An Eerie Feeling

Posted on Mon Feb 5th, 2024 @ 2:17pm by Lieutenant JG Eislyn Jortho & Ensign Kate Kono & Lieutenant JG Vienna Steele & Lieutenant JG Tarja zh'Rhun

Mission: Lost & Found
Location: USS Henry Hudson

The away team materialized in the rear of the bridge. Eislyn watched as Wyatt and Vi immediately pulled phasers and visually scanned the room, doing a tactical check. For her part, Eislyn pulled her tricorder and began scanning the bridge, confirming the results she had gotten aboard the runabout. "Everything appears clear" she said, confirming the look she was getting from the ranking officers. "I believe we can get power above these emergency levels in a few moments" she said as she made her way over to the Ops console.

Kate looked around the bridge as she breathed in the old, stale air. The slender Asian had almost sat down on the grey leather seat at the powered down science console at the rear of the bridge before realizing that the seat wasn't actually grey. Kate's dark eyes squinted as she reached out with her left hand and dragged the bladed side of her palm across the headrest. Jet black leather appeared from the other side of her motion as she brought her dredge toward the grey of the seat. Disgusted, she stood up and clapped her hands together like a grade school student smacking two chalk erasers together which created the same cloud of dust.

She reached forward and knocked on the console in front of the chair. Instead of a dull smack of textile, carbon fiber sheeting over plastic touchscreen lamenant, she heard the chrisp ring of glass greet her knuckles. They were still touch screens but there was an era where the preference of sharp contrast and Cathode Ray Tubes were back in style. If it were not for the unsettling silence on the bridge, Kate would have been waiting with childlike anticipation for the systems to come online. For now though, something about the dark black square pools facing inward at her was enough to make her shudder slightly as she turned away from them.

"Once everything is online here, I'd like to go down to the computer core and see if I can get it running," Kate requested.

Vienna looked around. “As daft a question as this is, what happened to the crew? There’s no sign of a struggle, a fight, or anything. It’s like they just...disappeared into thin air, and I can’t say I like it.”

"When we came in, did anyone get a look at the escape pods?" Kate offered the idea. Or maybe, they left through the shuttle bay. It's on the way to the computer core." Kate tapped her comm badge twice before tapping a magnetic decoupler onto the turbolift door. Being as small as she was, it was a difficult task but she eventually pried the doors open to the long shaft with a ladder on the side of the wall that trailed down into the black like a dark well of the unknown.

"Q said I'd be climbing the ladder in Starfleet," Kate quipped as she turned to her superiors. "If there's no objections? I'd like to go down there. I can check the shuttle bay for any sign of missing craft on my way to the computer core and let you all know through the com link."

"Back away from the turboshaft ensign" Eislyn said as she continued working on the console in front of her. Suddenly everything on the bridge sprang to life. "I think you will find that we can run everything on the reserve battery power. I can get main power back up once I check out the warp core in engineering. It appears the computer is fully functional, and in regard to the crew, while I can't say what happened to them, I can say that we have a full complement of shuttles, and all escape pods are in place."

"I'd like to check out sickbay, see if perhaps I can get any information there. I can also assist elsewhere as you see fit" Tarja said, looking in the direction of Wyatt and Vi.

Kate threw an MRE packet onto the turbolift roof before it appeared in front of the forced doors just for fun as it showed up. She knew that one day, when the ship was hauled back to Deep Space 34 for appraisal, someone would find that packet during inspections and get a free meal. Kate only wanted the water packet out of it anyway as the dust had made her thirsty. She leaned against the wall of the turbolift and sucked on the water pack while the lights above her flickered from neglect.

"So, Engineering?" Kate said between deflating the water pack and waiting for her would-be decapitator to join in on the fun. The little Asian girl threw the empty pack to the floor of the turbolift and unslung her backpack to pull out a PADD and a large flashlight that is actually capable of producing more than 12,000 lumens unlike the oddly shaped triangle lights that put out 40.

“Sounds good to me" Vienna nodded. “We need as much information as we can get, both Engineering and Sickbay would be good places to start.” She looked towards Wyatt to see if he had anything else to suggest.

Wyatt was being contemplative and cautious. Splitting up wasn't his first choice, but it seemed like a necessary evil if they were going to get answers. He especially didn't want to let Vi out his sight, but that too seemed like a necessary evil at this point. "I'll remain here on the bridge, take a look at what information is present and monitor everyone's progress. Vi, you go with Dr. Tarja to sickbay, see what the two of you can dig up there. Ensign, you pair up with the counselor down in engineering. With luck we can get everything up and running quickly and solve a few of the mysteries we seem to have here." He closed the distance between himself and Vi, wrapping an arm around her waist to bring her close, "Be careful. I don't like sending you out without me there to protect you."

Eislyn smiled seeing the couple share a moment of genuine concern. She supposed that was why couples weren't typically paired for missions, though she saw nothing wrong with it in this instance. She made her way over to the turbolift, "Let's get a move on you two" she said looking at Tarja and Kate.

The turbolift doors opened to a long empty hallway. The carpeted floors looked almost untouched, the hexagonal corridor stretched last a few closed doors. The turbolift behind her closed and kept going once she and the counselor stepped off. Out of all the overhead fixtures, some were lit, many others were off, and some flickered with age which gave the hallway a dull grey, shadow-lined look that turned the once bright space into an uninviting, haunted feel.

Kate looked down at her PADD as she pocketed her flashlight that she didn't need. She was still getting used to finding her way around her own ship so she had no self-conscious problem with admitting she needed a map to get around a ship that was completely alien to her.

There was a distant sound, a rattling that must have came from many sections away. Kate noted it but didn't say anything. The back of her mind desperately wanted to know what made that sound because it never came again. After pocketing her PADD, she pulled her tricorder and scanned for life signs on her deck - nothing.

Still, something made a sound. Rationalizing, she made note that with auxillary power, air flow moved through the ship, and with air flow came interactions with objects, objects fall, falls make noise...

The irrational part of her brain though, told her she wasn't alone. That, the sound was a stalking predator that doesn't show up on scanners... That, soon, despite all these years, all these generations she skipped in life, it would be ended by a strange figure waiting for her in the shadows of some derelict ship in the dead of space... Reaching it's arms out to her with a contract that stated "We've been trying to reach you about your car's extended warranty.."

Kate sighed that nightmare away as she pushed on into the grey. That past was behind her. The ship was long-dead, and the sound was probably just some piece of machinery that fell to the floor when the air came on.

"Off to engineering we go," Kate whisper to herself.

Eislyn was drawing from her past life experience to navigate the ship with ease. All Federation ships had certain design similarities but having a past life that actually served aboard a ship of this classification certainly made things easier for her. She could see that Kate appeared to be a tad bit uneasy. No doubt the young ensign was being overwhelmed due to the somewhat ominous look things had at this moment. Humans certainly had active imaginations, often turning the most benign into works of horror and suspense. As a counselor she certainly understood that, but at this moment she was not wearing her counselor hat, but rather that of an engineer. She recalled her cousin Ezri telling her of a time something similar to this happened to her during the war. It was on a planet, she tried to recall the mundane detail, AR-558. She helped an engineer break a Dominion jamming signal and then had to work a few additional miracles. That was the first time Ezri herself had been in direct conflict. It seemed the time had come for Eislyn to now face the same type of situation, though with any luck no Jem'Hadar or other blood thirsty warriors would be causing any trouble.

"Come along Kate. We mustn't dally." Eislyn quickly entered Engineering and let out a long sigh. This was going to be a bit of work.

Kate reached into her bag and pulled out a portable power cell. She plugged an adapter into it and used it to power some of the systems in Engineering. She smiled to herself when she saw that the last program running on one of the consoles was a time killing game called "Kwazy Cupcakes". Kate tapped the screen to make a cupcake match but then quickly shut the program off to bring the main status screen back to the foreground.

"It looks like the crew wasn't too worried about what was happening before the happenings happened." Kate said as she started scrolling through status entries.

"Hey, Eislyn, if you want to take a look at some of the last things they did..." Kate left her seat and pointed to the monitor she was sitting at while she attended another monitor to get the software systems up and running in preparation for whatever Eislyn needed to do in order to get her Engineering magic up and going.

"I don't think whatever happened here was expected. It happened suddenly, and it likely took them all by surprise. All evidence thus far seems to indicate that they were running normally when something happened quickly; so quickly that no one had time to even react" Eislyn responded. She checked the dilithium matrix and offered a half smile. "Well, we have dilithium crystals, though they aren't in great shape. Probably good enough condition to give us warp power for a week, maybe 10 days. Assuming of course we have plasma and antimatter" she said as she made her way over to the computer console and began looking at the readouts. "Well, if you believe in a higher power, send them a thank you and pray that they continue to bless us. Antimatter pods are full, and we have all the plasma we could ever ask for." She turned and looked at Kate, "Alright, grab those two engineering toolkits and let's get to work. With luck we can restart the core within the hour."


**



Tarja remained about 3 ft. behind Vi as they made their way down the corridors to sickbay. She continuously was looking at her tricorder readings. She wasn't reading any biosigns, but she was feeling uneasy. Suddenly she heard something in the distance. "Tell me that you heard that" she said nervously to Vi.

Vienna had heard it alright. “I heard it” she nodded as she paused and looked around.

"Please tell me that was you, because I'm not reading anything on my tricorder" Tarja responded. Whatever was causing the sound, it was in the distance.

“It wasn’t me, and I’m not sensing anything either.” Vi looked at her tricorder. “Though that doesn’t mean much, there are species Betazoid’s can’t sense. We carry on...” she pulled her phaser. “Quietly and cautiously.”

Tarja nodded and pulled her phaser as well, though she had to admit to being at the least a bit nervous. She followed down the corridor, her senses heightened. It was as they were approaching sickbay that Tarja caught glimpse of something that wasn't coming up on her tricorder. "Lieutenant, do you see that? It looked humanoid."

Vi nodded. She had to admit this was giving her the creeps, not that she was going to say it. She shone her light the way ahead.

As Vi shon her light forward, giving the necessary extra illumination, Tarja spotted what appeared to be a humanoid walking towards them. The main issue as Tarja saw it was that it appeared translucent. It looked like a StarFleet officer, the uniform blue uniform certainly looked right, and it appeared to be a Deltan female. Very few of them served in StarFleet, particularly on starships. Then to make things even more distressing, the ghostly visage walked through the doors to sickbay. "That did not just happen" Tarja said in a dreadful seriousness.

“Actually...it did” Vi looked at Tarja in disbelief. “There has to be more to this than ghosts! If there’s one thing my training taught me, it’s not to take everything at face value.” She tapped her comm badge. =^= Vienna to Wyatt, this is going to sound crazy, but we just saw what looked like a translucent Deltan Officer walk straight through the closed Sickbay doors! We’re going to investigate. =^=

Wyatt looked like Vi had said something incredulous. He hit his comm badge to reply, =^=Surely you are joking Vi. Telling ghost stories simply to frighten the others. Whatever is going on, be careful. =^=

Tarja wanted it made clear that Vi wasn't jesting. =^=Lieutenant, in all seriousness, we just saw what can only be described as a translucent apparition that looked like a Deltan female dressed in an old blue science uniform appear from seemingly nowhere and pass through the door to sickbay. It didn't open, she passed through it. And to clear up any misconceptions, I have scanned for any holographic emitters that might have been placed or what not, and none exist here, which isn't a surprise considering the age of the ship. We don't have so much as a stray photon. =^=

Wyatt was becoming perplexed. =^=Proceed with your investigation. Use caution Vi. =^=

=^= Always Wyatt, always. =^= Vienna nodded to Tarja. “Let’s go, I don’t somehow think we’ve even been noticed, if we had we’d have company by now. Either that or nobody cares.” She shrugged her shoulders, “Let’s see what’s in there.”