Lt. Cmdr Ian O'Connor- The De-Aged Need To Be Caged
rob mahardy
(( The good side of the central structure of the “Damaged Dome” on Moon Sigma, Ross-580 Gas Giant A,))
The doors slid apart and Ian stepped in and immediately stopped
O’Connor: What the???
He never could have been prepared for what he saw.
T’Fearne had stepped in with Ian and Wren poked her head around the door, eyes widening.
Shortrith/T’Fearne: Response
About a dozen infants, toddlers and young children of various species were strewn about the room. Most lay unmoving on the floor but a few were conscious and immediately looked at the team startled and frightened.
All of them wore very oversized clothes of technicians.
Delphina pushed by headed directly for a Romulan baby crawling towards an exposed panel on an enormous computer system.
Wren: ::fully running into the room:: No! Not for babies, no! ::scooping up the now-crying Romulan:: Hey, hey come on, stop that. Stop. You don’t want to be electrocuted, that’s not fun. ::reaching into her engineering kit:: Hang on, I- oh! ::pulling out an assortment of ID tags that are tangled together:: Here, play with this ::handing it to him::
O’Connor: Uh, okay…good job…::he took a long slow deep breath and looked back at the crew:: Ok, let’s…
The tug at his leg made him stop. A two-ish year old Tellarite boy with what seemed like huge watery eyes stared up at him. Ian tried the same trick as Wren reaching into her kit and pulling out a harmless data chip and handing it to him.
Seeing him immediately beginning to bring it up to his mouth, Ian quickly grabbed it back, He managed to get the small chip away but he was to slow to get his hand out of the way before the youngster chomped down.
O’Connor: Ahhhh… Son of a….
Ian shook his hand in pain. The bite had broken through both the EV suit and the skin and began to bleed slightly.
The Tellarite toddler backed off behind an overturned cart and started to wail.
Shortrith/T’Fearne: Response
Wren: ::completely distracted:: I always forget that Romulans wear shoulder pads and aren’t actually shaped like rectangles…… what? Oh, ::tucking the Romulan baby under her arm like a football, reaching into her engineering kit again:: I’m guessing this has something to do with the time ripples we saw outside. If I had to guess, this is what’s left of the crew after walking through one of those things.
He looked over the room again seeing multiple species and ages, ranging from several months to around 6ish as best he could guess. Some more started to approach them, some held back and some carried on with what they were doing, essentially oblivious to the newcomers.
O’Connor: Agreed, first let’s…
He spotted the tiny Tellarite out of the corner of his eye playing with something in the pile of equipment that had toppled off the cart.
oO Oh, sh...Oo
He managed to register what it was and close to within a half meter before the plasma cutter ignited and sliced into the fabric of his EV suit cutting a slit through the material but luckily only grazing the side of his leg.
O’Connor: Yaaaahh….
As he fell he managed to swat the torch away, clattering it across the floor toward the doorway.
Shortrith/T’Fearne: Response
Ian pulled himself back to standing. His calf was starting to sting immensely but he was grateful that his leg wasn’t sliced off He’d deal with a little pain, at least for now.
Wren: I mean it could be worse, at least they don’t know what’s going on…. At least I don’t think they know what’s going on, I can’t actually read babies. He still seems pretty broken up, though. ::handing the Romulan baby off to O’Connor, who is closest, before squatting in front of the broken panel:: This looks like it’s been kicked in, not removed properly. ::powering it down, before pulling out an old Sensor Relay emitter:: This is from the original Romulan empire. Romulan engineers have almost universally switched to the Vulcan systems by now, this site might be a lot older than we think…. Even with all the babies.... any way we can corral those guys?
Ian looked around again trying to come up with a short term solution. He was amazed that with no supervision that none of them appeared to be injured. He’d only been in the room a couple minutes and was starting to accumulate purple heart points way too fast. He gave the neophyte Romulan a “you better behave” look.
O’Connor: Well since we forgot to pack a sheepdog or a nanny I think the most qualified we have for baby wrangling duty is a counselor. ::He smiles at Shortrith and passes the Romulan baby off:: See what you can do to gather them up. :: he picked up the plasma cutter:: They seem to like shiny things.
Shortrith: Response
O’Connor: I don’t know…Maybe play a game or sing a song or something. .::bends next to where Delphina is in front of the panel:: Ensign, while you’re baby-proofing the room, see if you can create a small forcefielded area we can use for a playpen, then try to get the replicator online. Who knows when the last time these guys ate was. ::he waved his bitten hand:: They seem to be hungry.
Wren/T’Fearne: Response
O’Connor: Lt. T’Fearne and I will check out the rest of the rooms along this corridor and hopefully be right back.
Wren/Shortrith/T’Fearne: Response
Ian headed back into the corridor limping slightly.
TBC/Tags
((OOC: If Ian was a D&D ranger his favored enemy would be Tellarite Toddlers))
((OOC: I’m holding off on replying to Rurat’dari post for a few days to give everyone a chance to respond to dealing with the children for a post or two. Then I can’t wait to meet her while wearing my front facing baby pack.))
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Lieutenant Commander Ian O’Connor
HCO
USS Ronin NCC-34523
R240009IO4