"Suspicions and Investigations"
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Stardate: 61036.2010
Stormwind felt the breeze as it blew past him in the night. He was standing about six feet from the edge of the forepart of the saucer’s upper hull, which was about four feet from where the water gently lapped. He was uneasy, as a Vulcan this was a new area for him. Since he had built the walls around his human half, he had felt closer to his Vulcan heritage, but still the odd emotion would try to assert itself.
Gazing out across the expanse of ocean he wondered how Lieutenant Mei was doing with the away team. As was always the case when he thought of her he felt an odd warmness suffuse his body, but this was not the time.
Derek brought up the tricorder he was carrying and began to exam his surroundings. Unfortunately at the low power setting they had to use its range at best was twenty-five feet. Turning he began to walk the rim of the saucer section scanning the water as he walked.
The FCO had learned one important thing since being on board the ANUBIS, and that was to trust his big Hirogen friend’s instincts. The fact that Uxtar did not trust the indigenous people led Derek to wonder himself. Add to his friends misgivings, that they knew little of this world and of the liquid environment the ship now floated in, and though it was not his job or assignment to find out, he had the Vulcan insatiable scientific curiosity and desire to learn.
The half human soon found himself under the Array section and almost exactly 180 degrees from his starting point. Looking up he knew that the Array sensors where working, any other person would have some feeling of pride in having managed to get power to the ship, he simply accepted that it was done. Glancing back down at his tricorder he was intrigued by a flash reading of a life form under the water that was only there a moment. If his human half had been available he would probably have made an assumption that it was some type of fish but… he was Vulcan he did not assume. He continued his walk back to his starting point paying closer attention.
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Derek worked diligently on the sensor power grid trying to balance input to output power to get minimal sensors on line. He had told the Captain he did not feel they would be useful being mostly underwater as they were. But on his walk on the hull he had picked up a number of fleeting indications of aquatic life forms, some large enough to possibly be sentient although he knew size did not really matter for a species to be considered sentient.
The main control board slowly lit up as the power balanced to the correct levels. The FCO began a grid search of the area below and around the ship. The sea was teaming with life. Surprisingly very little of it was near the ship. Derek set the parameters of his search and let the computer take over. He began studying his tricorder readings on the make up of the sea.
The Vulcan found that the sea was much like the oceans on EARTH, although the salt content was near zero. In fact they were in a near fresh water ocean, the chemical make up closely matching that of a river on Earth, there were however a number of unidentifiable chemical compounds present. The lowest part of the ship was still over a thousand feet from the bottom. The sensors also showed a slight current that was moving the ship in the same direction the BLACK PANTHER had taken. The calculated movement came out to about eighteen feet a day.
Stormwind prepared a PADD to show to the Captain. He also realized that he would have to apologize for failing to activate the main sensors. It was obvious that there was much more to learn about the environment that surrounded the ship.
The half human could not of course admit to the red headed female, that his first concern had not been for the ship, but for Susan. It was hard for him to admit to himself that he had placed her above all others… this was not the actions of a Vulcan.
Derek shifted the sensor controls back to the bridge, and routed a feed line to the FCO office on deck 3. He had already planned to spend most of his time there while he searched for a way to increase power output and maybe get the warp engines restarted.
Glancing at the time, the pony tailed Vulcan headed to his quarters to clean up and prepare to brief the Captain at change of shift.
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As
Lieutenant J.G. 2006 post #262
Setting: USS ANUBIS, Outer hull, saucer section
Stardate: 61036.2130
Location: USS ANUBIS, Deck 10, Main Sensor control
Brian Matthews (dragonsslayer@excite.com)
Derek Stormwind
FCO
USS ANUBIS NCC-18501
