From: JoGoodman2@aol.com Sent: Tuesday, 11 November 2003 1:50 PM To: spectre-nrpg@freedom-squadron.com Cc: command@freedom-squadron.com Subject: Spectre compile Oct 28-Nov 3 (pt 3) Spectre compile, Oct 28-Nov 3 (pt 3) (USS Spectre - Containment Area - ACMO Anderson - 17.10) Rain had listened to the proposals and debate that raged behind the forcefield window and her feeling of helplessness grew. "May I say something?" she said, waiting for someone to hear her. Finally when the debate had died down, she cleared her throat. "We need to have a Plan B for where we are going to go when this forcefield can't contain us. That should be a priority. The safety of the ship has to come first. What about attempting to transport the node out.... has it integrated with our central nervous system? I don't feel any different. Maybe we could try that before transporters are ineffective in our presence." ~... If they are not already!!~ (Reply Gort, Cambridge, any) As they talked the Assistant Chief engineer entered and adjusted the controls of the containment field. Rain watched him work, hoping he could buy them more time. The Captain then entered the sickbay and spoke to Cambridge and Gort. Rain couldn't hear what they were saying. She felt like yelling out... "Hello we're just here.... we're not dead, just deadly!" Eventually the Captain made his way over to the containment area. "We're working on a way to get you out of here, as soon as possible but I have to warn you, it won't be long before these force fields fail and this area of the ship will be vulnerable. We're protecting as much of it as we can, but, if we can't find a way to stop this, I have no choice but to evacuate all infected crew to the planet." He said ~Good... someone has a plan B~ "At least, we can protect the ship and continue working up here if all else fails." "Kahila.", he said, "We've found the life signs of L'Tal, he's alive and I have his coordinates, but it looks like he's not alone. I am going to get a shuttle and go and get him, you have command, if it looks like the ship is in danger, get all infected personnel off the ship as best you can. I'll be as quick as I can." Rain thought it was going to be fun watching Lono try and run a ship while locked in a small room without a console, view screen, tricorder, sensors, or databases. Rain was wondering also how they were going to get them to the planet if it came to that. Eventually their EM signatures would interrupt with the pattern buffers in the transporter.... and as for travelling on a shuttle... that could be pretty disastrous." Rain tried to open the channel to the main sickbay area but all that resulted was a loud wailing sound followed by a high pitched whistle. "There goes communications. We'll be forced to write notes soon." She said to Lono and Tyrell. Rain mimed the task of writing, hoping someone would understand that she wanted to write something down. (Reply Lono, Tyrell, Gort, Cambridge, any) (Posted by Wendy Keen) (USS Spectre, containment area, Kahila Lono, 17:10) Kahila listened as the CMO described their situation. It seemed their next step was to be transferred to the secure medical bay. Of course that was no solution; so far no one had come up with a solution. Kahila didn't even need to glance at Rain's expression. Her empathic sense told her that the doctor was having many of the same feelings as she herself. When Gort began his report, Kahila was glad to know that he had some definite findings: "The EM signature this nanotechnology generates isn't just interfering with our technology. As some of you may have noticed when you get too near to a console or a PADD there are clear, distinct symbols present that may be random but given the clear structuring to them I'd be more inclined to say that it's a language of some sort. I've got the computer working on translating it." This was the first Kahila had heard concerning the possibility of an unknown language in connection with the nano. Despite her situation, she couldn't help but be intrigued. ~Could this be some attempt, by someone, to communicate? Though the motive doesn't seem likely to be benign. I suppose its more likely that they're trying to take over the Spectre's systems. Piracy? Are the Xenolithe so technologically advanced they'd be capable of this?~ Kahila always enjoyed the mental processes of speculation and problem solving. Even now. But her mind was merely whirling, with not nearly enough information to work with. Then Gort continued: He turned to address the 'infected'. "The other thing you should know is fairly obvious, but as the nanotechnology expands the field is gaining strength. I've been monitoring it for just these last few minutes and I'd estimate that you'll overpower the forcefield generators within an hour." ~An hour! It's probably already too late to try transporting the nodes out of our bodies.~ Kahila suddenly visualized what surgery would be like if the doctors couldn't use a tricorder or any other electronic aids. The thought made her want to sit down before she fainted, but she clasped her hands tightly, willing herself back to attention. Cambridge and Gort discussed the pros and cons of chilling as a means of slowing down the nano's processes. Kahila had the distinct feeling that the discussion was proceeding with very little input from the patients themselves. Though, when she examined the contents of her own thoughts, she found little there to contribute. From so few alternatives, even the chilling was beginning to look like a good temporary solution. When the Captain came in, Kahila couldn't help but feel relieved. Though she knew she was being illogical. The Captain was not likely to have figured out any more than the others. She was startled when he told her: "Kahila.", he said, "We've found the life signs of L'Tal, he's alive and I have his coordinates, but it looks like he's not alone. I am going to get a shuttle and go and get him, you have command, if it looks like the ship is in danger, get all infected personnel off the ship as best you can. I'll be as quick as I can." She nodded assent. Then she turned over in her thoughts all that would need to be done in order to evacuate the "patients" by shuttle. She certainly didn't want to trust the transporter process in their present condition! She wondered if it would be possible to rig a forcefield on the shuttle, for containment. She'd find a way to ask Ensign Longfellow. If not, then the evacuation plan didn't seem feasible. And if they were to arrive safely onto the planet's surface, they'd be in for some real primitive living. ~Weapons.~ She thought . ~Will we be able to use phasers? If not, we'll need some of Pierce's antique weaponry.~ (NRPG Where is Pierce? Here in containment?) Kahila soon realized that communication with the rest of the crew might be more restricted than she'd thought. When Rain tried to use a companel, the only result was a shrill whistle. "There goes communications. We'll be forced to write notes soon." Rain said, then began to mimic writing, obviously in hope that someone in the outer area of Sickbay would think to find paper and pens for them. But instead, Gort appeared next to the force field barrier and began gesturing for them to move to the left. Kahila did so, having no idea what the Ferengi was trying to accomplish. But when he then motioned for Rain to go back to the right, she thought she understood. ~ It seems we may even need to be isolated from one another. I don't know how I'll plan our evacuation.~ She caught a glimpse of Ensign Longfellow with the others, and wondered how she could ask him about putting a force field into the shuttles. (reply Longfellow, Gort, Rain, any) posted by Josephine Goodman (USS Spectre, Bridge, Ensign(jg) Hank Longfellow - 17:10) Hank frowned as his eyes darted back and forth over the panel trying to take it all in at once. It hadn't been that long since Lt. Gort had left his post but Hank desperately missed him in the way he'd miss his SEWG if he stepped outside for a cigar. Making sure that the various departments had the proper people in the proper places and checking out that the equipment for the functions had been provided, coordinating departments efforts between each other, maintaining power allocation requirements, juggling schedules here and there along with watching over the scans and making sure the search grid protocols were being followed.. Hank shook his head with a soft sigh between gritted teeth. "Ensign Longfellow, get down there and see if you can increase the output of the force fields in the Contamination Area, let's see if we can buy ourselves some more time. Also, reroute any crucial systems in case they fail.", said Remae, effectively ordering his last senior officer off the Bridge. The engineer's head snapped up at the order as Hank slipped quickly out of the seat. "Sir, yes sir," Hank exclaimed even as he tried to stifle a slight grin even as he relinquished the station to the Captain. Quickly going through what was going on Hank moved for the turbolift before the senior officer could change his mind. Hank didn't think he would but did not want to take that chance. The CO took the OPS station from the ACEO, they'd been conducting an intensive scan of the area of the planet they suspected to find L'Tal and despite what else was going on, he had to keep looking. (reply any ) (Posted by Mark) (USS Spectre, Sick Bay, Ensign(jg) Hank Longfellow - 17:10) Uncomfortably the engineer tugged on the front of the level 1 hazmat uniform. Being in such a suit was actually commonplace for him and he normally didn't have a problem with it but the knowledge of what might lay just beyond the layers of it haunted him. Shaking his head he started to work on enhancing the force fields in the Contamination Area. Overriding the power flow systems at the nearest junction he carefully steered power away from the EM interference but towards the containment fields as his mind started to work on the problem. A few reroutes later and he paused to study readings before continuing. Quietly he glanced over to those in the Containment area now and then. (USS Spectre, Sick Bay, Ensign(jg) Hank Longfellow - 17:45) As he worked he listened in quietly with looks around the room through his faceplate. A breath made the transparent aluminum fog over slightly before it quickly and efficiently cleared itself but he shook his head and moved over to a replicator for a moment and created a pair of small dry erase boards with a towels and some markers along with pads and pens. Moving back towards the containment field he paused as he watched the cycling on the field's display and keyed up for a site to site transport of them to a point just inside the field as a cycle created an opening, except for one of the boards and a set of the markers. He thought of adding in some food or drink to the little cargo but decided against it since they hadn't asked, but the thought made his stomach growl slightly. It was almost time for him to eat again, but shaking his head he moved back to the workstation he'd partly taken over. The idea of separating them to keep them from creating a build up was a good one from Gort, but he knew that it would only work as long as the EM's power was low but something was bothering Hank. Before he'd joined Starfleet he'd worked on a small out of the way planetary station as sort of a repairman and he remembered that there were times when actual live creatures were moved between planets or systems by the freighters that came through. ~I used to fix passive EM field generators,~ he thought to himself with a slight frown. "Has anyone checked the alpha frequencies and the theta waves coming from them," he asked generally over his suit's systems as he shrugged slightly before writing it down on the board for the group in containment to see. "I used to work on generators that were used to keep non-humanoid creatures passive and slightly disorientated," he added as he glanced to the group. "Not that I think it would work on humanoids that well but maybe the nanos don't know that," he added both in words spoken and written before looking back to the workstation. Quietly he started to work on something that looked like a sensor net weaving on the screen. (reply any ) "I'm going to see if I can find someway of simply draining off the extra EM energy at least to slow things down," he muttered as he began to work again. (reply any ) (Posted by Mark) (USS Spectre: Containment Area - Pierce Orde - 1715) NRPG: I'm just chopped liver, or so it seems. RPG: Pierce cursed lightly -- the HUD overlays in his eyeglasses were on the fritz because of that EM field. "We are a danger to this ship," he said aloud, stating the obvious. "We need to get off this ship. And when one method of communication fails..." Moving over to the field, he began to tap it with the butt of his rifle -- causing the field to audibly react -- in Morse code. ~You give the order,~ he sent to Kahlia, ~and I can relay it.~ (Reply Kahlia, Any) (Posted by Lenox) (Planet Surface, Unknown Village - CONN Lt(JG) L'Tal - 1720) Darkness... it was all L'Tal had known for the past two hours since his shuttle had been attacked by an unknown force that had sent the craft crashing down onto the newly discovered planet below. Unbeknownst to L’Tal the crash had been seen by a group of natives who, despite their initial fear of the alien craft and it's spectacular appearance on their world, had 'rescued' him and taken the CONN officer to their primative village for treatment. L’Tal let out a moan as he slowly regained consciousness. The dinly lit hut came slowly into focus, as did two male humanoids. L'Tal noted the humanoids dark skin, black eyes, wild unkept hair, and several two inch long ridges on cheeks. "Greetings outsider," began the bigger of the two humanoids with heavily accented speech "I am Beratim, and this is Loytalan." "Lt L'Tal of the Federation starship Spectre" replied L'Tal as he sat up awkwardly. His body ached, but nothing appeared to be broken. "It is a long time since we have had a visitor such as yourself" stated Loytalan. "Yes," continued Beratim "the last time we had contact with outsider was more than twelve cycles ago. A 'Romulan' I believe she calls herself, foolish is was we call her." "Foolish?" enquired L'Tal, not entirely sure what was going on. This was obviously some primitve, pre-warp civilisation and the news of this Romulan woman didn't sit well with L'Tal. "Yes foolish. She too appeared from the sky most unexpectedly, and she too was rescued by us. I know to you and her we are nothing but a group of backward savages but I assure you we are not uncivilised. Despite our best efforts this Romulan woman would not accept our hospitality graciously, infact she tried to escape killing three of our people in her efforts. She would not have survived long outside our village, these are extremely hostile lands. I hope you too are not as foolish as she" stated Beratim. "I can assure you that I am not foolish, nor do I hold any hostile feelings towards you or your people. Infact I would like to thank you for rescuing me from my downed craft. You speak as if this woman is still amongst you, is this true?" asked L'Tal. "Indeed she is, but she is no longer our guest. For both hers and our protection she is caged like a wild beast. We feed her and care for her as best we can given the circumstances, but after all this time she is still hostile towards us" The look in Beratim's eyes as he had said this left little doubt in L'Tals mind that holding the woman captive was not what these people wanted. "Interesting... with your permission I would like to meet this Romulan. I have had many dealings with her people in the past and perhaps I can help you in this situation?" "Any help you could offer us would be most appreciated, perhaps afterwards you could tell us more about yourself?" enquired Beratim. "Indeed," replied L'Tal as he reached for his comm badge in an attempt to contact the Spectre. Unfortunately all he could reach for was thin air, his comm badge lost or destroyed in the shuttle crash. He was alone on a primitve, hostile world. L'Tal followed his two host out of the hut and into the small open-air village. The dozen or so citizens that were nearby when the group emerged stopped and stared at L'Tal as they made their way to the prisoner's holding area. The walk took less than five minutes and L'Tal used the time to take in as much of his surroundings as he could. The village and it's inhabitants compared to the Earth's civilisation of some 1000 years earlier. Before L'Tal knew it he was face-to-face with the Romulan woman and she eyed him with a look of pure hatred. Her torn and soiled RSE uniform barely cover her modesty, and she was so covered in dirt and muck she was barely recognisable as being Romulan. "Greetings..." began L'Tal before being interrupted by the woman who spat in his face. "Federation filth!" she screamed, a wild look coming to her eyes. NRPG: Who wants to play a feral Romulan that's been held captive for 12 years? C'mon! It'll be fun!! :-) (Reply Feral Romulan, Anyone who wants to rescue me...) (Posted by Ian Walker) (planet's surface, native village, inside cavern holding area, K'tara: 17:25) Ktara watched the two wildmen approach the pen where they'd been keeping her -- for how long now? She hadn't asked herself that question for a long time. She'd kept busy inside her own head. Inventing games, making up new ways to kill her enemies. For a moment she wasn't sure if she was seeing something within her mind or in the outer world. She often imagined herself killing Starfleet officers as well as the wild natives. But she slapped her own face, as a test, to see if she was perceiving the outer world. She was. She approached the small opening they'd so kindly -- so they imagined themselves!-- provided for her. One of the wildmen opened the stone door, and the Starfleet officer actually walked into the doorway. "Greetings..." he said in that despised language. She'd greet him all right! She spat toward him, then grinned. "Federation Filth!" She shouted, using his own language. She remembered very little of it, but those words -- those she remembered! (reply L'Tal, natives) posted by Josephine Goodman (USS Spectre, Contamination Area, CO, Captain Remae - 17.30) Remae looked around at the area that had been assigned as the Contamination Area, it was barren and unwelcoming, touching a panel nearby, he performed a few site to site transports and beamed in some furniture and other non technological comforts. Pressing a communications panel, he spoke to the assembled crew. "We're working on a way to get you out of here, as soon as possible but I have to warn you, it won't be long before these force fields fail and this area of the ship will be vulnerable. We're protecting as much of it as we can, but, if we can't find a way to stop this, I have no choice but to evacuate all infected crew to the planet." Remae waited for a moment for this to sink in. "At least, we can protect the ship and continue working up here if all else fails." (Reply from Any in Contamination) "Kahila.", he said, "We've found the life signs of L'Tal, he's alive and I have his coordinates, but it looks like he's not alone. I am going to get a shuttle and go and get him, you have command, if it looks like the ship is in danger, get all infected personnel off the ship as best you can. I'll be as quick as I can." (Reply from Kahila) Smiling, he turned around and briskly walked back to Sickbay. (USS Spectre, Sickbay, CO, Captain Remae - 17.40) Remae brought up the team who was working hard in Sickbay what was going to happen while he was away collecting L'Tal. "I'd prefer not to go alone but I need you all up here, I can handle this. Commander Lono is in command while I am gone, can you check on the Bridge from time to time? We've a bunch of crewman running the ship! Carry on.", he said, walking out quickly again. (Reply from Any in Sickbay) The Bajoran was off again, after alerting the Bridge to what he was doing he headed to the Shuttlebay, if he could peacefully get his man back, so much the better for them if the worse came to the worse and they had to offload the crew to their planet. (Reply from Contamination Area, Sickbay, Any) (Posted by Anthony Keen) NRPG: If anyone wants to come along, you can try and persuade Remae that he needs you more on the shuttle than on the Spectre (USS Spectre, Shuttlebay, Ensign Rak'han - 17:45) Saurik had headed for the shuttlebay the moment he'd heard the Captin's transmission to the bridge, armed with his collapsable Lirpa, a phaser and his recently replicated Angel MK2. On his arrival he glanced around, all the shuttles were still here. As he heard the door hiss open again behined him he turned and nodded to Remae, "Sir, requesting permission to join you on away mission. We still don't know what brought L'Tal down, or the other life-forms we detected are hostile - strictly speaking it's too risky for the captin to go at all, but I'm guessing that wouldn't make a blind bit of difference." (reply Remae, any) (posted by Owen) (USS Spectre, Sickbay - OPS Lt Gort - 1745) The Captain made his announcement of Plan B, and Gort could only imagine how the infected crew were beginning to feel now. Trapped behind forcefields and being told of plans to abandon them on a planet in the middle of the Romulan Neutral Zone. (NRPG: We are still in the RNZ, right?) Then, as the Captain announced his leaving the ship in the hands of the First Officer - presently unable to leave Sickbay or even utilise any ships systems - the Ferengi realised how bad the staffing situation must have been and his stomach sank even lower. ~If only there weren't so many...~ A piercing whistle broke his concentration. The sound had obviously come from the contamination unit's communications console, but enough of the idea was still lodged in Gort's brain that he leaped to his feet. Standing close enough to the containment area that he could hear the hum of the forcefield generators, he began frantically gesturing for the crew within the field to move to the left. Slowly the crew began to get the idea, and within a few minutes they were all squished against the left-hand field emitter - which was now humming at a dangerously high frequency as it tried to counter the EM emissions from the crew. Aiming a stubby finger at the ACMO, Gort now gestured for her to move to the right, reaching for his tricorder as she did so. "Doctor," he called over his shoulder, "I may have found a way to increase our time span. The EM field surrounding Rain is less than it should be if taken as just a part of the entire EM field they were generating as a whole. "It must be something to do with her proximity to the other infected crew members... The more the crew group together, the heavier the EM build-up... Which means if we could split them into smaller groups and spread them throughout the ship then that might help decrease the EM gradient." At that moment he realised that Rain was still standing by herself at the opposite end of the containment area to everyone else - still standing right next to the comm panel. He reached out and touched the panel, praying that his theory would hold out, "Rain? Can you hear me?" (Reply Cambridge, Anderson, any) (Posted by Michael Drake) (USS Spectre, Shuttlebay, CO, Captain Remae - 17.45) "Sir, requesting permission to join you on the away mission. We still don't know what brought L'Tal down, or the other life-forms we detected are hostile - strictly speaking it's too risky for the Captain to go at all, but I'm guessing that wouldn't make a blind bit of difference." Remae looked at Saurik for a moment before answering. "We don't really have a lot of choice, do we Ensign?", snapped the Bajoran more in frustration with the situation than anything the Vulcan had done, he gathered himself before continuing. "I appreciate the offer Mr Rak'Han. Even with our depleted manpower, I could use another pair of hands, let's go." The Bajoran opened the door to the shuttle, he noticed that they seemed to have a lot less than when the left Sector 001. (Shuttle Gandalf, CO, Captain Remae - 17.55) The shuttle left the bay and headed down to the planet at speed, Remae was at the controls and he was pushing the shuttle as hard he could through the upper atmosphere. he angled the shuttle quickly and before they knew it, he has begun a steep descent to their target area. "Over here and here.", he said, making notes of possible landing areas for the crew if they did indeed have to abandon ship. "Remae to Spectre, I'm sending the coordinates of potential landing zones. I'm beginning the final decent to the area of the lifeforms. Shuttle out." (Reply from Spectre) It wasn't long before they landed in a clearing, close to where the sensors had shown the life form readings, they were also close enough that anyone for miles in all directions would have seen them land. (Planet's Surface, Close to the Native Village, CO, Captain Remae - 18.15) The shuttle was down safely and Remae had the door open and he was out all with one swing of his legs from the pilot's seat. Scanning for a moment or two, Remae began walking in the direction of the village. "Ensign, say behind me and keep your eyes open.", he said, walking directly up the main cobbled lane that lead directly into the village. (Reply from Saurik) Clothed people were all around, getting on with their work, cleaning, preparing food, bathing, all seemed quite accustomed to having a Bajoran walking among them. Remae wasn't concerning himself with the Prime Directive; all the indications showed it was long broken for a long time. "Look over there." Remae pointed to several devices that looked Romulan in nature, but were being used as stools or work benches, he could have sworn one of them was a replicator. Then, they came across the Romulan life sign, if that's what she was, a caged Romulan, at least, that's what the tricorder indicated. "Vulcan life signs, this way." For a few moments, they followed the readings until they came across another area where they spotted Lt L'Tal and a group of natives, Remae rushed up to them. "Lt L'Tal, are we happy to see you!", said Remae before looking over the natives that were escorting the CONN Officer. "Captain Remae of the Spectre. nice Romulan, how long has she been here?", said Remae. He looked around as he waited for an answer, this was a pre-warp community, what damaged had been done to their development, not only living in the Neutral Zone but having visitors from the starts amongst them? (Reply from Saurik, L'Tal, Romulan Woman, Natives, Any) (Posted by Anthony Keen)