Ghost Ship

Posted on Thu Nov 25th, 2010 @ 3:04pm by Captain Benjamin Byrne & Lieutenant Lianna Vanders & Lieutenant Chihiro Ogino MD & Lieutenant JG Nessa Jenarian & Provisional Lieutenant Commander Narayn Ballard

Mission: Bug-Eyed Bogies
Location: USS Endeavour
Timeline: MD07 1043hrs

Benjamin and the others stepped cautiously off the back of the yacht, looking with trained rapidity to each side. Each held a phaser ready, and while some held simply the Type-II hand phasers, Benjamin had picked up one of the yacht's stock of advanced Type-3 phaser rifles, and was holding it with practiced ease, making sure that the docking bay was clear.

"Edroski, Ogino, Jenarian;" Benjamin said when he was sure they were safe, his voice commanding. "Head to sickbay. See if you can use the internal medical sensors to find out what's going on. Myself and Ballard will head to the bridge."

Ballard allowed his Type-II to rest on the heel of his hand. He had no intention of letting the good captain show him up with his much larger firearm so picked one up from the racking. It was slim, lean, perfectly balanced. A million miles away from the rifles he had used aboard the Morality. Often the Vinarian ship was little more than a distant memory but it was occasions like this when it all came flooding back to him.

Nessa gave a simple nod of her head before moving a little to the side and waiting for the rest of the small group to follow suit. "A bit of information as to what we might be facing could be nice, but I guess one can't have everything." she murmured under her breath as her pulse accelerated slightly. She had done well during academy weapons training, but she hadn't had much chance to practice with the weapons since then. As such, she could only hope that her slightly rusty skills with a phaser wouldn't be a setback.

"I would recommend that we go via the Jeffries Tubes, Cap." He suggested. He supposed that now would be as good a time as any to see if the Captain was in the mood for a nickname.

Not responding to the shortened nickname of his rank, Benjamin simply nodded, and began heading down the corridor towards the nearest Jeffries junction.

[Deck Five]

Benjamin climbed up from the ladder onto deck five cautiously, his rifle in the hands of Ballard still on the ladder so as not to shed any light on himself whilst his back was vulnerable climbing up through the floor, but his Type-II still in hand for protection. Holding it out in front of him and scanning the dark, he reached down for his rifle to be passed up, and was thankful that in the new light he saw no movement.

As he placed his hand phaser back on his hip, and returned to using the rifle as his primary weapon, he noticed a body on the floor; an Ensign, dressed in services gold, with slight tears in the material around the abdomen and neck. Crouching down, Benjamin reached to feel a pulse - and found one, but it was so overly strong that if felt like solid beads of blood were travelling through the officer's veins at regular intervals. "He's alive, but unconscious," he told the Chief, who had followed him up. "He's safe enough here for the moment. Come on." Standing, he led the other man out of the small junction room, and into the corridor.

The only light beyond the intermittent blinking of a mangled red alert lamp was the torches attached to the two men's rifles. Ballard crouched down and stopped. There was something in the corridor with them. "Captain." He hissed, raising a hand to make sure the commanding officer knew to stop.

Benjamin came to a stop, standing so that they had one rifle aiming high and one aiming low, and each was on a different side of the corridor. His eyes were darting around, trying to find what had caused the Chief to pause.

Suddenly, a rather harried young woman flipped around and pointed a phaser rifle at the duo. "Don't move!" She said plainly. Li's hair was a mess, she had several wounds that were tied off by bandages made from strips of uniforms.

Ballard wasn't familiar with the desperate pang in the voice of the woman before them. The light of her rifle caught the Intelligence Officer in the eyes. He raised his rifle to take aim at her.

Benjamin too brought his rifle to bear by instinct. He was about to lower it until she shouted at the pair of them. Thinking that she may be under the influence of some kind of drug, he kept his rifle aimed at her, quietly noticing that by bringing their weapons to bear, he and Ballard had naturally moved closer together, and he couldn't tell which one of them Lianna was aiming at. "Lieutenant?" Benjamin said, his voice carrying a tone which clearly said 'get that weapon out of my face or you'll find yourself cleaning garbage chutes quicker than you could say Timbuktu'.

"I said don't move!!!" She bellowed, then she fired. The shot whizzed past both of their heads and hit something right behind both of them. As it dropped to the ground, it unleashed a insect-like groan of pain.

"What the hell is that?!" Ballard shouted as the thump of the alien carcass hitting the ground reverberated around the corridor.

Benjamin turned to look at the insectoid lying on the floor, and tried to search his memory to see if he knew of it. He didn't. The thing was large, had at least six separate limbs - some ending in a pointed 'foot', others in a slim claw-like part - and large, semi-transparent wings. The thing was enormous - at least six or seven foot tall. "What the hell is going on here?" he demanded of his security chief.

Li walked forward, her rifle on the insectoid, and shot it in the head. She then turned her attention back to Byrne and Ballard. "Come with me, right now! I'll explain later. We have to get to the bridge."

"Bloody hell. We can't leave you lot alone for a minute, can we?" Ballard said jokingly. The look he received from the Lieutenant suggested he shouldn't have opened his mouth.

Li spoke, "Shut. up." She whispered, "These things pick up on sound and body heat. And their thoughts are simple; eat and breed." She advised. "Where are Edroski, Jenarian, and Ogino?"

"Sickbay," was Benjamin's response, keeping it short so as not to alert more of the giant bugs. "Where's the crew?" he asked, wanting to know the most important thing here and now.

Li spoke, "I'll explain on our way to deck two, it's not a good idea to stay here."

[Deck 7]

Chihiro Led the way along the darkened deck seven. She stopped and gripped her phaser tightly. "Did you hear that?" she asked. The muffled sound of crying echoed quietly down the corridor.

"Yes," came the simple reply from the science officer. Her eyes had long since adjusted to the dim light and she took a quick glance in the direction the sound was coming from and let out a small sigh. "Might be a good idea to check on where that's coming from. If someone's in need of help..." her voice trailed off, not really bothering to state the rest of her thoughts on the matter as she resumed her watch behind the small group, making sure nothing crept up on them from the rear. For a moment, she thought she saw something move in the shadows, but as she trained the phaser pistol on it, it turned out to be nothing more than a cable that had been ripped from the ceiling and was now swaying back and forth. The thought that the ship wasn't exactly draughty passed through her mind only a second later, "Be careful, I think we're not alone here," she whispered to the other two, narrowing her eyes slightly as she tried to spot any other motion in the corridor.

"Come on, lets get to sickbay. We can use that as our base of operations" Chihiro suggested leading the way, walking slowly.

Suddenly a little figure bumped into her. Chihiro looked down three children had been running down the corridor. "Hikari, Tom, Rachel" Chihiro said recognising them immediately. "Where are your parents?" she asked Tom and Rachel who were holding onto Hikari. They shook their heads as if they didn't know. "Ok, you three stay with us, we're going to sickbay" Chihiro explained holding out a hand for them to hold.

Nessa took a glance over her shoulder to see exactly what the commotion was about, and that moment almost ended her short career. While her head was turning about, something large barged into her, knocking her off her feet and sending her to the ground under its weight. She tried to scream as something tore through one of her pant legs and ripped into the flesh below, leaving a bloody gash at almost the same time her phaser pistol whipped through the air to point at the bug-like head of the creature and the weapon discharged, splattering everything around her with insectoid blood and brain matter. The science officer's heart raced at an impossible speed while she tried to gather her breath, her eyes frantically moving about in an attempt to spot if there were any more of the insect-like creatures around her.

-------------------

Captain Benjamin J. Byrne
Commanding Officer

Lieutenant Lianna Vanders
Chief Tac/Sec Officer

Lieutenant Chihiro Ogino
Chief Medical Officer

Ensign Nessa Jenarian
Chief Science Officer

&

Chief Petty Officer Narayn Ballard
Chief Intelligence Officer