Need A Tow? (Time Zone 1)

Posted on 12 Sep 2018 @ 2:23am by Lieutenant Commander Camila Di Pasquale & Lieutenant Commander Arjin Djinx & Lieutenant Commander Joey Geisler & Lieutenant Danyl Adan & Lieutenant JG Ian Beckett & Story Teller

1,828 words; about a 9 minute read

Mission: Fractured
Location: USS Black Hawk, Various
Timeline: TZ1 || 1100 hours

Lieutenant Kemm, having heard about the plan to use the runabouts to tow the Black Hawk, relocated from Engineering to the Bridge. With as finicky as his systems were below decks, he didn't want to chance the communications systems shorting out in the event something went wrong. Today was actually the first time he'd even stepped out onto the bridge. Perhaps if the full crew was aboard, and not twenty percent of it, the bridge would have actually been full. Alas, only five crewmembers, including Lieutenant Commander Djinx, staffed the ship's command center.

Ian had finished shutting off power to the non-essential areas of the ship and had made his way up to the bridge. The route through the Jefferies Tubes was a maze and Ian wondered if renaming them The Labyrinth would be best. He'd stationed himself at an unmanned console to monitor to the power flow throughout the areas that were still active.

After some thought, Arjin had opted to do the calculations on the Sience console of the Bridge. That would be more efficient seen the limited amount of power available to them. As the doors leading to the Bridge swung open, he saw Lieutenant Kemm step trough it. Maybe things had been repaired down in Engineering and the towing was going to be unnessesary.

"Lieutenant Kemm. How are things progressing. Are you here to tell me we got our engines back?"

"I'm here to monitor systems during the tow," the Kelpian replied to the the Trill Acting Captain. "Honestly, I wish I had some other, more encouraging news to convey, but I figured my response times would be faster if I were up here and not dependent on our already fragile comm system."

Arjin nodded. "Then take a place on a free console and keep me informed is there is a problem."

The Kelpian nodded before crossing the bridge to sit at the wall-mounted Engineering station. With a few taps, he called up a schematic of the ship's structural integrity field and overlaid it with the EPS grid. He hoped as they slid out of the nebula that he would see the grid stabilize.

Another swoosh of the Bridge doors lead to the entry of another officer . A Lieutenant wearing gold. Arjin had seen him before but could not place the man at once. "Yes Lieutenant,", he asked as he saw the man look his way.

So far, the Transporter Chief hadn't noticed anything out of the ordinary that would require him to notify Lieutenant Adan. The areas that had been shut off showed up as light gray in color on his monitor while the others had no color distinction at all. Ian turned at the mention of 'yes Lieutenant' and saw the Acting Captain looking at him. "Just monitoring the areas where we shut off power."


===[Space]===

Joey sat in the cockpit of the Euphrates next to the pilot she'd chosen to be her partner during their expedition. She was grateful they now had a bird's eye view of the ship and the damage she'd sustained. Seeing it made her wince mentally, but she supposed it could have been much worse. So could her comfort level. Squeezing into the EVA suit she had on was a three man operation. Camila and Joey's co-pilot of the Euphrates pulling while she sucked and tucked in parts of her body that were too large to fit like normal. After about five minutes, she was now as safe as she could be, but the Intel Chief was sure she knew exactly how a kielbasa felt.

They were now in position, but needed to wait for Commander Djinx to plot their course based on the sensor readings he was receiving from both the Euphrates and the Mississippi. Joey took a breath and tapped her combadge. =^=Geisler to Black Hawk and Mississippi. We're currently in position and awaiting orders.=^= She looked toward her pilot. "This isn't going to be a walk in the park, but I have faith in us. Are you ready?"

The young woman manning the controls nodded her head as she surveyed the damage on the ship. Now, along with Lieutenant Geisler, she was waiting for orders from the Commander to come through. "I'm as ready as I'll ever be," she answered, though, she was anything but. Alas, there was a job that needed to be done, and like the rest of the crew, she was going to do it.

Camila got into her suit and boarded the Mississippionce she helped Joey into her suit. She ran through the flight check and knew how dangerous the mission was going to be. She took a calming breath as she ran through the check and wished she had a bottle of Romulan Ale with her, but shrugged it off. "This is Mississippi and all systems are go," she said on the Black Hawk and Euphrates frequency.

"Mississippi and Euphrates. This is the Black Hawk", Arjin responded when both shuttles were in place. "Following you scans I have been plotting the most optimal trajectory to get us out of the nebula. The optimal trajectory will require you howerver to tow us out backwards. And thus bringing you in closer contact with theradiatio. There is another route forward possible, but it will get us into a very narrow funnel at the end of the course. One where there will be no room for error if we want to avoid colliding with a filament. I will send you both trajectories. I want your own honest assesment about you piloting capabilities to see if that is an option. If one of you is not 100 percent sure, I will only allow the first route."

Camila surveyed the damaged to the ship from the cockpit of the Mississippi as she guided the runabout to the station where she would lock the tractor beam onto the ship. "What's the status of our sensors?" she asked the co-pilot, a young Bolian Ensign.

"Sensors are fully active and telemetry is being sent back to the Black Hawk in real time," The Bolian responded. "We are receiving trajectories now from Commander Djinx."

"Acknowledged," Camila responded before replying to the Trill. "It looks good, Commander," she said. "I have the route information and the tractor beam is ready on the Mississippi."

Joey took a deep breath and let it out slowly. This was the moment of truth. There were only two outcomes, and one of them the Intel Chief didn't even want to think about. "Okay, Thrace, this is it. Tractor beam on," she said as she moved her fingers over the console in front of her. It wasn't long before they were locked on and ready to begin the towing process per the Commander's trajectory. =^=Euphrates to Mississippi, we are locked on and ready on your word.=^=

"Mississippi, Euprates, you are clear to start. Take it slow. We will be monitoring and update the trajectory when needed. Take us out of here.", Arjin said.

Kemm could see the tractor beam pulling on one of the ship's aft sections. The structural integrity field attempted to compensate with forcefields and internal beam generators, which Kemm supported by shifting around some of the little available power that he had. "Integrity is holding at eighty percent," he reported to Commander Djinx.

Camila locked on with her tractor beam. =^=Mississippi to Euphrates, tractor beam is locked. All ahead slow on the trajectory Commander Djinx sent us.=^= she responded to Joey and gave her co-pilot a nod as she began to ease the runabout forward.

=^=Acknowledged, Mississippi. Slow and steady.=^= Joey said, glancing toward Thrace with a nod, then began to ease the Euphrates forward, being quite mindful of the filaments around them.

"Ship is moving astern at fifty kilometers per hour," reported Lieutenant Kemm to the crew on the bridge. He saw the structural integrity take a dip the moment the ship started moving, and the computer, with its limited resources, attempted to compensate.

Lieutenant Adan manned Ops as best he could. As his dark eyes narrowed ever so slightly, he checked the read-outs. They fluctuated and his slender fingers glided along the console to make the necessary adjustments.

To D'jinx, he announced, "Hull breach on Deck 11. Unable to compensate. There were no casualties."

Kemm winced, trying to boost power to structural integrity. "Euphrates and Mississippi, slow your speed by twenty percent."

=^=Affirmative, Actual=^= Camila acknowledged as she began to slow her runabouts speed. =^=Slowing speed by twenty-percent. Confirm, Lieutenant Geisler.=^=

"Slow speed by twenty percent," Joey told Thrace. It didn't take long before her co-pilot made the proper adjustments and was now moving at the same speed as the Mississippi. =^=Geisler to Mississippi and Black Hawk... speed has been decreased by twenty percent.=^=

Back on the Black Hawk's bridge, Kemm, whose attention was focused on structural integrity, jerked his head to the left at the sound of a master alarm. "No..." he gasped. Jumping from his chair, he turned to face the Commander and shouted at him and over the comm system, "Stop the ship! Abort! Abort!"

Joey looked toward Thrace and gave a simple nod, though she didn't have the slightest clue what was going on. "Abort," she ordered as the Euphrates came to a halt.

Camila broke the the tractor beam at the frantic call from the ships Engineer officer. =^=What's going on, Actual?=^= she called.

=^=Euphrates to Black Hawk, what's going on?" the Intel Chief asked.

The Kelpian rushed back to his station to verify the situation. The master alarm continued to sound, but he silenced it for now. "It's the antimatter," he said, calling back out but not turning around. "The containment fields started to fail as the anitmatter suddenly started becoming unstable. The more we moved ahead, the more unstable it became. Another kilometer, and we likely would have lost containment."

"I've shut down power to the empty areas," said Ian. "We could re-route it to the containment fields and shore them up a bit."

"Anything would help, Lieutenant," Kemm stated. "Or so the laws of physics tells us. But, whatever is happening with the antimatter is defying everything we know. Its almost like the antimatter itself is seeing its physical state altered."

Camila wanted to scream in exasperation at their tow attempt failing and slammed her fist on the controls of the runabout. She cut speed on the runabout and brought it around to face the Black Hawk and wondered if their shared fate would lead to a shared death as with a sigh, she headed back.

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