Getting Inside (USS Essex)

Posted on Tue Aug 12th, 2014 @ 9:49pm by Fleet Admiral Mike K`Wor Bremer & Colonel Danny Lennox & Admiral Deela T'Lar & Captain L'Verrem & Commander Jonathan Coleman & Captain R'nard Lokran & Commander Tressa Brislan & Lieutenant Colonel Jillian "Phoenix" Sullivan & Captain Jack Solomon

3,953 words; about a 20 minute read

Mission: Mission 86 - Discovery
Location: Various
Timeline: MD2 1400hrs, Following 'Away Mission'

ON:

Once inside the base, and the Away Team split into three smaller teams, Bremer and Lennox moved forward down the main ‘street’, looking for a place to duck out of the way so they could contact Phoenix with an update. A few meters in, they saw what looked like an old Earth telephone booth. Bremer nodded to Lennox as he stepped inside and pretended to talk on the old communications device while Lennox stood watch outside.

“Bremer to Phoenix.”

"Here," Phoenix replied back, a lot of diagnostic sounds in the background.

“We're inside the facility and have split into three teams as planned. What’s your status?” Bremer informed the Major.

"Ship still can fly. Just tryin' ta diagnose some occasional vibrations."

“Understood. Be advised, we've seen patrols from this base in the woods, some manning anti-aircraft weapons.” Bremer warned.

"Don' see that as a problem, so long's tha cloak is still on," Phoenix reminded him. "But I can probably load an EMP burst, usin' one of the micro warheads, if that becomes a problem."

“We’ll contact you once we have the device in hand, Bremer out.”

After finishing his ‘call’, Mike stepped out of the phone booth, then he and Lennox continued forward. They were a few steps behind two other men who appeared to be Senior Officers of the base. They were talking about the recent air raid.

“...and if we have any chance of turning the tide of this war we need to find a way to stabilize the weapon.”

“I agree, but with constant air raids and threat of ground attack we're behind on our work...”

“That’s no excuse Lanz, the Three-Thirty-Second just arrived yesterday to help reinforce our flank, the Two-One-Nine is reinforcing our position here.”

“Yes Sire, but most of them are recent draftees or came from the northern front and are exhausted. We need air support.”

“There are two fighter squadrons due in first thing tomorrow morning, the Twenty-First and One-Eighty-First, both flying the new Whirlwind class fighters.”

Lennox and Bremer glanced at each other and smirked when they heard the ‘One-Eighty-First’.

The first man gave a nod, then added, “Sire, we’re running out of men, material, and territory. Our way of life is threatened by our enemies, intent on destroying us. M’Pow has given us a gift, we just need time to better understand it, to use it to defend our homeland.” The two men turned down a side street and into a building with two guards standing outside.

Bremer stopped and looked at Lennox, “We need to find out more about this world war of theirs.” He looked around for a moment, “These people shouldn't have this level of technology, but if we remove it, we’ll be possibly interfering with their future and course of evolution...breaking the Prime Directive.”

“Who’s to say this isn't their natural course, and by these people being in position of advanced alien technology isn't what’s breaking the Prime Directive.” Lennox replied.

“That’s the paradox...damned if we do, damned if we don’t.” Bremer replied. He looked around again for a moment, then started walking again, “Let’s find this thing and get the hell out of here.”


Bridge, USS Essex

Billy continued to monitor the primitive military frequencies that the planet used to hear their troop mobilizations and if they had detected the Away Team. So far nothing of note, it was a tedious job, but someone had to do it. And at least he was familiarizing himself with a new language.

L'Verrem purred quietly at the bridge's science station as he continued to observe the tetryon emissions on the planet's surface. The signal strength was rising once again, as he expected. The source continued to destabilize, and it was a race against time to retrieve it before it destabilized completely and either outright exploded with a force he was sure the beings below had never achieved on their own, or bathe everyone within several tens of kilometers with a fatal dose of radiation. His attention was momentarily taken from the tetryon spectral display with a soft tone he knew was a new sensor contact. He looked at the display that caught his attention, which showed the results of the latest sweep of the short range sensors. He cocked his head and in curiosity and trilled. He tapped several commands into the display, which zoomed in on the new contact.
"Admiral T'Lar, I am detecting an object appearing from behind the planet's moon. It is unpowered and following an orbital path," L'Verrem announced.

Deela stood up, "On screen." She watched as the object came into view. "Augment." The object enlarged, revealing that it was a vessel but it was not a configuration that she was familiar with. The vessel looked lifeless and obviously damaged as well.

Deela looked over at L'Verrem, "Any lifesigns?"

The Caitian peered intensely at his display for a moment, then replied "Negative. However, there is considerable epsilon radiation emanating from it. Epsilon radiation is created from tetryonic energy sources. The vessel may be related to the tetryon source on the surface."

"Can we get an away team onboard safely?" Deela asked.

"Yes, so long as we are properly shielded. Environment suits should be sufficient. I will assemble a team immediately. The ship will not be in transporter range for two more days, so I would like to take a shuttle," L'Verrem said.

"I am way ahead of you." Turning to her XO, "Commander Lokran, I'd like you to lead the team. Captain L'Verrem will accompany you. Lt. Keikeya, you will also be joining them. Oh, and have Dr. Brislan come along as well."

"Aye, Ma'am." said R'nard. At last, an away mission. He had been cooling his heels on the ship, and now he was to investigate the ship. He hit his commlink. "Dr. Brislan, report to the shuttlebay."

=^=Brislan here, on my way.=^=



Surface, Base

Meanwhile Planetside. Duval looked around as he waited quietly with Lieutenant Solomon. "El Tee. you okay?" he said softly to the man next to him.

Jack nodded as he answered. He was tapping away quietly on his tricorder, trying to locate the source they were looking for. "Oh yes, in fact..." he started as the tricorder emitted a single beep, "I'm bloody spot on. I've located it, I've got the co-ordinates if your ready to leave?" He asked.

"Alright... nice and slow, lets not draw any attention to ourselves..." he said quietly, mostly for his own benefit as he was not a patient person. "Our big green style cannot be defeated." he smiled at Solomon.

"Agreed," said Jack as they moved off quietly, following the signal picked up by the tri-corder.


Elsewhere, Bremer and Lennox were making slow progress across the compound, when Lennox noticed a small shack with a large power generator attached outside and several high gain antennas attached. They looked around, then quietly entered the small building. Inside, there was two desks set up, one was clearly the desk of a guard, and a sign-in/sign-out book was laid open on it. The other looked like a communications station with an old-style telephone like device beside a wireless radio. The radio had a headset and microphone for voice communication, as well as a tele-type like device that reminded Mike of what a German Enigma machine from Earth’s World War Two looked like. Beyond the desks was a door, but judging by the distance, there wouldn't be anything behind as it was at the far end of the small building. This peaked the Admiral’s interest and he walked to the door, opened it, and realized it was a small elevator.

Bremer and Lennox stepped inside, shut the door, and slid the lever control. The elevator slowly started to lower. It seemed to drop about three to four levels before stopping inside a hardened concrete bunker. When the door opened, there was another guard desk, but again, no one was there. Bremer and Lennox guessed the Guards had been sent to assist in the base defense or clean up following the attack, but before they could step out the Guard came around the corner.

“Halt, state your business here.”

Without losing a beat, Lennox stepped forward, “We’re here to verify the integrity of the bunker following the raid.”

“I received no call.” The Guard replied, checking the phone on his end.

“There was no one manning the position up top, we were concerned so we proceeded down.” Bremer replied.

“I don’t know you, what’s your unit?” The Guard replied as he became suspicious.

Bremer flashed a smile, “We're with the Two-One-Nine’s Engineering Battalion, we only just arrived to help reinforce our position here.”

“Ahhh! The Two-One-Nine, I’ve heard about your unit’s deeds in the North, very heroic...but I heard most of your unit is made up of old men and boys now.” The Guard replied, still trying to figure out Bremer and Lennox.

“It’s true, many of our ranks were lost, we barely made it back ourselves. We lost a lot of good people up North.” Lennox replied as both he and Bremer stepped out of the elevator. Their body language was relaxed, hoping to put the Guard at ease too.

After a few moments, the Guard finally replied. “You’re defense of the Fatherland will never be forgotten, neither will that of the men or gave their lives in glorious battle. But, I have to verify with Command that they sent you.”

Bremer paused, the use of the word ‘Fatherland’ also made him think about Earth’s Germany, but he also smirked when he heard ‘glorious battle’, however he quickly shifted his thoughts back to the matter at hand. He knew if the Guard called and was told no one had been sent, there could be trouble.

The Guard picked up the phone and dialed the number. Bremer and Lennox stood there, looking calm, but inside were sweating it out. After a few rings, the Guard hung the phone up. “No one is answering.” He paused a moment, looking Lennox and Bremer up and down, “You may proceed, but you check in with me before entering any restricted area or leaving.”

Bremer nodded, “Of course.”

The Guard returned the respectful nod, then took his seat at the desk as Bremer and Lennox started down the corridor.

Bremer and Lennox had made this way through two rooms of the underground complex they were in so far. Nothing out of the ordinary was found, just two small offices for high ranking Base Staff members.

As they rounded a corner, they saw three more rooms ahead of them as well as a side corridor that seemed to lead toward a mess hall, bunk style quarters, and an armory. They decided to head for the three closed rooms first. One was another office, larger than the others they had seen, but relatively empty like the previous ones. The next room was another communication room, but it was unmanned. Lennox looked for any information, but there was nothing, the room looked unused.

They then proceeded to the third of three doors, and were surprised at the weight of it. Instead of just a wooden door, this one was a reinforced steal type of metal, extremely heavy, even though it looked to be no different from the others. It took both men to open it, and when they stepped inside they saw way. It wasn’t just another room, but it was another hardened bunker inside the bunker they were already in. Inside the door were set three heavy machine guns aimed at the door Bremer and Lennox had just come through. There were barricades set up for defense, and it was obvious what or whoever was in here, was important to these people.

Cautiously, Bremer and Lennox moved forward, even though on the Tricorder no one was around. After a series of turns and additional defensive positions, they came to a large reinforced door flanked by a final layer of defensive positions. The door was open, and Bremer and Lennox proceeded in. Inside was a treasure trove, paintings, gold, silver, books, filing cabinets, clothing, items that looked to be in museum cases...it looked to be the national treasure of the people that occupied the base above.

Lennox looked around the room for a few moments, “Amazing, it looks like they have put all of their National Treasures in one place for protection.”

Bremer was looking in the first filing cabinet. His Tricorder had translated the words on the front to say ‘Governmental Records.’ He opened the top drawer and started to look through.

“They call this planet Cabril, and the majority of the population believe in a god they call M’Pow. The nation-state we’re in is called Heshian, and was founded over two hundred of their years ago.” He continued to look through historical documents til he came to more recent events, “The Heshians claim in their historical records that they A’brabs started this war with a sneak attack that decimated one of their Naval bases. The A’brabs believe in another god, named H’mas, and they are said to be war-like, interested in total domination of the planet and the enslavement of all that don’t follow the ways of H’mas.”

He pulled out several black and white photographs that were in the same folder and showed them to Lennox. The pictures showed men, women, and children being shot, tortured, raped, as well as stacks of dead bodies. Text under the pictures described them as mass killings of civilians in territories captured by H’mas.

“Doesn’t this fly in the face of what we learned in orbit, that the majority of the world’s powers were allied against these people, the Heshians?” Lennox asked.

“It’s possible we picked up propaganda broadcasts, or both sides are equally brutal to none believers in their religious war.” Bremer replied as he put the photos back into the folder.

Mike continued to look through, finally finding information on ‘the device’. “Here’s something.” He said as he started to read, “They documented that the ‘Tesar Device’ fell from the heavens, a gift from M’Pow, after six years of war. The device streaked through the sky, turning night into day, landing in the heart of Heshian Territory. Their scientists claimed it was emitting power, glowing purple, and pulsing...which seemed to follow along with a prophecy in their religion. They brought it here and found they could harness some of the power, focus it, and the destructive force was greater than any weapon they had in their arsenal, while at the same time powering this entire base. However, they aren’t able to solve serious issues, such as ‘backfiring’ in the weapons after a few uses, causing the weapon to self-destruct killing whoever is using it.”

“It puts us in a bad spot, if we take the device, we’re basically condemning these people to death.” Lennox replied.

“These people were never meant to have tetryon technology, we’ll just be restoring the natural course of evolution for the planet.” Bremer replied. He didn’t like it either, but he had a look at the mission logically instead of emotionally.

“Some could say the same thing about Earth, when the Vulcans made first contact.” Lennox replied.

“But Humans had warp technology, and were ready to step foot on the galactic stage.” Bremer rebutted.

“But with help from the Enterprise-E who’d come back in time.” Lennox added.

“I know, I was there, rescued from the Defiant during the battle with the Borg.” Mike paused a moment, “These people were at war long before the tetryon device crashed on the planet, according to these records. Let’s focus on our mission, and allow this planet to find its own way to the future.” Bremer replied.

Lennox nodded after a moment, then the two closed up the files they had looked at and left the vault room. They made their way passed the defensive positions they saw before, then back out into the main corridors. They were nearly back to the guard desk when the Guard came around the corner.

“Find anything?”

“No, everything is secure, there appears to be no damage, thank M’Pow.” Bremer replied.

“Yes, thank M’Pow indeed.” The Guard replied. “I would suggest that when you return to the surface, you pick up rifles from the closest weapons locker, we’ve had a report that H’mas paratroopers are planning an attack just after dawn.”

Bremer and Lennox both looked at each other.

“I know what you’re thinking,” the Guard continued, “the Second Fleet and the Third Marines were due to hit their advanced base about an hour ago, but we just received word that the H’mas Fleet was waiting. We lost two battleships, a carrier, and half a dozen cruisers and destroyers, as well as three transports full of Marines. The Fleet is limping back to Ozar Harbor now.”

Bremer smirked, “It’ll be a glorious battle, today is a good day to die.”

The Guard raised an eye brow, then smiled, “I like that! Today is a good day to die!”

Bremer and Lennox then headed back into the elevator and headed back to the surface. The small building was still empty, so the two Starfleet Officers quickly left. They didn’t get ten meters away when three men rushed into the small building to take up their guard positions.

Two buildings away was a building labeled as ‘Weapons Supply’. Bremer and Lennox entered, explained to the Supply Officer there that they had lost their rifles during the raid, and they were each given a new rifle, helmet, and sidearm. Stepping out, Bremer had Lennox send the historical data they had found to the rest of the Away Team, Phoenix, and the Essex. Bremer looked over the rifle, which was remarkably similar to an American M-1 Garande from Earth’s World War Two, only its clip held ten rounds of ammo instead of eight of the Garande.

“You’re liking this aren’t you?” Lennox said with a smirk.

“I am, as a history buff, including Earth’s World War Two, it’s fascinating the similarities.” Bremer replied.

“Data sent to everyone.” Lennox replied after a few minutes.

“Good, let’s get moving.”

Meanwhile Duval along with Pepper and Soloman were walking down on of the main thoroughfares as if they belonged there, his tricorder beeped as he received a download from someone else on the away team. "Halt, who are you?"

Duval turned his head as he looked at Solomon.

Coleman, who was originally with Pepper, had stopped to download the information from Admiral and analyze his readings of the device. He had been fairly quiet during the mission. He was doing a lot of coordination with the Engineering and Science Teams on the ship, giving them information that he was finding and getting help on trying to make sure nothing got out of hand with the device.
When Coleman had finished this round of calculations, he noticed he was a little bit behind the group and they had gone around a corner. Before he went around, he heard someone yell, "Halt, who are you?" That stopped Coleman in his tracks. He took some scans of the people around the corner, noticing that Duval, Pepper, and Solomon were there, as well as a small group of the native troops. He realized this was the start of a bad situation.

Jack stood his ground as the native soldiers stood before them and demanded to know who they were. He'd been in situations like this a few times and decided to try and see if they could talk their way past.

"I'm sorry, we are lost. My brother and his friends here were headed south but our sense of direction is a little lacking. We meant no harm gentlemen," Jack offered. He kept his arms by his sides, offering a stance that was peaceful and non aggressive.

Duval nodded to the guard. "My apologies, we're newly arrived from the Northern front.." he added by way of explanation.

The Guard nodded. "Ahh, that explains so much... we thought you were infiltrators for a moment."

"No sir... not these proud sons of the fatherland." Duval was suddenly glad he had taken a moment to look at the information the Admiral had sent them, it had only been a few seconds worth of time but the notice about the fatherland stuck out.

Jack decided to add to Duval's successful beginning. "we're from the northern front my brothers.... we lost all our gear during the last raid as we ran for cover... we've been walking for days looking for shelter and new supplies with no luck. I know my comrades are strong but we are all suffering from fatigue and exhaustion whilst trying to avoid the enemy," he explained.

"Can you help us out?" he asked.

After a moment, the Guard nodded, “The Armory is right over there, where those two guys are standing. They can get you geared up, but be quick it’ll be dawn soon, you need to get to your post.”

The two guys the Guard pointed at by the Armory were none other than Bremer and Lennox. Duval, Solomon, and Pepper walked over to the Bremer and Lennox.

“Where’s Coleman?” Bremer asked.

Pepper looked around, “Damnit! He was right there!”

The group looked around and saw Coleman being questioned by three Soldiers, one of which appeared to be an Officer. A moment later, two of the Soldiers grabbed Coleman by the arms and led him away with the Officer leading.

Bremer looked back at Solomon. “Get to the device and get it back to the Runabout. We’re about to lose the cover of darkness. Pepper and Duval, you’re with the Lieutenant. Lennox and I will get Coleman. Let’s get it done.”

Bremer and Lennox double timed it after Coleman, but once they were insight of him, they slowed to a walk following to where he was being taken.

Duval nodded to Bremer, his orders being clearly understood by the larger then average Marine as he nodded to Pepper then Solomon. "Gents." he said quietly, he had no issues with having the Admiral along which for him was a nice change from the usual desk jockey who wanted some fresh air that he had been half expecting and half dreading. "Where to El Tee?" Duval inquired.

Jack looked around. "We need to find the source, once thats done, I can get it safely aboard the Runabout. Thats half the job done whilst the Admiral gets Coleman," he explained.

"Lets draw our gear first sir.. then we can blend in properly." Duval indicated the armory that the three men were presently standing next to.


Coleman waited until the rest of the group got past the guards on duty and regrouped. Coleman let out a sigh of relief, but before he could head over there with the rest of the group, he noticed two hands grab each of his arms and a voice say, "You're coming with us." Coleman knew this wouldn't end well and tried to come up with a plan of action, in case the rest of the group couldn't get him out in time.


tbc...



OOC:Mike - I'll be posting this tomorrow and starting up a new JP for us to continue, didn't realize this had gotten so long lol

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