Turn 5.0 "Organized Retreat, Damage Assessment, and Re-Arming"
Zach Simon had lost his connection with the Grid almost right away when
he'd seen the man caught in the airlock. Now he stood outside in the hall,
trying to put the image out of his mind. He took a deep breath to prevent
himself from vomiting. "Could things get any worse?" he wondered.
"I don't know guys. I'm no tactician, I just run the Grid," he told
everyone, "I'm kind of useless until I get upstairs. If you can get me
upstairs, I can give you some support. We better be careful though. If the
guy caught in the 'lock is any indication as to what is going on..." He
shuddered a bit and just looked about, seeming a bit lost at the moment. It
was obvious that he was out of his element.
Lugwig eyed everyone in the group with squinty eyes and said, "Wasss
Akerssss hurt, wounded, injured? Perhapsss he hassss left a blood trail,
yessss? You humansss jussst full of blood...and depresssion. By the way
Missss T'Sssharn, your chancesss of catching Missster Freak Eyesss before
I fixey your leg wasss ssslim. Perhapsss sssomeone need more fixey fixey...?"
Nola listened to Zach and the T'sa and fumed that Akers had gotten away.
"Only for now, hopefully," she thought to herself. Turning to Dimitrio she
nodded her assent, "Yes, let's go to retrieve everyone's weapons from the
armory, and maybe swing by the Security Office on our way. We'll see if you
can open them up. If you can't then we'll check out that guy Zach saw."
Dig said, "Yeah, it's about time we got some more weapons, not only for us,
but for the self-defense of our non-security types. If you don't mind, Nola,
I'll lead the way. Nothing personal, but I don't know if you have 100%
reaction and aim with that wound, even if Doc Lizard patched it up. I know you
must be hurtin'."
Dimitrio's face lit up as Dig took charge of the situation, basically
agreeing to go where he wanted to go. "Good man, you won't be sorry. I'm a
good shot with my gun. Really..."
Nola looked back toward the ladder that Akers must have used, frowned to
herself, and then finally pointed, "Is there any way we can bar this access
panel?"
Dimitrio nodded and stepped forward. While he went to work, Nola wondered
aloud who this creep Akers might be, "So do any of you know any further
information about this Akers guy?" She listened attentively whilst she checked
to make sure that they didn't get ambushed. No one had much to say on the
subject. Most of them worked second shift duty and didn't mix company with the
man.
"I would've thought you'd have seen him more than the rest of us," Jake
said, "You and he were on the same shift, but then you haven't been here long
enough probably to get to know everyone that well. What about Dimitrio or
Zach? Don't you engineering-types stick together or something?" He looked from
Zach to the mechanic, hard at work on the access panel.
Dimitrio shook his head, explaining, "Akers was a newbie, too. I never got
to know him that well. He arrived just before Nola got here, I think. Right
after that other guy... what was his name? Hendrick, I think it was. He got
himself killed during a spacewalk of some kind. His suit had a leak, I think.
Anyway, Akers was his replacement on third shift."
He positioned the access panel back over the hole that led to the ladder.
A few quick twists with his various tools and the application of a mini-torch
took only a few moments. Turning back around he said, "That ought to hold it
pretty good. Of course, it won't be easy for us to access it all that quickly
either...but I guess it's more important that we keep this renegade away from
here as best we can..."
Dr. Lugwig, appearing to finally be at a rare loss for further words, zipped
around the immeadiate area looking for any indication of which way the
mysterious Mr. Akers might have gone. Although there were some obvious drops of
blood on the deckplates in front of the access panel leading to the ladder,
nothing else was evident.
He stopped only for a brief moment, close enough to Dimitrio to be seen, so
he could make the sign of a gun with one of his clawed hands. He pointed towards
it with one of the claws on his other hand and shrugged his shoulders at
Dimitrio. He followed up all of that by a 'two claws up' and a wink.
Dimitrio tried his best at defusing the situation with some ironic humor,
"Good patching, Doc! I hope you never have to work on me like that fast though."
Are you sure you can use a gun?" he asked, "They aren't the same as those
guns you give inmmunization shots with, you know?"
He smiled, then said, "What are you going do anyway, Doc? Shoot the bad
guys first, and then go fix'em?"
Lugwig twitched but didn't answer right away, his attention span being so
short that he had moved on to examine the blood on the floor with the scanner
built into his medical gauntlet. "Ssstrange," he murmurred to the others,
"Mr. Akersss ssseemsss to have developed a fixxxation with SsstarMech
recreational drugsss. Nothing that would induccce hallucccinationsss but
ssstill sssomething to note, I would think. He'sss hyped up on ssstimulantsss."
He looked back at everyone, obviously in distaste. Drug-addicts were not his
favorite patients to deal with.
"OK, people, follow me and keep spaced out and quiet," Jake finally said,
bringing the conversation to an end for the moment. He began to lead the
group down the curving hallway, past a couple of viewports which provided a
starry backdrop almost like huge paintings upon the walls. There were no
significant planetary masses near the Kendai Relay Station, so all that could be
seen were the tiny pinpoints of light of distant stars. Everyone knew that
somewhere around the other side, the Kendai star itself would be visible as a
Red Dwarf about the size of a basketball when viewed from the station's
perspective.
To the left side of the hallway was a security-access checkpoint hatch,
clearly marked with signs next to it on the wall. They indicated that the door
led to one of the point-defense guns (large weapons designed for screening
against missile attacks upon the station). Although the guns had been tested a
few times, they still had never been put to use in a real-life combat scenario
yet.
The group continued moving through the darkened corridor, their shadows
stretched beyond belief by the red-lamps along the floor and ceiling. Jake
finally stopped at the Security Office door (compartment 17) and pulled out
his ID-tag. The door's access reader chimed and the door swung easily open.
"Everything looks clean in here," he reported over his shoulder before moving
inside.
The security stations all flickered with the camera images around the
station... including the same view that Zach had received through his remote
connection from the engineering control room. The legs and booted feet of
someone still poked out of the door leading into the airlock on the Hangar
Deck. The only noticeable difference was that the pool of blood had grown in
size since he'd last seen it. Zach's stomach began to churn once again and he
looked away at the rest of the room.
To everyone else, the camera images seemed to show that the sensitive parts
of the station were "situation-normal", except for the fact that every one of
the rooms were empty of people. Of course the cameras didn't view every room
on the station... just those that were deemed important enough to warrant
surveillance. One odd thing did catch Jake's notice, however. The monitor for
the interior of Powerlift One was filled with static. Perhaps the camera had
been damaged?
Nola cleared her throat and then stepped forward, "Ummm... let me see what
I can do about our friend, Mr. Akers." She spent a few moments manipulating
the various security workstations, effectively putting a hold on his security-ID.
As far as the checkpoints were concerned, Akers was now an active threat to the
safety of the station. He would be denied access to any sensitive areas. "That
ought to limit the amount of damage he can do," she said confidently.
Dimitrio snorted as if to disagree, knowing full well that any engineer
worth his salt could disassemble an access checkpoint like the ones on the
station. It would take time...but it was do-able. Heck, he'd done it a
half-dozen times trying to get the stupid things to work right in the first
place.
"Let's keep moving," Jake urged, "We need to retrieve our weapons and then
we can start searching for the others...as well as Akers."
Jake stepped everyone back out into the hallway, and turned right. He began
to lead the way through the airlock foyer (compartment 4 on Level 4), and was
surprised for a moment as he looked over the scene. "Man... would you look at
that?" he whispered back to Nola.
She peered past his shoulder and raised her eyebrows in concern. An
explosion had ripped into one of the powerlifts, clearly collapsing the
guide-wires. The metal cage to Powerlift One hung precariously turned on its
side, as if it might have fallen or drifted out of place inside the shaft.
Within the cage, several bodies could be seen... or at least, what was left of
them. The explosion had burned them beyond recognition. There were six... maybe
seven... in total. It was hard to tell. A few sparks leaped from a swaying
cable within the shaft, flickering like lightning in the dark hallway.
"What'sss the matter?" Lugwig spoke from behind the much taller security
officers. He poked his muzzle between them and surveyed the scene, "Oh, lookie,
lookie... much wassste... bad sssmell... many casssualtiesss. Too late to
fixey, fixey, yessss..." He shook his head sadly.
"Let's keep moving," Jake repeated, gritting his teeth. This was getting
worse by the minute. As everyone else filed into the small room between
hallways, they all checked out the powerlifts with more than a little concern.
The second, northernmost lift appeared undamaged, the indicator light on the
panel displaying that its cage was currently sitting on Level Four, the Hangar
Deck.
"Do we wanna climb back up the ladders or risk taking a ride on that
thing?" Dimitrio asked for everyone.
"It looks stable enough," Jake commented, "Let's check it for boobytraps
first, though. Whatever blew up the other one could take us out just as well
if we set foot on it without looking..." He stepped forward and closely
checked the wire-mesh doors for any explosive device that might be attached.
"It looks clean, but everybody stand back while I push the button..." He
carefully did just that, and the powerlift car arrived in just a few moments
on its normal cushion of anti-gravity, silently swinging the doors open.
"Let's go...," Jake waved everyone inside. Directing the car to Level
Three, they patiently waited until it came to a stop. Directly before them,
they could see down the same hallway that led to their original bedrooms. It
was just as dark and shadowy as ever, only marginally lit by the emergency
lamps.
Dimitrio still held his stiletto hidden in his forearm but clearly gave
Dig the lead, hanging in the back. "You go ahead, I'll check behind us. Call
me over if you can't open any doors...but the power's back up so you shouldn't
have any problems," he said.
With that, Dig headed off in the direction of the weapons, which he
recalled being inside the Master-at-Arms Quarters. At every corner, Dig
stopped, waited, listened, and then waited for Nola to get in a good cover
position. Then he would sneak forward to the next corner or turn, peek around
the corner (with thermal goggles if necessary to see), and wave his comrades
forward. Although he was most concerned with an ambush, he kept his eyes
moving along the corridor looking for anything like tripwires or out of place
things that might tip off a trap that someone had set.
So far, the hallways looked just as cluttered and dangerous as they had
always been on every other security patrol he'd performed since being on the
station. "Watch your step," he commented as he dodged a particularly loose
section of flooring, the exposed pipes and wiring underneath posing at least
a small hazard should someone inadvertently set their foot down on them.
Dr. Lugwig quickly found his way into the line of humans right behined
Dimitrio and whispered, "Mr. Fontecelli you think me fassst with two-clawed
treatment, you ssshould sssee me ssshoot with two clawsss at ssssame time.
Why you keep taking ssslicey thingie out of your foot covering?"
Dimitrio looked towards the T'sa giving a close look at the blade, "Well,
Doc let's just say that I can do some stitching of my own and this is my
scalpel."
Lugwig nodded and continued the trek to recover the weapons watching both
of his flanks. He only stopped to investigate anything that appeared entirely
foreign to what he perceived as normal for the station.
Alex trailed the others as they moved down the hall and away from the
powerlifts. "I don't like this," he muttered as he stumbled forward, moving
faster than Cal could guide him safely. "If we eventually get down to the
hangar, I want my stuff..." Cal murmurred an update on the situation,
informing him that they were still headed away from the Hangar Bay and back to
the Crew Deck. He nodded, as if in reply.
"I'm glad we went for the grav controls first..." he muttered, wondering
how they would have made out if they had a full fledged fire-fight under
zero-G conditions. Still slightly confused and flustered from the previous
events, he waited for 'Dig' and Nola to come to a decision. "Leave security
to the experts," he thought.
Zach also fell in line with everyone as the group decided to go look for
guns. All the time as they went along he remembered Seargant Andrews yelling
at him, "Simon, you got to open yer freaking eyes if you expect to hit
anything with that thing." He couldn't remember all the countless extra
practices Andrews would assign him while the rest of the unit was on R&R. It
never really helped that much. He got a bit better, but not much.
As the team went along, he kept an eye out for enemies from other
directions than the front. He also looked about at the station's structure to
note anything that was damaged and how it was done, just to give them any clues
as to what was going on. As they were going along, Zach wondered where the rest
of the crew was. Explosions and gun fire just didn't take place without people
coming to check it out. He listened as they went along as well, trying to hear
any sounds that might give any information away.
The group moved silently down the hallway toward the Master-at-Arms Quarters
(compartment 16), passing by the door to Berthing Compartment Beta. No sounds
could be heard from inside the crew quarters, though that in itself wasn't all
that strange since most of the third shift engineers and technicians had been
rooming there. They ought to have been on duty when the power went out.
They also passed the door to the Sick Bay, and Lugwig instantly turned his
eyes in that direction. "Perhapsss there are othersss hurt, yesss?" he
whispered to Dimitrio, "They might be waiting for asssissstance. They might be
waiting for Lugwig, yesss?"
"Just keep moving Doc," Jake called quietly from up front, having overhead
the T'sa, "Once we get armed, then we start seeing to everyone else. Until
then, we're out-gunned and you'll just have more patients lining up for you.
We've got to stop whatever's going on. That's our first priority."
When they got to the Master-of-Arms Quarters, Dig went right to the
compartment, found it locked, and whispered for someone to come up and run a
bypass on the lock. Dimitrio was only too happy to oblige, eagerly pushing
forward from the back in order to go to work with his tools again. Soon after,
the door was opened and they all filed into Rieger Bloch's suite.
It seemed like an eternity to Alex before they finally stood before the
locker which held their weapons, but the lock seemed daunting. He stood back
and examined the room while the others worked on it. The room was a mess...
nothing out of the ordinary for a man with little time to clean up after
himself, he supposed. In one corner stood the weapons locker, a huge metal
cabinet with a gleaming bioelectric scanner staring back at them. Clothes were
strewn around the floor. The bed was unmade, the covers turned back as if the
Security Chief must have already been up and about. Typically he only worked
first shift, so the sudden power and gravity outage must have attracted his
attention as well... but where was he now?
Dimitrio knelt down in front of the weapons locker and rubbed his hands
together like a thief about to crack a safe. "Oooooh, this is gonna be a
challenge," he admitted, "It might take awhile." And indeed it did take
several minutes to bypass the lock, requiring him to break some of the latches
and expensive equipment in the process, including one of his trusty tools.
"Crap! That was my lucky piece!" he muttered, "I don't suppose the Concord
will replace that, will they?" The blank stares from Jake and Nola made him
frown and turn away, cursing as he opened the locker, "Why'd I ever take this
damn, stupid job, anyway?"
When the door was finally opened to the locker, Nola tapped Dimitrio with
the lethal end of her laser pistol with a knowing look. "As I'm the active
Security Detail, we'll check that the guns really do belong to you."
The mechanic smiled at Nola's joke but his face cringed into a frown when
he understood that she wasn't joking. "Damn you woman, I've had this gun for
a long time and to tell you the truth, this is the only time where it's been
furthest from me. And that's only because I was under the Concord's protection
and some other bullshit like that. I'm not sure whether my baby will part with
me any longer, but we'll discuss that another time I'm sure of it..."
Nola pulled out the clipboard and checked the gun and ammo BEFORE handing
them out to the other members. "Dimitrio, this seems to be your charge pistol
and your ammo... Alex, I don't know how you shoot it but this is your laser
pistol..."
Dr. Lugwig used his T'sa speed and ran over to Nola. "Misss T'SSharn are
you sssure you want all of thessse peoplesss here to have weaponssss? I have
made sssome observationsss about our friendsss here. It ssseemsss that one
fellow isss not confident in hisss sssshooting ssskill and the other issss in
big hurry to get hissss hand on a gun, yesssss?"
Nola looked at the doctor and blinked, "We don't seem to have much of a
choice. There are armed people on-board the station. It seems they've
already murdered several people. The best thing is to make sure that the
rest of you are protected while the security officers hunt down Akers and
whoever else might be causing trouble." She held Dimitrio's gun out for the
engineer to take...
Dimitrio muttered something under his breath and grabbed the gun and
ammo, double-checking everything. "Ah, here's my baby, come to Papa," he
said, immediately checking the clip on his charge pistol and grabbing a couple
of more clips which he stowed away in his harness. He put the long dagger
back in its boot-sheath, and palmed the gun with his right hand.
"OK, I'm ready to go freak-hunting," he said.
Alex nodded as Nola checked his gun and finally returned it to him as
well. He felt to see if the gun had its safety on, then made sure the gun was
hidden under his flight jacket. The laser pistol slid snugly into the holster.
He didn't expect to be much use in a fire fight, but it was comforting all the
same to feel the accustomed weight of a weapon in its old shoulder holster.
Nola continued to look over the weapons in the locker, noting: two stutter
pistols, an autoflechette shotgun, two 11mm charge rifles, two 11mm zero-g
rifles, six stun grenades, six plasma grenades, and two stun batons. There
were enough ammunition clips to have four for each weapon. According to the
clipboard the extra weapons weren't registered with anyone, so they were
presumably Concord standard issue, and available to any security officer in the
event of an emergency. "Well, no time like the present," Nola thought, giving
serious thought to upgrading her weapon, or at the very least, complementing it
with something else.
After everyone had strapped on holsters and their weapons, Nola looked at
the well-equipped engineers/pilots in front of her, and was rather astonished.
"I don't believe it! We have people here that create and invent objects to
improve society and look at what they tote around! I mean it's understandable
that Security Detail have something at least slightly lethal because of what
we have to deal with, but you guys. Sheesh!"
Nola can't quite believe the enormity of more people on the station having
guns. "Not only is one guy running around shooting at security, and messing up
the gravity and power, but now there's another couple of armed guys as well,"
she silently thought to herself, "One of them should possibly think of going
to a psychiatrist, too." She wondered if maybe Dr. Lugwig had any expertise
in that particular field, and then shuddered at the thought. "What's important
is that we've got some extra hands at getting this situation back under control.
I just hope none of them get too out of line, or we'll have to get them under
control, too," she thought. She looked sideways at 'Dig', wondering if he might
be thinking the same thing...
Alex had listened to the astonished tone in Nola's voice and the Doc's
disparaging comments about his marksmanship and finally grinned. "It's the damn
military. They think everyone who's enlisted should have a gun, so I had to
take lessons. I don't do too badly with Cal's help, but I'm not one of the
'from the hip' types of people, if you catch my drift."
"Dimitrio, though," Alex thought to himself, "Seems a little trigger-happy."
He made a mental note not to be between him and Akers when next they met.
"Well not to come down on your job or anything," Dimitrio spoke up,
specifically toward Nola, "But somebody messed up big time, 'cause that Akers
freak has a gun, and apparently has a deadly intent on using it. Against you
for that matter! So lay off me for carrying a gun here and let's go
freak-hunting; I haven't pulled the trigger since I stepped onto this relay
station, but he has! Let's make sure he doesn't do it again."
Now fully armed, the group stood ready to investigate the mystery of the
Kendai Relay Station at last...
-------------------------------------
---------- Turn 5 Comments ----------
-------------------------------------
1. Whew! This was a long one to put together. I had to move around some
of the dialogue into places where I thought it might be more appropriate for
it come out. I think there might have been some initial confusion regarding
going to the Security Office (compartment 17) or the Master-at-Arms Quarters
(compartment 16). Since you had time for both, I went ahead and let you stop
by the Security Office on your way to retrieve the weapons. It made logical
sense, I think.
2. There's a lot of information embedded in all of that, so I hope you
read over everything a couple of times. There'll be a test later. ;)
3. Questions?
4. Actions?
-- Neil
1. I mainly want to replenish the medical supplies that I have already used,
anything I can get extra without over encumbering myself I would also like.
2. One other quick question, who is the overall ranking officer of our party?
-- Brian
2. One other quick question, who is the overall ranking officer of our party?
That would have to be me for the moment wouldn't it? :)
Actually, unless Neil says something different I would assume that whilst on
board the station, and in an emergency I would assume the top dog would be
the Head of Security, then the rostered security person (Me!), then the
unrostered security person (Dig!), then finally the Captain. During normal
situations I would assume that the Captain would go from no.4 to no.1.
As there is no Head of Security (or Captain) around then I guess it would be
me. (he he he he :0).
Neil will soon write back and put me into my place. Won't you Neil?! :)
Ciao,
-- Jamie
A few clarifications...
[Richard:]
Zach nods and takes the pistol, puts it in his holster and says, "Let me
jack into the grid and see if I can catch anything new. If you guys can
get me up onto deck 2, I could have a lot more control. Right now, I
can't change anything, I can only view through the cameras as they are."
Zach jacks in again and checks out any logs he can access and looks out
the various security cameras.
[Hai:]
Alex paused as a thought occurred to him. "Hey Zach! Can you show me
what the hangar looks like right now? I'm just curious if there's anything
there that'll clue us in on what's going on..." If there was anything
amiss about the hangar, Cal could clue him in. "Not only that, where can
we get access to the security tapes? That's probably got something good
on the opposition."
There still seems to be some confusion about the computers and the Grid
on-board the station. Deck Two is the Communications Control area... and as
such, the only computer systems it interfaces with is the ultra-secure
mail-routing machines...which doesn't access the security cameras at all. Now
this particular computer system does provide communication to the outside world,
and therefore, the interstellar Grid... but not the "grid" on-board the station's
closed-circuit system.
To access the cameras again, you need to go to one of the station computers
which I listed in my last OOC discussion. Remember, there are two separate
computer systems on board the Kendai Relay Station... and they do NOT talk to
each other... the communications system, and the main station computer. The main
computer is responsible for monitoring and controlling the station itself (i.e.,
security cameras, engineering, defenses, hangar bay operations, etc.). This
system is on a closed-circuit. No hacker can interface with it over the Grid,
because there's no connection to the outside world.
To make matters worse, this system is not fully operational yet. It was
intended that all of the terminals located throughout the station would be able
to control all of the other terminals eventually (except for interstellar
communication, because that's what the other computer system is for).
Unfortunately, these terminals haven't been set up properly yet in order to
control anything other than their specialized functions... they can still inquire
on the other terminals (which is why Zach was able to view the security cameras
through the engineering control terminal). The only terminal which is capable of
controlling the others (except the communications system again), is the command
station on Deck One, or the secondary command station on Deck Six once it's
brought online.
Presently, Zach and Hai are still in the Master-at-Arms Quarters, where there
is no terminal available. I think Richard was trying to suggest that once he got
upstairs, he could plug back into the closed circuit and begin monitoring the
security cameras. To do so, he would need to go to Deck One, not Deck Two. And,
I'm assuming that Alex's statements would occur once they arrived there... however,
so far, I haven't seen any definite statements from anyone that the group is
headed in that direction.
[Jamie:]
2. One other quick question, who is the overall ranking officer of our party?
That would have to be me for the moment wouldn't it? :)
Actually, unless Neil says something different I would assume that whilst on
board the station, and in an emergency I would assume the top dog would be the
Head of Security, then the rostered security person (Me!), then the unrostered
security person (Dig!), then finally the Captain. During normal situations I
would assume that the Captain would go from no.4 to no.1.
As there is no Head of Security (or Captain) around then I guess it would be
me. (he he he he :0). Neil will soon write back and put me into my place.
Won't you Neil?! :)
Actually...no. That would be Teri Reed, instead of Nola. The overall command
of the station is what we're talking about. In the absence of the Station
Commander and the Chief of Security, it falls to the next highest ranking official
on-board the station. As Chief of Engineering, that would be Teri Reed. She also
appears to be missing... but then you guys haven't gone looking for any of these
guys yet. Now even so, Teri would still be dependent upon Jake and Nola to provide
security even if she was in charge, but she would be your boss. This isn't really
a military operation that we're talking about. It's more like corporate security.
Now, in the absence of 1) Station Commander Brian Rouen, 2) Chief of Security
Rieger Bloch, and 3) Chief of Engineering Teri Reed, command would fall to...
believe it or not... Dr. Lugwig Wisek, Chief Medical Officer. How's that for
irony? He's the only remaining high-ranking official on-board Kendai. After that,
it would probably fall to Jake, only because he's been serving aboard the station
for longer than Nola (tenure, you know?)...
I hope all of that helps everyone,
-- Neil
{A keen wailing is heard through the regions of space, where no one can hear
you scream!}
Nnnnoooooooo!!!!!!!!!!
-- Jamie
"Yessssss, yesssss, when you sssscream I can ssseee thosssse wonderful
teeth. You really sssshould flossss a bit more.............."
-- Brian
1. It is very interesting playing an alien in this game. As I understand
it the human/alien ratio in this setting is about 40 to 1. (Neil if I am
wrong correct me). My intention is to put forth a image of Dr. Lugwig that
is alien to all of you and therefore strange. I figure prejudice against
aliens is probably quite strong in this setting and Dr. Lugwig can really
feel the 'vide' from some of the other party members, but I figure a T'sa
would not care much unless it interfered with the mission in question or was
expressed in a violent context. At any rate a T'sa would find it very
curious...................as I did living in Europe for eleven years.
-- Brian
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