Lieutenant Commander Riley Delar: Better Plans
Zeph
Riley: All of us trying to focus on the same thing?
Katsim: It’s not just that.
Riley waited for the big reveal, and tried to keep himself relaxed. The act of tensing up might be seen as a sudden move, and that would’ve been bad.
Katsim: Its’ more mathematical in nature. Possibly astronomical in nature. Or maybe…
Katsim: It’s all of them. And a sequence…the colours…
Vuq: Get on with it!
The impatience of the mercenary was obvious, though if he’d threatened to start shooting hostages probably would have made them work a bit faster. Riley took another breath and waited for Commander Katsim to direct the next phase of the puzzle-seeking.
Katsim: Commander…Would you take the artifact and stand on the white on the platform?
Toxin took the artifact and went to stand on the platform.
Enak: I think I see where you’re going with this.
Arlill/JoNz: Response
Katsim: It’s a spectrum. Light…white light, is the combination of all colours. Black is the absence…
There was a pause as Katsim studied the colors and spoke.
Katsim: White first. Then pink.
Katsim: Enak, if you would step on the pink, please. Riley, if you could take position on the red. JoNz…are you able to help? Could you stand on the orange?
Enak took his position on the pink, and Riley stood on the red.
Enak: Here I am.
Riley: In position.
Arlill: Response
JoNz: Aye, Sir ::to Katsim:: I’ll be fine.
Katsim: I’ll need to…borrow one of your men. We need six people to solve it. Otherwise it won’t work.
Vuq: Satosh, go.
One of the mercenaries was ordered to go stand on the space.
Enak: There we go.
Arlill: Response
JoNz: That’s amazing!
Enak watched as a set of spiral stairs downward was uncovered.
Enak: I was told in school that this never actually happened and was the providence of bad holonovels.
Despite the fact Riley had been subjected to numerous genres of holonovels since his time in the academy, he had also recalled some horror features with that sort of exposition as well.
Riley: Even some good holonovels, I’ve been told. Especially those of the Terran persuasion, both archeological genres and horror.
Arlill / Katsim / Vuq: Response
As the platform stopped moving, a control panel was discovered as well.
Enak: Well, that’s certainly interesting.
Arlill / Katsim / Vuq: Response
Enak: Folks, the stairs are big enough for us to go single file. Either we all go, or we figure out a buddy system. No one needs to die or get more injured.
He spat out some blood from where he had been clocked in the face as if to emphasize the point.
Riley: oO I really hate it when we have to compete for things. Then again, I’ve never been a super competitive person anyway. Oo
Arlill / Katsim / Vuq: Response
Enak: We all want to find out what’s down there, but bickering amongst ourselves isn’t going to get us there any faster.
Arlill / Riley / Katsim / Vuq / JoNz: Response
Enak: Alright, it sounds like we’re maybe coming to a plan?
Arlill / Katsim / Vuq /JoNz: Response
Of course not, that would be too easy.
Enak: I’m not saying we need a full plan, but some plan is better than nothing.
Arlill / Katsim / Vuq / JoNz: Response
Riley narrowed his gaze for a moment as his military background once again came into focus, trying to think of at least half a plan for how buddy systems worked. And how to make this fair, though ideally what he would have loved to see was an amount of Starfleet equal to the amount of mercenaries going buddy buddy with them. Or outnumbering them. Details were murky, but still.
Riley: Okay, how’s this? Each of us (gesturing to the Starflet & archaeologists) gets a buddy of your choice (gesturing to Vuq) to buddy with and we all go down together?
Arlill / Katsim / Vuq / JoNz: Response
Riley: If anyone else has any better plans, I’m all ears.
Arlill / Katsim / Vuq / JoNz: Response