It's Bound To Take Your Life

Posted on Tue Feb 25th, 2020 @ 10:02pm by Captain Abigail Laurens & Lieutenant Commander William Gunnison & Lieutenant Alexis Aenera & Chief Petty Officer Benjamin Thor & Lieutenant Commander Calvin Morgan & Commander Ichiko Gail & Lieutenant Commander William Rogers

Mission: Dead Moon
Location: Alien Vessel

The away team arrived on the deck of what looked like a vast cargo hold. Magnetic boots found solid purchase on the floor, holding them in place. Gravity's familiar tug was present, indicating that not every system had failed. Motes of dust hung in the air, swirling in the light of the encounter suits, while all around there was an odd, eerie calm. An odd quiet. Not the kind of quiet one encounters in a vacuum, but the kind of quiet one encounters in an abandoned building, or the ruins of a structure.

Or a tomb.

Various crates were here, but were not marked with anything other than a form of scanner ID, perhaps meant to be read by a machine, or a device. A load lifter was over by the doorway, also devoid of power. This failure was easy to chalk up to personal failure: The loader was not plugged into the central power flow. It's batteries, wherever they were, were likely dead or dying as well.

The entire room had a simple, basic color scheme attached to it. Greens, or tints and shades thereof. The only region devoid of the coloration was the metal plates that made up the floor of the designated cargo area which were simply metal plates in hexagonal shapes.

The doorway out of the cargo hold was easily discovered, as were the cargo bay doors to the side to allow for ease of unloading. Those doors seemed incredibly secure, perhaps even magnetically sealed. The doorway out, however, was unpowered. Some of the panels next to the doorway seemed to be able to be removed.

The cargo bay seemed to have a fair amount of cargo. What it lacked, though, were workers. The cargo bay was spotless, a forensic nightmare when looking for the remains of any form of crew.

Rogers leaned against a crate, doubled over slightly. "Hate it when they add clothes to you during transport." He muttered. "Always makes me feel like I'm gonna throw up."

Britteny smiled as the transport finished. She loved the feeling of falling that they got when the transport was in progress. Having materialised fully, she took up a defensive position off to the edge of the group. "All looks clear." She said to no one in particular.

Will pulled out his tricorder and began scanning. "I'm getting organic material in some of the crates that I'm assuming is food," he said after a few moments, "and what looks like spare parts in others. Environmental controls appear to be working, though I'd suggest holding off on removing our helmets until Dr. Morgan can confirm that it's safe to do so."

Pulling out his tricorder, Calvin scanned and tapped as he moved his tricorder around, pointing it in different directions. He walked over to the doors and scanned around there as well. "Atmospheric conditions are within normal limits for us. We can breath it if we want." After removing his helmet and taking a breath he remarked, "It's not the tastiest air however.

Lights flickered as the ship they were in experience a momentary crisis of power, but then the lighting returned at the previous 'low power' illumination. Shadows were cast throughout the cargo bay by the boxes of cargo and loading equipment. Briefly, the door at the far end lit up, and started to open. When the power flicker passed, the door disengaged, but now was open just enough for the away team to squeeze through to the interior of the ship.

"I wouldn't go too far without your helmet within reach," Calvin muttered, unsure of the power systems of the vessel.

Cam removed her helmet and took a tentative breath. "The air is pretty stale," she said quietly. "But we should be okay, for the moment." She motioned toward the partially open door with her tricorder. "I'd say that's our way out, I suggest we get through those doors then split into our teams..." She paused again before turning toward Calvin. "I don't know about you but I'll feel better when I find the crew and know what happened to them."

Calvin shrugged. "The longer this takes, the more time I have until I have to go back to updating charts." He smiled after his statement and winked.

Britteny decided to keep her helmet on. She'd always had a slight phobia of suffocating in the vacuum of space, and so she decided to er on the side of caution.

Ben moved over towards the door and started scanning the panels either side of them, "not too sure what that power flicker was but it doesn't look like it is going to occur again soon." he reported, continuing his scans for a few more moments he muttered under his breath, "wow, so different".

Rogers removed his own helmet and drew in a deep lung full of air. It reminded him of the way Ranger 3 smelt when he was reawakened. The crew was probably dead. "Think you can get the door all the way open?" He asked Ben. "Or are we going to have to use brute force?"

One of the panels near the door had a mark on it, a simple picture of a circle with a smaller circle set in one point in the ring. Perhaps a symbol for a manual crank.

"Looks like we might be able to crank it open." Ben said as he opened the panel revealing a small hand crank.

There was indeed a crank behind the wall panel, behind the simple picture. It wasn't a fun experience, but the door cranked open.

The hallway beyond the door was dark in places, and dimly lit in others. The lighting in that region was less reliable than here in the cargo bay. Personal light sources would become a gift in that hall. No sign of any inhabitants yet though. No reaction to their intrusion, and no bodies on the floor. What could be seen of the hallway seemed to head up to a major doorway, perhaps separating the ship into sections. From the diagram provided by the scans, that major doorway led to the primary hub of sorts, connecting most of the decks.

With the power out, whichever team heading to the bridge had a bit of a climb ahead of them. At least those going to engineering would be climbing down...

Slipping through the gap in the doors, Cam stood in the empty hall, looking left to right as slowly other members of the away team filtered through the gap to join her. "Right, I'm headed for the bridge. "Lieutenant Morgan, you're with me. Lieutenant Rogers, Lieutenant Gunnison and Ensign Wescott, you can head for Engineering?"

She paused for a moment, reaching up to tap her commbadge. "Away team to Astraea. We are about to separate into two teams, one heading up toward where we expect to find the bridge, the other heading south toward where Engineering is expected to be."

"Acknowledged Away Team."

Cam cast a quick, somewhat uneasy grin at the Chief Medical Officer. "Shall we?"

Calvin held out a hand, indicating his preference for who to go first. "After you. I'm glad I didn't exercise already for the day. How many decks up we talking here?"

Alexis had been staring at her tricorder almost the entire time and while she hadn't heard her name, she knew she was heading to the bridge and waited until both Calvin and Cam moved off before following in their wake, waving the tricorder from side to side.

The doorway to what looked like a central hub was closed fast. Another panel was on the side of this door, with a similar design to the one in the cargo bay. Though this door was different than the door in the cargo bay, and wasn't truly designed to stop hard vacuum. Simply forcing this door could be an option.

Rogers watched the Bridge Team head off. "So, engine room?" The question seemed directed towards Ben.

Britteny edged her way through the gap in the door, and heard the question, believing it to be directed to her. "Big place, usually holds the engine." She said, with a sarcastic grin.

Ben shrugged to both, "Guess so." he said gesturing in the opposite direction to the way the bridge team, "Ladies first?"

The primary hub was a cylindrical room, with a spiral ramp leading up along all the decks of the ship. Turbolifts, or the parallel, were spaced out along the halls. Easy access for walkers, and lift access for the rest. The design of the ship's internals showed a similar structure near the front, indicating that this design was more of a transit hub for people, rather than a one-time design.

The stale air weighed heavily in these hubs. The craft had only 12 decks, and neither team would need to fully traverse up to the extreme ends of the craft. The Bridge, or what was identified as such, was somewhere on deck three, while what was agreed upon as the Engineering section was around deck ten.

The lights in this region flickered, casting eerie shadows along the opposite ends of the transit hub. When the lights were on, they were a soft illumination. Seventy percent as intense as what they were used to on the Astrae.

To travel to deck three, to explore the bridge, turn to page 46.

To travel to deck ten, to explore Engineering, turn to page 87.