Mission Accomplished

Posted on Sat Apr 10th, 2021 @ 6:46pm by Captain Cynthia Jackson & Lieutenant Luke Osswell & Lieutenant Kevin Chambers

1,622 words; about a 8 minute read

Mission: Mission 4 - A Rose By Any Other Name
Location: Planetoid

Cindy woke up. She was lying on a square mattress that was quite comfortable. Mattresses nearby had Kevin Chambers and Luke Osswell lying on them as well. She got up from her mattress remembering their last actions. She shook Luke first. "Mr. Osswell, are you alright?"

"EEEEEEEEeeeeeeeeEEEEEEEeeeeeeeee", was all Luke heard at first, the noise screeching from through his eardrums. He faintly heard his Captain speak. As he regained full consciousness he could hear better, but the screeching noise remained an annoying pitch in the back of his head. Otherwise, he felt surprisingly good, as if he had had a good night's sleep. He indicated so to Captain Cindy and started to get his bearings.

She then headed over to Kevin and started to rouse the engineer. "Wake up. We need to figure out what happened and get back to Legacy."

“Mmmph.” Kevin’s eyes slowly focused and looked up. Lady. Familiar. Captain. Cindy. Ah good, recall was working. His head swiveled slowly to look at... Luke. Legacy. Fixing and squeal... he sat up, hands on both sides of his head as he felt his reality settle nicely into itself.

As he nodded, his head spun and he heard an unfamiliar sound as his mouth opened to automatically respond, “Aye, Cap.” He swallowed trying to pop his ears and then cleared his throat. Yes, that weird sound was his voice.

He looked at thei surroundings and realized that they couldn’t have gotten to this place on their own. The sound that had knocked them out hadn’t seemed related to his repair work. He was trying to work out how long it might have been when the Captain put his unasked question into words.

She looked them both over and asked, "Do either of you know how much time has passed?"

Kevin shrugged and leaned over to grab his toolbox. It was missing.

Luke shook his head, a worried look on his face. His gear and tricorder was gone, making him feel quite naked without them. The room they were in did not appear to have any windows or markers, and apart from the mattresses the room was empty. There was one door that Luke attempted to open.

The door opened easily for Luke. Cindy then asked, "Do you see anything? Where is Dr. Korby?"

He looked out into what appeared to be a large cavern. "We're underground, it appears to be natural. No sign of Korby." Luke announced.

Standing, Kevin stretched, feeling stiff but able to move. He moved to lend a hand and physical barrier if necessary.

"We should find him," Cindy announced. "The fact that we're here suggests that he put us here. There was nobody else that we saw, right?"

"Nope," Luke said, "despite his best assurances." One might say his tone had an [i]I told you so[/i] ring to it. "Alright, let's move out. Carefully, single file, I'll take point." Giving his eyes a moment to get used to the darkness after stepping into the cavern, Luke was amazed at the ethereal beauty of it. The ceiling glowed with soft blue bioluminescent lights, with massive glowing vines that hung down and glowing mushrooms finding their way through the cracks in the walls and floor. Traces of ancient ruins lay scattered here and there, their architectural sign similar to what they had found on the surface.

Kevin took up the rear, covering their 6 as much as an Engineer could.

From a side corridor, Dr. Korby appeared. "Up and around. That is good to see. Thanks to your engineer, Mr. Chambers, this vessel is back under control. It will no longer crash into that planet. Now, if I could show you to your equipment, I can go back to my research on this vessel and you can do whatever you were doing prior to arriving here. Again, thank you for your assistance."

“What a relief,” Kevin said flatly. “What happened, exactly, Dr. Korby?” He smiled at Roger. “That... sound. It didn’t do anything to you.” He had phrased it as a question, but his voice tone took on something akin to a statement. The engineer didn’t have a suspicious nature, but all that had happened on the surface definitely gave him... pause.

"Oh, it affected me," Dr. Korby replied with a shrug. "However, I was able to grab some noise cancelling headphones in a panel near me. Had I not, we would have all woken up on the floor in the computer room." He then gestured in a direction and said, "Your equipment is all in the next room. I can take you there and then you can beam back to your ship. Thank you again, for all of your assistance."

"How about I just punch you in the face, instead?" Luke said, and moved to stand right in front of 'Dr. Korby'. 'Nothing of what you have said and done has made any sense. Still haven't seen any other crew members either. We can't take any readings of you, all our equipment has been conveniently removed from our person, and now you wave us off, just after we have done your dirty work for you. I'm not buying it. Who are you, and what really happened?" He might not have his phaser rifle in hand, nor his phase pistols, or his vibro blades, or his grenades. But he still had his fists, and they were eager to punch the creature in front of him.

"Lieutenant!" Cindy hollered at Luke in a half aghast and half commanding voice. "Stop that, right now! We are not harmed and the Doctor has indicated that he can correct this planetoid."

Kevin squished his lips together and bit them, staring at the floor? ground? beneath his feet as he tried not to laugh. Too bad there hadn’t been noise-canceling headphones for the whole group, huh?

But they were alive... apparently some were a little more high strung than others... but it wasn’t upon his shoulders that the safety and security of two high-ranking people as well as himself rested, so he caught his own judgement call and figured that his priority was to get off this weird hollow planetoids with the high shielding and figuratively invisible crew.

Dr. Korby gave a small laugh. "No, no. He is right to be suspicious. However, the dampening field on this ship keeps all evidence of life signs quashed. As to other crew members, there are some here but not many. But we are going to continue our research now and you can continue doing whatever it is that you were going to do."

Politely, but firmly, Korby told Luke, "Now, sir, if you would step aside and I can show you to your belongings...."

Kevin looked at Luke, waiting for his response. He didn’t like it, but whatever happened, there had to be some coordination between them all. There hadn’t been a threat up to this point, but he could feel that possibility waiting on the Security Chief’s next move.

Frustration oozed out of Luke's posture and facial expression. He simply did not understand why the others seemed to just be okay with everything that had happened. The character calling himself 'Korby' evaded giving direct answers. Not a single other crew member had made an appearance. They were knocked out by some freaky alien computer and then moved to another location and disarmed. All that without consent mind you... And all they had was this dude's word that the planetoid was no longer a threat. And what of their original orders: investigate what happened to the research mission? Surely it involved more than just a simple thumbs up from Korby...?
If it had been up to Luke he'd have gone about this way differently. Is this what it meant to be Chief of Security? To watch in horror as the higher ups screwed things up and leave him to clean up the mess afterwards? Ugh.. Luke gave an inward sigh. Calming himself down, he forced a ''Yes, ma'am'', out of his mouth, stepped aside and let Korby pass.

Korby moved past Luke easily and led the party to a room that was completely unlocked and unguarded. He stepped into the room first. All of the party's belongings were here in this place. "See, everything here is just the way it was when you came here." He paused and said, "I do fear, though, that you may have more people coming soon. To avoid that, I would think that you need to get back to your ship, Captain."

Cindy nodded at Korby. "We've done what we needed to do here and we do have a mission to continue. We are glad to have been of assistance." She moved into the room and picked up her gear. "Lieutenants," she told Osswell and Chambers, "are you ready to go back to Legacy?"

Geared up once again, Luke immediately felt more at ease. "If there's no more other business, Captain C., more than ready", Luke replied.

"I've got my spine, I've got my Orange Crush," said Kevin, easily picking up his toolkit. "Let's head back, Cap." Weird feelings spread through Kevin. This hadn't gone quite as he had expected, and for some reason, he was relieved. He didn't know what he expected either, just a lingering feeling that this could have gone quite differently if they had been in a different place or time. He inwardly shrugged and bade a silent farewell to the hollow planetoid.

"Good." The Captain flipped open her communicator. =^= Captain Jackson to Legacy, mission accomplished. Three to beam up. =^= A transporter beam engulfed the three away team members and took them back to Legacy.

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