Turn 5.0 "Organized Retreat, Damage Assessment, and Re-Arming" Zach Simon had lost his connection with the Grid almost right away when he'd seen the man caught in the airlock. Now he stood outside in the hall, trying to put the image out of his mind. He took a deep breath to prevent himself from vomiting. "Could things get any worse?" he wondered. "I don't know guys. I'm no tactician, I just run the Grid," he told everyone, "I'm kind of useless until I get upstairs. If you can get me upstairs, I can give you some support. We better be careful though. If the guy caught in the 'lock is any indication as to what is going on..." He shuddered a bit and just looked about, seeming a bit lost at the moment. It was obvious that he was out of his element. Lugwig eyed everyone in the group with squinty eyes and said, "Wasss Akerssss hurt, wounded, injured? Perhapsss he hassss left a blood trail, yessss? You humansss jussst full of blood...and depresssion. By the way Missss T'Sssharn, your chancesss of catching Missster Freak Eyesss before I fixey your leg wasss ssslim. Perhapsss sssomeone need more fixey fixey...?" Nola listened to Zach and the T'sa and fumed that Akers had gotten away. "Only for now, hopefully," she thought to herself. Turning to Dimitrio she nodded her assent, "Yes, let's go to retrieve everyone's weapons from the armory, and maybe swing by the Security Office on our way. We'll see if you can open them up. If you can't then we'll check out that guy Zach saw." Dig said, "Yeah, it's about time we got some more weapons, not only for us, but for the self-defense of our non-security types. If you don't mind, Nola, I'll lead the way. Nothing personal, but I don't know if you have 100% reaction and aim with that wound, even if Doc Lizard patched it up. I know you must be hurtin'." Dimitrio's face lit up as Dig took charge of the situation, basically agreeing to go where he wanted to go. "Good man, you won't be sorry. I'm a good shot with my gun. Really..." Nola looked back toward the ladder that Akers must have used, frowned to herself, and then finally pointed, "Is there any way we can bar this access panel?" Dimitrio nodded and stepped forward. While he went to work, Nola wondered aloud who this creep Akers might be, "So do any of you know any further information about this Akers guy?" She listened attentively whilst she checked to make sure that they didn't get ambushed. No one had much to say on the subject. Most of them worked second shift duty and didn't mix company with the man. "I would've thought you'd have seen him more than the rest of us," Jake said, "You and he were on the same shift, but then you haven't been here long enough probably to get to know everyone that well. What about Dimitrio or Zach? Don't you engineering-types stick together or something?" He looked from Zach to the mechanic, hard at work on the access panel. Dimitrio shook his head, explaining, "Akers was a newbie, too. I never got to know him that well. He arrived just before Nola got here, I think. Right after that other guy... what was his name? Hendrick, I think it was. He got himself killed during a spacewalk of some kind. His suit had a leak, I think. Anyway, Akers was his replacement on third shift." He positioned the access panel back over the hole that led to the ladder. A few quick twists with his various tools and the application of a mini-torch took only a few moments. Turning back around he said, "That ought to hold it pretty good. Of course, it won't be easy for us to access it all that quickly either...but I guess it's more important that we keep this renegade away from here as best we can..." Dr. Lugwig, appearing to finally be at a rare loss for further words, zipped around the immeadiate area looking for any indication of which way the mysterious Mr. Akers might have gone. Although there were some obvious drops of blood on the deckplates in front of the access panel leading to the ladder, nothing else was evident. He stopped only for a brief moment, close enough to Dimitrio to be seen, so he could make the sign of a gun with one of his clawed hands. He pointed towards it with one of the claws on his other hand and shrugged his shoulders at Dimitrio. He followed up all of that by a 'two claws up' and a wink. Dimitrio tried his best at defusing the situation with some ironic humor, "Good patching, Doc! I hope you never have to work on me like that fast though." Are you sure you can use a gun?" he asked, "They aren't the same as those guns you give inmmunization shots with, you know?" He smiled, then said, "What are you going do anyway, Doc? Shoot the bad guys first, and then go fix'em?" Lugwig twitched but didn't answer right away, his attention span being so short that he had moved on to examine the blood on the floor with the scanner built into his medical gauntlet. "Ssstrange," he murmurred to the others, "Mr. Akersss ssseemsss to have developed a fixxxation with SsstarMech recreational drugsss. Nothing that would induccce hallucccinationsss but ssstill sssomething to note, I would think. He'sss hyped up on ssstimulantsss." He looked back at everyone, obviously in distaste. Drug-addicts were not his favorite patients to deal with. "OK, people, follow me and keep spaced out and quiet," Jake finally said, bringing the conversation to an end for the moment. He began to lead the group down the curving hallway, past a couple of viewports which provided a starry backdrop almost like huge paintings upon the walls. There were no significant planetary masses near the Kendai Relay Station, so all that could be seen were the tiny pinpoints of light of distant stars. Everyone knew that somewhere around the other side, the Kendai star itself would be visible as a Red Dwarf about the size of a basketball when viewed from the station's perspective. To the left side of the hallway was a security-access checkpoint hatch, clearly marked with signs next to it on the wall. They indicated that the door led to one of the point-defense guns (large weapons designed for screening against missile attacks upon the station). Although the guns had been tested a few times, they still had never been put to use in a real-life combat scenario yet. The group continued moving through the darkened corridor, their shadows stretched beyond belief by the red-lamps along the floor and ceiling. Jake finally stopped at the Security Office door (compartment 17) and pulled out his ID-tag. The door's access reader chimed and the door swung easily open. "Everything looks clean in here," he reported over his shoulder before moving inside. The security stations all flickered with the camera images around the station... including the same view that Zach had received through his remote connection from the engineering control room. The legs and booted feet of someone still poked out of the door leading into the airlock on the Hangar Deck. The only noticeable difference was that the pool of blood had grown in size since he'd last seen it. Zach's stomach began to churn once again and he looked away at the rest of the room. To everyone else, the camera images seemed to show that the sensitive parts of the station were "situation-normal", except for the fact that every one of the rooms were empty of people. Of course the cameras didn't view every room on the station... just those that were deemed important enough to warrant surveillance. One odd thing did catch Jake's notice, however. The monitor for the interior of Powerlift One was filled with static. Perhaps the camera had been damaged? Nola cleared her throat and then stepped forward, "Ummm... let me see what I can do about our friend, Mr. Akers." She spent a few moments manipulating the various security workstations, effectively putting a hold on his security-ID. As far as the checkpoints were concerned, Akers was now an active threat to the safety of the station. He would be denied access to any sensitive areas. "That ought to limit the amount of damage he can do," she said confidently. Dimitrio snorted as if to disagree, knowing full well that any engineer worth his salt could disassemble an access checkpoint like the ones on the station. It would take time...but it was do-able. Heck, he'd done it a half-dozen times trying to get the stupid things to work right in the first place. "Let's keep moving," Jake urged, "We need to retrieve our weapons and then we can start searching for the others...as well as Akers." Jake stepped everyone back out into the hallway, and turned right. He began to lead the way through the airlock foyer (compartment 4 on Level 4), and was surprised for a moment as he looked over the scene. "Man... would you look at that?" he whispered back to Nola. She peered past his shoulder and raised her eyebrows in concern. An explosion had ripped into one of the powerlifts, clearly collapsing the guide-wires. The metal cage to Powerlift One hung precariously turned on its side, as if it might have fallen or drifted out of place inside the shaft. Within the cage, several bodies could be seen... or at least, what was left of them. The explosion had burned them beyond recognition. There were six... maybe seven... in total. It was hard to tell. A few sparks leaped from a swaying cable within the shaft, flickering like lightning in the dark hallway. "What'sss the matter?" Lugwig spoke from behind the much taller security officers. He poked his muzzle between them and surveyed the scene, "Oh, lookie, lookie... much wassste... bad sssmell... many casssualtiesss. Too late to fixey, fixey, yessss..." He shook his head sadly. "Let's keep moving," Jake repeated, gritting his teeth. This was getting worse by the minute. As everyone else filed into the small room between hallways, they all checked out the powerlifts with more than a little concern. The second, northernmost lift appeared undamaged, the indicator light on the panel displaying that its cage was currently sitting on Level Four, the Hangar Deck. "Do we wanna climb back up the ladders or risk taking a ride on that thing?" Dimitrio asked for everyone. "It looks stable enough," Jake commented, "Let's check it for boobytraps first, though. Whatever blew up the other one could take us out just as well if we set foot on it without looking..." He stepped forward and closely checked the wire-mesh doors for any explosive device that might be attached. "It looks clean, but everybody stand back while I push the button..." He carefully did just that, and the powerlift car arrived in just a few moments on its normal cushion of anti-gravity, silently swinging the doors open. "Let's go...," Jake waved everyone inside. Directing the car to Level Three, they patiently waited until it came to a stop. Directly before them, they could see down the same hallway that led to their original bedrooms. It was just as dark and shadowy as ever, only marginally lit by the emergency lamps. Dimitrio still held his stiletto hidden in his forearm but clearly gave Dig the lead, hanging in the back. "You go ahead, I'll check behind us. Call me over if you can't open any doors...but the power's back up so you shouldn't have any problems," he said. With that, Dig headed off in the direction of the weapons, which he recalled being inside the Master-at-Arms Quarters. At every corner, Dig stopped, waited, listened, and then waited for Nola to get in a good cover position. Then he would sneak forward to the next corner or turn, peek around the corner (with thermal goggles if necessary to see), and wave his comrades forward. Although he was most concerned with an ambush, he kept his eyes moving along the corridor looking for anything like tripwires or out of place things that might tip off a trap that someone had set. So far, the hallways looked just as cluttered and dangerous as they had always been on every other security patrol he'd performed since being on the station. "Watch your step," he commented as he dodged a particularly loose section of flooring, the exposed pipes and wiring underneath posing at least a small hazard should someone inadvertently set their foot down on them. Dr. Lugwig quickly found his way into the line of humans right behined Dimitrio and whispered, "Mr. Fontecelli you think me fassst with two-clawed treatment, you ssshould sssee me ssshoot with two clawsss at ssssame time. Why you keep taking ssslicey thingie out of your foot covering?" Dimitrio looked towards the T'sa giving a close look at the blade, "Well, Doc let's just say that I can do some stitching of my own and this is my scalpel." Lugwig nodded and continued the trek to recover the weapons watching both of his flanks. He only stopped to investigate anything that appeared entirely foreign to what he perceived as normal for the station. Alex trailed the others as they moved down the hall and away from the powerlifts. "I don't like this," he muttered as he stumbled forward, moving faster than Cal could guide him safely. "If we eventually get down to the hangar, I want my stuff..." Cal murmurred an update on the situation, informing him that they were still headed away from the Hangar Bay and back to the Crew Deck. He nodded, as if in reply. "I'm glad we went for the grav controls first..." he muttered, wondering how they would have made out if they had a full fledged fire-fight under zero-G conditions. Still slightly confused and flustered from the previous events, he waited for 'Dig' and Nola to come to a decision. "Leave security to the experts," he thought. Zach also fell in line with everyone as the group decided to go look for guns. All the time as they went along he remembered Seargant Andrews yelling at him, "Simon, you got to open yer freaking eyes if you expect to hit anything with that thing." He couldn't remember all the countless extra practices Andrews would assign him while the rest of the unit was on R&R. It never really helped that much. He got a bit better, but not much. As the team went along, he kept an eye out for enemies from other directions than the front. He also looked about at the station's structure to note anything that was damaged and how it was done, just to give them any clues as to what was going on. As they were going along, Zach wondered where the rest of the crew was. Explosions and gun fire just didn't take place without people coming to check it out. He listened as they went along as well, trying to hear any sounds that might give any information away. The group moved silently down the hallway toward the Master-at-Arms Quarters (compartment 16), passing by the door to Berthing Compartment Beta. No sounds could be heard from inside the crew quarters, though that in itself wasn't all that strange since most of the third shift engineers and technicians had been rooming there. They ought to have been on duty when the power went out. They also passed the door to the Sick Bay, and Lugwig instantly turned his eyes in that direction. "Perhapsss there are othersss hurt, yesss?" he whispered to Dimitrio, "They might be waiting for asssissstance. They might be waiting for Lugwig, yesss?" "Just keep moving Doc," Jake called quietly from up front, having overhead the T'sa, "Once we get armed, then we start seeing to everyone else. Until then, we're out-gunned and you'll just have more patients lining up for you. We've got to stop whatever's going on. That's our first priority." When they got to the Master-of-Arms Quarters, Dig went right to the compartment, found it locked, and whispered for someone to come up and run a bypass on the lock. Dimitrio was only too happy to oblige, eagerly pushing forward from the back in order to go to work with his tools again. Soon after, the door was opened and they all filed into Rieger Bloch's suite. It seemed like an eternity to Alex before they finally stood before the locker which held their weapons, but the lock seemed daunting. He stood back and examined the room while the others worked on it. The room was a mess... nothing out of the ordinary for a man with little time to clean up after himself, he supposed. In one corner stood the weapons locker, a huge metal cabinet with a gleaming bioelectric scanner staring back at them. Clothes were strewn around the floor. The bed was unmade, the covers turned back as if the Security Chief must have already been up and about. Typically he only worked first shift, so the sudden power and gravity outage must have attracted his attention as well... but where was he now? Dimitrio knelt down in front of the weapons locker and rubbed his hands together like a thief about to crack a safe. "Oooooh, this is gonna be a challenge," he admitted, "It might take awhile." And indeed it did take several minutes to bypass the lock, requiring him to break some of the latches and expensive equipment in the process, including one of his trusty tools. "Crap! That was my lucky piece!" he muttered, "I don't suppose the Concord will replace that, will they?" The blank stares from Jake and Nola made him frown and turn away, cursing as he opened the locker, "Why'd I ever take this damn, stupid job, anyway?" When the door was finally opened to the locker, Nola tapped Dimitrio with the lethal end of her laser pistol with a knowing look. "As I'm the active Security Detail, we'll check that the guns really do belong to you." The mechanic smiled at Nola's joke but his face cringed into a frown when he understood that she wasn't joking. "Damn you woman, I've had this gun for a long time and to tell you the truth, this is the only time where it's been furthest from me. And that's only because I was under the Concord's protection and some other bullshit like that. I'm not sure whether my baby will part with me any longer, but we'll discuss that another time I'm sure of it..." Nola pulled out the clipboard and checked the gun and ammo BEFORE handing them out to the other members. "Dimitrio, this seems to be your charge pistol and your ammo... Alex, I don't know how you shoot it but this is your laser pistol..." Dr. Lugwig used his T'sa speed and ran over to Nola. "Misss T'SSharn are you sssure you want all of thessse peoplesss here to have weaponssss? I have made sssome observationsss about our friendsss here. It ssseemsss that one fellow isss not confident in hisss sssshooting ssskill and the other issss in big hurry to get hissss hand on a gun, yesssss?" Nola looked at the doctor and blinked, "We don't seem to have much of a choice. There are armed people on-board the station. It seems they've already murdered several people. The best thing is to make sure that the rest of you are protected while the security officers hunt down Akers and whoever else might be causing trouble." She held Dimitrio's gun out for the engineer to take... Dimitrio muttered something under his breath and grabbed the gun and ammo, double-checking everything. "Ah, here's my baby, come to Papa," he said, immediately checking the clip on his charge pistol and grabbing a couple of more clips which he stowed away in his harness. He put the long dagger back in its boot-sheath, and palmed the gun with his right hand. "OK, I'm ready to go freak-hunting," he said. Alex nodded as Nola checked his gun and finally returned it to him as well. He felt to see if the gun had its safety on, then made sure the gun was hidden under his flight jacket. The laser pistol slid snugly into the holster. He didn't expect to be much use in a fire fight, but it was comforting all the same to feel the accustomed weight of a weapon in its old shoulder holster. Nola continued to look over the weapons in the locker, noting: two stutter pistols, an autoflechette shotgun, two 11mm charge rifles, two 11mm zero-g rifles, six stun grenades, six plasma grenades, and two stun batons. There were enough ammunition clips to have four for each weapon. According to the clipboard the extra weapons weren't registered with anyone, so they were presumably Concord standard issue, and available to any security officer in the event of an emergency. "Well, no time like the present," Nola thought, giving serious thought to upgrading her weapon, or at the very least, complementing it with something else. After everyone had strapped on holsters and their weapons, Nola looked at the well-equipped engineers/pilots in front of her, and was rather astonished. "I don't believe it! We have people here that create and invent objects to improve society and look at what they tote around! I mean it's understandable that Security Detail have something at least slightly lethal because of what we have to deal with, but you guys. Sheesh!" Nola can't quite believe the enormity of more people on the station having guns. "Not only is one guy running around shooting at security, and messing up the gravity and power, but now there's another couple of armed guys as well," she silently thought to herself, "One of them should possibly think of going to a psychiatrist, too." She wondered if maybe Dr. Lugwig had any expertise in that particular field, and then shuddered at the thought. "What's important is that we've got some extra hands at getting this situation back under control. I just hope none of them get too out of line, or we'll have to get them under control, too," she thought. She looked sideways at 'Dig', wondering if he might be thinking the same thing... Alex had listened to the astonished tone in Nola's voice and the Doc's disparaging comments about his marksmanship and finally grinned. "It's the damn military. They think everyone who's enlisted should have a gun, so I had to take lessons. I don't do too badly with Cal's help, but I'm not one of the 'from the hip' types of people, if you catch my drift." "Dimitrio, though," Alex thought to himself, "Seems a little trigger-happy." He made a mental note not to be between him and Akers when next they met. "Well not to come down on your job or anything," Dimitrio spoke up, specifically toward Nola, "But somebody messed up big time, 'cause that Akers freak has a gun, and apparently has a deadly intent on using it. Against you for that matter! So lay off me for carrying a gun here and let's go freak-hunting; I haven't pulled the trigger since I stepped onto this relay station, but he has! Let's make sure he doesn't do it again." Now fully armed, the group stood ready to investigate the mystery of the Kendai Relay Station at last... ------------------------------------- ---------- Turn 5 Comments ---------- ------------------------------------- 1. Whew! This was a long one to put together. I had to move around some of the dialogue into places where I thought it might be more appropriate for it come out. I think there might have been some initial confusion regarding going to the Security Office (compartment 17) or the Master-at-Arms Quarters (compartment 16). Since you had time for both, I went ahead and let you stop by the Security Office on your way to retrieve the weapons. It made logical sense, I think. 2. There's a lot of information embedded in all of that, so I hope you read over everything a couple of times. There'll be a test later. ;) 3. Questions? 4. Actions? -- Neil 1. I mainly want to replenish the medical supplies that I have already used, anything I can get extra without over encumbering myself I would also like. 2. One other quick question, who is the overall ranking officer of our party? -- Brian 2. One other quick question, who is the overall ranking officer of our party? That would have to be me for the moment wouldn't it? :) Actually, unless Neil says something different I would assume that whilst on board the station, and in an emergency I would assume the top dog would be the Head of Security, then the rostered security person (Me!), then the unrostered security person (Dig!), then finally the Captain. During normal situations I would assume that the Captain would go from no.4 to no.1. As there is no Head of Security (or Captain) around then I guess it would be me. (he he he he :0). Neil will soon write back and put me into my place. Won't you Neil?! :) Ciao, -- Jamie A few clarifications... [Richard:] Zach nods and takes the pistol, puts it in his holster and says, "Let me jack into the grid and see if I can catch anything new. If you guys can get me up onto deck 2, I could have a lot more control. Right now, I can't change anything, I can only view through the cameras as they are." Zach jacks in again and checks out any logs he can access and looks out the various security cameras. [Hai:] Alex paused as a thought occurred to him. "Hey Zach! Can you show me what the hangar looks like right now? I'm just curious if there's anything there that'll clue us in on what's going on..." If there was anything amiss about the hangar, Cal could clue him in. "Not only that, where can we get access to the security tapes? That's probably got something good on the opposition." There still seems to be some confusion about the computers and the Grid on-board the station. Deck Two is the Communications Control area... and as such, the only computer systems it interfaces with is the ultra-secure mail-routing machines...which doesn't access the security cameras at all. Now this particular computer system does provide communication to the outside world, and therefore, the interstellar Grid... but not the "grid" on-board the station's closed-circuit system. To access the cameras again, you need to go to one of the station computers which I listed in my last OOC discussion. Remember, there are two separate computer systems on board the Kendai Relay Station... and they do NOT talk to each other... the communications system, and the main station computer. The main computer is responsible for monitoring and controlling the station itself (i.e., security cameras, engineering, defenses, hangar bay operations, etc.). This system is on a closed-circuit. No hacker can interface with it over the Grid, because there's no connection to the outside world. To make matters worse, this system is not fully operational yet. It was intended that all of the terminals located throughout the station would be able to control all of the other terminals eventually (except for interstellar communication, because that's what the other computer system is for). Unfortunately, these terminals haven't been set up properly yet in order to control anything other than their specialized functions... they can still inquire on the other terminals (which is why Zach was able to view the security cameras through the engineering control terminal). The only terminal which is capable of controlling the others (except the communications system again), is the command station on Deck One, or the secondary command station on Deck Six once it's brought online. Presently, Zach and Hai are still in the Master-at-Arms Quarters, where there is no terminal available. I think Richard was trying to suggest that once he got upstairs, he could plug back into the closed circuit and begin monitoring the security cameras. To do so, he would need to go to Deck One, not Deck Two. And, I'm assuming that Alex's statements would occur once they arrived there... however, so far, I haven't seen any definite statements from anyone that the group is headed in that direction. [Jamie:] 2. One other quick question, who is the overall ranking officer of our party? That would have to be me for the moment wouldn't it? :) Actually, unless Neil says something different I would assume that whilst on board the station, and in an emergency I would assume the top dog would be the Head of Security, then the rostered security person (Me!), then the unrostered security person (Dig!), then finally the Captain. During normal situations I would assume that the Captain would go from no.4 to no.1. As there is no Head of Security (or Captain) around then I guess it would be me. (he he he he :0). Neil will soon write back and put me into my place. Won't you Neil?! :) Actually...no. That would be Teri Reed, instead of Nola. The overall command of the station is what we're talking about. In the absence of the Station Commander and the Chief of Security, it falls to the next highest ranking official on-board the station. As Chief of Engineering, that would be Teri Reed. She also appears to be missing... but then you guys haven't gone looking for any of these guys yet. Now even so, Teri would still be dependent upon Jake and Nola to provide security even if she was in charge, but she would be your boss. This isn't really a military operation that we're talking about. It's more like corporate security. Now, in the absence of 1) Station Commander Brian Rouen, 2) Chief of Security Rieger Bloch, and 3) Chief of Engineering Teri Reed, command would fall to... believe it or not... Dr. Lugwig Wisek, Chief Medical Officer. How's that for irony? He's the only remaining high-ranking official on-board Kendai. After that, it would probably fall to Jake, only because he's been serving aboard the station for longer than Nola (tenure, you know?)... I hope all of that helps everyone, -- Neil {A keen wailing is heard through the regions of space, where no one can hear you scream!} Nnnnoooooooo!!!!!!!!!! -- Jamie "Yessssss, yesssss, when you sssscream I can ssseee thosssse wonderful teeth. You really sssshould flossss a bit more.............." -- Brian 1. It is very interesting playing an alien in this game. As I understand it the human/alien ratio in this setting is about 40 to 1. (Neil if I am wrong correct me). My intention is to put forth a image of Dr. Lugwig that is alien to all of you and therefore strange. I figure prejudice against aliens is probably quite strong in this setting and Dr. Lugwig can really feel the 'vide' from some of the other party members, but I figure a T'sa would not care much unless it interfered with the mission in question or was expressed in a violent context. At any rate a T'sa would find it very curious...................as I did living in Europe for eleven years. -- Brian