Character: Fi Khong
NPC: Kukagerrg, Vuedueloghz, Laki Semarkali
Location: Happy Trails
System: Voenggaks (Windhorn 1738)
Happy Trails emerges from jumpspace into a crowded space. There's lots of
traffic going in and out of Voenggaks. Its importance as a trade hub clearly
evident.
"The Confederation maintains a naval base here," Kukagerrg says. "We should head
there. I'm sure we can get re-supplied for free and then be on our way."
Kukagerrg gives Fi the coordinates for the base and then gets on the comm to let
them know they're coming.
Happy Trails is able to bypass the traffic and docks with the naval base.
Kukagerrg has had plenty of time to brief the base commander and requisition
the needed supplies.
While their ship is being tended to and Kukagerrg is off meeting with Naval
Intelligence, Fi and Vued exchange stories about past fun times spent on
Voenggaks. All Laki can do is sit and listen.
Happy Trails departs from the naval base. Fi punches in the coordinates for the jump to Igvaellrarr (Windhorn 1736) into the navigation computer.
Since Igvaellrarr has a much small gravity well than Voenggaks, acceleration is terminated to give the ship plenty of time to decel once they get there. Ship speed is 349,000 kph (209,450 mph).
A message comes in from the naval base. "Captain Kukagerrg, we're receiving an
automated distress call from a ship transmitting your missing ship's transponder
ID from somewhere out in the Oort Cloud. Transmitting the coordinates to you
now. We're looking through the defense fleet to see who can investigate the
quickest."
"Acknowledged." Kukagerrg turns to Fi. "How far out are we from safe jump
distance?"
"73%. We'll be there in another 54 minutes."
Kukagerrg mulls this over, paces the bridge, and finally wags his tail. "I can't
in good conscience order you to jump now—it's your ship. But would you
and Vued consider it?"
"Your ship will outgun us won't it? What's your plan for getting it back that
doesn't end with us getting shot to hell? Also what's the chance that the
transponder is still in your ship?"
"Oh it's still there. It's only been three weeks. I don't see them putting it in
another ship and us stumbling upon that ship in such a short time. No, it has
to be them. And yes, it will outgun us, so you'd better be a damn good pilot."
He laughs as only a vargr would at this statement.
"I hope you get shot, so I can show you I'm a better doctor than a pilot." Fi
growls under his breath.
Seeing that Fi isn't amused, Kukagerrg says more soberly, "They'll be refueling
at some ice ball out there, so they'll be cutting their vector. We'll have the
maneuverability advantage there with our vector. We can play khath and fez with
them until reinforcements arrive. But we may not have to worry about that:
They're transmitting a distress howl."
"It could be a trap," Laki says.
Kukagerrg shakes his head. "No. They're fleeing the Confederation with one of
our ships. They're not going to want to draw attention to themselves. Something
happened. Maybe my crew has re-taken the ship or fighting for it as we bark."
Fi turns to Vued. "We still have a bit of time for me to change the jump
coordinates to the outer system and the Oort Cloud. You've been on this ship
longer than me. Do you think it'll hold together?"
"Yes. Well, unless you think that particle in the jump drive is going to mess
things up."
"Verroel's better qualified than me to answer that, but it only seems to happen
around Ninnigam. No where else. I think it won't be a problem here."
"Then let's do it!"
Turning to the others Fi slightly bares his teeth in an OK. "Right, let's do it
then. Cancelling jump, what's those coordinates?"
Kukagerrg calls them out, and Fi starts the calculations for the new jump. He
says, "Someone want to tell the naval base that we're heading out while I get
the jump ready?"
"On it," Kukagerrg says.
Between the debate and re-calculation of the jump coordinates, another fifteen
minutes have elapsed putting the ship at 81% of the way to safe jump distance.
Fi is pleased to see that as the chances of them misjumping dropped from roughly
1 in 6 to 1 in 12.
"Ok, hold onto your tails," he says. "Here goes."
Jump!
Character: Verroel
NPC: Sosazue (Junior Engineer)
Location: Engineering
System: Unknown
Verroel comes to with a weight bearing down on him, a klaxon alarm blaring, and
someone rubbing fur in his face while yelling his name.
"Wake up, Verroel!"
He realizes that it's Sosazue and that she's on top of him, still strapped in
the chair.
"I'm awake!"
"Great, now you can help me get us out of this chair."
"Sure. What do you need me to do?"
"Roll to your right." It takes some effort, but he's able to do so. He notes
that the room is dimly lit with red light, but he can't see anything between
Sosazue and the deck.
He suddenly feels something click and a release of pressure as Sosazue rolls off
of him. She winces in pain and mutters, "Ow!"
Verroel gets to his knees and looks around. They're still between the maneuver
drive thrusters, next to the magnetic turbine housing. Several support beams
have broken loose and fallen. The engineering console where they just were has
been smashed with one of those beams. There's no sign of the vargr he shot.
"Are you ok?" Verroel asks.
"I'll manage, but we have to go."
"Let me get Gvekhs down here to look at you." He goes to comm Gvekhs but finds
that his headset is gone.
"Never mind that," Sosazue says. "Bridge says we have to shut down the reactor.
The magnetic containment collars are starting to fail. If they go—"
"Reactor goes boom. Yeah, I know. Can you walk?"
"With help."
Verroel helps her to her feet. She cries out, then stifles it, but keeps
wincing. She seems stable enough on one arm, so Verroel reaches around for his
assault rifle only it's not there. He still has a pistol in its holster though.
Knowing that time is of the essence, he doesn't waste time looking for the
assault rifle. He checks to make the pistol's clip is full. He says, "As fun as
spooning has been, let's get to work."
She growls for a second in response to the comment, then accepts his help to
leave the maneuver drive and find another working console.
They make their way to the large console with the wall mounted display. It's
still working, but the power plant controls aren't responsive. The only option
now is to go down to deck three and try the engineering station that directly
interfaces with the fusion plant.
Sosazue expects to head down the corridor, but Verroel starts pulling her toward
the ladder. After she tilts her head in confusion, he says, "The stairs might
be blocked."
"There's no way I can make it down the ladder. You go without me. I'm just
slowing you down. Med bay is next door. I'll see if I can find something in
there."
Verroel doesn't want to abandon her, but she's right. He darts off to the ladder
and opens the iris. The room below is hot and smells of ozone. He can hear
sparking wires amidst the klaxon alarm. He shoots down the ladder to the bottom
deck. He unholsters his pistol and keeps it in front of him as he shimmies past
the fusion plant. The heat is intense. The scent of singed fur hits his nostrils
each time he gets too close the containment vessel.
It seems like an eternity, but Verroel has reached the engineering console.
Fortunately, the console is unlocked. Verroel works quickly cutting off the fuel
supply to the power plant. Starved of fuel, the fusion reaction comes to a
halt. The reactor temperature is still dangerously high. It will be some time
before it cools down.
Unfortunately, one of the magnetic collars was damaged in the crash. It's
struggling to stay in position and contain the plasma. If it fails, the plasma
will eventually breach the reactor vessel. If the ship was in space, Verroel
could just eject the core, but the ship is lying on its belly and there's no
room to eject and no way of knowing if the ground below is ice or rock.
Short of praying that the collar holds, Verroel sees two options: Fix the collar
or vent the plasma. Fixing the collar will be a formidable task as the waldoes
inside the reactor may not be up to the task of repair under these conditions.
Venting the plasma through the maneuver drive is less difficult, but by no means
less hazardous. Verroel will have to control the rate of plasma exhaust: fast
enough to beat out the magnetic collar's eventual failure, yet slow enough not
to start pushing the ship across the surface of the planetoid they crash-landed
on. The ship could tear open its belly or smash into a mountain. Of course,
there's also the possibility that there are leaks in the conduit between the
power plant and the maneuver drive, which would mean hot plasma spurting out on
the deck.
Verroel considers his options as the core temperatures stay dangerously high.
He's familiar with this class of ship and the engineering systems after spending
years serving on board them. Still, the likelihood of interior damage is high,
and the chances of causing a much more catastrophic condition inside the ship
makes up his mind. He calls up to the bridge as he sets to work to prepare to
vent the plasma. "This is Verroel, the power plant is shut down. I'm going to
have to vent the plasma before it overheats. We can do repairs once the core is
cooled and then restart the plant."
He receives a heavily static reply. "Acknowledged, Verroel."
The heat in the room forces Verroel to work quickly. He's panting heavily as he
works the controls. He opens the conduit channel to the maneuver drive alters
the magnetic collar orientation and begins shunting the plasma out of the core.
It seems like an eternity before he sees the results of his efforts. Yes!
The pressure and temperature in the reactor are dropping steadily. Verroel has
prevented a reactor meltdown!
But before he can cheer, an alarm sounds on the panel. Conduit sensors indicate
several pressure drops along the way to the exhaust nozzles.That sounds like the
conduits are leaking. Verroel cues up internal cameras—no longer blocked
by the jumpspace aliens—along the route. Sure enough, the engineering room
he was just in is experiencing leaks. Sensors in the jump drive room, directly
beneath the maneuver drive room, indicate that the temperature is rising.
There's apparently enough gravity, whether from the grav plating or the rock
they landed on, to thankfully pull it downward.
However, they'll have to make a difficult decision soon. With the reactor
running down, there won't be enough power for all of the ship's systems. They'll
have to switch to batteries, which will drain quicker with the grav plating
switched on. Once that goes off, will there be enough gravity to pull the plasma
down and away from the upper deck where everyone is currently waiting? Well,
almost everyone. Sosazue was in medbay last he checked, which is directly above
the power plant room.
Character: Verroel
NPC: Sosazue (Junior Engineer), Dr. Gvekhs, Kfuez (Corsair guard),
Dharla, Uerro (corsair), Dzo (crewman)
Location: Medbay, then Bridge
System: Unknown
On his way to medbay to check on Sosazue, Verroel comms the bridge to let them
know that the ship is out of immediate danger of catastrophic power plant
failure. He asks about the aliens, but no one has seen them since the crash.
He goes to enter medbay but the door is locked. Verroel comms Sosazue, "Sosazue,
it's Verroel. I'm outside medbay, but the door is locked."
"Just a minute."
Dr. Gvekhs is there when the door opens, a pistol in hand pointed at Verroel's
midsection. He sighs in relief when he realizes Verroel is alone. "Almost done,"
he says.
Verroel follows Dr. Gvekhs into the room. Sosazue is putting her armor back on,
wincing as she does so.
"Are the stairs clear?" Dr, Gvekhs asks. "I'm not sure that climbing a ladder
will be good for Sosazue."
"I don't know. I took the ladder just to be safe," Verroel answers. "Let me get
the wolves on the bridge to have a look."
Verroel comms the bridge to check the stairwell for the aliens. He's given an
all clear, so Verroel leads Sosazue and the doctor to them, whereupon they meet
Kfuez and Dzo.
Verroel growls and then wags his tail as his pack remains calm and focused
despite the crash. He'd have to challenge Dharla at some point but after she had
him pulled out of cold sleep to save their tails his charisma should be pretty
solid. Of course there was still the problem with surviving!
Once everyone is on the bridge, Verroel says, "We need to get the power plant
back online, so that we can stabilize our situation for rescue. From what I've
seen of the drives, they're beyond our means of repair."
"Why not just rely on batteries?" Dzo asks.
"They're a short-term fix. We don't know how long we're gonna be here. The power
plant give us weeks; batteries only get us hours. While the power plant cools,
we get into vacc suits and turn off as many systems as we can. Lights go on
motion sensor and only to 50%. Gravity gets turned down to 25%, enough to keep
that plasma moving out and away from the ship. Thermostat gets turned down to
10°C in rooms we're in. All other areas can be allowed to freeze out.
Ventilation systems get shut off shipwide except for the rooms where we're
refurbishing our air tanks and recharging suit batteries. Same goes for the
CO2 scrubbers.
"If things get tight, we still have four low berths available."
Heads nod in agreement, even the corsairs.
"Doctor, do what you can for Sosazue. I'll need her help with the systems when
she's capable."
"I'll be fine," Sosazue barks, "just don't make me climb any ladders for a
while."
Uerro asks, "What about the aliens? You can't work on the power plant if you
have to constantly worry about them attacking you."
Kfuez replies, "I think we're going to have to go down to the cargo bay and
find out."
Verroel looks around at the other wolves and lets the ruff of fur around his
neck stand up a bit in a sign of hostility. "We'll kill the aliens, each and
every one, for what they've done to our packmates. I think they may not have
made the transition with us but we can't assume that they're gone. We'll go down
the main stairs into the hold and prepare to deal with them. All of us. It's
time to end this once and for all so we can focus on getting the ship's power
restored."
He makes a quick few motions on the bridge control panel. "Let me turn down the
life support first. We'll do the gravity and lighting once we've cleared the
ship. I don't want to fight in low G or in the dark."
Everyone dons a vacc suit. Verroel grabs Kfuez, Dharla, and Uerro to find out if
the aliens are still on board.
Character: Verroel
NPC: Kfuez (Corsair guard), Dharla, Uerro (corsair)
Location: Bridge then Cargo Hold
System: Unknown
Verroel leads the way down the stairs. Everyone has their weapons drawn. Dr.
Gvekhs closes the door to the bridge once they're clear.
The recon team reaches the bottom of the stairs without incident. The iris valve
to their right, which leads to the cargo bay, has a green status light. The
iris valve to their left, which leads to the airlock, has a red status light.
Kfuez says, "Either they left the ship with the airlock open, or they're forcing
us to go into the cargo bay."
Verroel replies, "If they left, good riddance for now. We have to clear the
rest of the ship."
He calls the doctor to seal off the other air locks by opening the inner doors
and be wary.
"I can close the main airlock door and lock all access to it. Can't do anything
about the cargo elevator, but since the ship's on her belly, I don't think
that's going to be a problem."
"You should also seal yourself into the bridge."
"Oh yeah. We did that as soon as you left."
Verroel notes the outer airlock door close and the red light on his door shift
to blue (locked). He then turns and leads the group into the cargo hold.
By the flickering lights in the cargo hold, the group sees that the crash has
made a mess of things. The cargo modules that blocked their earlier attempt to
enter the hold via the turret access tubes have been thrown forward. There's a
stain on the floor where some unspeakable things happened earlier, but there's
no sign of the jumpspace aliens.
Verroel wrinkles his nose in his suit, glad he can't smell whatever was
happening in the hold. He growls. "Damn aliens." Looking around he waves aft
with his weapon. "Spread out and search back to the engine room to make sure
they're gone."
There's a sudden blow to the back of his head, rendering him unconscious.
Character: Fi Khong
NPC: Kukagerrg, Vuedueloghz, Laki Semarkali
Location: Happy Trails
System: Voenggaks (Windhorn 1738)
It's a tense several seconds as Happy Trails crosses the Voenggaks system
via microjump. Other than a slight shudder upon entering jumpspace, all systems
appear normal, but crossing such a short distance via jump has Fi worried. But
before he can worry for long, the ship exits jumpspace. Something pops behind a
panel behind him, and Fi catches the faint whiff of ozone and smoke.
Kukagerrg announces, "Distress beacon is stronger. It's coming from that rock
dead ahead." He looks up from his console and points at the screen. He instructs
the computer to magnify and the dot resolves itself into the nucleus of a
comet. They're 458,000 kilometers (275,000 miles) out, but there's no mistaking
the rounded edges of all its surface features from melting, being too small for
gravity to play a role. Spectrophotometer readings back up the visual
observations.
Fi flips the ship over and starts decelerating. Unfortunately, they still have
160 minutes of vector to burn off.
He calls up a systems check to determine what blew, and the computer indicates
that a relay in the jump controls from the bridge has faulted. During all this
travel time since leaving Roetingaz three weeks ago, Fi's learned that Laki's
skills extend into electronics. Rather than call Vuedueloghz away from his
turret—they still didn't know if Kukagerrg's ship was a threat to
them—he asks Laki to check it out.
The comet's rotation is slow and with the signal noise generated by the engines,
it takes a while to spot Kukagerrg's ship. A scar several hundred meters long
is spotted first. At the end of it lies the wreckage of a Ueknou class
corsair.
Kukagerrg growls a curse. He hails the ship, but doesn't get any response other
than the distress beacon.
Fi asks, "Kukagerrg, do any of the weapons look usable or active?"
"Usable? Hard to say. Active? Definitely not. Not picking up any active sensor
readings from them. They're not actively looking for a fight."
"What are the passive sensors telling you?"
"IR reveals that she's still warm, but cooling. She's venting hydrogen and air,
so there's at least one hull breach to her fuel tanks and a cabin section that
was pressurized. I can get a better reading if we go active."
Fi mulls that decision over as he ask Laki for a status report on the jump
relays.
Laki replies, "I can definitely get it fixed within an hour."
"OK, lets go in. Can we dock with her safely, or do we need to EVA?"
Kukagerrg replies, "She's on her belly, so docking may be possible. We can find
out now if we go full active on her or wait until we get closer to resolve
things passively."
Character: Fi Khong
NPC: Kukagerrg, Vuedueloghz, Laki Semarkali (on ship)
Location: Happy Trails
System: Voenggaks (Windhorn 1738)
Happy Trails has landed as close to Kukagerrg's ship as possible. During
their descent, an active scan revealed that syncing up the airlocks wasn't going
to be possible to the orientation of the wrecked ship. Therefore, an EVA was
deemed necessary.
The active scans also revealed that the ship was still warm, but no signs of
activity from the power plant. And if there's anyone alive on the ship, the
sensors can't penetrate the hull to find out.
Fi, Vued, and Kukagerrg have donned vacc suits and are making their way across
the surface of the comet on the ship's air-sled, itself loaded with tools the
group thinks they might need. Fi and Vued have their autoshotguns (DS ammo). Fi
has his medkit. Vued has autopistol. Kukagerrg is armed with an assault rifle
and auto pistol from ship's locker.
Laki is staying behind on the ship to monitor communications and sensors.
The only things of note the team spotted on the way down was that someone vented
plasma from the reactor out through the exhaust cones and the g-carrier hangar
door is open, the bay empty.
Vued asks, "Why would they abandon ship?"
Kukagerrg's reply is in itself a question. "In case the plasma venting failed
and the power plant went critical?"
Vued counters, "But shouldn't we have seen it on our way in? Wouldn't they have
responded to our hails?"
Kukagerrg sighs, then says, "The hijackers probably realized that they're
vulnerable and have split the scene. The question is: Did they leave any of my
pack behind?"
"And my captain!" Fi barks.
The trio dismount from the air-sled and approach the airlock. The status light
is blue, indicating that the airlock is locked, but functional.
Kukagerrg says, "Unless they've changed the code, I should be able to get us
inside."
Vued says, "Should we comm first?"
"Why?
"If the hijackers are gone..."
"They could be locked up, unconscious or even dead," Fi adds. "But if they are
alive and have coms access they might be able to give us some intel. Or the bad
guys could still be in there and we give away the element of surprise. Do you
have any private channels only your crew use Kukagerrg?"
"That assumes the crew has access to the comms. I'll try it." He tries, "This is
Captain Kukagerrg calling anyone on board the Arraerouksagkor. Is anyone
there? I'm here outside the ship with a rescue party." There's no reply, so he
repeats the message.
A voice replies, "If you're Captain Kukagerrg, what's the name of the planet
where you went streaking through the Spitting Khodha chasing after a reporter?"
Kukagerrg growls. "I wasn't naked. I still had my briefs on. And it wasn't a
reporter; it was a health inspector. The bar was the Sneaky Khodha on
Rriksanirr."
"Ok, you passed. Captain, it's Dzo."
"Are you safe, Dzo?"
"Relatively speaking, sir. We've been through hell."
"Are the hijackers still on board?"
"No, they grabbed the g-carrier after we crashed and took off."
"Is everyone else, ok?"
There's a pause. "No. We've lost most everyone. It's just me, Dr. Gvekhs,
Sosazue, Oragrengouz is in a coma—"
"How about Verroel?" Fi interrupts.
"Yes, he's here, too. Hey, uh, give me a few minutes to get the airlock going.
We're trying to conserve power."
Next: Back to Consciousness