Rescue or Recovery, Away Team: Part 2

Posted on Fri Jun 27th, 2025 @ 12:53pm by Captain Remy Johansen & Commander Maxun Spello & Lieutenant Commander Nash Winters & Lieutenant Xalanth & Lieutenant Daynah Ral & Lieutenant Alexandra Blackstone & Lieutenant JG Jean-Baptiste Dorsainvil & Ensign Tyler Williams

1,510 words; about a 8 minute read

Mission: Gone, Without Ever Knowing the Way
Location: TE 3X031, Class L Moon in Typhon Expanse
Timeline: MD 06, After Part 1

"Alex, backup to solid ground. i can regrow any lost bits." Xalanth said as he carefully walked over, doing his best desert walk to limit the weight and pressure. Reaching the position, the lizard began running his glove along the bulkhead. " Magnet locks are sre still in place. If we had something to disrupt them, we may be able to pop them open."

“With my expertise I could fashion functional limbs… however, I’ll accede to your order on this one. I’m no good to anybody with body parts melted off.” Alex gave a small scoffing chuckle and then turned to Nash. “I believe the mag-locks are in your wheelhouse, Commander. Though we should probably find a way to ensure that once we disable them that whatever bits of this magma flow might still be hot don’t find their way into the cavity… if only we had a way that we could put the flow around that area in some form of cryo-stasis.”

Nash contemplated what the Doctor said. “If we only had thermal deflectors. Hold your horses, Doctor. I have an idea. Sounds a little unorthodox but it just might work. We have pattern enhancers on the shuttle. I can configure them to work like a….thermal deflectors. With some tweaking, they can protect us and the crash site from the heat and lava flow. Set them up evenly distant from each other and we should be in business.”

“Unorthodox and away missions seem to go hand in hand more often than not. I’m game for it; do we have enough pattern enhancers to both boost out patterns and to pull this off?” Alex eyed the area around the mag locks and a thought clicked; after a moment of pontificating she pulled out one of the stasis field generators from her kit. It was a small device; roughly the same size as a comm badge.

“I brought these in case we ended up needing them… might they be useful, Nash?”

Nash took it from her hand, smiled and held it up in the air between himself and the Doctor.

“That’s very good, Doc. These are perfect. It’s very important that we all wear them. I can link them to the deflectors. They will serve as nice reinforcement for the field. Configuring the enhancers and the linkage to these babies won’t take too long. How are you with a flux coupler? Want to give me a hand?”

Alex hesitated for just a moment at the question but nodded. “I’m better than you might expect” She folded her medkit open to distribute stasis generators to the members of the away team present, leaving her with two spare and then held her hand out to Nash for a flux coupler. “Just tell me the settings and frequencies and I’ll get a start.

“Music to my ears, Doc," Nash replied. "The pattern enhancers are still back on the shuttle. Lucky for us, it’s just a couple minutes walk. I’ll be right back.”

Alex nodded her understanding; eyeing the magma flow carefully.

Nash returned a new short moments later with the four pattern enhancers, two in each hand.

“Alright, Doctor, let’s get these evenly distributed.” Blackstone and Winters could differentiate between the stable areas of the moon surface and where the lava flow was and could restart any time.

“Place two here…..,” Nash pointed, “….and there. That should give us ample coverage. Let me see those portable generators.”

Xalanth took one of the pattern enhancers and placed it in the designated location. Giving a thumbs up, he indicated it was on and working.

“Thanks, Xalanth. Help me activate the rest and get them online. Once we see the net is up and running, I can link the portable generators,” Nash said.

Alex took one of the enhancers and set it up at the location nearest the maglocks then flashed her own thumbs-up then stood by while clipping one of the stasis generators to her uniform.

Xalanth nooded lifted the last of the enhancers carefully, making his way across the cooling ground before placing it in position.

"Uh, Lieutenants? Commander?" Tyler piped up with a question. He'd been listening in to the conversation and understanding very little technical babble but still wanted to help if he could. "I apologize if I'm stepping outta line here, but if you want someone to go in and try get that person out once you’ve got those generators, I volunteer."

“We appreciate the offer, Ensign. Let’s take it one step at a time, huh? We need to get our field activated and make sure it does its job. If the situation warrants it, you’re in.”

Alex looked to Tyler and nodded. “It’s highly appreciated; It’ll be myself, you… and perhaps Xalanth approaching the bulkhead once we are set up. I don’t want to risk anyone beyond that.”

"I'd recommend I take point. My bits can grow back." Xalanth suggested.

“No one’s losing any bits, lizard bubba. Let’s take it one step at a time, agreed?,” Nash said slyly.

"I know just being logical." The lizard replied with a grin.

Alex chuckled softly. “Aye; that might be prudent indeed.” She looked to Nash inquisitively. “Alright, Lieutenant. On your mark.”

“It’s just Nash. And we’re ready to activate the field,” Nash said. He checked his tricorder while making final checks to the enhancers.

“Make sure your portable generators are activated, everyone. Initiating the field in three, two, one….MARK!” Nash watched intently as the protective field blinked to life. “Well done, Alex….Doctor. Very nice. We’ve got an hour, maybe two before we have re-align and initialize all over again. Let’s go see what we find.”

Xalanth nodded and moved over to the bulkhead. " Right, let's get this open,"

Alex fell into step just behind Xalanth and motioned that she was ready to approach.

As the three officers approached the bulkhead they discovered that they were dealing with a broken remnant of the ship's nacelle, a fact that had been obscured from their scans because much of the structural integrity of the nacelle was either missing or buried beneath the surface. The heavy metals mixed in with the molten lava were causing the crew to get incomplete readings regarding just how much of the ship had been swallowed by Earth.

The surface temperature of their corner of the planet was heating up rapidly, 8 degrees in the last two hours, meaning it was now 39 degrees and rising, a metric that Lieutenant Ral was keeping a close eye on from her station on the Bridge.

Xalanth led the way, firing out one of his small wrist-mounted scout orbs to get a detailed look at the ship. Everything was a mess, the fact that it was still in one piece was proof of the fleet's engineering teams. " Astrea rescue team, anyone still alive in here?" He called out his words, seeming to echo around the burnt, melted walls.

Alex’s tricorder chimed rapidly as they got closer to the bulkhead and she paused briefly to more carefully calibrate the scan to adjust for what they were finding. After a few moments of panning the tricorder she stepped forward again and pointed to a point about midway down the bulkhead, to an area that would take some finesse to get into as it was partially buried.

“My readings are indicating a void behind the bulkhead there and I am picking up two separate life signs, though one is extremely faint. If we don’t move quick we may yet lose them due to a likely lack of oxygen or the rising heat.”

“Can you identify specific bio-signs, Doctor? Species, I mean? I’m reading some electromagnetic activity nearby. Thermionic radiation spikes. Nothing harmful, but could be if there’s anyone still alive out here,” Nash said.

Alex was focused on the scan trying to get a clearer image as she tapped a few buttons on the tricorder. “Don’t quote me on this but I have either a Romulan or Vulcan…. and… a Bajoran I think. I can’t clear it up any further from this side of the bulkhead.”

Nash swallowed in anxiety when she said that. He’d have to push his personal feelings aside for now and concentrate on the mission at hand. “Alright. Xalanth…give us a hand here, will ya? I think your strength can be an advantage for us just now.”

Xalanth reached for the bulkhead, which, unlike the outer one, wasn't magnetically locked. With his dragonian strength, he pulled the manual release and began heaving the big door back into its closed position. As the door began to move, a thin trail of blood began seeping out from under the bulkhead.

“Shit…..that’s blood, alright. Can’t tell what species, but it’s red, so we know it’s not Vulcan or Romulan,” Nash said, still keeping a close eye on his tricorder.

~tbc~

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