LT Tamio K'Wara - The Task Ahead

[LT Tamio K'Wara]

(( Main Engineering - Deck 4, USS Karnack Crashsite )) ((( OOC: As always, all opinions expressed IC does not reflect the OOC opinions of the writer :) )))

Now that Main Engineering had power, it was time for the team to focus on their next step. Understandably, however, the freak appearance of the Things, and the knowledge that they were loose on the Karnack and with all probability hunting down the crew in the different areas of the crashed vessel, was a bit distracting.

Tamio tried to pull themself together, focus. They’d been given a task, and they needed to complete that before they could start getting derailed.

K’Wara: According to the ship power grid, Main Engineering is online, as is the Quarantine Suite in Sickbay, the Anti-Matter Storage Bay and the Shuttlecraft Control Room on Deck 2. The Computer Core is also online. The rest of the Ship is still dark. ::taps their fingers together in thought:: What we’re missing for functional flight is... the Deflector Array, Impulse Engines, Shield Emitters, Lifesupport Systems and the Bridge.

Jaran: Are there any functional shuttlecraft that we could shield and get off the planet? Might be easier than getting the whole thing up.

Tamio looked up. That was a pretty good idea, actually. If there was a runabout or something- But Imril’s expression dashed their hopes pretty immediately.

Imril: ::To Jaran:: Shuttles are all gone. That’s what I heard when I got hustled towards the escape pods.

oO Of course they are Oo

They couldn’t have been that lucky.

Imril: ::To K’wara:: Don't forget the maneuvering thrusters, Sir. Unless we want the ship to only go straight forward. Which, technically, would get us off the planet. It would just take a lot longer, and cost far more energy fighting gravity and the atmosphere, given what we have.

Nodding, Tamio turned back to the team, turning their back to the console.

K’Wara: The fact that those areas are still functional means they must have shielding of their own that works against the effects of the Maelstrom. Is there any way for us to capitalize on that?

Jaran: It’s an interesting question. All we did intentionally was to secure Engineering, right?

‘Secure’ wasn’t necessarily the word Tamio would’ve used, but yes, their only intention had been to render power to Main Engineering. Which meant that the Quarantine Suite, Shuttlecraft Control Room - all of those rooms had been shielded from the Maelstrom all along, and had powered on now that the warpcore was back online.

It was a clear and unimpeded flow of power that they couldn’t easily dismiss.

Cole: Mostly, the doors look like they were used as a scratching post by a Magato.

That was to put it mildly. Doctor Jaran wandered off somewhere, and Tamio frowned as a response, but didn’t give it that much more thought. They were all a bit addled by their recent trials.

Jaran: Hey now. What’s that all about? It’s just me.

Cole: If we can’t get the lights one, could we … could we detonate a photon torpedo to create a heat source outside the ship.

Tamio looked at Natasha with their felinoid eyes narrowed. Tamio had been on away teams with Natasha Cole three times thus far, not counting her graduation. Four times, her solution to a problem put before her had been violence, three times with explosions. They’d thought the phaser grenade during her graduation a mark of creativity and innovativeness.

Now, they wondered if that assessment has been false.

Imril: That would make your target very, very hot, yes. But only for a very, very short amount of time. ::Thinking:: But the torpedoes’ EM shielding must still be intact, too, or they’d have exploded already and taken half the ship with them. We might be able to turn their matter/antimatter cells into batteries to help power the ship.

That, on the other hand, was a very valid use of the torpedoes - and something that would help them endlessly, given their current power bleed issues - if only for a minor detail. Tamio hoped they were wrong, but felt fairly certain they weren’t as they tapped through the console’s logs. Meanwhile, Doctor Jaran was busying themself with something irrelevant to their current engineering issues, but Tamio supposed they couldn’t fault them for wanting to dive right back into their own type of science at the first given opportunity.

Jaran: Hey, I know we have a lot of things on our plate, but I’m getting some real good data off Fuzzy here. It’s possible we could use what I’m getting to develop a better defence against our more angry neighbours.

Cole: ::looking at both officers:: Our team noticed their aversion to daylight, and their attraction to heat. ::beat:: I swear this isn’t because I want to blow something up.

Imril: I’m all for explosions, if they’re useful. Do you know about Project Orion? It was an idea developed on Earth in the Cold War era. Using atomic bombs to generate thrust, by setting them off behind a vessel. We could utilize the torpedoes for that, for an extra boost free of Callis I’s gravity well.

Tamio finally found the relevant log, and nodded slowly.

K’Wara: Your ideas are good, but we don’t have any torpedoes. ::indicates the relevant part of the log:: They were reloaded to another Starship once the Karnack was slated for decommissioning. No sense wasting perfectly good torpedoes on a Sabre class heading for its final resting place…

They turned around, shaking their head.

K’Wara: And as much as I’d like to give those Things a good wallop, they aren’t our main focus. We have to contend with our power issues, or we’re not getting off of Callis I.

Cole: We also noticed they were drawn to our resident telepaths, so time is more of a factor.

Tamio understood why it was difficult to focus on the power issues when they had prowling beasts hunting them and the rest of the crew through the hallways of the Ship, but the Things had to be a secondary concern. They had no actual weapons that would work against them - it was highly unlikely the phasers would be able to do more than make them regret a few life choices - so the best countermeasure was to get off of the planet as quickly as possible.

But a loud howl with intent practically dripping from it tore through the air, and they saw how the team’s focus immediately derailed.

Jaran: They’ve found the others.

Cole: We don’t know that yet. ::too quick:: It could just be movement between decks.

Natasha’s tone was unnecessarily sharp, and Tamio noted that Imril clocked it as well. Natasha likely felt the weight of the Things’ presence most of all - as the Security Officer assigned to the Karnack’s final trip, she likely felt personally responsible for the wellbeing of the entire crew - and Tamio saw how she was wound tighter than a Ferengi facing a stock market crash.

Jaran: ::softly:: Oh, I'm pretty sure.

Cole: If they’re attracted to heat and telepathic signatures, then we need to make them choose the more tempting option.

K’Wara: The other teams know what they’re up against, Lieutenant. Our task is to get the Ship back up and running, not run interference with the Things. Every second lost on those are seconds that we’re prolonging the danger they pose.

Tamio wasn’t certain she was hearing them. They really didn’t have time for this. Imril, closer in rank and familiarity with the redhead, tried a gentler approach.

Imril: Natasha, are you doing alright?

Cole: ::quieter:: We can’t let them harm anyone.

Imril: We’ve got this. They won’t win. We won’t let them.

Tamio didn’t generally believe in encouraging false hope and promises, but if that was what it took to get the others to focus on the task rather than the Things, that was what they had to do.

K’Wara: No one on this crew is incapable of defending themselves, Lieutenant Cole. You can’t protect everyone all the time; sometimes, you must let them protect themselves, so you can work for the safety of the entire crew. And right now, that’s by getting the Karnack up and running. ::slight grin:: Once we’re in space, let’s race the Captain to see who airlocks a Thing first, hm?

Cole: Response

K’Wara: Good. Now, ::looks to Imril:: We know the rooms we have to get back up and running. How do we do that as quickly as possible?

Imril didn’t need long to consider the query before they gave their suggestion.

Imril: With what we know now, here’s how I suggest we proceed. I recommend we route the Shuttlecraft Control Room’s power towards the Deflector and forward thrusters. They’re all pretty clustered together, so it’ll save time and materials. Assuming someone's manning the Shuttle Control Room during flight, we wouldn’t even have to link any power lines directly from them to the Bridge. So that’s a step we could skip, if it comes to that.

Cole: Response

K’Wara: Skipping as many steps as we can is imperative. ::looks to Imril:: What about the Bridge?

Imril: The shortest route to powering the Bridge would be to do to the Sickbay what we’ve done here, and then link them together. We could most likely assume control of Life Support through Sickbay as well, given the ability to pump medicines and other chemicals into the vents from there. If there’s time, I’d tie at least the Core into that chain, to shore up redundancies. That way, one energy route going down won’t cause the ship’s ‘brain’ or ‘lungs’ to turn back off. 

Doctor Jaran hopped into the conversation at this point, clearly more comfortable with participating once it was about their specialty.

Jaran: I'd be glad to handle Sickbay. I know every system in that room. Not to mention that Quarantine is already powered, and it has its own independent life support systems that I could tap into in a pinch. That wouldn't be enough to support the whole ship, but it's better than nothing.

Cole: Response

K’Wara: You’re right. Ultimately, this whole plan depends on the shield emitters. If we can’t get those up and running, the entire plan falls apart.

As would the Karnack, given the low likelihood that the hull team would be able to repair every gaping hole in the hull.

Imril: The impulse engines and defensive shield emitters are best powered from right here, because they’re going to draw the most power. Once we have either up and running, we could link them to the port and starboard thrusters. And then port and starboard thrusters to the forward ones. Which will link the Shuttlebay to Main Engineering in a nice, big circle. The last and least necessary step would be connecting the Core/Bridge/Sickbay/Life-Support chain to the Engines/Thrusters/Shields Deflector/Shuttlebay chain. Pure redundancy, but useful redundancy.

Jaran: Listen, you tell me what to do and I'm on it. I know my way around at least the basics of power systems. Enough to follow instructions.

oO Thank the Prophets (or whoever) for the Core Courses at the Academy Oo

Whoever designed that system needed a thousand promotions.

That was a lot of work... And considering their resource issue, this shouldn’t be taking weeks. A chirp from the console made Tamio look behind them as they considered the next step to take, and that’s when they laughed. The Computer Core, which had previously been a pale, flickering light, now shone brightly.

K’Wara: That looks promising. The Captain’s team must’ve made headway.

Jaran: Do we need to be communicating this to the rest of the crew, or are we just kind of going to hope they know what's going on?

That was a good point. The only problem was that Imril’s earlier test had showed that combadges weren’t reliable, as they had to travel through unwarded territory. But then, if it was between Main Engineering and the Computer Core…

K'Wara: We should be able to communicate via console. Hold on.

Cole/Imril: Response

Tamio headed for the console, typing out a message to send to the Computer Core. It was a gamble on whether the others would be there - the internal sensors were still offline, and unable to read lifesigns - but they hoped it’d work.

((( OOC: The following tag is communicated via console to the Computer Core Team )))

K’Wara: =/\= Main Engineering Online. Remaining facilities needed: Deflector Array, Impulse Engines, Shield Emitters, Lifesupport Systems and the Bridge. Can be rerouted through Sickbay or Shuttlecraft Control Room. Recommend dividing efforts. =/\=

As they finished typing out the message, Tamio noted that Jaran, who’d once again meandered away from the main team, fell to their knees, clutching their head. Tamio’s phaser was in their hand in a second, prepared to deal with the telepathic onslaught…

Only - Doctor Jaran was a Bajoran, IE not a telepath.

Jaran: ::groans:: That ::pants:: was awful.

Cole/Imril: Response

Jaran rose to their feet, refocusing and pulling out their medical tricorder. At least they had that now.

Jaran: These headaches can't be normal.

After a scan, they looked back towards Imril.

Jaran: Lieutenant, a word?

Tamio looked back towards the console, content that Jaran hadn’t screamed about an incoming apocalypse, just as a response came back from the Captain’s team in the Computer Core.

Cole/Imril: Response

K’Wara: Good. ::looks over:: Imril, Jaran, you good to go?

Imril/Jaran: Response

Well, that... Didn’t sound good. Sounded terrible, actually. An after-effect of the transporters had been expected, and while Tamio hadn’t experienced anything resembling what Jaran described, they’d also only used the transporter once.

K’Wara: ... The Medkit works, right? Doctor, find a way to ensure you and Imril can keep it together until we get off of this planet - stimulants, transporter sickness tablets, try it all. We can’t risk you two becoming compromised before the power’s back on. Meanwhile, Imril and I will be working on fixing up the Impulse Engines and the Shield Emitters.

Cole/Imril/Jaran: Response

K’Wara: No, the Captain’s team is handling the Sickbay systems. Which means powering the Impulse Engines and Shield Emitters from here is our primary task, and then we’ll move to the Shuttlecraft Control Room afterwards. ::to Cole:: Natasha, pull the shield modifications that Commander Munro programmed into the Computer Core and have those ready for the Ship shields. Once the shield emitters are online, it should eliminate basically all the power bleed.

Cole: Response

K’Wara: If you can get it to cover a larger part of the Ship - at least these three middle decks - that’d be great. It would give the teams some ability to defend themselves if they run into those things outside of a shielded room, but don’t waste power we don’t have. Better keep some in the bank, in case we need it.

Cole/Imril/Jaran: Response

TAG/TBC

LT Tamio K’Wara

Chief of Operations

USS Artemis-A

A240006GS1