Airless

Posted on 30 Jun 2020 @ 12:46am by Ensign Kelly Khan & Lieutenant JG Charles McCullen & Lieutenant Lucas Abrams M.D.

2,274 words; about a 11 minute read

Mission: Sentience
Location: Deck 13
Timeline: MD2, 1620 Hrs

ON:

[===Deck 13===]

Charlie stepped out of the turbolift on Deck 13 into darkness, only the flickering of emergency lights and the periodic flashing of the red alert panels were illuminating the corridor leading from the turbolift, past he offices and down to the main shuttle bay. The air was thin and had the distinct taste of ozone, telling him that until recently the room had been open to space. From what he could tell, the atmospheric systems had started to refill the corridor with air and then just... stopped.

The thought that the atmosphere could very easily vent itself again was very much present in the young ensign's head and he wished, for the very first time ever in his career, that he was in an environmental suit. As claustrophobic and uncomfortable as they were, it was better than randomly being exposed to vacuum. Nervously, he tapped his comm badge and got nothing but an inactive chirp.

"Console..." he murmured to himself, "find a console and get more information..." Charlie was a great pilot, a decent artist, and a passable singer, what he wasn't was an engineer. Beyond the basics that every Starfleet officer was required to learn, he knew very little about the minutiae of starship maintenance.

Alora trumped along awkwardly in the EVA suit. She'd just gotten back to engineering when the order came down to grab a suit and go back to deck 13, that she'd just come from, to investigate the venting of the shuttlebay. She quickly made sure her repair kit was stocked before heading out. She couldn't believe the difference a few minutes made.

When she had left the deck had been fine, now it was emergency power. She'd tried her comms but they were still down. She came around a corner and saw another officer coming toward her, "Are you ok?" She tried then remembered she had to hit a button in the suit to communicate outside, doing that she tried again, "Are you ok?" Figuring it was a good sign he wasn't gasping for air.

Charlie was a little taken aback by the sight of a suited person stepping around the corner. It made him feel like a bit of an idiot for the lack of an environmental suit. "Uh... yeah," he responded, "the captain sent me down here to..." to what, exactly? Handle the situation? "... to uh, get the shuttle bay sorted out. I'm trying to find a console to figure out what's going on... uh, sorry. I'm Lieutenant McCullen, helmsman."

"Ensign Nasek Sir, Engineering. Here to check shuttle bay, there's a decompression." She thought about taking off the suit or at least opening the helmet but figured she might need it to left it for now. She consulted an internal map about nearest console and pointed, "This way. If that's down I have a portable but I'd like to check the systems directly." She said and started walking.

Charlie followed the ensign, happy to let her take the lead. "I'm not much use at engineering, beyond the absolute basics, but I'll, uh... do what I can to help. There are three people trapped in a runabout inside the shuttle bay."

"That would have been nice to know before I tromped down here." She groused thinking of the one spare breathing mask she had, "You better have this just in case." She said giving him the spare then she stomped awkwardly in the suit toward the nearest console. There was one actually just off the shuttlebay, she meant to access it and attempt a diagnostic to determine just what was going on in the immediate area.

Charlie took the mask and watched her stomp away without comment. He took a moment to decide what to do with the thing, whether to put it on now or hold on to it, and decided to slip it over his nose and mouth, just in case, as she'd said, then hurried after her.

So focused was she on getting to the console she didn't realize she'd forgotten to explain. She turned to the flight officer, a bit apologetically, "I am just trying to run a check, see what we can learn. Sir". She explained before turning back to the console.

"Sounds good," Charlie responded, watching her work the console. "I figure it's gotta be a system malfunction, there can't be a breach, we'd have seen it and I'd, uh, probably be dead right now."

[===Runabout===]

In the Zambezi, Kelly looked at the other two officers. "The shuttle bay still isn't pressurizing. It starts to, then vents again. Fortunately, we can survive in here for another three months before our air supply or anything goes bad. Unless the computer decides it doesn't that like."

"I suppose they will send someone for us in the time-span of three weeks.", Roosje offered. "Are there any vacc suits aboard this vessel?", she asked.

Luc shook his head. "We'll be out of here before three weeks," he said, looking toward the view screen. "I don't think there are suits aboard, especially not one that will fit me, but given her position in flight, Ensign Khan will know better than I would."

Kelly got up and headed to the back and checked the storage lockers. "Let's see. Small, medium, large. Hmm. No gigantic sizes," she called out. "But we can weld two of the large together and use the legs from the medium for your arms. Your head is another story."

The large man arched a brow as he looked to the small woman. "You're joking, right?"

"Yes, I'm joking, Sir," the petite Ensign said. "Our other option is to risk the transporter. The holo woman is gone."

"For as far as we can see.", Roosje added.

"The transporter seems to be our only option," Lucas said, still unsure if he trusted such a thing.

"Did they forget about us?" the Flight Ensign asked.

"It does seem like it, doesn't it?" The big guy asked.

"One too few to play a game of cards whilst we wait.", Roosje replied.

"Hmm. Wait. We did this before," Kelly said before she headed to the pilots seat and began to tinker with the comms. =^=Ensign Khan to Lieutenant McCullen. Do you copy?=^= she asked, hoping to get the Flight Chief.

Out in the hallway next to Ensign Nasek, Charlie nearly jumped out of his uniform when his comm badge spoke. He had thought were out, but here was Khan, loud and clear. =/\= "Ensign Khan," he replied after a moment to steady himself, "we're on deck 13 now working on the problem. How are you all, uh, holding up?"

"Guys, we got comms!" Kelly told the others. =^=Fine except we're stuck in here and the shuttlebay won't stay pressurized.=^=

"Oh and who is coming to the rescue then?", Roosje asked.

"It sounded like Lieutenant McCullen, unless HASA is now intercepting comms and imitating personnel," Kelly said.

"Sir." Nasek could be heard talking to McCullen, "Just as you thought there was an error in the system. It registered the damage as real. No actual damage, preparing to re-pressurize area now."

=/\= "Sit tight, ensign." McCullen told Khan, "engineering is working on the problem now, it sounds like a systems error to me. From what I'm reading here, uh..." he peered at the display over Nasek's shoulder, "the computer somehow decided that there was a major hull breach in the shuttle bay and shut down all the environmental systems."

The helmsman then turned to Nasek, "can you give me an ETA, ensign?"

"Just a moment more..." She replied as she worked the controls, checking and rechecking the readouts. "It looks like it's restoring, can they use the shuttle systems to confirm?"

Charlie relayed, =/\= "can you use the shuttle sensors to check for atmosphere, Ensign Khan? According to Ensign Nasek it should be coming back now." =/\=

"What the sensors say may be a lie," Kelly said. "There's already been reports of the bay pressurizing and then it lost pressure again. We need a large.." She paused to look at the Doctor. "An extra, extra large EVA suit here and some cabling."

Charlie frowned at the console over Alora's shoulder, watching the pressure in the bay. He wondered if Khan was being paranoid or just cautious. "Ensign Nasek, you heard Ensign Khan? Report please? Is the bay stable or not?" He asked, "we've got to be sure before we start moving people."

"The system is telling me it's fine." She pulled out a tricorder to use that. "Tricorder confirms and nothing further is showing up on diagnostics." She paused considering the request for suits and equipment, "They can use their comms to request suits from storage and that'd be fastest since ours are still down or request a beam out." She suggested unaware of any problems to that system, "Or is the transporter system down too?" she wondered aloud as it just occurred to her why ask for suits if they could just transport. She put the tricorder away and started tapping away at the console again, refocusing. "Of all the buggy..." She muttered annoyed more to herself than anyone in particular.

Charlie hesitated for a moment, torn between caution and the desire to get the job done. He'd never known a tricorder to lie aboard ship unless foul play was involved and as far as he knew, there was none of that going on. He gave Alora a long gaze as he made up his mind, then turned to the shuttle bay doors and pushed the button. There was a pucker moment as he tested his faith, but when the doors rumbled open and he wasn't sucked into a void, crystallized and frozen, he remembered to breathe.

Charlie shot a shit-eating grin at Alora that was half relief and half amusement, then strode into the shuttle bay, tapping his com badge as he went. =/\= "Ensign Khan, open the runabout doors. I'm walking to you now." The air tasted of ozone and cold, evidence of a recently filled vacuum.

"If we get sucked out, I'm blaming you," Kelly said as she looked at Luc for confirmation to do as the Chief of Flight requested.

Charlie grinned to himself as he walked towards the runabout, deigning not to respond.

Lucas nodded his head, gesturing for Kelly to open the door. "If we get sucked out, we'll only have a split second to blame anyone," he pointed out. "That being said, we can't stay in this runabout forever. Open it up."

Kelly took a deep breath and grabbed the back of her chair with one hand, then released the door. When they didn't get sucked out into an airless shuttlebay and then into space, she slowly let her breath out. "I think...we're clear."

"Then, let's get out of here before anything else can go wrong," the big guy said.

"Hello," Charlie grinned up into the runabout, he was feeling oddly pleased with himself. "I have come to your rescue. Well, engineering has come to your rescue, mostly. I'm just the pretty face."

Alora finished checking the site to site transporter system and could find nothing wrong. Confused she made a note on a PADD of the issues and sent them to her CEO before putting it away. This was the sort of thing shake downs were meant to catch after all. It was just odd. She turned off the suit and took off the helmet before walking into the shuttle bay as others emerged from the hatch of one of the shuttles.

Kelly didn't wait but darted out of the runabout, past the Engineer and Flight Chief and didn't stop until she was out the door of the shuttle bay. "Run!"

Lucas followed Kelly out, but he didn't need to run. With legs as long as his were, he'd be able to catch up with the Ensign in no time. "The rescue is appreciated," he said, wishing to be off the flight deck as fast as possible. The large man didn't trust something else to go wrong, and he didn't want to be there for it just in case.

Charlie quirked an eyebrow at Kelly's retreating figure as she ran past him towards the shuttle bay doors, then turned and started walking in that direction. There were nerves, of course, there were always nerves, something else could go wrong, they could all be sucked out into the vacuum of space or be left hanging in an airless shuttle bay, but he felt the need to show calm, to put on the front of confidence and play the part of the senior officer even if he didn't exactly feel like one, and seeing that Alora had also entered the bay without her helmet on gave him enough confidence to keep his nerve and walk, albeit quickly, to the doors. "I'm trusting your repair work, Ensign," he told her, shooting her a grin as he walked towards her. "But let's get out of here."

When Kelly ran past Alora, she'd instinctively looked for danger she did not see and was with an air of puzzlement she replied to the Flight Chief, "Right." and with a final vaguely confused glance at the bay she followed the other officers out

Roosje had kept quiet during the last few minutes. Seeing that the others were safe, she also walked out the shuttle seemingly calm and headed towards the exit.

As the shuttle bay doors hissed shut behind the group, McCullen breathed a sigh of relief. He hadn't messed up, the air had held, everyone was safe. Mission accomplished.

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