Dream a little Beam of Me
Posted on Tuesday 7 May 2019 @ 15:20 by Captain Melody Jones & Commander Caroline Miller & Lieutenant Michael Ki MD
Mission:
The New Collective
Location: Transporter Room3, USS Merlin
Timeline: Continued from "Facing the Beast", Concurrent with "In the belly of the beast"
2957 words - 5.9 OF Standard Post Measure
PREMISE: The transporter room. O'Hara is trying to beam back Barstow and Jones. Caroline sent Ki with her to keep an eye on her and deal with medical traumas should he be needed.
Previously on the USS Merlin...
Micael's facial features drooped in a way as all expression left his face. He nodded in acknowledgement of Caroline's order and followed O'Hara into the turbolift. "Yes ma'am and I will make sure that she doesn't." Michael replied to Caroline. He tapped his comm badge =/\=Emergency response team to Transporter Room 3.=/\= As the turbolift doors closed he turned to Stephanie and spoke. "We will get them through this."
"Don' make promises ya can' keep, Doc," Stephanie said flatly. "Right now, this is all purely guesswork. Well educated guesswork based in science an' engineerin', but guesswork none th' less." The turbolift door hissed open to allow the two of them admittance. Stephanie stepped in.
Michael cocked an eyebrow and smirked. "My aren't we the pessimist." He followed Stephanie onto the turbolift.
And Now the continuation...
"How I wish, how I wish you were here. We're just two lost souls Swimming in a fish bowl Year after year. Running over the same old ground, What have we found? The same old fears. Wish you were here." - Pink Floyd, "Wish you were here..."
On the turbolift, Stephanie shrugged at Ki. "Na Doc. Realist," She said. "It may be different in th' medical profession... But as an engineer, guaranteein' success when failure is eminently possible turns inta a dangerous game... An' one I'm na too keen t' play right now."
Ki knew that in the heart of it all Stephanie was right, one should never guarantee success. However, he also knew that if he let her wallow in it her confidence would falter. For the first time since meeting the Engineer Michael actually wished for the overbearing confidence of Stephanie O'hara. He smirked at her again "I was led to believe that Starfleet had a long line of miracle working Engineers. I believe it started with another Celt, one Montgomery Scott of the Enterprise. I will tell you this much you have the talent and I know that you will pull this off."
"It's recently come t' my attention tha' I'm not nearly as clever as I think I am," Stephanie said simply. "Nor am I as clever as everyone else thinks I am. This entire feckin' three-ring circus is my fault. I have t' get 'em outta there. I owe 'em that much."
The door hissed open at deck 16 and Stephanie stepped out running to Transporter Room 3, The whole way shouting to clear the Cooridor. When she arrived, She snatched the comm badge off her uniform coat and affixed it to her gold sleeveless undershirt and tossed the jacket in the corner of the room. She walked over to the panel and took it off the wall, calling over her shoulder. "I need ya t' run a level five diagnostic on that pad right now."
Life had been a whirl wind for her after arriving onto the Merlin, and while she still worked on getting use to everything Bree found that she was starting to enjoy herself a bit more then she thought she would. Then again, she had been thrust right on into work and that's what had made the change much easier. Snapping to attention as she heard the opening of the door, her focus went right to her Chief. "Yes Lieutenant." The words hadn't even fully left her before fingers where moving over the console to start running the test.
When they arrived Michael got out of the Engineer's way. He always knew to let the doctors tend to the correct patient. They were the Merlin's docs so off they went. Ki found the emergency response team from Sick Bay waiting outside. He grabbed the medical bag and a small device that resembled a hypospanner. The team was given orders to wait in the corridor until Ki summoned for them, as Michael did not want to clutter up the Transporter Room. The device that he took is one of his own design, one that he had designed when he served on the Poseidon. This device's function was to interfere with a Borg transceiver and immediately sever a drone from the collective. He hoped that the worst did not happen to the Captain but one had to be prepared.
Stephanie, for her own part was already waist deep in the wall, contorted at an angle that allowed the lower half of her body to be seen while the upper half dissapeared into the bulkhead. When she spoke, it had a loud echoy quality. "If ya've 100% on the diagnostic, deguass th' transporter pad, then erect a level three containment field around it. Then see t' th' Doctor. Give him whatever he asks for. I'll be runnin' th' console f'r this transport." She then tapped her comm badge. =/\= O'Hara t' Bridge. Status report on th' Borg subspace field, please? =/\=
The only thing Michael needed was a dampening field set up, as well as a secure forcefield just in case the worst happened. He made the requests to the engineering team and stood back. All he could do now was wait for the away team to materialize.
=^=Its weakening but you still have a ways to punch through. Also we are getting indications that the main power grid is going to overload. We didn't think we had caused that much damage=^=
Her focus never faltered as she studied the scans, skimming and re-skimming as it all went through. While the test didn't take long to do, she just wanted to make sure that nothing was missed before signing off on the test. With a slight nod to herself as she felt confident she was correct in her assessment. "On it now Lieutenant" Bree responded back as she started doing what Stephanie had ordered her to do. Only as she finished up with that did she glance to the Doctor to find out what he wanted.
The dampening field, and containment field where set up as ordered and ready for whatever what about to happen. While curiosity and concern was getting the better of her, Bree also knew she needed to stay alert and ready to jump in with help no matter what kind it may be.
With the modifications Stephanie made to the subspace antenna, she may be able to get a comm message through. She boosted the gain and hoped it would make it. =/\= "Merlin t' Away team. Move as close as ya can t' the outer hull on th' east side o' the ship. Prepare for transport!" =/\= Only static came back. She didn't know if it had gotten through, She repeated the message.
A burst of static came over the comm system before =/\= Jon.. to Merlin. We r.... you.... Jus... The puppet ma... has erected a force.... fiel..aro........ section. I'm attemp... to override it. St.... by! =/\=
It was followed a few moment later with =/\= "Jones to Merlin. There's indications.......that the enti..power grid is about to feed back..... I'd say you have about t....... minutes before this ship expl....... No pressure!"
The feedback terminology, it set the wheels in Michael's head moving there was a connection to something he knew. But what was it, then, like a bolt of lightening it hit him. "Lieutenant if I understand the mechanics of a feedback correctly. It is a buildup of energy that has no escape so it explodes. That is a lot like hypertension, when the blood pressure gets to high we get something to relieve the pressure. What if while attempting the transport we give this energy of the puppet master a place to go?" Ki spoke to the open panel that O'Hara had wedged herself behind.
Stephanie's mind was otherwise occupied, so there was a delayed reaction as it pecied together the data it had been fed. "Feedback." She ran to the console and began tapping at it to bring up the external sensor data. Her eyes went wide. =/\= "Bridge, recall th' fighters an' move th' ship away. The feedback loop is a self-destruct sequence, that vendictive bastard'd rather destroy th' cube then let us have th' Captian an' Jones back. There's still enough subspace interference where I can't establish a 100% solid transporter lock, but I have a localization. Without it, this could all go horribly wrong... but if I don' go now, I don' go at all." =/\=
Stephanie then looked over to the Doctor... "If a body wanna jump off a cliff Doc, I'll na be tryin' t' hold 'is hand on th' way down. Let 'im burn. We've got bigger fish right now."
Whatever had been interfering with the comm channel suddenly cleared and Melody’s voice came though. =/\= Jones to Merlin. Now would be a good time!=/\=
Stephanie said a little prayer to the Transporter Gods and Energized... One person was standing on the transporter pad. As Stephanie's jaw went slack.
Commander Jones hoped off the transporter and moved quickly moved over to the control pedestal. She managed to get out "The Captain?" before suddenly she had to hang onto the console for dear life as she ship pitched hard to the left as the red alert alarm sounded.
Deep in the pit of her stomach, Melody knew what had happened and she whispered "No......."
Main Bridge
The viewscreen was suddenly lit up with a massive fireball as the Borg cube spectacularly exploded, sending debris flying in all directions including towards the Merlin. The ship recoiled hard and Caroline braced herself into the command chair. "Full shields! All hands brace for impact!"
The ship finally steadied.
Caroline pressed the comm button =/\= Transporter room! Do you have them?=/\=
=/\= "O'Hara t' Bridge. We have Commanda Jones... I didn't get th' Captain." =/\= Her words had a defeated quality to them. =/\= "I'm gonna try again. Status o' the Cube?" =/\=
=^=The cubes just exploded Lieutenant=^= Caroline stated numbly. =^=There's no life signs left to lock onto. How is the Commander. If Commander Jones is fit please send her to the bridge=^=
Transporter Room 3
Stephanie beat against the control panel with the tips of her fingers as she furiously tried to restablish the transporter lock on Barstow. She looked over at Bree. "Increase power t' th' targetin' scanners an reset f'r another go. An' be quick about it." She ordered and stuffed herself back in the open panel. She looked over at Jones. "I'm na whupped yet," she was trying to project a confidence she didn't feel. "We're gettin' 'im back if I have t' put on EVA suit and float out there t' get 'im myself."
Caroline's words hit Melody like a punch to the gut. She just stood there for a moment in stunned silence, watching the Chief Engineer work the console frantically. Finally she found her voice. "Lieutenant." She then took a step closer to O'Hara. Placing a hand on her shoulder, she spoke again, this time softer "Stephanie. He's gone. There's nothing to be done. There's nothing you could have done."
"Bullshite," She said flatly from inside the bulkhead as she withdrew the upper half of her body from the wall. "He didn't win. Tell me he didn't win." Stephanie looked wide-eyed at Melody. "There's got t' be more I can do. I'm na addin' another victim t' my ledger t'day." She pushed past Melody and walked over to the console and looked at Bree. "Are ya deaf? I want those targetin' scanners on-line 10 minutes ago." The Engineer was clearly becoming frantic, but trying to play it down like she was in control of the situation. It wasn't working for her and it was fairly apparent to all present. "I'm na gonna let him die! Na like this... An' where th' feck are those targetin' scanners?"
Nothing like being between a rock and a hard place. Bree had heard the news, the fact that the cube had blown up, the lack of life signs. She knew that without the life signs there wasn't much that they could do. Yet, she'd also learned well that sometimes one just had to keep their mouth shut and do as told no matter what. While she'd been working on the scanners and increasing the power to them so the Chief new she'd at least been following orders, two things where clear to her. One, what she was doing was pointless... and the second one being the Chief was running on emotions and not realizing that she'd done what was asked. Nipping her lower lip, she'd glanced a moment to the others as if to see who might catch the issue and jump in.
Melody took a deep breath and a moment to collect her thoughts. She looked at both engineers "Ok, Give the debris a through sweep to.... to make sure, then I want you to return to engineering. From the proximity of that explosion I'm betting that we have some damage to repair and I would like our Chief Engineer overseeing proceedings." She directed the next part towards O'Hara "Also Stephanie I need you to calm down. I'm speaking as your Commanding Officer and your friend. Even in this dark hour, we all have duties to perform. I'd rather not have to order the Doctor here to sedate you. I need a full damage report in two hours, understood?"
"Yes Commander." Breana said soft almost whisper, not overly wanting to draw anymore attention to herself then need be. While she'd not gotten the chance to know people on the ship yet, she knew well enough that losing a Captian was always a hard thing for a crew. Closing her eyes a moment as she swallowed hard to push back her own demons and memories, she started working on running that sweep. Making sure there was absolutely no chance that something was missed.
She looked at Doctor Ki "I'll..... I'll need a full casualty report as well Doctor. I'll be on the Bridge."
"Commander a moment please." He stepped in front of the XO before she had a chance to leave. Michael's face was stone as it often was when there were casualties and or something to cure. The fact that the Captain was most likely dead did not register on his radar at least not now. Right now there was Jones and O'hara. Two patients with unique issues, he knew he could not help one. So he took the steps needed to make sure that all would get what they needed. He flipped open his medical tricorder and gave the Commander a once over. She was bruised and needed some minor care but nothing life threatening. Most importantly there was no trance of Borg technology in her body. "You will need to come to Sick Bay eventually to get patched up but you are fit for the time being. When you relieve her please have Commander Miller report to Sick Bay she will have a patient. I will have that report to you as soon as possible." He stepped aside and allowed the XO to take command of the ship.
Melody managed to nod at Ki. “Very Well Doctor. I’ll call down to sickbay after I’ve seen Caroline in the bridge.”
The gravity of the situation had finally dawned on Stephanie. The Captain was dead. She stared blankly at the data she had called up on the console, absorbing exactly none of it. "Aye, Commanda" She said to Melody in a tone that gave the impression that she was a million light years away.
It occurred to Melody that she should say something. She looked at each of them as she spoke. “I know you’re all hurting. I’m hurting too. I need for you to all reach down and find that something that keeps you going and hold onto it. The Captain always depended on each of you and I need you to give your very best, as you always do. There’ll be time to grieve later. I’m sure counsellor Miller will be available if you need to talk and, my door is always open.”
She gave each one of them a final look before heading out of the transporter room.
When Melody had left for the Bridge, Stephanie looked over to Ki. "I killed him, Doc," She said, her voice quivering. "I killed him just as sure as if I'd stabbed him in th' heart with m' own two hands..."
For a doctor Michael was not too good at the reassurance game, however, he knew when he had to at least try, and this was one of those moments. "Lieutenant you are as much responsible as the rest of us. The one who is truly responsible is it, that thing that blew up the cube. Once the report is completed as the Commander ordered come to Sick Bay and have a chat with Commander Miller. We will get through this. And somehow if I know Apollo he is still out there and we will find him." Michael turned toward the response team and dismissed them as their services would no longer be needed.
OFF:
●○ LTjg Stephanie O'Hara
Chief Engineer
USS Merlin
●●● Commander Melody Jones
USS Merlin
Ensign Breana Rathburn
Asst. Chief Engineer
USS Merlin
Commander Caroline Miller
Chief Counsellor
USS Merlin
●● Lieutenant Michael Ki
Chief Medical Officer
USS Merlin
