Judgement – Making Contact
by Commander Karen Villiers & Alderman Yolanthe Ibalin & Alderman Dorian Gabriel & Commander Chelsea Dunham & Lieutenant Vincent Tan & Lieutenant Commander Bruce Freeman & Lieutenant Jana Kasikova & Lieutenant Mathew Totti & Captain Tasha Tahir (NPC)
Post Details
ON
--Runabout Tyne--
About an hour out from their destination, Petty Officer Garan's Console pinged. "Sir, we're receiving a hail from the planet. A Cornelian Pring?" She looked from Carstairs to Duquesne, waiting for permission to acknowledge.
Carstairs ran a hand through his curly blond hair, "Is that a good sign?" he wondered aloud, "Communications still possible from the planet's surface ... does it mean that the government hasn't seceded yet? Can it be traced?" he was all questions and no answers.
"Well, that at least means they recognize that we are here." Duquesne stated from Helm. "No point in ignoring them. We need to get a situational report from the ground. What is the strength of their forces, in addition to any requests for humanitarian assistance." he added.
Garan checked her panel. "Its unencrypted and can be traced sir. On screen?"
"I am tracing the communication now." Jana said, her fingers were flying over her console. "It's coming from a building 500 kilometers to the northwest of our current location." She finally said after a few moments.
"Can we see it please?" Ben asked, looking up at the main screen.
"I am putting it up on the main screen, hang on two seconds." Jana replied.
- Thames -
Following in formation, Harris brought the runabout to flank the Tyne.
"Lieutenant, we are receiving a hail. Patching you through to the Tyne, sir." Harris advised Mathew as he checked his sensor read out and made sure weapons were still offline.
- Tyne -
While Lieutenant Carstairs responded to the hail from the service, Duquesne responded to the incoming hail from runabout Thames.
=^= Duquesne here, we have just received a hail from the planet surface and are in the process of responding now." =^= he stated in a low tone.
-Thames-
"Yellow alert shields up as a precaution, I don't want weapons even looked at unless we are fired upon."
=^= Totti here. Commander would you like us to go in now? =^=
-Tyne-
Garan leaned over to the controls between herself and Jana, and deftly brought the communication to the main screen of all three ships. "There you go ma'am."
"Hold back for now," Carstairs said, "Pring will give us an overview of the situation on the ground, then we can see if its worth making a concerted approach to talks rather than just being told to turn around and leave," he said. "We'll be routing the talk with Pring so that all vessels can see it first hand."
Duquesne nodded. "Very well, we'll continue on course to the designated landing facility on the planet surface." he replied.
-Thames-
"Take us in a little closer but out of the others' way." Mathew said calmly.
Harris acknowledged and altered course to parallel the Tyne with a two hundred kilometre distance.
He turned to look at Ms York "Nervous?" Mathew asked politely but already knew she was.
Alicia flushed pink-cheeked. "Um... well, to be honest Sir.... yes." she admitted frankly, clasping her attaché case tightly to her middle. "Do..... do you think.... I mean... it's not that I'm a coward but.... how likely are we to make it back from this?" she asked, her eyes wide. "Only... I should have written to my mother....I wonder if she'll understand.... "
Mathew smiled and grabbed Alicia's shoulder gently to support her "This is a mission Alicia, have fun with it, and learn from this."
Harris grinned to himself, knowing this was far removed from fun.
-Feltor Prime-
"Are you receiving me? Hello?" Pring ran a sweaty palm through his dishevelled hair as he turned to one of his aides. "They're jamming the signal, see if you can increase the strength and get us through to that ship," he said. Starfleet were too late. Pring needed to warn them to withdraw, use only diplomatic channels ... the new government had officially seceded from the Federation ten minutes earlier.
"Federation vessel, Tyne, Federation Vessel Thames, are you receiving me?" he asked again.
The pilot on the Thames opened a channel back but linked it in a multiple open forum to the Tyne and the Nautilus too.
=^= Feltor Prime, your signal is not clear. We are attempting to boost the transmission and have tagged in all our craft to enable the best power amalgamation possible. You should be able to hear us now? =^=
On the Nautilus, Jorge picked up the weak signal from the planet with some serious static but the link the Thames' pilot had initiated helped to clear it up considerably. He indicated he was in the 'conference' by simply adding the name of the craft. =^= USS Nautilus. Clear =^=
- Tyne -
Duquense continued to plot the proper coordinates into the system to guide the ad-hock fleet towards the appropriate coordinates. Ordinarily, he would have been assisted by the automated surveillance satellites in the planet's orbit. Unfortunately, the recent conflict had rendered the facilities useless until repairs could be made. Tragically, that wouldn't be possible in the near future.
Garan adjusted a power setting, rerouting through the sensor array to add their functions to boost the signal. Pring appeared on screen, now only occasionally marked with a line of static.
-Thames-
Pring appeared on screen along with the other two ships.
"This Is Lieutenant Mathew Totti aboard the Thames representing the United Federation of Planets. We have raised our shields as a defensive precaution only, we are on a humanitarian mission of peace. Please identify yourself."
"We know who you are," Pring said ignored the request, "Evan, is that really you?" he asked recognising the pale blond haired lawyer. "How's your father?"
Carstairs reddened, "Well, Mr Pring."
"That's good to hear," Pring replied, "Had a bit of trouble getting through ... seems the 'government' have taken action to block unauthorised traffic off planet. Not sure how long we've got." Pring spoke in a terse clipped tone, very matter of fact. "Tell your diplomat he wants to contact Onaran Whissst, that's the mouthpiece of the new regime."
-Thames-
Mathew shrugged off the rude comment and rejoined the conversation "Could you give us any more information on Mr? Whissst? And how to get in touch with him?"
Bill was alerted to his console by a small power build up in the biomimetic conversion capacitor. He was not an qualified engineer, but even he recognised when something was not supposed to register a fault.
He began to boost power to shields just in case, as he didn't want to worry the CDO at present, but sent a a log to the other craft and made sure that their own logs were updated.
-Nautilus-
Bruce noticed the message coming through the Thames. He looked over to the Engineer manning ops and motioned his hand over his neck to mute the comm. "I want yellow alert, bring weapons to 50 percent. What ever is being charged I don't want to deal with empty handed." He then turned to White. "Prepare the equipment for landing if we do some how get permission to help."
- Thames -
Harris saw that the Nautilus had gone to Yellow alert. He knew that was not a good sign, but it was protocol.
"Lieutenant, the Nautilus has raised shields and brought weapons on-line. Shall we do the same?" He questioned the Diplomat without turning around as his hand moved toward the console to initiate the same command for the Thames.
Mathew had already put the ship into yellow alert so decided: "boost forward shields and bring weapons online" He was un-aware however that the pilot already was.
---
There was no warning from the planet, the first indication that anything was wrong were the fluctuations in the shields as the first pulse hit. The second, building on the first caused the screens on the Tyne to blaze white and then fade. The third pulse, crippled the engines of the runabout leaving it unable to pull itself out of the descent pattern.
- Tyne -
It did not take long for Duquesne to recognize that something had gone very, very wrong. He immediately try to take the ship out of auto-pilot and take direct-control of the Helm in an attempt to compensate for the sudden loss of power. Unfortunately, it too was failing to respond to his commands.
"Garan! Try to bring re-route secondary power to thrusters. We are quickly losing altitude and begining to descend towards the planet." He said in a heightened, but still contained voice.
"Re-routing now-" Her fingers moved, but the panel pinged a protest. Unperturbed she opened a penl beneath her feet, and began to rewire the circuit directly. "This will just take a moment."
This certainly was not his first time being shot out of the sky, but it was certainly the first time it had happened while in orbit of a planet while carrying a convoy of non-combatants. He had read the report involving the planet, but he had not studied the topographical information in sufficient detail to understand where exactly would be the best place for a crash landing if they could not restore power in sufficient enough amount of time.
"My console is not responding to any of my commands!" Jana called out, she slammed her fists on the console. Some of the screen came back online. ~Well who would of thought!?~ She thought to herself. "Trying to scan potential landing sights..." She turned and looked at Ben...a look of panic came across her face and she needed his reassurance.
There was a sudden hum from beneath the nose of the shuttle as Garan brought secondary power back online and directed as much as she could to the helm. "I'm getting about 55% power to helm. I can push it to 65% if I take gravity and life support offline?"
Duquesne was still focused on trying to get something, ANYTHING to respond. Fortunately, Garan's quick response was able to get him partial Helm control. However, it was not enough to prevent their continual free-fall descent.
"Everybody, secure yourselves! I've managed to get power to thrusters, but it's only enough to keep us from diving nose-first and burning up in the atmosphere." he said while still trying to keep control of the vessel.
"Garan, divert available power to aft thrusters, I'm going to try to keep the shuttle at a 40 degree angle while we enter the upper-atmosphere." he said as he began to managed to gain enough helm control to manoeuvre the shuttle into a tail-side-down position while entering the atmosphere.
She didn't wait for anyone to strap in before she killed the gravity and sent the extra power up to the thrusters. Now floating above the main ops circuit boards, she took the life support offline, freeing the last remaining energy in the system for manoeuvring. "Done, sir. That's all we have left."
Ordinarily atmospheric re-entry would not be such a complicated task since the computer would take control and adjust the shuttle's pitch and roll to the appropriate coordinate and degrees. However, the mysterious flash had completely knocked the primary systems offline and they didn't have the time to repair the damage in time to prevent the crash landing.
-Thames-
Mathew's eyes widened as he saw himself and then the confirmed sensor readings what was happening. "Damn it! Run a full sensor sweep I wanna know what that was! Can we lock on a tractor beam?" Mathew was annoyed he couldn't do what he had just ordered as the pilots station had the control. Ideas flooded his head from Tania his previous host a star fleet tactical officer. And with the added stress he could feel from Alicia who was basically screaming her thoughts out? He had to close the walls in his mind to focus.
Harris' eyes were locked on the shuttle and was momentarily dumbstruck. He knew what they were heading into was risky at best, but he had not expected to come under fire, not on a diplomatic mission.
"Sweep?" He questioned as his hand quivered above the console and as he took the next breath his hand came down on the tractor beam initiation sequence.
"Lieutenant, tractor inoperative, the Tyne seems to be shielded in" his brow dropped as he swung about to look at Mat, "anti matter. The tractors cannot get a lock." His reply was unthought as he explained the current predicament. His eyes were drawn to the Tyne. "Sir, we could try pushing her?" He asked rather than suggested.
Mathew frowned "Sweep, scan! I want to know what that was. Bring us in front of the the Tyne. Can we emit a repulser beam?"
"I would not recommend it sir, a repulser against anti matter could have serious ramifications." He stated as he began to transfer the data from the sensors and eased the Thames forward on thrusters.
"The crew aboard the Tyne appear to be alive, but sensors are ineffective through whatever is on the hull. The weapon seems to have been fired from the planets ionosphere." He signalled the Nautilus. "Nautilus, we need to stop the descent of the Tyne. Recommendations?" The question was to both the ship and to the Diplomat.
- Nautilus -
"There is not much we can do." Bruce said having ran over to the Engineering console. "As your aware the anti matter bubble is not allowing us to get a solid lock. And it is far too risky to try a unassisted manual lock-on. We will have a small window where the anti matter will be burned off in the atmosphere but," He said looking at the simulations. "There is only a very slight chance that will work." He added dismally.
- Tyne -
The viewscreen on the Runabout showed the clouds of the planet coming into the view and quickly passing out of view as the shuttle continued to plummet through the atmosphere and into the open sky of the planet.
"Lieutenant Kasikova, I still need an appropriate landing site." Duquesne said with anxiety in his voice as the shuttle shook violently, intimating that inertial dampeners were gone.
"I have sent coordinates of a landing site to the helm. " Jana called out.
- Thames -
Bill shook his head in desperation as he guided the Thames into a steep dive, managing to get a tractor lock onto the Tyne and silently prayed that the slightly larger Nautilus was able to lock on as he began to pull into full reverse.
Mathew was confused "How have you locked on?". He was curious and worried that the ship couldn't handle the stress. He wished again that he was in control not command.
The shuttle began to shake with a violence that made Harris feel more nauseous than he had ever felt before.
"We're not going to make this." He groaned.
- Nautilus -
Seeing that the Thames' tractor had failed Bruce knew there wasn't anything else that could be done for the Tyne. "Get a tractor beam onto the Thames, get them stabilized and then cut the beam. Don't want to send them into the planet either."
- Tyne -
The shuttle came to a slight halt as the tractor began to take affect, but the gravity of the planet was too strong and it overpowered the Thame's attempt to disrupt the shuttle's free fall. The remaining vessels couldn't risk following the Tyne due to the strength of the planet's gravity pulling them into a complete free-fall as well.
All they could do is just observe and try to plot the landing of the Runabout Tyne as it went off of their sensor screen.
"We've cleared the stratosphere! Everybody hold on to something secure!" He yelled as the sounds of the outside environment collided with the shuttle as it began its unmitigated decent from over 400,000 feet in the air into the planet's surface.
"I've found something close to a suitable landing site!" he yelled. He reviewed the list that had been sent from Jana's console and found a patch of land within the planet's more aird tropical forests. It was far from ideal, but hopefully the stretch of land would allow them to land safely as opposed the more mountainous region that covered the planet.
Jana looked back at Ben and told him everything that needed to be said with her eyes. It was a brief but intimate moment between the two of them before she turned back to her console.
Ben didn't need to speak, he returned her look and was oblivious to all else as he gathered together his med kit and secured it and then himself into his seat, bracing for impact.
Solid ground seem to rush toward them. Garan's console began to ping warnings as one system after another red-lined, though the controls stayed maddeningly unresponsive. "Inertial Dampers at max....Heat Deflectors at Max....Thrusters at max."
The computers voice chimed in. "Warning. Collision imminent. Collision in Five hundred meters... Four hundred meters... Three hundred meters...."
Garan braced for impact. She couldn't help closing her eyes.
OFF:
JP Between Cast of Thousands, as Follows:
Runabout Tyne -
JAG: Lieutenant Evans Carstairs (Louise NPC)
Operations: Petty Officer Garan (Notty NPC)
Science: Lieutenant Jana Kasikova
Medical: Lieutenant JG Ben Kensington (Jools NPC)
Tactica/Helm: Lieutenant Michael Duquesne (Thom NPC)
On a diplomatic ship (Runabout Thames) -
Diplomacy: Lieutenant Mathew Totti
Flight/Weapons - PO3C William Harris (Support to Mat) (Mark NPC)
Diplomatic Aide: Yeoman Alicia York ( " " " ) (jools NPC)
Nautilus (Engineering support) -
Engineering: Lieutenant Bruce Freeman
Master Chief Mike White - Engineering Assistant
Feltor Prime - in support of the Federation
Cornelian Pring - leader of the Feltor And Federation movement. (Louise NPC)
Feltor Prime - the new regime
Onaran Whissst (Louise NPC)
by Commander Karen Villiers & Alderman Yolanthe Ibalin & Alderman Dorian Gabriel & Commander Chelsea Dunham & Lieutenant Vincent Tan & Lieutenant Commander Bruce Freeman & Lieutenant Jana Kasikova & Lieutenant Mathew Totti & Captain Tasha Tahir (NPC)
Post Details
| Title | Making Contact | |
| Mission | Judgement | |
| Author(s) | Commander Karen Villiers & Alderman Yolanthe Ibalin & Alderman Dorian Gabriel & Commander Chelsea Dunham & Lieutenant Vincent Tan & Lieutenant Commander Bruce Freeman & Lieutenant Jana Kasikova & Lieutenant Mathew Totti & Captain Tasha Tahir (NPC) | |
| Posted | Fri Nov 19, 2010 @ 7:37pm | |
| Location | Feltor Prime | |
| Timeline | SD35 |
--Runabout Tyne--
About an hour out from their destination, Petty Officer Garan's Console pinged. "Sir, we're receiving a hail from the planet. A Cornelian Pring?" She looked from Carstairs to Duquesne, waiting for permission to acknowledge.
Carstairs ran a hand through his curly blond hair, "Is that a good sign?" he wondered aloud, "Communications still possible from the planet's surface ... does it mean that the government hasn't seceded yet? Can it be traced?" he was all questions and no answers.
"Well, that at least means they recognize that we are here." Duquesne stated from Helm. "No point in ignoring them. We need to get a situational report from the ground. What is the strength of their forces, in addition to any requests for humanitarian assistance." he added.
Garan checked her panel. "Its unencrypted and can be traced sir. On screen?"
"I am tracing the communication now." Jana said, her fingers were flying over her console. "It's coming from a building 500 kilometers to the northwest of our current location." She finally said after a few moments.
"Can we see it please?" Ben asked, looking up at the main screen.
"I am putting it up on the main screen, hang on two seconds." Jana replied.
- Thames -
Following in formation, Harris brought the runabout to flank the Tyne.
"Lieutenant, we are receiving a hail. Patching you through to the Tyne, sir." Harris advised Mathew as he checked his sensor read out and made sure weapons were still offline.
- Tyne -
While Lieutenant Carstairs responded to the hail from the service, Duquesne responded to the incoming hail from runabout Thames.
=^= Duquesne here, we have just received a hail from the planet surface and are in the process of responding now." =^= he stated in a low tone.
-Thames-
"Yellow alert shields up as a precaution, I don't want weapons even looked at unless we are fired upon."
=^= Totti here. Commander would you like us to go in now? =^=
-Tyne-
Garan leaned over to the controls between herself and Jana, and deftly brought the communication to the main screen of all three ships. "There you go ma'am."
"Hold back for now," Carstairs said, "Pring will give us an overview of the situation on the ground, then we can see if its worth making a concerted approach to talks rather than just being told to turn around and leave," he said. "We'll be routing the talk with Pring so that all vessels can see it first hand."
Duquesne nodded. "Very well, we'll continue on course to the designated landing facility on the planet surface." he replied.
-Thames-
"Take us in a little closer but out of the others' way." Mathew said calmly.
Harris acknowledged and altered course to parallel the Tyne with a two hundred kilometre distance.
He turned to look at Ms York "Nervous?" Mathew asked politely but already knew she was.
Alicia flushed pink-cheeked. "Um... well, to be honest Sir.... yes." she admitted frankly, clasping her attaché case tightly to her middle. "Do..... do you think.... I mean... it's not that I'm a coward but.... how likely are we to make it back from this?" she asked, her eyes wide. "Only... I should have written to my mother....I wonder if she'll understand.... "
Mathew smiled and grabbed Alicia's shoulder gently to support her "This is a mission Alicia, have fun with it, and learn from this."
Harris grinned to himself, knowing this was far removed from fun.
-Feltor Prime-
"Are you receiving me? Hello?" Pring ran a sweaty palm through his dishevelled hair as he turned to one of his aides. "They're jamming the signal, see if you can increase the strength and get us through to that ship," he said. Starfleet were too late. Pring needed to warn them to withdraw, use only diplomatic channels ... the new government had officially seceded from the Federation ten minutes earlier.
"Federation vessel, Tyne, Federation Vessel Thames, are you receiving me?" he asked again.
The pilot on the Thames opened a channel back but linked it in a multiple open forum to the Tyne and the Nautilus too.
=^= Feltor Prime, your signal is not clear. We are attempting to boost the transmission and have tagged in all our craft to enable the best power amalgamation possible. You should be able to hear us now? =^=
On the Nautilus, Jorge picked up the weak signal from the planet with some serious static but the link the Thames' pilot had initiated helped to clear it up considerably. He indicated he was in the 'conference' by simply adding the name of the craft. =^= USS Nautilus. Clear =^=
- Tyne -
Duquense continued to plot the proper coordinates into the system to guide the ad-hock fleet towards the appropriate coordinates. Ordinarily, he would have been assisted by the automated surveillance satellites in the planet's orbit. Unfortunately, the recent conflict had rendered the facilities useless until repairs could be made. Tragically, that wouldn't be possible in the near future.
Garan adjusted a power setting, rerouting through the sensor array to add their functions to boost the signal. Pring appeared on screen, now only occasionally marked with a line of static.
-Thames-
Pring appeared on screen along with the other two ships.
"This Is Lieutenant Mathew Totti aboard the Thames representing the United Federation of Planets. We have raised our shields as a defensive precaution only, we are on a humanitarian mission of peace. Please identify yourself."
"We know who you are," Pring said ignored the request, "Evan, is that really you?" he asked recognising the pale blond haired lawyer. "How's your father?"
Carstairs reddened, "Well, Mr Pring."
"That's good to hear," Pring replied, "Had a bit of trouble getting through ... seems the 'government' have taken action to block unauthorised traffic off planet. Not sure how long we've got." Pring spoke in a terse clipped tone, very matter of fact. "Tell your diplomat he wants to contact Onaran Whissst, that's the mouthpiece of the new regime."
-Thames-
Mathew shrugged off the rude comment and rejoined the conversation "Could you give us any more information on Mr? Whissst? And how to get in touch with him?"
Bill was alerted to his console by a small power build up in the biomimetic conversion capacitor. He was not an qualified engineer, but even he recognised when something was not supposed to register a fault.
He began to boost power to shields just in case, as he didn't want to worry the CDO at present, but sent a a log to the other craft and made sure that their own logs were updated.
-Nautilus-
Bruce noticed the message coming through the Thames. He looked over to the Engineer manning ops and motioned his hand over his neck to mute the comm. "I want yellow alert, bring weapons to 50 percent. What ever is being charged I don't want to deal with empty handed." He then turned to White. "Prepare the equipment for landing if we do some how get permission to help."
- Thames -
Harris saw that the Nautilus had gone to Yellow alert. He knew that was not a good sign, but it was protocol.
"Lieutenant, the Nautilus has raised shields and brought weapons on-line. Shall we do the same?" He questioned the Diplomat without turning around as his hand moved toward the console to initiate the same command for the Thames.
Mathew had already put the ship into yellow alert so decided: "boost forward shields and bring weapons online" He was un-aware however that the pilot already was.
---
There was no warning from the planet, the first indication that anything was wrong were the fluctuations in the shields as the first pulse hit. The second, building on the first caused the screens on the Tyne to blaze white and then fade. The third pulse, crippled the engines of the runabout leaving it unable to pull itself out of the descent pattern.
- Tyne -
It did not take long for Duquesne to recognize that something had gone very, very wrong. He immediately try to take the ship out of auto-pilot and take direct-control of the Helm in an attempt to compensate for the sudden loss of power. Unfortunately, it too was failing to respond to his commands.
"Garan! Try to bring re-route secondary power to thrusters. We are quickly losing altitude and begining to descend towards the planet." He said in a heightened, but still contained voice.
"Re-routing now-" Her fingers moved, but the panel pinged a protest. Unperturbed she opened a penl beneath her feet, and began to rewire the circuit directly. "This will just take a moment."
This certainly was not his first time being shot out of the sky, but it was certainly the first time it had happened while in orbit of a planet while carrying a convoy of non-combatants. He had read the report involving the planet, but he had not studied the topographical information in sufficient detail to understand where exactly would be the best place for a crash landing if they could not restore power in sufficient enough amount of time.
"My console is not responding to any of my commands!" Jana called out, she slammed her fists on the console. Some of the screen came back online. ~Well who would of thought!?~ She thought to herself. "Trying to scan potential landing sights..." She turned and looked at Ben...a look of panic came across her face and she needed his reassurance.
There was a sudden hum from beneath the nose of the shuttle as Garan brought secondary power back online and directed as much as she could to the helm. "I'm getting about 55% power to helm. I can push it to 65% if I take gravity and life support offline?"
Duquesne was still focused on trying to get something, ANYTHING to respond. Fortunately, Garan's quick response was able to get him partial Helm control. However, it was not enough to prevent their continual free-fall descent.
"Everybody, secure yourselves! I've managed to get power to thrusters, but it's only enough to keep us from diving nose-first and burning up in the atmosphere." he said while still trying to keep control of the vessel.
"Garan, divert available power to aft thrusters, I'm going to try to keep the shuttle at a 40 degree angle while we enter the upper-atmosphere." he said as he began to managed to gain enough helm control to manoeuvre the shuttle into a tail-side-down position while entering the atmosphere.
She didn't wait for anyone to strap in before she killed the gravity and sent the extra power up to the thrusters. Now floating above the main ops circuit boards, she took the life support offline, freeing the last remaining energy in the system for manoeuvring. "Done, sir. That's all we have left."
Ordinarily atmospheric re-entry would not be such a complicated task since the computer would take control and adjust the shuttle's pitch and roll to the appropriate coordinate and degrees. However, the mysterious flash had completely knocked the primary systems offline and they didn't have the time to repair the damage in time to prevent the crash landing.
-Thames-
Mathew's eyes widened as he saw himself and then the confirmed sensor readings what was happening. "Damn it! Run a full sensor sweep I wanna know what that was! Can we lock on a tractor beam?" Mathew was annoyed he couldn't do what he had just ordered as the pilots station had the control. Ideas flooded his head from Tania his previous host a star fleet tactical officer. And with the added stress he could feel from Alicia who was basically screaming her thoughts out? He had to close the walls in his mind to focus.
Harris' eyes were locked on the shuttle and was momentarily dumbstruck. He knew what they were heading into was risky at best, but he had not expected to come under fire, not on a diplomatic mission.
"Sweep?" He questioned as his hand quivered above the console and as he took the next breath his hand came down on the tractor beam initiation sequence.
"Lieutenant, tractor inoperative, the Tyne seems to be shielded in" his brow dropped as he swung about to look at Mat, "anti matter. The tractors cannot get a lock." His reply was unthought as he explained the current predicament. His eyes were drawn to the Tyne. "Sir, we could try pushing her?" He asked rather than suggested.
Mathew frowned "Sweep, scan! I want to know what that was. Bring us in front of the the Tyne. Can we emit a repulser beam?"
"I would not recommend it sir, a repulser against anti matter could have serious ramifications." He stated as he began to transfer the data from the sensors and eased the Thames forward on thrusters.
"The crew aboard the Tyne appear to be alive, but sensors are ineffective through whatever is on the hull. The weapon seems to have been fired from the planets ionosphere." He signalled the Nautilus. "Nautilus, we need to stop the descent of the Tyne. Recommendations?" The question was to both the ship and to the Diplomat.
- Nautilus -
"There is not much we can do." Bruce said having ran over to the Engineering console. "As your aware the anti matter bubble is not allowing us to get a solid lock. And it is far too risky to try a unassisted manual lock-on. We will have a small window where the anti matter will be burned off in the atmosphere but," He said looking at the simulations. "There is only a very slight chance that will work." He added dismally.
- Tyne -
The viewscreen on the Runabout showed the clouds of the planet coming into the view and quickly passing out of view as the shuttle continued to plummet through the atmosphere and into the open sky of the planet.
"Lieutenant Kasikova, I still need an appropriate landing site." Duquesne said with anxiety in his voice as the shuttle shook violently, intimating that inertial dampeners were gone.
"I have sent coordinates of a landing site to the helm. " Jana called out.
- Thames -
Bill shook his head in desperation as he guided the Thames into a steep dive, managing to get a tractor lock onto the Tyne and silently prayed that the slightly larger Nautilus was able to lock on as he began to pull into full reverse.
Mathew was confused "How have you locked on?". He was curious and worried that the ship couldn't handle the stress. He wished again that he was in control not command.
The shuttle began to shake with a violence that made Harris feel more nauseous than he had ever felt before.
"We're not going to make this." He groaned.
- Nautilus -
Seeing that the Thames' tractor had failed Bruce knew there wasn't anything else that could be done for the Tyne. "Get a tractor beam onto the Thames, get them stabilized and then cut the beam. Don't want to send them into the planet either."
- Tyne -
The shuttle came to a slight halt as the tractor began to take affect, but the gravity of the planet was too strong and it overpowered the Thame's attempt to disrupt the shuttle's free fall. The remaining vessels couldn't risk following the Tyne due to the strength of the planet's gravity pulling them into a complete free-fall as well.
All they could do is just observe and try to plot the landing of the Runabout Tyne as it went off of their sensor screen.
"We've cleared the stratosphere! Everybody hold on to something secure!" He yelled as the sounds of the outside environment collided with the shuttle as it began its unmitigated decent from over 400,000 feet in the air into the planet's surface.
"I've found something close to a suitable landing site!" he yelled. He reviewed the list that had been sent from Jana's console and found a patch of land within the planet's more aird tropical forests. It was far from ideal, but hopefully the stretch of land would allow them to land safely as opposed the more mountainous region that covered the planet.
Jana looked back at Ben and told him everything that needed to be said with her eyes. It was a brief but intimate moment between the two of them before she turned back to her console.
Ben didn't need to speak, he returned her look and was oblivious to all else as he gathered together his med kit and secured it and then himself into his seat, bracing for impact.
Solid ground seem to rush toward them. Garan's console began to ping warnings as one system after another red-lined, though the controls stayed maddeningly unresponsive. "Inertial Dampers at max....Heat Deflectors at Max....Thrusters at max."
The computers voice chimed in. "Warning. Collision imminent. Collision in Five hundred meters... Four hundred meters... Three hundred meters...."
Garan braced for impact. She couldn't help closing her eyes.
OFF:
JP Between Cast of Thousands, as Follows:
Runabout Tyne -
JAG: Lieutenant Evans Carstairs (Louise NPC)
Operations: Petty Officer Garan (Notty NPC)
Science: Lieutenant Jana Kasikova
Medical: Lieutenant JG Ben Kensington (Jools NPC)
Tactica/Helm: Lieutenant Michael Duquesne (Thom NPC)
On a diplomatic ship (Runabout Thames) -
Diplomacy: Lieutenant Mathew Totti
Flight/Weapons - PO3C William Harris (Support to Mat) (Mark NPC)
Diplomatic Aide: Yeoman Alicia York ( " " " ) (jools NPC)
Nautilus (Engineering support) -
Engineering: Lieutenant Bruce Freeman
Master Chief Mike White - Engineering Assistant
Feltor Prime - in support of the Federation
Cornelian Pring - leader of the Feltor And Federation movement. (Louise NPC)
Feltor Prime - the new regime
Onaran Whissst (Louise NPC)