left hand and drew his phaser. "Ready."

Feeling more foolish than he would ever let on, hoping to one notices what he's doing, Mcreeg runs back to where he had just been, to where things had gone south and he's been zapped, finding his weapon and picking it up, actually rolling his eyes at himself before hauling butt back to re-join the others, falling into place, phaser at the ready, thankful his rapid heartbeat can't be felt, or his goosebumps seen..

Something had been nagging at him like his parents when they were trying to convince him to stay home, like a puzzle without all it's pieces and he decides to risk being thought stupid, something he hates, but this time it might be important.

"Back where I woke up, the name on the jacket was Morgan, I saw it again when I went back just now, and you're discussing Daniel Morgan, does that help us in anyway?" He's asking everyone since he wasn't totally back to himself when he first walked in and didn't truly notice who had been speaking..
This message was last edited by the player at 20:13, Fri 25 Sept 2020.

OOC: I realized, belatedly, that I dropped a dangling clue just as the party was about to move on.

Rather than waste time with it, let me summarize your findings:

The fallen clone of the Starfleet officer is, in fact, the 'copy' of the headless man in the room of glyphs... Daniel Morgan.  He's no more 'alive' than the other clones.

And now we will move on to the next scene... dropping 1 Momentum for the scene shift as usual!

Following the tricorder signal to the next blip of Federation technology, the team presses deeper into the station.  The walls and floors remain as always, but, on rounding a corner, the team is confronted by an unusual sight.

In the brightly lit hallway, there were swirls of debris spinning in the air.  Like a 'dust devil' or a pile of swirling leaves in the wind.  But there's no wind.

The debris appears to consist of scraps of paper, small plastic debris, a few items like a stylus, and a small plastic cup.
This message was last edited by the GM at 02:03, Sat 26 Sept 2020.