Cold Comfort pt 1: Seven Seventeen
Posted on 21 Sep 2022 @ 12:08am by Commander Calliope Zahn & Command Master Chief Tāne HaiRoa
Edited on on 06 Feb 2024 @ 10:45pm
Mission:
M3 - Into the Deep
Location: Deep Space Storage Outpost 717
Timeline: M3 BACKSTORY
3593 words - 7.2 OF Standard Post Measure
HaiRoa had finished his lunch and was working through his afternoon schedule on his PaDD. He had spent most of the morning in Flight Control and he was planning on stopping by Operations next. They were working on ensuring all life support systems were fully operational and hardening the system for any possible attack as part of the increased security protocols.
He sipped his coffee and looked around the Mess; he had dined alone, the other seniors Non-Coms keeping a respectful distance until they got to know him.
A group at a nearby table were chatting. "Some of my team are convinced it's a Breen Battle group coming our way. I've told them that's nonsense but they won't leave it alone."
"Breen, now those are some cold hearted bastards if ever there was!" There was some laughter and the conversation continued.
~Cold hearted bastards, you got that right~ Tane mused to himself, a memory coming back.
"Come on in Bosun." Lieutenant Franks waved HaiRoa to a chair after he had responded to the Operations Chief's summons.
"Sir." He nodded to Franks and muttered, "Ensign," to the other person already there— Ensign Zahn. She'd been on the ship some three months longer than him, but it was her first assignment out of the academy and as far as he was concerned she was green through and through, not just her Orion toned complexion.
"Good morning Bosun," she greeted him with a bright smile. It was a natural enough expression but it was a little overdone, concealing an undercurrent of nerves for what was to be her first leadership assignment off ship. But she caught herself staring at him while she'd wondered about the meaning of his facial tattoos, and so with a little embarrassment, the young officer diverted her eyes back to the padd she held.
"We've traced that life support malfunction down. It's in the atmospheric stabilization system. The topaline coating on the air scrubber matrices is breaking down. The units were due for replacement last maintenance schedule but Starbase Sixteen was short of stock and only four out of the sixteen were replaced. The other twelve should have lasted another three months, but they are failing early."
HaiRoa knew the parts Franks was referring to. They were a rectangular box, about two foot square and around three feet long, containing a topaline coated honeycomb matrix . The matrix was positively charged and the honeycomb pulled natively charged particles out of the air. They were an important component in maintaining a fresh, clean atmosphere.
"There are no replacements less than eight days away at cruising speed and we have to be at Gensar VI in less than two days for the rendezvous with the First Federation Trade Ambassador. The Captain has informed me that is a hard aR-Vee that we cannot miss but we have a possible solution." Franks activated the screen on the wall of his office. It showed empty space, then zoomed into a blocky object, roughly a dodecahedron in shape. "Deep Space Storage Outpost 717. It's about four hours away at max warp. It's one of a series of unmanned storage facilities put out here during the Dominion War. They contain a large inventory of spare parts and replacement components for combat damaged starships to carry out repairs.
Now, this one doesn't have any air scrubber matrix left, but it does have a automated electroplating bath and, according to the manifest, nine kilos of topaline. We're going to pull the twelve failing units and divert to the Outpost. We'll leave a team there to re-plate the units and then come back and collect them in three days after the rendezvous with the Ambassador. We're going to shut down decks four, five, seven, eleven, and twelve and the remaining four units should be able to keep the atmosphere stabilized without problems.
Ensign Zahn will be leading the team, you'll accompany her and we need a couple of maintenance technicians and a life support specialists. Who do you want Calliope?"
Calliope considered carefully, looking down at a padd she'd brought on hand. Her options were somewhat limited based on who was free for her to select from in order to avoid conflict with the diplomatic mission and the essential personnel. "CPO Malmrose in Engineering knows the life support systems well and Petty Officer Rowle is a labtech with experience in the replating formulation. Between the four of us, it should be a fairly straightforward endeavor."
HaiRoa nodded. It seemed like a reasonable plan; he was also under no doubt he was being sent along to ensure Zahn didn't screw it up .
The deck shuddered again and HaiRoa reached out to rest his hand on the bulkhead and steady himself. For the last hour or so the Scorpio had been battling an Ionic storm front.
"Shouldn't be a problem." Franks called over cheerfully from his position by the Transporter control panel. "Bridge says the main storm's about seven hours out, it will pass though and be gone within thirty hours and we'll be back after it's cleared. The Outpost is fully shielded , so there won't be any issues once you're all aboard."
HaiRoa kept his thoughts to himself, since Franks was not the one going to be stuck on a small little station for the next three days, and did a final check over of his gear. They had all been issued cold-weather clothing, since it would take several hours for the Outpost to warm up once they got the power online. Besides the cold gear, they had several tool kits, ration packs, water, sleeping bags, and flashlights. They also had limited duration personal supplemental air supplies, as the Outpost atmosphere would be a little stale at first.
Calliope shuffled the duffel she was carrying over the puff of her thermal quilted overcoat, adjusting the strap to keep it from sliding off again, and then looked around to gauge the rest of her team. HaiRoa was difficult if not impossible to read on his naturally stoic face. He was managing the checklist and she knew she'd get a look at it when it was done.
Off to one side stood the team's engineer, hovering over a few crates almost as if he were pacing but trying not to. Jack Malmrose was a man in his late 20's who had made a life out of managing typical engineering tasks. He'd enlisted and just kept re-upping since he wasn't sure what else he had in mind to do with his life anyway. And so he'd become something of a reliable fixture in his department, capable of being handed off tasks he'd been trained in and producing the desired results in a timely fashion. Calliope felt he often got overlooked, and that was part of her calculus in picking him. As far as she knew, Jack Malmrose didn't get out much.
"You good, Mr. Malmrose?" She asked.
He nodded and gave a polite, "Yes, ma'am," despite the news of the ion storm making his stomach twist with a warning.
By contrast, Rowle had an eager look which, on his Antican face, just made it hard not to see the dog likeness in his species. "I'm fully prepared!" he volunteered without being asked. "I have some back up materials in case the station's chemistry lab has expired solutions for the process."
Calliope tapped her hooded noggin with a gloved hand, "Ah! Good thinking, Mr. Rowle."
Ten minutes later, punctuated by several more judders and rumbles, the ship came to a stop.
The Transporter panel communicator beeped =^= Transporter Room Two, sensor sweep shows the Outpost is operational but in shutdown mode. Artificial gravity is at fifty percent; atmosphere is at sixty-five percent of normal; temperature is minus twenty three Fahrenheit. Get the Away Team on their way. Captain says we can remain on station for thirty minutes, they need to get the reactor online and life support going in that time =^=
"Ensign, this is your show. You have the PaDD with the outpost control codes and reactor start instructions. Lets get moving," Franks said to Zahn.
Calliope gave one decisive, positive nod. The implications were clear enough and she felt confident they could get the job done. "Yes sir. Go ahead, gentlemen." She motioned to the transporter pad and watched them file into place.
After they were all on the pads Franks said, "Once you've got the reactor up, we'll beam the scrubbers over. Carry on Ensign."
Calliope switched on her breathing mask, flicked down her visor, and waved Lt Franks a small salute.
HaiRoa put the safety visor over his eyes, slid the mask onto his face, and activated the air supply, taking a deep breath, feeling and hearing the value open as he got a lungful of air. Then he put on his gloves and pulled up the hood of his parka. As a child of the tropics he was not looking forward to the near arctic environment they were heading to.
Moments later the team was enveloped in the transporter shimmer.
The team rematerialized in near darkness, only a dim red glow from the emergency lights in ceiling and a few back-lit control panels illuminated the space around them. Instantly the temperature dropped rapidly and their visors misted up with condensation, that quickly froze into ice.
HaiRoa reached up and wiped his clean with a gloved finger. Somebody else moved a step forward and lifted up nearly a foot in the air under the low gravity before coming back down. The movement triggered a sensor somewhere and the main lights flickered to life.
HaiRoa blinked and looked around. They were stood in a small compartment, the walls lined with control panels. The exhaled air from their masks hung in clouds around their heads; he shivered despite the cold weather gear.
He had looked over the Outpost deck layout before leaving. A twelve-sided sphere shape, it had nine decks. The top and bottom decks being the smallest. They were on One, the Control Deck at the top; besides the control room there were several store rooms for small components and a rest area, tables, chairs, a head and so on, but no bunks or replicators. They'd be eating rations and sleeping on the floor.
Deck Nine at the bottom housed the reactor, gravity and environmental systems. Deck Two below them housed the machine shops, engineering bays and most importantly the electroplating tank. The rest of the decks were given over to storage and divided into a series of cargo bays. There was one central lift tube in the center, with two turbo lifts. Otherwise inter-deck access was via several stairwells and ladders. There was one large docking port on Deck Five, the central and largest deck.
It was facility designed and used in wartime— utilitarian, spartan and functional.
Calliope got hold of a wall grip and found her way back to the deck, then waited for her stomach to resettle from her throat. "Okay," she said. "Everybody's comm link good?" With the masks on, she was relying on the earpieces for clear audio. "Sound off."
"Rowle. I hear you clearly, Ensign."
"Malmrose. Signal is good."
HaiRoa clicked his chin mike twice and held up a thumb "All good"
"Great. Watch your step." She cleared her throat from embarrassment over her own misstep, but she knew that a little self deprecating humor could often glaze over the ills of clumsiness. "From a little empirical testing of my own, I've confirmed the decking does indeed have partial gravity... HaiRoa and Malmrose, you can proceed below and begin the reactor restart. Rowle, you're with me. We'll head over to the control station and manage the grid restart."
"Understood" HaiRoa replied, he tapped Malmrose on the shoulder and pointed to the old fashioned mechanical control room door, they bounced lightly over to it, swung back the locking levers and HaiRoa spun the central wheel to open it. "Should be a down ladder out here," he said, visualizing the deck plan.
Sure enough twenty feet down the red-lit corridor there was an alcove in the wall and a hatch in the floor. Hauling it open revealed a wall-mounted series of steps and rungs. He clambered into the hatch, the low gravity making the movement easy and he managed to descend quickly using only his hands on the rungs. Malmrose followed after him.
Fourteen feet below was another hatch and they repeated the procedure. "Seven more to go," HaiRoa counted off. "Leave the hatches open for now, we'll close them all up before we leave."
Back above, it was a short enough jaunt from the beam in point to the Control room. But Calliope couldn't help taking it very slowly, at first moving along the bulkhead walls and gripping each structural strut in series. Their own elongated shadows were cast in multiple directions in the cold dark corridors set her nerves on edge and she kept feeling as if someone was in her periphery, just outside of the view her hood was blocking. After a bit, she tried to work with the light gravity and get a good sense of stride. Just when Calliope had gotten the hang of it there was a loud 'thunk' behind her. Mid air, Calliope whipped around to face the noise. In that instant her hand went to her hip in search of a phaser she wasn't carrying- they weren't outfitted for a confrontation after all. Her shoulder slammed hard into a side wall as she lost her sense of balance.
"Sorry," Rowle said, "I just..." He reshouldered his hardshelled kit. "Bumped it on the bulkhead there."
"Never mind." She rubbed the shoulder and decided it wasn't bad. The thick coat had served as a decent cushion. "We're close now." Around the next bend were the main doors to the control room. Rowle moved to the panel and manually set the door mechanism, then pulled a lever. The doors split part way and then ran out of steam. Rowle tried again but there was no more spark in the mechanism.
"Get a battery." Calliope told him. They had more than enough stored charge in their kits for something like a door. As Rowle set down his kit to get the battery linked, Calliope switched a small torchlight on and put her visor to the gap in the door, shining the light around the inside. It wasn't much to write home about. The control room had three center workstations around very primitive display units. Some of the gear looked repurposed from decommissioned ships, probably old by the time it was installed. "Oh man. have we got some collectors items up here..." She commented into the team comm.
Meanwhile below, six more hatches and ladders brought the pair to Deck Nine, the last ladder let them down to the service equipment level. Reactor, life support, gravity generators, lighting, heating, and all the other systems and equipment that made the station habitable for work, if not long term occupation.
Turning around HaiRoa scanned several doors that let off the corridor they were standing in. "I'm thinking it's the one marked 'Reactor Room'," he joked through his mask.
"Worth a try," Malmrose agreed and they moved over to that one.
Opening the door they found a round compartment housing the station's sole power source, a Mark Eleven Fusion Reactor, which occupied the center of the compartment. It was not much to look at, a medium gray cylinder, some eight feet in diameter, about the same high, it poked up through a surrounding circle of grating, and ended in a domed top. Several conduits exited the dome and entered the ceiling.
A control panel protruded from one side the of the cylinder. A central screen glowed in soft amber "Standby Mode".
All other indicators and readouts were green. HaiRoa activated his mask mic. "We're in the reactor room Ensign Zahn, confirm reactor is in standby, all other readout are in the green. Looks good for a restart"
On Deck one, the control room doors hissed open and Calliope let Rowle collect his kit before proceeding together. They tested out a few of the display screens before finding one in low power mode. Calliope took the seat and found she couldn't call up an LCARS menu. But Lt. Franks had briefed her on this. Feeling well prepared and ready to show off, she unzipped her jacket pocket and took out the coded data rod the Lieutenant had given her. But when she tried to find a proper data rod slot, it was a different connector gauge. She tried a few times but the rod shape and thickness just was a mismatch to the port. "Oh, for the love of... Hang on, Chief." She motioned to Rowle to haul his kit over. "I need an adapter for type J to isolinear 9x."
"Type J? That was phased out back during the Howlan Administration." Rowle chuckled in his broken, bark-like laugh.
"I dunno when Howlan was running Antica, but probably back when your great granddad was in his prime is my guess. This stuff is ancient."
It took Rowle a series of five adapters to rig something that could link with the older unit and he laid it out in a string along the top of the console before giving a little flourish of a hand in presentation.
"Well, it's not pretty but..." Calliope plugged in the data rod and the screen switched modes to the familiar LCARS display. She cracked her knuckles. "...it gets the job done." She switched back to general comms mode. "HaiRoa, we've got systems read out. Seeing standby mode and grid updates. Go to restart."
"Copy." He tapped the panel, a small screen blinked to life and he initiated the automated start up sequence. The panel ran a quick diagnostic, gave a short countdown and moments later the entire reactor panel glowed and various readouts began blinking and flashing. The main display changed to read "Restart Initiated" in yellow. There was a pause and then a soft electronic hum filled the air. Moments later the readouts steadied out and the display changed to read "Reactor Operational" in green.
"Alight, let's get some heat, air and weight back on." HaiRoa nodded. "You check life support and I'll work on the gravity," he said to Malmrose.
The pair returned to the corridor, separated and entered two other compartments.
Five minutes later HaiRoa heard Malmrose call out, "Life support and heating is ready for full operations," over the comm.
HaiRoa followed it on with, "Same with the gravity generator, good for standard Gee."
As they reported systems go, Calliope was busy with balancing the grid. Without advanced computer help, it was kind of a tedious job setting the flow limits. She rubbed some of the condensation from her visor with her sleeve. Finally, she double checked stable signal returns and then rerouted power to the desired systems.
"Well, the heater is back on, but I wouldn't take your coats off yet. And I'm turning the gravity plating back up to standard. Things are about to get heavy," Calliope warned and then gave it a ten second count. She set a soft transition ramp to avoid any incidents in adjusting.
HaiRoa felt himself sink down on his feet as his weight came back, even after just a short time at the lower setting it felt strangely hard to raise his feet and walk for a moment or two. There was a soft whirr and a waft of warm air came out of a duct above the door as he made his way back to the corridor.
Malmrose met him there and they found their way to the center of the deck and lift shaft. They rode one of the two open cargo elevators back up to control deck. HaiRoa pulled his mask aside, the air was still cold, but it was starting to smell and taste fresher by the time they arrived. Finding Zahn he checked the time. "Twenty three minutes, Ensign. We better get them to beam the scrubbers over so they can depart."
"Roger that..." She nodded along as she was waiting for the last diagnostic readout for a comms system test cycle. As it came back to life she leaned into the physical switch on the panel to open a channel. =^=This is Deep Space Storage Outpost Seven Seventeen calling USS Scorpio, do you read?=^=
=^=Loud and clear Ensign Zahn.=^= The comm crackled to life with the voice of Lt Franks and Calliope cringed at the feedback, diving to adjust the manual output array on the literal soundboard before the comms could build up to a squeal. =^=What is your status?=^=
=^=Reactor restart is- oh.=^= Calliope paused before she remembered she had to be leaning on the push-to-talk switch. =^=Reactor restart successful, Power grid holding, Life support systems operational and online.=^=
=^=Very good. We'll see you and your team again in approximately four days, fourteen hours. Congratulations on your very first command, Ensign Zahn. Scorpio out. =^=
"My first command—" sitting back, Calliope pulled off her face mask and slipped the visor open, letting the air bite her in the face. "—and no one bought me a cake."
