The Future Belongs To Those Who Dream

Posted on Thu Apr 16th, 2020 @ 6:28pm by Lieutenant Commander T'se & Captain Michelle Bartlett & Commander Rostra Tang & Lieutenant Cor Cordale & Lieutenant Commander Shaille Levine & Lieutenant JG Siobahn Fallon & Lieutenant JG Odelle Lin & Cadet Senior Grade Brady Macleod
Edited on on Thu Apr 16th, 2020 @ 7:23pm

Mission: Present In The Past
Location: UES Nelson

The journey through the ship had been without incident, though there was a certain eeriness to the whole situation. It was almost like walking through a distant memory, one devoid of details. Some of these spaces should have been full of activity, crew members hustling and bustling, the sound of chatter, orders being given... the sounds that one equated with life on a starship... instead, there was silence, darkness, and the occasional dead body to remind them of what may have been.

"If the tricorder is correct, then just through those doors is the first lot of power," Shaille said quietly as she drew her phaser, holding it firmly against the tricorder as she looked toward the Thux engineer. "Lieutenant Cordale, can you open the door?"

The Thux gave a nod, "I can." he commented, a positive attitude in everything he did. Manual access panel should be somewhere... around... Here! Removing the panel gave him access to the manual release, which in this case, was just a tedious wheel. Fortunately, his prosthetic arm didn't get tired. Unfortunately, the rest of him still got bored. He had a smirk on his muzzle, though, as he continued to convince the door to open slowly. "And.... there." he poked his head in, just to check for traps or survivors gone crazed with hunger.

No, to either. "All clear." and he opened the doors up the remainder of the track.

"What in the name of hell?" Shaille stepped through the doors behind the Thux and stopped short, staring at the scene in front of her. As the others followed through the doors, Shaille's attention turned toward the small away team gathering. "Are they what I think they are?" she asked quietly.

The scene before them was almost like something out of a really old, really bad sci-fi movie. Assorted stasis chambers shoved hodgepodge into any space they could fit, jury-rigged together in an attempt to keep them active.

"Commander," Shaille looked toward Rostra, uncertainty clear on her face. "I'm no engineer, but it looks like some of these are still active," she said, lowering her voice, almost as if she were afraid of waking them.

Rostra took the chance to peek in, illuminated better by the pair of headlamps the Dalacari was sporting. "Sweet Dia..." she breathed, hesitant to walk in.

Cordale, though, was made of slightly sterner stuff. "Well, I'm an engineer..." he offered, and carefully set about inspecting some of the units, "And... some of these are very much still active." he sounded impressed, "Though, what to do about it is slightly out of my pay grade. Sorry Commander, but that's your call."

Rostra wasted almost no time thinking about it. "Get me as much information on these stasis units as you can, and then coordinate with the Wellington to make sure we can supply power to them with little..."

"... to no interruption." Then one of the twins hit her comm badge, or where her comm badge would be under the suit, "Captain, Rostra here. We've found several stasis units still in operational status. I've..."

"... informed Mister Cordale to begin prepping to transport them to the Wellington to get them onto stable power. Is this permissible?" She realized halfway through that she was dangerously close to Seek Forgiveness rather than Ask Permission. Champion save there, Rostra.

T'se scanned the system allocating power to each of the active stasis pods. "Commander," she called out, noticing an irregularity in the power distribution. "The power signature is Federation in origin, although I cannot say at this time as to how the survivors maintained power levels for this length of time and under these unique environmental conditions." She paused, kneeling to one of the inactive pods. "I can say with certainty, however, that the power delivery nodes for each stasis pod are shunted to one another." T'se pointed to a modified coupling that fed the pod she was kneeling in front of, over to the one to the right, which was still active. "This is most irregular, Commander." There was a hint of bewilderment in the Chief's voice.

"Actually, before we do anything, I would recommend that we have medical come over and assess the viability of the bodies," Shaille said quietly. "Then we'll need to be very careful about what we do. We don't know how much, if any, time these people spent in the Delta Quadrant before they opted to go into stasis. The last thing we want to do at this point would be to wake someone up too quickly. I imagine it's going to be hard enough trying to explain to them that they're seriously prehistoric without having them woken up and being greeted by Binary Banditos and Sonic the Hedgehog...." her voice trailed off as she cast a sheepish glance at Rostra and Cor. "No offense," she offered. "That all, of course, relies on them still being alive enough to be able to be revived, so, yeah, I think we need medical before we make any more decisions."

"None taken." Rostra said with a pair of smiles, "I'm not a hedgehog."

Cordale almost facepalmed himself a concussion. He caught the reference but was rendered incapacitated by the Commander's grasp of Earth's culture. "I'll inspect the power couplings. Careful like," he added. "But yeah, I gotta agree with 'er. Medical's gotta clear them for transit, nevermind viability, what if they're sick? Something a few hundred years old, I'd rather not risk all of you having your boosters." he smirked, "I'mma Thux, we're immune."

He probably wasn't. His bravado would protect him, though. He knelt by T'se to inspect the coupling she was inspecting. "Risky, and probably a last-minute patch job." he grew distant for a moment, but came back to the here and now fast enough. "It's what you'd do if you were panicking and out of options, I'd wager. Running out of options actually does wonders for your choices. They all seem to sound better near the end." he mused.

Rostra gave a series of nods, "Alright, we'll get an inspection going." her enthusiasm got the better of her. She tapped her comm badge through her suit again, "Rostra to Medical. Lin, are you available for a consult? I need you over here if you can manage." she told Lin where she was, which wasn't as easy as it sounded. These halls weren't marked at all.

"This is Doctor Lin. I'll be right down. I'll beam as close to your coordinates as I can. She looked at Dr. Levine. "Guess we're going on a field trip!"

Once the request came in, it didn't take long at all for Siobahn to have her medical kit prepped and ready to go. The transport was quick and easy as they arrived on the other ship, using tricorders to guide them the last of the small distance to where the away team had gathered. There had been some small talk and supposition over what medical was being called in for on the walk, but nothing could prepare them for the reality of what they were about to see...

Siobahn's eyes opened wide as her gaze fell on the stasis chambers in the room. "Are they...?" she started to ask.

Shaille nodded in response. "Yup."

"And they're...?" Siobahn followed through.

"Yup."

"But...." Siobahn flipped open her tricorder as she approached the first of the stasis chambers. "Deities..." she turned toward Rostra, eyes wide and disbelieving. "Commander... they're alive."

Lin looked over at her colleague and then returned to her own scans of the pod. Unbelievable. But... how? "This one too, ma'am. Full vitals and everything. Talk about more questions than answers..."

Moving through the array of stasis chambers, Siobahn continued scanning and reporting. Finally, as she reached the far side of the room, among the last of the stasis chambers, Siobahn paused. "Commander, these last two chambers, the life signs are very faint and fading!" she called hurriedly. "It looks like the stasis chambers are failing, is there enough power for them all?"

T'se's head sashayed from side to side, although the gesture largely went unnoticed by the other members of the away team due to the limited vantages provided by the suits' helmets. "Regrettably not, Ms. Fallon." The sense of urgency was unmistakable in the Doctor's tone of voice. "I concur; power failure is imminent." T'se gently tapped at her tricorder, directing the scan toward the two pods' power distribution system. "Correction, power from these two stasis beds are now being redirected." She verified the energy patterns before confirming, "Commander Tang," T'se pointed to the two failing chambers. "I have a theory."

Rostra weighed her options and re-evaluated as the power failure loomed in their future. Then, things seemed to level off. "Huh, that's ... that's certainly something. I'm all ears for your theory." One turned to watch T'se, while the other twin joined Cordale in examining the two errant pods. Rostra herself knew little about engineering, and even less about ancient engineering. She was essentially there for moral support.

"I believe the power distribution system to this series of stasis chambers was the crew's attempt to guard against independent power failure of a single pod. If one chamber began to lose power, a neighboring pod would compensate for that loss by sharing its power reserves, maintaining nominal power levels for both chambers until such time that full power could be restored to both pods. However, if I am interpreting this wave-guide correctly, a cascade power failure to this series of chambers is inevitable."

Shaille paused for a moment, contemplating the weight of the words. "Commander, I suggest this would be a good time for us to split up. There were several other sections of isolated power on the ship. We should assess those as quickly as possible in case they're facing cascade failures as well. Once we know what we're dealing with, we can make an educated plan as to how we proceed."

"As adverse as it is to divide resources, I think that's actually our best bet to find out exactly what we're dealing with. Track down what you can and see how bad..."

"... things are. Assess each, and we'll start dealing with it in terms of more severe to least. I'll have Mr. Cordale see about bringing over a power cell and seeing if he can..."

"... stabilize the power grid."

Shaille nodded quickly. "Aye Commander. I'll take whoever you don't want to keep here with you."

Rostra gave a giggle, "You make it sound like a sentence. Why don't you and T'se check things out. I'm certain Mr. Cordale, and I can keep things observed here." she started.

"Report in with any findings you make." her twin continued, "No matter how minuscule they may seem. Anything could shed light on the power issue, or the underlying reason they all..."

"... decided to go into stasis, to begin with." a pause, "Be careful, the lot of you."

Shaille nodded. "Alright, Commander Tse, Lieutenant Lin, you're with me, the rest of you are here with Commander Tang. Looks like our next stop is on the other side of this deck. Let's go."

T'se offered a nod of her head before replying, "Acknowledged." She gestured toward an open port along the cabin's starboard bulkhead, "We will follow your lead, Ms. Shaille." The Chief Operations Officer recalibrated her tricorder, retuning the sensitivity of its sensors to ensure the scanners picked-up even the most minute of readings. Pausing for another moment so that Doctor Lin could pass, T'se followed at the rear of the trio; her diminutive size obscured behind the taller Trill. Even at the end of the column, she could offer Lieutenant Shaille a reliable interpretation of the data as it became available.