The Secret Facility (Part 3)

Posted on Wed Mar 3rd, 2021 @ 1:00pm by 1st Lieutenant Kara Melo & Lieutenant Aenar Torek & Ensign Chevy Tuff & Private 1st Class Trent Kushner

1,141 words; about a 6 minute read

Mission: Eye of the Storm
Location: Moon Base

[PREVIOUSLY]

'Uh, no, Tuff,' replied Aenar quickly, suppressing an eyeroll. 'But I don't know if you noticed, we're on the clock a bit here - the quicker we get this done, the quicker we can get out.'

Kara said nothing, but she agreed with the science officer. She was expecting trouble any moment now and didn't want to stay too long in one place.

[CONTINUED]

"Rush work and you get rotten work," Tuff replied undeterred, carefully starting the process of hacking into the computer systems.

Rubbing a hand over his face, Aenar glanced over to the Marines, and then back at Tuff and forced a smile, 'true enough Ensign. But do let us know what we can do to help you expedite the situation.'

Kara smiled at the science officer and turned bakc to watch the corridor.

Tuff allowed his fingers to flow over the computer's consoles. He hummed thoughtfully. "There is a lot of planetary information here. Very interesting...."

'Does it show the relation of the station to the planet?' prompted Aenar as he hovered by the Ensign's shoulder, forcing himself to be patient. It would be more prudent to check out the station's personnel. But the Betelgeusian probably knew that.

"Are you speaking of the positioning of the station on the planet itself?" Tuff asked trying to seek clarification of the question. "Or, do you mean whether this station is causing some sort of effect on the planet?"

'No to the first,' replied Aenar flatly. 'That will have been logged for the sensors.' He clarified, trying to break his request down to rudimentary blocks, 'see if there's any history on the facility, who built it, why it was built. Who are its present occupiers, and whether or not it's being used to generate this ion storm.'

"Given the time constraints, that is a lot to ask, sir," Tuff replied unperturbed. "I will do what I can." Tuff mused, making a humming noise. His hands flew over the console and he said, "Interesting. Very interesting."

Kara sighed. She was getting antsy. They'd been here far too long and the position wasn't that secure to begin with. She nodded to Trent to go down the corridor to the next intersection and check it out.

Tuff continued musing. "Hmmm. This station has been studying things for a long time.... I'm finding records on meteorology, gravitational waves, solar storms, ion storms, and magnetic readings...."

'Fascinating,' Aenar looked to Calith, 'are we able to download the data?'

Calith looked to the Betelgeusian, 'if we've masked our entry it shouldn't be too much of a problem to hid a data-dump. How much data are we talking about Mister Tuff?'

Chevy ignored Calith's question as he was thoroughly engrossed in the data. "This is most interesting," Tuff continued. "There are graphs and charts on all the data regarding these events."

Kara turned to the science officer. "They're monitoring the ion storm from here?" It was an unusual location, especially given the time since the last message from the colony.

Peering over Tuff's shoulder, Aenar nodded at the Marine, 'it certainly seems that way - Mister Tuff, can we safely try a data dump and get on our way?' He tried to keep the nervous tetchiness out of his voice.

"If we can't do a safe upload to the Calypso, I have a data rod," Kara said. Marines had to be prepared for a lot of things, and she often kept a spare rod in her kit.

Tuff ignored Torek's question. "The data I'm starting to find seems to indicate that this station is likely directly connected to the storms...."

'Ensign Tuff, we need to get that data downloaded. We're wasting time,' Aenar emphasised one last time, trying to get through to the man. What in the Fire Caves is up with this guy?'

Tuff slowly turned his head and looked around at Lieutenant Torek. "I thought that you wanted to discover what is occurring here. I am doing precisely that. Downloading and dumping may lose us the opportunity to do something about it if I find something here. Do you not agree?"

Kara walked over and handed Tuff her data rod. Ï believe we can do both."

Not pleased that he had to stop his immersion, Tuff turned to Kara who outranked him. Silently he accepted the data rod. He placed it into an outlet after overriding security programs and subroutines that might be harmful to data transfer.

Nodding his thanks to the Marine, Aenar stepped back, merely asking, 'how long will the download take?'

"Perhaps thirty seconds?" Tuff estimated.

Kara nodded. "Good. As the Lieutenant said, we have to move on."

"I could stay here and continue to interpret the data," Tuff offered, as he watched the transfer and simultaneously tried to break deeper into the computer.

'I'm sorry, Ensign, we have to stick together - that's an order,' said Aenar apologetically, 'download as much as you can, we can interpret the data back on the ship.' The Bajoran seldom had to pull rank with his fellow officers, and he hated it. The group was too small to split safely.

Calith spoke up, tense. 'There appears to be life signs moving in our direction. From further down the corridor outside. A mixed group, I'm having trouble defining the species.'

Tuff considered his options and immediately set his efforts towards burning the computer files onto the data rod. He could decrypt everything when he got back.

As soon as he was done, Kara took the files and hurried him out of the room and down the corridor, away from whoever was coming toward their location.

The corridor was fortunately empty. For now.

Tuff allowed himself to be shooed, wondering where they were heading next.

Bringing up the rear of the non-combat participants in the mission, Aenar flipped open his own tricorder and tried to work with Calith as they went to compensate for the ion storm's interference.

Swearing in Benzite, Calith waved her tricorder about, 'new group ahead. Lifesigns appear to be Reman? Is that possible?' Getting a hold of herself, she relayed more information, 'coming down the corridor we entered. If we don't get to the intersection before they do, we'll be trapped between the two groups.'

Trent's HUD pinged the multiple lifesigns closing in on them. His HUD didn't show details about what species they were, but it did show their numbers and spacing. Remans, he knew, were brilliant strategists and fearless in combat. Long considered shocktroopers for the Romulan military.

(To be continued...)

2nd Lieutenant Kara Melo
Alpha Platoon Leader

Ensign Chevy Tuff
Computer Specialist

Lieutenant Aenar Torek
Chief Science Officer

Ensign Calith
Engineering Officer

PFC Trent Kushner
Marine

 

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