And Away We Go - Part II

Posted on 14 Jun 2021 @ 6:35pm by Lieutenant Lucas Abrams M.D. & Ensign Kelly Khan

2,873 words; about a 14 minute read

Mission: Extinction
Location: Sadoria
Timeline: Mission Day 21 at 1130

At the bottom of the incline, Kelly groaned and raised up from the ground, rubbing the side of her face that had been scratched in the fall. "Guys? Hey? Hello? You hear me?!"

Lucas laid against the cold, damp ground with his eyes closed. His ears were ringing, and there was a dull ache in his head. He didn't remember hitting it, but he had at some point on his way down. Still, that wasn't his primary concern right now. The well-being of the two women were.

"I'm here," he called out as he pushed himself to a sitting position. It was dark. The only light came from above them, but offered little illumination as far down as they were. "Are either of you hurt? Can you move? Even if you can, don't. I'll make my way to you."

Sarah heard his voice but it was a bit jumbled as her brain felt like it'd had been given a a good, hard shake as she thudded to the ground. It ached most along with her hip, "frackin' belt..." she muttered. She was going to have one heck of a bruise from where her belt had dug into her hip when she landed. She moved slowly to sit up, doing a internal inventory as the Doctor's words finally settled in her mind, "I'm here. I'm ok."

Lucas removed a flashlight and tricorder from his medkit that hit the ground not too far away from him, then turned the flashlight on. He scanned the area, spotting both women not too far away. Carefully, he made his way over to Kelly and scanned her with the tricorder to see if she had any broken bones or internal injuries. "Does anything hurt?" He asked before looking back at Sarah. "Miss Proctor, stay where you are. I'm coming to you next."

"Just my pride," Kelly said. "I should have been quicker."

"Nonsense. We didn't know the ground was going to give way. And truth be told, this could have been much worse for all three of us," the big man said, helping her to her feet when he was sure she wasn't injured. Lucas then made his way over to Sarah and crouched down to scan her. "Anything hurt?"

"Dinged my hip but I don't think anything is broken..." Sarah replied after a moment, "Brain's a bit rattled but I don't think I'm bleeding..."She replied her head throbbing a bit.

Lucas continued to run his scan. "Nothing is broken, and I don't see any blood," he confirmed, shaking his own mental fog away. "Do both of you think you can push through while we try to find a way out of here?"

"I'm good," Kelly said as she brushed some dirt and dust off of her uniform. "Your turn to be scanned, Doctor Abrams. Are you okay?"

He passed the tricorder over to Kelly so she could scan him. "I took a knock on the head, but other than that, I feel fine."

The petite brunette took it and gave him a scan. "This concurs, Doc," she said and handed it back to him before she looked around. "We need some more light."

Sarah, finishing rechecking herself, heard the request and pulled out a mini light to begin shining it around. "I'm game..." She considered the hole they'd fallen in and didn't think the grapple won't hold well around the hole anyway.

Kelly looked around and saw what looked like clearish crystals with dirt locked in the crystal. Dirt, or something. She squinted in the light, which wasn't directed at what she was looking at. "Hey., check this out," she said. "Over here."

Sarah shifted the beam to the area Kelly indicated and the Crystals lit up in the beam, sparkling in their bed of dark something. "Wow". She played the beam over the area, she stepped closer to get a good look but left some distance.

"What do you see?" Lucas asked as he rose to his feet again, then moved over to stand by the women. He shined his light where Proctor's was and blinked. "What in the hell is that?"

"It's the crystal we picked up earlier," Kelly said after looking at her tricorder. "But the structure...is off."

"That doesn't look like anything I've ever seen before," the big guy said, moving forward a bit to get a closer look.

"Do you think we should break a chunk off and take it with us?" the pilot asked.

"Can you tell how its different Doc?" Sarah asked curiously, turning around with her light now that the Doctor was there and looking more at the circular cave they found themselves in shining the light around, there were two other exits or just deep alcoves, it was hard to tell from where she stood.

Lucas took a deep breath and let it out slowly. The egghead inside of him was about to come out full force. "Hardness and ductility depend on perfection of the crystal structure. It is thus found that irradiation results in a loss of ductility and an increase in hardness. Such effects are attributed to glide-plane obstruction in the crystal. Most structured materials become harder, less ductile, and sometimes more brittle as the result of neutron irradiation," he said, pausing momentarily as he opened his medkit to retrieve a specimen container. "In other words, the structure is brittle and shouldn't be. We'll take a sample of it and bring it back to the ship to be analyzed."

Radiation was about the only thing Kelly understood as she listened, but tried to remember it for later if the opportunity arose to to talk about irradiated crystal. "Is it safe to take a sample? I'd suggest getting a sample box from the shuttle, but... " She looked up at the hole they had all fallen through.

Sarah listened carefully catching some but appreciated the summary at the end, "Seems to be a lot brittle here. I wonder what happened." She said, following Kelly's gaze briefly at the hole. "I could try a grapple on the ceiling but if the rest it is as brittle it'll be the least elegant escape ever seen." She joked lightly.

"I've got a specimen container right here," Lucas said, raising his hand. He knew the ladies wouldn't be able to see it, but it was definitely there. "I would suggest you two standing back just in case. Once we have the sample, we can figure out how we get free."

Sarah shifted position, glancing back at the wall as she lowered the light. Stepping back, "Fair enough. I can keep a light on it if you need both hands free."

"You do?" Kelly asked, but looked around for a moment. "What can we use to break a piece off with?"

"I do. You never know what you're going to need when you're out in the field," the big guy said, looking toward the crystal. Now, Kelly's second question needed to be answered, but he didn't exactly have any answers. "I'm open to suggestions. It's brittle and should break easily enough, but we don't want the entire thing to come down on us."

"Can we dig one out, just grab a whole crystal?" Sarah asked aiming her like at one of the smaller crystals. "Less risk of breaking?" She wasn't entirely sure but seemed worth suggesting.

The petite Flight Ensign turned her tricorder and cracked it against a six inch protrusion of crystal, causing it to break off. "Got it," she said.

Lucas nodded. "That's one way to do it," he said, moving over to the fallen crystal and using his light to scoot it into the specimen container. When that was done, he sealed it and looked up toward the hole above them. "Now let's get out of here and get this back to the ship."

"Toss me up," Kelly suggested. "Rather, cup your hands and give me a boost."

"Even if I were to do that, I don't think that would be enough for you to get to the top. Our best bet would be Proctor's grapple to get up. Well... for you two. I'm not sure it will hold me," the large man stated.

"It's monofilament," the petite woman said. "It'd haul a Co'blat up without strain. I used it at the academy to scale walls."

"What I have is rated for about 200 lbs." Sarah replied, "Though there's usually some safety margin built in. We can take your gear to offset your weight but it's the ceiling I am most worried about. We need a solid piece near enough to the hole to get out." She continued, putting her light away and pulling the grapple gun off her belt with the monofilament to begin loading the device. They could call for a rescue but until it became necessary she'd rather not. That was just embarrassing.

"If that's the case, it's definitely not going to hold me. The two of you climb up and see if you might be able to find anything that might get me out," he said.

At that point, the Type III drone lowered itself into the hole and hovered above them. "Lieutenant Abrams, I have an alternate suggestion," came the voice of the pilot. "But you may not like it."

"Go ahead," the big guy stated.

"I could tag each of you with the transponders on the drone, but it would transport you all back to the ship. In the Brig." the

Lucas listened as their drone pilot spoke. "I'm not sure that's going to work. The interference in the atmosphere will likely cause issues with communications with the ship. Our best bet would likely be for you to use the shuttle transport us back to your location."

In the runabout, the drone pilot smacked himself in the forehead. "Why didn't I think of that?" he asked himself before he opened the comm again. "Locking on. Prepare for transport."

Happily surprised, Sarah hadn't been sure a signal would be get through period. She made a mental note to check next time. She held still, grapple device still in hand.

Tag all

The drone pilot went back to the shuttle's transporter controls, locked on and proceeded to energize. However, there was no telltale whine of transporter activity and no one showed up on the transporter pad. He checked the energy readings and saw that it used enough for a transport of three people, but no one was transported.

In the cave of crystals as they prepared themselves, the entire mass of crystals around them began to make the same signature sound as the transporter. And then they blew up. Fragments of crystal flew everywhere and Kelly took a decent sized chunk in the stomach and knocked her down, saving her from another hail of shards that was coming for her head.

Sarah had no idea what the crystals were doing when they began to emit a sort of whine that sounded like the transporter but it didn't sound good and it was instinct that had her moving as she had little time to react before the hail whirlwind from hell exploded into being all around them. Bits of crystal shrapnel bit into her skin as she tried to dive toward the others.

Lucas was a much bigger target than the women were, but that didn't stop him from wanting to get to them in an effort to protect them from what was happening. Of course, that was short lived when one of the larger pieces of crystal connected with his head. If he thought knocking his head on the way down hurt, that had nothing on this one. This time, there was blood pouring from the wound. He hit the ground and tried to speak, but the ringing in his ears prevented him from.doing so. He didn't know if the others were okay, but he tried to fight through the fog to find out.

Kelly coughed from the cloud of crystal dust still in the air and looked for her tricorder and handlight. "Hello?" She called. "Can anyone hear me?" Her ears were ringing, but she kept feeling around with her hands, hoping to find a body that was moving. It scared her to death at the thought of getting her hands tangled in the hair of another corpse. "Hello?!"

Sarah found herself, once again, on the ground unsure how much she was hurt. Her vision was blurred as she looked up into bright light coming from the hole. That gave her shock that helped wake her up as 'going into the light' was not her goal. Her eyes tried to focus as her mind cleared a little. She thought she heard something beyond the ringing in her ears but wasn't sure. Though it was only one ear as the other seemed completely deadened. Now the pain kicked into the front of her brain as, what felt like a thousand cuts dug into her skin. She moved carefully to sit up, trying not to throw up as her equilibrium went out the window. Blood streaming down one ear she reach for the voice she couldn't really hear, so it could have been overly loud or it could have been a whisper but she tried anyway, "What?! Hello?!"

Lucas could just barely hear the ladies calling out over the ringing in his ears. He didn't want to move because his head hurt so bad. "I'm here," he said, not wanting to call out any louder lest the pounding in his head increase.

Kelly finally heard a male voice near her and felt around, cutting herself several times on tiny crystal shards. "Doc? Is that you?" She felt around, then felt a large arm. "Is anything broken?"

At that time, the Type 11 shuttlecraft appeared over the hole and the side hatch opened. "Hello?! Is everyone okay down there?" the drone pilot asked as he tossed a compact rope ladder down into the hole after securing it. "Do you need medical attention?"

Lucas was still trying to hear what was going on around him through the increasing ringing in his ears. His head hurt, and it wasn't going to get any better until they were out of the cavern. "I took a hard knock to the head. It's bleeding pretty bad," he called out to anyone that could hear him.

The one ear that still worked had the ringing still but she saw the pilot and the rope. "We could use a hand." She called then turned to the doctor and Kelly, who were nearby. Unsure if they could hear her, she just pulled out a small dermal regenerator from her mini med kit and placed, as she'd been taught, at the doctor's head. Her goal being to try to stop the bleeding so they could get moving. It was hard to hold on to though, slick with her own blood from cuts on her hands.

The pilot reversed the shuttle and lowered it down more, then turned the bottom lights on so everyone could see. Kelly moved to where Doctor Abrams and Ensign Proctor were, then grabbed the bottom of the rope ladder. "Come on, Ensign, let's get the big guy secured."

Lucas could feel the pressure in his head start to ease a bit and the ringing start to subside. "Thank you," he said, pushing himself to a sitting position.

She gave him a thumbs up, unsure if he could hear then shoved the regen back in her belt and picked up the grapple she'd dropped, shoving that in her belt as well. Giving him a moment to hopefully clear his head. "Right." She told Kelly then moved to one side of the big man, "Think you can stand?" She said hoping he could hear better now but just in case gestured at Kelly who held the rope, then moved to help him stand if he needed it.

As the dust cleared and the coughing fits stopped, Kelly looked around in the now larger cavern and saw more than broken crystal shards. She saw what looked like several tunnels leading away in different directions. "Hey, guys. We need to mark this spot and come back down here." Despite being shorter, she still offered Luc her shoulder, even if it was to put his beef slab of a hand on it.

The big guy managed to get to his feet and used the shoulder Kelly offered to steady himself. He used the sleeve of his uniform jacket to try to wipe away some of the blood. "Thank you both," he said sincerely, then began to take a look around. "Yeah, we definitely need to flag this area and come back. In the meantime, we all need some medical attention, and that's more than I'm capable of doing here on my own. We can request to come back with whoever is assigned to investigate this place."

Marking the area for further investigation was easy enough, and so was getting everyone back aboard the shuttle now that the crystals shattered. Soon, the small group was back on their way to the ship to receive medical treatment with hopes of returning to the surface to further their investigation.

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