Team Savar

Posted on Fri Nov 17th, 2023 @ 10:34pm by Captain Rhenora Kaylen & Senior Chief Petty Officer Ronson Mitchell & Commander Savar cha'Salik hei-Surak Talek-sen-deen & Ensign Kitiuas Thenis & Patin

Mission: Halloween
Location: USS Sunfire
Timeline: Current

The team beamed down a short distance from the other away team, near the castle high on the mountain. The air was thin, but the rebreather kept the supply of oxygen ready and available.

Ronson was a little nervous, having not been on an away mission for a very long time. The last time he had set foot on the planet was when the ship had crashed, and previous to that when the crew had been abducted on the jungle planet. Neither of those incidents had gone well.

Patin looked around, then up at the stone building in front of them. "That doesn't look so scary. I was expecting more, I suppose. Anyone get a read on the way in?" she asked of the group. Her voice through the rebreather was muffled and with it resting in her mouth made her crave a drink.

Ronson scanned the imposing structure with his tricorder. "We are here, the other away team is here. Looks like the front door is here." He offered, showing his teammates the options. "That is of course if you want to go in the front door..." He hastily added.

"Hmm," Patin thought aloud, "Front doors are easy. I suppose we could just knock." There was no telling what was going on inside the castle walls, or of the reach of the power source coming from the tower. "Any sort of danger of exposure to that signal, power source thing?" Patin questioned, unknown what to call 'it'.

Ronson scanned again. "Looks like there may be some kind of shielding in place, but the energy signatures are coming from the top two towers up there" he pointed to the highest section of the castle. A storm started to brew in the west, it's timing adding to the eerie feeling.

"Then it is best we move to avoid the storm as well as determine the source of the energy signatures Mr. Mitchell is picking up." Savar replied looking at the group. "We will try the front door. The direct approach is often the best."

Ensign Thenis was busy scanning the castle and surrounding environment; comparing the data she was gathering with the known data they had. Something was off. First none of the crew were showing up on the ship’s sensors, she had confirmed this with the ship’s computers, only their commbadges and tricorders were appearing weak at best. Then there was the fact she was no longer detecting any lifeforms around the castle, other than the landing parties, or for at least two kilometers from it. Finally, there was a strange stream of energy slowly being drawn from the base of the mountain and the forming storm to their west, to the top two towers.

“Commander, the energy source seems to be drawing energy from the base of the mountain and the forming storm to our west. Also, I am unable to detect any lifeforms other than the landing parties, and after running scans from the ship and using its computers it does not detect any lifeforms but is receiving faint signals from our commbadges and tricorders.” Stated Kit, somewhat nervously, to Commander Savar.

"Dampening shield? Or just something super weirdass?" Ronson replied, showing Kit the readings from his own tricorders. He pointed to the front door that was several hundred metres away. "Best get cracking if we want to beat that storm" he quipped, striding towards the large door.

Patin didn't have a fancy tricorder, or other gadgets. What she did have was a unique set of skills which she had developed over time. What she was doing was paying attention to details, like, the closer they got to the front door, the closer the storms cloud cover grew to their position. Using the positioning of the stone structure she stopped and eyeballed the movement down to a practical step by step movement.

There was something else though. A strange moisture in the air. Most storms come with a wall of water as they are released across the land, like a shadow falling. This particular storms' shadow was darker, thicker, more red. As the first foot fell upon the drawbridge leading to the front door, a drop fell to her cheek. She casually touched it, studied it, tasted it... "Blood?" She questioned out loud.

Ronson suppressed a squeak of shock at the thought of it before snapping back into officer mode. "High iron content, denser viscosity. Not organic though...." He almost breathed a sigh of relief.

Savar looked at the others. "Enough. We know what it isn't. Time to end the speculation and get some answers. To do that we must enter the castle."

Kit finally figured out what was off, the energy was similar to photonic energy, with mixtures of other energy sources, making it extremely more powerful, she couldn't separate all the types of intermingled energies. "Commander, I finally have a fix on the energy source, sort of, it appears to be photonic with several other unusual energies combined with it."

Ronson had made his way to the large ornate front door and stood before it to shelter from the storm. "Do I knock?" He asked hesitatingly.

Patin moved over to the large door, "Photonic, as in holographic?" Then she reached up and pounded upon the door. It was an act far from subtlety, but then despite the blood rain, she wanted answers as to why, and inside that door lie the way. "What?" she asked when she caught the team looking at her. "I knocked."

"Now do the rest Patin. Open the door and enter so we may all follow you." Savar replied.

Ensign Thenis sighed inwardly "Yes and no, the photonic energy is extremely strong, and is also extremely entangled with several other undefined energies. Remember even Federation photonic energy can kill, and well only the Thousand Gods know what this can do." Kit reminded the team. She had an uneasy feeling about this.

"Photonic energy...is that the kind of energy that the candle ghost from the Enterprise was made out of? You know the one from Caldos?" Ronson
asked, rubbing his chin as Patin pushed on the large doors.

The doors swung open with little resistance, as though the visitors were expected. As they stepped inside a large bolt of energy erupted from one of the turrets towards the Sunfire.

Ronson looked around the spooky interior of the foyer. Two large staircases erupted from the upstairs landing and wound their way downstairs into the grand foyer. A chandelier hung from the high ceiling, covered in a black material. It was seriously spooky.

"Looks like someone forgot to turn the welcome lights on" he muttered as he flicks on his hand beacon and drew his weapon.

Initially dark within the confines of the castle door, upon stepping within, torches along the long hall corridor began lighting up on their own, one after another, after another. Patin brought her weapon up in front of her, expecting an attack, but also chose to tempt fate as she called out, "If anyone or anything chooses to attack, just know I only fear the empty bottle." And as though reminding herself she used her left hand to take a sip from her hip flask.

Kit looked about and a small shiver went down her back. This definitely was not going to go well. She wracked her brain to come up with an idea to help them when she noticed her tricorder was no longer gathering data. In fact, it was completely dead. "Uh guys, my tricorder is dead." It was like all the energy had been drained from it.

Ronson checked his, finding the same result. "Ditto", he thumbed the power cell on his weapon to find it also empty. "Ahhh, everything's dead." He looked at Savar and Patin for guidance.

Patin checked her weapon and found nothing wrong with it. She then shrugged her shoulders, "I guess propellant based weapons still work, nothing digital." The hairs on her neck suddenly shot up and she snapped her head down in the direction of the lit hallway, "Something's coming." She stated.

Savar was instantly alert at Patin's warning. "Everyone be alert. We are about to have company."

Kit didn't see anything, but trusted there was something coming. She knelt down and withdrew two slender blades from her boots. She doubted her dancerknives worked. She could detect the faint smell of copper and ozone. as she stood. Ready as she could be.

TBC